Tag: Mara L.

One thing I like about remote places in Italy (I am far south right now, in a small place near Napoli), is a certain presence of the 1950ies. Some ‘bars’, as the standard Italian café is called, are pretty much unchanged. No pedantic ‘authenticity’, no. There’s no intention to ‘be retro’, to imitate a certain style of the past. Rather, there is a cool mix of 1950ies furniture that was, at the time, picked with the intuitive sense of style that so many Italians seem to be born with. The 1950ies, in these bars, look like a colorful plastic version of classic modern design. And thus, everything is justly kept in place: it really still looks great! And in a way, much more fun than the brainy, real version of modernity. (I particularly like plastic items in pistachio green, and here, in the south, the kind of blue that looks like the sea.)

In one of these bars, I encountered the kind of torta di fragole that, in New York, I wouldn’t touch. In New York, I would be annoyed. Who wants to eat Italian food from the 1950ies, I would think. No one! With all the cream, the meatballs, the general heaviness. But here, in my little bar in the south, I found it in me to enjoy a frightfully old-fashioned 1950ies cake. The kind of strawberry cake that our aunts would make in the 1950ies, with a huge amount of cream.

And now I worry. Am I being too harsh on Italian cuisine in Manhattan? I had better admit it. I am dying to be back.

Coming up: Gnocchi Di Patate

Readers of my entries to Jens’ blog have perhaps noted that I am overly favorable to the attractions of Alpine Cuisine. By that I mean, the wonderful cooking to be found anywhere between the Trentino and the Dolomites, Austria, the south of Bavaria, and Switzerland. (What about the French Alps? From a culinary point of view, they should be part of the list. But the French close down their hotels in the mountains for all of May and June, a fact which I find unforgivable. If you’ve been to one of their mountain places in early summer, and have seen the complete desertion, if not to say desolation of the mountains ruined by too many ski-lifts, you will know that these places are machines that generate tourist-money in the winter. That spoils it for me, sorry!)

In any case, many of my Italian friends think that Monaco di Baviera is a part of Italy. Since many of my Italian friends are, like me, not real Italians, coming from the very north – that is, the Alps, where people speak German-Austrian-Italian – they like some things (but not others) about Germany. One thing they tend to like is Munich.

Monaco di Bavieria, as we call it in Italy, would like to have something in common with its illustrious namesake at the French Côte. It doesn’t entirely succeed – there’s more homeliness than glamour. What strikes me most is the fact that young women constantly eat on the subway, preferably “Leberkässemmeln”. A “semmel” is a roll. “Leberkäs” is a meat-product that Bavaria proudly advertises as one of its specialities, to be eaten with Bavarian mustard. Let me just say that I would never consider eating a Leberkässemmel, and that I do not recommend it to anyone with the tiniest bit of concern for health, calories, and the like. Thomas Mann nicely characterized Munich women as a little too strong, and things haven’t changed since then.

However, there’s one bit of glamour that is worth mentioning. This is the phenomenon called Schumann. Schumann is an actual person, a tall guy with a tan, a super-elegant suit, and a bicycle (very Munich!). He is a local celebrity of the most amusing kind. First, he has a night club, Schumann’s Bar. Second, he has a lunch restaurant and café, called Schumann’s Tagesbar. Third, he is the author of several books on drinks. Fourth, he became, at a rather advanced age, a fashion model. In essence, and perhaps that is really all I should be saying, he is very beautiful. And if you walk down 5th Avenue, you may well see him looking down at you from a billboard (he certainly looks like he steers away from Leberkässemmeln.)

But since I am more interested in food than in anything, let me turn to the reason of why I am mentioning all of this: Schumann’s Tagesbar has one of the very best Italian chefs ever. Part of the arrogant charme of Schumann is that there is no listino di prezzi, no menu. Tourists thus stay out of his places. One needs to ask what there is for lunch, and there are always just a few choices, but everything is delicious. In fact, lunch is very affordable, but I am going to take this back, since the aura of luxury keeps away the crowds, and that of course is entirely necessary for this aura to persist. But to my dear readership, a circle of the select, I am happy to recommend a plate of cannelloni, or vitello tonnato, at Schumann’s Tagesbar.

Coming up: Retro Food

Here’s the next bit of news from the food front for Jens’ blog – that is, my culinary summer in Europe. Today, I feel inclined to share my likes and dislikes regarding Austrian classics.

There are by now a few Austrian chefs in Manhattan, and some cafés, for example the Café Sabarsky in the Neue Galerie. Not for me, I am sorry to say. Too posh, as the Brits would say, and that’s unbearable if a place, in the end, is not genuine. Austrian cuisine, in Manhattan, is in one sense quite true to the realities of Austria: it has delusions of grandeur. The air of bygone times, and the unrealistic dream that, at the time, one would not have been the maid slaving away in a hot kitchen, but the lady who is served her delightful dinner on a shady terrace. I do like the story that Kaiser Franz Josef had a fresh “Guglhupf” (a very fragrant version of pound cake, with a characteristic round form) made for him every day. The lightness of it would evaporate a couple of hours later, and then the leftovers went to the servants.

I had words of caution about traps set up for tourists in my earlier entries, and one might think that the Café Sacher in Vienna, and its little sister in Salzburg, should be first rank instances of this. Untrue! If you get anywhere close on your travels, absolutely go there and buy huge supplies. They are used to catering to an international clientele, and have the nicest little wooden boxes ever, perfect for world-wide shipping. The cakes (I recommend the classic, Sachertorte, but if you want a cake that will survive many weeks and still be fresh, take Linzer Torte) are amazingly well packaged, and arrive in perfect condition at every possible destination. If you want to impress your New York friends with an amazing dessert, buy a box with six individual mini Sacher tartes, about the most luxurious and sinfully rich chocolaty treat you can think of.

But you may also want a Wiener Schnitzel. For those who don’t know the word (one of the few Austrian words that should be integrated into your international vocabulary), that’s a kind of scaloppine – veal, very thin, very large, and breaded in a mix that is the best-kept secret of every Viennese chef. This dish is extremely popular and often well-prepared in Italy, where I had it the first couple of times. (Recall: the Veneto, Venice, Trieste, and so on, are, from the point of view of past delusions, part of Austria. Tempi passati, but still, that region of Italy is excellent cake country. Especially versions of Linzer Torte, a thin nutty tarte with rasperry jam, are the everyday dessert at many trattorie in the Veneto. ) Anyway, I am right now, of all places, in Berlin. And I wanted to note that Berlin-Austrian cooking nicely steers away from the pretensions of Manhattan-Austrian cooking. Thus, I’d like to send everyone to Lutter and Wegner, an Austrian restaurant at the Gendarmenmarkt (and less posh than the next door Borchert). Here, Wiener Schnitzel is served with the classics potato-cucumber salad, half-warm (the right temperature is part of the secret of it all), and it is sufficiently light for every Manhattanite to enjoy without remorse!

Coming Up: Monaco Di Baviera