In a famous aphorism, Emily Dickinson, stated: “my friends are my estate”. I cannot agree
more: friends make you prosperous
because their way of being naturally enriches your perspective on the world,
yet this prosperity is not tangible, you cannot trade it or stock it. Secondly,
in their companionship, one feels able to express as liberally as possible:
such a lack of restrictions in the unconscious exchange of our best part makes
everything special.
|
Not In Vain by Emily Dickinson
If I can stop one heart from breaking,
I shall not live in vain:
If I can ease one life the aching,
Or cool one pain,
Or help one fainting robin
Unto his nest again,
I shall not live in vain.
One of my favorite poems.
|
The fact that this reciprocity doesn’t have
any goal - save friendship itself - makes a relationship free from contractual
bonds: one is friend to another not because of a reason related to the place
(such as the class or the office), or because you are performing a service (as
for the bartender and the client), or due to an earning that will be gained in
the end. A friend is like an elephant
bearing a tower, but it is a pretty inexplicable mythological apparition:
from there you can see further beyond the horizon.
 |
| Via San Vitale, Bologna, Italy. |
Their reproaches, even if sharp and hard to
be accepted, are meant to help and never to demolish, they are constructive.
Those who slip into the limbo ex-friends have normally developed a nasty form
of envy, commuting altruism and sympathy into malice and contempt: friendship
knows no form of evil competition and never turns into weapons those keys of our soul we entrusted to
somebody:
 |
When she
got to the door, she found she had forgotten the little golden key, and when
she went back for it, she found she could not possibly reach it.
- From Alice Adventures in Wonderland by Lewis Carrol -
|
True friends, instead, are a refreshing
source of good humour, support, laughs, and delightful time, in one word a
pleasure without interest. Friendship,
as a feeling, is a form of affection that does not reach, of course, the passion of love. Love is a sublimated desire, drive. In Latin, the word amor
shares the same family etymology of the Ancient Greek mào, nonetheless I prefer the fake etymology of a-mors, i.e. something that makes death
vanish. I cannot cope with my romantic side, my apologies:
When I think of friendship I am still attached to the first image of the boat: it
is that sentiment of “I like you and I care for you”. I must say that as an
Italian, the expression “I love you” used for a friend sounds too emphatic. We
make a great deal of distinction between “ti voglio bene” and “ti amo”. There
is an abyss between them.
|
 |
| The satori state in the buddhist conception of enlightenment |
William Shakespeare found (obviously) a
very powerful expression in his 116 Sonnet to describe love: “it is an ever-fixed mark / that looks on tempests and is never shaken”. I won’t contest, but I feel
the need to add that the idea that we are the caretakesrs of the ever-fixed
mark - this lighthose on the perilious sea-rocks of love-life.
The idea of Nirvana made stem another
connection in my mind (the last I promise). Rachel Weisz, in Darren Aronofsky’s
The fountain (2006), plays Isabel of
Spain and in her gorgeousness I figuratively fond that sense of commitment,
attractiveness, inexplicable drive, which should internally push each person to
tend to the one’s own subjective best, the most delicate authenticity.
 |
| Rachel Weisz performing Queen Isabel of Spain in The Fountain directed by Darren Aronofsky. Recently she also took some pictures with her second husband Daniel Craig, former 007, at the Skyfall premiere: |
All these entwined causes, brought me to think which was the best way to host a coming-back party at home: the ambition was that of witnessing the bonds of friendship and reproducing its nature throughout food. Something then was needed that should have reproduced the array of different personality gathering together. The perfect meal would have been the brunch, so various and flexible, but noon was a busy time of the day for everyone. What to do? Giving it up what not a choice! A tea party was too weak! What about a brunch after tea? I duplicated the idea of the brunch and its lavish comfort food, but I bent it to the exigencies of a dinnertime, and this is the visible result of it. Every dish is shaped on some features of my friends' personality:
1. Claudine’s tarts: Claudine is the personification of Elegance. My idea is that she was one of those elegant one-trait-silhouettes of the early XX century that came to life, with her dowry of raven hair. Her interpretation and reception of this concept allows her to be always perfect in and for every occasion. Her style is a mirror of her interpretation of the world: formally exquisite, substantially impeccable. You simply cannot add or subtract anything from her without damaging the whole harmony:
 |
| Home kneaded bread with Provola, Taggiasche olive, Sun-dried tomatoes and sometimes Prosciutto crudo di Norcia. A perfect finger food. |
2. Martha’s filled courgettes: Martha is mirrored by this dish. She's apparently coriaceous and crusty in the outside, but the reality is that she is very tender and romantic in the inside. Her appearance is striking and it is all there, without deceptions: she never hides something, because she is incapable of lying. Sometimes you feel in need of a pair of pinches to relate with her, because she is as a burning coal, yet this threat becomes a virtue because it works as a sort of earth-like energy which warms the spirit and the atmosphere, as a good fireplace. Her beauty and wit march at the same pace.
 |
| Grilled courgettes filled with Robiola cheese (creamy and thick, but still spreadable), black pepper, and freshly trimmed chives. |
3. Hannah’s aubergines and mozzarella: Hannah is a living monument of aristocracy. In Ancient Greek oi àristoi were the best people. Although she'll deny it, she aims always for the best, she is a perfectionist of good manner, so she will be the perfect example for the Order of the Garter motto "honi soit qui mal y pense" (translation: shame upon who thinks evil of it). This attention to how to perform things rightly and righteously often slows down her approach to life, but she is working on that and with a great deal of success. And above all or after all she is a virtuoso of the use of languages, and she creates delightful puns in many idioms.
 |
| Grilled mille feuilles of aubergines, mozzarella, basil leaves and tomato: as in bon-ton etiquette there are different layers and grades of adequateness. Grill the aubergine, make a sort of pesto with basil and oil and spread it onto the aubergine, lay on top the mozzarella and the tomato, finally sprinkle with black pepper |
4. Lora's chocolate plum-cake: Lora is an extremely dynamic woman. She is just a few years older than me, but this discrepancy brings along a wide range of jokes related to adulthood and aging. The one I prefer to mock her with is that she is supposed to have in her photo-album a polaroid of the clay that would have become Adam. Loughs, applause! She is also very stylish in her taste for clothes, and she ALWAYS swings between black and purple, a sort of chromatic chastity. To correspond this coloristic attitude I choose a chocolate plum-cake. Beautiful texture due to a diced apple, dark as the night for the coca powder, scented of cinnamon and crowned of a jewel of pistachios [I was hoping Michelle would have make it and she adores pistachios]:
5. Claire's final dish-composition: Claire is an eclectic character: journalist, PR, student, brilliant conversator. Her hair are short as in the roaring '20ies, her eyes as blue as the skies over the Alps one instant before sunrise, her attitude toward life is that of a lioness. She is picking up from the world all the most brilliant flowers, those that allow her soul to blossom in replay. She is so cultivated that when she steps inside a museum, the museum pays the ticket.
 |
Chocolate plum-cake recipe:
[in brakets you can find the procedure steps] |
 |
| The composition was very personal: there was the aubergine mille feuilles, a little bun called Parmigianino (because the main ingredient is Parmigiano), a courgette roll, some hand-fried crisps, a stuffed mushroom and a slice of Felino salami (check on Waitrose) http://www.waitrose.com/shop/ProductView-10317-10001-83981-Waitrose+Felino+salami |
The purple napkin comes from IKEA.
No comments:
Post a Comment