The Marchesi Code

On Friday I met a living legend Gualtiero Marchesi. He is the founder of the ALMA school of cooking and an Italian culinary giant. He has opened several restaurants, written several books, including The Marchesi Code which is pretty much the bible of Italian cooking, and is a Michelin starred chef. Mention his name to anyone in the culinary world and they will know who he is. The teachers at ALMA and at the ICA in New York pretty much worship this guy. He is now 82 and no longer cooks but some of his recipes were created before their time using techniques that are only now catching on with the rest of the culinary world.
Pretty much he's a genius and a culinary rock star and meeting him was like meeting a superstar. We were all ecstatic. What's even better is that Francesca (our den mother) negotiated for him to come teach a class with us on March 1st. I can't wait!

This weekend Peter, Chelsea, Pasquale and I went to Verona for a night. The city was gorgeous, everything was built in classic Italian renaissance style. Since this was the city that the story of Romeo and Juliette took place there was plenty of romance in the air. We saw the balcony that was supposed to be Juliettes. The coolest part was that on the walls leading up to the courtyard where the balcony was located people from all over the world had written declarations of love in graffiti. The walls were abolutely covered and although is was technically defacing the monument it was beautiful to see how many people in love had come there to honor the classic love story of Romeo and Juliet.
But for now I must get some rest because we leave our apartments tomorrow at 6am for a two day field trip to Tuscany and an overnight in Sienna.