We're all yellow*

31st January 2021

And so we come to the end of the first month of 2021, which is going out not so much like a lamb as like a damp squib. That’s ok with us, though, for whilst for the second week in a row I have very little of import to relate, in a world where no news can definitely be good news, it means we have continued safe and well.

Keeping safe and well was definitely on Vanna’s mind when we had our Skype lesson on Monday lunchtime. She was due to head off later that afternoon for a business trip to Sweden, staying overnight in Bologna before flying via Amsterdam the next day. However, when I asked if she was all ready for the trip I can’t say I was surprised when she said that it was postponed to a later date. The airline had implemented increased testing requirements in order to use their flights, which made it a logistical nightmare to have the necessary certified documents. If anything, it further vindicates our outlook on the whole situation: why go anywhere when you can stop at home and eat biscuits?

Tuesday was, by the general scheme of things, a red letter day as we finally got our Tupperware boxes, which have already been put into good service in the freezer, and the sun returned. This latter was a good thing as it meant clear, dry weather and also sub-zero temperatures overnight. That might not at first seem like a positive, but the knock-on effect was that for our morning walk on Wednesday the muddy area in the lane marking the water table that has become increasingly squelchy over the past couple of months was more like semifreddo than zuppa inglese.

For those of you unfamiliar with these two Italian deserts, let me explain.

Anyone who has been to an Italian “restaurant” in the UK might think that semifreddo is just another name for ice cream, but in reality it is slightly different. It’s more like a cross between a mousse and a custard which is frozen but allowed to come around a little before being eaten. As for zuppa inglese, this translates, you won’t be surprised to learn, as English soup and is what Italians think of as equivalent to trifle but in most of the places where I have had the misfortune to be served it, it is really a gloopy aberration of the real thing. Though not always, sometimes what arrives is more akin to cake than soup, which shows that the dish is very much a moveable feast – or should that be a removable one?

Wednesday was also the day that Harry went AWOL in the evening, causing Stephen not a little uneasiness in the process. I was oblivious to Stephen’s puzzled searching as I was downstairs in the office for a lesson while he tried to figure out where Harry could have got to. He checked all the terrazzo and all the rooms, as unsurprisingly Harry likes to sneak onto our bed if he can and make a cosy nest of the pillows. On this occasion he hadn’t, but what he had done, as betrayed by a sausage-shaped mound in the duvet when Stephen checked the bedroom again and this time turned on a light, was manage to get himself under the covers where he lay inscrutably Sphinx-like. He must have thought that lying with paws stretched out rather than curled up in a ball offered a better chance of going undetected, and he was almost right.

And that is about as exciting as it got. Thursday was as average a day as you can get, though Friday offered some novelty as we had to queue up outside the Post Office for our turn so Stephen could pop in and pay the yearly charge on our fire extinguishers to the gas company and I took the opportunity to pop into Pina and buy a magazine (I won’t tell you which one as you would be too shocked at my low brow tastes, but it was one that does not demand a very high reading age, if, in fact, one at all). While Stephen had his hair cut I did the shopping where Pia treated us to an impromptu singing of “Torniamo giallo” (we’re returning to yellow) before sorting me out a very nice piece of beef for Stephen to turn into ragù.

This is a belated innovation on our part, being the first time I am ashamed to say that we have made our own meat sauce a casa. Even more embarrassing is that we used a recipe from a British cookbook to make it, where it is claimed to be authentic. I’m not totally convinced about that but it is certainly a lot closer to an Italian entity than the anglicised – and non-existent for that matter – Bolognese sauce so beloved in the UK. Anyway, our ragù turned our very fine after its three hours of slow cooking and has been portioned up and frozen for a later date. Hopefully, though, while we seem at the moment to have a well-stocked freezer, we won’t find ourselves in a siege situation for, as Pina reminded us and as the media has been reminding us all day, tomorrow, torniamo giallo!

*well, almost.