Italian Cookery Course - Day Eight, Saturday 17th May 2014

Our last day. Normally a day of packing and waiting to go. No. We all had to report for bread making at 9.30am. Not going to report who woke up at 9.23am – but was still ready on time! We were back in the room where it all started last week. We all had boards and bowls of flour – just needed to have the master class with Mateo first. We were making the seven cereal bread that we have had every morning for breakfast. It needs proving twice, so we started with this one – we have got a plane to catch after all! Mateo makes it look so easy – he had 3kg of flour, we have just 500g. We use live yeast and a “starter” - purportedly forty years old. When you use a bit, you just put another bit of flour and water in to make up for what you have used. Kept in the fridge in a kilner jar. No green bits on, so not a problem in my eyes. Mix it al up with a squirt of olive oil, mix it together and Bob's your uncle. Easy as that.
Except when your board has a slight tilt and the water goes all over your feet. Not saying who that is either! They all get mixed up, and then they have to sit and prove for thirty or so minutes. Whilst this is happening we go up to the kitchen and make some typical Italian flat bread called Romagnola Piadina. This is flour and lard and baking powder. Nothing else. Same process of mixing in with water, and then leave it to rise for thirty minutes.
Back downstairs to see how the cereal bread is coming along. It knows has to be pushed and pulled in a certain way, and then put in a rattan bowl for the last proving. Either long or round. Back upstairs for the Piadina.
This is now rolled flat, and either cooked on a flat plan plain, or filled with mozzarella and tomato sauce, or spinach, or any other filling you fancy. We fancied tomato sauce and mozzarella so that is what was cooked. And it was delicious. Eaten outside in the beautiful sunshine again. Next to the wood oven that was lit at some unearthly hour by Mateo in readiness for our loaves of bread. He cleared out all the wood, which left the tiles on the side white with heat. A towel on the end of a pitchfork cleared out the debris, and then we all put our own loaves in with a large metal paddle. Leave them there for half an hour or so whilst we finish lunch!

Gianni then came out with deep fried acacia flowers and elder flowers in tempura batter. We had seen them in the kitchen – not for the table displays then. They were actually very pleasant. Not sure what I thought they would taste like, but I think most of the taste came from the oil and the batter rather than the flowers. Marissa then came down with a certificate for everyone and a chef's hat. She said we had all passed. Passed what I wonder? Passed the mark for the most bottles of wines consumed for one group? Or the worst Italian karaoke? Any of the above! Our last hour in the garden before we leave for the airport.  

We then all got our bread out of the oven. It had risen, and smelt beautiful. We all remembered where in the oven we had put our own (some had the forethought to mark it with a special symbol!) so that we could reclaim the right loaf. I am sure someone put another one in the place of mine – it really did look like the runt of the pack. Mateo said he thought that one was his, and gave me one that looked that a little too good to be mine. I wasn't proud, and took it! What a gentleman. If I'm going to carry it all the way back to England I might as well take one worth having.
We all soon packed, and were on our way to Bologna Airport. With our loves of bread. We got there in plenty of time, checked in, and then queued for over an hour to get through security. With our bread. Wondered why they got us here three hours before departure. No-one queried the brown bags full of bread at all. The flight left on time, and Heathrow Terminal 5 was a pleasure to get through. One area where the Brits lead the way.

To sum up this holiday, if you can get past the quirky hotel, the family will give you the warmest Italian welcome you will find in all of Italy. Marissa's vibrancy and the whole family's love for this area is apparent in everything they do. If you love being one of the very few tourists in the village, you will fit in well here.