Chapter 23 #2
Luca goes to Nonna Lucia and I hear her say, ‘I’ll tell you some of the secret but not all of it!
’ Pietro stands next to him. Aimee and Caterina’s daughter join Nonna Teresa, and I go to Nonna Rosa, although I’m not sure I’ll be much help.
Alessandro, Enrico, Caterina and the mayor wait nervously in the archway into the dining area, watching.
‘Let’s cook!’ says Giovanni, clapping his hands together.
The big kitchen turns into a hive of activity, with the three nonna s overseeing their own cooking, as well as each other’s.
‘No, no, not like that!’ Nonna Rosa calls to Nonna Teresa.
‘Madam, pay attention to your own cooking. I’ve been making this lasagne for years!’
‘Trying to copy mine …’
‘It is my recipe! It may look similar but I can assure you that it tastes very different! I had to make it up myself, remember? Until I found another woman prepared to share her recipe.’
‘It’s not authentic. This is the real lasagne. Our mother’s mother’s mother passed it down the family. Not like an outsider’s.’ She sniffs at Nonna Teresa’s and then at Nonna Lucia’s.
‘This is authentic! My mother-in-law learnt it from her maternal grandmother.’
‘But it’s not traditional Tuscan lasagne, is it? Not like mine!’
The argument erupts, like volleys in a table-tennis match, the insults slung back and forth.
But somehow in the chaos, sauces are made, pasta is rolled, flour flies into the air, béchamel thickens and the lasagnes are layered into dishes, like bambini being tucked snugly into bed.
And as the dishes are slid into the oven, with some jostling over who has which shelf, resolved by pulling straws, the tension in the usually cool kitchen is almost palpable.
I organize myself and the children into helping the nonna s with the clean-up. Work surfaces are scrubbed, and even that seems like a competition for the cleanest space.
‘If that’s a reflection of her cleanliness at home, I wouldn’t eat there …’ says Nonna Teresa to Nonna Rosa.
‘I can see my face in the shine on this worktop!’ barks Nonna Lucia.
‘Don’t scare the young ones,’ says Nonna Rosa. ‘They won’t sleep tonight.’
When the work surfaces are done, and glasses of water have been passed around, the kitchen fills with the most delicious aromas. The bread is put into baskets and bowls of salad placed on the table. The room fills with chatter and expectation.
Slowly the oven’s door is opened.
‘Don’t open it! The hot air will escape!’
‘There’s so much hot air coming from you that that won’t be a problem!’
‘Madam, do not touch my lasagne! It has to be cooked in the very centre of the oven.’
‘I haven’t moved it.’
‘I saw you touch it when you reached in to check yours.’
‘I didn’t go near it, you silly woman.’
‘I am not a silly woman! How dare you?’
‘You’re just scared you won’t win.’
‘We’ll see about that!’
The dining room starts to fill with locals. Pietro has gone to get Francesco. And Alfonso arrives with his wife, in a wheelchair: she is clearly delighted to be out and about and in company.
I hand round glasses of wine from one of the jugs on the table and offer small plates of antipasti : marinated olives and little cubes of carrot from jars in the store cupboard, squares of goat’s cheese from Giuseppe, and Caterina’s home-grown small, sweet tomatoes that burst with flavour when you bite into them.
The excitement is building. Everyone is keeping an eye on the kitchen door and an ear to the exchanges taking place in there: will things bubble up and boil over between the three women, just like the rising temperature?
Finally, the three big lasagne dishes are taken ceremoniously from the oven, with a flourish, and carried into the dining room.
A hush settles among the room’s occupants.
Each lasagne is golden brown, bubbling with molten sauce.
One is topped with breadcrumbs, another a sprinkling of cheese, and all undulate, like the rolling hills around us.
Everyone in the dining room stands and stares, gripping their glasses and the antipasti plates, stopping in mid-conversation.
It’s as if they’re in the presence of great works of art and their creators.
No one speaks and I’m hoping this will put an end to the years of arguing, each appreciating the others’ hard work.
Until Nonna Rosa lifts her head and declares, ‘Anyone can see mine is the better lasagne.’ She points at it on the table.
‘Clearly not!’ says Nonna Lucia.
‘And yours looks nothing like a traditional Tuscan lasagne,’ says Nonna Teresa.
‘That’s because the recipe is from my family’s home! Remember? I left to be with your brother, who brought me here so he would have a decent meal every evening,’ Nonna Lucia bites back.
‘Madam! May I remind you that I won the competition all those years ago and I will win again today,’ Nonna Rosa snarls.
As one, they turn to the mayor, who looks terrified and I don’t blame him. This was a dreadful idea. What were we thinking? I glance at Giovanni, whose face tells me this may not be turning out as we’d hoped.
‘I think, really, you’re all winners today,’ the mayor says nervously. He is visibly shaking.
‘But what about the taste test?’ demands Nonna Teresa, determined to have her revenge.
‘Really, you’re all winners,’ the mayor repeats.
‘How can you choose without tasting?’ Nonna Rosa frowns at him.
‘You mean you cannot decide?’ says Nonna Lucia, folding her arms across her chest.
‘Or are you not man enough?’ Nonna Teresa purses her lips.
‘We were promised one winner.’ Nonna Rosa slaps the table, making the mayor jump.
‘For a summer festival!’ Nonna Lucia unwittingly sides with Nonna Rosa, and Nonna Teresa joins in, narrowing her eyes at the mayor.
‘Perhaps we have been lured here under false pretences!’
Nonna Rosa turns on Giovanni. ‘I think the world of you, but what is this sham of a competition?’
‘Shame on you!’ Nonna Teresa says indignantly.
‘Yes, shame on you,’ Nonna Lucia joins in.
One by one, the women huff and strip off their aprons, stuff them into their baskets, collect up their favourite utensils, including Nonna Teresa’s pasta machine, and strut towards the door.
‘No, wait! Please.’ I try to stop them. ‘Really, we want you all to be winners, to be a part of this. Let me explain.’
‘Help yourselves,’ says Nonna Lucia to the waiting crowd, gesturing at the bubbling lasagnes.
‘Lucia, won’t you eat with us?’ I plead.
She looks in the direction of the other nonna s, leaving through the gate.
‘I’d better go,’ she says, then smiles and makes for the door, clearly not going to break ranks against the new common enemy, the mayor.
He is evidently shaken and is being given more wine, as he dabs his forehead with a napkin.
‘Wait!’ I catch up with her just as she’s leaving through the gate.
‘Lucia, we need you. All three of you,’ I blurt out. ‘It’s Alfonso. He’s closing the shop. Giovanni can’t keep La Tavola going without it and we’re trying to find a way to save it. We might be able to, if we can run cookery weekends for tourists to learn how to make Tuscan recipes in the kitchen.’
‘Why would they come here to cook in this kitchen?’ She frowns.
‘Because this is about team-building, working together to create good food. It’s an experience.’
Slowly her expression softens as she thinks about it. ‘It’s a wonderful idea,’ she says. ‘I know that at one time my sister, my sister-in-law and I would have loved to be a part of it. Probably still would.’
Thank goodness. ‘Then you think it might work?’
She places a hand on my forearm. ‘If we can’t find a way to overcome our own differences, we are hardly going to be of any use to you in a team-building weekend. I’m sorry,’ she says. ‘I wish it were different.’ She looks back at La Tavola. ‘I shall be very sad to see it go.’
The last breath of wind has just left my sails. All the fight goes out of me.