David

Before he was a food and travel writer, David Lyon was a commercial fisherman, a line cook, a poet, and a sometimes teacher of writing and cooking.

Cucina Italiana moderna

Posted on by David
[caption id="attachment_268" align="alignleft" width="300" caption="Anna Maria cooks rombo in her Venice kitchen."][/caption] Anna Maria Andreola's kitchen at Le Mansarde B&B in Venice was not what we expected, especially in a lovingly maintained but traditional old stone palazzo that wore its two centuries proudly. The aroma of fresh bread greeted us at the door. She had dumped all the ingredients into a high tech bread machine that morning and set the timer so bread would be ready for dinner. Right next to the breadmaker stood her universal kitchen machine that weighs, processes and slow-cooks food. (It also serves as a mixer and a blender.) The counter also held a juicer and an electric ice cream freezer. Silly us. We'd been expecting a big stove and nothing...Read More

Cooking in Venice changed our lives

Posted on by David
[caption id="attachment_172" align="alignleft" width="300" caption="Crossing the Grand Canal on a traghetto"][/caption] Venice changed our lives. Really. More exactly, it changed the way we eat. After a week of cruising the Venetian lagoon on a rental houseboat, we spent several days in the city, staying with Anna Maria Andreola at the B&B in her family's 18th century Cannaregio palazzo. (It's called Le Mansarde, but has no web site. Contact Anna Maria Andreola at 011-39-041-718-826 or [mobile] 011-39-338-868-8935. Her email is cazzar.ola@libero.it.) One day she took us shopping and showed us how to make a Venetian meal. From the B&B on Rio Tera San Leonardo, we headed straight to the Grand Canal and boarded a "traghetto," a bare-bones gondola that crisscrosses the canal and saves walking long...Read More