Palladian Days (37 page)

Authors: Sally Gable

BOOK: Palladian Days

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Supper at Wilma and Paolo's apartment is, as always, a feast for the eyes as well as for the stomach, as the pastor's wife said to Anne in one of my favorite passages from
Anne of Green Gables
. White plates on a pale blue cloth. Yellow chrysanthemums on pale blue paper napkins. Medium-blue glasses to hold our Gavi wine. The first course is so simple the recipe might seem hardly worth jotting down. But several times it has saved me when we have unexpected guests on a Wednesday afternoon and all the stores including the Battistons’ are
chiusi
—closed.

WILMA'S SIMPLE TOMATO SAUCE

1 yellow onion, chopped
Olive oil
4 or 5 fresh tomatoes (or 1 can good plum tomatoes), chopped
Salt and pepper
Pasta
Smoked cheese, such as ricotta
affumicata

Saute the chopped onion in olive oil until soft. Add the chopped fresh tomatoes and simmer for 20 minutes. (If using canned tomatoes, drain them and chop them, then simmer for 10 minutes.) Blend lightly in a food processor. Season with salt and pepper to taste.
Serve on a bed of interesting pasta such as
orecchiette
(little ears) or
farfalle
(butterflies) cooked al dente. Top with the grated smoked cheese.

Last Sunday Francesca introduced me to her fried zucchini blossoms.

FRANCESCA'S DELICATE FRY

8 fresh zucchini blossoms
24 fresh sage leaves
1 egg
1/4 cup beer (preferably flat)
1/4 cup flour
1/2 teaspoon salt
Peanut oil

Rinse the zucchini blossoms. Cut each blossom along one side and spread it out flat on a paper towel to dry. Rinse the sage leaves and dry them on paper towels.
Beat the egg with % cup water, the beer, the flour, and the salt.
Heat oil over medium-high heat. Dip the zucchini blossoms and sage leaves in the batter, then fry in hot—not smoking—peanut oil (about 1/2 inch deep) for two to three minutes, turning once. Dry on paper towels and serve as an antipasto, with crackers and a soft cheese such as Robiolo.

As I draw these favorite recipes from several years of notes, it seems that lam eating at Francesca's or Wilma's every evening. Although I try to reciprocate with equal taste and fantasy, my efforts seldom reach their standards. But I keep trying and, right now,
tocca a me
. It's my turn.

Appendix 2
A Sixty-Second Guide to Venice

All of Venice is a museum! You only need to wander the streets, without going in anywhere, to experience some of the world's great Gothic and Renaissance treasures. And if you choose to step into some church that you are passing—almost any church—you'll stumble upon some painting or sculpture by a famous Renaissance artist. In other words, you don't really need a guidebook to tell you where to go.

Buy a guidebook anyway! (It will tell you where you are when you get there.) And, of course, a street map. (The ones in the guidebooks are helpful, but frequently not detailed enough.) Here are our favorites:

Sheila Hale,
The American Express Pocket Travel Guide-Venice
.
Hugh Honour,
The Companion Guide to Venice
.

SOME KEY SIGHTS

1.
Piazza di San Marco
. There's a good reason why St. Mark's Plaza is the most touristy, crowded place in Venice: It's filled with incredible monuments!

Basilica di San Marco. Is it “a treasure heap … hollowed beneath five great vaulted porches” (Ruskin) or “like a vast and warty bug taking a meditative walk” (Twain)? Be sure to go inside. Don't miss the Pala d'oro-golden altar screen—and the museum up the stairs near the front entrance. Small admissions for each.

Doge's Palace. An architectural masterpiece steeped in the history of Venice, which was an independent and powerful empire for more than a thousand years, ending with the surrender to Napoleon in 1797. Everything is here: council rooms, art treasures, dungeons. Allocate an hour minimum.

Campanile (Bell Tower) and the Loggetta at its base. Wonderful view of Venice from the top of the Campanile, if you have the time.

View (across the basin of the Grand Canal). That's Palladio's spectacular church of San Giorgio Maggiore sitting on the island across the way.

Everything else in sight.

Rialto Bridge
. Hustling, bustling shops, souvenirs, view of the Grand Canal in two directions. Prices here are generally better than at Piazza di San Marco.
Grand Canal
, via vaporetto or gondola. The No. 1 vaporetto (boat bus) gives a slow and majestic (sometimes crowded and hot) ride along the whole length of the Grand Canal, allowing you to view all the palaces from the water, which is their principal facade. (Many vaporetti go two ways; be sure you get the one going in the direction you want!) Or for an infinitely more romantic (and pricey) view of the Grand Canal and other, smaller canals, spring for an hour (i.e., 45-50 minutes in gondolier time) on a gondola one evening near sunset.
Accademia
. Venice's major museum for paintings. The number of visitors allowed inside at one time is restricted; this policy can result in a long waiting line outside during busy times of day.
Church of San Zaccaria
. A somewhat arbitrary selection from the many incredible churches. The facade shows Gothic styling on the ground level (architect: Gambello) shifting to Renaissance motifs on the floors above (architect: Codussi). Inside, look (left aisle) for Giovanni Bellini's masterwork,
Sacred Conversation
. Don't miss the sacristy and crypt (small admission fee).
Church of the Frari
and
School of San Rocco
(beside each other). The Frari is filled with treasures, including Titian's famous
Assumption of the Virgin
over the central altar. San Rocco's walls are covered with all the Tintoretto paintings you could possibly want to see, plus two or three.

Acknowledgments

The story of our years in Piombino Dese should make clear the support and encouragement we have received from all directions. Nonetheless, we feel a need to acknowledge specially a few individuals for the friendship and tireless assistance they have bestowed on us personally and the protection and interest they have extended to Villa Cornaro.

Giacomo and Silvana Miolo and their sons, Leonardo and Riccardo, together with Ilario and Giovannina Mariotto, have been the linchpins of our Italian experience, loving and defending Villa Cornaro as fiercely as we do ourselves.

We are grateful to Monsignor Aldo Roma and to Mayor Luciano Cagnin and his predecessors for responding to every call that we have made for their advice and assistance. We have benefited as well from the care and protection that the office of the Superintendent of Fine Arts in Venice extends to Villa Cornaro and all the other great treasures the Veneto shares with the world.

Others who have been critical to our experience include Richard and Julia Rush for entrusting Villa Cornaro to our care, Douglas Lewis for his extraordinary pioneering research that opened our eyes to the fascinating history of our villa and the Cornaro family, and Lola Butler for her tenacity and good humor in teaching us Italian.

Our children love Villa Cornaro as much as we do, and each assisted in bringing this book about. Ashley inspired our efforts with her own writing career and offered valuable comments on an early draft, Carl assisted us in assembling photos, and Jim consistently encouraged us.

Ogden Robertson, Blaine Wiley, and Jean-Francois Jaussaud have taken beautiful photographs of the villa and generously allowed us to use them here. The enthusiasm and assistance of our editor, Ann Close, and our literary agent, Kitty Benedict, deserve special mention, as does the foresight of Lydia Somerville in bringing us together. Branko Mitrovic graciously reviewed several technical sections of the text for us. We thank them all.

Sally and Carl Gable
May 2005

Photographic Credits

Grateful acknowledgment is made to the following for use of illustrations appearing on the pages indicated:

Jean-Francois Jaussaud, pages 11,133, 228

Wiley-Robertson Photography, pages ii-iii, 77, 78,129, 213, 226

Local Piombino Dese collections, pages 97, 98

All other illustrations are from the authors’ collection.

Copyright
© 2005
by Sarah B. Gable and Carl 1. Gable

Anchor Books and colophon are registered trademarks of Random House, Inc.

Title-page art: Villa Cornaro—North Facade

Gable, Sally, 1939-

Palladian days: finding a new life in a Venetian country house / Sally Gable; with Carl I. Gable.—1st ed.