i think saturday might be my favorite word in the english language.

to do list for saturday:

1. wake up (check)

2. make coffee (check)

3. sip coffee and blog (in progress)

4. watch the hub watch “guy candy” movies.  that’s what we call his action flix.  (it’s 7:20 AM and he is already watching lethal weapon 1.  the man does not mess around.)

5. go to the farmers market.  yippee!!!

6. then spend the whole rest of the day trying to figure out what i should do with the free day.  clean?  go to the mall and re-enter american society at its best?  go to the pool?  practice the new music i need to learn by the end of this month?  who am i kidding.

whatever i do all day, i will definitely make dinner tonight!  what should i try?  something like this?

this is pasta carbonara.  i’m sure we’ve all had the olive garden version of this.  well, i never have because i knew digesting it would be a nightmare.  not this stuff.  for some reason, this uber-rich cream sauce, made with prosciutto, cream and egg yolks, is also light and easy on the stomach.  and absolutely the most delicious comfort food you will ever have.

the red pasta in the background is pasta all’amatriciana.  also divine.  it’s a red marinara-type sauce, made with prosciutto as well.  you can get these at any and every restaurant in rome, but the day of this picture, we happened to be near the spanish steps.  everything is very high brow and shi-shi around there.  when we walked by this gorgeous restaurant, we all moaned ~ i was with the teachers and administrators of my hub’s high school.  and then the head priest/president, who i absolutely loved hanging out with in rome (you MUST see rome with a priest.  MUST!) said, “no, let’s do this.  this is what we want and this is what we’ll have.”  i’m so glad he didn’t let us walk on and try to find something cheaper and less amazing than the wonderful meal we had that day.

so, i digress.  should i try to make this dish tonight?  or should i make something very healthy for us?

in amalfi, there was this salad on all the menus,  i call it the amalfi salad.  here is the unique combination of ingredients:

italian tuna ~ this is canned or jarred tuna, but it’s packed in olive oil.  giada on food TV swears by it, but i never bothered to try it.  it is SO MUCH BETTER than the tuna packed in water!!!  it’s a few more calories, and worth every calorie.  even the hub, who doesn’t like tuna, was picking chunks out of my salad.

chunks of fresh mozzarella

tomatoes

pickles (what?  oh yes.  my mouth is watering.)

corn

diced carrots

olives

white onion rings

it’s served with white vinegar and salt and pepper.  no olive oil needed.  really, no vinegar needed.  the pickles are vinegary and the tuna has the olive oil.  i think i would add boiled eggs and celery because i like those.  the lettuce was a softer lettuce, like boston bib.  but it looked like they just threw in whatever lettuce was leftover.  it was really so good.

enough FP (that’s food porn ~ thanks for clarifying, toni!)

one slightly deeper thought than the food talk…

i feel so full of experiences and and fortified by the teaching and singing and having been around such amazing musicians for those two weeks in cortona.  and now that i’m back, i’m sort of lost.  more on that later.