Matt you must stop here

September 12 - Lucca
One of the really fun things of being in Italy is finding a place of your own.  Not very far from our Hotel, we came across a restaurant sign that had my name all over it. Witness the next photo.  I can't pass this up

How can I pass this up.  It's like my greatest hits.  Tartufo, fungi porcini, Trippa, lampredotto, salumi formaggi, vini.  So we have to stop.  It has something on the menu that I had never heard of before,  "Cioncia".   Of course it's right next to Trippa so I have to know what this is.  We quizzed the waitress and she tells us that it is veal cheek.  So now I have to have it.  Well it's not really the veal cheek that I was imagining.  I was more like a dish I had had before in France called "Tete de Veau" (head of the cow). Again it's the food of poverty that fascinates me.  It's easy to make food taste good if you put lots of butter or cream in them, but try making something tasty out of just the cows face, now that's a challenge.  I think the Cioncia like the Tete de veau is made from the entire head, skin, cheeks, everything.  Cooked for a long period of time until it's soft. It had a very nice flavor, but just as I remember with the Tete de veau, when you cook the entire animal for so long that it all breaks down, so too does all the collagen.  Enough so that when you eat it your mouth is sticky from all the collagen.  It's the thing that gellatinizes stocks.  The thing that thickens them without simply using fat or or rue.  I think this one is a little too adventous for most of my friends so you don't have to worry about finding this on the menu any time soon.  But it was fun to try.

  

Cioncia Pannini

Porketta Pannini

Linda ordered the Porketta Pannini.  Porketta is a whole slow roasted pig, skin, liver and all.  Again another of Linda's "not my favorite" you owe me one moment.  She wouldn't eat the crispy fatty part with the skin on it.  The best part.