Tiramisù

Je n'aime pas le café, sauf parfois en Italie, et parfois aussi en dessert. En fait, s'il y a une manière de me faire consommer du café, c'est de le mettre dans un mon tiramisù. J'en ai mangé un fort honnête récemment chez Prezzo (une chaîne assez ordinaire au demeurant). Il paraît que mon frère Andrew en fait un excellent, mais je n'ai jamais eu l'occasion de manger celui qu'il fait jusqu'ici.Et je termine ce billet de pure food porn avec un mot: je sais que j'épelle tiramisù tout croche et qu'en français ça ne prend pas d'accent sur le u, mais je préfère l'italianiser.

Tiramisù and Italian

I haven't blogged in a while about my progress in Italian (last time was in September) and a recent anecdote reminded me of it. Last Monday, I had tiramisù for breakfast. I have my breakfasts at work, usually some biscuits, scones, cereal bars I can bring. An Italian colleague had made for us a tiramisù. I was on my way to my desk after a long meeting when she told me, in Italian that there was tiramisù available, and come and get yourself a piece. I was startled: I had understood it. Not everything, but most of it, enough to know there was a tiramisù available. It seems that my sporadic Italian lessons are working somehow. So I said grazie tante and I scooped myself some tiramisù. In the morning. For breakfast. There was some alcohol in it. So fitting. I love Italian breakfasts for this, they are so unapologetically sugary and decadent. So authentic Italian tiramisù for breakfast (I just cannot get over it) and I could understand Italian. It made for a nice beginning of the week.

Italian desserts and criminal minds

"Leave the gun. Take the cannoli."

This is from Peter Clemenza in The Godfather, of course. I have seen the movie millions of times, but I never had once in my life cannoli. I did try to find them, sadly when they were on the dessert menu of Pizza Express they had been sold out. This is the kind of totally decadent dessert I usually crave for. And it is associated with one of my favourite movies, so just for this I want to try it.

I have been blogging recently about tiramisù and I guess Italian desserts are on my mind, but also the association we make with sugar and sugaree stuff and criminality. In The Godfather trilogy, it is obvious: when smeone eats or buys an orange, murder is being planned or about to be committed. Cannoli are associated with not one, but two murders in the saga: Paulie Gatto's and Don Altobello's, who gets poisoned by them. In another classic, Amadeus, Salieri, a jealious Italian composer who sends Mozart to his death even though he believes he is the Son of God (adding blasphemy and deicide to murder), is also depicted as having a sweet tooth, and a patriotic one at that, being particularly fond and proud of the speicalties of his homeland.

I think there is a reason for this association. There are two kinds of villains which I find particularly interesting: the puritan and the gluttonous. The puritan is dehumanised and his ethics close to fanaticism and the gluttonous displays appetites that are being the realm of food. They have the destructive hunger of ogres. I will blog a bit more about crime fiction in the next few days. Until then, I leave you with the classic murder scene and the immortal line.

Le mot inusité du jour: tiramiser

J'ai lu ceci hier sur Facebook, publié par mon petit frère: "a tiramisé pour l'avant-dernière fois de l'année. Faites-en votre deuil." Tiramiser est donc un verbe signifiant bien sûr préparer un tiramisù (je garde l'accent sur le u comme en italien, bon). Contrairement à pifomètre, le terme tiramiser est bien une invention originale de petit frère. Je songe à établir ici un dictionnaire de mots inusités. Comme le tiramisù est un dessert délicieux comme à peu près tout ce qui vient d'Italie, j'espère utiliser le mot souvent. Peut-être lorsque je visiterai petit frère.