Olimpia feeds the family

All we can say is OOF. What a meal!

It was a crys­tal clear day, as you can see, as we set off for Olimpia’s house in Catskill, New York, which is actu­al­ly a pseu­do­nym for “Very Far From Any­where.” As in, their dri­ve­way alone is like the dis­tance from Avery’s school to Buck­ing­ham Palace. You have to cross the Rip Van Win­kle Bridge to get there, and thence resist the temp­ta­tion to stop at the Rip Van Win­kle Din­er, but file under your hat the vacan­cies at the Rip Van Win­kle Motel. You will have gath­ered that this lit­er­ary phe­nom­e­non is the focal point of the cul­tur­al life of Catskill, New York. Except that we turned a blind eye on all these attrac­tions, know­ing that if our old VW sta­tion wag­on could make it up the dri­ve, ambrosia lay at the end of our jour­ney. We were not disappointed.

I will nev­er for­get the day that Olimpia and I cooked all day long (or rather she cooked and I salaamed “I’m not wor­thy” at her feet, for John’s work Christ­mas par­ty just before we moved last year. Meat­balls to serve 60! Ribs that spent the entire day in her home­made toma­to basil sauce. All the oth­er “food” that I sub­mit­ted for con­sid­er­a­tion was entire­ly eclipsed, and peo­ple stood around the emp­ty plat­ter where the meat­balls had been, say­ing, “But I did­n’t get any!” So when we knew we were going to have a chance to see Olimpia and her hus­band Tony dur­ing our vis­it home, we jumped on it. And I had no hes­i­ta­tion in ask­ing her to make my favorites.

Tony built this log cab­in with his own hands! It reminds me of the incred­i­ble accom­plish­ment of my dad (well, we helped a lit­tle) when he built the bed­room exten­sion on their house: the sheer capa­bil­i­ty bog­gles the mind. And now Tony’s build­ing a kitchen exten­sion for Olimpia and we were able to see the plans, plus the work in progress, plus exam­ine tile sam­ples, peek at light­ing fix­tures, cab­i­nets in progress. Very excit­ing, and you can imag­ine the views. The Catskill moun­tains loomed in the dis­tance and there were ful­ly two feet of snow. Avery was in heav­en sled­ding, with all of us in atten­dance to try to pack down the trail.

We sat down to lunch, and it exceed­ed all our expec­ta­tions. It was like eat­ing through the entire menu of a small Ital­ian restau­rant. We began with lasagne, in which there were tiny, tiny meat­balls instead of the mince I use to make mine. Avery was in heav­en. From there we pro­gressed to large meat­balls and the suc­cu­lent ribs, which had sim­mered all day in sauce. Then, if you can imag­ine it, a dish of flank steak wrapped around pars­ley, pine nuts and raisins, PLUS an egg­plant dish with olive oil, capers and black olives. Oh MY. Sim­ply sub­lime. And through it all we gos­siped about John’s aban­doned office, Tony’s col­or­ful his­to­ry as Deputy Fire Mar­shal of the FDNY (excit­ing­ly on the arson squad). Did you know that every FDNY fire hel­met (and every one in the world, for all I know) is made from a cast of the indi­vid­ual fire­man’s head? Unique, every one. And Avery did her posh accent, and her David Beck­ham accent, which I must say is spot on.

I will pass on any recipes I can man­age to cajole from Olimpia, espe­cial­ly the egg­plant dish which revived my inter­est in that dead­ly night­shade (well, not dead­ly, but you know what I mean). Thank you, Olimpia and Tony, for everything.