I Loved, I Lost, I Made Spaghetti by Giulia Melucci

Author:Giulia Melucci [MELUCCI, GIULIA]
Language: eng
Format: epub
Tags: BIO026000
ISBN: 9780446550949
Publisher: Grand Central Publishing
Published: 2009-04-08T04:00:00+00:00

String Bean and Potato Salad for Gringos

1 pound string beans (or long beans or green beans or whatever you call them)

1 pound baby red potatoes

1 clove garlic, minced

2 tablespoons extra-virgin olive oil

1 teaspoon red wine vinegar

½ teaspoon salt

Freshly ground pepper

Put two big pots of water on the stove and bring them to a boil. Meanwhile, pull the ends off the string beans and halve the potatoes. When the water is boiling, add the vegetables each to its own pot. The beans will take about 6 minutes, the potatoes will take 12 to 15. Test them both to see if they are done to your liking. The string beans should be soft but still have a little snap to them. When this is determined, remove the beans with a slotted spoon or drain them in a colander, then run a little cold water over them to stop the cooking—or better yet, dump them in a large bowl filled with water and ice and drain them again. This will stop them from cooking and give them a bright color. You can allow the vegetables to cool or season them now, combining both with garlic, oil, vinegar, salt, and pepper.

Yield: 6 to 8 servings.

Mitch’s sister Penelope was going through some marital tensions with her husband, Michael, when we were all down there. Mitch and I didn’t need to know what the problem was; as soon as we noticed him wearing a T-shirt that advocated “juggling for peace,” we had all the explanation we needed, as well as a source of laughter for years to come. Someone that earnest would never survive with a Smith. Earnest, too, was the family in its endeavors to make peace between this couple, so much so that they were willing to take a real risk and let us go out to a restaurant for dinner to celebrate Michael’s birthday. As long as we kept away from lettuce and ice cubes, Mrs. Smith surmised that we would be all right. We weren’t. In the middle of the night, Mitch and I were struck by the expected unpleasantness. He succumbed first: I woke up in the middle of the night to find him gone. He wasn’t in the bed, he wasn’t in our bathroom.

“Using the bathroom down here would be too much sharing,” Mitch explained when he returned. “I thought introducing you to my parents and my dog were enough for this trip.” Not long after Mitch, I was stricken. I was in so much pain that I fainted on the bathroom floor. Mitch had to bust in and rescue me. Talk about sharing! And yet as embarrassing as this all sounds, it wasn’t. Our illness was bonding, and I was moved by Mitch’s care and heroism. (Not to mention the blatant contrast it revealed between him and Ethan: If I had ever passed out on a bathroom floor under my last boyfriend’s watch, he would have just left me to die while he lay in bed with his eye pillow over his face.

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