Food, Friendship, Fiesole

We've started a new Thursday tradition. Dinner. (Together.)

Two weeks ago we had tacos, and this Thursday we (mostly me. . . I'm kind of a kitchen hog) made balsamic bruschetta and penne with vodka and tomato sauce. Thursdays are our Fridays since there's no class on Fridays here. These dinners are great because we all get together and each of us buys a few ingredients and it saves us a ton of money considering how much it costs to go out or how much it would cost just one of us to buy everything to make a nice dinner.

I'm ridiculous and I follow an insane number of food blogs. I have this Word document on my computer called "Recipe Bucket List" and it just gets longer every day. I write what it is I want to make and which blog or website the recipe came from, and when I feel like making something I can just go to my list! It's a marvelous idea which I copied from a couple of bloggers who have their bucket lists on their blogs.

Anyway, I crossed off two keepers.

Balsamic Bruschetta (recipe from Allrecipes) is so easy! Chop tomatoes, basil, and garlic. Add balsamic vinegar, olive oil, salt and pepper, and freshly grated Parmesan cheese. (The real stuff. Not the green can of Parmesan, although I suppose that would work in a pinch.) Mix it all together and let it sit for a while to get really flavorful. Slice and toast some French bread (or a couple of baguettes like we used) and then top your slice with some of the tomato mixture, drizzle with olive oil if you feel so inclined, and then eat it! It's marvelous. Really. I want it every night. With every Italian dish I ever eat.

Then we had this incredible Penne with Vodka Sauce (recipe from Vittles and Bits) which went really well with the bruschetta! The recipe had a lot of butter and cream in it, so it was totally unhealthy, but awesome. The recipe was perfect but it took ours a  lot longer for the vodka to evaporate. I tasted it before it was evaporated and the sauce was horrible. I had never had vodka sauce, so I didn't know what it was supposed to taste like. Catherine tasted it (Catherine and Veronica had joined us for dinner.) and said it just needed to evaporate more. Anyway, it was awesome. Everyone loved it. I would will make this again sometime.

Friday, we went to lunch at Mario's and then we wandered through the leather market. (They sell things besides leather, but I'm saying leather market because I don't mean the food market.) We found a 5-way friendship necklace! I've been wearing mine since then.

Our 5-Way Friendship Necklace
Aren't we adorable?

After that, we went to the Paperback Exchange and I traded in a book I had finished for one Lindsey recommended, The Hunger Games. Then we did some shopping at H&M. Since the only pair of shorts I have here is one pair of running shorts, I bought a pair of jean shorts, a bright pink skirt, and two tank tops. Hello, warm weather!

Speaking of warm weather, Saturday was our trip to Fiesole, a cute little town overlooking Florence. We left Florence around 11:30, I think. The bus from Piazza San Marco to Fiesole takes about 20 minutes. When we got there, we explored the little market on the main road. It was lunch time, so we bought some things for a picnic. We bought fresh pecorino cheese (I love pecorino!) and some really ripe and sweet, delicious strawberries. Then we hit up the CO-OP grocery store for freshly baked bread and prosciutto. We took our lunch to a shaded park and sat in the grass and enjoyed our little feast. It was a perfect day for a picnic. I even got a little sunburned. (Don't tell my dad.)

Lindsey and I shared this for lunch.

After our picnic we walked up to explore the church of San Francesco, and then a terrace overlooking the whole city of Florence. The view is incredible. It's hard to tell, but in this picture you can see Florence's Duomo in the middle near the top.

View from Fiesole

We took pictures and then wandered around the town for a while, stopping to sit and talk in the shade at another park, and then deciding it was time to head to Fiesole's best bakery for treats. I got three little cookies. One was a shortbread shaped like a bunny and dipped in chocolate. Another was like a tiny pie crust filled with jam and topped with chocolate. The third was a very mini jam-filled pie, no chocolate. They were all yummy.

When we finished, we headed back to Florence, around 4:15. We took naps and then Lindsey and Brittni came back over to watch Hairspray. Saturday night we went out. It was a lot of fun.

I can count the number of weeks left in the semester on one hand. It's going to be hard to leave.