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La Settimana Italiana Posted by Serena on Jan 23, 2009
The Italian word for week is settimana which comes from Latin and means ‘in numero di sette’ (lit. in number of seven) because, yes you’ve guessed it, there are seven days in the week. The first five of these take their names from the planets. lunedi’ (Monday) is from the Latin Lunae dies, or ‘day…
Calamari Ripieni Posted by Serena on Jan 21, 2009
A reader recently asked if I knew a recipe for calamari ripieni (stuffed squids); this is my mother’s recipe and, as always happens with handed down family recipes, it’s very ‘approximate’, just un pizzico di questo (a pinch of this), un po’ di quello (a little bit of that), percio’ vi chiedo scusa (therefore, please…
Rainy Day Blog Posted by Serena on Jan 20, 2009
Stamattina mi sono svegliata col rumore della pioggia che batteva sul lucernaio. This morning I woke up to the sound of rain beating on the skylight. Hmm, inspiration for a rainy vocabulary blog! As is true of just about anywhere, us Italians like talking about the weather. It’s nearly always too hot, too cold, too…
Memorie Siciliane Posted by Serena on Jan 17, 2009
Recently I received a comment from a reader whose family is originally from Monreale in Sicilia (Sicily). These two names, Monreale and Sicilia, immediately brought back a stream of memories from a holiday I enjoyed many years ago in this beautiful region. My adventure started in Rome where I caught a night train to Palermo. Making…
Lezione di cucina Posted by Serena on Jan 14, 2009
In Italian we have two verbs which both have the meaning of “to cook”: Cucinare and Cuocere. Mi piace molto cucinare perche’ e’ creativo (I really like cooking because it’s creative). Cucinare means “to prepare and cook food”, which involves gathering the different ingredients needed for a recipe, then preparing and cooking them. I spend quite…
Timber! Posted by Serena on Jan 12, 2009
Warming oneself by the stufa a legna (wood burning stove) on these chilly winters evenings I have plenty of time to contemplate the importance of wood in our everyday lives, especially here in the heavily forested regions of Lunigiana in the north of Tuscany. In Italian we have both a feminine and a masculine form of the word for wood: legna (fem.)…
Homo Sapiens Posted by Serena on Jan 9, 2009
Homo Sapiens is a Latin construction meaning “Knowledgeable or Wise Human Being”. Sapiens, or in Italian Sapiente, comes from the verb sapere (to know), however in Italian we also have the verb conoscere (to know). These two verbs, conoscere and sapere, although both translating as “to know”, have different meanings, which are not interchangeable. Sapere…