Big Ol' Italian Words

So my roommate works at The Smoking Goose in Indianapolis as their production manager. Since I am so privileged, I get to try some really awesome -and also strange- cuts of cured and smoked meats.

He is making Wild Boar Soppressata. I have never had wild boar before, but the really special thing about this salami is that it is fermented. I never usually think of salamis as being fermented, so that kind of blew my mind. I also got to try a cured salami called Ciauscolo which is also fermented.

The strange thing that I noticed about both of these were that they had a hint of the room in which they were cured in the flavor profile. It didn't taste odd, or sterile or really anything identifiable, but it did have a sort of funk to it. A funk like a blue cheese funk, or a sour beer funk. It tasted interesting.

This got me thinking. I wonder about some of the foods and spirits we consume, and about how they are aged. Take bourbon, for example. Though manufacturing bourbon is done fairly uniformly, they still vary pretty wildly. This is because they are aged in different ways. Last year I visited Buffalo Trace and Woodford distilleries, and I could taste the rooms they were aged in in their respective products. It was a kind of confusing experience in that my smell was giving me sensory information I thought my tongue should - if that makes sense.

I feel like the metaphor for ourselves at this point should be obvious. We are a product of our environments where we are allowed to 'ferment'.

Here is a recipe for Soppressata and Penne pasta. Simple. Rustic. Enjoy!

Ingredients:

Olive oil

4 ounces soppressata or other hard sausage, cut into 1/4 inch dice

6 ounces pancetta, cut into 1/4 inch slices (your deli counter will do this for you) and then cut into 1/4 inch dice

1/4 teaspoon fresh ground pepper

1 tablespoon chopped parsley

5 garlic cloves, chopped

1/2 cup basil leaves, chopped

Two 28 ounce cans whole tomatoes, drained

Salt and pepper

1 14 ounce can diced tomatoes, drained

1 pound of ziti, penne or other small tube pasta

14 ounces fresh mozzarella, cut into one inch dice

Directions:

1. Coat the bottom of a 12 inch frying pan with olive oil and heat over medium heat. Add sausage, pancetta and pepper and cook until lightly browned, adding the parsley near the end.

2. Raise the heat to medium high and add garlic and basil and cook for one more minute.

3. Pour the whole tomatoes into a bowl and crush them with your hands. Add them to the pan and boil them uncovered for about 8 minutes. Season with salt and pepper.

4. Stir in diced tomatoes and cook one more minute. Remove from heat and cover the pan.

5. Cook the pasta until it is two minutes from being done. Drain and add it to the skillet with the tomato sauce. Stir over medium heat for a few minutes until pasta is done.

6. Fold in mozzarella and serve at once on your favorite plate.

Fear the Fear II & III

I think my timing was a bit off for my presentation of my assignment. I meant to present my video a bit earlier in the class but I hesitated until the last second. With that in mind, I don't know if people were in the "fear" mode when I presented. But it seemed as though people were receptive to it. Compared to my hypothesis about my project, I think people were enticed by the thought of the unknown and were actively interested in my project.

Aside from the obvious answer of changing my presentation timing, I think that my project was well thought-out. I enjoyed putting my project together and analyzing what it was I was really afraid of.

There were a couple fear projects that resonated with me. The first was David's grief of losing a child and the second was Dana's project on the fear of losing a loved one. David's was an unapologetic outpouring of emotion. It made me think about the possibility of losing a child in the future. Dana's made me want to spend more time with my family. Looking at my project in relation to the two, it seems theirs' were based on a family theme, whereas my project was focused on my own life. It makes me feel a bit selfish about the content of my project.

Fear The Fear

I was way more nervous to interact with people than I think I realized. After my initial plan to shoot and interview inside the hotel failed, I was forced to think on my feet and come up with a plan. I walked and drove around French Lick and West Baden until I saw a promising location and went in for the kill. I never got anybody to do a traditional interview like I had envisioned on the way down. People seemed really put off by the fact that I had a camera. The managers who I talked to were generally quite antsy to get me out of the building.

I initially stopped at the West Baden hotel. I did not bring any of my camera equipment in with me and proceeded to try to find the front desk. I really wanted to save the reaction shot of the dome for when I had better equipment, but unfortunately a shitty video on my phone will have to do. I tried to make it look like I wasn’t filming, but I think I just walked through the huge space looking like a bit of a schmuck, mouth agape, staff and patrons curious about my sanity.

The ladies I talked to at the front desk were curious about what I was filming and I tried to play up my student status to get their sympathy or some information. They passed me onto their marketing director Diane Duncan. I had to call Diane to see if I needed a $50 press pass to shoot inside the building and on the grounds since the hotel and grounds are “copyrighted”. I am going to have to check with my Tech and the Law professor Bryan Redding on that…  Oh, and since it was a Friday at 3 pm. Diane was unavailable.  So, no shots inside the hotel, instead I snuck one as I walked away. The building and dome were absolutely beautiful, but those images will just have to exist in my mind.

I learned that French Lick and West Baden are essentially smashed together and separated by a railway. This railway was now a museum and where I decided to go after being turned down from the Hotel to regroup and determine a new plan. There was not much going on there. Apparently Ben had been there before… I almost abandoned the project entirely at this point but at risk of looking like the idiot l was in the dome, I soldiered on into French Lick.

In French Lick I first found Steve at Whites Service convenience store who didn’t have time for an interview, even though it looked like he had time for everything else imaginable. He recommended I go “over there” when I asked about potential interview candidates. I thanked him for his time and promptly left. “Maybe I should abandon the project?” “People do not seem to want me here” were some of the thoughts pouring through my mind at that point.

Walking away from Whites, I snapped a few pictures of French Lick. It seemed like a town that was a combination of an up-and-coming suburb and a small town. It was a weird, off-putting feeling and anybody who I walked by looked like they did not want to interact with a stranger who carried a camera. This was when I was the most nervous. I was in a foreign town. I had a lot of expensive camera equipment with me. There were some rough looking folks walking around. I was alone. Surveying the town by car sounded like a better idea and was what I decided to do.

I drove around town for a little bit. Actually a lot. I was actually nervous that I would be stopped because I was essentially circling the town trying to decide the best location for an interview. The winery was the best choice and I stopped for a look.

The most receptive person to my insistence on an interview was Nicole at the Winery but I think it was only because I conned her into an ‘interview’ through a wine tasting. Only one blurry image of her exists. Aaron was quite more knowledgeable about wine than Nichole was, so he helped me through the tougher questions I had.  The manager Laura requested that I run any pictures of the winery by her and her team before I made them public. I did not take anymore pictures after that.

Driving out of West Baden/FL I felt like I had quasi-accomplished something. I had an experience in the way that some people, like me, look back on high school and say “it was an experience”. I do not know if it was positive or negative, and honestly, it was a lot of the negative. But I did learn to take on my own challenges and to tell a (hopefully) compelling story.

Fearing the Fear Assignment

1. I have decided I am (mostly) afraid of the unknown. I do not often like to change. It makes me uncomfortable.

2. ???

3. I think people will be excited for my project. I think people will actually like to experience what I will experience but from a vicarious position because, deep down, they are afraid of the unknown too. The unknown offers a sort of excitement about it, though that may be enticing.

To make sure people can get the feelings that I will experience vicariously, I will put some stipulations on my project.

Takeaway10

Eh, a bit late on this. Sorry!

I missed class this week but...

The truth is this fear assignment got me thinking a lot about my job and I felt like I needed to take some time and reflect on some goals and take stock of my career position. I was offered to apply to a position by a friend who thinks I would be a serious contender and would give me a solid, reputable recommendation. Some consequences are I would have to quit school just shy of graduating with a diploma (could school be a wasted investment?). My personal relationship would be jeopardized--she was offered the same one. I had to think about those.

However, I currently work as a server, bartender, trainer, administrator, assistant manager at a restaurant. I do not want to be in the restaurant industry anymore and instead want to start working towards a career that is related to MAS. So I've been searching for something that can satisfy my needs and the truth is...

I am scared. I have worked in restaurants for a steady paycheck for about a decade! Its all I know! I am afraid of what is out beyond restaurant-land! Which brings me to...

Fear...

Fear. What is Fear?

I think Fear is an evolutionary feeling we have towards things that are dangerous, or that we perceive as dangerous.

What I find really interesting about Fear is that when we evolved our prefrontal cortex we evolved the ability to plan things out in our minds. With that ability comes the ability to Fear something that has not happened yet, or may not happen. This reticence towards certain actions based on Fear is something that must be distinctly human because there must be something about the outcome of that action that is not agreeable.

For example. Talking to a room full of people is widely regarded as one of the most difficult things one can do as a human. It is one of the biggest fears people mention. What could go wrong? Well, for starters you may forget to put on pants that day. Wouldn't that be embarrassing? What if you forgot your whole speech and just stood up on stage for ten minutes in silence? That is a possibility, isn't it?

Now, those things are not likely to happen, but in our minds we are able to envision them.

Why Do We Have Fear?

This Fear we have brought with us up the evolutionary chain only serves its intended purpose some of the time. The rest of the time, it is mostly a hindrance.

By overcoming Fear, or the perceived threat of some sort of inconvenient discomfort, we may be able to accomplish goals better and faster.

Takeaway 9

I am writing this as I just finished kegging the tequila beer I mentioned as a part of my previous assignment. Oh man, this is going to be tasty!

Anyway, today was a really great way to start off the week and welcome a renewal of energy toward getting things accomplished. It seems the end of another semester is in sight... didn't we just start last week?

One of the most powerful things brought up in class a couple times was the quality of the things and people around us as opposed to the quantity. Something that I have learned is that everything in our lives requires constant attention and maintenance, otherwise it will come into a state of disrepair.

Or in a more streamlined version "everything around us is in a constant state of entropy".

Entropy - lack of order or predictability; gradual decline into disorder

The things we choose to not take care of will gradually fall apart. This is true of all things. Relationships. Cars. Pets. Roads. Guitar skills. I could go on but I think you get the picture...

Another thing brought up today was a surprising lack of people who knew who they were. Now, that is not to say that I am the most confident person in who I am. But I feel like I have a pretty good grasp on the previous experiences that have shaped me into who I want to be.

I know who I want to be, but ultimately its the future that makes me nervous.

Maybe that was the point of the exercise; to challenge us to look into the crystal ball of the future and see the kind of people we wanted to become? Or maybe it was to take stock of all the experiences we have had and try to make sense of them all and amalgamate them into a singular person to better understand ourselves?

Man, I don't know if I will ever understand existentialism...