Filling my Five Stomachs in Naples

           I awoke feeling refreshed and excited not only to see Naples, the center of the culinary world, but to taste it as well! Every time we told someone that we were coming to Naples, the first thing that came out of their mouths was some variation of "delicious food". This was good for a variety of reasons, including that all of us – myself, my fellow student Myriah, and our faculty advisor, David, share a love of great food. Knowing that, we couldn't wait to see what different tastes the city would offer us.

Photo credit: David Marks

          We were in Italy to take part in several ContextTravel tours. Our fantastic docent, Fiorella, took us to an amazing pizzeria that was famous for serving the best pizza in the world. It was a great environment with classical music, great servers, and families having a fantastic time. From our entrance until we sat down, all I could smell was the old fashioned brick oven doing what it does best. When our waiter took our order, I felt stuck between two emotions…total excitement because I felt like this was about to be the peak of my whole entire experience of being in Italy, and on the other hand, doubt. What if I had come all this way in search of great food that might not even be appealing to me? But...I never back down from a challenge. I had come way too far to be second guessing myself, so I ordered the most meat-filled pizza on the menu and waited patiently for the moment of truth.

           As you could guess from a true foodie, my heart was beating fast, and my taste buds were tingling in anticipation. It wasn't long until the saints brought me the most elegant and beautiful piece of pizza I have ever seen in my whole life. Strangely, I felt as if the world stopped. All eyes were on me. I paused for a second, then took a very deep and confident bite...

           This moment was when I became a man in the food world. That first bite almost brought tears to my eyes, and in that instant all I could do was smile with my mouth full and my taste buds satisfied. This bite? It totally changed my view on pizza. I realized that nothing - and I mean nothing - will ever compare to what I was eating in Naples…and this was just the start of my gastronomic journey.

           The next day after breakfast, another amazing docent, Alberto, arrived to take us on a culinary tour of Napoli. He took us to several local farm markets to pick up fresh ingredients. We arrived at a fish store, where they had a live octopus that Alberto and I touched out of curiosity. While the octopus had behaved itself for Alberto and I, it got a little friendly with Myriah. She jumped, screamed, and ran across the street, as far away from the moving tentacles as possible. After everyone was finished laughing, we proceeded onward with our walk since we knew we had a lot of shopping to do.  After scanning the stand that had fish, eels, shrimp, and assorted marine life, we bought a kilo of Naples clams that were so fresh that their little eyes were stretching out of their shells. We entered a small delicatessen with ham hanging from the ceiling, and sampled buffalo mozzarella that was so fresh that milk came out of it when it was cut.  Our shopping basket quickly filled with the rest of our amazing ingredients: bitter greens, fresh baked bread, hard bread for bruschetta, and olive oil, lots of olive oil.    

           

Photo credit: Malik Lee

              With our arms full of goods and watering mouths, we headed to Alberto's house to cook a traditional Neapolitan dinner. Alberto was an excellent teacher for Myriah and I, as neither of us had cooked these recipes before.  He guided us perfectly through the making of many Neapolitan dishes, including making pizza dough, pasta, friarielli, and the proper way to cook clams. After all our hard work, we got to reap the rewards The clams with linguine sung in my mouth with the taste of perfectly al dente pasta swimming in briny goodness.  Caprese salad held the perfect culinary blend of Italy’s trifecta: mozzarella, basil, and tomatoes.  Although our hand made pizzas were delicious and a notch above the American variety, they could not hold a candle to the pizza of the restaurant, where they have 900 degree ovens and bake the pizza for no longer than 90 seconds!  Our bruschetta held the perfect crunch of the bread with a simple cherry tomato and basil tapenade.  We had made an extraordinary and very delicious Neapolitan meal!  Myriah and I were happy that our hard work and hands-on learning experience was so satisfactory to all those lucky enough to be seated around the table. We ate until we were stuffed, and then ate some more. While, as a growing teen, I can eat a lot, this was the first time I’ve ever felt like I filled my five stomachs. Luckily, my memories will ruminate with me for a lifetime.

-Malik Lee