On Sunday, we took the train out in the country, to a little village slash bedroom community a ways out of Milan. In other words, the sort of forgettable little burg that tourists don't see, or if they do they immediately forget on their way to someplace more interesting. The kind of place, in fact, that people who have lived in Milan all their lives have never heard of, much less been to, unless they either live there or know someone who does.

We were on our way to lunch with Bond.

Bond is an Italian man W works with. For reasons unclear to me, they call him "Bond. Giuseppe Bond." And Bond loves this, despite of (or because of) the fact that he does not resemble James Bond, in any of his incarnations, in the slightest. He is a short, gray Italian man, approaching retirement age, who lives in a respectable house in a respectable suburb with his wife (who I'll call Mama), mother (Nonna), and at least one of his daughters (Figlia). He could do a decent M, though. Pre- Judi Dench, of course.

Bond is a very nice man. Rumor has it, in fact, that he's trying to out-nice Giorgio. If this is true, he's got a tough road ahead of him as Giorgio is without a doubt the nicest man any of us have ever met. Giorgio may, in fact, be nicer than the Pope, although that's a tough allegation to prove. In any case, Bond is a darn nice guy, and invited us to lunch with his family, along with U1, U2 and his wife V2, Unspecified Consultant (UC), and Cesar. This was very brave of him, especially given that we're most of us a bit odd, except for U1 who is certifiably insane. UC is rather new, but seems entirely normal and is, therefore, of no special interest.

So, we chugged into town, Bond picked us up at the train station (a platform with pedestrian overpass and small parking lot for all those commuter cars), and took us back to his house. The first thing we noticed was the green. And the trees. And the quiet. Then we noticed that we could breathe, due to the complete lack of pollution-- or as complete as it gets in Italy short of climbing an Alp. Bond lives in a nice, middle-class house with a large terraced garden and a lovely patio compete with grape arbor. Which is where he took us (meeting the family along the way), gave us an apertivo (Vermouth. Italians love Vermouth.), and commenced to feed us.

We finished eating four hours later.

The family is originally from Calabria, so the lunch was a mixture of Southern Italian and Northern Italian (ie. local) cooking. Here's what we ate:

Antipasti on patio: green olives, potato chips, nuts, black olives, more olives(pitted), stuffed and baked olives, baked mozzarella balls, crackers with tapenade, stuffed mussels gratineed in their shells, scallops with a type of pesto sauce also in shell, open faced tuna sandwiches, some sort of cheesy-puff, anchovies, pickled onions, bruschetta with tomatoes.

Antipasti at dinner table: seafood salad, anchovies (with onions this time), spinach puffs, puff pastry filled with some sort of cheesy potato mixture, sausage (3 types, two spicy), grilled eggplant, grilled zucchini, some sort of fish in a spicy paste, another seafood salad, bianchetti (bait!) fried in a batter so thin you could see their little eyes right through it (which, quite frankly, I would have enjoyed more if they were hot and perhaps had some lemon), peperonata, puff pastries with tomato paste and either speck or ham that looked like little braids, broccoletti salad, russian salad, spinach, bread, bruschetta (plain). And my favorite, caponata. Made by Mama.

As some point, we noticed that the family, at the end of the table, was not filling their plates to the same extent we were. We had been too busy passing all these dishes around to really notice at first. This is because La Famiglia is wise, and also because they knew something we didn't: namely, how much food was still to come.

Primi: large tubular pasta in a simple tomato sauce flavored with cinnamon, nutmeg, garlic, onion, and shreds of pork. Mama made it, and it was sublime.

Secondo the first: Pork ribs. The ones that had been simmered in Mama's pasta sauce. I am, at this point, in love with this woman. I am also wondering if anyone would notice if I undid the top button on my pants. I decided, ultimately, against this. It was tempting, though.

Secondo the second: Made by Bond himself. Roughly the size and shape of an American football, he had pounded veal thin and wrapped it around a filling of spinach or erbetta with some sort of yellowish sauce and onions, whole carrots, whole eggs. It was very pretty when sliced, which is the point. This is the kind of thing that Italians make on special occasions, festivals, etc. I was touched. Sadly, it was not as good as Mama's pasta and ribs, but everything is relative and it was very good indeed. Especially when I take into consideration what our own guests would be faced with if W attempted the same thing.

By this time, we are on our fourth or fifth bottle of wine, and think that we can relax, it's almost over. Mama and Bond start asking U1 to sing. Besides his insanity, U1 has a wonderful talent for playing the piano and an allegedly fine singing voice. "Sing us a nice song by Signor Sinatra," says Mama. U1 is embarrassed and very quiet, both of which are unheard of for him. Finally, he starts messing around with Strangers in the Night, but in English so La Famiglia didn't get most of it, which is probably a Good Thing. (We had, I should mention, spoken almost entirely in Italian. Mama and Nonna don't understand English, and Bond isn't too proficient. Figlia, who is 24 and studying medicine, is very proficient and giggled frequently.) So we started talking about this and that, until U1, possibly disappointed that he was no longer the center of attention, burst into song. He does have a good singing voice. The song he chose sounded like a show tune of some sort. I'm pretty sure it was not by Signor Sinatra, although Mama sounded happy enough.

Cheese course: this was presented on a large, heavy wooden tray with stout handles. For good reason, of course. Gorgonzola (Very local. Under 10 km, in fact.), Duetto (gorgonzola with marscapone. Ditto.), Assiago, Valtellina, Pecora (Calabrian. And huge, still with the ropes used to hang it to dry.), something white from Piemonte, and the ubiquitous Grana Padana.

Sorbetto: Lemon.

Next we staggered out to the patio, holding our bloated bellies, to get some air, digest, smoke (me and W), and finish our wine. And it was a lovely afternoon. Well, just about evening at this point, so we hung out a bit round the patio table, chatted, drank some more wine for digestive purposes. Bond uncorked another bottle.

You can see this coming, can't you?

Mama and Figlia disappear into the kitchen. The return with a couple bottles of Asti, and...

Dessert: Gooey cake with cream filling, chocolate shavings within and without, whipped cream and cookies on top. V2 brought it, from a bakery near her house. We wanted to kick her at this point (we brought a couple bottles of wine, ourselves), but it was a very good cake.

After this, Bond gave us a tour of his garden, which is very nice and he's constantly improving. Aside from that, we wanted to stay away from the table. Just in case.

Before we left, Bond cut V2 and myself three branches of February flowers and three daffodils from his garden. It being March, the Feb. branches had lost half their blooms before we even made it to the train station. I threw them away at Lanza, as I didn't want Bond to see them in the trash when he caught his train to work on Monday. The daffodils, however, I kept. I put them in a small blue and white vase (bought for 50 cents at a street market in Turkey, made in China), which I put next to my computer, and I'm looking at them now. They are very yellow and cheery and jaunty.

Spring is here.

And it's nice to have friends, especially ones as nice as these.