And now I give you a little Italian naughty

Chloe and I miss being in lovely places like a warm terrace somewhere under the Italian sun, especially on cold, gray Vancouver days like today, and we especially miss the golden sexiness of Venice.

We wanted something warm, something sexy, something spicy today and we thought of pasta Puttanesca for supper.

As always, our first stop on any Vancouver/Italian dream is lunch at Cafe Calabria on Commercial Drive in the very heart of little Italy, where Frank sr. and Frank and Nick and Vince treat us like family.

So most of you know I don’t like coffee, (ducking my head in shame), but the only coffee I’ve ever had and actually liked, (outside of Europe), has been Frank’s Latte because he makes it with “amore”.

C asked Vince to make her the Frank’s Special panini: Cappicollo, mortadella, mozzarella, roasted eggplant, lettuce and tomato, while Frank sr. and I chatted about old times. C basically grew up at Cafe Calabria. Come to think of it, so have Kerstie and Jonathan. Come to think of it, I’ve been stopping by since I was in high school. Time…eh?

So back to pasta Puttanesca. Legend has it that the dish was devised by…um…ladies of negotiable affection because it was quick and simple and ready in the time one has between…um…customers and in the time it takes to boil spaghetti.

Usually I tend to throw this together with whatever we have, but today we stopped at one or two Italian markets and bought some peperoncini piccanti and, because we can take our time, some fusilli col buco, breadsticks and some lovely, sexy soda.

And now I must go cook our Puttanesca but I want to leave you with one last image.
C made these naughty cup cakes for her friend Graham’s 21st birthday party to which eight other 20-something boys were invited. They were a hit.

How bad is she? 😉