Day 17 - The day of reckoning

Here we are - two and a half weeks in on our European odyssey.  We have traipsed around various churches, landmarks and icons - things we have known about all our lives - and now we have experienced them for ourselves.  We have had adventures, We have dined well.  We have seen the sights. All the sorts of things that people like us in our dotage hope for when they head overseas.
And you would be justified in thinking that's why we came on this trip.
But I'm going to let you all in on a little secret, dear readers. We came to Europe for one reason, and one reason alone.  And today is the day.
First  - let's go back.  Maybe a year ago.  Our nephew Tom is chatting to Annie and he casually mentions that he's been watching a great show on Netflix - The Chef's table - and Tom thinks Annie might like it.
Turns out Tom's right.

I have watched a few episodes and it's not a bad show.  The first episode in the first series is about this Italian bloke - Massimo Bottura - who has a little restaurant in Modena.  It's a classic tale.  He was a lawyer with a food dream - you've seen Masterchef, right? He chucks it in, buys a little place in his hometown. Goes and works with great chefs and then returns to Modena.  He eschews traditional Italian food and at first, the people of Modena hate it.  But - surprise, surprise - it all works out well in the end.  Three Michelin stars and number one restaurant in the world.

Here he is now. With some other famous guy.  By the way, I should warn those readers who are not interested in reading about food that is - let's face it - far removed from the normal stuff we eat, you should skip this chapter and come back tomorrow.  This one will have some perfunctory historical stuff, but largely will be about fine dining.
Because as you will have guessed by now, the main reason we have come to Europe is to eat at Osteria Francescana.  Massimo's joint.
The very first thing Annie booked was this restaurant.  Apparently the website makes the date available three months in advance and is sold out within seconds.  Thanks to years of buying Springsteen tickets, Annie knows how this stuff works and we have a table for lunch reserved today.
We get the train to Modena, which is an hour or so on the train, and arrive there a couple of hours before gametime. So we do what we do every other day.  We look at the sights, visit a famous church, and we visit the market.
Here are some sights:

Pretty good sights.  Modena is rich in history and is an historically important town.  But I'm not going to talk about that today.  Go here if you want to know more about it.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Modena

Here's the famous church.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Modena_Cathedral

Note the complete lack of electrical activity in the sky even though I was once again inside a church.

Market stuff.  You can probably guess that I didn't take these next photos.

Food, glorious food

We're anxious to try it

Three banquets a day

Our favourite diet.  Apologies to Lionel Bart.

Still not time for our 13:00 appointment so we have a coffee in the piazza.  Waiting, waiting, waiting.  Eventually, the hour comes around.

We make our way through narrow streets until we arrive at this unassuming facade.

Before we can knock, or ring a bell, the door opens and a man welcomes us.

I'm reminded of the scene in The Wizard of Oz when Dorothy steps out of her black and white house and everything turns technicolour.

They take our bags and fuss over us before showing us to our table.

We are seated in a room with three tables - a couple on each of them.  Note the couple over Annie's right shoulder.  We will be meeting them later.

For now - that's a very nice roll.

We opt for a prosecco to start and look at the menu.  You can order a la carte, or go for the degustation - of which they have two varieties.  One of them is simply called  "Tutto" (everything).

Yes please.

Would you like the paired wines?  Why, yes!

Here's the menu.

First we had this thing.  It wasn't on the menu.  It was a Fish and Chips amuse bouche, which amused my bouche very much. 

The quenelle of ice cream was the fish, and the crunchy thing underneath was the chips.

The thing on the left was a fish/parmesan/crunchy thing which was very impressive.  On the right was some eel presented as cardboard.  Neither thing looked particularly edible but tasted lovely.

Part of the same course, the macaron in the middle was fish flavoured (and delicious) and the things on the side were little packets of fishy tastiness.  Were I a food writer, I would be able to give you a more accurate account. But with my limited skills, I can let you know that it was very nice, beautiful to look at, and a little bit whimsical.

Here's the rest of the first course.  I'm not quite sure what it was, but there was lettuce and crunchy things and oils and stuff.  Lot's of flavours and textures happening at once.  The black powdery stuff is there on purpose (as is the white powdery stuff on the other side of the plate which doesn't show up as well in the photo).

Seriously?

 Next course.  Mediterranean Sole.  There is paper that you can eat on the top of the fish.  It tastes slightly better than other paper I have eaten.  And the fish is nice.

This might be the third wine so far.  Could be the fourth.
It's very nice.

Now this one was a little unusual.  As you can see, the dish was covered with foil.  But it turns out this is edible foil.  Doesn';t even hurt your fillings!
Underneath are some beautiful oysters and little crunchy potato balls in a broth.
Seriously delicious.

And now three types of rice.  The three coloured rices here each have completely different flavours - mushroom, squid ink, and possibly pesto.  Something green anyway.

By this stage it's all very nice, and really impressive, without blowing my socks off.

Yet.

I should probably tell you at this stage that the service is like nothing I've experienced before. There are more serving staff than patrons. They are not overly friendly, but appropriately for this sort of establishment, they are efficient and helpful, answering the many questions that one of the people on my table was asking.

 Here's a video showing this dish being presented.  Tasted pretty good.

More wine?

I didn't love this one.  It was a broth with pasta made out of pizza.  

 I did love this one.  Five ages of Parmigiano Reggiano.  Modena is where this cheese comes from and this dish five iterations of the cheese in different tempratures and textures.

 This is the nicest thing I have ever eaten in my life.

 Annie is liking the cutlery.  The knives are particularly lovely.

 Now the pigeon.  Breast on the left, and ground up thigh meatball style on the right.  All sorts of oils and reductions to go with it.

Seriously, if you want to know what these ingredients are you can probably google it, but by this stage, the paired wines were kicking in, and I was not taking notes.

 Annie wanted the the artwork in the blog.  More wine please.

 Here it is now.

Asparagus with some yellow stuff on it.  Beautiful

They served this in a popcorn bucket, that they lifted off the plate as they put it down.  It was very nice popcorn.

And here was the Oops I dropped the lemon tart.
It tasted like a really nice lemon tart.

 Here's a glass of red.  And behind the wine glass is a young couple from South Yarra.  He grew up in Ararat and she is originally from Templestowe.
Small world.

Here are three little tasty things to finish.
The ice cream thing is foie gras.
The little blobs between the golden gaytimes are rabbit, and the round things on the other plate were sensational, but to be honest, I can;t really remember why.

Annie is not a fan of the foie gras paddle pop.

She's wearing here new blue suede shoes.  Carl Perkins would be proud.

The meal is over and we are completely satisfied.  The best fine dining experience we have ever had.  It's time to go.
But I ask our waiter if it might be possible to visit the kitchen.  He checks and says it will.
He leads us back there.  We walk in applauding, and ask for a photo.  We take a minute to get organised,

 Nearly ready.

Our waiter snaps this shot, but then we say he needs to be in the photo too.

This is the result.
We bid the crew farewell and return to our table.
We chat to the other diners.  The youngsters from South Yarra make their way out, and we are left with the couple from Dallas, Texas.

Let me introduce to you, Dr. Lee Reeves and his wife Nina.
The room is full of Reeveses. We talk about old times and eventuallyrealsie that we will have to move quickly if we are to make our train back to Florence.
We move quickly and make our train.

Annie is well fed and relaxed.
We should be going home to a quiet night, but we are here for a good time, not a long time.
We get back, freshen up, and hit the streets to catch up with a mate who is in town.









Sean and Elaina are in Florence on their way from Greece, and about to head to the Cinque Terra via Lucca.  We swap war stories and have a great night.  Incidentally, I had the gnocchi.