Yes, yes, I realize that we should have gone to Income Tax Bar on Tuesday to drown our sorrow over being newly poor. But the weather was so nice on Tuesday and, anyway, the government hadn’t cashed the big checks we mailed to it, so the sorrow was more abstract. It was easier to be sad on Wednesday when it turned cold and blustery and our bank accounts were noticeably smaller. Those are ideal conditions for going to a bar and drinking some wine and expounding at length on our personal grievances with life.
The strangolapreti, fried spinach dumplings stuffed with ricotta, made more sense. Of course, it’s hard to go wrong with any form of fried cheese, but the outside shell was crisp and the ricotta was light and sweet. The stuffed quail with rye dumping and red cabbage looked so tiny and adorable on the plate, almost like doll food, that we were initially loath to eat it. We did, because we were still hungry, and then we gnawed on the little baby drumsticks. It tasted like chicken, but the rye dumpling—which functioned more like stuffing—added an unexpected note of flavor. “This tastes like Germany,” my friend said.
