My kids have outdone themselves this year for my 71st birthday. I always try to make each of their birthday’s special and always have. When my daughter turned 21 in college, I took out a big ad in the campus newspaper, wishing her a happy birthday. This approach seems to have rubbed off on them and every year they get me something for my birthday with varying degrees of effectiveness. Effectiveness defined as getting me something that I particularly like. Obviously, I like anything my kids get for me. My mother used to admonish us to make something rather than buy a birthday present, but I am not sure that lesson ever sunk in and took hold. What do you get for someone who has pretty much everything they want? Isn’t that always the issue these days? Often they opt for some sort of food product, knowing that there are certain things I particularly like and that it will catch my attention in the extreme for at least a day or two. That’s really all the impact they are looking for because birthdays come and go and a touch of pleasure is pretty special for that guy who has everything. The problem is that most specialty food products run the risk of being great for the first bite or two and then going sideways. My favorite example of this is the infamous Slim Jim spicy meat stick that hangs around every mini-mart check-out counter in America. Buy one every six months and they are wonderful. Buy a box of them and eat more than one at a sitting, and you will never likely touch one again. If my kids sent me a a box of Slim Jims for my birthday, they understand very well that I would wonder what they were thinking.
This year, my kids, acting independently of one another (they have joined forces before, but this year they have gone down their own paths), each found something special that I very much appreciated. I will start with my youngest son, Tom. He bought and had sent to me a cell phone case with a favorite New Yorker Cartoon. Only a few people know how much I like this particular cartoon, but Tom does. The cartoon dates from 1994 (my 40th birthday year) and it was created by Charles Barsotti, a regular cartoon contributor. It depicts a rigatoni pasta on the phone saying “”Fusilli, you crazy bastard! How are you?” The entirety of the humor comes from a mainline pasta variety like rigatoni characterizing the more avant garde helicoidal pasta, fusilli, as crazy. Talking pasta, especially one caring about another type of pasta is certainly humorous, but anthropomorphizing pasta is far funnier. I love that image and that notion. So, Tom gave me the cell phone case, indeed the right one for an iPhone 15 Pro Max (remember, every Apple phone has different sizes for these cases). Only this case is white hard plastic and it feels like it will slip out of my hand at the first opportunity. I have told him this straight up and told him I will be saving it for a special occasion, which I will. In any case, it pleases me greatly when my kids get my sense of humor and remember about it.
My daughter Carolyn always works very hard to please. This isn’t just about me, but I am fortunate to be among those who she does care about and does seek to please when it comes time for gifts. She is forever suggesting gifts for me to buy Kim. I never hesitate to take her advice and I almost always put in an order as soon as I see her suggestion. It’s emblematic of the thought she puts into her gifting. For the last few years she has been finding foodstuffs she thinks I will like and sends them for my birthday. This year she sent me a tin bucket of popcorn, something she has done before a time or two. She knows I like this brand of popcorn and I can’t imagine who wouldn’t. It’s one-third very cheesy popcorn, one-third very buttery popcorn and one third very sweet kettle corn. The combination is perfect and the taste of any of the three flavors is both extreme and delicious at once. No one would ever accuse this product of being low-calorie, but it is very good. I have been allowing myself a medium bowl of it in the afternoon and I suspect there is less than a week’s worth. That will be plenty as after a week this would start approaching a Slim Jim overdose moment. It pleases me that Carolyn knows all too well what I like…a lot.
And then there is my oldest son, Roger. Roger takes great pride in gift-giving. I may be flattering myself, but I think he does so especially when it comes to gifts he chooses for me. He has said for years that he expects to be the person who takes care of me in my dotage. For whatever reasons of filial obligation and/or his extreme sense of loyalty to me, he seems determined to be the one to wipe the inevitable drool off my chin. He is quite familiar with my likes and dislikes and has traveled enough with me to know that one of my favorite places on earth is Piazza Navona in the heart of Ancient Rome. It’s a place I have frequented since my high school days living there and I have introduced it and the extra-special Tre Scalini ristorante to friends and family ever since then whenever I am in Rome or whenever someone going to Rome asks me for suggestions. I have eaten lunch and dinner at Tre Scalini on a number of occasions, but it isn’t the meals that I like from Tre Scalini, its the desert, and that is available any time from noon on any day of the year. That is not just any desert, but specifically, tartufo.
Tartufo is a classic Italian ice cream dessert that originated in Pizzo, Calabria (the “instep” of the boot of Italy) in the 1950s. In Italian, “tartufo” means “truffle,” and this dessert gets its name from its resemblance to the prized truffle mushroom (I think it looks more like an apple, but that’s me). The original tartufo di Pizzo was created by Dante Veronelli, a master gelataio (gelato maker), who needed a clever way to serve ice cream to many guests at once at a wedding. He came up with the idea of forming two different flavors of gelato around a liquid chocolate center, coating it in cocoa powder, and freezing it. The traditional tartufo di Pizzo consists of two flavors of gelato (typically chocolate and hazelnut or chocolate and vanilla…but sometimes also pistachio), a heart of liquid chocolate sauce or melted chocolate at the center, a dusting of cocoa powder or a chocolate shell coating, and sometimes chopped nuts or candied fruit (including a substitute maraschino cherry at the center). What makes tartufo unique is its construction method – the gelato is carefully molded by hand into a sphere with the liquid/cherry center, then frozen to achieve its distinctive round shape. When served, the outer shell is hard while the center remains liquid, creating an interesting textural contrast. Today, variations of tartufo can be found throughout Italy and in Italian restaurants worldwide. Modern versions might include different gelato flavors, fruit syrups instead of chocolate, or various coatings like crushed pistachios or chocolate shavings. The dessert remains particularly popular in its hometown of Pizzo, where local gelaterie still make it by hand using traditional methods, and it has become a protected regional food product.
But given the remoteness of Pizzo, I will always vote for tartufo from Tre Scalini. The restaurant claims it has the original tartufo, invented in 1946. I don’t care if that is the truth or not, I love tartufo from Tre Scalini. So imagine my surprise when a box laden with dry ice arrived with six tartufo deserts sent to me for my birthday by Roger. So this week, besides great flavored popcorn, will be about boffo tartufo. I will ask Kim to make me some fusilli, to complete my crazy week.