Italian Food and Furby's?

Me and my friends are officially like a big Italian family. We had our first pot luck yesterday and boy was it amazing.

I raided my Pinterest for a dish to make, because I really cannot cook without referring to it every time. I made roasted potatoes with Parmesan  Not really Italian, but they turned out pretty good considering it was my first time dealing with a Celsius oven. 

Can everyone just stop and look at those stuffed peppers? YUM. I don't even like peppers, or anything in them- but I could not stop looking at them.

I took these photos before we included the wine. There was around 4 bottles. 

The ovens here are half the size of at home- and sometimes (like yesterday) only have ONE shelf. So making food with 6 other people is extremely chaotic, yet entertaining at the same time.

Since then, I have been on this cooking high. I want to cook everything- even things I have never eaten before. I mean I bought eggplants to make somehow. Not one.. but two, just in case I am really love it for some reason? We will see how that goes, I am going to totally lean on my roommate Alex for that particular adventure. I guess you can say my cooking rut is over?  

This morning, Alex and I went to the fresh market. This was my first time going inside. It is like Vince and Joe's X 100. Not in size, but in the quality, freshness, and level of Italian-ness (? if you can understand what that means). There were quite literally rows of full cow thighs hanging behind each stand. This woman was cutting fresh prosciutto and handing out free samples. The already prepared meals made my mouth water instantly. I don't know what kinda of fish there was, but it looked like the body of a giant sword fish. Just hanging out on the counter fresh out of the water like it was no big deal. And don't even get me started on the cheeses. :o 

Mounds of deliciousness. 

I just followed Alex around in awe, trying to pretend I did not have change on me- or else I would have came back with meals for the next two weeks. 

On the way back we cut through a Piazza Santa Croce, I tried to capture the way the light was hitting the buildings because even though it was bitter cold out today, it looked so warm and had that morning glow to it.

I like walking through here because it is much quieter than most of the city. Not many cars, except the one I captured, are trying to run you over, and the number of tourists are slim to none. During the afternoon, the open square, as well as the other Piazzas, has artists and little stands to sell different paintings and such. It is very "middle ages" of the Florentine people. 

After this- I had my new wine class. It was exactly what I was hoping it would be. We get to try three wines a day to compare them. The only problem is I could not taste, nor smell any of them today because I am sick. So that's great since next Wednesday I have to serve and answer questions about them to real customers at the University's restaurant. This is the way my life goes. 

The next class was the "hot teacher class," lets call it HTC for short. Last week he had us fill out different questions about ourselves so he could get to know us better. 

Today, we went over some of the main answers people responded with. One of the questions was: "What products/services annoy you?" For some reason, I DON'T KNOW WHY, a Furby was the first thing to pop into my head. So I put that along with a Kazoo and a small anecdote about my hatred for kazoos. I thought it was a pretty honest and sincere answer. So he starts calling people out (with our answers in hand) and asking people to explain why those things are annoying. The whole time I am thinking "dear God no, please do not ask me about Furby's today, I am sick, sound like a man, and cannot handle this right now." 

He calls around 10 people and finally moves on, I think I am in the clear. No. A little while later we are getting to the end of the questionnaire. The topic of our inspiration for going into marketing and studying abroad comes up. He reads off various answers people put on their pages, it was mostly friends and family members. Then he stops, gets this confused look on his face, and mumbles somewhat to himself (in his British accent mind you) "Furby? Well I don't know who that is but okay." Little did I know, they don't have Furby's in Europe!
So just to re-cap:  My professor thinks I am inspired by a weird thing called a Furby, and probably a Kazoo at this point, and is most likely looking up to see what this mysterious "Furby character" is as I am typing this. 

I am getting off to a great start with that class.

Well I have to get up early for Italian tomorrow. 

Ciao!