Time for a Coffee

The street was busy. Everyone seemed to be out enjoying the early warm air. The long, cold winter was giving way to the first delights of spring. Before she had opened the shop, Eula had been down to the fish-market on the estuary and bought her daily supply of fish and other seafood for the 40 or so lunches she would probably have to make today. The “Catch of the Day”, today, was some good sized yellow-tailed trevally. She bought some King George Whiting as well for the few regular customers who thought there was no fish better than this local delicacy. She also bought some local mussels and clams which would make a fantastic marinara.

GG Horden had been in earlier than usual for his first shot – double shot long black – now that was the real way to drink coffee. He liked to sit at a sidewalk table if the wind was not too sharp. His old dog Bruiser, a staffy that enjoys his food too much, would curl up around the legs of the table and watch the passers-by, tongue lolling gently from the side of his mouth which was in a perpetual smile. Gently, he cupped his coffee in both hands as he sipped away at the inky brew and with every sip his face grew more lively and his cheeks more ruddy.

A little while after GG had left, three young school girls ordered coffees – all lattes and undoubtedly with three sugars added at the table. They seemed happy, chattering away to each other, obviously getting into the holiday mood that would soon descend on the whole village as it filled up with summer-holiday visitors. When they got up to leave, two crossed the road shrieking in response to a loud wolf-whistle from the passenger of a black ute cruising down the street. The other girl ambled into the arcade rather aimlessly.

It was then that Eula noticed a woman in classy clothing checking out her display of traditional Italian sweets. She delighted in making as much of this producer herself as she could, but some delicacies were bought in. She bought in her biscotti – Mattei and Artusi – but she made the best Crumiri, Brutti ma Buoni and Pasticciotti Casalinghi for miles around – all traditional recipes. A friend in the city supplied her with an amazing range of marzipan fruits – exquisitely accurate in every detail. But the centre-piece of her window display was always the gelatine slice she made. Today it was a Budino alla Vaniglia dressed up with a layer of Gelatina di Mirtinilli, or in common parlance, a vanilla pudding with blueberry sauce. This was cut up into neat squares, and if she was lucky it would run out just towards the end of the lunch period.

"Buon Giorno, " said Eula as the lady approached the counter.

"What kind of coffee do you have?" she asked.

"We have the very best from Italy, and we make the usual kinds - latte, cappuccino. But if you want something special we can make it for you."

"Oh, no, no. I think I will have a latte. Can you do that with skim milk? And can I have some of that Mattei biscotti? That would be nice."

“You have good taste, madam. I will bring them to your table. Please sit down.”

Eula hurried about her business of making the coffee and selecting the biscotti ready to take to her customer. As she brought them to the table she said “It’s a lovely day. Are you here on holiday already?”

“Oh no. I was married last month and I have just moved into town. My husband owns the Real Estate shop just there. My name is Nicolette, but you can call me Nicky.” Eula had to work hard to prevent her eyes from swelling obviously at the realisation that this was the “bimbo” Sam Malone had thrown everything away for. She seemed very nice, but she couldn’t be more than two years older than his oldest son.

“Well, it’s very nice to meet you, Nicky. I’m Eula. My husband Alfeo and I have been here in the village for 15 years now and we love it. I hope you will grow to love it, too.”

She excused herself and wandered back into the shop. Alfeo was in the kitchen preparing the basics for lunches today. It was always good to get a head start on some of the preparation. He had found that the trevally could be treated like sea-bass that he was familiar with in Italy and so as a special for the day he prepared these by rubbing them with a rough mixture of fine salt and fragrant herbs – rosemary, sage, marjoram and thyme, all grown in his kitchen garden at home. He also prepared some fresh artichokes for light steaming when the order came. Yes, each of these dishes would take 15 minutes to prepare, but that gives time to prepare the creamy garlic and parsley sauce that will dress the baked fish.

Today the King George Whiting would be baked in a buttery sauce and served with steamed vegetables over which ground fresh herbs would be sprinkled. Alfeo tried to vary the ways he prepared this delightfully sweet fish as well as the accoutrements he laid beside them on the plate.

He preferred to work with fresh pasta, rather than dried because it always produced a better result, and more quickly. Some of his morning was taken up in preparing some fresh fettuccini for the day. This will be served with his marinara of clams and mussels, in a rich tomato, chilli and garlic sauce.

Eula came into the kitchen, now free to raise her eyebrows in a way that caught Alfeo’s attention. “I just met Mrs Sam Malone,” she whispered. Alfeo looked confused. “His new wife,” she explained.

“Ah! What’s she like?”

“She’s a sweet young thing, I think, but still young. I wonder what the town will make of this now that it has come out in the open.”

“I suppose they will get over it, like everything else.” Alfeo had seen a number of scandals come and go within the village. There was usually an initial response of outrage but once they realised that the interloper was here to stay, the outrage subsided and before long they were just part of the tapestry of town life. Alfeo couldn’t understand the casual attitude Australian’s had to their marriage. Even his parents who had their marriage arranged for them stayed married for life. His father wouldn’t have dreamed of throwing one woman away and getting a newer model.

It seemed to Alfeo that there was a lot of trouble in our communities because men and women were not committed to making their marriage work – the kids, the single parent families. The only winner it seemed to him was the marriage celebrants who got to do the same people three and sometimes even four times; and the reception places. People seemed to throw money at a wedding thinking it will make it last even longer, and yet his observation was that the more money they spent, the more likely they were to split up.

Eula was never more happy than when she was at home with her family. Their children had been born in Australia, but they wanted them to still have Italian names. They chose names that could very easily become Aussie names, so their first child was Gregorio - his mates just call him Greg – that’s easy. He was born during their first summer in Quarabup and is now 15. Then came Nadia which nobody thinks is a foreign name, but it was Eula’s mother’s name and she wanted to carry that name on. Nadia began high school this year and was 13 years old (going on 30 sometimes).

The de Luca family lived on a large block about 5km out of the village. Ten thousand square metres gives lots of space for crop rotations of all sorts of veges. They even have enough room for a half-dozen Sabel Saanen goats from which they can obtain enough milk to maintain a steady supply of traditional cheeses and ricotta for the Trattoria.

They grew a large patch of cold-climate tomatoes – not the best really, but enough to make their own tomato sauces for the year. There was a large clump of artichokes that could supplement their supplies of pickled ones when the season was in, and the corner of asparagus produced the fattest and sweetest spears in the world.

Olive trees served as a hedging border to the block and were now producing enough fruit to supply local restaurants for miles around. They were preserved in a variety of ways – in brine, in oil, marinaded with spices and herbs, dried and made into tapenade. A small trellis of grapes served to keep the home table in three varieties of grapes, each ripening after the other over a three month period.

Intensive domestic agriculture is a concept foreign to most Aussies but everyone in the village had the highest regard for the quality of the produce Alfeo and Eula used in their Trattoria because they knew they had grown it with their own hands.

Just as Eula was clearing up the table after Nicky Malone had finished, Gregorio came round the corner with a worried look on his face.