 |
| Everything ready to receive the guests |
Last weekend it was the first time that Italy participated
in the world-wide Restaurant Day. And our house was one of the six ones open to
the public. A short report follows here.
Restaurant Day
was first initiated in 2011 by a group of Finish people. It is an excellent
opportunity for everyone who loves to cook to prepare food and share this with
others in their house, a real restaurant, in a park, on the rooftop of your
office or wherever you like. People who didn’t know each other enter someone’s
home and become friends.
Until last week there wasn’t anyone who opened a restaurant
in Italy. The laws here can be complex and therefore it isn’t easy to find a
way to make sure your restaurant is legal. It is for example important that you
do not cook in a public place. If you want to prepare something and serve it
hot, you need to prepare it in your own kitchen. Than it is important that you
don’t oblige your guests to pay a bill. You can only ask them for an offer to
cover the costs of your shopping. At most you can give an advice of the offer
you like to receive per person. And then you have to expose all the ingredients
to make sure the people know what they are eating.
However it is not as easy as it seems to open a temporary
restaurant, we decided to open one up anyway. With our Dutch inventive minds,
we sought a solution for all the possible thresholds. And we had a small
success!
The fun started already a week before, when we had to think
of a name and a description. Because you have to offer something special, don’t
you? We decided to offer the traditional Dutch filter coffee which you have
around 10 in the morning with friends, family or neighbors. And with the coffee
goes a nice piece of cake or a biscuit. Something easy to do and in case there
are leftovers, also easy to conserve.
The day before was the day in which the cake and biscuits
where prepared.
In our tiny kitchen it is always a challenge to do this, but we managed. After
hours full of sweet smells filling our house, we could finally take a rest on
the couch and enjoy our clean and well decorated house.
And then it was the
day. We we’re completely ready to receive the guests which made a
reservation in our house. And even though not all of them showed up, we had a
fun day in which we shared our Dutch tradition with new Italian friends. We’ll
be there again next time!
