A Night At The Opera!

HANK PHILLIPPI RYAN: Reds and readers, you are such a wise and literate crowd, and we’ve talked about books and magazines and movies and TV shows in our days – – but have we ever talked about opera?

Last week we went to Tanglewood, the beautiful music venue in the Berkshires in western Massachusetts, to walk in the gardens and look at the art and to attend two concerts – – one of which was a performance of Tosca.  We had seen Tosca once before, in Rome! At one of the very settings where the opera takes place, the Castel Sant'Angelo.

But this night, the performers were accompanied by the entire Boston Symphony Orchestra playing the gorgeous Puccini, and it was quite a tour de force. And though it was in Italian, there were supertitles of the dialogue in English above the stage, which made it easily understandable.

Sometimes the libretto of opera is a little…weird. Possibly that’s just the translation, but when everything has to be song, the performers wind up singing things like:

SACRISTAN

Oh! So sorry!

Be sure to close up when you leave.

CAVARADOSSI

Run along!

SACRISTAN

I'm going.

But Tosca is a fantastic story! And just as timely as ever, with the villain Scorpia, arrogant and power-hungry, using his ill-gotten power to control everyone around him.

As our hero Cavaradossi sings:

CAVARADOSSI

Scarpia? That licentious bigot who exploits

The uses of religion as refinements

For his libertine lust, and makes

Both the confessor and the hangman

The servant of his wantonness!

That sort of struck a chord with me. How about you?

And from the standpoint of crime fiction, there is such a suspenseful twist in the plot – – Scarpia, the villain, has captured Cavaradossi, and is about to have him shot by a firing squad. Tosca, the gorgeous jealous beauty, agrees to have a night of passion with him if he only pretends to execute her lover–and then allows them to escape.

Scarpia knows he has to make it look like he’s killed Cavaradossi, but he promises Tosca his sharpshooters will use only blanks.

This is all singing, remember :-)

But as Scarpia sings his instructions to his henchmen, we know, from the haughty  lift of his eyebrows and his sarcastic intonation, that he is actually giving instructions to them to use real bullets. And kill Cavaradossi.

But!  Tosca believes him. And sings, (of course,) to her lover, not to fear the firing squad, but that he must be a good actor and pretend to be shot and killed and then she will come take him away to the countryside.

Uh Oh. The audience knows that this is not going to happen.

And I have to say, the suspense of watching that firing squad line up, ( and it’s not often a firing squad has the Boston symphony to accompany it,) had everyone in the audience thinking run run, Scarpia was lying! And there was a poor Tosca, believing she had saved her lover.

And after the shots, she sings, of course, what a good actor, you really look believably dead! Or something like that.

And then she realizes what’s happened – – and a lot more drama ensues. And I haven’t even told you the whole thing, including a couple of murders.

But the music was gorgeous, and the performers were terrific, and it was a memorable summer evening under the roof of the Tanglewood music shed. 

Reds and readers, do you like opera? Do you go to outdoor concerts in the summer?  

LUCY BURDETTE: I do like opera, though I don’t know many and don’t understand a lot. When we were going to Paris, I convinced John to go to the opera with me. We saw Rigoletto from excellent last minute seats–it was glorious! I noticed that La Traviata will be at the Met this spring. That’s the one opera I’m familiar with because an old flame was performing in it in CT and did a lot of practicing LOL, so I’ll definitely go.

We are booked to go to Tanglewood in a couple of weeks. Luckily some good friends live in Lenox, so it’s much easier for us. We love going to see the rehearsals during the day too!

DEBORAH CROMBIE: Fun post, Hank! I had season tickets to the opera for at least a decade, back in the 80s/90s, with a friend. But I suppose life intervened in one way or another and we gradually stopped going.  But this last year, I talked Kayti into going to a performance of Tosca (loved your dialogue breakdown!) and she loved it so much that she bought us FRONT ROW tickets to see Boheme this last spring! That was so amazing (only problem being we nearly broke our necks trying to read the supertitles!)

We just bought tickets to see Carmen in the fall and I’m very excited to introduce her to that glorious production and music. I’m really enjoying rediscovering a lot of this music myself as well as sharing it with her

RHYS BOWEN:  I’m a big opera fan. My aunt took me to Rigoletto when I was 12 and I was hooked. For several years I sang in an opera chorus and absolutely loved it. It’s also a challenge as it’s not like a choir where other singers are singing the same notes  as you. And you have to act while you sing. I was in La Traviata and cried every night in the third act ! I had to make sure my make up didn’t run. 

I do love Tosca and almost all Italian opera. And Mozart. I’ve sung Magic Flute.And Carmen.  But I can’t get into Wagner. To me it’s not hummable!

JENN McKINLAY: I’m with you on Wagner, Rhys. I used to have season tickets for the Arizona Opera (before kids) and I would groan whenever Wagner was in the line-up. My favorite production was a reimagined Carmen (by Arturo O’Farrill) set in a Cuban cigar factory in 1958. Carmen smuggles guns to her soldier and the rebels - it was brilliant!

HALLIE EPHRON: When I was in high school, they took us to see a comic opera. It was Gianni Schicchi … Something about a barber and that’s all I remember.  

In Padua on my honeymoon we went to see an opera in the ancient arena. Aida. I remember it went on for more than 4 hours and the seats were hard and we hadn’t eaten dinner. 

A Philistine, I know.

I was a huge fan of Broadway musicals because our parents took us to all the ones that traveled to Los Angeles. Carousel. Oklahoma. Annie get your gun. And we had the record albums and I’d play them over and over and sing along and dance around in our den. I never made the leap to opera.

JULIA SPENCER-FLEMING: When I was a kid in Germany, a child-appropriate performance at the Stuttgart Opera was a part of our Christmas celebrations - I saw Hansel and Gretel, The Magic Flute, and Cenerentola (Cinderella.) But it was my college professor boyfriend (don’t judge!) who made me into the opera lover I am today. He took me to Mozart’s comic operas: The Marriage of Figaro, Abduction from the Seraglio and my fave, Cosi fan Tutti. 

I utterly fell in love, and gradually expanded my tastes to include other light operas, then the dramatic warhorses, then Wagner (in a category all his own) and finally modern compositions. The most amazing opera I’ve heard in recent years, in fact, was The Hours (2022) based on Michael Cunningham’s bestseller. 

Thank God for the Met’s simulcasts! I haven’t seen a live performance in years, but I’m a regular attendee at the Frye Academy Theater on opera Saturdays.  

HANK: And I will never forget the day in Paris when were just happen to be at the Champs de Mars when the Three Tenors were about to perform. It was a free concert, can you believe it? And we found a perfect spot on the grass, and we were transported.

Of course, any performance of anything is awful if you are hungry or cold or confused or bored or not in the mood.

If you’d like a tiny taste of some perfect opera, please please listen to these. I dare you not to love them. And they are completely hummable. 

Here’s O mio Babbino caro, from Puccini’s Gianni Schicchi. (Maria Callas!)

Here’s the duet from Bizet’s The Pearl Fishers. (This is a great version, but it's not on video.)

Here’s Nessun Dorma, from Puccini’s Turandot. (Pavarotti!)

(And go look for yourself for the irresistible Carmen, and the gorgeous Madame Butterfly, and the tear-inducing La Boheme. Oh, and again, I dare you not to start marching around to the Triumphal March from Aida.)

Here--at the Met! No elephants in this version, but it is WAY ridiculously over the top. The music is incredible, but I am still laughing at the performance. And imagining the cast call for the supernumeraries: "Anyone, anyone, we'll take ANYONE!)

Reds and readers, tell us how you feel about opera. 

(We’ll do musicals another day.)

Rigoletto and Fish Pie, a Sunday Recipe from Celia Wakefield

 JULIA SPENCER-FLEMING: Just in time for Lent, our local chef de cuisine Celia Wakefield has you set with a warm, delicious and comforting fish pie, which, yes, seemed VERY British to me as well. Please don't let the length of the recipe scare you off - I saw Celia make this after a two hour round trip to the theatre and a performance of Rigoletto, which isn't a short opera. It was NOT difficult, and has the benefit of being a dish you can throw together the day after cooking the seafood. I had two helpings and would have taken the left-overs back home with me if Celia had given the slightest hint. Oh, well, I suppose Victor and she did have to have something for lunch the next day. 

(Note on the videos - I'm sorry there are so many! I usually edit them to make two or three compilations, but my video editor would NOT cooperate.)

Good morning to all the Reds, and a Big Thank You Julia for letting me loose on the blog yet again. So where are we? My Facebook page told me several time that today is a palindrome. While that has nothing to do with the fact that February has 28 days I’m willing to explore these wormholes. I know the 28 days has to do with squaring our year to fit within the lunar cycle, and why February? I am inquisitive enough to actually go and check up. Here is the answer from Britannica -the Romans considered February an unlucky month as this was the month they honored their dead so lets make it the short one.

 

 Well that’s enough of the Romans, though I do find it interesting that we are still doing things mandated by them. Just to complete the cycle of facts, I first came across a or several palindromes in one of Margary Allingham’s books -“More Work for the Undertaker” is the book I think. I was probably in my teens when I read it. I remember the story involved an eccentric, well educated and well bred middle aged family of siblings with a murder in their midst. Call for Albert Campion (non de plume).

Enough of dawdling down paths of mystery, my task today is to offer another of my recipes. Julia chose this as we had it for dinner after the three of us had been to see Rigoletto in a Met Opera HD performance. It is lovely to find a friend who enjoys Opera as it’s so much fun to be able to share views after. Another side note. If you are an Opera buff and haven’t seen this production, please try to catch it. The singing and acting is sublime. Both Rigoletto and Gilda have performed this together many times and it shows. 

 

We had a grand afternoon and because HD shows begin at 1pm, I had made and brought smoked salmon sandwiches to tide us over till dinner. It was a rather fishy day.

 

Arriving home we got to work on dinner, my fish pie, after the necessary restorative cuppa. With full disclosure as they say in the media, I have never been very fond of fish. Having thrown out a challenge to the ocean I must admit that I love shell fish, and totally love sushi and sashimi. In fact I really only like tuna raw. I am also partial to some smoked fish and was very disappointed when Legal SeaFoods took their blue fish pate off their menu. But serve me blue fish, Herring or mackerel, nothing oily, too fishy, thank you. I had unpleasant eating experiences with fish at boarding school. Being a convent it was fish on Fridays and usually boiled to flannel texture with bones still in and no sauce. 

 

But that will not be the case with my fish pie, there will be sauce and that is what caught Julia’s attention. Why fish pie? Well for some long lost reason fish pie is what I crave if I’m not feeling well. Baked golden brown fish pie with an embellished white sauce thick with cheese and hard boiled eggs into which one mixes cod, pollock, cusk whatever white fish available. As I can get good fresh pollock that was the choice along with Bang Island mussels. 

This is a no recipe, beloved of Sam Shifton, NYT Food Editor, who usually writes about no recipe meals on Wednesdays, then proceeds to tantalise me with many no recipe ideas which I can’t read as I won’t pay the price so to do. But I will put in my quantities as I can best guess them, which probably is good for 4-6 people. There was plenty left to serve again after the three of us had dinner, and it held up well over six days refrigeration.

 

Sea food ingredients:

1# bag of mussels

1# pollock

 

For cooking the mussels:

1/2 onion, chopped

Fresh dill

1 tsp fennel seeds,

1 tsp peppercorns

1/2 c white wine or vermouth 

Wash mussels, throw out any that have broken shells. 

Use a large frying pan with a lid to cook the mussels  

Add half a chopped onion, some dill fresh preferably, tsp of fennel seeds, tsp peppercorns, 1/2 cup white wine or vermouth, 1/2 cup water and the mussels to the pan and cover.

 

Heat till the liquid boils and the mussels start to open, 

Cook a couple more minutes, then drain liquid and mussels through a sieve.

       

Put the mussels to one side discarding any that didn’t open, to cool down

Carefully pour the cooking liquid into a microwave safe dish with lid and add the fish. Do not use all the liquid as there will be some sand etc from the mussels at the bottom.

 

The cooking liquid can be used with milk in the sauce if wished

Sauce and topping ingredients:

 

4 hard boiled eggs, peeled

Cheddar or another grating cheese to make a cup plus grated (Parmesan would only be my choice for topping)

Potatoes, enough to make 3-4 cups of mashed potato

Milk, butter, oil, salt and pepper

Dill to season if liked

Toasted bread or Panko crumbs for topping

Egg and Cheese Sauce:

Hard boil the eggs in advance and peel them

Grate enough cheese to fill a cup measure, I choose cheddar*

Step 1, seasoning the milk

Add to a pint of milk

1.     bay leaf

2.     10 peppercorns

3.     nutmeg pieces or half a tsp grated nutmeg

4.     small piece of onion or shallot

5.     couple sprigs of parsley

Put the milk and first five ingredients in a small saucepan, 

Heat almost to a boil, 

Turn the heat down all the way and allow to simmer gently for ten minutes or so

Strain the milk to remove seasonings into a jug for pouring onto the roux.

 

Step 2, making the roux

 

2 Tblsp unsalted butter - if you use salted just taste sauce before adding more seasoning

2Tblsp flour - if GF use enough potato starch to make a roux

Salt and pepper, dill, nutmeg

Melt the butter and add the flour in two or three turns

Stir to incorporate butter and flour and cook for a few minutes over medium heat to ‘cook out’ the raw flour taste 

Take the pan off the heat and whisk about a quarter of the milk into the roux, mixing well to break up any small lumps

Return pan to medium heat and continue to add the milk a little at a time, whisking briskly and watching the mixture thicken. You may not need all the milk

 

As the sauce thickens add the cheese which will help the sauce thickening process then season to taste

Mix in the well chopped eggs, chopped dill, or parsley, grated nutmeg and salt and pepper to taste

 

Baking the Fish Pie:

Pour the sauce into the casserole,

Mix in the cooked fish, and shellfish if used, which should be broken into bite sized pieces

Cover the top with mashed potatoes and add a sprinkle of grated cheese and breadcrumbs if you wish.

Use an oven proof casserole and bake at 350F for about a half hour or until the top is golden brown. 

 

 

 

 

NOTES:

This is truly a ‘seat of pants’ recipe and I encourage you to make it as you will. Looking back there do seem to be many directions but I would rather over compensate than leave a step out.

 

The sauce is based on a béchamel sauce that I learned to make many years ago. However it is fine to make a roux and mix in the milk without going through the seasoning process first. But done this way if you have time does add an element to the dish. As you can see the sauce is what makes the dish special. Perhaps I should just make the sauce and get a spoon!

 

I often make this with white fish which I cover with milk in a microwave safe dish and nuke for a couple of minutes, then let sit. That cooks the fish and I use the milk to make the sauce. 

 

Final Word: An immersion blender can solve almost all lumpy problems.