The perfect liner

2023 Author: Cody Thornton | [email protected]. Last modified: 2023-11-26 19:13

As children we were told that it is not orthodox to do it, especially in public, at a restaurant, at a friend's house. Then we grew up, and after having cleaned up the plate with the first pureed bread we never stopped, once we understood what we were losing we made up for it.

Among those who practice the shoe in great secrecy and those who instead perform in popular performances in front of a large audience, without forgetting the daring who cultivate the bizarre idea of dedicating a restaurant to this art (first course of the menu: spaghetti with tomato sauce with bread for the shoe), we give you some tips on how to recognize the professional shoe shooter in a crowd.

- First clue: from the bread basket he carefully chooses the little ass (the definition changes according to the geographical location). You understand, however, the initial or final part of the vein.

- Selecting the piece of bread carefully means seeking the right balance between crust and crumb. Usually the shooter stealthily places the prey next to the plate. He does it without attracting attention, defending the squat from possible side attacks.

- At the bottom of the plate leaves with calculated carelessness a quantity of sauce that exceeds the right measure.

- At the restaurant your choices are not random, the final shoe is one of the determining factors.

- The long experience acquired allows him to combine the most suitable type of bread for each sauce.

- During the practice he reaches out towards the plate with a gesture of sentimental tension for the final bite.

- Indifferent to the presence of others, he fights against the force of gravity: as the artist of the shoe as he is, while everyone thinks that the sauce is about to fall (and in any case it will certainly fall before he manages to bring it to his mouth), he overturns the predictions and we he does it without getting dirty.

- Scarpetta everywhere, he is now a genius of intuition: he glimpses a potential shoe there where the rest of us see only an empty plate.

- Identify your fellow shoemakers from afar, following the slow ritual followed to prepare yourself for that last priceless piece of bread.

- It happens that you diversify: from the shoe to the dive. Then dip the loaf of bread directly into the sauce pan or sauce jar.

Since we are on the subject, I take this opportunity for my personal top ten of the shoe?

Here instead my personal ranking of the perfect shoe, the dishes that take away any embarrassment from me, that make me feel obliged to do it:

1. Fried egg, a sublime experience if there is also a truffle.

2. Tomatoes in salads with raw oil in abundance.

3. Homemade tagliatelle seasoned with abundant ragù.

4. Caponata or ratatuille with my favorite vegetables (eggplant and courgette).

5. Juicy bruschetta preferably with garlic seasoned with new oil.

6. The Ligurian pesto (but Ligurian seriously) that exalted the trofie.

7. Roast pork with milk, a classic of Sunday lunch.

8. The sauté of clams as they do it in Campania.

9. In the summer delirium of a Greek salad with onion, fresh tomato and feta.

10. The oil mixed with chopped parsley and mint dipped in lemon juice in the Roman-style artichoke.

Do you also have a top ten?