Wednesday, May 18.
At Hyatt Centric’s Rooftop Bar.
Thursday, 19.
Checking out the renovations at Park Hyatt, “my hotel”. I don’t like what they did to it. Too bad.
And what have they done to Anish Kapoor’s mirror?
Lunch at Al Cantinone. Always very good.
I keep waiting to see veal with radicchio on the menu ever since I first tried it there many many years ago. I was told then that it was a typical Milanese dish, so how come I never saw it again?
This time I had lovely stuffed zucchini flowers and roast chicken breast with a mountain of roasted vegetables.
Stuart had scallops risotto and grilled sea bass. He has risotto whenever it’s on the menu. It never photographs well.
Dessert was crema di grom at Grom.
Opera night at Teatro alla Scala.
Seeing that “Un Ballo in Maschera” was on that evening, we sat in Il Foyer the restaurant next door waiting for the ticket office to open at 2. We got tickets at reduced senior prices for excellent 4th row Platea seats. Fantastic!
At the intermission’s second call, usher Jacopo, whom we’ve been chatting with, escorted us to our staircase.
Follow me, he said, worried we might be late getting back in. He’s sweet, only 22, a pianist studying Economics at the Conservatory.
After the opera, we had drinks at Park Hyatt.
I thought the evening’s Riccardo was completely outshone by both Amelia and Renato whose voices packed enough power to be heard above the orchestral music which seemed to me overly loud.
Is this even possible at La Scala?
Jacopo may have unwittingly given us unauthorised information that may partly explain this. He told us that Covid cases necessitated the substitution of the La Scala orchestra with another flown in from Berlin.
I’ve tried to get confirmation for this from opera news on the internet but only managed to find reports of the theatre’s announcement early on in the season that the ailing Riccardo Chailly had withdrawn as conductor because he was unable to rehearse with the orchestra for this production.
I’m not qualified to make judgments on the performers’ musical abilities- I do know that this particular opera title is notoriously challenging for both the singers and the orchestra. But I can definitely say whether or not I can hear the tenor’s voice above the chorus and the orchestral music. And I can categorically say that at times, I could not.
Soprano Sondra Radvanovsky as Amelia.
Friday, 20.
We found a fish-only restaurant! Pretty rare in Milan! Enoteca happened to be the only restaurant still open when we went out rather late for lunch. I guess it had remained open after their 3 o’clock closing time only because of the ladies at the curb-side table who, judging by the noise level at their table, obviously had a very boozy lunch.
I had an enormous plate of delicious fried fish and seafood.
Stuart had spaghetti with mussels.
Saturday, 21.
Today was hot and humid, not really the ideal weather for browsing around the Brera district. It was Open Day at the Accademia so there was no escaping the crowds in its usually cool and quiet square.
So even though lunch wasn’t really part of the day’s plan, lunch at Trattoria Torre Di Pisa seemed a good idea. We remember it from when we went there with Marilou and Eddie several years ago.
We chatted briefly on the phone with Jimmy, Beth, and Belen who called from Sydney.
I had to try the lardo but in the end I found the unaccustomed fat overload a trifle daunting so I piled some pieces onto Stuart’s risotto where they melted nicely into the warm rice. I ordered a simple dish of roasted vegetables with provolone cheese to go with it.
