English metaphors with cooked and raw

1) He knew he was cooked when he saw his boss standing at the desk.
(Cooked is caught or responsible for wrongdoing, as if prior to being caught, one is raw or unfinished.)


2) She had a raw talent for music.
(talent is only potential, and must be devoloped)

" 'A çimma", a sung recipe

Almost everybody in Italy, knows one of the best-known italian singer and songwriter, Fabrizio De Andrè. The success of this unconventional intellectual is due to some of his dreamful songs as “La canzone di Marinella”, “La guerra di Piero”, “Geordie” and many others. One of the peculiarity in his artistic activity was to rediscover the traditional italian dialects, a heritage of italian culture. 

This song, “A çimma”, comes fron Faber’s repertory, and the lyric is written in Genoese dialect, the language of his hometown. 

We choose to publish this song because it’s a “sung recipe”, a song consacrated to his favourite dish, the italian (and Genoese) “Tasca”. It’a a delicious dish, made with meat stuffed with ham and vegetables. 

Here you can find the original lyric of “A çimma”, with the italian translation of this sung recipe.

Ti t’adesciàe ‘nsce l’èndegu du matin

ch’à luxe a l’à ‘n pè ‘n tera e l’àtru in mà

ti t’ammiàe a ou spègiu dà ruzà                                  

ti mettiàe ou brùgu rèdennu’nte ‘n cantùn

che se d’à cappa a sgùggia ‘n cuxin-a stria

a xeùa de cuntà ‘e pàgge che ghe sùn

‘a cimma a l’è za pinn-a a l’è za cùxia

Cè serèn tèra scùa 

carne tènia nu fàte nèigra 

nu turnà dùa 

Bell’oueggè strapunta de tùttu bun 

prima de battezàlu ‘ntou prebuggiun 

cun dui aguggiuìn dritu ‘n pùnta de pè 

da sùrvia ‘n zù fitu ti ‘a punziggè 

àia de lùn-a vègia de ciaèu de nègia 

ch’ou cègu ou pèrde ‘a tèsta l’àse ou sentè 

oudù de mà misciòu de pèrsa lègia 

cos’àtru fa cos’àtru dàghe a ou cè 

Cè serèn tèra scùa 

carne tènia nu fàte nèigra 

nu turnà dùa 

e ‘nt’ou nùme de Maria 

tùtti diài da sta pùgnatta 

anène via 

Poi vegnan a pigiàtela i càmè 

te lascian tùttu ou fùmmu d’ou toèu mestè 

tucca a ou fantin à prima coutelà 

mangè mangè nu sèi chi ve mangià 

Cè serèn tèra scùa 

carne tènia nu fàte nèigra 

nu turnà dùa 

e ‘nt’ou nùme de Maria 

tùtti diài da sta pùgnatta 

anène via.

Ti sveglierai sull’indaco del mattino
quando la luce ha un piede in terra e l’ altro in mare
ti guarderai allo specchio di un tegamino
metterai la scopa dritta in un angolo
che se dalla cappa scivola in cucina la strega
a forza di contare le paglie che ci sono
la cima è già piena è già cucita

Cielo sereno terra scura 

carne tenera non diventare nera 

non ritornare dura

Bel guanciale materasso di ogni ben di Dio 

prima di battezzarla nelle erbe aromatiche

con due grossi aghi dritti in punta di piedi 

da sopra a sotto svelto la pungerai 

aria di luna vecchia di chiarore di nebbia 

che il chierico perde la testa e l’asino il sentiero 

odore di mare mescolato a maggiorana leggera 

cos’altro fare cos’altro dare al cielo 

Cielo sereno terra scura 

carne tenera non diventare nera

non ritornare dura 

e nel nome di Maria 

tutti i diavoli da questa pentola 

andate via

Poi vengono a prendertela i camerieri 

ti lasciano tutto il fumo del tuo mestiere

tocca allo scapolo la prima coltellata 

mangiate mangiate non sapete chi vi mangerà

Cielo sereno terra scura 

carne tenera non diventare nera 

non ritornare dura 

e nel nome di Maria 

tutti i diavoli da questa pentola 

andate via. 

Pasteurization and ultra-pasteurization

Pasteurization is a process of heating a food, usually liquid, to a specific temperature for a definite length of time, and then cooling it immediately. This process slows microbial growth in food. The process of heating wine to preserve it longer was known in China since AD.1117, but the modern version was created by the French chemist and microbiologist Louis Pasteur, after whom it is named. The first pasteurization test was completed on April 20, 1864. The process was originally conceived as a way of preventing wine and beer from souring.

As usually, from an innovation somebody else can reinvent new solutions, not always as clever as the starting innovation. If heat is good, then more heat must be better, or so the theory goes. Ultra-pasteurization is just that: heating the milk to an even higher point. This effectively increases the shelf life and stability of milk, like up to 60 days! However, it also destroys the taste, some argue...

The microwave

A microwave oven, or simply a microwave, is a kitchen appliance that heats food by dielectric heating. This is accomplished by using microwave radiation to heatpolarized molecules within the food. This excitation is fairly uniform, leading to food being more evenly heated throughout (except in dense objects) than generally occurs in other cooking techniques.

The first personal microwave was introduced in 1967 by the Amana Corporation.

Basic microwave ovens heat foods quickly and efficiently, but, unlike conventional ovens, do not brown or bake food. This makes them unsuitable for cooking certain foods, or to achieve certain culinary effects. Additional kinds of heat sources can be added to microwave packaging, or into combination microwave ovens, to add these additional effects.

The pressure cooker

Pressure cooking is a method of cooking in a sealed vessel that does not permit air or liquids to escape below a preset pressure. Because the boiling point of water increases as the pressure increases, the pressure built up inside the cooker allows the liquid in the pot to rise to a higher temperature before boiling.

Pressure is created at the beginning with boiling liquid, such as water, inside the closed pressure cooker and the trapped steam increases the internal pressure and temperature, which is maintained throughout cooking time.

An early pressure cooker, called a steam digester, was invented by Denis Papin, a French physicist, in 1679. Large pressure cookers are often called pressure canners in the United States, due to their capacity to hold jars used in canning. A version of a pressure cooker used by laboratories and hospitals to sterilize materials is known as an autoclave.

Feltro & Lana cotta, or Felt & Fulling wool

fulling wool and felt balls

Felt and fulling wool are some of the earliest forms of textile processing we know. Asian nomadic tribes started spreading all over the continent thousands of years ago. Felt gives wool a very windproof quality when it's thick enough, and it gets relatively water-resistant as well. 

Felt differs from fulling wool beacuse it takes raw fleece and puts it through the same process without having any initial structure. On the contrary, fulling is the process of fluffing up an already woven or knitted piece of woolen cloth. A well-known example of fluffing wool is Loden cloth, developed to deal with Alpine climate, which is knitted before it's fulled. 

There are some ways to make the process easier. One of the primary ways to encourage the little scales to open up quickly is by wetting the fibers. Cold water will work, but very hot water is far better. Alternating hot and cold water (this process is called 'shocking') it works best. That’s the reason why, in Italian, we call this material “Lana cotta”.

Raw and scoured silk

silk cocoons, raw silk and scoured silk

Silk is a natural protein fibre, obtained from the cocoons of the larvae of the mulberry silkworm Bombyx mori, reared in captivity (sericulture).

The silk thread is made up by 74% fibroin and 23% sericin (3% remaining is made by dye). Sericin gives to raw silk his specific tactile poperties: matting and roughness. But sericin dissolves totally in hot soapy solution. 

We can call “Raw silk” the crude one which usually appears dull, rough and pretty hard, white or amber coloured. Submitting raw silk to “scouring”, a specific washing process, we obtain “Scoured silk”, which, on the contrary, appears very soft, smooth and iridescent.