Onion Schiacciata

Two nights ago, I made onion schiacciata from a recipe I found on http://thepioneerwoman.com/tasty-kitchen/recipes/breads/onion-schiacciata. When I was in Florence this summer, I would eat schiacciata often for lunch. My favorite little deli would have round ones with olives, mini-pizzas with this bread, and even some prosciutto sandwiches. I miss it. This recipe is the closest thing I've found so far, and it's pretty simple. I do need to learn to chop onions more quickly, though...that part took me about half an hour by itself. Guess I'm not the sharpest knife in the drawer, so to speak...

Besides my splurge on cooking, I've spent the week running from one meeting to another or working. I have a giant stack of repertoire that I'm trying to get through to choose pieces for my recital. I'm hoping to center it around Shakespeare. There are plenty of art songs written in English using Shakespeare's text, but I'm searching for the unique ones that are in German, Italian, French, and maybe even Swedish or Spanish. My goal is to create groups around specific characters, like Ophelia or Ariel. So far, I have two really fun groups - for Ariel and Ophelia, in fact. Now it's on to the others... It may be a good idea to focus on specific plays rather than characters - makes it a lot easier to find repertoire. But that's a brainstorm for this weekend.

Resume rework was also on the slate. I need two: a performance one and a business one. Performance resumes list all your performance experience - roles, concerts, etc - as well as education, performance training, and "special skills" like "Stage combat" or "Acrobatics." Business resumes are more typical, although a kind mentor suggested that I adapt my normal business resume to the arts by putting a bio at the top. It gives it a more narrative flavor, essentially mixing in some of the artistic format.

Another fun bit was today's lunch. It was the first meeting of my coffee/lunch Italian group. We converse only in Italian - my little way of keeping up with the language. I can hardly believe how rusty I've gotten in just a few months, and how much my Spanish keeps dripping in. I'll need to hit the books to review - my grammar, especially future and conditional tenses, is a bit stilted at the moment.

Time to turn in. It will be an early day tomorrow, and I need all the energy I can get!

~Hope