Tiramisu to Ciao

by Shannon Cartier
As Americans, we are accustomed to a life of convenience: I idle in drive-thru lanes to get my morning coffee, do my banking, grab a bite, drop off and pick up prescriptions, and thanks to some interesting laws in Idaho, motor through the middle of a tube-like structure to buy beer and sundries. When I go out to eat in my hometown, I typically have some portion of my meal that I take home to enjoy later and look forward to having one less meal to fix for myself that day. When I travel to other cities in the U.S. and dine out, I am quite disappointed if my accommodations don’t include a fridge and a microwave, allowing me to reheat leftovers. As my dining experiences in Italy have been gastronomic delights, and possessing a healthy disdain for cooking and the resulting cleanup, I had hoped when dining out to order more food than I would eat at one sitting and put the rest in the fridge for the next day’s lunch or treat. I learned rather quickly that taking home a “doggie bag”, getting something “to go”, or having a pizza delivered for that matter are non-starters. The epitome of learning about taking food home from a restaurant in Cagli came courtesy of a waiter at Pineta whose English vocabulary consisted of one word: “ok”. I was attempting to ask for a container to take home some tiramisu to enjoy later. My Italian-English phrasebook failing me, I tried to explain that I wanted my dessert to go “ciao” or “goodbye” with me. If someone in our home country said they wanted to take something to “go bye” with them, I think I would be able to reasonably interpret that they were looking to take that item “to go”. It’s similar to when I ask my dog if she wants to “go bye bye” and she gets really excited for a car ride. Pretty basic stuff. After several repetitions of the phrase “tiramisu ciao” with accompanying wild hand and arm gestures depicting the act of leaving, the waiter said, “Ok”. I paid for my meal and dessert, waited for a time, reminded him of my request, observed him smile, nod, and agree again, but left with no tiramisu. I have since added the phrase “da portare via” to my repertoire so I won’t be without a sweet treat at home again. (Side note: I have since learned that it is quite uncommon in Italy to take home leftovers from a restaurant meal. Very few establishments stock disposable containers for this purpose. At Pineta I knew they had containers because they wrapped up leftover pizza for one of my classmates. I’m still not sure what the difference was between her success at taking home the pizza and my failure at getting my dessert.)