Quick Trip to the Grocery Store, Vegetable Risotto

1.  Find a simple italian recipe, keeping in mind you have no food processor/blender, forgetting that you have no chopping knife.

2.  Make a grocery list.

3.  Translate entire grocery list into Italian, even if you plan on letting your language skills deteriorate into blubbering the moment anyone tries to converse with you

 beyond one word sentences.

4.  Walk to the open-air market.  On the way, make sure to not take 40-year-old portly truck driver on getting into his truck.  Consider that the reason you wear eye-catching jewelry in the U.S. is the exact same reason you don't want to wear it in Italy.

5.  Wander around aimlessly in awe of how many types of mushrooms there are.

6.  Get increasingly more and more flustered with every interaction, and end up running off in the direction of the supermarket.  Fondly remember the days where you enjoyed grocery shopping and a wider vocabulary than "mi dispiace!"

7.  Stare at the bouillon powders for 15 minutes and realize that even with all of your translations you still have no idea which one to buy because you have not been raise to know what "traditional" broth means.

8.  Be genuinely shocked when the cashier does not pitch a fit when you pay with a $50.

9.  After an hour of shopping, come home and translate recipe from tablespoons and cups into grams and milliliters, only to then guess at all the quantities anyway because there are no measuring utensils in the house, not even a scale.  Follow that by spending an hour and a half "chopping" vegetables with a paring knife.

10.  Drink as much wine directly from the bottle as you pour into the pot, so that once you're done with this whole mess you won't even care what it tastes like.

It looks less appetizing than it actually was.  Thanks for washing out my photo, blahgger!

11.  Feel 100% entitled when your roommates are impressed.  Realize that there probably would have been nothing wrong with just having brioche alla Nutella for dinner.  Again.