- I followed
Stanley Tucci 's lockdown routine, and while thefood and drink were delicious, it's clear the actor has a little more time on his hands than he'd like. - I started the day with pilates and a healthy breakfast before changing into my best Tucci outfit of black t-shirt tucked into belted chinos.
- I cleaned — almost constantly — throughout the day, one of the actor's favourite pastimes.
- Most importantly, I made Tucci's
Negroni , which is not one for the purists but is still delicious. - I ended the day full of beautiful food and drink, but glad that I could return to work the next day, and not have to do so much cleaning.
If you spend half as much time on the internet as I do, you probably will have noticed Stanley Tucci trending on social media because of his cocktail making skills.
"How Dare Stanley Tucci Look So Hot Making A Negroni," Elle magazine demanded in its headline after people across the world thirsted over the 59-year-old.
Following the viral success of his Negroni tutorial, Tucci broke down a day in his lockdown life in a charming piece for The Atlantic.
As someone who can fully get on board with a 5 p.m.
Unfortunately, the similarities between myself and Tucci may start and end with our mutual love of the red, Milanese beverage. The man describes himself as "a very tidy person," which, as you'll come to understand, is a bit like Elon Musk describing himself as "slightly unconventional."
Being an actor, Tucci also has very little in terms of work to fill his day right now, whereas I, mercifully, am busier than ever. This provided some limitations as to what I could and couldn't do as part of Tucci's routine but I managed to fit all the important parts — like the Negroni — into my normal schedule.
Tucci wakes up at 7 a.m. to his 5-year-old talking to him about dragons
Tucci is currently in lockdown in London with his wife Felicity Blunt and their two young children, a boy aged 5, a girl aged 2; and three older children who he had with his late wife Kate Tucci (she sadly died from breast cancer in 2009), a girl, 18, and boy/girl twins, 20, as well as their friend from university who was stranded in the UK.
Basically, it's a full house.
I too have chosen to spend lockdown with my family at my parents' home in Kent, South East England, but my only sibling is my 22-year-old brother who requires a lot less attention than Tucci's children seem to.
He's woken every morning by his five-year-old who, he writes, is obsessed with the book series "How to Train Your Dragon" and its various cinematic spin-offs.
Since I don't have a 5-year-old, I set my alarm for 7 a.m. and started my day by watching clips of "How to Train Your Dragon" on YouTube.
I'm young enough to remember reading the fantasy series as a child and the clips of Hiccup and his dragon Toothless bring on a wave of nostalgia.
Pilates is actually difficult, I find out
After a few clips, I'm ready for Tucci's morning exercise: pilates.
Tucci says that he and his wife complete an online
I settle on a POPSUGAR Fitness video led by Amy Jordan, creator of LA-based WundaBar Pilates, which is good enough credentials for this novice.
The trainers in the video are pretty much a caricature of what you'd expect: all popping abs, fake tan, and ivory white smiles that don't crack for a single second of the 25-minute workout. They say things like: "You really feel your bodyweight in this one!" While laughing through a grimace.
I cringe my way through the workout at their relentless pep, but find the exercises to be challenging nonetheless. Pilates, I discover, is kind of like a more intense yoga, with awkward positions held for an unnecessary amount of time.
By the end, I am sweating, and my core feels tight and activated.
In order to feel like Tucci, I had to put on the uniform
After showering I'm ready to get dressed.
Of course, in order to become Tucci, one must channel Tucci in all aspects of their being — including clothing. Any follower of the actor will know that he likes to keep his outfits understated, chic, and with a tight fit around the bicep.
I opted for a fitted black t-shirt, which I tucked into a pair of belted chinos and instantly felt the Tucci energy flowing through me. I am civilized, an artiste, a connoisseur of life.
Tucci enjoys a very healthy breakfast
Tucci wrote in The Atlantic that his breakfast consists of: "double espresso, orange juice, and a bowl of cereal with a banana and almond milk."
I can get on board with pretty much all of these items apart from using non-dairy milk in cereal, which in my mind is sacrilege. Nevertheless, in the name of journalism, I do it Tucci's way.
I opted for some granola with my almond milk and banana sliced on top, and, since I didn't have the means to make a double espresso at my parents' house, a black coffee.
The almond milk was a little watery for my liking – I probably would have opted for oat milk if I'd had to choose a non-dairy substitute — but it wasn't as bad as I was expecting, and the undiluted coffee re-energized me after my pilates workout.
Overall it felt like a very balanced breakfast, with the kind of European civility that one would expect of Tucci. It reminds me of the breakfast of Count Rostov in one of my favorite novels "A Gentleman in Moscow" by Amor Towles.
Every day the count, imprisoned in the attic of the Hotel Metropol Moscow, sticks to a regimented routine, from a piece of fruit and coffee for breakfast to a nightly brandy (also not dissimilar to Tucci's 5 o'clock Negroni).
Tucci, bound to his London home during lockdown, is not unlike the count ordered by a Bolshevik tribunal to spend the rest of his life in a luxury hotel.
Tucci finishes his breakfast with a cocktail of vitamins, "including D3, K2, C, B12, curcumin powder, and joint supplements so my knees don't crack like a melting glacier every time I bend down to pick up a rogue Lego."
Since I'm 25 and my joints are (thus far) fine, I skip the vitamins and proceed to Tucci's most regular activity of the day: cleaning.
Stanley Tucci is a clean freak
After breakfast, Tucci cleans up his family's mess. For most people, this might mean loading the dishwasher or washing up, possibly wiping down the odd spill. For Tucci, this means: emptying the dishwashers, scouring the counters, wiping down the cabinets "and their handles," and organizing the contents of the fridge. He also sweeps the floor and notes summoning the willpower to delay mopping until after lunch.
"As you might glean, I am a very tidy person. I actually like to clean, as I find it soothing," he wrote. No s---.
I don't like to think of myself as untidy at all, but I'm also not scouring the kitchen surfaces after every single meal. My mother, however, is elated — "do you even know where the broom is?" She asks. I don't.
I emptied the dishwasher, refilled it, swept, scoured, wiped, and attempted to reorganize until mom blocked me because she already had the fridge in a certain order.
Since I was attempting all of this before work had even begun at 9 a.m., I didn't really get the therapeutic element that Tucci gets out of it. I was in a rush and the last thing I wanted to do before I started a full workday was clean the kitchen.
After breakfast, Tucci's days consist of fairly little during lockdown
"With the exception of finishing voice-over work from my studio for a CNN series I recently completed, I have very little to do these days, as film and TV production have shut down," Tucci admitted in his article.
He fills his days with cleaning, laundry, and playing with his children.
Since I have no children, this allowed me to continue my workday as an
At 3 p.m., Tucci does a crossword and takes a nap — I begrudgingly follow suit
At 3.pm. Tucci writes that he intends to "write something, read, or catch up on emails." Instead, he picks up a New York Times crossword to clear his head, and promptly falls asleep.
I'll be honest, taking a mid-afternoon nap is not something I'm inclined to do during a normal working day (my editor is reading this) but I'm allowed to make an exception for this important cause.
I grabbed my UK equivalent of the NYT — The Times of London — and got started on the crossword, waiting for my eyes to droop.
Perhaps it's my age, perhaps it's my lack of infant children, regardless, I just couldn't summon the will to sleep at this stage in the afternoon. It felt wrong while all my colleagues were typing away.
Instead, I decided to focus my efforts on the crossword, which I managed to get about a dozen answers to in the time I had allotted for my nap.
Finally, Negroni time — but it's not a recipe for purists
The main event. At 5 p.m. every day, Tucci makes himself and Felicity a cocktail.
He's shown fans on Instagram how to make a Negroni, a scotch sour, and shown James Corden how to make the perfect martini.
On the day of his piece for The Atlantic, Tucci cannot wait for 5 o'clock. "I look at my watch and will it to be 5 p.m.," he writes at 4:30 and then, soon after, at 4:45: "I acquiesce and make a Negroni."
Now, far be it from me to question the master here, but Tucci's Negroni would — and indeed did — upset the purists.
—Brandi Devlin (@BrandiDevlin) April 21, 2020
The traditional Negroni uses one part gin, to one part Campari, to one part red vermouth. Tucci however, doubles up on his gin.
His second crime is shaking it. It's a bartenders rule of thumb that you should always stir spirits, not shake them. Shaking ensures that non-alcoholic components are mixed thoroughly with the rest of the ingredients, however, in a cocktail like a Negroni that consists only of spirits, you don't need to bash them all together because they're already of a similar density.
Furthermore, shaking causes little bits of ice to break off in the cocktail, which makes it more diluted with water than if it had been stirred. Shaking also changes the texture of the drink by introducing bubbles of air.
"Stirring will yield an icy, dense, and silky cocktail, while shaking will yield a frothy, light, and crisp cocktail," bartender Erik Lombardo wrote for Food52.
Today is not about the purists, though. Today is about Tucci. So, I double poured my gin, shook, and served straight up (with no ice).
Tucci also garnishes his Negroni with a slice of orange, not the traditional twist of peel — this man simply does not care for the rules.
While it may not be how I usually make my Negronis, there was no denying it still looked absolutely delicious.
Maybe it was my hard day of cleaning, but I actually enjoyed the Negroni a little more gin heavy than my usual — instead of being masked by the Campari, the botanicals of the gin came through a lot more and were very pleasant.
The increased dilution from the shake had also been counteracted by serving the drink straight up, so it wasn't too watery either. And once I'd finished the drink, I had a Negroni-infused orange wedge to eat, which I couldn't deny was a win.
I made Tucci's pasta alla Norma and sautéed lamb chops for dinner
As well as a drinks enthusiast, Tucci is also a foodie and spends a lot of his day thinking about food, preparing food, and
I neglected to mention that around noon, Tucci made chicken stock from scratch because A: I didn't have time, and B: I wasn't about to roast a whole chicken just so I had a carcass to use in a stock. So, I bought some, sue me, here it is:
Any complaints should be directed to my editor.
For dinner, though, I went all out and followed Tucci's recipe to the letter, and I'm glad I did.
"Given our short supplies, I decide to make something simple tonight: pasta alla Norma and sautéed lamb chops" — I don't think there's a single other person on Earth who would think that pasta alla Norma and sautéed lamb chops was a simple, cobbled-together sort of dinner you make when you have nothing else in, but I was happy to ignore that because it sounded utterly delicious.
Tucci notes that it also suits his vegetarian daughter, who can just eat the pasta without the lamb, which works for me too as my mom doesn't eat meat.
I started by dicing eggplants and picking rosemary and thyme from my parents' garden (not something I would have had access to in London). I also salted my lamb chops well in advance, as recommended by Tucci.
I then fried the eggplant in oil and garlic for 15 minutes until soft. In the meantime, I got some hot, salted water on the boil for my rigatoni pasta.
I added my pasta and poured a bottle of pre-made marinara sauce on to the eggplant — Tucci uses his homemade marinara, the recipe for which is in his cookbook and on Instagram.
Needing just five minutes of frying, the lamb chops came last.
With my pasta on the boil, eggplants and sauce simmering, and lamb chops frying, I had three pans on the go at once, which was a little hectic but the entire cooking process from start to finish was done in 20 minutes.
I took everything off the hob, combining my rigatoni and sauce, and left my lamb chops to rest in some aluminum foil.
As per Tucci's instructions, I deglazed my lamb pan with a little white wine, and gently cooked the garlic and herbs from the garden for a few minutes before pouring over the meat. The smell really was a beautiful thing.
Since the weather in England has been mercifully balmy as of late, I served dinner for my family outside in the evening sun, and it really did feel like we could have been on vacation in a rented villa in the Mediterranean somewhere.
The rich tomatoey sauce was cut through by a sprinkling of sharp parmesan, and the eggplant was wonderfully juicy and tender. The lamb, meanwhile, was wonderfully aromatic and light, and complemented the pasta perfectly.
I felt a pang of jealousy for Tucci's family who must eat like kings and queens in his London residence.
I went to bed full, content, and glad that I didn't have to be Stanley Tucci again tomorrow
Tucci ends his day by cleaning (again), thankfully this time with help from his family, and then heading to the sitting room to read with his wife.
As I followed suit, finally finishing "The Secret History" by Donna Tart (which, incidentally, I have absolutely adored), I reflected on my day as the debonair actor.
While Tucci's day was full of good food, good drink, and plenty of quality time with his family, it struck me that he, like many people right now, is in a state of limbo — on hold until life returns to normal.
This is particularly striking when he writes while making dinner, "I switch to white wine and thank Christ it is evening." Another day checked off the calendar.
My day as Tucci reminded me to be grateful that I have a job that I love, colleagues who I respect and admire, and plenty of work that stimulates and fulfills me.
There are plenty of elements I will take away from this day, though, and it has confirmed to me that Tucci truly is the suave, homme du monde that he comes across as on social media.
The fitted black tee, pilates, the piece of fruit for breakfast, the afternoon crossword — all things I will continue to wear, do, and eat.
Most of all, of course, I eagerly await 5 p.m. tomorrow so that I can, once again, acquiesce a little early, and mix myself a Negroni — shaken, not stirred.
Read more:
I lived like Ina Garten in lockdown for a day and it was the most fun I've had in quarantine
Stanley Tucci showed James Corden how to make a martini after the success of his negroni tutorial
Read the original article on Insider