Leonardo's toe started to ache again. Parmesan cheese had seeped over the edge of his boot again and he sat down to it out.

"No breaks!" barked the sous chef as he unceremoniously gave Leonardo a kick in the kidneys. The young apprentice yelped, jumped to his feet and resumed his position filling giant raviolis with herbed ground meat.

"Water tips in 10 seconds," barked a voice from down the line.

Leonardo and the entire kitchen staff rushed over to a ginormous pot of boiling water that rose nearly ten feet in the air. It sat upon a large grill under which a wood fire burned.

A cool mountain breeze hit the pot lifting a cloud of steam high into the blue sky above them. Next to the pot the ground was slippery with moist parmesan and the men braced themselves so they would not fall down the steep terrain of the mountainside.

"4:15 macaroni on schedule, tipping in three, two, one," yelled the gruff voice of the head chef.

It took thirty kitchen staff in all to tilt the pot which was anchored on hinges to prevent it from tumbling downhill. Boiling water hit the ground deepening the slick yellow luge-like track down which the pasta shot. As the noodles cooled they collided with the dry parmesan and continued to roll and tumble downhill. At the bottom, with napkins tied around their necks sat the gluttons with their mouths open hungrily. 

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In the 14th-century writer Boccaccio's collection of earthy tales, The Decameron, he recounts a mouthwatering fantasy concerning a mountain of Parmesan cheese down which pasta chefs roll macaroni and ravioli to gluttons waiting below.

I would have loved to write more but I need to get started on Thanksgiving dinner!