Italy

Montepulciano spearheads the wines of Abruzzo

Montepulciano spearheads the wines of Abruzzo

Posted on by Pat and David
For one of the most-exported of Italian wines, Montepulciano d'Abruzzo seems to fly under the radar for most Americans. As a rule of thumb, just remember that these DOC wines represent the best value in Italian reds. They are perfect, by the way, with Thanksgiving dinner. Just make sure you read the labels carefully. Many producers give their wines fanciful names like Ottobre Rosso (Red October) or Divus (Rich). Look for the Montepulciano d'Abruzzo DOC indication on the capsule. Unless your family hails from Abruzzo, you might not even know where the region is located. Geography says it's central, but most references call it southern Italy because of the cultural links to the south. The main thing to remember is that Abruzzo is a green,...Read More

Lonely Planet captures taste of place

Posted on by Pat and David
We've always believed that one of the best ways to get to know people is to eat at their table. Lonely Planet, the erstwhile backpacker guidebook series that has been heading steadily upmarket since it changed ownership in 2013, must agree. Last month Lonely Planet (under NC2 Media) launched the first of a projected large line of books about different cuisines. Called “From the Source,” they pair a writer and a photographer to chronicle the flavors of a country through heavily illustrated recipes for regional dishes. The first two volumes tackle the cuisines of Thailand and Italy, which is a pretty tall order. The recipes are given in both metric and U.S. measure, and they are intricately detailed. In the Thai book, this means delineating...Read More

TWL: Getting to know Prosecco DOC in Treviso

Posted on by David
Wine is one of the easiest and best ways to bring the taste of travel back home, so this post initiates what we're calling The Wine List — travels in wine country with a focus on the wines themselves. And we launch TWL with a journey through the beautiful towns and delicious wines of the Prosecco DOC region of the Veneto and adjacent Friuli--all within driving distance of Venice. Prosecco is one of those wines that's almost too good for its own good. The light sparkling wine made from the Glera grape is the signature sipping wine of Venice, and it is synonymous with laughter and indolent afternoons at an outdoor cafe (see above, on Piazza San Marco). The wine is made in a tightly...Read More

Truffles on demand (more or less)

Posted on by David
I confess to being a truffle snob—and an ignorant truffle snob at that. Following some pretty spectacular truffle eating and hunting experiences in and around Alba in November 2004 (see Truffle Pursuit under the ''Sample Articles'' tab), I was convinced that nothing measured up to the white truffle (Tuber magnatum pico) and that nowhere in the world could compete with the white truffles of Piemonte. Slowly but surely, I am learning better. The people of Acqualagna, a small village of 4,000 in the hills of Le Marche, changed my mind when I paid a visit at the end of March. Located near the Furlo river gorge, the area has been known as a great truffle hunting ground for centuries. The white truffle—still the greatest, I...Read More

All menus lead to Rome

Posted on by Pat and David
Ultimately, we did visit the amazing museums at Vatican City—and here's our sneaked photo of the Sistine Chapel ceiling to prove it. (Yeah, like we were the only ones....) But we have to admit that we were originally waylaid by Rome's greatest gourmet food shop. And who could blame us? Gastronomy is Italy's other art. Or maybe its other religion. When we'd finished eating lunch at Franchi (see previous post), we decided that it was a good time to stop in at Castroni (Via Cola di Rienzo 196, Tel: 06-68-74-383, www.castronicoladirienzo.it, open Mon-Sat 8am-8pm), reasoning that since we were already stuffed, we would be immune to the lures of the merchandise. It was only next door, and we'd still have plenty of time to get...Read More

Bites worth standing for

Posted on by Pat and David
It's easy to get a good, quick lunch in Rome. Usually we opt for a couple of slices of pizza in whatever pizzeria is closest when we're hungry. But for even more variety, we sometimes head to a tavola calda—an amazing array of hot and cold dishes ordered at a counter, served up quickly and almost always eaten standing up. One of the best in Rome is found at Franchi (Via Cola di Rienzo 200, tel. 06-68-74-651, www.franchi.it.), which is also one of the city's most extravagant alimentari (local food stores). Outside of meal time, this is the spot in the Prati neighborhood to buy sliced cold cuts, cheese, and cooked dishes to take home for dinner. But at lunchtime, the shop is swarmed with...Read More

Stuffed tomatoes from Roman pizzerias

Posted on by Pat and David
Like many Roman visitors (and many Romans, for that matter), we took advantage of the city's many pizzerias for quick meals or snacks. Once our Zone 6 garden swings into production around mid-July, we hope to revisit the subject of Roman pizza for the myriad of vegetable versions. But it was in the pizzerias that we stumbled onto another quintessentially Roman dish: stuffed tomatoes on a bed of roasted potatoes. Tomatoes stuffed with rice are a standard dish in a lot of parts of Italy, but Rome was the first place where we had seen them served with a big batch of potatoes. The simplicity of the single combined dish appealed to us, as it clearly does to many Romans getting an inexpensive casual meal....Read More

And then there was amatriciana

Posted on by Pat and David
While Tsatsu Nicholas Awuku was teaching us to make bucatini cacio e pepe (see below), Alessandro Sillani, the chef of Ristorante-Caffe di Rienzo (Piazza del Pantheon 8/9, 06-686-9097, www.ristorantedirienzo.it), demonstrated the equally popular and almost as simple sauce for bucatini all'amatriciana. Tradition holds that this sugo (sauce) originated in Amatrice, a town in the mountains of Lazio on the border with Abruzzo. Many families from the region settled in Rome, adding this dish to the capital's own cuisine. Sillani heated olive oil in a large frying pan, sautéed sliced onion until it was soft, and then added a thick pinch of hot pepper flakes and a handful of diced guanciale -- cured pork cheek that is similar to pancetta but typically leaner. He kept cooking...Read More

Learning Roman pastas (#1)

Posted on by Pat and David
Much as we love Trastevere and its restaurants, one of our other favorite eating establishments is right on one of Rome's most tourist-thronged plazas—just the type of location that we usually avoid at meal time. But when we stopped for coffee one morning at Ristorante-Caffè di Rienzo (Piazza del Pantheon 8/9, 06-686-9097, www.ristorantedirienzo.it), we struck up a conversation with Marianna Di Rienzo, whose father opened the restaurant in 1952. She even invited us to come back at dinner time so that the chef could show us how to prepare some classic Roman pasta dishes. Chef Alessandro Sillani has been with Di Rienzo for 15 years. When we returned around 6 p.m., he and his assistant Tsatsu Nicholas Awuku were not even breaking a sweat sending...Read More

We love Roma in the springtime…

Posted on by Pat and David
The point of this blog is to discover food that we enjoy when we are traveling and to learn enough about it that we can recreate the flavors at home. But we have learned that some dishes are so special at a particular time and a particular place that we have to enjoy them on the spot and not worry about bringing them home. The best place to spot these seasonal specialties is often the fresh food market. Since we were in Rome in early April, all the vegetable stalls at Trastevere's daily morning market in Piazza San Cosimato were overflowing with beautiful globe artichokes. It meant that the season was perfect to try carciofi alla giudia, the traditional fried whole artichokes made famous in...Read More