This past weekend I visited Bologna with a side of Bolognese!

Sunday, last day of my fall vacation and I decided to travel just outside of Firenze to nearby Bologna.  My intentions were to take the 6 euro train two hours to a city just 30 or so minutes from the city where I live.  Well to my dismay the computer systems were jacked and I was unable to find my time and ticket, so I settled for a 24 euro fast train with screaming babies, but at least I had a guaranteed seat.

Anyways to my arrival at 9:30 am I sat in the station and waited for my travel companion, Courtney to soon arrive at 11!  It was chilly so I wandered a bit around the area and then found a warm side of the station to sit on to keep away from the wind.  Once she arrived we decided we must walk towards their duomo, church, and find the shopping and food.

Bologna I had not heard good things about, it is dark, gothic, architecture is totally different from Florence. Their "leaning tower" wasn't much of a leaning tower but more of something that looked as if it were about to fall at any moment.

Why I was not impressed with the scenery, we decided to get lost a little bit and wander outside of the normal areas of Bologna.  While chatting we managed to get pretty lost and figured well if we have anything it's appetites so let's find our way back close to the duomo and then eat our time away until our train comes to take us home.

We order the traditional foods we were instructed that were best in Bologna.  Food wise, I was very impressed, so impressed that we splurged and even got dessert.  It was amazing.  We sat at a cafe outside and had our late lunch surrounded by huge torches of fire to keep us warm, it was ideal.

We shopped and shopped a little more, I bought nothing, thank you very much.  My shopping strike has officially started with my nightmares of having to give away my entire new wardrobe because it will not fit into my luggage.

This week we are in classes and then we have a long weekend for the holiday off Monday for All Saints Day.  I believe daylight savings for here is Saturday night of Halloween, but we shall see.  I am planning on traveling somewhere this weekend, but not sure where.  There is a couple of options, I will keep you posted!

This was Courtney's dish, it was large tortellini, called something but I forget.  It was filled with pumpkin and pancetta with a balsamic vinaigrette reduction sauce!  It was unreal!  Heavenly!

Bon Appetito!

This is the Duomo from the outside!!!

I climbed the Duomo

Yes I know I live here, and I can see the duomo from my apartment window, and even pass it everyday on my jaunt to class, and I know I haven't taken full advantage of the beautiful historical city I live in, but yesterday I decided to do just that.

I set out early in the morning to avoid the tourists and the lines of people waiting to get in. I paid my 8 euros and started my hike up the narrow, stone, claustraphobic walls of the stairways to the top.  There are 463 steps and it is advised if you have asthma or any chronic heart problems to not attempt the climb.  They have a half way mark but no place to rest, just an open area where one could lean and pant and catch their breath, but still there are over 200 stairs to go when you get to that point.  So you push forward and climb on, and on, and on, and on, until! you reach the top.




So the uncomfortable part of the climb is that some of the "going up" and "going down" pathways cross and the tiny steps you are climbing are soon filled with traffic going in the opposite direction, and you not only cannot catch your breathe because you of course have just dined on your "traditional italian breakfast, cappucino and cornetto" but you want to get this climb over with because there are so many tourists, and you are living here, so you can do this anytime, and why are there so many damn americans doing this?  Anyways to my point......

Is that the view is sooo completely worth it once you make it to the top!

But you have to remember.....you have to climb down afterwards!

Did you know.....

Did you know... you can get any type of coffee, or cafe rather, in a vending machine on the streets of Florence!  How ever you like it, one size with whichever type of brew and espresso!

Did you know... you can get a hot or cold dish of risotto or pasta pomodoro from a vending machine on the streets?

When in Rome....hello yeah guess what I was there!!!!

me at the trevi fountain!!!

spanish steps

i took no risks and did all three coins!

this is my favorite fountain in rome, it was also in the movie Angels & Demons, it was so large and beautiful all lit up.

the vatican at night, slightly blurry but still gives a glimpse of how insane it looked!

I took this after they announced no pictures.  great shot at least!

you cannot go to rome and not have some of the Roman pizza! girl's gotta eat!

another addition, the potato pizza, yes you guessed it, boiled potatoes seasoned with rosemary and put on a pizza, carb on carb, come on now, who wouldn't eat this?

me excited at the Vatican, hoping for a front row seat to see the pope!!

this is the view from the top of the college our friend took us to, it was on the roof top, it was above the whole city!

oh you know just another place in Rome!

the cat sanctuary.  there were sooo many!

this was the gelato from a great place, I ate so much food but there is always room for gelato.  Limone of course.  I just assume gelato is like water, fruit and ice, no calories there right?

Vatican by day

So, where oh where do I begin.  Rome was absolutely magnificent.  I was blown away by the experience, the views, the sights, monuments, architecture, the entire city was enormous and more than I expected.  

Initially I was warned about the gypsies and the pick-pocketing that was around every corner.  Well hello, I do live in Florence I do know a thing or two about gypsies and I was not at all hindered by the people in this community.  It felt very familiar in this city, much like New York or a city in Connecticut, it was surreal.  Everywhere you turned there was another monument or church that you had seen in your history book or in a movie.  It was amazing, in case I haven't yet said that.  So we reach out destination of Rome in the late afternoon, close to 5pm ish.  Right away we want to start seeing some sights because we only have a few days in this beautiful city.  We take the metro to the Spanish Steps and immediately next to the steps is Furla, ahh I am home.  Shopping with Furla and Gucci and Prada and the Spanish Steps it doesn't get any better than that!  We climbed to the top and took many pictures.  There were hundreds of people resting on these steps, you can tell they were weary from their days adventures.  We decided to try and make our way to the Trevi Fountain nearby and catch a snack before we searched for someplace for dinner.  We followed the tourists hoards and the big sunflowers on a stick that led each of the groups all the way to the fountain and were surprised by the enormity of the fountain.  Michael, my traveling partner in crime, found a small Roman pizza place close to the fountain, was enjoying a slice paid by the weight of enormous basil leaves, mozzarella and big chunks of whole tomato on top of it, while I took chance to guarantee my return to Rome.

The story is if you toss one coin in, you are to return to Rome someday, two coins you will return and find the person you will marry, three coins backwards, you will return, marry, and live in Rome forever! So I took no chances, and backwards tossed my three coins in!!!  We shall see wont we!

Safety and security, in all the tour books they do warn you of pick-pocketing and gypsies begging for money often.  Well yes this is true but I feel like the danger lies within the tourists.  Many of the tourists all travel the same route to each of the sites.  First spanish steps, next trevi fountain....etc, etc, etc.  so the pick-pockets know where to go, where these large groups of people reside and mingle.  It was easy to avoid the crowds at times and others it was hard, but using common sense and like I do in Florence, carry your purse in front or backpack, know where your money is, look ahead, don't cause interest to any of the locals and know where you are going, don't look around all lackadaisical and be like "oh wow, this is pretty!" Oops there goes your wallet.  So I didn't find Rome to be any worse than Florence, I felt it to be pretty equal.  Use your brain.

Next we decided to make our way across the city because it was getting late to try and find our hotel.  I was getting more and more nervous that it was getting dark and we would never find it.  I just wanted it to be clean and comfortable because already we had walked quite a bit.  We stopped by a popular touristy piazza I had read about, Piazza Navona? sp? not sure.  It was filled with tourists and lights and entertainment and fountains galore.  It was filled with restaurants with people of course telling all the american tourists that "this is the right spot," "you don't know what you are missing"  It was like being around a bunch of car salesman.  Next, we made our way to this magical bridge all lit up and across the bridge was the most magnificent sight, the Vatican.  AWWWWWW, cue angels singing.  Hahah it was so incredible.  Especially at night with all the lights and the view, it was right out of a movie.  Both Michael and I had to pinch ourselves because it didn't feel real.  We both felt like it was a replica of the real thing in like NYC or something, there is no way that the two of us could be here right now, at the Vatican, seeing this?  It was hard to believe.

We explored a bit and asked many times for directions and many times we were sent in multiple directions.  Soon we reached a man with a gps, most people in Italy own these, but mind you they still get lost.  There are too many streets in Italy nevermind one city for satellite to update them all into a gps. So we come to the address of our hotel.  One door is label communist room and the other is a gated community with passcodes.  I immediately tell Michael I am not staying in a communist dorm, we will turn around and find the train and head back to florence.  So we call our guy and he instantly shows up at the gated community.  Thank god! He shows us to our room, very car salesman like, and I am comfortable and pleased with the result.  It is clean, there is soap and towels.  No bed bugs.  We head out for a usual late dinner after settling in for a bit and try and find a place to fill our stomachs.

The traditional foods we heard about in Rome were the "roman pizza," paid by the weight and cut however long you would like, they are baked in sheets, and often with many many toppings, and the pasta a la carbonara.  We dined on the carbonara.  It was so delicious.  I loved it.  We return to our place of rest and pass out with excitement for the day tomorrow, even though it took us a bit to get to our destination we are pleased and happy that this trip is turning out so well.

Friday we wake to make a mad dash to the shop around the corner for the free breakfast, Italian breakfast mind you, a croissant and a cafe and are on our way to the daunting line of the Vatican tour.  We arrive at 8:30 with 1-200 people deep.  We finally reach the doors at 9:15, not so bad, I would have waited days to see the inside.  We are searched and scanned and led in one by one.  Swiss guards are everywhere and there are many american tourists I am surprised by the lack of Italian I hear.  We get some audio guides and head on our tour.  I, and neither is Michael, am not the artsy type but we are the slight history buffs.  So we cruise through the statues and articles from the Etruscans, Egyptians and many more.  My attraction of fever is the Sistine Chapel, everytime I see a sign my heart races.  At the end of the tour is the chapel.  All in all we spend like an hour or hour and a half in the Vatican alone, more of it in the chapel, listening to the audio and viewing all the magnificent fresco's.  Unreal.  No pictures are allowed in this room, but silly me ignored that quickly and snapped a photo.  Oops.

Next we made our way through St. Peters, which also was amazing to see.  We hurried off to meet up with a friend for lunch and picked up our jaws off the floor from all the sights and history we had just been next to.  We are meeting a friend of Michaels who is studying to become a priest.  I know I know, in Rome of all places, well yes.  This man, kid, whichever, he was 25, and a brillant person at that.  He was so educated and kind and open to all my 8000 questions about everything.  As we walked our way to his college where he studied we must have passed a dozen or so other priests or those he knew and they all kindly waved and said their hello's and continued on their way.  It was such a welcoming and nice experience to walk through Rome with someone like him.  He knew every church, what everythign was, the history behind it, it was daunting.  I loved meeting him and felt it made for such a more educational experience especially in Rome.  We took a tour with him through his college and saw all the photos of past priests and bishops, etc.  It was a beatiful place.  He then later took us to lunch, a little restaurant called "Abruzzi," named after a little part of Italy where my family is from.  Of course we dined and stuffed ourselves, and of course it was with the carbonara, they are known for it here.  We rolled ourselves down the streets to gelato, one can never eat too much, and then rolled ourselves another twenty or 15 miles or so around the city checking out all the sights.

One of my favorite sights was the cat sanctuary.  This by far was the weirdest concept.  It is were Caesar was assassinated in Rome.  It is in ruins now and surrounded below to keep the cats in.  They take care, spay and neuter and feed the cats.  They are lounge around in these ruins.  There were so many, I lost count at like 30.  It was definitely a sight to see in the middle of this city.  Definitely a must see.  Colosseum, more ruins and a few more churches.  It was an amazing day.  Lastly we decided to humor the female on board and attempt to perk her up with some shopping, at this point the priest in training left and had to return for evening mass.  Michael and I shopped a bit in a few specialty food shops and then decided that even at 7pm we could not fathom eating another thing.  So we returned to the hotel and decided to rest until dinner and then would head back out at 8 or 9ish, Italians eat late.

Well 10 pm rolls around and both of us are passed out cold.  Like don't move one muscle, land on the bed and fall asleep just like that.  I get into my pj's and Michael is passed out in his clothes.  Needless to say it was a long day with many sights and our full stomachs put us to sleep.

Morning comes and we pack up shop for Florence.  We are meeting up with our friend for breakfast before we head out.  One last croissant and cafe.  We walk along the streets to find so many early morning weekend markets.  So many fresh, huge, not so life like, vegetables and fruits.  They have slaps of beef and pork bolted to these boards clamped between these braces and are shaving off the prosciutto right there in front of us.  If only my chefs were here.  This was a sight to see.  My central market in Florence has nothing on this market and this is only a neighborhood one, this isn't their main market?  It was unreal.  So many vendors, so few tourists in these outskirts, it was great.  I took many photos and we hurried on our way to meet for cafe and cornettos before our train departed Rome.

We relaxed a bit and said our goodbyes to only hop on the train and be back in Florence in just over an hour.  It seems so unreal that there are so many places near Florence, or in Italy in general that you can travel to in such a short time and have such a different experience.  I would love to go back to Rome any day.  It was such a wonderful place.

Here are some of the 100's of pictures that I took during my few days stay.  I hope you enjoy them, nothing compares to the real thing.

A Biodynamic Farm: Poggio Antico

This farm was quite the site.  They have lived as a community with around 20-30 people all on this one farm.  They are goats, cows and many other animals.  They are self sustaining and have all their needs met by the farm.  It was a definite experience here at this farm, I was blown away by the perspectives the local farmers had here at this farm.  Their idea of living sustainably was to understand that there is more to life than just us, our bodies, our existence.  They were a bit earthy crunchy in a good way but beyond a scope that as even hard for me to comprehend.  The people living on this community, many since 1979 and others since 1983, have all their belongings combined.  They combine their money, necessities and work and labor.  It was an amazing site to see it all in action.  They use everything they can on their farm, nothing is waste!

This was the end of our week of workshops.  Now comes the fun part.  I have four mid-term exams Monday and Tuesday and then I am off to Rome.  I have packed my bags and am ready to bolt.  We have the remainder of this week of as well as all of next week so there may be some interesting adventures.  I am sad to report though after break soon to follow is November.  What November brings is only another month here is this beautiful city.  Too crazy, and too fast!  

I will keep you posted on Rome and all the adventures afterwards!  Lots of lucky charms to bring home!

The workshops have concluded on a savory & sweet note

Okay so where to begin.... So let's recap. 

Monday: Truffle digging with bella and furla

Tuesday: toured pretty much everything sustainable, eco-friendly, biodynamic traditional area in florence.  Lots of informational sessions and presentations.  A tad dry for my foodie liking.

Wednesday: Cheese Day!

This day we were at Palace Ruccelai and we got to taste over 20 different types of cheeses.  Our professors is a lover of all things goat so first on the list of cheese's of course was a little goat cheese.  These here are my personal favorite.  If anyone out there in this world of internet who knows me, knows that i do not eat cheese outright, picking up a piece of cheese and eating it creeps me out.  But dum-dum-da-dum dum, ladies and gentlemen I have stepped out of the box and grabbed me some cheese. Thank you, thank you very much.  And to top it off I even have two favorites!  But please no standing ovation and don't you dare go out and buy me any cheese.  

So in class we got a little background on her goats of course, and then a little bit about the cheese making process.  We were already equipped with the prior knowledge of making ricotta so much of the class was spent tasting.  Fruit and crackers were even provided for in between fresh, aged and aging cheese tastings.  We tasted italian gorgonzola, french roquefort 1070, english cheddars, italian parmesan of course, dutch gouda, french camembert and so many goats and other salted cheeses.  Many smoked and covered in hay, it was quite the site.

Now moving on to our big and final day, Thursday: This day was the end all be all of being an agriculture student.  I know I said before that I think they feed us ag kids more than any other, well if I didn't think that before I sure as heck do now.  So we trekked into the hills of Tuscany early in the morning to only find ourselves at the top of a mountain where this lovely couple and their family resided there to help us prepare a sustainable meal.  We are a bit obsessed with sustainability in case you haven't gotten that.  So the husband, was a celebrity chef but of course left the field to stay at home and share his skill with his family and those traveling abroad; the wife, she teaches middle school and they have two children.  The kitchen is huge, filled with canisters of flours and wheats, millions of jars in their spice cabinet; there is so much you can tell about a cook by looking at their spice cabinet, uhh I love it, it's like a candy store to me.  So the group of us 12 are divided up amongst the tasks for the meals.  The menu is so delicious it would make your mouth water.  

Appetizer: Roasted eggplant, roasted red and yellow peppers, and tomato and basil crostini's

Primo: Spinach and Ricotta filled ravioli with sage and butter.  These were twice the size of a deck of cards uhh delicious.  We eat these often in our house here in italy except we put pesto on them!  so goood.

Secondo: Red sauce from scratch with homemade gnocchi

Contorni: Roasted pork loin with roasted onions 

Dolce: Tiramisu!

Espresso of course, but pass for me, although i am slowly entertaining the idea of sharing a cup of cappucino one of these mornings

gnocchi, all made by hand

The table we ate at outside, this was so italy it was like gushing!  It was sunny, there were kittens running around, we were sharing in great conversation and eating more than we could chew.  It was the perfect day for a perfect meal.  Afterwards we all piled on a bench and absorbed the sunshine and felt warm and full.

the large and in charge ravioli

the pork

The dolce, I was in charge of this,  I am a master at this now!  We used Amaretto this time, Marsala the last, but oh boy did I have one too many servings!

This was one of the kitties that sat next to us on the bench at the table.  So adorable.  I was trying not to cheat on my kitty.  This one liked gnocchi and tomatoes, it was totally italian.

After this meal we made our way to the biodynamic farm.  This is a another story that I will tell you about soon.  Let's just say the whole sustainabilty and cycle of all life as we know it, was demonstrated at this farm.  I will upload some pic's and fill you in on the conclusion to our last day of workshops....for now at least!

More Truffles for your feasting eyes!!

Word on the street is that I got a crew back in the states that like you know, cook for a living, and they were a little enamored by the photographs so I thought I would post some of the others!  These are the same type of truffles that we searched for this day, the white truffle.  These are the hardest to find and are only located in this particular area of Tuscany.  We are in season for both the White truffles and black truffles at this part of fall.  This here is a picture of the truffles we had in the restaurant, they have people like Marco go out and search and he will work with the restaurant in exchange for money to provide them with their essential truffles they need to prepare their meals!

Workshop week, Day 1: Truffle Hunting

This is the puppy breed that searches for truffles!  So adorable.  

         So we begin our morning destination to San Giovanni d'Asso to dig for truffles.  There we meet up with Marco and his two dogs.  I do not remember both their names only one of them, Furla, and only because she was named after a purse I just bought in Milano this weekend.  Too  funny.  Anyways so for the concept of the truffles, you need to have a dog sniff them out in the woods, typically near water.  They have a strong sense of smell and very much enjoy truffles.  The idea is that you let the dogs sniff around, trained dogs and  a certain type of breed, and if they start to dig, you must, the trainer/owner, get over to the spot fast enough to stop the dog from eating the truffle.  It was amazing to see them, very trained, but also very friendly dogs, searching for the truffles.  We were given an introduction of the truffles, what it was and why people were so crazy for it.  We searched a bit with the dogs, we must have walked a few miles into the woods.  It was an adventure.  After some time we found a few small truffles, we then found a larger one.  It was around 15 grams and by the cracks you could see in the truffles this told us that it was only grown just that day.  

After the search we returned to the town and enjoyed a lunch prepared with truffles.  There was a restaurant that prepares everything with truffles.  We enjoyed our feast as usual, I always feel like they feed us agriculture kids more than any others.  We then started our destination to the vineyards of Montalcino.  It is owned by the Banfi brothers.  It is a private company owned by the two brothers who are from Long Island New York.  The operation was huge, amazing and a hell of a lot of wine.  I would encourage anyone in the states to try some.  They are famous for their Brunello and many other vino rossi wines.  We got a tour and saw the amazing production and the storage, it was unreal.  The land combined was over 7,700 acres of vineyard.  It was crazy.  We then did a formal tasting, without the spitting patoon of course of the Rossi & the Brunello.  They were both incredible.  I was partial to the Brunello.  I did not buy any because they are offered in the states so if I want to entertain a liking to the wine while at home I can find them, and of course it saves me time trying to find a way to get all this extra stuff home that I keep accumulating.  It is not good to be a foodie, wine drinker, shopper, lover of all things italian.  My tastes have begun to change, I find myself saying in my head, wow those colors together are so "classic."  I'm like "classic" who am I, but soon enough I am walking out of the store with shopping bag in hand a addition to the wardrobe and accessories i am slowly accumulating!!!  Too funny.  I live so sustainably here.  

This was the dog that was named "Furla"

Theses were the truffles we found, the dog at one of them and this was the collection of about 15 grams. This was the large one that grew all in one day!

This is a funny story.  I despise the smell of truffles mind you and we were standing in the "truffle kitchen" and the smell was too much, i had to go outside for fresh air.  So as I go outside I see next to the fence this fig tree with all these ripe figs.  So I couldn't help myself but to have a treat!  Uhh amazing.  Next to the fig tree is a peach tree, so I grab a peach.  Next to that tree is a pomegranate tree.  I mean really is this Italy? Because I pretty much ate lunch in this guys driveway!

 These are the humungous fermentation barrels that are patented by the vineyard and the brothers.  They were taller than my house!

Each of these barrels holds 450 bottles of wine, and they have thousands of these size barrels!

 These are the biggest barrels I have ever seen.  These are taller than most SUV's, and they were stacked.  They came pre-assembled and they are filled in this room and they use hoses to get them out!  So much wine, so much wine!

                                                                                                                     

Creepy Italian trees!

"There is something strange about these trees, it's like they know.  They know!  They know that we know that they know.  they are creepy, creepy italian trees."

Under the Tuscan Sun, one of my favorite quotes from the film.  These trees really are creepy and they are everywhere.

Are those all your shopping bags?????

Okay so let's cut to the chase, Milano was my heaven!  I got of the train and fell in love, not only at the station but with all the black leather pants, black boots up to your knees, mini-skirts, black scarves in 70 degree weather, I absolutely loved the chic-ness of the whole place.  I would live in Milan in a second if I could.

Once we arrived at the shopping section of the city it was all over from there.  Courtney and I with wallets in hand made our way through the 8 million tourists and began our trek to find me some purchases to lug back to the states.  My goal for the day was to buy a Louis Vuitton purse and a matching belt to go with it. Only to my surprise they are expensive, even in Milan.  I was expecting like anywhere from 250 Euros and up, but in order to get the number to come down to my range of money the purses kept getting smaller and smaller and smaller!  Eventually I decided that rent/car payment/weekend in vegas for my 30th/spa treatment for my return home, all were more worth it than the purse and belt.  I mean there are always knock off's :(.  I was saddened by this reality and moved on to try and find the next best thing.  Prada, Gucci, Dolce, Furla.  Well in the end Furla was it.  We made some purchases and broke the bank pretty much.  I enjoyed my purchasing as well as the time with my friend in this magical shopping city.  It was a great day overall.

Amongst the shopping there are a few things to note.  We found the twin of the cafe/restaurante from the movie "It's Complicated," with Meryl Streep.  Literally this place was identical.  It had brioche and cookies and a full menu with teas, cocoa's and milk and honey.  So adorable.  Courtney and I stopped on our way back to the train station for a treat.  They had the cutest shopping bags that you could purchase but we decided against it.  Would have made a cute gift idea.  Anyways so the funny part of the story is that this cafe was soo expensive.  I got a cioccolato caldo, "hot chocolate" and courtney got a "latte cioccolato" chocolate milk or something.  So we get them and mine literally is bittersweet chocolate warmed up to steaming hot.  It was beyond bitter.  Courtney's as you can see was the size of the table and was pretty much hot milk with cocoa powder sprinkled on top.

14 euros later, we ate a crepe and fruit and drank what we could of the hot milk and steaming bittersweet chocolate from our cups.  We laughed all the way to the train station about how much we paid for hot milk and a melted chocolate bar, hey it is Milano!

We did get to see the sites, shop alot and enjoy an expensive cup of hot milk!  Why not, you only live once right.

Okay well I must have some tea and sit down and do some writing, it's been on fire since I have been here, so I want to work on that before I have to go out and purchase some produce for the week.  This week we have no classes and we are workshopping it all week at multiple farms and areas in Florence.  Tomorrow is truffle digging, so I will post pic's and keep you posted on my travels.

Ciao ragazzi!