blogfromafar

Pictured: A Riff on a Hamburger

Gary read about it in Saveur, otherwise we would have missed it. From the street, Roscioli looks like “just another” fantastic local shop chock-full to the ceiling with meats, cheeses, wines. But in the back is a tiny restaurant with elegant, white-tableclothed tables surrounded by high gray stone walls.

You’ve got to have reservations. We did not, but put our name on the waiting list and by virtue of showing up and asking one more time, finally scored a table. (more…)

We are here in Italy reporting live from our Wine and Food Week in Tuscany. Here is what struck us today.

Italy is always wonderful, beautiful, but we love it most when special moments open and give us a sense of the people and their heart. Case in point above: Squadra del Cuore – the Team of the Heart. This soccer team plays in San Fermo up near Lake Como in Northern Italy. They’ve come here to Tuscany for a little “teambuilding” (same name in Italian) prior to the “preparazione” for the season that begins in September.

For Italians that live in Lombardia up north, a trip to Tuscany can be something a little exotic; after all, Italy has only been a country for the last 150 years or so. So, our friends from the Team of the Heart spent yesterday seeing the sights in Siena, where each adopted a contrada (neighborhood) and is now sporting a scarf with the corresponding logo (caterpillar, goose, giraffe, etc.). (more…)

We were on a quest for the best pizza in Napoli and found it three times. Twice in Naples, and once, horrifyingly for pizza purists, in Sorrento. Pizza is best consumed when you are already a little dizzy from hunger and after a sip or two of that lunchtime birra you don’t allow yourself back home.

It’s all there: the circle of life in a pie. The elements are all there: earth (San Marzano tomatoes grown in Vesuvian volcanic soil), wind (smoke rising through yeasty crust), and fire (from the igloo-like woodburning stove). (more…)