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Our Italy Trip


little ms foodie

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We had a beautiful drive from Florence to Bologna but there were A LOT of motorcycles on the narrow roads which made it a bit white knuckle also.

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we could not have had better weather!! The beginning of Sept was a perfect time to go. Our first night we stayed just outside of Modena in Castelfranco Emilia. The farmhouse we had rented ended up being not to our tastes and the area wasn't as close to things as we wanted to we moved on the next day to Parma.

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we could not have had better weather!! The beginning of Sept was a perfect time to go. Our first night we stayed just outside of Modena in Castelfranco Emilia. The farmhouse we had rented ended up being not to our tastes and the area wasn't as close to things as we wanted to we moved on the next day to Parma.

It wasn't Villa Gaidello by any chance, was it?

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we could not have had better weather!! The beginning of Sept was a perfect time to go. Our first night we stayed just outside of Modena in Castelfranco Emilia. The farmhouse we had rented ended up being not to our tastes and the area wasn't as close to things as we wanted to we moved on the next day to Parma.

It wasn't Villa Gaidello by any chance, was it?

yes it was, they were very nice about letting us out of our intended 3 night stay

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Another place we really liked in Firenze was Enoteca Ponte Veccio. the woman who ownes it with her daughter is a gem! and they carry Amedei chocolate for those of us in the hunt (Ling if your reading this, this is where we picked your up- but they have big bars too one of which Dayne ate while I got ready for dinner one night!).

The first night in ER region we drove into Modena and stumbled upon Caffe Concerto and had dinner!

started with house cocktails (non alcoholic with compliments) and aperitivos of nigroni and aperol with soda. then shared the salumi misti.

Tortellini di zucca

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medaglioni fillet

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then there was this Cone Dessert that looked like a witches hat and dayne was in love!

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cafe and wine with dinner and in the Piazza Grande it was just what we needed!!

this was our view during dinner

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this is the restaurant from the square

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This area is very industrial until you find the center of each city, park and walk inside where they don't allow cars- and then it is heaven!!!

Edited by little ms foodie (log)
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Wendy - I am truly loving your blog and pictures. I'm going on a trip without my passport and it feels like I'm there with you. The only downside is that I cannot taste the glorious food that you posted. Though I have been tempted to lick my computer screen several times.

Doddie aka Domestic Goddess

"Nobody loves pork more than a Filipino"

eGFoodblog: Adobo and Fried Chicken in Korea

The dark side... my own blog: A Box of Jalapenos

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Thanks DG, so glad you are enjoying!!!

We spent an entire day in Bologna which is just marvelous for food!!

First off we wandered around the markets

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then we went shopping for salumi!!

do you see the prices??? oh my!

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now this is what I call a deli!

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we bought some of this salami stagionato

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Such great photos of food and of Italy... What a wonderul trip.. It seems like you guys really did it right.. I had no idea Tall Drink of Water was your husband.. Ahh its all coming together now..

A night too these cities take on a whole new feel.. This pictures really makes me want to jump on a plane..

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Really Daniel?? I thought everyone knew!! haha!

In Bologna we decided to have lunch at Tamburini which is a 100s of years old salumeria and cafeteria. On the way we passed more nice windows!!

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Then we hit the cafeteria! Like no other cafeteria food we have had! It was fun and very busy, definately a locals place. We had a hard time stopping ourselves from ordering way too much!

fontina and proscuitto heated together in the microwave as your ordered it!

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We also had a few types of pasta and more salumi and a quartino (?) of Lambrussca - we ordered that by accident, not to our liking but at least we experienced it!

this is the Tamburini truck! I would love to see it in my neighborhood! :laugh:

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more salumi shopping after lunch. Each time we would buy some the counter guys would let us take some of these!!!! YUMMMMMMMMMM.

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Dayne's favorite moment...gelato by the breast squirting fountain!! :laugh:

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Then the day turned a bit shakey as there was a slight scooter and rental car occurance.... :unsure: after some time with the local police we went off to do our much needed laundry and had a few beers at this spot while waiting

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some postcard writing, beer and cheesypoufs- I'm addicted to these and buy them in every country we go to. I could do a whole blog just on cheesypoufs and their subtle differences- in Italy they make them with the parm that doesn't pass muster for being sold by the consortium!

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Bologna is one of my favourite cities! Wendy, the picture are great. I am feeling nostalgic of years as a student when I would visit friends in Bologna every other we...and the nights after the cinema lining in front of "Bombocrepes" for a warm bombolone nutella and mascarpone

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The bread on the top left is the typical from town it is called pane a pasta dura, because of the low water content. It's so good. The one looking king of a butterfly is the "coppietta" from Ferrara

fontina and proscuitto heated together in the microwave as your ordered it!

Prosciutto in a microwave :wacko: There is no more religion.

more salumi shopping after lunch. Each time we would buy some the counter guys would let us take some of these!!!! YUMMMMMMMMMM.

Pork cracklings. They are crasy for the pork. Did you try the cicciolata? That's to much even for me

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Wendy, awesome report! You have brought back a number of great memories both in Tuscany and E-R. I am sorry that Villa Gaidello didn't suit you. I found the place very charming with great food. I wonder if it has changed since I was there in 2003? Did you visit any balsamico acetaie?

John Sconzo, M.D. aka "docsconz"

"Remember that a very good sardine is always preferable to a not that good lobster."

- Ferran Adria on eGullet 12/16/2004.

Docsconz - Musings on Food and Life

Slow Food Saratoga Region - Co-Founder

Twitter - @docsconz

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I loved the pork cracklings and did not need to be educated on what they were! I was like a kid in the candy store.

Doc I think that we were just in the mood for something central in a town since we were doing some much driving around during the days!

We had a nice breakfast there before leaving and there were very gracious!

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We ended up staying right in the center of Parma at a funny little place called Hotel Button ("cute as a button"....) Dinner was right next door at Gallo d'Oro

salumi misto + gnocco frito- now this is what I'm talkin' about!!!

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we also had risotto with parmesan, rabbit with olives, pork cheek with balsamic sauce and this utterly amazing panna cotta with berries!

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finished off with sambuca con mosca!

The next morning we were up early for our tour of the parmesan cheese factory!!! I'm just going to apologize right now for the number of pictures coming your way. We just LOVED this!!!

very excited and goofy!!

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once they are done with the whey they put it in containers and feed it to the pigs!!

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and they also use it to help ment broken bones and ailments!

this guy was here on dr's orders!

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I would recommend a tour of a Parmiggiano Caseificio to anyone in that area. It was a ton of fun, very educational and unique to the region. Nice pics, Wendy!

John Sconzo, M.D. aka "docsconz"

"Remember that a very good sardine is always preferable to a not that good lobster."

- Ferran Adria on eGullet 12/16/2004.

Docsconz - Musings on Food and Life

Slow Food Saratoga Region - Co-Founder

Twitter - @docsconz

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thanks doc!!

here they've cut the curds into two big balls and have caught them with cheesecloth

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after they seperate the curds from the whey they put it in the round molds and write on them

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this is the template that is used to mark the factory's number- ours was 2322

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then they float in a salt water bath, this is the only salt the cheeses get! they are floating and they are flipped by being pushed on with a stick so both sides are salted

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and then you go to the CATHEDRAL OF CHEESE!!!! :biggrin:

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and there is one robot that grabs every cheese and turns it, cleans it and cleans the shelf. And it's just plugged in on the back wall :laugh:

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after the tour we sat around and ate huge chucks of parmesan! and then we bough A LOT!

As doc said if you go to the area you really shouldn't miss this. Yes you have to get up early which I am not a fan of but it is truely a very fun and interesting experience. It was really one of my favorite days! After the factory tour we took off to go the the Ferrari factory outside of Modena passing the Barilla factory on the way!

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Thank you LMF so much for sharing your trip with us. Your pic's are some of the best I've seen anywhere. What kind of camera do you use, are all the photos from the same camera? Also did you have a set daily food allowance or just go with the flow? All that wonderful gelato it's not fair you should be made to share. How much would a typical serving cost? Also do you speak Italian and if not was language a problem? All that cheese is beautiful. Thanks very very much again.

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thanks guys you are all very sweet!!

doc slaughter we have a very nice and small cannon powershot sd550 7.1 mp that we use all the time- it's the same camera we use for our Dinner shots.

We don't have any kind of allowance, we just do what we want. depending on where we were gelato would cost anywhere from 2 euro to 5 euro! We do not speak Italian but of course we tried and we really like these small little menu guides that we have purchased for france, spain and italy. in fact when people gave us menus in english (which was rare as we try to go to places that are italian only) we would ask for them to give us at least one in italian so we could learn more. language has really never been a problem for us in any country- even russia!! we just take our time and try to communicate best we can, it's all part of the fun of travelling!!!

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oh also I wanted to tell you that to make that fabulous "king of all cheeses" only takes 45 minutes! and then it just sits and ages.....

and we really loved that the cows, cheese and pigs were all kind of bound together!

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Ferraris!! the factory is in Marnella

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then we drove back to Modena and had a really fantastic lunch at Ristorante Da Danilo. No pictures but we had prosciutto e melon, papperdelle with lepre, roast baby goat, caprese, wine and so far our best espresso of the trip

A question, we ordered caprese salad quite often and almost always the tomatoes were very firm, not ripe and really hard. is this normal??

After buying some very nice 30 year old balsamic from a great little shop and wondering around Modena a bit more we stopped for camparis and aperols and then headed out. Modena is very charming!

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Dinner our last night in Parma was at the Ristorante Oriental.

We started with ricotta stuffed tortellini

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TallDrinkOfWater ordered this very nice wine on the advice of our waiter- delicious!!

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steak in balsamic (how decadent is this!!!)

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gorgeous veal

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parm with 100 year old balsamic!!!

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then it was on to Venice!!

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