posted by catherine / May 02, 2005 /
since i didn't take pictures while in italy, i figure the next best thing is to take pictures of all the stuff i bought afterwards! and believe me, this pile could have been MUCH LARGER. but i used my famous self-restraint and only spent euros on things i really needed.
the purchases pictured in this photo, starting more or less clockwise from the big white box at top:
vino nobile and two bottles of extra virgin olive oil from the contucci cantina in montepulciano, tuscany. montepulciano (see some photos here) is a small, renaissance-era town perched on a narrow ridge in southern tuscany. in recent decades it's become pretty famous for its wines, especially its vino nobile. a few of us made the drive there last tuesday. the scenery from cortona to montepulciano is pretty much what you expect: classic rolling hills, small hill towns marked by church towers, crumbling farmhouses, blah blah pretty whatever. montepulciano itself is lovely - incredibly hilly, views for miles, and a beautiful classic piazza, framed by two palazzos and a facade-less duomo. we spent some time walking the narrow streets, then stopped for lunch on the piazza, and eventually winded up walking past the contucci shop (one of dozens of cantinas we passed) and decided to go in for a tasting. i normally don't buy wine in italy to bring back to the states, but this bottle ended up not being drunk during our debacherous week, so i took it home. i don't know much about wine (i tend to think either "hmm, this is delicious alcohol! give me more!" or "ugh, this wine tastes horrible. give me more!"), but if i had to describe it, i'd say it's rich and, um, velvety? a tiny bit fruity and pretty smooth. so, you know, good. olive oil, on the other hand, i like to bring back from italy whenever i can because i think it's much harder to get good olive oil in the states than it is to get good wine in the states. and this olive oil was magnifico! peppery and light, and only like 7.50 euro for a bottle.
honey and limoncello from the mercato centrale in florence (not for me, for coworker gifts). the mecarto centrale in florence is really a wonder of the city. you can find it a little bit north of the san lorenzo church, and it looks fairly unassuming from the outside - big, but plain, marked by green accents, a red roof and lots of dumpsters surrounding it. but on the inside, you will find some of the best produce, meat, and cheese to grace tuscany. from early in the morning till about 2pm, the dozens and dozens of vendors (there are two large floors in the mercato) hawk everything from fruit to whole skinned rabbits to blocks of percorino twice as big as your head. even if you don't intend to buy anything, it's certainly worth it to just go and look around. a must see for any self-professed wannabe foodie, or any silly boy who likes to look at cow stomachs and brains (interestingly, tommy turns out to be both). there are an excellent article and photo gallery about the mercato over at the food section.
ceramics (the lemon bowl underneath the honey and the fish bowl to the left). in june of 2003, after i'd finished teaching at the american school of milan, tommy and i stayed with charles' molto generous family at their rented villa in panzano, tuscany. one day, while checking out a winery with charles, his sister johanna, and tommy, i noticed a pitcher sitting on one of the walls. i thought it was really beautiful - it had a simple, slightly abstract painting of a yellow, red-roofed church surrounded by cypress trees and a blue tuscan sky (the same pattern in this hysterical picture of the store's owners). the woman at the winery told me she'd got it in florence, but couldn't remember exactly where or the name of the store. big help. anyway, a few days later tommy and i went on a mad shopping mission in florence, and i was lucky enough to stumble across the store, cheba. i bought the pitcher immediately and have bought something there every time i go back. last year it was a small pomengrante plate, this year it was the limone dish (and tommy bought the bowl with cute fish).
a vespa t-shirt, blue scarf, and, um, rabbit fur-lined leather weirdo hat, all from the mercato di san lorenzo. the san lorenzo market is unavoidable in florence - hundreds of outdoor stalls with agressive vendors, asking for your hand in marriage if you so much as look at a leather coat or pushing "penises of florence" posters on you as you walk buy. overall, it's a totally awesome thing. you can spend hours there looking at jewelry, clothing, cermaics, stupid souvenirs, CDs, and glorious, glorious leather, all at fairly reasonable prices. i didn't buy any leather myself this trip, but several of my friends did, and they all got great jackets and purses for under 100 euros. aside from the santa croce leather district, it's definitely the best place in florence to buy leather products, especially if you're good at bargaining. this time around i bought myself a blue scarf (8 euro), that twisty red-beaded necklace (10 euro) and the blue vespa t-shirt (7 euro). i love those vespa t-shirts - i already have one - and they make pretty good gifts for friends back home. for those of you who know that tommy's uniform is his ted leo shirt - well, his backup is his black vespa t-shirt. i also bought that crazy leather hat because, well, it's AWESOME! and since i'm moving to the north pole in september, i needed something to keep my pretty little head warm.
the last thing that you can't see too well are several bars of baci perugina chocolate. um, i got these at the milan malpensa airport when our flight was delayed like three hours (which is not necessarily a bad place to go shopping; you can get cheap liquor at the duty free shop - named dufry - and other cheap chocolate things). however, the best and most authentic place to buy chocolate is perugia, a very medieval looking town in umbria. it's the head of the nestle-perugina chocolate empire, and every year they host the eurochocolate fesitval, which i attended in 2002. unfortunately this time around when we visited perugia, it was kind of disappointing - windy, cold weather and no chocolate festival :( but tommy got several bars of fondente chocolate (dark chocolate) which we later used in a chocolate zabaglione. yum.
next up: where to eat in italy! (answer: anywhere!)
Comments
Did you all do the group rental of an Italian villa thing? If so, how did that work out? I really want to go to Italy, but the global currency situation is not so favorable right now.
it worked out pretty well. the villa, which we rented for a week, ran each of us about $200 (there were 10 of us). renting cars is expensive, though, but autoeurope.com is a pretty good site. and we all ended up getting round trip plane tickets for under $500. but yeah, the currency thing kind of sucks right now, so everything else was pretty expensive. but it's worth it!
Welcome back Zunta kids! I'm glad you liked Montepulciano—that was one of my favorite towns I visited a few years back. It was the first time I'd seen one of those little torture museos that everyone seems to have and they were hosting a wine festival at the same time (which is probably like every day, now that I think about it). Nothing goes with vino nobile like a Catherine Wheel.
You got me a vespa t shirt right? right???!!!??
I just had to say hi to Catherine...I stumbled on this site while surfing for info on catinas in the bolzano region...happened to see american school of milan in the chatter and when I clicked on your pics and saw you and Christy...well, I just had to wipe a tear from my eye and all that. Che piccolo mondo, eh cara? I hope you are well.
Baci,
Elizabeth
Post A Comment