A Walk in the Pink Park: March 2016

Thursday, March 17, 2016

The Hamptons of Florence: Fiesole

Last week I got the chance to get out of the city and go to the suburbs. This suburb in particular is considered the "Hamptons of Florence" and major names like the Medici family and Frank Lloyd Wright had houses here to enjoy the quaint & tranquil town of Fiesole.

Fiesole is pronounced like "fee-ay-so-lay" and was the go to big city for Tuscany until Florence expanded and took over the title as we know it today.

Every year 12 boys used to be sent here from Rome to become monks in the monastery on the hill.

Its a great place to hike since there are so many hills and trails - it was so peaceful and quiet - I hardly ever heard a sound except for a bird singing every once in a while.

Here is the town square - where most of the restaurants are and a few historic shrines from when the Romans came through.

We found Frank Lloyd Wright's home on our hike - so crazy that out of all the people to have a home in Florence, it's him!

On one of the hills we trekked up - if you really look you can see the Duomo!

All the little olive trees to harvest for oil - yum!

Going up the hill to the monastery!

Here's the monastery!

It was a pretty quick trip but definitely worth the views and a great way to get out of the city for an afternoon. Next time, I'd love to bring a little snack & a book!

Ciao!

Wednesday, March 16, 2016

Florence Finds: Chocolate Tasting

Last week we went to a chocolate tasting and had a crash course in all things cocoa.

Here's a few takeaways from the mini lesson on the process of making chocolate as we know it:

The difference between "cocoa" and chocolate - cocoa is a raw material, chocolate is the finished product.

Cocoa has only 100 flowers that can turn to fruit - it matures after 6 months and produces 30-40 cocoa seeds with the pulp fermented and distilled then dried (kinda like coffee).

Chocolate is a product of cocoa and cocoa mass, cocoa butter (main part of the flavor), and sugar. White chocolate is made with just cocoa butter & sugar, hence the lighter color from the butter. All chocolate is produced in Europe (especially Italy), where the highest quality of chocolate is made.

What's the origin of name? Cacacau / chocolatl (the Aztec name for it) means "food of the gods" and made from the cacao trees in central and South America as well as west Africa.

Chocolate bars were invented in Italy - not Switzerland as everyone thinks, and is known for a special kind of chocolate with hazelnuts called Giandua.

Richard Lindt invented milk chocolate (to be eaten in bars as we know it now) in Switzerland in 1875.

The types of chocolate include: forastero- strong & bitter, sour (80% of the worlds production), criollo- delicate but intense flavor 7% of the worlds production and quite expensive, and one other.

You need to pair chocolate with sweet wine to melt the sweetness of the chocolate and the wine together to taste best & need a high alcohol content. It can be a very fragrant (white) and also tannic (red wine) to drive the saliva to come to your mouth and mix with the sweetness to make it more flavorful.

Now that you have a few fun facts on chocolate, on to the tastings!

School of Eataly

Vin Santo

This is a very sweet wine and pairs pretty well with the chocolate.

The first time I had Vin Santo I wasn't really a fan, but it was alright with the chocolate!

This was on the Chianti tour I went on too, see my post about the history of it here.

Sauce Tasting #1

First up was the vegan chocolate sauce - it was so good and we were the first people to ever taste it since they were meeting with executives and buyers the next day about it! Too cool!

We honestly had no idea it was vegan until it told us at the end.

Bar Tastings #1-3

The first bar seemed to melt very fast but was oh so good! Definitely my favorite of the three and pretty light in flavor.

The second was quite dark & bitter and 70% cocoa - it tasted much darker and richer. The flavor was a little strong for me but not bad.

The last was also dark but more bitter, coming in at a whopping 80% cocoa. I wasn't a huge fan of this one as it was too strong for me but for dark chocolate lovers - this one's for you!

Hope you all enjoyed your chocolate lesson and see you in the next post!

Ciao for now!

Monday, March 14, 2016

Wines, Meats, Cheeses & Oils - Oh My!

Hi everybody! I had the opportunity to go to the Chianti Region of Tuscany a few weeks ago and it was such a great experience!!

The trip consisted of multiple vineyard tours, a typical Tuscan meat shop, and a Tuscan town with a Chianti castle.

Here are a few highlights from wine tour, below:

First Vineyard: Tenuta del Palagio

During the first tour, we sampled a couple reds, vin santo and a few different types of olive oils - or "green gold" as its known in the culinary world.
One in particular, Moraiolo (black olive), extra virgin olive oil goes best with pasta and bread.

For those who don't know, Vin santo is a very sweet wine. When I say sweet - I mean SWEET. I like sweet wine but this was a little bit much for me. Priests used it for holidays and is typical of Tuscany, produced by farmers and in the countryside and would be used for guests when they came over.

We also learned how to properly "taste" the wine. First, how to hold the glass. Use the 1,2,3 trick and count on your hand. Thumb and index should be on the stem and the middle finger should be on the underside of the glass, with the index and middle making a scissors.
Now that you're holding on to it correctly, tilt the glass over a white surface (napkin, plate, anything white) to observe the color & clarity of the wine. A dark ruby red indicates a good red wine, while a bright & clear white is another good sign. If the red is really orange, the wine is usually too old and not drinkable.
Afterwards, smell your wine to get an idea of what's inside. Once you find something, swirl it and repeat to see if you find a different ingredient this time.
Once you have a feel for it, take a small & quick sip to shock your mouth - it gets it ready for the alcohol.
For your second sip, "chew" the wine by swishing it around your mouth to take in the flavor.

On your third sip, swallow it and count for how long the flavor lasts in your mouth - higher numbers mean better quality wine.

Next Stop: Typical Tuscan (Siena) Meatshop

Here we got to taste mozzarella gelato with bits of prosciutto on top - actually better than it sounds!

Definitely try it if you get a chance! After the gelato, we went to sample some of the meat.

Tip: if the tail is left on the meat, it is a higher quality of meat & more expensive than the others offered. Such a nice stop for a little snack! We then got to "sample" different kinds of wine from the vending machines that were inside: you loaded a wine card with either $5.00 or $10.00 depending on how much you wanted to try. Once the card is loaded, pop it into the machine and choose/sample a couple wines - each sample is only a couple bucks! Some of the wine was pretty expensive too, such as Brunello, so it was a bargain to just try it for a few dollars.

2nd Vineyard

Hey there's me!

My adorable friend, Nikki, posing with the Chianti Rooster

This spot was wonderful. We tried a few Chianti and Chianti Classico wines, as well as truffle oil and grappa too! In order to bear the name "Chianti", the wine must be made of at least 80% San Giovese grapes and be made in the Chianti region. The Chianti Classico has one more step: it has to have the stamp of a black rooster on it as well. If a bottle says that it's "Chianti Classico" and does not have it - it's a knockoff.

What's the difference between Chianti & Chianti Classico, you ask?

Chianti Classico is a higher quality wine & more expensive but both are good quality - you can't really go wrong with either.

Next was the truffle oil - otherwise known as liquid gold or the diamond of the kitchen. The reason for the rarity of truffles are that only dogs (or pigs but sometimes they eat them) can search and find them. They also have a very short season, right in September where festivals are held in their honor. This is why both the black and also the white truffles are so expensive, however they will last you a while since you only need a few drops of the oil. It is quite strong and very aromatic. White truffle is harder to find & more expensive than black - white is mostly used in oil and cooked dishes while black can be used for spreads and also cooked & eaten on its own.

Lastly was the Grappa. I didn't enjoy this too much, - you take it as a shot and it tastes like moonshine. It is processed similarly to vodka but made of a particular grape instead.

Last stop, Chianti Castle

In the town, we found this cute little dog sign.

It means - "I wait for you here" and used for dog parking

Too cute!

One last tip I learned on this trip, but wasn't planned, was actually from another guest like me. A girl we talked to during the trip said that if you are starting to feel a cold or sickness coming, eat a clove of garlic. Make sure to eat it with something though since it can make you throw up if you have an empty stomach!

Well, that's all I got!

Overall, this trip was amazing and definitely well worth the forty-five bucks.

Still playing catch up with my posts since I have way too many things to share with all of you but expect some more posts soon.

Ciao ciao!

Friday, March 4, 2016

An Evening In Roma

Hi friends!

For the first school-sponsored trip of the semester, I went to where dreams are made of - Rome of course!

Fulfilling my Lizzie McGuire childhood goal of going to Rome was so exciting and, overall, a great experience. Here's a little summary about how each day went.

Day 1