All posts by Newmexicotoitaly

Seriously, MORE Festivals?!?! (yes, but this time there’s cheddar!)

Ciao Readers!

Okay, if you’re tired of hearing about all of the festivals here, this is not the post for you. Then again, if you’re a festival junkie like me, read on…

It’s almost hard for me to believe how many festivals there are here in Florence. I think I’ve just decided that festivals are a part of everyday life – like little food markets, the passeggiata and cappuccinos (and, “purtroppo,” the post office). Seriously, I can’t remember a weekend in the past several months where there wasn’t at least one festival or festival-like happening. And now that it’s the holiday season…well, you can do the math!

This past week marked the start of the German Christmas Market which runs for about 3 weeks in Piazza Santa Croce (recall this is where the European Food Festival was held). It’s a little like that festival (complete with wurst), but with more permanent and holiday-adorned stalls, as well as more non-food gift items (pictures below). There’s also the addition of a cold-weather treat we sampled – mulled wine (pictured in Steve’s hand) – we could not put our finger on what gave it its unique flavor (wine, spices, and….varnish?).

While all of that was fun enough, the festival came to an exciting crescendo when we came across the gentleman from England and his wondrous booth of… CHEDDAR CHEESE!!!! (I actually yelled out-loud, in English, “OMG, he has CHEDDAR CHEESE!!!”) Okay, now those of you reading this back in the States may be thinking “huh, what’s the big deal?” I’ll tell you what the big deal is – it is the first time in 4 months we’ve had a taste of real cheddar cheese (and we used to eat this stuff by the pounds back in ABQ)! (You may recall I have said you can get [very expensive] cheddar at Pegna, which is true, but the taste is not spot-on). Not only does the English chap (pictured) have cheddar cheese, but he has a mind-boggling array of varieties (with jalapenos anyone?). I think we were too overwhelmed by excitement (and taste-testing) to make coherent choices, but we did come home with two blocks (some of which will make its way into enchiladas tomorrow night; while we have no green chile, I did bring dried red). We’ve agreed it’s worth the splurge, so before the festival ends we are going to go back and get one of the flavor assortment wheels pictured. Woo Hoo!!! (I actually had to e-mail another expat who I know stays on the lookout for cheddar as well – she responded with similar enthusiasm [“Yuuuuuum. How totally exciting!!”]).

I know it’s been a blog-post-filled week – thanks for reading and have a great weekend!!!

7 Comments

by Newmexicotoitaly on December 7, 2012 • Permalink

Posted in Culture Shock, Food

Posted by Newmexicotoitaly on December 7, 2012

https://newmexicotoitaly.com/2012/12/07/seriously-more-festivals-yes-but-this-time-theres-cheaddar/

Fun Fact (interactive poll edition!)

Ciao Readers!

Today I am attempting something new – an interactive “fun fact”! I have my own personal guestimates of the varying waits at the post office between the U.S. and Italy, but google as I might, I can’t find any hard evidence. So, I thought I’d let you all participate in a poll and see what we find out (for those of you in neither the U.S. nor Italy, feel free to use an experience you had in one or the other, or both; for those that have lived in the other at some time, feel free to vote in both polls as well):

Thanks for taking part! By the way, if you’re interested in the psychology of waiting in line, the New York Times published an interesting article, “Why Waiting in Line is Torture.” (And, yes, if you’re wondering, I wrote this after returning from the post office!)

4 Comments

by Newmexicotoitaly on December 6, 2012 • Permalink

Posted in Culture Shock, Fun Facts

Tagged post office, wait times, Why waiting in line is torture

Posted by Newmexicotoitaly on December 6, 2012

https://newmexicotoitaly.com/2012/12/06/fun-fact-interactive-poll-edition/

A Tale of a Good Day (Complete with mini-tour of Bargello)

Ciao Readers!

I have shared with you many stories of woe and culture shock, so today I thought I’d share a tale of a very good day. To me, this was yesterday; but since I have already written about 2 weeks worth of blog posts, to you it was probably a couple of weeks ago. (Lucky for you you’re not reading about actual yesterday (Dec. 4), or you’d be reading about my being wet and cold and homesick and about my wait at the post office.) In any case….

The day started off with a necessary trip to the Questura (where you do most immigration-related things). Now, you’re probably thinking “that doesn’t sound like the start of a good day” – but the sun was out for the 35 minute walk there and the lines were faster than usual, with the lady who’s helping me already through by the time I got there (yay!). With so much of the beautiful morning left (this was a Friday; I don’t have school on Fridays), I decided to just stroll.

Somewhere during my leisurely stroll I came upon the Bargello (lesser known museum); with my Uffizi card in hand, I walked right in (love this card!). While I’ll provide the educational tour part below, the Bargello was also cool for two reasons other than the art – 1) it was almost empty and soooooo quiet and peaceful – I sat in the courtyard and relaxed (and watched the woman pictured below sketching one of the sculptures) and 2) I bumped into one of the women from the charity organization meeting I had attended and it made me feel like this is really my town (bumping into acquaintances has that effect).

After the Bargello I decided to stroll around “my town” some more, soon realizing I was less than a mile from Steve’s school and it was almost his lunch break; we met on the hill and sat in the sun for a bit – nice! After Steve got home from work we decided to fight the urge to be lazy and go out for (yet another) stroll. First, to see if a Korean grocery store my new Italian teacher (she’s originally from Mexico and now studying Korean!) told me about really exists (it does – tiny but cool). At this point Steve needed to find a restroom, and as you may or may not know, this isn’t the easiest task anywhere in Europe and usually involves paying for the privilege. Since we were close to the Uffizi and I was thinking they might still be open (about 5:30 p.m.) and we have that card that gets us in for free, we checked it out – at first we thought they were closed because it was deserted, but the sign said “aperto” and in we went (good tip for visiting the Uffizi sans crowds)! So, how amazing/surreal is this – I waited for Steve in front of Botticelli’s “Birth of Venus”!?!?! Seriously – taking a bathroom break in the building with some of the world’s masterpieces?!?!?! Unreal. In any case, we still had an hour before the museum closed, so we strolled around and appreciated the museum.

By this time we were getting hungry, but being Italy it was still about 1 – 1.5 hours too early to think about dinner…but NOT too early to think about the aperitivo buffet at Serafini (which I wrote about and posted photos of here)! We had a lovely time at the aperitivo, and not having stuffed ourselves on what was not meant to be dinner, stopped by our favorite pizza place (which opens at 7:30) and got a margherita pizza to go. All in all, it was a very good day!

As for the Bargello, it is a sculpture museum, which used to be a prison. As I mentioned, the courtyard (row 1) is very peaceful (I didn’t know until researching later that they used to execute prisoners here – gasp!). The museum has a few lesser-known pieces by Michelangelo and (almost) an entire room dedicated to Donatello. There are also lots of tiny sculpted works such as vessels and combs and more. Photos are prohibited, but now I’ve learned in the less-populated rooms, if you ask nicely they sometimes let you take a no-flash shot (much better approach than when I did so without permission in a different gallery and promptly got yelled at and kicked out of that room). So, below, following the courtyard shots, are a few more shots throughout the upper rooms (notice the cool grotesques on the plate), ending with Donatello’s “David” as well as another artist’s (Verrocchio’s) version of David (seems like they had a contest as to who could make David look the “least intimidating,” no?).

It was a lovely stroll (I google-mapped as much of it as I can remember and in total I walked about 10 miles) – thanks for coming along!

6 Comments

by Newmexicotoitaly on December 5, 2012 • Permalink

Posted in Art

Tagged Bargello museum, donatello, Florence, Uffizi card

Posted by Newmexicotoitaly on December 5, 2012

https://newmexicotoitaly.com/2012/12/05/a-good-day-complete-with-mini-tour-of-bargello/

“Fun Facts” (an exciting new blog feature!)

Ciao Readers!

So, as you sit there reading my posts about festivals and museums and pizza, I am actually sitting here shivering from walking all day in the rain and cold. But, since I have decided not to use my blog to gripe (well, not too much), I have come up with an amusing new mini-series – “Fun Facts.” In this way I will take my woes and turn them into something fun and educational (which I will post between the usual longer, photo-filled posts). For example:

Fun Fact: Florence usually gets about 4.5 inches of rain in the month of November, which is about half of what Albuquerque, NM gets in an entire year (9). Florence also averages 15 rainy days in the month of November (yes, that means HALF the days it rains!). This November (2012), according to the weather channel, the West Side of Albuquerque (drier side, where we lived) got .05 inches of rain, while Florence was drenched by at least 5 inches. If I am doing my math correctly, that means we got one hundred (100) times more rain here than our house in Albuquerque did.

Who knew?

8 Comments

by Newmexicotoitaly on December 4, 2012 • Permalink

Posted in Culture Shock, Fun Facts

Tagged Albuquerque, Florence, rain, weather in Florence

Posted by Newmexicotoitaly on December 4, 2012

https://newmexicotoitaly.com/2012/12/04/fun-facts-a-new-and-exciting-blog-feature/

Our Favorite Local Pizzeria

Ciao Readers!

I have talked about a pizza-review post for a while, but have failed to deliver. I think the reason is, there are some things that they just do right here (like gelato, olive oil, wine, pasta….), making it really hard to pick the “best.” What it really comes down to is that there are several places that do things very well, and you end up picking the one where the folks are the nicest. Such is the case in our pizza quest. (But in case you’re wondering, we both prefer thin-crust pizzas, more crispy than not.)

Now don’t get me wrong – not everyone does pizza well. There are tons of pre-made pizza places in town where you just pick the kind you want from the display case and they heat it up for you (barely). In my humble opinion, these pizzas are really inferior (not only due to being tepid in temperature, but also in flavor), and with so much good pizza in town, why eat this stuff?! (Okay, one answer is real pizza places don’t open till 7:30 at night, while these heat-and-eat places may be open all day, but still…) “Fast-food” pizza:

“Real” pizza is made on-the-spot in a super-hot brick oven – it only takes about 90 seconds for one to cook, so it’s worth the “wait” for the real deal. We’ve only tried places in our neighborhood so far, as ya want the pizza hot when you get it home. The two runners-up in our neighborhood are La Luna (pictured first) and Le Stagioni (pictured next). La Luna actually makes pretty yummy pizza, but they are the most expensive and least friendly (not unfriendly, just comparatively less so), so lose for subjective, non-taste-related reasons. The folks at Le Stagioni are very friendly and their pizza is good, but just a little undercooked for my taste (notice the crust color), so they come in a close second (sorry for the pics – sorta like apples and oranges as the first was a specialty pizza and the second was a plain margherita):

Our “winner” is…… Fuori Piazza Restaurant (nope, not a type-o, piazza, not pizza). Their pizza tastes great (and is nice and crispy) and they are super friendly. The restaurant itself looks like a cozy local joint and next time (if we can wait that late), we’ll probably actually sit down instead of ordering pizza to go (they also have pasta and risotto dishes). Here are both their margherita pizza as well as one with ham and zucchini:

Thanks for coming along for our pizza-taste-testing! Bon appetit!

17 Comments

by Newmexicotoitaly on December 3, 2012 • Permalink

Posted in Food

Tagged Fuori Piazza Restaurant, italian food, La Staggione, margherita pizza, pizza

Posted by Newmexicotoitaly on December 3, 2012

https://newmexicotoitaly.com/2012/12/03/our-favorite-local-pizzeria/

The Best Truffle Festival EVER!!! (In San Miniato)

Ciao Readers!

Okay, my mouth is watering just reminiscing about this festival and I am still smiling thinking about the fabulous little town it was in – San Miniato. Apparently for the last 3 weekends of November every year for the past 42 years this little town has had the largest truffle festival in all of Tuscany (truffles as in fungi, not chocolate, though there was some of that as well). It was so much fun (and soooooo delicious [if you like truffles])!

Now, for those of you paying extra close attention, you may remember that San Miniato is the name of the church on the top of the hill overlooking Florence (and supposedly where San Miniato brought his severed head). Contrary to what I first thought, this is not where the festival was – there is actually a separate town (requiring a 40 minute train ride, then a bus ride into town) called San Miniato. While it is a very ancient and historic city (which you can read about here), it also had a very modern and relaxed feel (complete with a “peace” restaurant and funky musicians, pictured). It is also on top of a hill, so it has great views.

The festival itself spread throughout town – with various booths selling both truffle and non-truffle-related food specialties (and providing tastes) as well as full-fledged food stalls serving many truffle-based dishes. Anywhere you walked in town you bumped into another section of food stalls (as well as all-around good cheer). Pictured (row 1) is some of the truffle pasta we had (okay, not tons of truffles, but it really was yummy and truffle-y tasting) as well as the makings of our truffle-infused porchetta sandwich (YUM!) and our non-truffle infused pistachio cannoli for dessert. The next photos are various shots taken at the festival, followed by shots of the very cool town (including one of Steve looking content) and views. I can’t say enough about what a lovely day and festival this was. If you’re ever in Tuscany this time of year, it’s a “can’t miss”! Thanks for coming along…

12 Comments

by Newmexicotoitaly on November 29, 2012 • Permalink

Posted in Food, Trips In Italy

Tagged food festivals, San Miniato, San miniato truffle festival, Truffle Festival

Posted by Newmexicotoitaly on November 29, 2012

https://newmexicotoitaly.com/2012/11/29/the-best-truffle-festival-ever-in-san-miniato/

When it Rains in Florence….

Ciao Readers!

It’s been raining here – lots! You may have seen on the news how Venice was recently under water (more than usual). Pretty much all of the northern half of Italy was drenched. So, I decided to share some of the rainy day activities we have undertaken (seeing as we have no car and no mall to drive to)…

When it rains in Florence….it’s a good excuse for an extra-thick ridiculously rich cup of “cioccolata calda” at Grom (think hot chocolate/pudding hybrid):

When it rains in Florence…it’s a good time to go to the laundromat to use a clothes dryer and be amused by the lost-in-translation signs (here they are trying to tell you to empty the washer when it’s done washing):

When it rains in Florence….it’s the time I stare at our ceiling and think about how much I hate the “chandelier” that hangs where a perfectly functional ceiling fan should be. (In order to make my gripe more humorous I actually tried to write a haiku about a ceiling fan; the results were pretty pathetic. I then tried to write the song “Oh Ceiling Fan” to the words of “Oh Christmas Tree” – complete failure). Maybe the picture is amusing enough; behold:

When it rains in Florence….I try (half-successfully) to see the glass as half-full and take photos of the lovely rainbows that follow:

Thanks for sharing a rainy afternoon with me! P.S. – if you enjoy the blog and are so inclined…you can click on the “top blog” logo on the upper right of this page and review my blog for some possible virtual kudos. Grazie!