Parmigiano Reggiano

Friday I woke up early and headed on up to Reggio Emiglia to Santa Lucia to see how they make the real, true Parmesan cheese.

Making parmigiano is a long process that starts with two parts: first, starting with milking the cows in the evening and letting it sit over night so that it naturally skims, and secondly mixing the skimmed milk with fresh milk from that morning's milking.

This milk is then poured into large copper vats, starter whey is added and also calf rennet- which is the special enzymes mammals have for digesting their mothers milk and this enzyme allows the milk in the cheese making process to separate the liquid from the solid. The milk's temperature is watched carefully around 91-95º F for about an hour.

The compacted final curd of the milk, muslin, is then split into two and placed into molds. It is then placed into a stainless steel mold which has the imprint of "parmigiano reggiano", the month, and the cheese plant where the cheese sits for 3 days in order to keep its form and marking. 

The cheese then must sit for another 20-25 days in a brine bath in order to absorb salt. After being salted it is brought to the aging room where it will sit for at least 12 months until--- a very long time. 

At the plant in Santa Lucia, I saw around 7,000 parmigiano wheels and a few of them were 10 years old! 

I sampled a 3 year old cheese and it was incredible, nothing like krafts parmesan cheese that's for sure!

Not to mention that all the cows are traditionally grass fed and cheese farmers argue that their cheese is best based on what their cows eat.

A Weekend in March Part III

POMPEI/SORRENTO

The last day of our weekend trip down south was to see the ruins at Pompei. Visiting Pompei was a completely different experience than I had expected. There really isn't that much to see. You get off the little train and walk about 30 meters to the site entrance and that's it. So we walked around for a few hours and it was only 2 in the afternoon so we decided to randomly hop the little train  until the end of line- Sorrento. 

Sorrento is a quaint little town right on the sea. It reminds me of the Cinque Terre with lemon and orange trees everywhere, a beautiful view of the sea with cute little shops with hand painted ceramics and embroidered dish towels .... for all the tourists. 

We didn't have a lot of time, but we made sure to stop at a caffé where we got strawberry torts and chocolate covered profiteroles, and coffee while we looked over the water. 

A Weekend in March Part II

ROMA

The main reason we took this weekend trip was to visit the Necroplis, the tombs underneath Saint Peter's Basilica in Rome. They only allow 50 people to go under a day, in groups of 12-15 people and you need to make an appointment a least a month in advance, so naturally we were really excited. 

It was very impressive and apparently I saw the bones of Saint Peter.

This was my fourth visit to Rome, but the first time that I actually stepped foot into Saint Peter's Basilica and saw Michealangelo's Pietà and Bernini's Baldacchino. 

After our afternoon at the Vatican, we headed on over to the Trevi Fountain and dipped inside a Chinese restaurant to get out of the pouring rain. We had a very friendly, unexpected, incredible surprise. The only other customers in the restaurant, another American family, bought our dinner for us without saying a word. Pay it forward.

We ended our stay in Rome by getting mojitos and hanging out in Campo di Fiori which is apparently the student hot spot on a Saturday night.

A Weekend in March Part I

NAPOLI

Bright and early Thursday Meghan, Kylie and I headed on down to Napoli. We started the day trip out right by getting the infamous vera pizza napoletana (it's better than Punch's).

 

Afterward we wondered around the historical center. It's hard to describe the atmosphere of Napoli, but I would say it is a rustic Barcelona. It seems very artsy and heavily influenced by underground culture but also stark honest with a somewhat "dirty" look. March 17th being the 150th year celebration of Italy's unification there was a lot of Italian pride- flags, music, posters, confetti...

We also made sure to stop at Scaturchio in Piazza San Domenico and get delicious Neapolitan pastries- a Zeppole and a 
Sfogliatelle. 

 Unfortunately we only had one day and saw only a small fraction of the city. It is Napoli so there is garbage on the streets, but I was surprised at the cleanliness- I thought it would be worse. I am definitely hoping to return very soon and stay a lot longer.

Carnevale

Carnevale this year started February 26th and ends March 8th. I headed out to Venice with a few friends to celebrate this Friday and it was incredibly fun and an unforgettable experience.

We were lucky to have missed the snow the day before, and we arrived for a beautiful sunny day which we started out by grabbing a venetian spritz. 

Later we headed into the heart of Venice, to Piazza San Marco where it was bustling with all sorts of beautiful, elegant, costumes.  Everyone is dressed up unrecognizable and if not wearing at least a mask they would get their face painted.

We met up with some other friends at the Ponte Rialto where we eventually joined a traveling dance party (which consisted of one large speaker in a shopping cart, an ipod, and two Italians leading the cart and mob of dancing people) through the narrow streets of Venice frequently stopping so we could dance in the little piazzas between the bridges.

We stayed up all night and waited for the first train back to Bologna at 5:57 am. We were chilled to the bone and exhausted, but it was completely worth it.