If you are arriving in Italy today, you will be greeted at the Rome airport and taken to Soriano nel Cimino, where you will get settled in.  If you are already in Italy, we can either meet at the Rome airport, the Orte train station (36 min from Rome’s Central Station), or in Soriano if you have a car.  If you are arriving by ship, we will pick you up at the Civitavecchia Cruise terminal.  We will have a light lunch, and give you a few hours to get settled in.  For those that are up to it, later in the afternoon we will take a drive to Lake Vico and have some Gelato while we look at this beautiful volcanic lake and get to know one another.  Tonight we will go out to dinner at an extremely unique Pizzeria that serves seemingly endless varieties of pizza ‘by the meter’.  After dinner, we will go home so that you can get a good night’s sleep.

Today will be a full day of cooking.  After breakfast, we’ll do some shopping at the local family groceries, bakeries, and butchers.  At around 11:00 AM, we will begin our dinner preparations.  We will make a delicious sausage and cheese bruschetta, lasagna made completely from scratch, and more.  Lunch today will be casual Italian finger foods and sandwiches as we will spend most of the day on our dinner preparations.  In the afternoon you will have a few hours to rest up after this intense day, followed by the dinner you have spent all day preparing.

After breakfast we will go to The Park of Monsters in nearby Bomarzo.  This park is one of a kind in the world, with huge sculptures of monsters and fantasy.  It is regarded as the 14th century Disneyland.  We will then go up to the enchanting Faggeta forest, where we will have a nice walk, followed by a traditional Italian picnic with Focaccia, Prosciutto, local cheeses, other local cold cuts and fresh fruit.  The picnic will be just under the forest at Sasso Naticarello (Shaking Rock), which is a huge volcanic rock that was made famous by Pliny the Elder, the famed Italian philosopher who died at Pompeii.   In the afternoon, we will learn how to make home made Gnocchi from scratch for today’s class.

In the morning we get up early and prepare the dough for tonight’s pizza class, then take off for Assisi.  In the evening we will visit a local farmer where we will spend our evening making our pizza in an outdoor wood-fired oven.  You will make amazing pizza and focaccia like you have never had before.  In between, as we visit with the farmers, we will have a chance to tour his vineyard, olive orchards, hazelnut orchards, and his private cantina, where we will sample his private wine.

You have had at least one cooking class every day this week, so today we will let you rest.  However, your stomach gets no rest until you go home.  Today we will go to see the beautiful Villa Lante.  We will then visit the provincial capitol of Viterbo, where we will see the ancient Papal palace and what is considered to be one of the best preserved medieval quarters in Italy. For lunch, we will stop in a local restaurant that specializes in Neapolitan cuisine.  After lunch, we will visit the dying town of Civita di Bagnoregio, and finally the beautiful city of Orivieto, best known worldwide for its Orvieto Classico wine.  We will arrive home to a gourmet dinner that awaits us.  Tonight we will have a very traditional menu from Soriano’s immediate area.

Today is your last day, and we have saved the best for last.  We will be going to town at 7:45 for those that would like to see Soriano’s Friday market.  However, at 9:00 sharp, we will be taking those that are up to it to a place very few people (tourists and locals alike) have ever seen:  Corviano.  Corviano is an archeological site near Soriano that reveals an ancient Etruscan village which is thousands of years old.  You will explore ancient cave dwellings, an abandoned castle, an ancient necropolis, and more. This will certainly be one of the highlights of your trip.  Corviano is a light hike, so we will return early to rest.  Lunch today will be light since we have a mega dinner tonight, and you need time to pack, but as afternoon approaches we will begin our final class… the one that will leave your mouth watering on your trip home.

In the morning you will check out of your home before we have our last breakfast together. We will then take you to the Rome Airport for your flight home, to a train station if you are travelling onward by rail, or to the Civitavecchia Cruise Terminal if you are taking a cruise.