Let's face it... when I am in the US, this blog runs pretty dry. After all, a blog about Italy doesn't do too well when you are sitting at a computer in Florida. Well, that is soon to change.

On May 12, I'll be heading over again, and this time I will be there for 5 months straight. No back and forth this year like I have done the last few years. But the news gets a little better... I'm heading over there with some new high-tech toys for the blog (and the rest of the site).

I'll be bringing a new Canon Vixia HF-10 High Definition camera, as well as a new Gateway P-171XL FX with a full compliment of video editing software.

My intention is to get pretty serious with the videos this summer. I'll be doing very in depth video blogs for all of the towns we visit on tours, as well as all of the festivals and events. Considering that we already have 14 tours booked, there will be a great deal of material, so stay tuned.

See you soon!

Face it, I'm back in the states for a few months, so I just don't have much material for the blog these days.  I mean, when I am in Italy, I could write several posts a day, but I am sitting here in Florida, what to contribute to THIS blog?

That said, little things catch my attention here and there, and while I was clicking away on Youtube, I stumbled across another one that had me rolling on the floor.

If you have read deeper into my blog, you certainly know the disdain I have for Olive Garden  -- actually, any massive chain restaurant, but I am about Italy, so Olive Garden really hits a nerve.

So you will certainly appreciate why I love this video....

This year wasn't my first time seeing the Chestnut Festival, but through the years, I have never made it to the Palio.  

First things first, What on earth is a ‘Palio' ?  Those who have heard the term generally know of it it in connection with the famous ‘Palio di Siena', which is a horse race.  But Palio is really  a term that can be used for any kind of competition in Italy.  The word Palio itself refers to a large banner that acts as a trophy for the winner of whatever competion is being held.  In other words, the Palio is the prize, not the contest.

Soriano's Palio, unlike that of Siena, is not a horse race.  Instead it is a half-day event that is made up of an archery competition and a jousting competition.  It is one of the main events in Soriano nel Cimino's Sagra delle Castagne (Chestnut Festival).

During the festival, the twon divides into 4 ‘contrade' districts, each with their cavalier and archer that will compete in the Palio.

The contradas are ‘San Giorgio', ‘Rocca', ‘Trinita' and ‘Papacqua'.  This year, San Giorgio swept the competition.  Luckily, Paola's family belongs to San Giorgio.  Actually, Paola's father was one of the founders for the festival, and he was the president of the San Giorgio contrada for years.  Still, I lived in the Papacqua district when I lived in Soriano, and our rentals are all in the Rocca district.  That said, I had a 75% chance shot at being connected to victory!

 The openening event of the festival is the ‘Blessing of the Cavaliers and Archers', during which the cavaliers ride (and archers walk) into the main square in a grand procession, accomanied by their districts trumpeteers and drummers, all followed by a magnificent parade of villagers in medieval dress.   They take formation in front of the catheral as a priest blesses the competitors and the opening ceremonies commence.

On the day of the Palio competition itself, thousands of people march down to the fields where the event will be held to cheer for their their respective contradas.

The even begins with a round of archery, followed by a round of jousting for rings.  Naturally, this is 2007, so the cavaliers are not jousting one on one.  Instead, they ride a course that is marked with a series of poles.  Each pole has three rings of different size.  They are scored based on how many rings they get, how big those rings are, and the speed at which they maneuvered the course.

With the second round, the archers take more distance and the cavaliers get a second shot at their remaining rings, again judged by ring count, ring size and speed.

A third and final round puts the archers at a greatly increased distance, and the cavaliers that their last run around the track in an effort for the perfect score.

When it is all done (It lasted about 5 hours), all of the scores are tallied and the contrada with the highest combined score wins this year's Palio.

From that point forward, the losers go home deflated, while the winners parade all the way back to town for an evening of extreme celebration.

The event is strongly felt in the town.  Emotions run deep.  I watched losers in tears and winners rejoice at their sumpremacy. 

I have to admit, I started out really not caring, but with all of the tension in the air leading up to the event, I found myself really excited, too. It was truly a blast!

I remember my mother telling me about her move to Southern California, and how excited she was the first time she picked an orange off a tree and ate it right there.  I was thinking, like... ok, big deal... you need to get out more!  But then again, she was from New York, and I had been born and raised in L.A.  After all, I had never seen an apple tree...  In fact, at 42 years, I still have never seen an apple tree.  Maybe I'm the one that needs to get out more.

That said, if you are reading this from Napa Valley (Hi Jac and Ami), this post might have you thinking I've been locked in a cage most of my life.  Well, that cage was walled by the confines of the 101, 405 and 118 freeways in the San Fernando Valley, and I can't stop saying to myself: ‘Dude!  I, like, fully made WINE yesterday'. 

OK, I'm going to admit that it wasn't my first time.  The first time was about 13 years ago when I happened to be here in Soriano nel Cimino during the harvest, and I helped my father in law with his private yield. 

At the time, my only point of reference in making wine was the image of Lucy rolling her pants up, stomping grapes, and screaming ‘Ohhhh Ricky'!  I quickly learned that grape stomping was actually a practice that ended about a thousand years ago when the first mechanized wine press was invented. Some towns still practiced stomping (of a small portion of their grapes) for fun and entertainment during their wine festivals, and of course THAT made far better entertainment for the ‘I Love Lucy' fans.

The ‘basket press' (Torchio in Italian), which was invented about 1,000 years ago has remained largely unchanged through the years.  Farmers throughout Italy that have their own private vineyards for personal use still use this press every year to make their wine.

Yesterday marked my second time. I went to visit Leo, Santino and Andrea.  They are actually the contractors that restored our villa, but they also have a farm with their own two acre vineyard, plus more acreage of an olive orchard, hazelnut orchard, etc.  They harvest their grapes each year, which produces an average of 1,300 liters of an excellent red.  Believe it or not, that is hardly enough to get them through the year for their own personal use!  Does that thought just drive your mind away from Lucy, and on to Otis from The Andy Griffith Show, or what?

We spent the afternoon in their cantina filling the press with the separated grapes, and watching the must (basically grape juice that will grow up to become wine) pour out.  As I watched and helped, I listened to them tell me what a true labor of love it is.  Every so often, it was time to assemble the press and start cranking away, squeezing every little bit possible out of those pesky grapes!  After all, we couldn't have a year with only 1,299 liters, could we?

In between, we would rest, eat pecorino cheese, salami and mortadella with freshly baked bread.  Of course, all the while we are either drinking the remains of last year's wine, or drinking the must straight from the press ( YUM!!! ).

It was a wonderful afternoon that I will never forget.  So much so, that we discussed expanding the vineyard for next year and dedicating a section to DiscoverSoriano's own private reserve.  We'll be planning days with our guests to share in this wonderful experience, and will set aside enough to produce roughly 300 liters of our own reserve for our guests.

Today I am off to Maurizio's farm, where he is just starting to pick his grapes.  More to come!

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Olive Garden is one of those places that really sets my blood to boil. Every time I hear the word 'Hospitaliano' I begin to cringe and twitch. When I hear them say 'When you're here, you're family', I can't help but visualize the corporate offices of a chain with nearly 700 cookie-cutter restaurants. I'd just love to show up there one day waving my hands saying 'Ciao!!! It's cousin Michael'. I wonder what kind of Hospitaliano I will receive when I help myself (as family would) in their executive lunchroom at the corporate HQ. Better yet, after you leave an Olive Garden, how many people that work there know your name, let alone consider you family? Do we actually buy into this stuff?

OK, marketing marketing marketing. But now their commercials focus on their 'Culinary Institute' in Tuscany? They imply that their chefs all go there to learn how to make true Italian food with the freshest of ingredients. They learn from a local grandmother, then come back to their local Olive Garden and you get the benefit of their newfound talents. Yeah, Right! This is just over the top. Is Olive Garden actually trying to imply now that they serve authentic Italian food? Do they really want us to believe that it is the real thing? Fresh? We are talking about a Boil-a-meal-in-a-bag-then-serve chain here, people. Their recipes are at best 'Italian Inspired', but by no means Italian. It would be like having someone serve you a sausage and call it a hot dog.

Their latest commercial talked about how their chefs came back from Italy with their new recipe, 'Chicken Crostina' . Ummm... sorry folks, no such thing, and I can most certainly guarantee that the grandmother shown teaching the chefs in the commercial wouldn't put an Olive Garden Chicken Crostina in her mouth to save her life, let alone teach anyone to make it.

So what is this 'Cooking Institute' all about? I did a little research, and I put some two and two together. It appears that someone in corporate found an independent cooking school in Tuscany and made a deal with them. Olive Garden ranks all of their chefs and managers (as any corporation would), and the top 100 win a one-week trip to Italy the following year. It appears that they send 10 of their people at a time. It sounds like a great performance perk, and they are certainly getting a ton of marketing mileage out of it. However, I can pretty much guarantee that they come home and look at the food they make at their local Olive Garden and simply shake their heads, having finally experienced the real thing. In any case, they then go back to their 'line chef' system and feed you the same junk they always have. Sigh.

 

A tradition in Italy during christmas time is the living manger.  Many towns go way beyond a simple manger scene, and produce a full scale reproduction of Bethlehem.   What makes it so special in many cases, is that they have the landscape and existing structures to really make it look and feel real.

Some towns do a better job, and others fail by comparison.  This holiday season, there are at least 15 towns doing it, and each one competes with the others to be the best.  Last year I saw the manger at the nearby town of Bassano, and thought it couldn’t possibly be outdone.  However, many people had told me that the one produced in Chia (a suburb or Soriano) is by far the best there was.

I was skeptical.  After all, the people of Soriano would naturally favor the living manger in their own suburb, and Chia is small beyond small.  How good can it be?  Still, this year I decided to check it out.

I went to Chia on December 26, thinking I really wanted to go back to Bassano.  When I stepped into their version of Jesus’ Bethlehem, I was awestruck. They had taken an area of town that was full of babbling brooks, caves, huge rock formations, etc. and literally constructed a massive production.  There must have been 500 people in full dress, each doing their unique job:  Roman soldiers, Carpenters, Blacksmiths, Baket weavers, etc. I felt as though I had been transported 2,000 years back in time.

It was so amazing, that I believe a trip from the states just to see this would be worth it. 

On my last trip to Italy, I was hoping to attend an Italian NFL football game. Actually, it was the 'Silverbowl'. Unfortunately, Paola wasn't feeling well, so we ended up skipping it. Still, while browing one of the sites, I followed a few links. One of them brought me to the Italian Baseball League. I discovered that there was a game on July 1st ina town not too far from where I am (Actually, it ended up being about 80 miles away). So I figured, what the hell! It is important to note that the Italians have 3 major sports: Soccer, Soccer and Soccer. Well, to be perfectly fair, they also follow Soccer. So, the fact that I discovered a baseball league was something I couldn't pass up. So I made the trek to Grosseto, home of the 'Grosseto Prink Orioles', the team that just won the European World Cup of Baseball, as well as the Italian Championships last year. They are in the italian version of the majors (Series A1). What I discovered when I arrived at the ballpark was awesome!! The 'stadium' was much larger than I had anticipated. I would say that it could stand against many minor league fields in the US. More impressive was the crowd... THEY HAD ONE! Remember, if you ask 1,000 Italians, maybe ONE can tell you the difference between a strike and a ball. OK, so there is probably curiosity factor. Still, it is a crowd.

The game is about to start, and Mickey Mouse (really) throws the first pitch. The game starts, and I very quickly realize that these fans (around 1500 - 2000 of them) are real fans. They know the game, and are there for their team. No curiosity factor here.

The game moves on scoreless... inning after inning. The players were pretty good. I wouldn't say any were good enough for U.S. Minors, but pretty close.

All the while, I am there with a local friend of mine, to whom I am teaching the ins and outs of baseball. As the top of the 7th is about to end, I tell him about a tradition we call the 7th inning stretch. While I am still explaining it, the batter strikes out and all of the sudden they start playing 'Take me out to the ball game' over the loudspeakers as the announcer announces the 7th inning stretch. Too cool!

After the song, the announcer mentions the presence of some Americans from Boston at the game. Apparently that was somewhat akin to mentioning the presense of a few rock stars :-)

I ended up meeting the americans, as well as the announcer (Ciao Guido), and he ends up announcing yet another American from Los Angeles... Wow! I'm famous now!

In any case, we get to the bottom of the 9th, still scoreless and go into extra innings. The game finally ends at around midnigght at the bottom of the 12th, the home team victorious.

Believe it or not, it was more fun than any Dodgers game I have ever been to!