Food Lover's Odyssey

Burano -- Jewel of the Lagoon

From the boat, the island looks like a veritable treasure chest, loaded with jewels of every color.  It is instead an island of colored houses sitting atop the turquoise lagoon.  Always, I have wanted a house that is brightly painted, both inside and out.  I've been known to paint each room in my house a different color to remind me of specific places around the Mediterranean.  But here, I've found my dream village!

It's like looking at my 164-count box of Crayola crayons. The houses are each a bright contrasting color because the fishermen wanted to be able to see their houses from out on the lagoon.  It was also a way for these fishermen to navigate themselves back to their unique houses in the morning mist of the lagoon. 

Burano is a lazy quiet village during the day.  There are many gathered together or alone on chairs outside chatting or yelling across the small canals at others relaxing in front of their own houses.  Here it seems the streets are extensions of living rooms.  

Burano has about 7,000 inhabitants, and the brightly colored houses are also here for tourists to enjoy.  I wasn't given one dirtly look from owners as I clicked away on my camera.  Instead I was greeted with smiles and "ciaos."

Besides its colorful houses, Burano is known for it's fish dishes.  You can find several restaurants serving typical Buranese dishes of sarde in saor (sardines marinated in onions and raisins), or the risotto al nerro di seppia (squid risotto with a black sauce made from the juices of the squid).  Burano has a tradition of lacemaking, and you can visit the lacemaking museum (Museo del Murletto).  Unfortunately, lacemaking is a dying art, and much of the lace is mass-produced and imported from China, so shop carefully if you want something hand-made and from Burano.

The kaleidoscope that is Burano is a magical place to spend the day.  It's a scenic 40- minute vaporetto ride from the Fondamenta Nova vaporetto stop in Venice. 

Good Food at Taverna San Trovaso

 

Eating in the traditional Italian way, 3-5 courses a meal, is extremely hard to do by myself.  My brother and his family were traveling with me for a while, so I had some help with eating the many different Italian courses available.  
 

 

Here in Venice, we ate at the Taverna San Trovaso and its sister restaurant, Ristorante San Trovaso.    Most of the same dishes are available at both places, except the taverna serves pizza, which is also very good, and t he restaurant has an outside seating area, which the taverna doesn’t.

 

To manage a dinner of 3-5 courses, we would usually share many or all of the courses.  The first time we went my brother and I shared the Spaghetti alle Vongole (spaghetti with clams) for our primi piatti (first course).  We both love seafood and thought this was the best spaghetti with clams we’ve ever had. 

 

I asked my usual question of the waiter, “Come e fatto?” The waiter told me it is made with oil, garlic, very little white wine--used only to open the clams, the juice of the clams, the spaghetti, and finished with chopped parsley.  Simple and Buonissimo!  They blended the juice from the clams and olive oil to make a simple sauce that added the flavor of the sea to the pasta.  They don't skimp on the clams either!

My brother was sad he didn’t order the plate for himself, and that is the real reason we went back a second time.  He made some excuse about wanting to try their pizza, but not so surprisingly, he ended up with his own plate of Spaghetti alle Vongole.  I tried the pizza with vegetables the second time, and it was very good.

Dishes we had and can also highly recommend include the Spaghetti allo Scoglio (literally meaning spaghetti of the rocks).  It's spaghetti with shellfish in a tomato broth.  For secondi piatti (second courses), the grilled calamari (which may only be available at the restaurant) is exceptional.  As are the Frittura Mista (mixed fried of seafood) and the grilled sole. 

 

We also had a few of their desserts.  I  got only tiny bites of both the Tiramisu and the two plates of Profiteroles that we ordered to share between the five of us, proving how good these two desserts were.  I also had the Sgroppino, which is lemon sherbert drowned in vodka.  It's served in a wine glass and is a refreshing end to a very big dinner.

 

They give you the bill (il conto) on a ceramic dish with the restaurant's name, address and phone number painted on it.  My sister-in-law wanted it as a souvenir, so at both the restaurant and the taverna they sold it to us for 5 euros each.  Our request seemed extremely strange as it took two to three waiters to decide on a price, and even had one waitress cracking up and going to her boss to ask if buying the dish was even possible.  We were eventually able to buy the dish at both the restaurant and taverna and have a memory of our time in Venice.  The taverna San Trovaso is located on the Rio di San Trovaso right after the Accademia bridge in the Dorsoduro section of Venice. 

 

Notes on what a traditional Italian meal includes:

Antipasto--- (meaning before pasta): which usually includes some type of salumi with bruschetta (By the way it’s pronounced bru sket ta)

Primi Piatti (meaning first plate/course) which, depending on the region, is one or an option of  pasta, rice, or soup

Secondi Piatti (second plate/course) which is a protein dish--what type of protein also depends on the region....since we're in Venice and so near the ocean, fish is the most popular.

Contorno which is your vegetable ordered to go alongside your secondo piatto.  This includes salad, so you don't get it before the meal like in the U.S.

Dolce which is dessert

 I’ve asked around, and this is not normal everyday eating for Italians.  Normally they have a pasta, protein and vegetables, and possibly fruit for dessert at home.  They will go all out for holidays and eat traditionally then, or when special guests arrive.  (One of my classmate's husband is from the south of Italy (Bari), and she says whenever his family gets together they eat like that.  Even my Italian teacher was surprised to hear that.  When going out to dinner, my Italian teacher said the amount of money available decides how big the meal is, but Italians are more inclined to splurge a little when they go out.  It's perfectly acceptable to share all or any courses with your dining group.  

A Morning at the Rialto Market

I haven't found my dream gondolier yet, but I did find my dream fish market.  I spent the morning at the Rialto Market, which is most popular for its fish market located next to the Rialto Bridge in the Campo della Pescheria.  It's a place to watch the few real Venetians on the island go about their daily lives.  The vendors shout salutations to the nearby store owners as they go to their stands.  Some even place their lunch orders ahead of time.  And, the few Venetian housewives (casalinghe) and grandmas do their shopping for the day's meal and put their purchases into their rolling shopping carts.

I'm fascinated by the fish, their names in Italian, and how their displayed on ice.  Each fish is labeled with an F.A.O.  number.  This number indicates exactly where the fish was caught anywhere in the world.  I love to watch the vendors slice and dice the fish into fillets, and spent a lot of time staring in awe at the fish mongers at work.  I can fillet a fish but not nearly as quickly and efficiently as these guys do it.  

Along with the fish market, there is a fruit and vegetable market (Erberia). Summer fruits and vegetables are in abundance now, along with those beautiful zucchini flowers.  The fruit and vegetable signage also names the origins of the produce.  The Rialto Market is open from Tuesdays through Saturdays from 7am to Noon, a little later for the Erberia.  Get there early like the Venetians do in order to see daily life in Venice.

I have several ideas for dishes and am sure I'll be making a few more stops at the Rialto Market during my stay here, and might pick up some of those little snails, too. 

Relaxing in Venice on the Vaperetto

I've finally landed in Venice.  It feels great after 32 days of traveling from one city to another every third or fourth day.  My 25 kilo suitcase, also not fondly known as the "red beast", is no longer a burden.  The first thing I did when I arrived was let the beast free and rid it of all its contents.  It is resting silently under my desk in my apartment.  Yes!  I'm in an apartment with my very own room, no hostels (for a while, anyway) and a kitchen!  You can look forward to me cooking and recipes in the very near future. 

I'm here for a month and will also be studying Italian.  I'm taking courses at Istituto Venezia.  We'll see if the Italians are more patient with my mispronunciations than the French are.  (A little disclaimer for the French---I've actually studied Italian for quite some time in the past---so I should be a little better at speaking it than French.)

I spent the morning of my first day here riding the vaporetto around the the Grand Canal and the edges of the Venetian Islands. 

During my first class, we did an exercise where we had to guess a few "fun facts" about Venice.  I was astonished to learn that in Venice, there are:

116 islands (Venice is actually made up of these islands)

416 bridges

176 rios (little canals)

170 campaniles (bell towers, and YES, they still chime starting at 7am!)  Long ago, these used to be used as light houses to guide the Venetian sailors.  Am I the only one who wishes they were still light houses and not morning alarms?

1000 chimneys!

only 60,000 actual Venetians living in the city

a whopping 12 million tourists a year, on average

and in 2007 they had a record number of tourists visiting --- 21 million (My mouth actually dropped when the teacher said this number was the correct answer.)  The Venice Tourist Board must be doing something right; the magic and beauty of Venice doesn't hurt either.

Of course, my American business mind kicked in and I asked who is making the most money from all the tourists?  The gondoliers was the teacher's first response. 

She also commented that you should pay 80 euros for a 30-minute ride.  And, those gondoliers that offer a "discount" of 40 euros for 15 minutes, aren't doing you any favors.   Humm, I have a fascination for gondoliers, anyway, and am always snapping pictures of them.  And, to find out that not only are they cute, but with all these tourists they must be rich. 

Note to self:  Find a gondolier!

Tasty Roman Dishes at Il Fico Ristorante

We did find some zucchini flowers at a restaurant in Rome.  The restaurant was wrapped around one of the small winding streets behind the Piazza Navona.  It's name is Il Fico Ristorante, and one of the house specialties is the terrine of zucchini flowers (La terrina ai fiori zucchina).  The paper-thin zucchini flower is the perfect vessel to encase creamy fresh ricotta and parmigiano reggiano cheeses melted together with an addition of some chopped parsley.  Many of the dishes we had were simple and delicious. 

Other typical Roman dishes that were also good included:

For starters, both the bruschetta and Caprese salads were fabulous.  The tomatoes are so sweet here you could eat them for dessert.  The Caprese salad was one of the best I've had with those same sweet tomatoes and buffalo mozzarella cheese, salt and olive oil.

Tonnarelli Cacio Pepe & Ricotta -- The tonnarelli is house made.  Tonnarelli is an egg pasta that is a little thicker than spaghetti.  Cacio  e Pepe is a typical Roman dish.  It's also made with few ingredients.  The sauce is basically the pasta water (some places use wine, some don't) heated with pepper. The addition of pepper to the heated pasta water creates a greyish or darkish (scuro) sauce.  Off the heat add the Pecorino Romano (sheep milk cheese).  Fico puts their own spin on the dish and also adds fresh ricotta cheese.  The waiter said the addition of the ricotta lightens the dish a little.

Bucatini alla Amatriciana -- Another Roman classic, and it is my favorite pasta dish in Italy.  The sauce is made with pancetta, tomato sauce--made with the sweet fresh tomatoes, red pepper flakes and pecorino romano cheese.

The prices weren't bad either.  Pasta dishes (primi piatti) were around 8 euros and proteins or second courses (secondi piatti) averaged about 12 euros.  My brother got the Veal T-Bone steak and my sister-in-law the steak, which were both good.

The restaurant is just north of the Piazza Navona, so after dinner we strolled over there and admired the Bernini fountains, pondered buying a painting, watched street artists, and had some gelato for dessert.

Information on Restaurant Il Fico:  Located at Via di Monte Giordano 49, Rome -- www.ilfico.com

Campo dei Fiori

 

The Roman forum, Vatican, Catacombs, Trevi Fountain and everything else in Rome can wait.  Instead, I spent half the day in the market at the Campo dei Fiori.  Campo dei Fiori used to be a field of flowers, the literal translation of its name, but now it's the food market in Rome's historic city center.  They had sun-dried tomatoes, purple Roman artichokes, zucchini flowers, tomatoes, flavored pastas, herbs, meat, poultry, salumi, and about anything a cook could want.  They also have stalls selling flowers and some clothes, and you can pick up a jersey of your favorite Italian soccer team there.

 

I fell in love with the zucchini flowers.  Mainly because I don't see them at any Farmer's Markets in the San Francisco bay area.  (If anyone knows where to find them in CA, please let me know.) 

I asked the vendor how he would cook the zucchini flowers.  Batter and fry them was one way he suggested.  The other was to stuff them with tomatoes, mozzarella, and anchovies and bake them in a hot oven until the cheese melts.  Both ways I will try once I'm done being "little Miss Tour Guide," as my brother's been calling me and am in an apartment and able to cook.....oh, I'm so looking forward to that day. (June 8th is when I'll be at my apartment in Venice---with dependable wifi and a kitchen).

 

Besides the zucchini flowers, the sun-dried tomatoes were in abundance.  They had three kinds with the most expensive being the sun-dried pachino tomatoes (small and sweet tomatoes that come from the pachino region of Sicily).  I bought some of those for future use.

 

Campo dei Fiori is a definite stop in Rome.  Even if you don't have a kitchen while you're there. You can pack the goods up and ship them or bring them back home with you.  I met an American couple while I was there, who said they had a suitcase full of food goods they were bringing back with them.