Eating Santa Margherita – Miramare Breakfast

Restaurant: Grand Hotel Miramare (Breakfast)

Date: June 26-29, 2011

Rating: Mid level Italian breakfast

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As I’ve written about earlier, almost all hotels in Italy include buffet breakfast. The Grand Hotel Miramare is no exception.

This is the same dining terrace as we ate dinner at on the previous evening.

And the view still doesn’t suck.

The have cappuccino and juice as always.

Various sausages, sauteed mushrooms, tomatoes.

Italian bacon. Eggs.

Breads.

Juices.

Yogurt.

Cereals.

A few cakes and jams, although nothing compared to the cake selection at the Adriatic beach hotel.

Fruit and cheese.

And a closeup of the cheese. Missing here, oddly for Italy, were the cured meats like Prosciutto.

My plate. A bit of protein, a bit of cake.

This local cake was really interesting. Not only did it have various dried fruits inside (raisons and some other stuff), but it had fennel seeds!

Overall this breakfast, while totally fine, was a bit of a disappointment considering the level of the hotel. The more commercial Palace Hotel (here for breakfast) we stayed at earlier in the trip had a much more extensive buffet, with even a slightly higher ingredient level. Even the Real Fini (here for breakfast) may have had a few more options, although the breakfasts were fairly comparable.

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Eating Santa Margherita – Hotel Miramare

Jul25

Restaurant: Grand Hotel Miramare (Dinner)

Location: Santa Margherita, Italy

Date: June 25, 2011

Cuisine: Ligurian

Rating: Old school

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Finally, we enter the final phase of our epic trip: Liguria. This is another seafood area, but quite different than Milano Martittima. Here we are on the Riveria, at the top of the Ligurian Sea instead of the adriatic. Near to France and home to Belle Epoque grandeur.

Our hotel — the white one — the Hotel Miramare, on the western end of this lovely town. We got lazy the first night and decided to try out the hotel restaurant.

And the view from the dining terrace. It sucks to be in the Italian Riveria.

The menu. A slightly unusual fixed price one at that.

An amuse. I can’t for the life of me remember what. The “spoons” are edible bread though.

A nice light white Ligurian wine. I liked the easy-drinking whites in the region. They go well with seafood and don’t last.

Grapefruit juice. Yes, this is a bonafied option for the anti-pasta!

Or instead you could choose these very nice local Morrone fish fillets, marinated with a small salad.

Borraggine herb rolls with egg-plants and buffalo mozzarella. Borraggine is a kind of nettle. The dish was, however, delicious!

Taglierini with local scampi. This is a classic pasta type. Very simple with fresh tomatoes and garlic. If it ain’t broke, don’t fix it.

Baked sea-bass in herb flavors. Very nice fish, also local.

Glazed ribs of veal with rosemary. Duchesse potatoes and spinach coupole Mornay. Old school, but tasty.

They also have a full salad bar you can help yourself too. It was fairly extensive but I took it easy and got only simple greens. I’ve never actually seen a salad bar in Italy, and here it was at this five-star hotel! There were also some local cheeses at the salad bar you could grab.

Petite fors.

There was an extensive dessert cart. Sachertorte.

Grandmother’s torte (with pinenuts).

Tiramisu.

Creme Caramel. One of my favorites.

A kind of berries and cream torte.

This was a peculiar and slightly old school restaurant, but the food was tasty, and the view and terrace impeccable. No complaints.

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Eating Certaldo – Il Castello Certaldo

Jul23

Restaurant: Il Castello Certaldo

Location: Celtaldo, Italy

Date: June 24, 2011

Cuisine: Tuscan

Rating: Nice view, ok food

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Ah, the last meal in Tuscany! (except for breakfast) We took a couple hours to visit the cute little town of Certaldo. The old town is up on a hill and you ascend by funicular. The town was great, but there weren’t a lot of restaurant options. We chose the most likely looking.

At the end of the main drag.

And the dining terrace turned out to have this rather lovely view.

And pretty courtyard.

The menu.

Olive oil and vinegar.

House wine, white.

And red. Both decent, very cheap.

Local meats, including the big one which is a special local salami with saffron in it.

Bresaola with pecorino and arugula.

Marinated mushrooms and artichoke hearts.

The now familiar panzanella. Last time you’ll see it though as we’re leaving Tuscany.

A risotto with vegetables, peculiar in being slightly soupy, but supposedly decent.

A truffle risotto soup (haha, just a soupy risotto). Tasted good though.

Local pasta in pomodoro sauce.

Spaghetti alla carbonara. Not bad, although perhaps not as eggy cheesy as it could have been.

Ravioli with cheese, butter, and sage. Those that ate this felt the ravioli might have been packaged.

THe same ravioli, but with a truffle sauce. They were fine.

Roasted potatoes.

Pork fillet in balsamic sauce.

Saltimbocc alla romana. Veal with ham and sage. Pretty tasty actually, but salty.

And a bit of gelato to finish.

This was a decent meal. The patio location — which we had entirely to ourselves — was absolutely world class. The food was good. Not great by any meals, but decently executed. The company, though, was as good as the view, so all was good.

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Eating San Donato – Pizzeria Pretorio

Jul22

Restaurant: Pizzeria Pretorio

Location: San Donato, Italy

Date: June 22, 2011

Cuisine: Pizza

Rating: Best pizza we had on the trip

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The wine guide who took us to Montacino seemed to have very good taste in food, and so we’d asked him where the best pizza in Tuscany was. He was confident it was a place in the tiny town of San Donato called Pizzeria Pretorio. We trekked for 30 minutes each way just to find out.

San Donato is one of those pretty small stone towns. It wasn’t very big, so it didn’t take long to just stumble into the joint.

And they turned out to have such a terrible view.

And cramped unappealing terrace — not!

The menu.

One thing about this terrace — it was hot hot hot in the Tuscan sun. So I took an artsy water bottle shot.

And we felt that pizza called for beer, in this case the special premium “silly beer!”

Here is pizza margherita with mushrooms.

Calzone Napoli: Ricotta, prosciutto, cotto, salami piccante, mozzarella.

La fabrizino: small tomatoes, sausage, porcini, mozzarella and arugala.

Then the piece du ressistance: the four seasons. We don’t know exactly what was on this, but clearly the green pesto & zucchini part was spring, the sausage winter, the squash part fall, and the remaining one summer.

Overall Pretorio was some damn fine pizza in an impeccable location.

Then walking out we stumbled onto this: an artisan gelato place.

Oh the hardship. This turned out to be one of the three or so best gelatos I had in Italy too.

The didn’t have a lot of flavors, but those they did were really good.

Chocolate.

Lemon.

And my trio: Cassata di Siciliana (ricotta with candied fruits), chocolate with cherries!, and nutella. All three flavors were fabulous, but the nutella was hands down the best nutella gelato I’ve ever had (and I’ve had plenty). It was so thick I wondered if it just WAS nutella, but really I know better as even at fridge temperatures nutella becomes unspreadable.

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Eating Florence – Gelateria Santa Trinita

Jul21

Restaurant: Gelateria Santa Trinita

Location: Florence, Italy

Date: June 21, 2011

Cuisine: Gelato

Rating: Awesome!

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On our first day in Florence we had walked by this Gelateria with huge lines (not far from Nove IX). And then coincidently I was talking to our wine country guide who was a definitive foodie and a Florentine native and he recommended the very same place as the best in Florence.

So on our second day we had to try it.

I mentally think of gelato as falling in two broad flavor groups. These are the “non fruits” (i.e. chocolates and cream flavors).

Some more of them, and some hybrids like cherries and cream.

Then we have the fruits.

A couple more angles on this stuff.

Yum.

I went for “creamy” this time, with pannacotta and tiramisu type flavors.

Half the group going to town.

This was indeed one of the best Gelato places we ate at on the trip, although there were certainly lots of very good ones. I asked them for a sample of their pink grapefruit too and it was totally spectacular, making me want to get a whole second cup.

As a second opinion though, my wife thought Vivoli, was more to her taste because she loved the “chocolate mousse” fluffy style flavor. In 1986 I spent five days in Florence, and I went to Vivoli at least twice on each of those, as at that age, and not having much gelato it was mind blowing. It was certainly still good, but I thought Santa Trinita was a little better personally.

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Eating Florence – Caffe Pitti

Jul20

Restaurant: Caffe Pitti

Location: Florence, Italy

Date: June 21, 2011

Cuisine: Tuscan

Rating: Touristy location, very good food

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On our second day in Florence we came out of the Pitti Palace starved and thirsty.

One of our guide books directed us to a spot just across the street from this grand piazza, which is a location always fraught with peril for “over touristy” restaurants. This one surprised. Yeah they had an all English menu, but the food was very good. Plus there was a special truffle menu that had some delicious items (one of which, sadly, I forgot to photo /cry).

The menu.

Prosciutto and melon.

Tuna salad.

Caprese.

Special caprese, with burrata instead of regular mozzarella.

Panzanella, bread, tomatoes, olive oil.

There was also a bresola with parmesan and white fresh truffles that I forgot to photo — but it was incredible.

Penne pesto.

Simple risotto with fresh truffles. This was fabulous too.

Spaghetti pomodoro.

French fries for the kids.

A very tasty little lunch, proving that random (or semi-random) picks can work fairly often in Italy.

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Eating Montalcino – Le Potazzine

Jul19

Restaurant: Ristorante Le Potazzine

Location: Montalcino, Italy

Date: June 20, 2011

Cuisine: Tuscan

Rating: Tasty traditional

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We took a most excellent wine tasting tour of Montalcino (the home of the one and only Brunello). This was led by a top flight young guide named Matteo Perinti, who took us to a pair of top flight small wineries (but more on that itself later). In between we stopped at Montalcino the home base for Brunello.

Montalcino is one of Tuscany‘s long list of ugly locales — just kidding. It’s a gorgeous mediaeval village — with a LOT of wine for sale.

We went to the restaurant owned by the Le Potoazzine vineyard, which was one that we visited. Not only was their wine incredible, but they run a nice restaurant.

For lunch we actually had their IGT Tuscan, slightly down the curve than this amazing Rosso Di Montalcino, but I didn’t get a photo. If you can find the above wine in the states do — it was incredibly seductive.

Tuscan Prosciutto.

And a wider selection of local cured meats.

Panzenella, the very traditional “salad” of stale bread crumbs, onions, tomatos, and fresh olive oil.

Bruschetta with tomato, basil, and olive oil. Tuscan’s have no fear of serving bread too many ways.

Minestrone soup.

Gnocchi done the simple way, with cream, butter, and cheese.

Risotto Brunello. Very fitting, and very tasty.

Local wide pasta fresca with vegetables.

This was a nice little lunch place. Certainly nothing radical about the cooking but every dish was delicious.

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Eating Poggibonsi – Babette

Jul18

Restaurant: Ristorante Babette

Location: Poggibonsi, Italy

Date: June 19, 2011

Cuisine: Tuscan Seafood

Rating: Great food, great value

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After our self selection failure on Saturday, we got another restaurant recommend from our host (the owner of our villa). He sent us to this casual but very good seafood restaurant in Poggibonsi.

As usual there is a nice outside dining space.

And a gigantic menu.

This being all seafood we got both a prosecco.

And a local white from San Gimiangano. This is one of those joints where the wine is like E10. I like this light quaffable, almost Greek-style, white.

Caprese.

One of my friends and I ordered this “assorted fish appetizer, min 2 people” which was E10 a person, it came with this and EVERY dish until the pastas! An amazing assortment. This one was “Tuna with balsamic dressing.”

Marinated white anchovies and onions.

Crostini with white I think is a fish row mayo.

Marinated Salmon with red peppercorns.

What I think are winkles, or little sea snails, in a delicious garlicky sauce.

Octopus pulp. Also garlicky.

Muscles.

Scallops stuffed with a kind of pesto scallop paste.

Some tasty but undetermined shellfish “stew.” Wow, that’s a lot for two people and E20 total.

Home made pasta with a kind of tomato pesto.

White Risotto with mixed seafood. This was good, and unusual in that usually seafood risottos have some tomato in them.

Risotto with squid.

Strozzapreti with Fish ragu. This was highly unusual (for me) and really good. It was essentially a ragu made using shellfish instead of ham. It was very salty, with a significantly briny taste, but very tasty. The al dente shells were a fantastic foil.

Pizza Margherita.

Mixed fried fish. Lightly fried and delicious.

Branzino, simply grilled and filleted at the table.

A very very typical fish preperaration all over the Medditeranian, but done very well here.

The final presentation of the fish.

Not only was this restaurant a bit different, being all seafood, and very good, but it was an incredible deal. The bill was less than E20 a person and we had an incredible amount of food.

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Eating Poggibonsi – Osteria da Camillo

Jul14

Restaurant: Osteria da Camillo

Location: Poggibonsi, Italy

Date: June 18, 2011

Cuisine: Tuscan

Rating: Very mediocre

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We were in Poggibonsi to drop my brother off at the bus/train station and we spent a few minutes wandering around and then picked a likely random lunch restaurant. This turned out to be our worst pick of the trip compared to expectations. It looked like all the other likely places — and it was even very touristy — but the food just wasn’t very good.

The menu.

This inexpensive Chianti Classico (probably 10-15 euros) was perfectly nice though.

Classic bruschetta with liver. These weren’t bad, one of the places better items. They weren’t however even close to the best bruschetta we’ve seen.

Mixed bruchetta, also fine. Starting from upper left and going clockwise. Fava beans, lard, mushrooms, and tomato.

Spicy pici with walnuts. This pasta tasted like glue. Paste. It was pretty gross. I think they added flour to the sauce, making it like elmers.

Tagliatelle al pesto. Edible, but very mediocre pesto.

Green tortelli with fossa cheese and yellow pumpkin cream. I didn’t try these.

Linguine with cheese and pepper. This was really bad too. Not even close to the amazing pepper and cheese pasta at Trattoria Pepei. I could barely eat a few bites. The pasta was pasty. Those thin slices of pecorino has an unpleasant melted cheese taste, and the sauce — there barely was one — tasted of paste.

Penne pomodoro.

Tagliatelle with tomatoes, olives, capers and hot peppers. Didn’t try this either.

Chicken, green beans, tomatoes, mushrooms. This was fine, not horrible. Not really a dish that does it for me though.

This place was completely unique for this trip in that it actually had bad dishes, several of them. That pretty much makes it the worst meal, even though it wasn’t horrible or anything. But it goes to show, eat out 50 times in Italy and you can find a dud!

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Eating Tuscany – Villa Breakfast

Jul13

Location: Staggia, Italy

Date: June 11-25, 2011

Cuisine: Tuscan

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This is our third year renting a villa in Europe for a big chunk of June. I’ve experimented with different ways to handle the breakfast situation for a large number of people (9-15 is what we’ve had). It’s not practical to go out everyday, it would just take too long to wrangle everyone, and a free for all at the house (which we tried last year) has all sorts of issues. Namely the challenge of restocking the groceries and cleaning up. So, our houses at this year’s villa arranged to set and clear a continental breakfast table, to which we added some local products. Overall it worked out very well.

The first thing I need is my coffee. Cappuccino this time of morning. Our hosts made them, which was convenient as last year my dad was making them straight for 90 minutes every morning. Given that many people have two, and the slow speed of the little home machines, it’s hard to churn a lot of them out.