Greece: Athens and Mykonos

This weekend I went to Athens and Mykonos Greece. It was by far one of my favorite trips abroad! We arrived Friday morning ub Athens and went straight to the Acropolis of Athens. The Acropolis is the most important site of the city and a major monument of the world. We only had about an hour on the hill, but we still got to see it all. It was spectacular. The view from the top showed all of Athens. We also went souvenir shopping and bought fake ray bands. They were everywhere in Greece! I loved Greece already and could not wait to go to Mykonos.

We took a four hour ferry Friday afternoon to Mykonos and spent the rest of the trip on the island. We went to Paradise beach on Saturday and spent the afternoon laying out in the gorgeous sun. We went on ATVS on Sunday for a few hours and roamed around the island by ourselves. Mykonos is gorgeous! The white buildings and beautiful beaches on the island were spectacular. The food was amazing! Better than pasta! I had a greek salad, chicken, and pita with tziki sauce at almost every meal. I could probably eat a greek salad every day for the next few months. I consumed 6 salads within 3 days.

Everyone else had gryos. We also had baklava once, but it was a little different from home. We had to go back to Athens Sunday night to catch our plane in the morning, and I can tell you right now the islands are much nicer and prettier than Athens. It was not as dirty as Rome, but I did not like Athens.

I really hope I can go back to Mykonos or anywhere in Greece in the future. I loved this weekend! I only have 12 more days left in Rome, then I am back in Wilmette, IL. I have loved every trip I have taken, and do not want to leave Italy. It has been once in a lifetime opportunity and I cannot believe it is almost over. This has been an amazing 4 months!!!

Sugar does NOT cook Egg Yolks

Today was our final day of cooking class, and we made desserts! One group made Eclairs with chocolate and regular cream filling while the other group made Tiramisu.

An éclair is a pastry made with choux dough filled with a cream and topped with icing. Eclairs originiated in France in the 19th century, but many Italians have adopted this pastry and have added them to their dessert menus. Once the dough (butter, milk, and water) is made, it is baked and then cooled down. The pastry is then filled with a pastry cream such as custard, whipped cream or chocolate. For some reason our ecalirs did not puff correctly, but they still tasted good. We filled them with regular cream and chocolate cream. Yummmmm.


Tiramisu is a popular Italian dessert. It is made of lady finger cookies, dipped in coffee, layered with whipped egg yolks and mascarpone, and flavored with cocoa and liquor.

Mallory Comes to Visit: Cinque Terre and Florence

This past week, my friend Mallory came to visit me from Manchester, England. She spent the week in Rome wandering around the city, and traveled with me this weekend to Cinque Terre. It was her birthday yesterday, so we went to Florence for the day/night to celebrate her 21st birthday!

Cinque Terre has been a place I have wanted to go to ever since I have been studying abroad in Italy. Cinque Terre consists of five coast towns: Riomaggiore, Manarola, Corniglia, Vernazza, and Monterosso. We arrived Friday afternoon in the first town Riomaggiore and went to our hostel. It is located at the top of the hill in Riomaggiore with a gorgeous view of the water and the town. We took a train to the beach town, Monterosso and laid out all day. That night we went to a restaurant called Ristorante Ripa del Sole, which was a slow food restaurant. Cinque Terre is known for pesto, so we all had to try it. It was fabulous.

Saturday was our day of hiking the towns. The main hike is closed, so we couldn’t hike all five towns, but 4 out of the 5 paths. The hike from Riomaggiore to Manarola is known as the love path and is defined by locks and names inscribed on the path.

The path from Manarola and Corniglia was closed, but the hike was Corniglia to Vernazza was amazing. My favorite hike however was from Vernazza to Monterosso because we were on the coast the majority of the time and walking through the tiniest and most narrow areas of the mountain. I felt like I was actually hiking a mountain, my heart beat went up and down. I have a new passion for hiking and cannot wait to go to Colorado this summer and hike the Rocky Mountains.

We left Cinque Terre Sunday morning and took a train to Florence. We walked around the leather markets and bought some leather products, then had dinner at my all time favorite restaurant Aqua al Due to celebrate her birthday. We of course had Rigatoni alla Melanzana, the best pasta I have eaten abroad. Mallory even said it was the best pasta she has had abroad as well. After a long weekend of traveling, we skyped with some friends and went to bed.

This week is a quick one for me, with one quiz and an Italian test, but then I am going to Greece on Friday! We are flying into Athens, but spending the majority of our time in Mykonos. I cannot wait! Greece is the one place that I have been dying to see! It will be a dream come true!

Fish and Meat: Two things I do not eat. Whoops.

Yesterday was our second day of cooking. The topic of the day was meat and fish. Last week the groups made anchovies and told us that you had to take the heads off and remove all of the intestines from the fish which was rather disgusting, so we tried our hardest to cook another fish, but lost. We picked up the anchovies at a fish market. We also cooked veal, so picked up some slabs of meat at a butcher shop.There shops are right in Campo di Fiori, an old Roman market that sells a variety of fruits, vegetables, bread, pasta, and other assortments. We bought peas to eat with the anchovies as a side and zucchini for the veal at the Campo di Fiori market.

We headed back to the restaurant to cook our food. The first thing we did was cut teh heads and remove the intestines from the anchovies. I REALLY do not like fish, so I only cut off the heads and my partner Emily touched the anchovies and removed their intestines. She was brave and a good sport because it was very disgusting to do.


Here is how they looked before and after the intestines were removed.

Then we had to cook the anchovies in oil and blanch our green beans. We boiled the green beans for a few minutes in hot water, put them in an ice water bucket to bring out the nice green flavor, then sauteed them with oil and salt. Below is a picture of our anchovies dish. Bread with mozzarella cheese, sun-dried tomatoes, and anchovies with a side of green beans. Whoever tried the sandwich said it was amazing, but I could not go near the anchovies, I really do not like them.


We also cooked veal. We used a flour, salt, and pepper mix to bread the piece of meat. We then cooked the veal in oil and butter and used a wine reduction to make a creamy sauce on top. Our side was zucchini so we sauteed those as well. Again, I did not eat the veal, but I heard it was good. I however did eat the vegetables and they were delicious!


Our last day of cooking is DESSERTS! We are making Tiramisu and Eclairs. I will write about them next Wednesday!

Ciao!
-Marisa

Cilento aka Mozzarella di Bufala

This past weekend, my program took all 32 of us to Cilento, Italy for a group trip. Cilento is a region of Campania in the central and southern part of Italy. We went to this region to learn specifically more about Mozzarella di Bufala and the Mediterranean Diet. Buffalo mozzarella (Italian: mozzarella di bufala) is mozzarella cheese made from the milk of the water buffalo rather than from cow milk. Buffalo mozzarella from Campania bears the "Mozzarella di Bufala Campana" brand. It can only be called Mozzarella di Bufala if it is made in the Campania area. Throughout the whole weekend, we got to see different farms with buffalos and see how mozzarella di bufala is made from the buffalo’s milk.

Italy is known to follow the Mediterranean Diet. The Mediterranean Diet incorporates the basics of healthy eating plus olive oil and a glass of red wine, among other components characterizing the traditional cooking style of countries bordering the Mediterranean Sea. The diet includes :getting plenty of exercise, eating primarily plant-based foods, such as fruits and vegetables, whole grains, legumes and nuts, replacing butter with healthy fats such as olive oil and canola oil, using herbs and spices instead of salt to flavor foods, limiting red meat to no more than a few times a month, eating fish and poultry at least twice a week and drinking red wine in moderation.

We left Friday morning at 8:15 for Cilento. It was about a four hour bus ride. The whole schedule for the entire weekend was packed with activities and tours that I knew I was going to be in for a long weekend. We arrived at an Agricultural Farm in the Cilento area. We first started off with a five course meal of appertivo, pasta, bread and mozzarella di buffalo cheese, buffalo, pizza, than dessert. After our big lunch, we got to see the buffalo that makes the mozzarella di bufala cheese. We saw males, females, and baby buffalo. We also got to see the winery where red and white grapes are grown to make Campania region wine.

The next place we ventured to was a sea port in Cilento. This seaport is a major fishing area where there are many fishing boats that go out and catch fish for the restaurants nearby as well as to sell in the fish markets. The fisherman had just gotten back from their fishing trip for the day so we got to see all kinds of seafood from the Mediterranean Sea. We saw sea bass, monkfish, squid, clams, mussels, crayfish, lobster, and shrimp. It was interesting to see that most of the fish that were caught were still partially alive.

Dinner was at a family run pizzeria close to our hotel. We had more bread with mozzarella di bufala, pasta, and margherita pizza. We were at dinner for about 3 hours because there was karaoke. We sang and danced to Italian and English songs with the owners and had a blast. This was probably the best dinner we have had as a group. We laughed and enjoyed each other’s company all night.

Saturday was a long day. We first went to Vannulo Production of Mozzarella di Bufala. Vannulo. Vannulo is an all organic farm where they don't use any pesticides are chemicals in their food productions. This was a much bigger production set up of buffalo mozzarella. They had so many buffaloes that they use for their milk to make the buffalo mozzarella. They also produce ricotta cheese, pudding, and yogurt. The most interesting thing that I learned there was that the female buffaloes are more important than the male buffaloes because they produce the milk. The male buffaloes are only good for mating with the females so they when the males have done their job, they sell them for their meat as well as their hide to make leather goods. I also saw how they form the mozzarella into balls to be sold. The farm also produces their own flavors of yogurt and pudding, so I bought some dark chocolate pudding and it was amazing!

We then went to Pioppi, another area in Cilento, and went to the Mediterranean Diet Museum and Museum of the Sea. This place is where the inventor of the Mediterranean diet did his research. The main part of the museum however is learning and seeing different types of sea creatures that come from the Mediterranean Sea. The museum was located on the beach of Pioppi so we got to sit by the water and take pictures of the beautiful landscape.

After lunch we went to Paestum Archeological sites. Paestum was originally a Graeco-Roman city in the Campania region of Italy. Today, the city has been turned into a place for visitors to see Greek and Roman architecture. The most important places to see are: the Roman amphitheatre, numerous ancient houses, and the three magnificent Doric temples: the temple of Hera, the temple of Athena and the temple of Posiedon. Then we looked at a museum about the sites and some of the designs of the temples along with the artifacts found in the area.

Dinner that night was at Fabbrica dei Sapori which is a famous pizza factory/restaurant in the Campania region. They are known to make 15 different pizzas with regular flour and 3 gluten free pizzas. A gluten-free diet is a diet free of gluten. Gluten is a protein found in wheat, barley, rye, malts and triticale. People who have celiac disease or are intolerable to gluten cannot eat foods with those ingredients. This restaurant makes their own gluten-free flour known as antioxidant dough for people with this problem. We were able to see the ovens and processes that go into making pizza and then see a demonstration of a chef making the Regina Margherita pizza from scratch.

For dinner we were given samples of some of their pizzas. We tried the Regional Margherita (basil and mozzarella di bufala), Stranapoli (olives and spicy tomato sauce), one of their gluten-free pizzas with vegetables, Jeans (stuffed pizza with cheese and ham), and Nutella pizza. They were all delicious! My favorite was the Stranapoli pizza.

Our last day in Cilento was spent in Salerno. Salerno is a city in the Campania area in South-West Italy. It is a town located on the Amalfi Coast on the Tyrrhenian Sea. We first stopped at Giardino di Minerva, a botanical garden in Salerno. During the Middle Ages it was used as a garden for teaching students at the medical school in Salerno. The garden is special because it is dedicated to the medical herbs from the Mediterranean to help cure anyone that is in need of medicine. Monks wanted to cure their pilgrims, travelers, and other people all year round so they created this garden that was accessible to anyone. When we first arrived, they gave us a sampling of their tea, which they make from their gardens with mint, licorice, and rosemary. It was really interesting because it started out kind of bitter then at the very end you get a hint of sweetness without adding any sugar. Afterwards, our guide showed us around the gardens and pointed out certain plants to take note of. There was a variety of different herbs and plants that they grow along with flowers and some orange trees. They even had a plant that is apparently used to make gin. It was a gorgeous garden and had a great view of the Amalfi Coast.

We then had some free time to hang out at the beach and enjoy the beautiful weather. Before we headed home, we enjoyed our last meal in Cilento at a Pizzeria. Everyone was able to order their own pizza. I got a pizza that had tomato sauce, artichokes, olives, and peppers. It was amazing and probably my favorite pizza I have had in Italy.

As you can see from my blog, we basically ate all weekend, but it was all fantastic and yummy! This week my friends Mallory and Jenna are visiting. For Easter, I will be spending the weekend in Cinque Terre and Florence. I cannot wait to sit on a beach and get some sun!!

Ciao Ciao!

-Marisa