I just had to. I’ve been here in Italy for almost 2 months and my apartment here in Milano is just 3 doors away from the best pastry shop in the city, Pasticceria Spezia Milano. I hadn’t been in yet for my favorite: Babá, a sponge cake filled with sweetened ricotta cheese and chocolate bits. [...]

How do you give a 13-year-old a whirlwind overview of Milano and other spots in Italy? I had grown up picking rocks off of Earl’s parents’ waterfront on Three Tree Point, just down from the house I have in Seattle now. (In other words, he’s known me since I was born.) So when Earl decided [...]

The excitement of a college-time trek through Europe! Hannah & Zibby started together on June 8, in Newcastle Under Lyme. They went on to Amsterdam and Berlin, took a wrong train into Switzerland, and arrived in Milano yesterday. They’ll go on to Venezia, Firenze, Roma, then Athens and Santorini. A time to discover themselves and [...]

Dinner the night before was followed by a long lunch the next day. Renata and Angelo, who live in a town within walking distance from Sanremo, were having some friends over on Sunday and I was invited to come along. So gracious! It’s a real treasure to have people open their doors and ask me [...]

Years ago, a girlfriend of mine from Seattle traveled and stayed with Marcello and Raffaella Tori of BluOne Cooking Tours in Bologna. When my girlfriend, Carri, returned home to Seattle, she kept talking with great fondness about the couple, their big hearts, and the wonderful time spent with them. For 15 years, Marcello and Raffaella [...]

New Year’s Eve. “Capodanno” they call it here. Fireworks are going off in the distance. Having just come back from the energy of Paris, I don’t feel compelled to go downtown tonight, but will follow my tradition of spending the evening writing. Part of that act is the reflection on the past year, and for [...]

Hungry in Paris? Good food is never far away. I like that the stores are specialized and are clustered near each other. Hop from one to the next and gather enough for a very good meal. Here’s the selection of food stores at my metro stop, Maubert-Mutualité, on St. Germain. The boucherie (butcher) and charcuterie (cooked [...]

What was for dinner on Christmas Eve in Paris? Fast food, Parisian-style! From my journal yesterday: 5:30 P.M. Christmas Eve, Paris. I’m eating in my hotel room, after spending all afternoon at Musée D’Orsay absorbing the impressionists and Art Nouveau and before heading to Notre Dame for Midnight Mass. At the Maubert-Mutualité exit for the [...]

It’s the holiday season, and it starts with a rush here in early December. Today, December 7, is the Feast Day of Milan’s Patron Saint, Sant’Ambrogio; it’s a citywide holiday. This day is followed with a national holiday tomorrow, the Feast of the Immaculate Conception, and all the Italian world is shut down for a [...]

After 5 months here in Milano, I’ve finally had people over for a meal! I invited Evelina, Glenda and Lydia, from the office at NABA, to come join me for lunch. We all see each other whenever I’m on campus and we get along well. Just before they arrived, I baked a fresh loaf of [...]

One thing that I brought back with me from my time in Ireland this year was enjoyment of traditional Irish Soda Bread! Here in Italy I’ve been on a constant lookout for dense, moist, flavorful bread with some nutritional value. So much of what I’ve found is white, light, fluffy and dries out in a [...]

What a street market! I rose up out of the subway this evening at 6:00 and immediately stepped into a one block section of tented stalls hosting vendors from the many regions of Italy. Wow. Cheeses, meats, spices, pastries, dried fruit. As they say “over the top”! One stall in particular had what I can [...]

Little did I know that these chocolate-dusted (and, therefore, cough-inducing) pastries were FILLED with, what else?! Chocolate and Vanilla Creme. This is not an uncommon breakfast for an Italian-on-the-go. (How about stay-at-home Italians? What are they eating for breakfast?) Pastries fresh from Spezia Pasticceria are accompanied by a little shot of espresso and, poof, you’re [...]

Oh, the pastries! Each one an art piece and divine in the mouth. Each one could make me swoon. Those pear-shaped, sponge-cake gems in the middle, with the cream centers… That cake is so saturated with some sort of lovely liquor that just picking up the pastry makes the potent liquid run down my fingers and into [...]

Took my long walk to the grocery store today, up along Corso San Gottardo, where the little specialty shops are, as well as a few “bigger” stores. The grocery store has a good variety and good quality. In my shopping bag today was: a big red pepper, a half dozen on-the-vine tomatoes, green beans, garlic, [...]

There’s a really great grocery store that I walk to about a mile away. It’s a good thing that it’s two miles there and back and that I walk because I keep finding really delicious cheeses to try out! (Uh oh! I’m much more of a sucker for the cheeses than the photogenic pastries here. [...]