Casalinga Lunch in Cortona, Italy

Cortona is a charming Etruscan and Medieval walled hilltop town that is easy to reach via the Italian train line between Rome and Florence. One hour and 23 minutes on the train from Florence, exit at Camucia, and take the 15-minute bus ride up to Cortona. 

Piazza Garibaldi e chiesa

Walled city and view

Of all the times I have been to Cortona, my most recent trip was the first time I visited Cortona when it was not crowded with tourists.  

Locals in the Piazza

Wear comfortable shoes since many streets are very steep, and you have the opportunity to walk several paths, either along the wall or out in the country.  

Typical Cortona streets

This particular day, though not a clear day for gorgeous views and photographs full of vibrant color, was still quite wintery, and I enjoyed breathing in the clean air from the hillside and the smell of wood-burning fireplaces.   Early in the day, we found a good local restaurant that we would return to for lunch.  

Trattoria Tacconi Agniolo and a local woman

We asked Graziella, the owner and cook of our "Cortonese typical food" restaurant, to save us a table at one o'clock.  It was necessary to do if we truly wanted to eat there since the restaurant has only five tables.  

Graziella showing the fegato (liver)

We then resumed our exploration and chose to climb uphill so we would work up an appetite for all the delicious homemade food we would eat a couple hours later.

Fresco

Cortona views and streets

The restaurant is Trattoria Tacconi Angiolo (Via Dardano, 46, Cortona; phone: 0575.603588).  Deciding what to order wasn't easy.  Most of the dishes offered this day are dishes I enjoy.  Each region in Italy has its specialties.  This restaurant identifies its food as Cortonese style, but perhaps I am not yet experienced enough to tell the difference from Cortonese, Fiorentina, and Toscana food because all the dishes she was preparing were the same specialties in Florence. Graziella showed me the kitchen -- it was like being in their home -- and what she was preparing. 

Baccalá (salted cod in tomato sauce)
Fagioli (cannellini beans) on the back burner

The restaurant is called a trattoria (small restaurant), but it is really more like a casalinga (housewife, and also refers to a restaurant that serves homemade food and is very simple.)  It is like going home to eat at mom or grandma's house.  The atmosphere is no atmosphere.  That is how simple it is.  But the food is always delicious.  Tacconi is open only for lunch. Graziella does all the cooking, and her husband, Angiolo, serves your food. 

Graziella e Angiolo nella cucina

We took Angiolo up on his offer to order a half order of primi piatti (first plates) (3,50 euro) because we did not want to fill up before our second plates arrived. Oh, and the pasta comes from just across the street at the fresh pasta store.  

Fresh Pasta

I ordered pici (a long, hollow pasta) with fresh tomato sauce for my primo piatto and Arista di Maiale, which is a Cortonese and Florentine specialty of pork, and fresh spinach for my second.

Arista di Maiale

After lunch and stuffed to the gills, we walked along the wall and in the country for a good two hours to work off just how full we had become...well, that and also because we spotted a bakery we knew we would want to sample later in the afternoon.

View

Il Bramasole, Frances Mayes's house (Under the Tuscan Sun)

When you are ready to leave Cortona, I recommend you ask the bus driver his destination.  There are two buses that leave the same piazza at the same time.  Since only one bus was there, it did not occur to me to ask. We were engaged in conversation when all of a sudden I realized we had been on the bus too long and the road was unfamiliar.  I inquired of the bus driver where we were and where we were going.  Of course, everyone in the front of the bus got involved in the discussion between the bus driver and me.  Sure enough, we were on the wrong bus.  Luckily, we were heading in the right direction to return to Florence, and he let us off near another train station.  If it weren't for the fact that our train was five minutes in ritardo (late), we would have missed our train to Florence.

Oops!  Stazione Castiglion Fiorentino

Cortona has so much to offer, to see, and to do, yet I only touched on one of my favorite topics, food: where to eat with the locals and off the usual tourist map. We were the only non-Italians in the restaurant, and we enjoyed our food, the interaction with the locals, and our day overall.
-- Josslyn
Cortona, Italy

Prato

Nineteen minutes by train from Florence (15 km), I arrived to Prato, Italy, to meet a friend a meta' strada (halfway) and see a town I've been curious about for quite some time.

Basilica Cattedrale Di Santo Stefano

I find it hard to imagine, coming from Los Angeles, that Prato, with only 180,000 inhabitants, is Italy's third largest city following Rome and Florence

Fresco on the ceiling inside the Basilica Cattedrale Di Santo Stefano

Prato has its history in textiles.  Today it is the garment district of Florence.  Full of immigrants in the past 60 years and Chinese in particular since the 1980s, it is also Tuscany's official Chinatown.  If you're really desperate to eat Chinese food while in Tuscany, then Prato is the place to find authentic Chinese cuisine.  The "Made in Italy" label on the scarves and many other items you might buy while in Italy are often made by the Chinese in Prato, Italy.

Shadows above the candles

Finocchiona salami

Finocchiona is a Tuscan salami made with fennel seed and one of my all-time favorites.  Its origin is from Prato when allegedly someone stole a salami from the market and hid it in a bushel of finocchio (fennel).  When he later retrieved his salami, he discovered the salami had absorbed the aroma of the fennel. And a new salami was born.

Prato (field under grass, meadow) is a small town with a very old historical center and well worth visiting.  There are several churches to see with a few important pieces of artwork, the textile musuem, a castle, some nice piazze (squares) to pass some leisure time and fare una bella chiacchierata (to have a good chitchat).

And I am always in the mood for a caffeè macchiato (espresso with a spot of milk).  Don't forget from my recent post, this is also home to the famous Antonio Mattei biscotti.

-- Josslyn

Prato, Italia

Reflections

From the age of two Los Angeles is where I was raised and lived, yet it never felt like my home. Until I began traveling abroad, I believed I had a midwesterner's heart because I desired a simpler, slower, and less transient lifestyle.  Not to say it doesn't exist in L.A., but what I sought didn't exist for me in L.A.  In fact, I've often thought I was born in the wrong era. Perhaps the Renaissance?  Lorenzo de' Medici is the person that comes to my mind when I think of that question that goes around the Internet: If you could have lunch with anyone, who would you choose?  However, lunch wouldn't be enough time to satisfy me. 

Don't get me wrong.  I love Los Angeles and California.  It's a gorgeous state, and both the city and state have much to offer.  Probably the best climate in the world can be found in various parts of California, and the state is like a country unto its own with the varying geologic and geographic terrain barely an hour away in any direction.

We are taught in the society within which we live what we are "supposed to" do, think, say, look like, dress like, feel, desire, achieve, and buy. Some of us (I) end up having internal conflicts over following our heart versus following what we were taught.  Operating more on emotion, spirit, and inspired action rather than rational, conventional thinking has been the result of my unorthodox life.  Depending on my perspective (it constantly vascilates), I can feel like I've missed out on so much, or I can feel gratitude for the freedom to take the risks I choose.  More often than I'd like to admit, my life feels lonely because the paths I take are less traveled.

Since a child, I have loved meeting people from other cultures and have had a ravenous appetite to learn about the people from other parts of the world.  In high school I used to watch the foreign exchange students in awe, desiring to be like one of them in a foreign land exploring and experiencing the differences and similarities of human beings, customs, and cultures.  Growing up in an unhappy household, there was a lack of guidance, direction, and support to branch out from mainstream conventionalism.

My brother used to tell me that at around the age of 18 to my early 20s is when I would figure out who I am and what I'm all about.  Am I retarded?  I'm still asking myself those questions and more.  For many years, I believed I wasn't even from this planet, that I'm some sort of alien.  Being painfully shy, socially inept, a misfit, clumsy, unloved by the ones I wanted to love me, I felt such deep solitude and loneliness.  (Only occasionally do I fall back into that state nowadays and not for long.  Not to worry.)  Everyone else in a group seemed to have a connection, but I wasn't connected.  I remember as a teenager, smoking dust and driving a car full of kids around, and my car and my body feeling like they were astroplaning (no, I don't mean hydroplaing), and parking and walking a few inches above the ground   I wasn't even connected to the earth.

Traveling Abroad:  It was a romance with a wonderful, special Dutchman that finally got me to Europe my first time in 1994. Before and after that first trip to Europe, trips were in the planning stages with friends.  They would flake for any number of reasons, excuses, and fears.  I quickly grew tired of waiting on others and not taking the trips I wanted and started taking responsibility for my own happiness and realizing my personal dreams.  It took only one trip abroad to learn how much I love traveling solo.  Sure, I enjoy having shared stories, memories, experiences, laughs, mishaps. And at the same time, traveling solo, the opportunity to meet the locals is so much greater.

Once I felt the earth under my feet in Europe, I realized I was honing in my home, and it's not the Midwest of the U.S. Before Italy, I didn't like to travel to the same place twice because there is so much to see in the world and wanted to see something I hadn't before seen.  That changed when I discovered Italy.  I know many people share this sentiment:  "I feel I belong here" or "I found home."  I hear people say it all too often.  Excuse me.  But there isn't room for all of America and England here.  Italy is my home.  Can we close the borders now and stop allowing into the country the expats that continue to come here since my arrival?  

I was especially impressed with Italy when I returned my second and subsequent trips.  To be chased down in Piazza Navona, Rome, where there are thousands of tourists 365 days a year, or a small village or in the streets of Florence and welcomed back in Italy and remembered where we met, when we met, what city I come from, and even coming close to remembering my name is damn impressive to me.  Even years later, I am still stopped in Florence by people I think I've never before seen that tell me "it's been three years last April" since they last saw me.  How do they remember when there are millions of us flooding their towns and cities every day, year after year?  But that is only a small piece of what impresses me about Italy and why I call it home.

I spent about five weeks living in a cupboard between our lease ending and my moving into my new, amazing home last Wednesday.  The temporary place started out fine but got harder daily at about week three and a half.  Tired of working on a stool, having one burner to cook with, a convection oven that looked brand new but didn't work, and a TV that also didn't work was the framework for a monastic five weeks. Joking that the most spacious part of my monolocale was the shower is barely an exaggeration.

Still finding my way, still asking myself some of those same questions, I know I've come a long way from who I used to be -- that shy, insecure person still pops her head out.  It's built into my DNA -- because I have the courage to act on inspiration (it comes from within, and I get more as I evolve).  I am proud of what I have achieved in such a short time and love the paths I currently travel.  The view is amazing.

-- Josslyn "Giosalina"

Firenze, Italia