Italy Adventure - Day One (November 23, 2009)

Currently on a trip to Tuscany, Italy.  Trying to post daily but we have limited access to the internet and so much to eat and drink and enjoy!  I am trying to type them daily so that even if I make multiple posts in a day they are accurate:

DAY ONE

Today we arrived in Italy. As always it was a little unexpecteded adventure. We flew from Dallas to Chicago, then Chicago to Brussels and then we were supposed to fly from Brussels to Florence. After a four hour layover and a slight delay in Brussels, we were ready to go.  Then suddenly there was a huge comotion at the gate and people were arguing in Italian and obviously very upset. It is very amusing to be standing amoung a group of people who are very upset and animated about a situtation, yet you yourself have no idea what the situatation is because no one is actually speaking English. We got the gist of it but had to wait until everyone yelled and threw little fits until we could get someone to tell us what was going on.  Basically they decided to fly us to Bologna, which is north of Florence and then put us on a bus to bring us to the Florence airport.We looked at it as a way to see a little more countryside of Italy but the business travelers and locals were not exactly excited about it. It did put us about 4 hours behind our original arrival time but we are on vacation and didn’t mind. When we finally arrived at Florence airport, we received our rental car, a FIAT 500. SO CUTE!!! It is red and about the size of a mini cooper. It is a fun car to drive, and after navigating through Florence rush hour traffic we were on our way to Greve.

When we arrived, eating was our top priority. Many places were closed, we think because it was Monday, but we found a restaurant in town, Gallo Negro, that was open, well, actually we asked him to open and he turned on all the lights and let us in, but it was the most amazing meal to start off our vacation.

The meal started with a bottle of house wine that was about $16 US. Our first course was a crostini with pork lard and shaved truffle. Don’t make a face because it was AMAZING!!!!! Yes - all those are TRUFFLES!!  We were in awe!  Add a little freshly pressed olive oil and we were in heaven. So simple yet so good. The bread was a simple Italian country bread that had no salt, which was very very good, and even better dipped in Olive Oil, with a little salt and some fresh grated Parmesan. Next we had the Spagetti Carbonara. Now in the US that is typically one of the heaviest things you can order on the menu as it is full of cream and bacon but this was light and full of flavor. So good!!!! Then our next course was a Mixed grill that we split as well. It had sausage which was delightful, amazing pork spare ribs, a simple grilled chicken breast and this out of this world steak. All of them were so simply grilled but had so much flavor. Tonight wasn’t a dessert night although Reagan had some limoncello. Overall it was the perfect meal to start our adventure.  The funny thing is that when we arrvied at the farm, Cccilia our hostess told us that the restaurant we went to was just ok.  Funny how persepctives are different.  At least we know that the food can only keep getting better!

We arrived at the farm, Podere Torre, after dinner and Cecilia had wine waiting for us. We unpacked, sat on the roof deck for a bit drinking wine and now we are ready to collapse, which I guess is fair after 28 hours straight of traveling. Tomorrow the adventure really begins.