Published on Friday, November 15, 2013 by Kathy McCabe The Italy Mix is a post about the most interesting Italy and Italy travel news and human interest stories around the Web each week. Here are our top picks for this week: Venice: Google Street View: How did Google captures the alleys of Venice without cars? Employees carrying backpack-mounted cameras. (The Guardian) St. Peter's Bones: For the first time in hist...

Published on Tuesday, November 12, 2013 by Kathy McCabe What do Italians do at the end of October and beginning of November? They harvest their olives. Up and down the country, huge olive producers as well as folks with just a few trees on their property bring together friends and workers to pick the olives from the trees. Once picked, they gather them up for a trip to the olive mill. As part of the Southern Go...

Published on Friday, November 1, 2013 by Kathy McCabe When in Rome, do as the Romans do and when it comes to the lauded dessert Tiramisu, they get theirs at Pompi. Pompi is known as "Il Regno Del Tiramisù"  or "the kingdom of Tiramisu." The original location for the kingdom is a coffee shop/bar, Bar Pompi,  in Piazza Roma di Rè. This is where Romans would flock to buy a Tiramisu for a dinner party or get a swee...

Published on Monday, October 28, 2013 by Kathy McCabe I've been in the region of Puglia, in the heel of the Italian boot,  this week. The most southern part of the region is called the Salento and here they eat a favorite sweet pastry -- pasticciotto! This single-serving, crusted cake with sweet filling was born sometime in the 18th century. Of course, there is debate about where exactly this sweet treasure was in...

Published on Sunday, September 22, 2013 by Kathy McCabe The grape harvest has begun in Italy and looks to be on track to make more high-quality wine than the 2012 harvest. According to Italy magazine, "Climactic conditions in summer 2013 favoured a slow but optimum ripening of grapes, resulting in very high quality." The harvest (vendemmia) is about 10 to 15 days later than usual though. A forecast by Istituto di Serviz...

Published on Sunday, September 15, 2013 by Kathy McCabe 10 Things We Love About Italy from The Perennial Plate on Vimeo....

Published on Friday, September 13, 2013 by Kathy McCabe The Italy Mix is a post about the most interesting Italy and Italy travel news and human interest stories around the Web each week. Here are our top picks for this week: Take Action for Tiramisu:  An Italian politician has asked the European Union for protection for that precious dessert - tiramisu. (Italy Magazine) No Fun at Leaning Tower of Pisa: A panicked ...

Published on Sunday, September 8, 2013 by Kathy McCabe The Academia Barilla in Parma is the first international center dedicated to the development and promotion of Italian gastronomic culture. So the folks there know a thing or two about Italian food and how it should be prepared and eaten. The center recently published  10 Italian cooking commandments according to Academia Barilla. Here they are: 1. You shall not s...

Published on Sunday, August 18, 2013 by Kathy McCabe As the grape harvest begins  in southern Italy, the Association of Italian Enologists predicts that 2013 may well be an excellent year for the production of both red and white local wines if the current climatic conditions continue. ""It's going well, this climatic situation cannot but be favorable. We need to use a conditional tense, obviously, but if it carries on ...

Published on Friday, August 9, 2013 by Kathy McCabe I've been talking to people who are deciding at the last minute to visit Italy this summer. For a number of reasons (like the school schedule), their schedules only allow them to visit Italy in August. Many of them have heard horror stories about how the whole country goes on vacation, there's no one left to cater to the visitors and it is too hot. Don't worry, August...