All the Strade dell'olio. The new frontier Made in Italy.

Italians are keen on good food and wine. A well cooked pasta al forno, a fresh mozzarella di bufala, a juice of true oranges or a bruschetta dressed with pure extra virgin olive oil can move us to moments of culinary delight. The gusto of looking for the typical, local and wholesome product is a national trait of Italian culture at home and abroad.

The typical out-of-town tour, looking for the village with the characteristic restaurant and the wonderful landscape, where also Ancient Romans ancestors indulge, is being transformed in an economical and touristic development potential of mainly agricultural and eno-gastronomical areas, often among the most beautiful in Italy and worldwide.

Tour operators, municipalities, chambers of commerce and industry, local companies operating at a national and international level seem to have realised that the BelPaese is not only beautiful, but offers also juicy specialties renowned especially among the connoisseurs of good eating.

Everything started with events linked to wine, a success, to move to delis such as PDOs and PGIs produced in some of the most amazing Italian regions, often immersed in natural parks, thermal areas among the most spectacular in the world, in the hinterland and in territories laid on the marvellous Mediterranean Sea.


In those wonderful landscapes some stylized olives road signs started to be seen,  'Strada dell'olio', or in Abruzzo 'Vie dell'olio' signposts. In some tourist info points appeared maps with restaurants and farm holidays, often built within castles, entire burgs or ancient farms, highly interesting archeological, historical, artistic, thermal, seaside and UNESCO areas. Some regions, traditionally accustomed to conjugating touristic actractivity with good food and especially with the defense of the identity of the places, apparently decided turn on the spotlights on traditional PDOs, to promote charming touristic routes and products, along olive tree groves and awesome towns, sometimes a bit snubbed by mass tourism.

Those are the PDOs and the linked Strade dell'olio in Italian regions, some of them entirely PDO areas:


Abruzzo:
Aprutino pescarese
Colline Teatine
Pretuziano delle Colline Teramane
http://www.visitabruzzo.eu/vie_olio.html

Calabria:
Alto Crotonese
Bruzio
Lametia

Campania:
Cilento
Colline Salernitane
Irpinia - Colline dell'Ufita
Penisola Sorrentina

Emilia Romagna:
Brisighella
Colline di Romagna

Friuli Venezia Giulia:
Tergeste

Lazio:
Canino
Colline Pontine
Sabina
Tuscia
http://www.stradadelloliodellasabina.com/

Liguria:
Riviera Ligure
http://www.rivieraligure.it/IT/guida-la-strada-dell-olio-in-liguria.g12.htm

Lombardia:
Laghi Lombardi
Garda

Marche:
Cartoceto

Molise:
Molise

Puglia:
Collina di Brindisi
Dauno
Terra di Bari
Terra d'Otranto
Terre Tarentine
http://www.tipicipuglia.it/test/str_olio/
http://www.dopdauno.it/

Sardegna:
Sardegna

Sicilia:
Monte Etna
Monti Iblei
Val di Mazara
Valdemone
Valle del Belice
Valli Trapanesi
http://www.lastradadellolio.it/

Toscana:
Chianti Calssico
Lucca
Terre di Siena
http://www.stradavinoeoliolucca.it/
http://www.stradevinoditoscana.it/elenco_delle_strade/ 

Umbria:
Umbria
http://www.stradaoliodopumbria.it/

Veneto:
Veneto Valpolicella, Veneto Euganei e Berici, Veneto del Grappa

©2010.2020
Special thanks to the WR community and to WP

Roman skyline

The Ethernal City is dense of history, and so is its skyline, a regional park where culture, art, walking, eating, and drinking is a long lasting tradition.

Skyline defines and shapes a city, represent the landscape that makes us understand where we are, the overall view, the panorama and the geometric movement of a place.

In North American megalopolis  long lines of skyscrapers, futuristic designs and proper architectural challenges to the laws of gravitation, indentify a city. European capitals, urban settlements, are usually more harmonious and ancient, especially if considering Mediterranean Europe, and Italy in particular. Unmistakable roundness, most diversely shaped bell towers, volumetric evidences of historical era and passages, colours that highlight citizen's peculiarities and the climate, eccentric modernities, towers, castles, fortresses, in other words 'Goody Old Europe'. 

Europeanness, the essence of a patchwork of thoughts, religions, nations and diverse people, is probably to be found in the nuances range of the constant dialogue between buildings and the surrounding environment.
White mountains or lakes sided by pearl streams of light, sweet hills or colorful coastal landscapes, European cities skyline is always marked with a graduality in contructing century after century a stratification of human settlements among natural elements, with some exception, such as postWWII Rotterdam recreated as a kindergarted for creative architects willing to experiment the most innovative theories and techniques.

One of Italian peculiarities there's one regarding the capital, a city where the tallest building cannot be higher than the 'Cuppolone', Saint Peter's cupola and that obviously has not many skyscrapers nor a prominent vertical expansion.

In Rome, after millenia of debates and fights with 'palazzinari', building speculators of every reign, empire, p Roma, nonostante millenni di discussioni e litigi con i palazzinari di ogni regno, impero, papacy or republic, nature kept rounding in a huge hug the Ethernal City  and the small cities and villages often built well before Urbe was condita. The hug of the Lucretili Mounts, massif developed mainly in Sabina region, at the moment regional park with many stories to tell.
It has been some time since associations have started again to appreciate and live Roman skyline as a place to explore, in full respect of nature, rediscovering paths that inspired sage, scholar's dissertations and unforgivable poems to artists like Lucretius, Horace, Emperor Hadrian or more recently, so to speak, Galileo Galilei, one of the first associated to the Accademia de' Lincei founded by Federico Cesi, who loved inviting his guests in the so called Linceo's Amphitheatre, a Karst plain close to Pratoni locality. Easy to guess that also in ancient times there was some indulgence on good food and eno-gastronomical traditions of the area where nowadays is still possible to enjoy delis prepared following recipes and original techniques passed on generation after generation for centuries and millennia.

©2010.2021
Special thanks to WR community and WP 

History, food and wellness on the paths of PDO

Abroad you always feel a bit homesick for Italy, for those provincial burgs, for the marvels of genius at every corner of every street in each village laid in the middle of the hilly landscape, or in up in the mountains that have witnessed so many events, or in front of one of the most beautiful seas of the world, and of course, for Italian cuisine.

A truism with its intrinsic truth, and I'm not talking about the midnight spaghetti syndrome, that affects also the most purist xenophilous, all of a sudden, sometimes after smelling in the air filled with more or less known odours the aroma of a wood stove baked pizza, but of the simple and delicious elements that express the pure essence of Italian taste. No, I'm not talking about wine, even though it is a deli that the entire world learned to appreciate, but of that ingredient that trasforms the simpliest food in a precious course.

Extra virgin PDO olive oil, that when added to a slice of bread, possibily Italian focaccia, creates a unique food, a moment of absolute sensorial stimulation that brings to mind the extraordinary wonders of Italy.

It's been some years since the nostalgics and the newphytes, and most of all the gourmet enthusiasts have an additional plus to tour some of the places that can emotion and move for their inner beauty, in other words the places of the great Italian provincia, with hills reminding sea waves, the riffs or 'simply' the inland and the countryside, places that during the millennia inspired generations of artists and have been contended by many armies.

Paths in the PDO production areas to get acquinted with extra virgin olive oil, through guided tours in typical restaurants, romantic burgs, villages and cities, with moments of learnig-while-playing for kids and grown-ups in the museums of oil, and in town, regional or international festivals. Obviously surrounded by ancient palazzi and castles immersed in monumental and Medieval, Renaissance and old fashioned piazzas, typical products shops and Spas to treat yourself with oil-based products and great food.
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©2010.2020
Special thanks to the WR community