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The grass is always greener on the other side Read more…

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Curious Appetite is a Gourmet Blog by Coral Sisk, Italian-American writer, certified Italian sommelier & culinary tourism specialist from Seattle living in Florence, Italy

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The other side of street food in Florence is not all offal 😂 Love how you can walk from Sant’Ambrogio to Palazzo Vecchio and run into a handful of fresh produce stands! What’s street food like in your corner of the world? 🍐🍊🥬🥕#CuriousAppetite #eatflorence

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If you’re curious about authentic Italian food, while a troubled term- for me, a truly genuine Italian meal is on Sunday at someone’s home where fresh pasta and familiar faces are traditional protagonists. The fascinating part is realizing not all times are sunshine, pasta and wine. Rather, during darker years in Italy this one day a week (or once per month for some) was the one meal where a smidgen of decadence could be afforded. This Sunday was spent with dearest friends near Spoleto in Umbria (Italy’s 💚) over bowls of gnocchi con spezzatino, a sugo made with less costly chuck/muscolo cuts of beef (or wild boar, pork, etc) and long stewed with veg and tomato called “spezzatino”, meaning to break into pieces, as the meat does as it breaks down with slow cooking. What does genuine Italian cuisine mean to you?🍝🇮🇹 #curiousappetite #eattheworld

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Getting cheesy on Valentine’s Day with the things we love the most: gourmet food and wine at our favored spots, chatting about Tuscan cuisine with curious travelers, devouring specialty fresh pasta and in Italy- loved spending such a complicated date on a dinner crawl in Florence ❤️🇮🇹 Hope you all spent the day (and all the rest of them) with something you love, too! 🌹 #curiousappetite #foodtours

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Chianina salada (like a thicker tender salted carpaccio, a Trentino specialty but made from Tuscan heritage beef Chianina), burratina, fresh truffle and grassy Tuscan ev olive oil- eating all the things in Florence for as much as my appetite can handle it. Another solid Trattoria in Sant’Ambrogio, Cesarino. Have you been? 🥩🇮🇹🍽#CuriousAppetite #florenceeats

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Getting proper doses of vegetables, umami, finocchiona salami and catch-ups w/ @girlinflorence @eminchilli at off-track Trattoria Baldini in Via il Prato- it’s safe to say my Florence/Italy jaunt is kicking off to an epic start! If you find yourself in this part of town like these days for tourism fair @bto_buytourism (near Leopoldo station/Porta al Prato) or tire of trattorias in the center, this classic Florentine trattoria is mega worthy a bookmark (I’m coming back for the steak 🥩 and pici cacio pepe) and if you like torturing yourself watching food when hungry like me make sure you sit across from the kitchen to fawn over plates of pasta twirling out like magic 😍 #curiousappetite #florenceeats

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Visiting Florence soonish and curious about things to do (besides calorie collecting on one of our food tours)? Our latest guide cherry picks favorite eats, drinks, sights plus links to more in-depth guides (think espresso, aperitivo cocktails, best bites around museums, budget eats, etc) Guides galore via curiousappetitetravel.com/travel-tips
p.s. Watch this space over the next few weeks for more Italian travel insights- I’ll be happily back hanging in Italia and uploading lots of favorite things- mostly in Florence plus Bologna, Turin and other spots. Super stoked! Absence indeed makes the heart grow fonder...Non vedo l’ora di vederti, Italia! 😘🇮🇹#CuriousAppetite #FlorenceItaly

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Mandarin, blackberry orange and dragonfruit- sorbetti tutti frutti full of vitamins and antioxidants, I mean why wouldn’t you eat one a day?! Get your dose of wellness in Florence at classic spots like Gelateria de’ Medici (either Piazza Beccaria or Via dello Statuto). For more tips on favorite scoops around town, head to thecuriousappetite.com 🍨🍊what are your go-to fruity combos? #curiousappetite #foodblog

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Modern Italian cuisine playing with nostalgia: Pizza fritta con lampredotto e salsa verde da @gambero_rosso 🍕🍕🍕pizzaiolo Michele Leo @dujepizzeria in Sant’Ambrogio. Lampredotto (lampre)/4th cow guts offal has been defining peasant food/la cucina povera for Florence over centuries, whereas tripe (most popular/seen versions come from first/second stomach which can be distinguished by its matrix) is not exclusive to Tuscany like lampre which to me makes it super special. And if you’re curious what happens to the 3rd stomach that’s centopelle and is practically lost/rarely prepared or sold (though there are a couple places in Florence it can be found). Whereas now it’s cool to talk/eat/revisit lampre and trippa so these guts are unlikely to die out. Who would have thought back in the Renaissance a hot pocket filled with guts would become a culinary trend in 2020? Buon weekend a tutti! 🍕#offaleater

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Still looking for dinner plans next Friday February 14th? Would love to be your steak date for the occasion! Let’s dine around Florence together and snack on antipasti, fresh pasta, somm picked wines, quality sourced bistecca, tiramisù for the love of Italian food (my idea of amore vero, really)- hope to ‘meet’ you! 😜🥩Tickets/contact via bio or curiousappetitetravel.com 🍽#curiousappetite #foodtours

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Wine is if anything a collection of memories. Sagrantino from Umbria’s Montefalco is one grape with special memory for me (see second slide) and not only! Scholars suggest Pliny the Elder spoke of this inky, dark cherry and plummy grape (referred to as Itriola) in Naturalis Historia/Natural History (considered the 1st encyclopedia of ancient knowledge dating back circa 77CE!) Fast forward hundreds of years later and only in the last 30-40 years has it been given official recognition by the whole DOC/DOCG powers that be and made into one of the most potent, tannic rich dry red wines to cut through protein rich wild boar dishes Umbrian culinary dreams are made of. My first memory with Italian wine was with this very grape when I was studying in Perugia and how I learned the phrase: vuoi la botte piena e la moglie ubriaca (you want a full barrel and a drunk wife) that indeed I will be for you, beloved wine! What are your first memories with Italian wine? 🍷 😜#CuriousAppetite #winesessions p.s. let’s swirl some wine memories on my Italian wine tasting sessions in San Francisco- info via bio!

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