Artsygirl: Difficult to answer without knowing your interests. Do you want rural or urban? Interested in shopping, architecture and museums? (If so, Turin)

Tell me more. But off hand, I would say Alba.

We'll will have been in Murren and Zermatt prior and headed to Verona and Venice. We're interested in both rural and urban but Switzerland may take care of the rural?? architecture yes not too many museums 16 year old and 14 year old tend to get a bit ansy after too many.

Alba is lovely, and easy to walk around. But the draw in this area, or a large part of it anyway, is the food and wine. Will you have a car? If not, I would head for Turin. Give me some more information on the car issue, and likes and dislikes.

The kids should love the cinema museum and the Mole in Turin. And there is also a car museum that is supposed to be wonderful, even for people who are not enamored of cars!

And maybe even the Egyptian Museum! They will certainly love the cafes with all of those treats on offer! So I am rethinking my original advice to you from 6/09. Turin may be better for you with the kids, but you need to tell me if you will have a car or not.

I plan to begin the home stretch of this report soon..just two more dinners and one full day of exploring Turin.

I appreciate your advice! Our kids are versatile... Im picturing Alba to be like the Napa area in CA. Things are a bit farther apart with smaller towns. Car is necessary! We're still debating on the car...
We live very close to wine country in CA. I'm almost thinking the city would be better too. Kids want to experience the culture, learn about the history and eat food :) My husband and I will get back and can then do the countryside.
Can't wait to hear about your dinners!

eks --

For future reference in case you ever head back that way. Did some more checking on Cascina Cornale. Their web site (in Italian only) indicates that the ristorante is only open on Friday, Saturday, Sunday and Monday. But the good part is that the have a web-based form for reserving a table so you can do this well in advance.

Have now re-aranged my itinerary to take this into account! What looks like a menu for May is posted on the web too. Sounds amazing:

Venerdì 1 maggio - Menù

Salumi del Roero
Carpione di vitello piemontese
Insalata di fagioli borlotti e cipolle
Tonno di pollo
Insalata di patate lesse e uovo sodo
Zuppa di ceci e verza
Gnocchetti di ricotta e erbette al forno
Spezzatino di vitello Piemontese
Straccetti di coscia di vitello Piemontese
Spinaci saltati e carote stufate
Insalata di finocchi, carote e topinambur
Pera Madernassa da pianta storica cotta in vino
Bunet
Vino a scelta
Pani cotti su piano in mattone refrattario
€ 25

We spent several hours at the Cinema Museum. First, the elevator whisked us through the interior of the structure to an outdoor viewing platform that offered a spectacular view of the city and surroundings. In better weather, the view would be even more awesome, extending to the mountains which even in late April, wore crowns of snow.

After the elevator ride, we spent about 2 hours in the museum itself,
Lounging in the jaunty red chaises, we watched film clips, then proceeded to the wonderful temporary exhibit recounting the life, filmography, and death of Rudolf Valentino. We then meandered through the playful displays of film posters and film-related artifacts, and participated in a couple of interactive special effects.
It was great fun and I highly recommend a visit.


We remained until closing time and then crossed the street to the restaurant where I had made reservations a couple of days before: Sotto Le Mole, a SlowFood favorite at Via Montebello, 9. (Closed Mondays)


In deference to its location across the street from the museum, film posters and memorabilia, as well as vintage liquor ads, adorn the walls of the handsome dining room, crowned by soaring brick arches. The menu hews closely to Piemontese tradition, with a few modern twists.


http://www.sottolamole.eu/Italiano/menu/menu.htm

One clue to the quality of the meal was the basket of mini-grissini (Torinese bread sticks, a fixture at local tables and one we found to be often, but not always, a reliable indicator of the quality of the meal to come) and the stupendous bread dusted with finely chopped Taggiasca olives from Liguria.

I began (the menu has changed slightly since our visit) with
a terrine of broccoli and “pumpkin” sauced with Raschera, a raw cow’s milk mountain cheese. Excellent!

My partner opted for the soup of peas and favas, reflective of the season, which was equally lovely. (Why do my own soups pale by comparison to those we enjoy in Italy?)

We skipped the secondi in favor of main courses of the quintessential local pasta—agnolotti del Plin, or tiny ravioli (“Plin” is dialect for “pinched”) stuffed here with rabbit and herbs.

For dessert, another quintessential Piemontese dish—the rich and delicious Giandujot, which vaguely resembles a chocolate pudding and is better in the mouth than described on the page!

I should note, for those hankering for fish, that our dining neighbors ordered the steamed merluzzo, or cod, which they proclaimed to be stellar.

We drank a 2006 Barbera from Fontanafredda (I became a Barbera fan on this trip!). With water and service, the total for two of us was 70 Euro. Recommended.

The morning of our last full day in Italy was April 25, Liberation Day, a major national holiday. Last year on this date we had been in Amalfi, where restaurants and tourist-oriented businesses remained open for the hordes of daytrippers who descended on the town.

We found a very different story here in Turin. On this rather chilly and damp Saturday, virtually all of the shops were shut tight. (Eataly, too, was closed, and I was very glad we had visited on the day before.)

The Turin City Tourist Office offers several guided tours, most of which take place at the end of the week.


http://www.turismotorino.org/index.php?id=505

Here are few other options for guided touring:


http://www.somewhere.it/

We opted for the walking tour of the city, given every Saturday at 10am for 8 euro per person and departing form the tourist office on the west side of the Piazza Castello. Online booking is possible and highly recommended. I neglected to book in advance and thus we were forced to wade through the crowd clamoring for last-minute tickets at the tourist office. It was quite a scene and those arriving less than 15 minutes before the 10am departure time were turned way for lack of space, resulting in much anguished hand wringing and loud verbal laments. Perhaps the crowd was a result of the holiday; virtually all of our fellow tourists were Italian.

After purchasing the tickets and receiving our paper badges, we waited. And waited. Finally, after having been divided into two groups of about 20 people each, we set off, following in the footsteps of our accomplished guide,Silvia Pellegrino. (Silvia is available for private tours and I highly recommend her:
[email protected].

Glad you enjoyed the cinema museum. I adore it. (That's my temple!) Did you have anything to drink at the bar?

Thanks, Eks, this has been most useful. We're set for Marcarini agroturismo October 4 to 8. I'm hoping that maybe we can arrange to bump into drbb while we're there and compare notes. I have an acquaintance who is starting to plan a trip there for about a week before we get there. He's likely going to wind up staying in Alba. I've forwarded your report to him as well. It's so nice to have so much information available from such a reliable source. Thanks.

Zeppole: I can understand why you love the cinema museum! No, we did not have a drink but I do recall seeing the bar area which looked inviting.

I just found this interesting article about aperitivi buffets in Torino; it includes a few of the cafes we visited:


http://www.guardian.co.uk/travel/200...nk-italy/print

Julie: I truly appreciate your comments; I will finish up with this very soon..

The funny thing about the bar is that the menus are video screens embedded in the glowing tables (which change colors constantly). The video screens show clips from famous movies of people playing with their food depending on what you're ordering (primi shows the baked potato dance from Charlie Chaplin's The Gold Rush, etc).

I went to the cinema museum and liked it so much I begged my husband to go back with me the next day, and we did. I think it is the greatest museum of its kind. It's like being inside a giant movie brain, and it really captures the overwhelming romance of the movies, and the fun of them.

I hope to go back again very soon. I enjoy Torino quite a bit and I saw too little of it. I want to go to the modern art museums and the auto museum, and do some more shopping. It's the only place in Italy I ever had a lot of fun shopping (including buying PACE flags).

Thanks for the fascinating report! I had just been wondering about Turin-- was looking for a northern Italian destination for next year to give me an excuse to make another stop in Milan for the sights I didn't get to this time, and from you report Turin sounds like a good choice.

Looking forward to reading about the walking tour.

Zeppole: I am so sorry I missed that museum bar! The auto museum is not something that sounds as if it would interest me. But had we had more time, I would have put it next on our list, because several seemingly like-minded people have recommended it highly. Turin clearly has an abundance of attractions for visitors.

FiFi; I will try to continue later today..after a rather gruesome-sounding dental treatment!

The walking tour lasted about 2 hours and provided an excellent introduction to Turin. All of our fellow participants spoke Italian, but this was not, thankfully, one of those tours where the guide offers a long, detailed explanation in the primary language, eliciting lots of laughter and comments, and follows with a two-sentence translation in English. As I mentioned above, Silvia was an top-notch guide and I would recommend her for a private tour of the city. We might have booked this ourselves, had I known about her before we arrived.

The tour began at the Palazzo Madama, built on the site of the east gate of the Roman town, Augusta Taurinorum, the ruins of which are visibile within the palace. The façade was rebuilt in the 18th century, according to the design of Filippo Juvarra, the celebrated architect of the Savoy court. The jewel of the Baroque interior is the monumental staircase, also designed by Juvarra. Here are photos:


http://tinyurl.com/bv5tgg


http://torinodailyphoto.blogspot.com...staircase.html

and more information:

http://www.palazzomadamatorino.it/pa...?id_pagina=103


Also contained within is the Museo Civico d’Arte Antica; the tour does not include this museum, however.

After the Palazzo Madama, Silvia offered historical information about the Royal Palace, and the royal chapel of SanLorenzo, a Baroque masterwork by whose elaborate interior by Guarnino Guarini, whose effusive interior hides behind a rather severe façade.

Photos:

http://www.greatbuildings.com/buildi...nzo_Turin.html

Leaving the Piazza Castello, we passed Turin’s only surviving Renaissance structure, the Duomo di San Giovanni, home to one of the most controversial relics of Christendom, the Shroud of Turin.
Unfortunately, we did not have time to enter either the Duomo , or Guarini’s Capella della Sacra Sindone, the chapel built for the shroud.

Next, we plunged into the Quadrilatero Romano, the grid of right-angled streets west of the Piazza Castello that formed the core of the original Roman settlement. Today they are packed with restaurants and shops most, but not all, of which were closed on the holiday. The 17th Century Palazza della Citta, Turin’s city hall, overlooks the former Roman Forum and medieval market square. On this day, there was a small craft market that we planned to visit after the tour.

We walked along the Via Garibaldi, one of the main arteries of the Quadrilatero Romano, lined with chain shops and moderately priced clothes shops, as well as some fast-food-type restaurants.

The city tour includes an option to continue on to the Museo Egizio, whose collection of art and artifacts from ancient Egypt is reportedly second only to that of the Cairo museum. We passed on this option (more reason to return to Turin someday) and said goodbye to the group and to Silvia, at the Piazza San Carlo. From there, we wandered past the elegant shops lining the Via Roma, and walked back to our hotel for a short break.

Even with two days/two nights in Turin, we realized how little of the city we had actually sampled. Centimeter by centimeter, this must be one of the richest cities in Italy as far as places of interest for a visitor!

ekscrunchy, how many more days would you add if you had time?

I corresponded by email with a Torinese who suggested a week, but that was probably campanilismo or local patriotism.

If you spent four days in Rome, I would think four days would be ample for Turin.

It depends on the time length of the entire trip, but I would think that 4 days would give a good overview and allow some time in museums as well as perhaps even a day trip to one of the attractions outside the city. And there seem to be very good prices at hotels on weekends, so including a weekend would be a good idea price wise.

Here is a bit more:


Deciding to skip lunch in order to have more time for explorations, we headed, instead, back to the Quadrilatero Romano for a quick, on-the-go snack of Focaccia al Formaggio from a bakery that seemed to specialize in Ligurian breads. Disappointing. We were headed for perhaps the most legendary of Torinese caffes, Al Bicerin. Tucked away on the Piazza della Consolata, facing the “double” church of the same name, Al Bicerin dates from 1763 and has been owned and operated by women ever since.


Make sure to take a look at the recipes, and at the “specialties” page, on their website:


http://www.bicerin.it/eng/index.html


Our Chocopasses entitled us to a slice of chocolate cake and, fortunately, we were able to nab a table within the miniscule jewel of an interior. To go with the cake: A Bicerin, of course! Born on these premises in the 18th Century, bicerin is a sinfully rich concoction of espresso, chocolate, and fresh cream, whose exact proportions as served here are a closely guarded secret. Suffice to say that the combination of the chocolate cake and the Bicerin was a bit rich, even for me. One or the other might be a better strategy.
Nevertheless, there was no crumb remaining on the plate! Heavenly!

After our treats, we headed across the piazza to the Santuario della Consolata, dedicated to the virgin protectress of Turin.


More about the church, and the rest of our last day in Turin, soon.

ekkscrunchy.

It occurred to me to ask, if I haven't already, if you ever go shopping on Arthur Avenue/187th St. in the Bronx. (My favorite stores are on 187th Street.) There are some fabulous treats up there, including a pasta fresca shop with wonderful handmade ravioli with fresh ricotta, a salumeria where the meats are made in shop, a very good bakery (TerraNova) wine store and large alimentari that sells a homemade long-cooked red pasta sauce and no end of imported Italian goods, plus makes incredible sandwiches. Some of the Italian-American offerings can be as good as the Italian offerings.

http://www.arthuravenuebronx.com/

Yes, I love that area! I was there about a week ago and wrote about a few things that I bought in a thread about AA on the US board! We need to go together sometime.

The pasta fresca shop is Borgatti Ravioli and there is no better fresh pasta in the entire city. In fact, the coincidence is that I am having some of their spaghetti (Lidia Bastianich recipe for Trapanese Tomato/Almond pesto) in about an hour! And, oh, that Terranova bread! Oh my goodness!

And heve is some important news on the NYCfood front: Eataly will open next year, at 200 Fifth AVenue (Zeppole, I certainly have you to thank. If not for your comment, I would still be calling it EatItaly!)

http://dinersjournal.blogs.nytimes.c...e-in-new-york/

And look:



http://tagliatellevaganti.splinder.c...Avenue,+New+Yo

How many tries did it take to get that great title just under 75 characters?

FiFi: Quite a few!

In my inimitable fashion of dragging out these reports so long that the details threaten to fade from memory, here is a snippet, to be followed soon by our last dinner in Turin (at the legendary Antiche Sera)




I strongly recommend a visit to the Santuario della Consolata, both for the unusual double plan of the interior, with a lavish gilded high altar by Juvarra, and for the very colorful and animated ex votos housed in a pair of side chapels. Being a fan of these plaques, I was astounded by the absolutely superb collection –reminders of all manner of gruesome accidents and sicknesses from which the victim recovered and gave thanks line the walls, rising high above the heads of visitors.

From the church, we walked northeast towards the Porta Palazzo, reportedly the largest open-air food market in Europe. Unfortunately, as I suspected, it was closed on this holiday Saturday, as were most of the other shops that we passed on our wanderings. We did see the outer fringes of the Balon flea market that sprawls along the neighboring streets and appeared to be operating in a much constricted form on this April afternoon.

Next, more Chocopass treats, a now-forgotten bag of sweets that we were handed inside the gorgeous former Agnelli hangout, the late 19th Century Caffe Platti, not far from the train station:

http://www.platti.it/locale.html

I neglected to mention that the Bicerin (the word means "small glass" in local dialect) at the cafe of the same name cost 4.50 each and were well worth it!

Here is more information on the cafe, and the beverage:


http://www.nytimes.com/2006/02/08/dining/08olym.html

What a wonderful trip report. Now I'm inspired to add Turin to our next trip.

We wandered around the city for several hours.

We intended to explore the area to the east of the city center. where a string of green parks edges the banks of the River Po, but our feet gave out before we reached our destination, so we ambled back to the hotel and relaxed in the very comfortable room for an hour or so before getting ready for our last dinner of the trip.

Several days before, I had booked a table by phone at Osteria Antiche Sere, a casual Slow Food eatery located to the southwest of the city center in the workaday residential district of Borgo San Paolo. .

Shortly before our 8pm dinner time, we set off in a taxi from the hotel. The ride to the restaurant took about 15 minutes and cost 13 euro; the return trip (we asked the restaurant to phone a taxi for us) cost 11 euro. (The custom in Turin is to call a radio taxi, not to hail a taxi on the street. There are taxi stands but they are few and far between.)

At the risk of using a well-worn phrase, I will say that Antiche Sere is a quintessentially Torinese osteria. We received the warmest welcome of a week of very warm welcomes by Antonella Rota, the vivacious young woman who served as hostess and server, (her brother presides in the kitchen) and were ushered to a table in the front dining room. With is well-worn checkered tile floors, brown painted wainscoting, and sturdy wooden tables and chairs, Antiche Sere, founded about 16 years ago on a the site of an old bocci court, is a film director’s ideal of a homey Italian trattoria.


The menu is all Piemontese and reads like an edited version of the region’s “best hits.” We had seen these dishes on so many manus in the past week that I could probably recite them in my sleep. Prices are very reasonable. My only quibble is that this is the only place that we were served commercial grissini (breadsticks) in their wrappers. But the rest of the meal made up for this lapse. Simple, unadorned Piemontese food in a simple and unadorned setting.

Here are some photos, and a copy of a (not current) menu, with prices that approximate those that we experienced:


http://con-vivium.blogspot.com/2007/...re-torino.html




After ordering (no English is spoken here),we were presented with complimentary tastes of the local favorite insalata russa (Russian salad, made with mayonnaise).

For my first course, I ordered the tajarin with asparagus, made with a variety of asparagus from nearby Santena whose season lasts only 10 days. Excellent! (For more on Italian asparagus, and photos, see this Italian-language link; the comments are funny as everyone is touting the variety of his or own region)

http://cucina.blogautore.espresso.re...4/23/asparagi/



My partner, who would have turned into an agnolotti if he stayed one more week, surprised no one with his first course. The veal agnolotti was served with a light tomato sauce and pronounced “terrific.”

To continue the theme, I took the asparagus as a secondi; hefty (unpeeled) spears were topped with poached orange-yolked farm eggs. Simple and absolutely impeccable. (Although I would have peeled the asparagus, and in fact I did when I coped the dish a couple of times after our return home.)

I followed this dish with a salad—mache, arugula and a few other varieties of spring greens.

On inquiring about dessert, our delightful server informed us that Antiche Sere is renowned for its panna cotta. With an endorsement like that, we found it impossible to resist. This was one of the best desserts of the trip. Exquisite.

With a half carafe of house wine, coffee, cover and water, the bill for two totalled 57 euro. No credit cards are accepted and the restaurant is closed Sunday. Reservations are essential. We watched with sympathy as finer after diner was turned away, including one forlorn Japanese couple who had arrived by public transportation and looked absolutely devastated upon being told there was no room. The phone did not stop ringing the entire time we were there, and each time the response was something along the lines of “ questa sera completo.”

ANTICHE SERE, via Cenischia, 9; open for dinner only; closed Sundays; cash only

The next morning, Sunday, after breakfasting on the extensive hotel buffet, we set out for the drive to Milan Malpensa airport, where we were booked on a flight departing at 12pm. I had debated about the advantages of taking the airport bus from Turin, or keeping the car and driving to the airport. The first option would have meant taking a 7am bus from the train station in Turin (with taxi to the station) ; the second meant parking the car in the hotel lot for two nights at 18 euro per night. With much hesitation, we decided to keep the car and drive to Malpensa.

Via Michelin shows the driving time as 1hour 37 minutes. But when I asked the hotel concierge to print out the ViaMichelin directions, she warned me that the drive would take “more than 2 hours, driving very fast.” She was very vehement about this, saying that she had made the trip several times, and I became quite worried!

On the Sunday morning of departure, newly printed Via Michelin instructions in hand, we set off, pulling out of the hotel parking space at 7:40am. The drive was, in a word: Easy! A straight shot northeast out of the city and onto the autostrada.

There was very little traffic on this rainy Sunday morning and, after a stop to top up the tank, we arrived at Malpensa (remember to follow the sign for “car hire”; you can pick up directions for drop off when you rent the car; I recommend doing so), dropped off the car, and were inside Terminal One two hours after setting out.

I made 2 purchases at the Malpensa duty free shops: 1 bottle of Aperol (9.80 euro) and 1 bag of Martelli “artisanal” spaghetti, manufactured in Pisa (3.80euro for 500 grams—probably not a significant savings over US prices—I’ve yet to verify). The airport shops offer lots of food items at high prices.

The flight home (Delta) encountered some very scary turbulence (flight attendant dropping to the floor in preparation for ????) but was otherwise uneventful. (The turbulence may be a seasonal (spring?) issue because a few weeks later we encountered more of the same on a flight returning from London.)


And that, ladies and gentlemen, is the account of our introductory visit to a few selected
highlights of Piedmont. Thanks for reading!

Thanks for the delightful introduction to Turin! You've helped make up my mind-- spring 2011 trip will be Turin + Milan. (But how to wait two years for that bicerin?!)

FiFi--Glad you enjoyed. We will have to keep you busy until spring 2010!! I will think of a few ideas!!

Oh, sorry. Until 2011! A slew of ideas are needed!

Had to laugh about the grissini. DH and I found it ironic as well. We put ourselves at the mercy of our server in Turin. After 6 or 7 courses from the roasted dinner trolley, we were sorry we ate so many of them!

Can't wait to try Eataly. It will be yet another good excuse to hop the megabus to NYC!

Just found this again and read the last bits.

Thanks, ekscrunchy. Lots of great info that I'll be using on my trip in October. Can't wait.

Good luck to you in your future travels!

For Julie or anyone else going to Alba --

I emailed Cascina San Cassiano, producer of the fab foods in jars ekscrunchy described above. Turns out that Gallo Winery in La Morra is the main store for selling their products. The address at San Cassiano 4 in Alba is their production facility only.

I decided to take Rina out to a new restaurant as a birthday treat- which is a perilous task since she is such an accomplished (and acclaimed) cook, and partly on the excellent review on this thread and based on some of our guests (from Mexico) rave review we chose Prufumo di Vino in Treiso

After a wonderful wine tasting with one of Piedmont’s pioneer lady wine-makers, the fabulous Chiara Boschis of E.Pira in Barolo (www.pira-chiaraboschis.com) we wound our way around Alba past Villa Favorita on to Treiso on a truly gorgeous Piedmont day – we had a thunderstorm the night before and the day was fresh and sunny with reach out and grab me Alpine vistas. We sat on the outside terrace facing the piazza and the mountains and relaxed for a long slow lunch.

However I am sorry to say after all the build-up about Profumo we were truly disappointed. Some of my tasting notes:

Amuse Bouche-: stewed turkey and vegetables – too much vinegar, killed the aperitivo wine.
Antipasto 1 : Uova in pasta (egg ravioli) – raw egg yolk, all you could taste was the yolk, needed lemon juice and parmigiano.
Antipasto 2: Fried rice balls in squid ink with fried calamari heads in yellow pepper sauce – by far and away the best dish, the calamari was perfection and the sauce divine.
Primo Piatto 1 : Gnocchi with fresh tomato and mozzarella sauce – gummy-bear gnocchi, couldn’t eat it and can’t believe a restaurant of this calibre would serve such an inedible version of a classic dish
Primo Piatto 2: Seafood ravioli with tomato pasta and herb-flavoured oil – no explosion of flavour, the seafood was not fresh (I thought it was frozen), and pasta was dry. Very disappointing.
Secondi Piatti 1: roasted rabbit rolatini with sautéed pepper sauce – rabbit was dry and tasteless, peppers not peeled, fried potatoes greasy, and Rina couldn’t finish the plate.
Secondi Piatti 2 : Roasted quall with rosemary sweet onion relish and olives. It was OK, can’t go too wrong with roasted quall, but the olives on the side didn’t quite match.

The dolce’s were excellent and did go a long way to salvaging what was becoming a disastrous outing. I had baked peach stuffed with biscuits and ginduaja chocolate, Rina had a nocciola (hazel nut) tasting plate with a beautiful light torte, a rich mousse and a light meringue and we washed it down with an excellent Moscato Passito.

The wine list was very extensive, and being such a warm day we chose an excellent metodo classico (champagne style) sparkling Arneis from Giovanni Negri in Neive.

The bill was 140 euro which was in my opinion very dear for the quality and what we have paid at far superior restaurants in Piedmont. After the food sat in our stomachs for hours – very uncomfortable.

Overall we were disappointed to have chosen this restaurant when there are so many wonderful places yet to try in Piedmont, too bad we didn’t go to Ciau del Tornavento down the road that we have still to try. Maybe we just hit a bad day for the chef, but sorry to say, we cannot recommend Prufumo di Vino to our guests.

Tim: So sorry you did not like Profumo di Vino. We spent 62 euro and 63 euro for two wonderful dinners. All of the secondi on the menu we had were under 20 euro, so the fact that your bill mounted so alarmingly must mean that you drank much better wine than we did!

Of the dishes you mention, only one was on the menu on the nights we ate at the restaurant. That was the egg yolk ravioli which, indeed, had a healthy lashing of cheese.

I will look forward to your comments on Ciau; both principals of Profumo di Vino worked there, as I probably mentioned in my report. Not sure that the comparison is fair, though, since Ciau is a much more elegant, and expensive, restaurant that PdV.

Sorry again for your poor experience. Happily, you live in a fabulous restaurant area and will hopefully enjoy lots of superb meals in the future!

Ekscrunchy (how do you derive your name?), like or dislike are not the words I would use, everyone has different tastes and some people can love one place but others hate it. In plain words it was downright terrible and not worthy of Piedmont. I will admit going out with Rina to a restaurant is fraught with peril, she is such a gifted cook and a fierce critic of restaurants, but even myself who am normally a trencherman when it comes to food, I always eat everything (except for wine, that’s my forte, give me a bad wine at your peril), couldn’t eat some of the dishes (gummy bear gnocchi!!), and what we ordered was quite representative of what we would expect to be perfect or near perfect in most Piedmontese restaurants.

We live in Piedmont and our lifeblood is to be able to pick good restaurants and wineries for our guests to have a great experience. Often it happens that the first place someone goes to when they arrive, after a long journey to get here, they fall in love with and go back repeatedly. We always take rave reviews with a grain of salt, given that guests are in holiday mood and not as used to the local cuisine as we are, we will send someone else to eat there with a proviso, and if we get 3 rave reviews Rina and I will go ourselves and see if its worthy to be included in our short list of recommended restaurants, and we develop a personal rapport with the owner.

And once in a blue moon someone has a bad meal at one of “our” restaurants, so we will review it again, talk to the owner and sort it out or drop the restaurant. A few of our standbys have never had any bad report in our 8 years of being here (Rabaja, Vignaiolo, Tacabanda to name a few) and that’s what we like.

So in this case we were looking for a treat for ourselves as well as a possible inclusion on our list. Bitterly disappointed. Its very rare that I will go online and write negative stuff, but I was p****d off to use a mild expression. We should have just gone for the treat and gone to a higher end like Ciau or Doumo in Alba. However most of our guests are not in this expensive eating bracket so we like to stick to reasonably priced restaurants. For a treat Rina loves the Enoteca in Canale which is up there with the others, but a more reasonably priced, we paid 180 euro last time we treated ourselves and it was truly fabulous, our review of this and others of note are on E-Gullet.

Pricing – 66 and 63 euro for your dinners. You only had wine by the glass? Most of the bottles were at least 20 euro, we had a 25 euro bottle of sparkling Arneis and liked the Moscato Passito so we took the half-bottle home at 20 euro. But that’s still 95 euro for one antipasto, primo, secondi and dolce each. Are but I note that they gave you free desert. Not in our case. Their fixed menu ‘s were 35 and 45 euro, although they list at 18/25 euro fixed lunch in the Langhe restaurant guide. Maybe they jumped their prices for summer. Did you have a tablecloth (-: We noticed a section without table linen presumably cheaper prices.

Oh well, at least we are not starved for choice in Piedmont – Ciao.

Tim, again I am sorry that you had a bad meal. We ate in the main dining room and yes, we had wines by the glass. I do not recall any fixed price meals. It is possible that they raised their prices because the menu that I have lists all secondi under 20 euro and primi in the 6-12 euro range.

Hopefully I will be able to try some of the places you mention on a future trip!

Happy eating!

Last week I happened to pass the site of the soon-to-arrive NYC branch of Eataly in the Flatiron district near Madison Square Park. It seems that Mario Batali and the Bastianich's plan a spring opening:

This is from the press release:

<Eataly, the largest artisanal Italian food and wine marketplace in the world, is coming to New York. Two years after Oscar Farinetti opened his groundbreaking food and wine market in Turin, Italy, he is teaming up with Mario Batali, Joe Bastianich, and Lidia Matticchio Bastianich of Batali-Bastianich (B&B) Hospitality Group to transform a 42,500 square foot space in the Flatiron District into New York City’s premier culinary mecca.

The marketplace located at 200 Fifth Avenue (the former Toy Building) will be the city’s ultimate destination for food lovers to shop and taste and savor – an extravaganza that will include a premier retail center for Italian delicacies and wine, a culinary educational center, and a diverse slate of boutique eateries. This gourmand’s delight will feature cured meats and cheeses, fruits and vegetables, fresh meats, fresh fish, handmade pasta, desserts and baked goods and coffees.

Eataly — at its essence – embodies the philosophy and commitment of artisanal products that represent the finest quality, sustainability, affordability, and responsibility – all of these are cornerstones of the Batali-Bastianich brand.

Each retail area will be paired with its own dedicated restaurant, including a wood-fired pizza and pasta bar, a cheese and salami counter, a beef restaurant, a vegetable restaurant, a crudo and seafood bar, and a classic Italian bar serving gelato, espresso, and wine. There will be a separate wine shop, bakery and patisserie. On the roof will be a 4,500 square foot open-air rooftop beer garden serving pizza and sausages.
Education will also be a defining focus of Eataly. There will be events year-round with food and wine courses, demonstrations and lectures from renowned chefs and food and wine producers from the best farms in the world.


Eataly is scheduled to open in spring 2010.>

I changed my itinerary because of this thread...
Going in May!