For ages, the Abruzzo of the Apennines (Italy’s backbone mountains) has been a well-kept secret. Although this is changing, it is changing slowly. Inland Abruzzo still feels like a world apart, a place from a bygone era. Here are seven reasons to visit (not in order of importance):
The foods we love to feature on tour and celebrate at home always come back to the people. Our favorite restaurants are owned and operated by real people, who belong to a specific place, and whose hands, faces, and stories give as much to the dishes they make as the ingredients they use.
This time of year can be delightful—burrowing down cozily with a mug of something piping hot, or basking in the beauty of low winter light. Or: It can be dreary—as you outfit yourself against the creeping cold and weight of darkness.
One of our wonderful guests, "Jan in Italy," reflects on her fall cycling tour of Piedmont.
People sometimes ask: How did Food.Stories.Travel. come to be?
Guests may dream of beautiful hotels, fine flavors, and breathtaking landscapes. But after the tour, many tell us that their enduring memories are of the people.
In Abruzzo last week, Cristiano and Alessandro met third and fourth generation wrought iron artisans in Pescocostanzo. “One of our main reasons to travel,” Cristiano said, “is to meet people like Enrico and Nicodemo. Bottega Donatelli is a precious piece of heritage worth knowing, preserving, and celebrating on tour.”
Links to the blog of Patricia Thomson, an American journalist who writes about wine.
Emilia-Romagna is a big and rich region. Because of this, we’ve chosen to take it in “two bites” – offering separate itineraries for Emilia and Romagna. Here we present our top seven reasons to visit Romagna.
Villa- or agriturismo-based travel is when a group of friends or family rent a villa in an area where they are happy to linger. Think Enchanted April (which shows off Portofino wonderfully).
We see five components to the ideal travel destination: natural beauty; created beauty (e.g. art, architecture); food/wine; climate; and people. Italy soars in all five. And then goes a step further…
Story by Rachel Greenberger featured on Slow Food USA’s blog in March 2018. For four years now, my husband Cristiano Bonino and I have undertaken an annual winter scouting trip to explore the places and meet the people who will be featured on tours that year.
Perhaps the peak reason we’re so in love with Italy is the food. It’s the first word in our name, after all. But our culinary captivation goes far beyond taste. First comes Food; then Stories. Blending them, we say that recipes are edible stories and the very best way to experience people and place as you Travel.
Food.Stories.Travel. is about making you feeling like an insider when you’re in Italy—on the road, at the table, and in all the places in between. When it comes to Italian culinary traditions, the insiders all know Artusi. This January, we traveled to Forlimpopoli, the little town in picturesque Emilia-Romagna, where Pellegrino Artusi was born.
Scouting tour of ten regions of Italy (where it doesn’t feel like Boston winter) by Cristiano Bonino and Rachel Greenberger.
Called the Green Heart of Italy, Umbria is the only Italian region with borders that touch neither the sea nor another nation. A world apart, it is known for its fertile landscapes, soulful lifestyle, and village traditions.
Article by Rachel Greenberger featured in September 2016 on Elephant Journal.
Much of the year, I am in the country where I was born, exploring Italy’s less-traveled roads and recipes with my guests who mostly come from my adopted country, the United States.
Article by Rachel Greenberger featured in May 2016 on Elephant Journal.
Why do we love to travel? So many great thinkers and writers have addressed this question. And there have been so many answers. Mine is that we want to learn and meet people and taste new things…
During my last dinner out with friends at Giulia in Cambridge, while talking about wines, I mentioned a producer that I had recently visited who makes his noble nectar from 100+-year-old vines of local, indigenous varieties called "Tintore" and "Piedirosso."
Few places left on earth still feel like nothing has changed in three hundred years. Bhutan is one. Tuscany’s Crete Senesi is another.
Think of Liguria and you think of the sea (and maybe focaccia, fresh lemons, and seafood as well). This slice of the Italian coast, tucked between mountains that shield it from the winds off the Alps and temperate Mediterranean waters, enjoys a microclimate all year round, at the moment punctuated by winter oranges, tangerines, and the Slow Food presidium of Chinotto.
By Rachel Greenberger and Cristiano Bonino
For 2016, we are kicking things off right: leaving cold Boston to visit five regions of Italy (some of the warmest of the "boot") for Food in the Boot 2 from January 11 to February 22.
Article by Stefano Salimbeni featured in the December 2015 issue of Bostoniano magazine.
Story by Cristiano Bonino featured on Slow Food USA’s blog in November 2015.
