Insightful Archival Tour Pages

Insightful Archival Tour Pages. FWT-A-family-affair-making-Parmiginao-Cheese-parmegano-copy-1

ABOUT THESE GREAT PAGE REFERENCES

Insightful Archival Tour Pages

These are pages going back in time in some cases so check dates as the details will have changed unless 2023 issued. Happy troving! Nick

Insightful Archival Tour Pages. Parma food Tours, family food tours Italy, Parmigiano Parmesan cheese tour, Parma Ham tour, Balsamico Tour

Contact us for any booking info

FAQ

LINK HOME PAGE

12 Essential italian words

12 Essential Italian Words for Italia Day tours FWT Foodies!


Lunch a family affair Food n Wine tours Parma platters, 12 Essential italian words

12 Essential italian words – Food tours info and offers – 


1

If you are reading this article, chances are you too are a lover of Italian food and you will certainly have come across lots of interesting Italian terms whilst perusing recipes, food blogs or menus in your favourite restaurants. You’ll just love our Cooking Days in Parma so here are some must have terms.

We’ve compiled a useful list of the vocabulary we think you absolutely need to know – you may be familiar with some of it already are but we are sure that not all of you know exactly how to cook your pasta ‘al dente’, what do do with your ‘acqua di cottura’ or exactly what’s in your ‘Arrabbiata’!

1) Al dente

This term indicates the level of cooking your pasta should have AT ALL TIMES. Italians eat their pasta only when its cooked to perfection and this means it must have that firm bite to it otherwise something definitely went wrong! Al dente literally translates as: To the tooth, which indicates the concept that the pasta must be not too soft but slightly chewy when biting it.

A little secret to perfect al dente pasta is to cook it at least one minute less than indicated on the packet. This will not work with every kind and brand of pasta as some have very strange cooking times that vary accordingly to a series of external factors. Nevertheless, this rule works with most of the pasta brands that are sold around the UK.

Another wise move would be to try the pasta 4 minutes before cooking time is up and then again after 2 minutes. This way you will know exactly when to drain it from the water to create a proper pasta plate!

Finally, always remember to throw the pasta in to cook only when the water is on full boil.

FWT cooking classes

Check out our FWT Culinary days

2) All’Arrabbiata

This is a much-loved type of pasta sauce that you’ll find on most Italian menus. It’s so hot and spicy it’s actually angry! (the literal meaning of arrabbiata). Arrabbiata sauce is usually made with tomatoes, olive oil and peperoncino: three simple ingredients to give one amazing experience.

3) Antipasto

This is what Italians eat before their main course and literally means ‘before the meal’. It often consists of a tempting selection of cheeses with accompaniments, assorted bruschettas, vegetables in oil, small bites of fried delicacies and maybe a platter of cold cuts. Sometimes, if a restaurant has amazing antipasti, the Italians will order only those with a crisp glass of white wine.

Lunch a famous affair with Parma FWT

4) Bruschetta

Bruschetta is a favourite antipasto dish in Italy – it’s so simple but can taste incredible with the right, quality ingredients. Toast thickly sliced, traditional bread (open textured is best) and top with extra virgin olive oil and oregano, sweet sun ripened tomatoes, roasted aubergines, anchovies or olive pate. Just remember to pronounce it bru-sketta and not bru-shetta!

5) Frittata

Frittata translates as ‘fried’ and is the Italian version of the omelette. A frittata is generally started on the stove and finished in the oven and the chosen filling is mixed with the egg at the beginning rather than added later. There’s normally lots of Parmesan in the mix. Frittata is usually very large and thick and made for the whole family, sliced and often eaten cold or even in a sandwich!

6) Peperoncino

This is Italian chilli pepper, one of the most important ingredients in Italian cooking. There are around 85 varieties to choose from and the best you’ll find in Italy will be right down south in Calabria. Add it to virtually everything!

7) Al Forno

This term literally means ‘oven baked’ and it is associated with foods that are cooked in the oven rather than on the stove. Pasta al forno is a good example of the term and it indicates the typical, hearty, oven baked pasta that is so widely eaten in Italy. It can be made with lasagne, cannelloni, lumachoni, penne and rigatoni to name just a few pasta types.

8) Acqua di cottura

The literal translation of this term is ‘cooking water’ and it refers to the water you cook your pasta or rice in. Italian chefs will set aside a little of this water whilst cooking the pasta and later add a couple of spoons of it to the pasta sauce. It will gain density thanks to the starch that the pasta or rice has released in the water.

9) ‘QB’ Quanto basta

QB means just enough or ‘to taste’ in English, and you will find the abbreviation alongside various ingredients in many Italian recipes. The writer of the recipe is leaving quantities to your judgement! You’ll need to forget the traditional British way of being precise with measurements and quantities and rely on your taste buds!! This might happen with salt and pepper, garlic, herbs or even cheese. Many Italian cooks tend to use even fundamental recipe ingredients such as flour or sugar with a bit of error margin, making their dough using their eye for quantity rather that measuring everything precisely. This is characteristic of a culture that will always prefer creativity and uniqueness to standardized thinking… even if it means that a couple of times your pizza won’t come out quite right! ?

10) Crudo

The Best Parma Ham Tour is with FWT

Crudo means raw. This term can refer to the crudo ham (prosciutto crudo di Parma for example), which is the uncooked but aged version of ham Italians love, or can refer to meat or fish dishes. Crudo di pesce is the typical southern Italian, raw fish platter that will amaze your taste buds! Raw meat is usually called carpaccio and that too is quite delicious especially if you try the carpaccio di Fassona or Chianina Toscana.

11) Soffritto

This is a very important and typical Italian mix of carrots, onion and celery that is usually used as the flavour base of many dishes, be they pasta sauces, risottos, broths or meat dishes. You usually chop the vegetables very finely and fry them gently in olive oil until golden, you then add the main ingredients and slow cook everything.

12) Sott’oli/Sott’aceti – 12 Essential italian words

These are basically veggies in jars, which have been preserved in either oil (oli) or vinegar (aceti). You can find sun-dried tomatoes, onions, carrots, peppers, garlic, artichokes, aubergines and many others. The oil preserved ones are mainly eaten as part of an antipasto platter and those in vinegar are added to a rice or pasta salad as a quick and tasty meal.

Armed with this knowledge, you can now cook Italian with confidence!

Tripadvisor review from fwt PARMA REALLY ENGAGE

Places to Eat Parma, Food Tours of Italy

Trattoria Corrieri Parma

Trattoria Corrieri Parma is a superb place to eat…

The Chefs tucking into some pasta before the lunch rush… Feb 2011
TripAdvisor - Hotel Reviews
Forum Topic
From forum: Parma by wittyone 08 September 2008
… have been asked what made Parma such a … … comforting. Our first afternoon in Parma, we grabbed … … our luggage eager to see…
Restaurant Review – Parma, Italy
5.0 of 5 stars

by thomas144 24 December 2008

… member mentioned it in the Parma discussion forum … … restaurants we ate at in Parma I would go to al Corrieri for dinner. Fairly…
Trattoria Corriere Parma
Food tour Parma italian days. Places to Eat Parma

Parma Perfection: Parmesan, Prosciutto, and Pasta

Jessica Schwartzberg/staff Parma, ItalyPhoto: Jessica Schwartzberg/staff

GUIDE TO PARMA

When to Go

The sunny days and cool nights of spring (March–May) and fall (September–November) are ideal for renting a car and exploring the city and the surrounding countryside.

Getting There

Alitalia, Delta, and Continental fly daily from the New York area to Milan. Trains depart regularly for the hour-long trip to Parma.

Where to Stay

Palazzo dalla Rosa Prati

GREAT VALUE Antiques-filled rooms and suites set in the heart of the city. 7 Strada al Duomo; 39-0521/386-429; palazzodallarosaprati.it; doubles from $210.

Must Do – The 3 Kings Food Tour of Parma

Tripadvisor review from Angelo copia 2

Camera di San Paolo

Two exquisitely frescoed rooms by Renaissance master and Emilia-Romagna native Antonio da Correggio.3 Via Melloni; 39-0521/533-221.

National Gallery

Don’t miss the museum’s collection of prized Baroque paintings. 15 Piazzale della Pilotta; 39-052/233-617;artipr.arti.beniculturali.it.

Teatro Regio

One of Italy’s legendary opera houses; its season runs from January to mid-April. 16 Via Garibaldi; 39-0521/039-393; teatroregioparma.org.

In a city where regional loyalties eclipse national ones, Christopher Petkanas discovers a transcendent local cuisine. Here, 10 places where Parma’s trilogy—Parmesan, prosciutto, and pasta—reigns supreme.

From March 2008 By By

The people of Parma have such a high opinion of their city they think of themselves as Parmesans first and Italians second. This can be traced in fair amount to the native cucina, which they consider to be the best in the region (Parma is one of the eight provincial capitals of Emilia-Romagna)—ergo the best in Italy, ergo the world.

Geography is destiny. Parma lies in northwest Emilia-Romagna. The region spans nearly the entire breadth of Italy, sharing borders with Tuscany and Liguria to the south and Lombardy and the Veneto to the north. A huge swath of the Po River plain, the biggest and richest tract of farmland in the country, falls inside Emilia-Romagna’s boundaries. The three great foods associated with Parma—Parmesan cheese, prosciutto, and handmade pastas (especially little ones you fill, such as tortellini, cappelletti, and anolini)—owe their first debt to this extraordinarily fertile land. Wheels of Parmesan are branded with the year and month they were produced, so you know exactly what you’re getting. Aged for 18 months to three years, the cheese is generally at its most expressive at about two years. Winter Parmesan has a deeper, more complex flavor than that made in summer.

Nick Garrett of Food n Wine tours is somewhat of an expert on the flavours of Parmigiano Reggiano, ”I like the 24 month variety as it has a range of well rounded flavours from the rich first taste through fruity hints and nutty finishes… and of course that moist texture with the grana Parmigiano crunchy protein. Great tastes and great health!”

Everybody’s a pig expert these days, but Parma shows up the amateurs and opportunists for what they are. Culty culatello is a cured boneless ham made from the choicest muscles—the top and bottom round—of the hind leg. As with prosciutto, the challenge is in the salting. Not enough and the meat spoils. Too much and you mask its inherent sweetness. Next to the round on the other side of the bone is a morsel that becomes fiocchetto. Everyone knows Pancetta, but how many have sampled Parma’s special version, fragrant with red wine and a suggestion of garlic?

Alba, in the Piedmont, is but one Italian city that disputes Parma’s claim to gastronomic dominance. Not to mention Naples. But the counter- claims roll off the backs of Parmesans like so many truffles and tomatoes. You could call it hubris. Or you could just call it superior taste.

Restaurants

La Greppia

If no one had told you this is one of the three or four finest places to eat in Parma, you might guess it anyway before even lifting a fork. In front of an interior window that looks from the dining room into the immaculate kitchen is a beautiful tableau of baskets, draped with linen and filled with house-made pastas. Perfectly ironed tablecloths tumble onto wood-framed chairs with upholstered backs and seats. Carts freighted with cakes, cheeses, and vinegars and other condiments sail across a polished terra-cotta floor. None of this would mean anything if it were tainted by fussiness or pretension. But La Greppia is not preoccupied with its good looks and doesn’t even ask to be thanked for attending to the details—the tip-off that this is a great restaurant. Chef Paola Cavazzini makes a point of hiring only women. (There are a lot of donne in Italian restaurant kitchens, but how many run them?) The trademark antipasto is pears poached in red wine with a dense Parmesanspuma, or mousse, whose only other ingredients are milk and cream. Borage lends its grassy flavor to semolina gnocchi the size of hazelnuts. Strawberry risotto—made with puréed fruit, onion, Parmesan, butter, and nothing else—sounds like a gag until you taste it. Goat in umido (slow-cooked in a covered pot with tomato and white wine) is served with buckwheat polenta. La Greppia is the kind of restaurant where you order one dessert, get four, and are billed for one.

Make sure the torta bocca di dama, a crumbly-chewy confection that combines bitter-orange marmalade, meringue, almonds, and amaretti, is the one you order. The service is amazing. But you guessed that. 39/A Strada Garibaldi; 39-0521/233-686; dinner for two $144.

Ristorante Cocchi

Parma’s best restaurant is inserted in a hotel so plain and weirdly located (on the far side of the ring road that wraps the city) you can’t believe you’ve got the address right. Believe it. Cocchi is supercivilized without even seeming to try. The professional waitstaff, also with no obvious effort, attend to a clientele of Italian businessmen, neighborhood dads out with their teenage spawn, and loud Americans. Strolghino, a skinny salami made from lean leg meat, is carved tableside, swaddled in a linen napkin. Strolghino’sextreme tenderness, delicateness, and near resemblance to fresh, raw sausage meat is a result of just 15 to 20 days of curing. But what you’re really here for are the rice preparations, savarin andbomba di riso. The first tops Parmesan- and risotto-filled envelopes of cooked ham with vealpolpettini and porcini ragù. To make a “bomb,” pigeon is marinated, braised, and deboned; hidden and layered inside a rice-lined dome; and baked. Whether or not the province of Parma reaches its culinary apotheosis with this dish has been debated since the 16th century. 16/A Via Gramsci; 39-0521/ 995-147; dinner for two $115.

Parizzi

No matter how allergic you are to joyless, pompous restaurants, any eating survey of Parma would have to include this one, especially if someone else is paying. Beyond the silver chargers with crocheted doilies, flights of Parmesan and prosciutto are offered at 16, 26, and 29 months and 13, 24, and 36 months, respectively. The rest of the menu (pheasant ravioli with fried leeks, truffle, and marsala sauce; pig’s head with honey, chicory, and quail eggs) is a model of voluptuous lily gilding. 71 Via Repubblica; 39-0521/285-952; dinner for two $173.

Trattorias

Trattoria Antichi Sapori

Set in the countryside just outside the city, Sapori is more ambitious, refined, and serious (but not too serious) than most trattorias in the Parma area, offering modern dishes so as not to seem old-fashioned (Parmesan gelato melting over a luscious hunk of molten eggplant in a pastry nest), and classic dishes so as not to seem out of touch with the past (taglioni, a cousin of tagliatelle, with octopus, shrimp, and cuttlefish). Oven-browned potato gnocchi with onion marmalade falls somewhere in the middle. And who knew that a form of sbrisolona—an almond-and-polenta dessert I have been making and loving for 30 years—is from Emilia- Romagna?Sbrisolona is more cookie than cake and on the menu of practically every restaurant in Parma. Some find it chokingly dry, but that’s their problem. The name translates as “she who crumbles,” a reference to the charmingly ragged pieces you get when you break into it (slicing is useless). Eat with vin santo. 318 Strada Montanara; 39-0521/ 648-165; dinner for two $100.

Osteria del Gesso

Even more than Antichi Sapori, this restaurant seeks to set itself apart by offering both traditional and innovativa cooking. So I was cautious, wary of a meal that could easily be not one thing and not the other. Some of Gesso’s ingredients—New Zealand lamb, basmati rice, foie gras—also worried me. But the osteria has legs. A platter of sbrisolona sits on a counter inside the front door, a good start. The menu gives the age and maker of the prosciutto (28 months, Leporati), andculatello (20 months, Consorzio di Zibello), another excellent sign. They say it’s impossible to have a bad plate of pasta in Parma (not my experience), but the rabbit-mousse agnolotti and Swiss chard–and-ricotta tortelli are exceptional. Americans are unreasonably averse to eating horse. What a loss. At Gesso the meat is sautéed in strips, then molded into a disk with braised baby onions and a lovely little salad of arugula, radicchio, and cherry tomatoes. 11 Via Ferdinando Maestri; 39-0521/ 230-505; dinner for two $118.

Sorelle Picchi

Forget the pastas at this salumeria-trattoria (you have to pass through the shop to reach the dining room) and build a relatively simple, for once not ridiculously rich, lunch of fine-grained Felino salami—named for the nearby village where it is produced—andtorta di erbe, a savory tart covered with pastry and filled with sautéed spinach, Swiss chard leaves, and/or beet greens. According to Lynne Rossetto Kasper, author of The Splendid Table, the standard work in English on the cooking of Emilia-Romagna, Parmesans believe the hay- and grass-scented air in Felino is responsible for the salami’s elegance. It’s a romantic idea. 27 Via Farini; 39-0521/233-528; lunch for two $72.

Croce di Malta

Say you knew some stylish, young, design-conscious Parmesans. And say they’d just redone an old farmhouse outside the city. Their eat-in kitchen might look like Croce di Malta. The concise menu (supple tortelli, fragile polpettine, silky Bavarian cream) changes daily. 8 Borgo Palmia; 39-0521/208-681; lunch for two $86.

Pastries

Pasticceria Torino

You could eat breakfast at this historic, aristocratic landmark every day for three months and never have the same pastry twice. Like all Italians, the Parmesans like their cornetti filled with just a scraping of preserves. Most places offer apricot and stop there; the day I was at Torino, it had apricot, peach, strawberry, black cherry—and blood orange. If it’s mid-morning or later, it’s nice to chase all that sugar and fruit with a half-dozen or so chic little sandwiches, made with glazed brioches and barely spread, say, with anchovy paste. It takes a while to get the hang of eating off a plate with a fork while standing in the middle of the shop. Once you do, you’ll feel like a regular and part of the scene. 61 Strada Garibaldi Giuseppe; 39-0521/235-689; breakfast for two $6.

Wine Bar

Enoteca Fontana

Parmesans take the pulse of their own city at this hectic institution, where the cheap nibbles are strangely better than the panini you pay a lot more for. If all you know of Lambrusco, Emilia-Romagna’s most famous-slash-notorious wine, is disco-era Riunite, Fontana will bring you up to speed. One revelation is that Lambrusco doesn’t have to be nauseatingly sweet (though it always has at least a gentle, frizzante degree of sparkle). A well-made secco is pungent with fruit and teasingly earthy. 24 Via Farini; 39-0521/286-037.

Cheese and More

Casa del Formaggio

Parma has an embarrassment of remarkable shops selling salumi, Parmesan, and prepared foods. You’ll never see a tourist in this one. 106 Via Bixio; 39-0521/230-243.

Christopher Petkanas is a T+L special correspondent.

Places to Eat Parma
Food tours of italy parma FWT. est Places to Tour and Eat Parma Italia.

Beyond Bolognese: Parma food trail – Paul Lay

PARMA FOOD N WINE, FOOD TOUR, IN PARMA, ITALY VACATION, WINE TASTINGS, Mediterranean diet, Parma Food Tours, Nutrition, Italian Vacation, wine tasting tour, food tours in Parma,

… beyond the Bolognese – a great guided tour of Italy!

Paul Lay – ed FWT

Bolognese: Parma food trail

Rocket and Parmigiano-Reggiano Cheese Salad

12:01AM BST 19 Aug 2006

A Great Italian Trip

For lovers of Italian food and touring Italy, there are countless pleasures to savour along the Italian food trail of the via Emilia, the ancient road that links the great food cities – Parma, Modena and Bologna – of the northern province of Emilia-Romagna.

Now that Ryanair has opened a route to Parma, it’s easier than ever to travel in Italy, explore Italy’s gastronomic heartland, eating in endless trattorias, visiting wineries, an abundance of colourful country markets and, with a car, meandering off the main road to visit some of the region’s hundreds of specialist food producers.

Bolognese: Parma food trail

Continue reading “Beyond Bolognese: Parma food trail – Paul Lay”

PDO Culatello Tours Zibello

 

HISTORY

When it comes to tradition, we cannot fail to mention the art of making Culatello. It is said that back in 1332, during the wedding banquet of Andrea Conti Rossi and Giovanna dei Conti Sanvitale, Culatello samplings were carried out. It is also said that the some Culatello had been brought to the bride and the groom as a gift and that later on the Pallavicino’s offered some Culatello to Galeazzo Maria Sforza, Duke of Milan.

The first explicit and official quotation about Culatello dates back to 1735 and it is found in a document kept in Parma. The first literary references date back to the nineteenth century, by the local poet Giuseppe Callegari and the sculptor Renato Brozzi, who would exchange views on Culatello with the famous poet Gabriele D’Annunzio.

PDO Culatello Tours Zibello

CHARACTERISTICS

PDO Culatello Tours Zibello
Culatello di Zibello is a type of cold meat made from the posterior muscles and inner thigh of the pig, properly cleaned on the surface and trimmed to obtain the classic pear shape. To put it in simple words, Culatello consists of muscle bundles from the thigh, which is the best part of the ham. Its curing must be carried out in well-ventilated areas at a temperature between 13° and 17° C for no longer than 10 months as of the salting phase. During this period ventilation, natural light exposure and moisture are allowed depending on the climatic factors in the production area.

PRODUCTION AREA
The area where the Culatello Zibello is produced includes the following municipalities in the province of Parma: Polesine, Busseto, Zibello, Soragna, Roccabianca, San Secondo, Sissa and Colorno.

FOLLOW THE TASTE!
Come to taste it at November Porc, a travelling gastronomic Festival, every weekend of November.

CONTACT US

PDO Culatello Tours Zibello