Simple Italy – Page 38 – Celebrating Your Inner Italian

Confetti di Sulmona

Posted May 23, 2009 by Walter 2 Comments

confettisulmona

By Walter Sanders

Lining the main streets of Sulmona are shop after shop selling confetti, the confectionary for which the town is famous. It sounds simple: start with almonds, pistachios or hazelnuts and coat them with multiple layers of molten sugar cane syrup.

This dessert artistry has been evolving since Roman times when almonds were coated with honey. The results are magnificent. They are edible mosaics, work so detailed, artistic and well-executed that they fool your eye. Of course these are real flowers . . . no, they are confetti.

Confetti Pelino, which dates form 1783, operates a museum of the craft at their factory at Via Stazione Introdacqua 53-55.

Land of Honey

Posted May 15, 2009 by Walter 2 Comments

honeyshop Full disclosure: I’m a honey consumer, a big-time honey consumer. I make a five-pound jug disappear every 6 to 9 months and I can find legitimate ways to enjoy honey three meals a day. I’m also intrigued about flavored honeys. The only one I ever met that I didn’t like was a buckwheat honey. I ended up diluting that bad boy with clover honey.

I was thrilled to see honey on the bar counters in Abruzzo . . . and even more excited to see the locals using it to sweeten their cappuccini and espressi. As we walked through Sulmona on market day we spotted the Non Solo Miele (Not Just Honey) shop. We popped in and were invited to sample some of the floral varieties, including a complex, slightly bitter, chestnut honey which the proprietor informed us was rich in iron.

I’ve since learned that Abruzzo has been a center of honey production since ancient times. Today a wide variety of blended and monofloral honeys are created by the people and bees in the region. To read more about Abruzzese honeys, visit Discover Abruzzo.

Market Day in Sulmona

Posted May 14, 2009 by Walter 10 Comments

The market in Sulmona is a feast for the senses.

You enter Piazza Garibaldi by stepping down stone steps and passing through a series of stone arches. From street level you see the tops of the arches and beyond them, in the distance, snow-capped Apennine peaks. The vast National Park of Abruzzo, a magnet for nature lovers, surrounds the city.

Down the steps, through the arches, you enter a different world. There are about 200 vendors, under a crazy quilt of dazzling canopy colors, selling everything from DVDs to gym shoes, house wares to flowers, clothing to produce. You want a New York Yankee cap? Someone has a deal for you.

fishgirl

We join the other market-goers . . . walking, talking, smiling, enjoying the sun, aromas, excitement and vendor engagement of market day in Sulmona.

Italian vendors reach out to their customers. They charm them, cajole them, spin a playful web of banter and soon you find yourself negotiating for something that you suddenly feel compelled to buy.

My favorite vendor is the fish lady. She has it going on in a brightly painted truck . . . and she attracts a constant stream of customers. She winks, sings, laughs and puts on a great show. Hell, I almost buy a fish.

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Ristorante Clemente

Posted May 8, 2009 by Sharon 15 Comments

Ristorante Clemente in Sulmona offers the genuine dishes of Abruzzo.

We weren’t being fair to Ristorante Clemente. We knew it . . . but we couldn’t help ourselves. We had allotted one night, one dinner in Abruzzo, a region in which neither of us had passed time. We sought to “taste Abruzzo” in that one meal. No small order.

We were in the small city of Sulmona on our way to Puglia. Our Ital’guru Fred Plotkin, author of Italy for the Gourmet Traveler, picks Sulmona as his “Classic Town” of the mountainous region east of Rome. Ristorante Clemente appears first on his “Dining List” and his description appealed to us. For insurance, we inquired of our hotelier and a local barista where we should dine. “Clemente,” they both answered. We even scouted out the restaurant location, tucked on a tiny back street, so we’d have no problem finding it later in the dark.

So it was that Walter roused me from a my nap at 7:15 p.m. so we could arrive when the doors opened for dinner service. He worried that a place this touted would fill up fast. No such problem transpired. Upon entry, we were invited to choose our own table and selected one deep in the rear of the main room under a splendid stone vaulted ceiling. Stone and gesso walls the color of cantaloupe cream, exciting food-related art work, photos of family members and a couple canvasses and prints of Sulmona created a cozy setting.

Chef Clemente Maiorano (right), son Alessandro (left), and another sous chef in the Clemente kitchen.

Chef/owner Clemente Maiorano, with warm brown eyes and salt-and-pepper Julius Caesar haircut-greeted us with a one-page menu. We asked if we could place our appetites in his able hands. He seemed pleased and disappeared through the archway into the kitchen. The waiter took over and reminded us how perfect service in Italy can be. Not obsequious, not aloof, just professional.

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Backroads Abruzzo

Posted May 5, 2009 by Walter Leave a Comment

By Walter Sanders

We left Fiumicino, not in “my” noble Alfa 147 but in an ordinary Lancia Ypsilon (damn it), heading due east on A24 for Abruzzo and our first night’s destination in Sulmona.

View of the Apennine peaks from the Abruzzese town of Sulmona.

As Sharon caught some shut eye, I missed the exit for A25 because I was paying more attention to the soaring, snow-covered peaks of the Gran Sasso than to the signage. I zipped past L’Aquila (the ancient city that was damaged by an earthquake three weeks later) and was on my merry way to Pescara on the Adriatic when Sharon awoke.

She spotted the mountains and then turned her attention to the map. Oops, I had overshot the exit by some 50 kilometers. My mistake. It didn’t help my case that Sharon and I always debate whether to rest near the airport upon arrival or get on the road immediately.

It was time for another cappuccino.

Exiting the highway, the Alpine architecture made it seem as if we had driven all the way to the Tyrol instead of central Italy. This was ski country. In fact, we learned that Abruzzo boasts the most national parks of any region in Italy. Some guest house/restaurants had already closed for the season but we spotted a charming tiny bar. Spring dandelions poked through the snow.

The gracious bar owner seemed glad to see some Americans. He told us that he had married a woman from Nebraska but that she had returned to the US to live in Colorado. A young ski-bum-who would have looked at home in Snowmass-ordered a cappuccino and sweetened it with local honey instead of sugar.

With the bar man’s directions, we headed on a back road short cut to Sulmona. In the town of Paganica, we decided to change some money before the bank closed for midday. Sharon disappeared through the “Star Trek” glass security tube. The time dragged on as my “on the road” adrenaline began to surge again.

Finally, nearly 25 minutes later she emerged with her Euro and a story about how new anti-terrorist measures had led to increased scrutiny on stranieri attempting to convert cash. She was passed up through layers of junior, middle and senior management before someone could authorize the modest transaction. I think they were just intrigued by Sharon because I didn’t get that level of attention when I changed money later that week.

Spring blooms frame dramatic snow-capped mountains in Sulmona.

Euro in our pockets, twisty mountain roads behind us, we approached Sulmona. Activating our internal radar, we reached Viale Roosevelt which turns into Corso Ovidio through the Centro. Aha, Sharon spotted the sign for Albergo Stella just as we passed by the tiny street that housed it. After several circles around the general area of our hotel, we succeeded in pulling right up to the door. Proprietor Roberto Bono greeted us so warmly that our irritation melted as quickly as the snow at the base of the Gran Sasso.

Next: Surprising Sulmona

Chuck Olson: Art and Parma

Posted April 24, 2009 by Walter Leave a Comment

Artist Chuck Olson conducts a Springtime in Parma arts program for St. Francis University students.

Artist Chuck Olson conducts the Springtime in Italy arts program in Parma for St. Francis University students.

By Walter Sanders

We can find Inner Italians almost anywhere. And so it was that we encountered artist Chuck Olson’s Italian connection in Old City Philadelphia at the opening of his most recent exhibit at the Rosenfeld Gallery.

Sharon’s alma mater St. Francis University in Loretto, PA, hosted the event for Olson, 56, who is Chair of the school’s Fine Arts Department. He has been teaching there since 1976.

Look at Chuck Olson and you see a confident, polished and worldly gentleman. Yet, until he was 29, he had never traveled further from his western Pennsylvania home than Youngstown, Ohio. To polish his pronunciation skills of French artists and authors, he took an elementary French language class, then an additional 27 credits in French. “Studying a foreign language helped me understand and appreciate the power of a new cultural dynamic,” Olson said.

He met Marie, a French woman, in the United States and in 1987 they married. Marie shared her roots in western France with Chuck, and eventually, their two children. Every summer, the family rented a French farmhouse. “We prefer really experiencing a place, rather than collecting destinations.”

In 2006, Olson was given the opportunity to direct the Springtime in Italy arts program in Parma. “I took a risk. Many people in their 50s tend to withdraw but I jumped at the chance. Initially I didn’t know the language, I didn’t know a soul in Parma, but the journey has been amazing. After three years, I can stroll into the Mayor’s office after a warm welcome by his security people and discuss our programs,” Olson said.

“Italy was a different experience for me . . . the light, the foliage, the language. The food was different, even the bread. The people were more open and sharing. That helped me shape my teaching philosophy. My students’ experiences won’t be limited by lack of imagination. So I encourage them to travel on the weekends, participating in and sharing every cultural difference they can. The students come away with experiences that are legitimately their own.”

Italy has been fertile ground for Olson to develop interpersonal relationships. “I enjoy making connections between good people. Many of these relationships blossom, and a few whither on the vine.” It is the magic of Italy that inspires people to connect with others.

To view more of Olson’s acrylic paintings, visit The Rosenfeld Gallery.