Wine Appreciation Week

02/14/11

I started out my Valentine’s Day by going to a market with my group for class and fellow Italian students. We were supposed to all meet at Roma Tre, but my friend Timmy talked to one of the Italians and arranged for her to pick us up at our apartment, saving us a 45 minute walk! The girl was so sweet, as she picked us up she gave us hand baked mini chocolate muffins in the shape of hearts! Once our whole group arrived at the school, we started walking towards the Garbatella Market. We were in an area of Rome I had never seen before so it was fun to see different parts that I otherwise would have never thought to even explore. They walked us through the market itself where there was so much fresh food that looked delicious. I found it interesting that market food is actually less expensive than at a supermarket. Might be worth it to venture all that way for the freshness of the products! 

Fresh fruit at the market

Fresh meat and cheese

     After walking through it, since it was small we still had plenty of time to kill. We walked over to a park where our Italian friends helped us edit our compositions for our Italian class that were due that day. Once our compositions were all A+ with some help, we got to know them better and learned of their upbringing, major, etc. They were all very nice and eager to get to know us, which will make meeting up with them much more enjoyable over the course of the semester. Because we had no idea where we were, one of the Italian students was kind enough to take us back to our tram stop from the Metro. It was my first metro experience and it was surprisingly nicer than expected. We made it back to class with more than enough time and it was the first time in awhile I wasn’t running in order to make it on time. 

     After class, we planned to have our visitors come to our apartment and we were going to make dinner for them as a way of celebrating Bridget’s 21^st birthday, which was the following day. We made a pasta salad, bruschetta, and chicken with garlic and parmesan. We also grabbed a cake and some dolci to put candles on! I think she really appreciated it and had fun. We tried to go to a club, but it turns out not many people go out on Monday nights in Italy and the club was closed. Instead, we went to Scholars Pub, the only place that seemed to be open at this time. We met some Italians on the way and invited them with us. Although we were the only people in the entire bar, it was the most fun I’ve ever had there. We created a dance floor in the middle of the place and spent the night there until it looked as though everyone was about to fall asleep standing up.

02/15/11

     After a long night, going to our Layers of Rome class with our intimidating professor was the last thing I wanted to do! My roommates and I literally ran from the tram to where we thought we were supposed to meet because the bus didn’t come on time. Of course, we got a text saying that the group left the meeting place and told us where they were walking. Feeling extra nervous now, we picked up the pace even faster and caught up with them just as the lecture was about to start. I had gotten my workout in and had sweat dripping down my forehead! This class we were going to the Church of San Clemente. This was a unique church in that it actually showed several layers of Rome. The farthest story down consisted of an old Roman home, where a 6^th century church was built on top of it, and the 13^th century church was built on top of that! In less that three hours we traveled further into Roman history and got to see different aspects and how art transformed over this time period. However, this church was freezing and since I was sweating earlier, it was frozen on me and I couldn’t stop shivering the entire class! 

Church of San Clemente

     After two more classes that day, we could finally relax. It was our friends last night in Rome so we decided to meet them over by the Trevi Fountain and do whatever they wanted. We stopped at a restaurant nearby to there and had a fun last evening together. Their flight was the following morning at 7 so after dinner we parted ways and I went to bed immediately and with all the site-seeing we had done the past few days, I was able to fall asleep within a minute. 

Trevi Fountain at night

02/16/11

     Today started as another typical day of class, but ended with what I wish class was always like! Our last class of the day met at a restaurant called Ketumbar for a wine tasting! During this, we discussed the three components of a wine tasting: sight, smell, and taste. For each of the four wines we tried, we discussed these components as a class. This was helpful for me because it was interesting to hear someone with experience talk about scent. For me, the wine smelled like wine, but our teacher was able to extract scents such as vegetables, wood, fruits, etc. After hearing him talk about it, I was better able to recognize this scent as well which I think will help me in wine tastings in the future. During this tasting, we tried two white wines, a red (Chianti), and a dessert wine (Moscoto d ‘asti Piedmont). The wine tasting concluded at about 6, perfect time for us to come home and make dinner. Following dinner I did some homework and caught up with friends and family until going to bed early looking forward to a good night sleep!

Ketumbar

02/17/11

     We didn’t have class until 1 today so I slept as late as I could and then got up to study for my Italian quiz. A couple of us decided to go to a café to study to get out of our apartment for awhile. When we walked out of our apartment, we noticed that there were five trams backed up at our stop and we weren’t sure why. As we approached our stop, we noticed that there was a man laying there bleeding from his face. I have never wished more that I could speak Italian so I could have known what was going on. I was astounded that people were so calm and no one was really approaching him. I was even more astounded by the fact that it took the time of five trams coming for an ambulance to even arrive on the scene. After surveying the scene for a bit, we decided to just walk the half hour walk to class since we were early anyways. I felt very nauseous the rest of the day thinking of the sight that I saw earlier. I asked my teacher about it, but he hadn’t heard anything and doubted it would make it into the newspaper so the incident is always one that will be mysterious to me. After two classes, we came home and now I’m going to go to bed early so that I can get up early for our trip to a vineyard tomorrow!

02/18/11

     I don’t think I’ve ever been more excited to wake up before 7 than I was today. I’ve always wanted to go to a vineyard and today was my opportunity to see a true Italian vineyard. We traveled an hour and a half outside of Rome on a coach bus to a region of Italy called Umbria to the Castello della Regine vineyard. The trip started off by seeing the different areas where the white, red, and rose wines are made. From here, we got a tour of where the wines are fermented and while our tour guide tried to explain what was occurring as we watched, it was too loud to hear him so we moved downstairs. While downstairs, we were able to see where all the wine was aged in barrels. 

View on the way to the vineyard

Vineyard

Fermentation process

Catello delle Regine

     Following seeing this, our tour guide had a little mini wine tasting for us. We split into our three groups our class is split into to try three different wines: a merlot, a cabernet, and a sangiovese wine. We were to determine which wine was which after hearing a brief description of typical wines of these sorts. My group was the only one to get all three correctly! It was a fun activity and funny to see how your perception of wine changes when you don’t actually know what you are drinking. I had one friend claim to not like one because she was under the impression that it was cabernet and she doesn’t like cabernet. It turned out she was actually drinking the merlot and didn’t like that, but actually did like the cabernet! 

     From this portion of the tour, we took the bus up to a great view of the owner of the vineyward’s home, which was massive. We walked down a hill to see the farm that is on the vineyard’s site where they house a particular and special type of cows and pigs. I couldn’t get myself to go very close with my gag reflex when smelling animals, so me and a couple other girls hung back a little. It was still interesting to see how much larger these cows were than a typical cow I’m used to seeing. 

Girls at the top of the Vineyard

     By the time this portion of the tour was over it was about 1:30 and us being American, were starving since it’s much later than we’re accustomed to eating lunch. Luckily, lunch was the next stop! Before we ate though, we first had another wine tasting. During this time we had two white and two red wines, all of which tasted delicious. I took one of the corks to the wine to remember this day and how much fun I had. Lunch was the biggest lunch I’ve ever had. It started with bits of finger food including: slices of salami and prosciutto, different types of cheese, pizza, breads, and almost breakfast like casseroles. The main meal consisted of penne al’arrabiata, rice, and ravioli with meat in it. I was so full I didn’t think I would be able to eat again for the rest of the day! After thanking our tour guide and teacher for setting it up, we headed back towards Rome and got back around 6. When I returned back to my apartment, I decided to watch the Lizzie McGuire movie to reminisce and as time passed, I somehow got hungry again! I didn’t want much so I made myself a grilled cheese and called it a night!

Wine Tasting!

Starters

Main Course