The Pizza Quest and Gelateria del Teatro

Rome Part One. 

DB Bahn you have competition. Trenitalia knows how to do it. Complimentary prosecco for those in 1st Class, 24 hr wi-fi for one cent. 

Our train from Venice put us into Rome late afternoon. We got our introduction to the Rome metro, descending upon escalator to escalator into the recesses of the ground to be whisked quickly across the city towards our hotel, a twenty minute walk from the Vatican. 

We were hot. We were sweaty. We still had the pizza from Mestre in our minds. We kicked off our boots and took a walk. One of the recommended spots were found was a place called La Gatta in the Monteverde backwoods. We were just eager enough that La Gatta wasn't even open by the time we got there. We killed some time chowing down on some cannoli and grabbing a drink at a bar across the street. I was introduced to Aperol and what an Aperol spritz is. That is a lot of orange-coloured fun in a stemmed wine glass.

La Gatta specializes in thin crust pizza, when in reality apparently they keep a foot in either camp of paper thin Roman crust and fluffy, chewy Neopolitan. The crust in Mestre was paper thin, floppy almost. La Gatta had the crust that you saved to eat after the pizza was done. We tried a margherita pizza, as part of our research project using Mestre as our benchmark, and a pizza bianco (meaning no tomato sauce) with mushrooms, mozzarella and sausage to finish. 

Mestre won. It was really quite quick. 

La Gatta's pizza, excellent. For places to eat in Rome, especially pizza places, I would recommend La Gatta (and don't use Google Maps to get there). But Mestre had a furious hold on us. 

The next day, we headed out. Armed with our map, we wandered the riverside. There is a reason they call Rome the Eternal City because it would take you an eternity to see everything. When you are there for a limited amount of time, you limit what you want to see. You pick the big things and you forget the things that just won't fit. But if you had the time, you could walk Rome FOR DAYS. Taking from our time in Venice, we wandered and figured things out as we walked. We saw the Spanish Steps, which lead from Piazza del Spagna to Piazza del Monti. We took in what is supposed to be the best cannoli in Rome at Dagnino, which tasted like a donut and the flavour lingered in your mouth long enough that you contemplate walking halfway across Rome for another one.

You walk up to the Trevi Fountain as if it's just another street sign, the reach of Poseidon so much larger and the movement of the horses so much more dynamic than pictures can even suffice. A couple swats and elbowings through the crowd and an eventual climb over the railing, one can arrive at the edge of the fountain and flick a coin in for good luck. 

You get past the pizzerias hawking 11 euro pizzas to the famished Trevi Fountain seekers and you come upon Hadrian's Mall, the massive remnants of the first shopping mall. 

Down the steps and round the front, you are spit out in front of Altare Della Patria or Monumento Nazionale a Vittorio Emmanuele II, a monument to the first king of a unified Italy, Vittorio Emmanuele II. Most Romans hate it, thinking it to be an eyesore. It's either too white, too big, or the unfortunate reality that part of Capitoline Hill was destroyed in order to build it are cited as legitimate reasons to nickname it after a Italian take on English Trifle, which, I would suppose, isn't a compliment. 

Statue of Vittorio Emmanuelle II

We replicated pattern we have created thus far on this trip which is Moozh finds the best off-the-beaten-track foodie gem, and I take us to the Jewish Quarter. 

When doing our preliminary foodie research on Rome, we got pretty excited. No matter what you're in the mood for, or what your budget it, Rome will have your expectations beat. Salumeria Roscioli, located in the Centro Storico neighbourhood, tucked away behind the Argentina line and minutes away from the river, is what could crudely be described as a deli. I slap my own hand as I say that because it is so far beyond any deli you have ever seen. Upon entering, the right wall is lined front to back, floor to ceiling with local Italian wines, everything from plummy Barolos to chocolately, warm Sardinians, spicy Valpolicellas to inky Super Tuscans.

Roscioli's Bike 

What lies along the left side is what grabs you. Full legs of pancetta, proscuitto hang along the back wall. Balls of fresh buffalo mozzarella bob in water. Bowls of marinated artichoke hearts, roasted red peppers and wheels of cheese the size of sidewalk blocks. We wandered around, mouths agape until one gentle man behind the counter wrapped some goodies in white paper and gestured towards the bakery, their sister restaurant, down the next lane. We didn't bother with bread. We didn't bother with sitting before we tore the packages open. A salty wedge of pecorino romano, translucent slices of proscuitto and two marinated artichokes kept us busy as we planned our next move. 

Best finger food ever. 

By this point I was beginning to realize that the Spaniards were getting a run for their money. Italians are beautiful. Beautiful in a dark, swarthy way I can't explain. My lovely friend Karin back in Van passed along to me an old saying her Mama used to have. "Warm weather, warm people. Cold weather, cold people" in a way to explain the friendliness and reservedness of a culture. A framework to which Canadians fit perfectly. 

I would, in certain circumstances, extend that to say 'Hot weather, Hot people", especially throughout Europe. But maybe there's just something in the water. Anytime we were near the Mediterranean, there were just beautiful people left, right and centre. I think I commented each time I saw a beautiful person while I stuffed my face with whatever Roman delicacy was in front of me. 

The No Reservations episode of Rome is a perfect example of just what The Travel Channel will do for Anthony Bourdain. They'll dress him up. They'll showcase his wife. They'll film the entire episode in Black and White, as his tribute to Federico Fellini. But while Bourdain, though sometimes on the obnoxious side of eccentric, still knows how to choose 'em. After our artichokes, we sauntered along the river, shaded in the speckled light, past Trebi Island, towards the upwardly cool and popular neighbourhood of Trastevere. We are on the hunt for Roma Sparita.

To this, my husband said, "What's that? Casa del Awesome!" We are meant to be. 

Again, in our eagerness, we are forced to kill time until it opens. We wander around Santa Cecilia just in time to see a newly wedded couple spill out. We got married in the summer so we are fully aware of what wedding traffic looks like in the summer months. (We know people who got married each day the weeks leading up to and following our wedding, as well as someone on the same day.) But I have been amazed to have seen so many weddings since we've been travelling. And I always have to see her dress. It's a girl thing.

We wander back out into the courtyard to the sound of celebratory music of another wedding's reception in an upstairs dining room. We head to what I figured would probably be my haunt if I lived in Rome, a tiny bar aptly called "The Hole".

We take in two classically Italian aperitifs, a Negroni and a Sbagliato, as the light turns peachy and Roma Sparita is open for business. Roma Sparita specializes in pasta, and it was to be our one, and only, deviation from our pizza 'research'.

It keeps to the classics and does them right. Moozh had the amatriciana, a sauce of tomato, pecorino cheese, and pork, slathered on tube-like noodles. I had the cacio e pepe, or cheese and pepper pasta, served in a playful parmesan cheese bowl.

Fried squash blossoms, a summer seasonal speciality in Rome

Walking Trastavere at night is like stumbling across one thing after the next, lit in spotlight. Up Via Guisseppe Garibaldi, we stumbled upon the Panoramio, which lived up to it's name.

Rounding the corner, you find Pontificio Collegio San Pietro Apostolo, another large monument centuries old that is now functioning as the centre of a traffic circle.

From there onwards, we quickly realized that Roman streets aren't really meant for pedestrians. We walked the entire Aurelia Antica, the entire 6 km of it, on a six inch shoulder. And with Italian drivers, like all European drivers, we certainly got an earful of what they thought.

Next stop, the Colosseum.

Rome served us up a greyish day to see what of it's most famous landmarks but the structures are no less majestic. Climbing the steps to the Capitoline, you see a replica of the oldest equestrian statue in the world, of Marcus Aurelius on horseback. Passing another wedding where the bride loves big hair, we passed under an archway to a panorama of the Roman Forum.

Moozh figured out how to drink from the fountains that we've been seeing everywhere in Europe. The whole time we had been slurping from the palm of our hands, splashing our entirety with water, when had we simply plugged the spout of the faucet, there is a small hold drilled at the curve of the faucet that  turns it into an easily accessible stream. Go figure.

Passing the gates to the Palatine and the Roman Forum, the Arch of Constantine rises in front of you with the window laced facade of the Colosseum. We had invested in a Roma Pass that garnered us to jump the line at the Colosseum and free public transit in the city, as well as free entry to one other museum in the city. The transit pass definitely made a difference to us as we were staying a little bit outside the historic centre of the city. But it really came in handy as we were walking up to the Colosseum to see a healthy line of people snaking through the admissions line outside. A quick scan of our pass and we were in.

From the outside, the Colosseum is huge. But once you get inside, it feels much bigger. The rows and rows of seats that must have existed at one point is staggering but the tunnels below ground, which would have held gladiators, lions, bears and large pits truly is an engineering marvel. Gladiator wasn't lying.

Next was what used to be one of the last free historical sites in Rome, the Roman Forum. It has now become part of a package, in which you pay for the Colosseum and can then see the Roman Forum and the Palatine museum. The fact that some of these ruins are still in existence given the time and history that has past in the meantime puts it so much in perspective.

They can start to just look like a bunch of crumbling rock. But then you realize the age of each of these things, and their purpose back in their day. That's when you realize how small you are. And how impermanent.

We headed from the Colosseum back over to Centro Storico to try out Roscioli's sister restaurant, Roscioli Al Forno, with high expectations for their pizza bianco. Closed on Sundays. Ok.
Across the street, Chowhounders had raved about a pizza place with cheap margherita pies called Pizza Florida. Closed Sundays and Mondays. Hmm.
With Roscioli Al Forno closed for the day and no Pizza Florida, we took in pizza al taglio, which means pizza by the slice, at a small joint called Pizza Art. Now pizza al taglio is a common way that 'fast food' pizza joints do pizza in Rome. These places put the whole concept of pizza by the slice to shame. Slabs topped with goats cheese, pancetta and artichoke hearts or squash blossoms and fresh tomatoes, the pizza is cut and then priced by weight. This is not thin crust pizza. This is a focaccia-like crust, piled high with delicious toppings. You can try as many different kinds, slices of any size. We could have stayed there all afternoon.

But it's good we didn't!  Any preconceptions I had about gelato from the stuff we had in Venice was blown out of the water. Gelateria del Teatro is by far the best and most inspirational gelato I have EVER had, anywhere ever, and will ever in my life. It was like going to Pierre Herme and having the skies part and Saint Honore herself billow down to hand me something that would so redefine and inspire my desires for my pastry career. Now I have mentioned before that I have a bit of a bizarre palate. I love flavour combinations, presentation methods and ingredients that surprise me, intrigue, that make me want to pursue them. I had Lavender and White Peach along with Basil and White Chocolate. Moozh had Sicilian Wine Cream and Raspberry and Garden Sage. Each flavour had balance and beautiful freshness. I would have gone back to try everything they had.

Make some pasta. Add some cheese. Add some pepper. That's all you need. And maybe some wine.

Things I learned in Rome:
Pizza al Taglio = bomb dignity.
When in Rome, always keep your eyes open or you will miss something that is just hidden enough.

Quote from Rome Pt 1:
Moozh: "Babe, you do this weird chicken thing when you talk. It's like you're pecking your point across."
Runner Up:
Moozh: "You know why Rome wasn't built in a day. Because nobody here knows what the f*** they're doing."

Alfons Mucha, The Green Fairy, and Fried Cheese Sandwiches

Down from Berlin into Prague, we passed the red-roofed farming villages. We passed the tiny yellow fishing boats atop a glassy lake and the public announcements full of "und, ein and strasse". In passing over a bridge, the dialect over the intercom became clipped and slavic. Just as we figured out how to pronouce it, we were spit out at Praha Hlavni Nadrazi and wandered out into the patina wonderland of Prague, Czech Republic. A quick jaunt along winding streets, past overlapping stands peddling bratwurst and fried cheese sandwiches, of which we made a mental note of for later, art nouveau chocolateries and cabaret and strip clubs, we wound up at Archibald City Design Hotel, a delightfully air conditioned pillar of rooms from which we got a Prague-wide vista. Packs off, it seemed like no time before we found ourselves bathed in the peachy dusk glow on Wenceslas Square. 

Armed with our street food, replete with the requisite spicy mustard flecked napkins and a beer that set us back thirty cents, it began to dawn on us that Prague was going to be more than just a porky stopover between Germany and Italy. 

Funny money: A Czech Krona

Searching out another Bourdain haunt, we went on the hunt for Pivovarsky Klub, a pub with over 200 bottled beers available as well as six regional draughts that you definitely will not find anywhere else. Best Hefeweizen I've ever had. EVER. 

We had taken in Czech street food but we wanted to get a sense of good Czech food. It feels similar to what seems to be available around it. Czech food is similar to Hungarian food, Ukranian food is similar to Russian food. People who were close together, tended to do food that was close together. Regional cuisine is fascinating. On one hand, French cuisine (which we have been fed intravenously for six months) is lush, flamboyant, full of cream and butter, cognac and laminated pastry. Eastern Europe seems to have a cuisine built on about four ingredients, in a variety of different manifestations. And that pig gets used up. There's knuckles, ears, jowls, tripe (which WHAT THE F do you want to eat that for?). In Czech's case, pork rolled in early and established its turf. And NOBODY disagreed. Czech cuisine is a study in what comes of, "This is all we've got to work with and I need you to be able to work until you fall down." Goulash. Goulash is the answer. Beef. With bacon dumplings. That's what I had for lunch. Me. 

Said Pork Knuckles.

'Sup Goulash. 

Moozh in his element.

That meal had more pork in it than I think I've ever eaten in my entire life combined. I don't have anything against pork per se. I had no formative experience of trauma in my youth regarding pigs, dead or alive. But I have been on a diet decidedly lean on animal protein of any kind for quite a while now. My digestive system isn't even really mad yet, just very confused. It's still looking at me, a week and a half later saying, "What do you want me to do with this?"

I somehow doubt the Slavic diet is any easier for a meat eater to process. Boil dough in water and that crud will keep you going for at least twelve hours while you chuck hay bales. Or drink a beer on a patio somewhere. 

Moozh had me try his pork knuckles, which came with a side of raw white onions and a pickled pepper -which makes for choice breath afterwards- so that he could have an audience while he pontificated on the virtues of whole animal butchery. The pork knuckle was very good actually, very tender. But then he started talking about it being tender because the collagen melted. Suddenly, I just wanted a big, bottomless beer and no more pork. 

Prauge, more than beer, and more than pork, held one thing for me. The Mucha Museum. My favourite style is Art Nouveau and in my opinion, Alphone Mucha is the unchallenged king of Art Nouveau. Gaudi is great, Beardsley is distinctive in his own way, Klimt just does his own thing, Horta designed some beautiful buildings but Mucha quite literally pioneered the style that is so instantly recognizable. He lived a pretty charmed life, too. None of this suffering for his art, crisis of calling nonsense. From an idyllic village in Bohemia, where he was born and eventually died, to a series of financial benefactors throughout his life that facilitated his every artistic desire paired with an almost instantaneous fan base that has far outlived him, he pretty much grabbed on to an uphill trajectory and never let go. He not only drew theatre posters, he designed jewelry, furniture, theatre sets, and produced what he called The Slav Epic, a set of twenty canvases that are easily fifteen feet square and chronicle Mucha's interpretation of significant events in Czech history. It is a truly massive work. He painted them all with the intention of donating the entire work "to the Czech people" with the mere proviso that they display it in a place where civilians could see it and appreciate it. 

No photos were allowed in the museum so we don't have a ton to show for our time there. The Mucha Museum had what felt like a poor value for the price. At ten krona per person, they carried a handful of Mucha's works as well as some of his sketches from personal sketchbooks. They also had a film of Mucha's life on a loop at the back of the room. But it was probably no bigger than a 7-11, with many of his most amazing pieces not represented. They are in partnership with the Franz Kafka museum which probably meant that their attentions were not truly focussed on the Art Nouveau genius that is Alphonse Mucha. I wish I had done my research a bit better but for the same price, we could have seen the exhibition of the Slav Epic in the Grand Hall at Veletrzni Palace. 

Canadian-American architect Frank Gehry, the guy behind that insane Walt Disney Concert Hall and that limpid pool of serenity The Waterfall House, collaborated with Czech architect Vlado Milunic to design a building to fill an empty lot along the river that they affectionately nicknamed, Fred and Ginger. It has since been renamed The Dancing House but I personally like the original name better. 

Prague has a fascinating art installation culture. Whether it's an aged, mossy statue, decades old, or a new cue of yellow penguins along the riverside, you are never short of something to look at. 

The central squares, like all of Europe, are a marvel, chock a block of things to suspend and entertain you. The astronomical clock is a 600 year old clock, the oldest clock in the world still operational.  

Gothic figures rise from the gothic history of Prague, one full of creative, artistic people and a harsh history, one of hostile takeovers and subservience.

Jan Hus statue

Charles Bridge is an ornately decorated bridge that leads to Prague Castle. Over time, it has been continually added to. 

We realized here that every city we've been to post-Paris has their own version of the Love Bridge. We're okay with that.

Though he never actually stepped foot in the place, he did seem to provide the anthem to a young generation trying to get out from under the thumb of Communism. John Lennon has his very own wall in Prague. Aptly called 'The Lennon Wall', it is a ongoing project, to which anyone can contribute. 

Yeah you should!

Rails of grapevines and iron-work fences climb the mount that leads to Prague Castle, the largest castle complex in the world, as deemed by the Guinness Book of World Records. A UNESCO Heritage site, it sits high above the city, providing a view that you couldn't have conjured, a view dense with forests, glittering river currents and baroque building faces. 

We wanted to see it because it's of significant size and, you know, it's a Prague thing. But Mucha designed a stained glass window for St. Vitus' Cathedral, which is inside the complex. The stairs were a good antidote to our heavy-laden diets and we even got to see the changing of the guards by accident. 

Clad in pale blue uniforms that appeared to be made out of couch upholstery fabric, the guards put on the same stern face of those at Buckingham Palace, replete with the goony tourists trolling around in front of them trying to get them to crack a smile.

We picked up an absinthe beer along the way. Everybody else had a beer, we were beginning to feel left out. We even found an absintherie, where you can get absinthe mojitos and margaritas. 

Absinthe is first and fore mostly a Parisian thing. At one point, the Parisians alone were drinking about 3 million litres of the stuff. No wonder the government thought it must be a problem. But since the ban of Absinthe in the 19th Century, the stuff never really lost it's stigma. Even still, there are many places in the world where Absinthe production is still illegal (the good ol' US of A being one of them). The Czech Republic, with its Bohemian leniency, has cashed in on this in a way. The country currently produces the most Absinthe out of any country in the world and drinking absinthe has become a uniquely Czech thing to do while you're in Prague. There has been no definitive research to support the fact that absinthe messes you up in any way. The potentially-hallucinogenic property in Absinthe, thujone, comes from the herb wormwood. Most absinthes have about 10 mg/kg of thujone in them, which essentially means you'd be sloppily peeling yourself off the floor before you would have enough thujone in your system to accomplish anything. Stronger, "Artisan" absinthe contains 35 mg, which sounds exciting but would probably still only get you as buzzed as a cigarette. Some absinthes come with 35 mg in them but again it's such a minuscule amount that it probably wouldn't do much. The classic preparation of absinthe involves sugar and water added to taste. Some pour water over a sugar cubed balanced on an absinthe fork until the sugar cube melts. The "Czech way" is to dip a spoon in the absinthe and then in granulated sugar. The alcohol on the spoon is then set alight and the flame caramelizes the sugar, which drips into the absinthe. "Straight up" is harsh and apparently a dead give away that you're a tourist but absinthe is a fairly accessible flavour, similar to jaggermeister. I had mine straight up. What does that say about me? There's a popular cocktail called the Death in the Afternoon -invented by Ernest Hemingway actually- where absinthe is mixed with Champagne, named such for reasons I'm sure we can all deduce. 

Moozh and I had hunted down a local pub, over across the tracks, away from anything on a tourist map, that served what was voted the best pale lager in the Czech Republic. And Czech is the birthplace of the original pilsner, a tiny village called Plzni. Pilsner, just like Champagne, or Parma, is a place-specific word. It's not just a lager. It's a beer from Plzni. The region has soft water, and regional hops that all contribute to a unique flavour in the beer. The Nook Brewery's Koutska Dvanatska is a phenomenal beer. Light and therefore infinitely drinkable, but with a complexity that no pilsner across the Atlantic achieves. We tried some more of Nook's beer, which each had a different characteristic to them, floral, spicy, toasty. Moozh got some headcheese and I met the first cheese I didn't like. 

Prague held this uncommon beauty about it. The dense forests and pristine mountain vistas of Central Germany, with the clippy, Slavic tongue and sensibility of neighbouring former-Soviet bloc countries. Like Germany, they managed to preserve facets to what it means to be Czech, eat Czech, feel Czech on the other side of Soviet occupation. 

Things I learned in Prague: 

Fried cheese sandwich = win. Cheese that tastes like sweat = no thanks. Prague has both. 

Where language is concerned, Czech and Russian are not the same. And you get a funny look when you act as if they are. 

Quote from Prague: 

Moozh: Now THAT's a mother f'ing sausage.