Parma and Modena

This morning started with the free breakfast buffet at the hotel. They provided various kinds of croissants. Very flaky and buttery, nice... The best part is the prosciutto and pancetta. They serve it crisp like bacon and ham, yummy.

Today, we went to Parma and Modena to gather information. Parma is known for Parmesan (of course) and prosciutto. Modena is known for balsamic vinegar. The Emilia Romagna region is a heaven for foodie people. Also, Lambrusco is a specialty of Modena. Lambrusco is a red sparkling wine. I was trying to get the contact information to visit producers of these various products.

Unfortunately, we needed more advanced notice to visit the cheese and ham producers and Lambrusco producers are closed for summer. However, a woman at the tourist information center helped us to schedule a visit to traditional balsamic vinegar producer for tomorrow!

We had a lunch at Giallo Parma SRL in Parma. They had prix fix lunch for 12 Euro. 3 choices. Mine came with pasta, cipollini onions and roast beef. It was a good deal.

Again, the pasta was very al dente..


The dinner was at Ristorante Papa RE in Bologna. Because we were both tired, we chose a restaurant close to our hotel. It was very good! We chose a tasting menu with two dishes and one dessert. It had to be the same dishes for both of us. The pasta dish was Gramigna with sausage, which is also a regional specialty of Bologna. Gramigna is a long and thin macaroni with a little curl at the end.

 

I know it looks a bit gross. But it was very tasty!

The second dish was braised beef cheek.

Again, it doesn't look appetizing but it was very good actually.

Desert was Mille-feuille. It had a bit more cream than usual.

Also, we had an additional complimentary desert (we had complimentary zucchini soup too)

Lots of good food. We are going to visit a Balsamic vinegar producer in Modena tomorrow!