Karin Loves Italia

 We have returned to Florence from our 10 day jaunt to Sicily and it felt like coming home!  We have often walked down these streets before (Janice, I can hear you singing that).  The guys who run the auto service station next door cheered our arrival. Mozzarella guy greeted us like long lost friends.  We missed being greeted with paroxysms of ecstasy by our Franklin, but otherwise it felt right. And damn good. I'm trying to avoid sounding like a Rick Steves promotional brochure, but a certain amount of hyperbole is unavoidable when discussing Sicily. The island is simply fabulous...some of Mother Nature's finest work. The blue in these photos has not been digitally enhanced.   Neither has the view of Mt. Etna, which erupted for our visual delight. We watched it by day and by night from our hotel room in Taormina.  And also from the restaurant. We spent a day with a geologist climbing to 2500 feet, which is as far as the powers-that-be will let you cli...

Our traveling buddies, Sylvia and Len, arrived from Chicago this week. We spent a day in Florence and a day in San Gimignano before heading to Sicily for our third shared travel adventure. Here we are enjoying a lovely lunch at a San Gimignano winery. The natural beauty is astonishing here.  And if you ask me, the scenery isn't bad either😀 As we flew to Palermo from Florence, the theme music from The Godfather  became an ear-worm I simply could not extinguish.  La da da da da da, da da da da da daaaaaaaaaaa.  Despite the unrelenting music in my head, I suspected the mafia was no longer entrenched in Sicilian daily life.  According to our guide, Mimmo, I was only partially correct. He explained that Cosa Nostra is not as visible as it once was, but they are everywhere and continue to involve themselves in all aspects of Italian business, most of it, these days, legitimate.   We arrived on an auspicious weekend. It was the 30th anniversary of the assass...

 In Italian, this is called Tarallini del Re con olio di oliva. In English, it's called crack.  You can purchase these in any Italian market. We have often seen them in La Stalla market in Newtown, but have never caved in to temptation. These little darlings are freshly made here, and we pop them like M&Ms. Like crack, try one and you are instantly hooked.  In my humble opinion, the people who created these are the Sacklers of Italy. The Florentines love their carbs. Every morning, when we embark upon our first of several daily walks, the locals are lined up at our favorite cafe, Serefini, waiting for their first carb of the day...a mouthwatering croissant ( I personally favor the one stuffed with lemon curd while Harold prefers the pistachio cream. "Yum," he says with a giggle.) or a cheese danish or cinnamon bun.   I ordinarily have nothing for breakfast.  Nothing doesn't work here. We have trained ourselves to have a small scoop of yogurt with fruit ...