Perche

This is a good, funny, rejoinder to end this debate in what is a friendly forum 99% of the time. I went to the supermarket last week, and they had bananas! In February! And, they were still greenish! How is the fruit going to have any taste if it is picked before it is ready. People still buy those things, and let them ripen on their kitchen counter. When they get yellow enough to eat, they eat them. With eyes closed, if you were asked what you were eating, you probably couldn't tell it was a banana because there is no flavor. In Italy, if you walk into a supermarket in February and say, "where are the bananas, I can't find them," they will back away, and think that you just escaped from an asylum, or if they are patient will say, "excuse me, bananas don't grow in February." In fact, in the USA since the bananas are so green, they do "artificial ripening" to make them look salable, by putting them in a room and put ethylene gas in the air to help them yellow-up.

Tomatoes actually are a gassy fruit (tomatoes are not a vegetable), and they have a way of producing their own ethylene gas, to ripen themselves up. When the green tomato is mature, it starts making ethylene gas for itself, to make itself turn from green to red color. Only tomatoes can do this, making them the only fruit in the world that you can pick before it is ripe, and still get the good taste. Even then, they are at the mature green stage only at the end of summer. Go to an Italian grocery and ask for a tomato in April, and see what a dirty look you will get. The USA penchant for having all food available, all of the time, has led to a serious downgrade in the taste buds.

Klouis, your humorous response, most of the US Americans don't care about what they're given to eat! made me spill my morning coffee!

mromalley

On the subject of Mordi e vai, they have other sandwiches other than offal and they are quite good. The picchiapo (beef/onio/tomato) is delicious as is the meatballs and the eggplant. I usually meet a friend at the Testacchio Market for lunch, I have tried several ofthe food stalls there.

highlanderfil

Amen. I'd rather have scarcer availability, even it came at higher prices, but real taste.

So, on the subject of produce, is there a way to find out what fruit/berries are in season in Italy, by month? And what are good places around Rome to buy the fresh stuff?

PWMTrav

The only thing I'm going to add is that Italian groceries are guilty of this too, to a certain extent. I'm usually in Italy in February (this being the first one in a long time where we skipped), and never had a problem getting a banana in Conad or Esselunga. Bananas are actually a non-seasonal crop. It's that they're picked green that really diminishes their flavor, but most of us don't live close enough to where they grow to buy a tree-ripened version.

Perche

I'll have to disagree, slightly. Bananas are considered non-seasonal, if you are willing to eat them ethylene gas ripened and green, as opposed to ripened on a tree. For most other fruits and vegetables, there is no such remedy. What makes Italian food so great is the WOW-freshness of the ingredients. A tomato is not just a tomato, a plum is not just a plum, an artichoke is not just an artichoke. Unlike French food that might have 15 ingredients, Chinese food that might have 20, or Thai food that might have 25, few Italian dishes have more than 3-4 ingredients. Yet, Italian food is consistently voted as the best food in the world, and it primarily has to do with only one thing: the freshness of the ingredients

If you go to a true Italian grocer, not a chain like Conad, and you ask for cherries when not in season, they will frown and back away from you.

Since Highlander asked, here is a general rundown, although my memory can be faulty.
In June, get peaches, cherries, strawberries, figs, prunes, watermelon, apricots, eggplant, arugula, peppers, peas, basil, string beans, and parsley.

Later in June all of the real restaurants will start carrying all of the root vegetables, very fresh, and leafy greens start dominating.

July and August is good for almost all fruit, and it's the only time of the year for melon, so when in Italy, if in a real Gelateria, go for the melon.

The Fall is grapes, squash, chestnuts, apples, berries, mushrooms, and of course, truffles. h

In the winter, you are stuck with cauliflower, broccoli, cabbage, fennel, spinach, kale, and radishes, so go for the soup. By December, you are stuck with only bitter things like chicory, so you need to develop a taste for the bitter things in life.

Amazingly, oranges ripen in Sicily in January, and they will often be in a box outside the store with a sign saying, "assagarne uno," meaning try one. You will wind up leaving with a full bag. In February, you are still stuck with cabbage, lentils, fennel, things like that, although broccoli starts to come out. As Spring dawns, out come the strawberries, cherries, asparagus, leeks, and wow, even artichokes. Too bad that by the end of May, no more artichokes. In the summer, everything is game, shop for anything you want.

In Italy, very different from the USA, people don't shop at Conad, Coop (pronounced coop, not co-op.), Esselunga, etc. Of course, many do if just looking for toilet paper and soap, but most still rely on their grocer. Except in big cities there really isn't any other option. Here in California, I am sure that Whole Foods will have cherries right now, but I'm sure that if you went to the grocer anywhere in Italy other than a chain like Conad, Coop, Esselunga and asked for cherries, the owner would start to slowly back away from you, out of fear that you might be crazy.

JBD

Here's an old thread of mine (I used to post as sk3): Some good resources for determining where to eat in Rome

As I mentioned there I follow these people on twitter and there's a whole group of expats that are friends and you'll see them regularly tweet and blog about each other. Some have been more successful than others with getting their articles and books published, some have apps. One of these women is named Natalie Kennedy, and she was the author of the article in Thrillist.

Here's her blog: An American in Rome

Here she is on twitter: https://twitter.com/natalierae

JBD

Though this article from Katie Parla is from 2010, it should still be quite helpful. (At the very bottom of the article she lists specific produce per month, and right before her list she suggests where to buy it): Guide to Responsible Food Tourism in Rome

JBD

Since the Katie Parla article was 8 years old, I looked and found this post from Elizabeth Minchilli from January of this year. As well as listing her preferred Roman markets she also offers her "unspoken set of customs" to adhere to when shopping:

shopping at the market in rome + 5 rules

Perche

Great info here. Here's my two cents. Natalie Kennedy is a great writer. I read her blog. She's not a "foodie," but she certainly knows Rome. She is super at figuring out things to do, or to see. She doesn't have the food pedigree of someome like Katie Parla, but she is a really good source of info about Rome. It's interesting that her opinions are often 180 degree opposite of others, but they all make sense.

The global environment hasn't changed so much yet that your post from the 2010 Katie Parla article is still 100% correct. Buy your food at the local grocery, not at COOP, or Esselunga, or other supermarkets and you will always have seasonally correct, fresh food. It's sad that Katie now is a very part-time blogger, as she has moved her enrgy into being a full-time author about food.

I like Elizabeth Minchilli's blog too, as a source of info. I think that ex-pats living in Rome provide the best info. I was in Rome, not too long ago, and I was eating a panino (It's not called panini). A young lady started talking in english to the guy behind the counter. When she sat down, I asked where she was from, and what she was doing here. She said she was a college student, in London, and to put herself through college, she flies to cities in Europe, and writes articles about the food for Lonely Planet. She only took about two bites of the panino, then left, becasue she said she had five more places to go to before her flight back to London that evening. You can't trust stuff like this.

Elizabeth Minchilli is a very popular food blogger, and tour guide. There is only one thing that I'd bring up. She has started doing reviews of restaraunts everywhere she travels, including NY, and whatever, and every meal is fantastic. If Katie Parla feels that a meal wasn't very good, she'll provide verifiable reasons why, with pictures, like this is the industrial barrel that your fresh tomato sauce is coming from. It seems on the other hand, that Minchilli has never had a bad meal. Every meal is wonderful, never criticized.

When I am in Rome, which I try to do for at least 2-3 months per year, this being a strange year, becasue I haven't been there since the end of last July, I rent an apartment in her neighborhood of Monti. I've never seen her. She posted an article about a bar, and said that's where she could be found every day having a Negroni with her friend. I would also go to that bar everyday for a night cap, before heading up to Fattamorgana for gelato. I never saw her there. I wanted to meet her. So, just before coming back to the States after three months I asked the young lady bartender if she knew her. She said she didn't. That doesn't mean anything, because almost no matter what you ask in Italy, the answer is, "non lo so." (I don't know).

This was a conversation completely in Italian so, I went over to the owner, and asked him if he knew Elizbeth Minchili, and he said,"Non lo so, I would need to see a picture." So I pulled up her website on my phone and showed him a picture of her, and he started yelling at the bartender, "What do you mean, you don't know her, she's the redhead who comes in here who I told you doesn't speak very good Italian!!!"

Jeb321

mromalley

@Jeb321 - Good call.

Jeb321

Thank you, thank you. I'm also planning dinner at Roscioli. What thinks you? Need 3 other good spots in Rome. Any suggestions? If they're good I might just impose and ask for suggestions for my amalfi coast sojourn and then for the trip up to Venice and Florence. Will be in Italy 1 month. Lots of eating.

Perche

You better make a reservation fast. It often requires a month. Request a table upstairs, but away from the counter. They'll probably laugh at that, but no harm in trying.

Jeb321

Thanks Perche. I asked my hotel this am to make reservation for 7pm 4/12 in the restaurant. Did not know about the "upstairs" part. Have not yet heard back.
As mentioned in earlier message am looking for a few more suggestions. Maybe suggestions including mussels, clams etc?

Perche

No mussels and clams, or pre-conceived notions. When in Rome, eat Roman dishes. When in Florence, eat Florentine food. In Venice, eat like a Venetian. The food is different in all three places. That's why the notion of, "Italian Food" doesn't exist there is no such thing. Don't go there thinking about what American food you want to order, like mussels and clams. In Rome, eat what Romans eat. Cacio e Pepe, spaghetti alla carbonara, saltimbocca, carciofi alla giudia, spaghetti all gricia, porchetta, coda alla vaccinara. Don't think mussels and clams. This is not a trip to Olive Garden. Eat roman food. There are some seafood dishes on the menu, but Rome is not know for its seafood.

The same for Florence. No mussels and clams. It's not near the ocean, just the dirty river Arno full of industrial and agricultural drainage, untreated sewage, and massive amount of algae and bacteria. You don't go to Florence thinking about clams and mussels. Think of grazing cattle, and monster size steaks, ribollita, lampredotta, tripa.

Italian food has little in common with Italian-American food. It isn't what grandma made, because the ingredients were available in the USA.

In Venice, think cichetti, branzino, linquini alle vongole, fegato, bigoli in salsa, sarde in saor, baccala mantecato, risotto nero di seppia, moeche, and of course, prosecco, valpolicella, and soave.

Really, there is just no such thing as Italian food, and Italian-American food is as different from Italian food as Chinese food is from Indian, or German food from french food. There are few things in common, but not very much. Roman food doesn't even have much in common with Florentine food an hour and a half train ride away. And I have never seen Venetian food on a menu in Rome. You will rarely see Italian food on the menu of an, "Italian" restaurant in the USA. You might find a carbonara, but that's Roman, not Italian. They never heard of it in Sicily or up North in Torino.

Don't go there thinking of eating clams or mussels, or Italian-American food. In each city you go to find out what they eat, and what they eat. If I understand correctly, you are going to Rome, Florence, Venice. If so, forget about lasagna. You'd have to go to Bologna to eat that.