Food Features

We were looking forward to the great food in Florence until we started studying Italian and could interpret some of the names of the typical foods. Since Bill hates cooked vegetables, we were already off to a bad start, but when we heard about the favorite food, tripe (the intestines of a cow) we were really freaked and decided to be careful about what we ordered. (We saw people eating tripe in the outdoor market as it was dredged out of a pot of meat juice and fat, and slapped on to a sandwich of boiled beef.) It looked like white sausage casing and extremely gross!
We are really just talking about dinners now, since the hotel provided the breakfast and lunch gratis.
Our first dinners were fixed price meals, where all of the courses are included in the price. Keeping in mind that the dollar was worth 60 cents, a typical dinner (as in the picture of an outdoor cafe) will run 10-15 euros ($14-21). It may have a pasta, some chicken, and a salad--pedestrian at best. A meal on the run might be pizza or a stuffed sandwich with a cup of warm coke for perhaps 8 euros ($11). The only way to get really good food--the food you have read about and drooled over is to go to a really good restaurant and plan to pay--a lot! We did that for our last night there. We had seen a restaurant in the Rick Steves book that looked really good, so off we set to find it. It was raining occasionally, and we seemed to walk for miles, when we came to the street in question. We shared the narrow street with some vagabonds (to put it nicely) and a few garbage cans, but then, in the distance, we saw some people waiting to get into a door, and sure enough, it was our restaurant. Normally, they wouldn't take you without reservations, but it was not a very busy night, so they kindly took us in.
The service was sooo slow, until we realized that the waiter did nothing until we directed him to do so. Finally we ordered the three courses. I had a tasty onion soup that was bold but not overpowering, a cheese and pear over greens salad that was outstanding, and veal with potatoes for the main course. Bill had a tortellini soup, shared my salad, and steak (from a breed of steer unique to Tuscany). It was a memorable meal, with each part being very tasty and wonderful. The eat and wait and discussion and wait, meant that the meal took 2 1/2 to 3 hours, which is typical. This is a Florentine evening activity, evidently, so you are not only buying a meal, but you are renting a seat! We added bottle of wine (should have had red, but we don't like red, so we had white) and a bottle of water, for a grand total of $180 ! And we were cheap! Needless to say, once was all that we could afford.
But the best food in Florence was the Gelato--the wonderful ice cream, custard, of a million flavors. We had it nearly every day, and normally that would be disastrous for the waist line, but we walked 10 hours a day, so we didn't gain weight. It is the best ice cream anywhere.
We ate in a McDonald's one night, and it was great to taste American food and coffee far from home.

Florence

The Euro during our trip rose
to its highest value against
the dollar, which fell to a value of just $.60.
Since we charged most of our purchases, it wasn't until we got home that we realized the true cost!

Florence

Believe it or not, this was our hotel, the Hotel Paris. Our room was not terrific, but this breakfast room was lovely, with its fresco ceiling and old world service. The food was great, too (hard rolls and meats and cheeses, yogurt and cereals, fresh fruits and lattes, coffees, and croissants) Every day, we would make sandwiches from the breakfast foods, grab a piece of fruit, and we were good to go for lunch and snack. This was all included in the room price (which was hefty), along with lots of help with arrangements and advice.
The sweet little patio area was filled with potted rose bushes, but the floor was covered with moss and was very slippery, so we didn't spend much time out there. It had a picturesque view of a quiet back street.
Our room had shuttered windows that we could open to peer down the street. In order the keep out the noise of the very busy street (ambulance lane?!), we closed the shutters, the outside window, and the double-pane inner window, and the drapes, but it was still noisy. We ended up wearing ear plugs in order to sleep!
The streets are very narrow in the historic section, but traffic is fast and furious, with buses and motorcycles and cars fighting for space. Pedestrians could reach out and touch the buses from the sidewalk. Motorcycles are the preferred way to travel and some streets have parking for them, side-by-side--forty to fifty in a row.

Fabulous Florence

Our trip to Florence, Italy in April was the completion of a similar trip we made 40 years ago. We were married in the Calvin College Chapel in 1966, after completing our junior year there. Dirt poor, we got married on Saturday afternoon, honeymooned in Traverse City for the weekend, and then went back to classes on Monday. Two years later, after we had saved some money, we went on a real honeymoon to Europe for a summer, touring the Netherlands, Germany, Austria, Belgium, Italy, and France, and England in a green Volkswagon bug that we had purchased across the street from the airport in Amsterdam. It was a fantastic experience and CHEAP since the dollar was really worth a lot then. However, on our way North from Rome, we intended to stop in Florence, but it was so hot and we were so tired, that we just rode on by, hoping that someday we might return. Now, 40 years later, we finally made the trip. It cost infinitely more, but this time we had done our homework and could understand what we were seeing. Some people question why we would go there, rather than a hundred other places, and I would say that it is because Florence doesn't just have museums with great art, Florence IS a museum in itself. It was the pivot point, the turning point in history between the classical world and the Renaissance world, the ancient world and the emerging modern world. And although art of all kinds is essential in portraying these changing civilizations, it is only one aspect of the change. One needs also to see the role of the church and religion, political factions and philosophies, architecture and inventions, money and banking, medicine and diseases, etc. In a sense, Florence was the eye of the storm of change, and all of these factors were swirling around it. Going there and studying all of these factors was like putting together the pieces of the puzzle we had been carrying with us for a long time.
I won't be showing you photos of everything we saw, but rather picking a few that had special significance for us. I hope you enjoy them.