COME IN ITALY AND YOU'LL FALL IN LOVE OF ...

PIZZA!

My researches about the reputation of my city  abroad continue and today I've descovery a new web site : "lorisorrentino Fotography" (lorisorrentino.com) writen by an american photographer.

Although she's intrested in art, landscapets she's falled in love with ...pizza and italian food and it seems Naples is the right city for all of it!

Here is what she has writen on her website :

"Please don’t eat pizza when you're in Italy. Honestly. Because unless you stay, it will only break your heart.

If you love to travel, at some time in your life you’ll likely visit Italy - land of romance, sexy Italian accents, comforting food smells on the breeze like Sunday dinners at home. There’s something intoxicating about the juxtaposition of Italy - an everyday scene played out against ancient backdrops from centuries ago.

And the food. Oh, the food. More than anything, I remember the lovely dinners and delicacies I gobbled up when I was there (tried to savor because I knew it wouldn’t last). Pasta, some homemade and some not, though their homemade isn’t the same as our homemade. A common dish I fell in love with in Naples was spaghetti with cherry tomatoes, spaghetti con pomodori ciliegini, a simple dish of meaty sautéed cherry tomatoes bursting with flavor, with fresh garlic and basil over very al dente spaghetti pasta. I still make this at home way too often. Braciole, lovingly pounded thin, stuffed, then rolled, sautéed and devoured. Eggplant so many ways, but my favorites were the pickled eggplant salad in vinaigrette for breakfast, and the sandwich we bought from a little two-table sandwich shop in Amalfi, with eggplant in marinara sauce stuffed in a bread pocket and baked. The coffee drinks and pastries rightfully claim their own meal time, as in 'Breakfast, Lunch, Dinner, and Coffee and Pastry', and not necessarily just once a day or in that specific order.

one of the many restaurant in the seacoast of naples (lungomare)

And then there’s Pizza. Just the thought of it now literally renders me speechless… thoughtless… writers block… I don’t even know where to go from here. Because I know what’s coming. I know it’s true. I am ruined forever for pizza.

I had an idea it would happen, and there were plenty of warning signs. But I thought it was just hype, and didn’t give it a second thought. Probably because I was never a huge fan of pizza before, I believe this may be why it happened to me.

My husband has always expressed his love for the pie by saying “pizza should be its own food group” and many others I know feel the same. Yet, I’ve never had a huge affinity for it. Don’t get me wrong, I like pizza well enough, but I’m more inclined to order an Italian sub or good salad than I would a slice of pizza. I also live in the United States and am a second generation Italian. I’ve always known that the better Italian food came from the first generation, and sadly has been ever-so-slowly diluted by each generation since. “Gram used to make it like this” we’d say. “Yes, but I put my own twist on it.” So in the back of my mind, maybe I always knew there was something better, over there, waiting for me across the ocean in the old country.

And I found it. Oh yes, I found it. Sweet… sweet pizza.


Now, to be fair to you and make every effort for full disclosure, I must tell you that my first exposure to this involved Julia Roberts, and I hope that doesn’t bias you one way or the other. And you may have already guessed it also involved that chick-flick-to-end-all-chick-flicks, Eat. Pray. Love.  Arguably the biggest hit movie of the last few decades among middle-aged women inspired to find themselves through travel, meditation and affairs with hunky Latin men, it also was probably the biggest tourism boon to Italy, India, and Bali in recent history. We were planning on traveling to Italy for our anniversary anyway, but the movie without a doubt inspired me to find that little pizzeria on a side street in Naples, where I fell in love again.

Julia Roberts sat during the movie play in the Naples

Neapolitan pizza is unique. The Dough as the headliner takes center stage, the crust soft and chewy, not hard and crusty. Generally wood fired, it’s tomato bed is soft and pillowy, just the slightly bit doughy in the center, so its best eaten with a fork and knife. It’s not smothered with shredded cheese, but has just a few blobs of bufala mozzarella and several whole basil leaves adorning the middle. Together the ingredients become something magical, and a stark contrast to what we consider pizza in America. A Naples pizza is a purist's dream. It’s reputation as the best pizza in Italy, and hence the world, is well deserved. And once consumed, necessarily ruins the diner on pizza forever.

It’s a sad fact of life - with pizza, a lost love, or anything for that matter - but there’s nothing better once you’ve had the best. Ironically, as I’m writing this, a friend of mine is visiting Italy now and she posted a pic on Instagram today of her latest Italian discovery - pizza. Sad for her, I left this comment on her post: “You’re ruined forever for pizza, you know that don’t you?!”
I just wish I could have gotten to her in time. " (Lori Sorrentino)

In her web site Lori Sorrentino recomand a good pizzeria near by the city center. I wont write about it sice...despite it's good (may be to try after the best one) Im a " local "and I've the vantage to know better pizzeria to take you after my tours! ;)

The article in the inverted comas has been writen by Lori Sorrentino ,wereof i thanke you, and all the copywriters are riserved.
Pictures are upload from the facebook fan page "Pompeii walking tour" (uk -usa)
 and visitare napoli" (ita)

Fabio Comella tour guide in Naples, Pompeii , Herculaneum, Caserta, Sorrento, Capri

DISCOVERING NAPOLI

Guided Tours in Campania region
www.campaniaguidedtours.com

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