Got back home the day before yesterday after 10 days in Toscana ( and a cheeky one day in Liguria!). According to the invoice from Europcar we’ve done over 1700 miles in our rented Fiat 500, we’ve seen a chunk of that stunning land and we have eaten very well indeed. Again. 🙂

One place that knocked me off my feet was San Giminiano. I always wanted to go and visit it and it was well worth it. Super hot, very crowded, but stunning. We’ve had lunch; Izzie became a huge fan of prosciutto e melone and that’s what she asked for there. What arrived was a very generous plate of possibly the best Parma ham I’ve ever tasted, surely freshly sliced, plus melon as sweet as candy.

Florek went for a beef carpaccio with truffles, while I was starving enough for a plate of gnocchi.

Two bottles of wine were purchased, one of the local ones will be kept on the rack until some cold autumn day we will fancy a vino from San Giminiano, while this lovely Brunello was enjoyed that same day on Marco’s terrace.

Then, one evening we set out for Lucca with our eyes set on Bistecca Fiorentina. And bistecca we had alright, a T-bone, served to us on a hot plate, so we could finish the cooking of it the way we liked, some salad with that and a caraffe of red wine. An excellent piece of beef it was, followed by a less impressive bill of over 150 euro- it turned out they charge by weight of the meat, which also had a massive bone. :-/

When we hopped across the fence to Liguria to see some of Italian Riviera and Cinque Terre, we’ve eaten well again. For me it had to be some seafood, so I started with octopus salad and managed to convince Izzie to try a piece.

Salad came with a chilled glass of Pinot Grigio, simple and fantastic.

And then spaghetti with seafood, the langoustines were actually sweet! Loved it.

On the last evening we went back to Lucca and I ordered spinach gnocchi with walnut sauce, waitress said it was amazing, it looked the part, but I thought lacked a bit in terms of oomph. Google photos made it look like that;

In terms of stocking up the pantry I’m currently very much ok for truffles and porcini, 4 chunks of great parmesan in the fridge too.

And, pleasantly surprised, no shock while checking my body weight, I managed not to go too stupid while on holidays! 🙂