Day 9: Palazzo Madama, Torino

Day 15: The Shroud of Turin

As I mentioned yesterday, we visited the Shroud of Turin in Turin. Pope Benedict XVI authorized the Shroud for public display to a two month period this year - the first time since 2000. We booked our reservation about three months ago and received our first choice date. The ticket said to arrive an hour prior but we really didn't expect the line snaking around the block. It was easy to find the end - hundreds of pilgrims led the way. After about an hour and a half in line, we finally made it into the church. Technically, no photography was allowed (and definitely no flash) but after I realized that, aside from the praying nuns, I was the only one not taking photos, I whipped out the camera for a shot as our line filed out of the church. Clearly, it didn't turn out well but I think you can at least see the outline.

The mystery of the Shroud of Turin has been debated for centuries. According to many of the faithful, it's the cloth used to wrap Christ's body in period between the crucifixion and the resurrection. According to the skeptical, it's not. Seems like the only thing that the majority can agree on is that stains that resemble blood outline a figure that appears to have been crucified - and that the fabric is really really old. Whatever your belief is, it was hard not to be moved by the story of the Shroud and of the deep religious significance. While there were plenty of tourists using FLASH photography DURING the priest's prayer (seriously - that irritated the heck out of me), there were plenty of the truly faithful and the interested academics. Since it could be another decade or more before the Shroud is brought out for public viewing, we felt very grateful to have been in the right place, at the right time, in 2010.

Day 16: Caffe Torino

I spent my birthday in Turin, one of my favorite cities in Northern Italy. We visited the infamous Shroud of Turin, open for the first time in about a decade, walked around town, and enjoyed a mostly beautiful day.


One of our stops was at the Caffe Torino, a centuries old institute in the Piazza San Carlo. Their coffee is delicious and the pastries looked amazing, especially in the spacious salon filled with frescoes and mirrors.

Eataly

Despite what you might think, my friend and I were not done food shopping when we departed the Torino chocolate festival. The festival had been a fortunate detour from our true destination - the ultimate grocery store in the world. Ok, maybe that's an exaggeration. I've been to the Whole Foods flagship store in Austin and that place is pretty cool but this one is probably the best in Europe and definitely the best in Italy.

What's the number one best part about it? The name. Eataly.

Get it? I think it's so clever but maybe I just have a "punny" sense of humor. Eataly is a store that embodies the principles of the 'Slow Food' movement that was invented right here in Northern Italy. This giant warehouse of a store/restaurant contains good from small-scale producers from all over Italy. Rather than shipping their meats, cheeses, and produce through a middle man and risking the loss of quality, they joined together to sell their goods for a sustainable price at Eataly. With some small exceptions, a handful of 18 producers make up the bulk of the goods sold here. If you want to know where your salumi comes from, the Eataly website will tell you all about the father/son team of Franco and Carlo Pernigotti in Tortona, who still makes their salumi by hand in the same location that they have been since the early 20th century. Selling from artisan producers to the mass market doesn't mean a sacrifice in selection either. You can see from the picture below that my friend and I had quite the challenge when it came to picking the salami or prosciutto that we'd take home with us.


Eataly embodies the principles of the 'Slow Food' movement that were formed in Italy in 1986 as a response to the fast food/Americanization that was sweeping through Europe. While they didn't manage to stem the tide of McDonald's, they did create a niche market demand for high-quality sustainable foods. The Slow Food organization serves a consulting role in Eataly's growing empire (they have a small store in three other Italian cities and will be opening more).

Pressed for time, we mainly explored and shopped in the retail food and beverage sections, planning our dinner for that night. While we initially wanted to make a seafood pasta, the price of sustainable shrimp was a bit beyond our budgets and neither of us know how to debeard mussels. Instead, we opted for fresh ground beef with a locally produced tomato & basil sauce. We picked up fresh pasta (so much better than the dried stuff) along with whole-wheat bread and the makings for a fresh garden salad. So perhaps it was the American-ized version of a Bolognese but the ingredients did make a world of difference.

And the icing on the cake? It wasn't dessert - it was our beverage of the night. When we wandered to the cellar, we noticed these gigantic barrels and gigantic glass bottles. Local customers stood there, some with gallon-sized glass jugs, to fill up on wine. Priced at just 3.50 euro per liter, I couldn't resist grabbing a two liter bottle of my own (for only 80 cents!). I was initially worried about whether we'd drink it before it went bad - silly me, it was gone by midnight! Typical Italy, just when you think this place is too expensive to live well (you should've seen the prices on that shrimp), it'll turn around and shock you with something ridiculously cheap and delicious.

CioccolaTO

I've mentioned before how much I love Turin and how famous they are for their chocolate (even if you've never heard of it). If you weren't convinced that it should be on your Northern Italy travel adventure, perhaps this will do the trick. Every year, usually at the end of February, the city of Turin sponsors the CioccolaTO - a gigantic chocolate festival.



Held in the Piazza Vittorio Veneto (seen above), tents are set up to display the makings of chocolatiers from all over Italy and Europe. Vendors ply passersby with freebies, tempting you to stop and eventually purchase some of their goods. I took an afternoon off work and headed out to Turin with a friend visiting from Zimbabwe (she needed the break) to explore this foodie haven.


It didn't take much to get me to stop immediately. The first stand we saw was for hot chocolate. Options abound. You can get your cocoa flavored with mint, liquor, dark chocolate, milk chocolate and about six others that I don't even remember. I opted for canella, or cinnamon. This is no Starbucks where they add your high-fructose cinnamon-flavored corn syrup into your cocoa. No, these hot cocoas are blended together from fresh ingredients - the stand had separate containers for each different type of cocoa. As you can see, the drink had more of a "thick pudding" aspect than your typical watered down Nesquik.


The first few booths we encountered seemed to be run by small producers (one of the later ones was heavy hitter, Swiss Lindt). They didn't spend as much on fancy wrappings but what they did, they did well. Fruits and spices were candied and covered in dark chocolate (orange and ginger above) but there were multiple options in the way of normal chocolate bars. I walked away with some of my favorites like chocolate orange, rose chocolate, and chocolate with fleur de sel. Some dark chocolate may have also made its way into my bag, to be saved for making my dark chocolate cherry chunk cookies for the next bake sale/fundraiser.


I saw some uses for chocolate that I'd never previously imagined. Yes, that is actually chocolate pasta (light and dark) pictured above. When I asked the clerk what one cooks with chocolate pasta, I got a "whatever you want" as the answer. While I didn't buy any, I guess I'd imagine a light sauce with fresh nuts and cream or folding them into a sweet dessert casserole or a "chocolate spaghetti with candied fruit 'meat'balls". Hm, maybe I should've bought it to experiment with!


But the CioccolaTO is more than just buying and tasting chocolates. it has to be - even with my sweet tooth I could only take two small pieces after the hot cocoa. The festival puts on laboratories, demonstrations, and even cooking classes available (some in English) to the general public. The above demonstration got going after we left but it appeared as though he chef was going to do something very interesting with all those little cups. We even stumbled across a local group of Italian elementary school students participating in a learning session under another tent. The production and history of local, regional, and national foods are a serious matter in Italy.

Though the chocolate festival was not our only foodie destination in Torino, we left with full bellies, chocolate hangovers, and heavy shopping bags. Since the festival closed just a few days after we visited, we were lucky to have caught it at all and even luckier to have experienced such a wide range of Italian chocolates with so little effort!

Torino

About a month ago, I headed on a brief work trip to Torino. Also known as Turin, or the site of the 2006 Olympic Winter Games, this city is OLD with roots that date back to it's origins as a Roman camp in the first century, BC. Just under two hours away from Milan (less by car), it's even easily do-able as a day trip.

Despite only have one night in Torino, I was determined to cram in as many sights as possible. With a hotel downtown, I found out that this would be very easy. Torino is a compact city with wide sidewalks made for strolling along the boulevards. In my short time, I fell in love with Turin. It took my favorite aspects of Milan (the "Italian" feeling and the lack of English signage) with my favorite parts of Rome (charm, and lack of crazy hustle & bustle) to create a Francophile's Italian city. Why is this a perfect city for Francophiles, parce que the Savoys of France had a heavy hand in development and architecture from the fifteenth through eighteenth centuries. You can feel it in the big piazzas with their active cafes (feels like St. Germaine) or the wide arcade walk-ways that evoke Paris and its Grandes Boulevardes. Is it any wonder that I, a confirmed fan of Paris, fell in love?

While my hotel room was plenty plush, my co-worker definitely had the better view. The red roofs of Turin and the domed roof of the Mole Antonelliana were protected back in the Roman, Lombard, and Savoy days but the Alps (on the north and west) and the hills of Monferrato.


After work, I started out my sightseeing with a visit to the famous chocolate shop, Peyrano.


Turin is actually the birthplace of solid (versus drinkable) chocolate and Peyrano is one of Turin's most respected producers. With their origins going back to a regular candy shop back in 1914, it is still their version of Gianduiotto that keeps winning acclaims in a town with lots of competition.


Each spring, Turin plays host to an annual chocolate festival called Cioccolato with tastings, chocolate-based literature readings, and theater inspired by chocolate. Even though I have no earthly idea what "chocolate-based literature and theater" could actually be, I'm intrigued enough to want to find out this spring!

After grabbing some chocolates to take home, I strolled back downtown. Via Roma is the main shopping street that cuts through the center of town to some of the major sights. With distractions along the way ranging from Cartier to Zara Home, that was my chosen route. I mentioned the arcades before and want to reiterate, they are stunning. Also, with the slightly drizzly weather that popped up in the early evening, they were very handy to stay dry! Supposedly, the 18km of arcades were constructed back in the days of royalty so that the king could stay covered wherever he went around the city.

Via Rome feeds into the Piazza San Carlo, where a statue of Emanuele Filibertois flanked by the twin churches - Chiesa di San Carlo and Chiesa di Santa Cristina.


Piazza San Carlo is known as one of Turin's main drawing rooms and is home to cafes with spacious outdoor set-ups.


However, during my visit, the Piazza San Carlo was also home to a special photography exhibit titled Siddhartha, il Budda. The photographers explain the exhibit as an attempt to tell the story of Siddhartha through photographs of modern Indian and Buddist lives.


Finally, my walk ended at the Piazza Castello, Turin's grandest square and home to many museums, theaters, and cafes within the arcade walkways. This square was the base for the House of Savoy during their reign of the region and dominated by the Palazzo Madama (center in the below photograph). Built in the 13th century over an old Roman gate, this part-Baroque/part-Medievel castle was named after Madama Reale Maria Cristina, who lived there in the 17th century.


Even without the 2009 chocolate festival, Torino holds many promises of interesting sites to see and paths to walk. We will definitely be headed back.