Day Ten: Bologna Food Tour part three

Could there be more? Yes! This is Italy.

After the vinegar plant we drove to what appeared to be a side-of-the-road butcher. Surprise surprise ! Just down a stairway and we were in a prosciutto producing facility! It is run by a former leg- and runway model -turned businessman/butcher/cured meat specialist named Pino. He took us through many many rooms full of hams in different stages of curing. The smell was rather repulsive.


Legs about to be salted


Room after room was filled with drying prosciutto


Volunteers seal the exposed areas with a seasoned lard "paint"


Pino modeling with some of his art

There were many stages of the process that can be simply reduced to "the ham hangs for a really long time." Also, Pino makes many different meat products. One of these is DOP prosciutto of Modena, for which he is one of six makers in the whole world. 

We trekked upstairs to taste test several different meats, including prosciutto, truffle ham, culatello, and mortadella, along with two different wines.


Pino's shop

Then, as if we haven't had enough, we voyaged over to an agritourismo terrace for lunch. That's right: an actual meal. And what a meal! 

All sixteen of us sat around a very large table and enjoyed a family style feast for several hours. First we had three pasta dishes, one with ground sausage, one with bechamel and ham, and one ragu Bolognese. Next came the second plates, including roasted potatoes, chicken cacciatore, beef and tomato-stuffed zucchini, and chicory, plus a regional bread disk for which we didn't learn the name. They made special substitutions that didn't have beef for John, so we also saw a tomato spaghetti, a cheese plate, and homemade fruit jam. For dessert we had yogurt mousse with berries, house made licorice liqueur that tasted of sorghum, and cafe. And there was abundant wine at each course. Abundant. Red, white, sparkling, still. At one point Adam swashbuckled a bottle open with a sword, which we caught on video but can't seem to upload. The meal was seemingly endless and our tour guide was slick about getting us to eat and drink more, even when near the "burst" line.



Two images from the site of our lunch

We ended the day with more conversation before being dropped off back in Bologna. What a phenomenal experience! We had eaten so much that we didn't eat the rest of the day. We spent the evening clothes shopping in Bologna (hmm.... Hard to find the correct size after such a day...). We also took several long walks through town!


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