New here? Check out “Best Of” for some top posts, subscribe to my RSS feed - http://feeds.feedburner.com/MsAdventuresinItaly or receive email updates!Way back in December, while driving around Gargano, Puglia, and after we made a stop in Ischitella to pick up those delicious Marzipan fruit, we stopped in on some of S’ relatives, naturally unannounced. [...]

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Since we’re going to India over the Christmas break, we decided to go visit S’ family since we have spent the past 3 years with them. This time we made a special trip deep into the National Park Gargano.

S’ father was born in Ischitella, a small town with less than 5,000 people in it [...]

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Be sure to read: Part 1 of Inside a Pugliese Forno (Breadmaker)
In part one, we looked at preparing the dough for the rising and baking. Now our oven is ready for the all the dough we prepared.
I love this picture - it could be the inside of Any Forno, Italy. The baskets of dough [...]

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Be sure to read Part 2: Inside a Pugliese Forno (Breadmaker): Into the Oven!
“Oooo, I’d like to go in there.”
When my friends and family here hear this, they know that I am immediately making plans to infiltrate whatever I’m talking about. What I really mean is, I want to approach complete strangers, follow them around [...]

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The beaches on the coasts of Italy are completely different from region to region, and even from kilometer to kilometer, but most don’t fit the ideal of a beach that I grew up with - miles of wide, open beach and fine sand confronting a turbulent ocean. I have divided most of my life between [...]

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When I saw that my visit in Puglia coincided with the Sagra della Bruschetta e Nodino - Festival of the Bruschetta and (mozzarella) Knot, I was ecstatic. I consider these little “knots” to be one of my top ten favorite foods in Italy. Something that must be sampled and savoured here, because the freshness and [...]

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Still talking about being in the Puglia - Apulia region (see previous Puglia articles), there’s a dish that many may not have heard of but are quite familiar with - Spaghetti allo Scoglio (literally: rock/reef) but often known as Spaghetti ai frutti di mare - “fruits of the sea.”
This is usually one of the more [...]

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In the valley below my in-laws’ house in Manfredonia, there is a sea of prickly pear cactus, and this time of year they are overburdened with multicolored fruit. They tell me at one time, the whole area was covered with them. In the mornings, I often saw older men walking through the cactus valley, picking [...]

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