I’ve talked a bit about how I don’t really enjoy some of the planning parts of travel – I don’t like price comparing flights, searching out deals, or spending tons of time on ratings websites. But one thing I do love doing is sussing out the place I’m going to stay and start to get a sense of the surrounding area even before I get there. That’s when I open up Google Maps and create a custom map for the trip. I have some Google Maps which have been around for years, and with each subsequent trip I add more landmarks, more suggestions, and often discover and chart out a new area in the city.

Here are some tips I have if you want to get started with it yourself – read on!

Create a map

In http://maps.google.com, search for something (usually your hotel or lodging is a good place to start), click on the pin, then “Save to map” and click on the drop-down and select “Create a new map” and Save.

Here are a few of my favorite maps:

Use the “Search nearby” function, a lot

Now that you’ve got at least one pin on your new map, I love clicking on it and selecting “Search nearby” to find all the essentials – coffee, of course, is the first thing I look for near my hotel. I know most hotels have coffee in the room, or even in the bar downstairs, but I like going outside for a few minutes, saying hi to the city, and getting my coffee, even if I head back to my room to work or have to go somewhere else after. It gets me going and it’s a few minutes I take for me. So that’s what I search nearby for, first. As you continue to use Google Maps moving forward, don’t forget you can click on any landmark in your search results, then “Save to Map” and select which map you want to save it to. I usually find some supermarkets and pharmacies in case I need to stock up on something or have an emergency, and then I start adding restaurants/bars/shops/clubs that I discover or have recommended to me. I love going through bloggers’ recommended lists and then throwing everything into my map! If you’re super advanced, you can click on the pin, and add a link in it to – Rename your map. Usually the map takes on the first name of the thing you’re adding it to (which is annoying), so make sure you navigate to “My Places,” click on the map name, then “Edit” and rename it.

Setting my home location:

Searching for coffee near my “home” location of the Waldorf Astoria (note: I’ve never stayed there…)

Results for coffee near my home location – I might save this one to my NYC map!

Decide on a legend / color scheme

You can actually use your own images for the icons (check out my London map to see the WordPress logo indicating where I had a meetup one night), but I think the best way is to work with an icon scheme that you remember to group similar items. Here’s a look at mine and the icons I use:

• Coffee cup: obviously coffee! sometimes breakfast places (bagel shops, bakeries)
• Hamburger/Drink: Fast(ish) food or a cafe’ (not a restaurant).
• Fork/knife: Restaurant
• Martini glass: Bar / Drinks out, club
• Basket: Supermarket
• Snowflake: Gelato and Ice cream, naturally
• Yellow house: I usually mark this as my home base, and it makes it really easy to do “Search Nearby” after clicking on the icon
• Running guy: gyms and sports clubs

New York map

Set the privacy settings of your map

You really only have two listings for your maps - public and unlisted. Unlisted means only people with the URL can view it, and the public will not be able to find it. Click on “Collaborate” (upper left, after you’ve selected the Edit button) and make sure “Allow anyone to edit this map” is not clicked if you don’t want people to modify your map. Alternatively, you can explicitly invite people to collaborate on the map with you.

Do the prep at home on your computer or in your hotel room

This is best done through your desktop / browser where you can load tons of maps, open various tabs, etc., i.e., during the planning phase and not while you’re actually out and about on the street. Unfortunately you can’t access My Places from your iPhone (but you can from your Android phone), though I’ve heard you can get to them from the Google Earth iPhone app (but satellite imagery is a bit of a pain to download on those data plans!), through a free/paid app called “My Places for Google Maps,” or by navigating to maps.google.com on Chrome for iPhone. I haven’t been able to verify them myself so be sure to try it out yourself. Also, downloading maps can take up a lot of data and it’s best to do it while you have a wifi connection or if possible, download the city center maps to your phone locally (Android only, as far as I know), or at least spend some time loading them and navigating them while in the hotel room and they might remain in your phone’s cache while out and about.

And I got a preview of the new Google Maps recently which looks pretty awesome. Let’s hope those changes flow back to My Places, too!

Google Map: newer interface

Do you use Google Maps for travel like I do? What tips can you share? 

Read more about How I Travel with a peek inside what I pack in my carry-on!

That was one of the reasons I bought Michael Ruhlman’s “Ratio: The Simple Codes Behind the Craft of Everday Cooking” so I could feel more confident dissecting a recipe and making it my own without messing up the right ratios (and turning a cake into a pudding, for example) or playing with some basic ingredients and building them up into a recipe that is all mine.

Don’t expect a big colorful cookbook from Ratio. It’s more like a science textbook, analyzing ratios and providing some basic recipes, and it’s one I see myself referring to more and more in the future. I would even suggest the ebook version as it’s more of a reference and the photos are black & white in the hardcover version anyway.

The weather this winter in Milan was unusually rainy, cold, and grey. It can often be rainy, cold, and grey in Milan, but it was for far too long. I say was, since we’re technically in spring for more than a month, but it’s only been warm this past week that I’ve been able to feel it at all. For a while, I rebelled in my own “American in Italy” way – nixing the omnipresent scarf (which I love) but still having a completely zipped-up jacket, or trying not to wear 2 pairs of pants to the gym (like I do in winter) during my 100m walk out in the “elements.” Finally it looks like I can shed that heavy winter jacket for good.

But while I was deep in the still-in-winter-blah (only last week), I started obsessing about lemons. Lemons are one of my favorite ingredients, and scents – I rub a lemon beeswax hand salve on my hands every day in my form of aromatherapy – and I wanted a lemony cake to snack on. LEMONS! I couldn’t stop thinking about lemons.

I started jotting notes down in a moleskine (I have a small cahier where I write down weekly menus / recipes which you can see below) just to try and get it out of my head. But the lemons wouldn’t go away. I made a special trip down to the store to gather a few ingredients and over lunch, in a frenzy, I whipped up this Lemon Almond Cake.

I have sacks of raw almonds in my house which is why I turned again to them as the “flour” for this cake (it’s a gluten-free cake!), and wanted to keep it really basic so that I could continue to tweak it as I moved on. Eggs, almonds, greek yogurt, and sugar. That’s it! Oh, and of course lemons.

I wanted to post this, pre-tweak, in its basic form, to encourage you to make this recipe your own.

The tweaks I have thought about? Less sugar, more almonds, maybe add some coconut flour/unsweetened flakes, more eggs, honey instead of sugar, whip egg whites with sugar? Leave the skins on the almonds? Poppyseeds? What about chia seeds? Obviously I won’t do all of those tweaks together, and I’ll think back to the ratios I want to achieve as I tweak, but those are some ideas to experiment with. Experimenting with the pan and cooking times, too!

And as for Ratio? This cake is a hybrid because I’m still a bit of a rebel. It’s close to a pound cake, with some characteristics of a sponge cake, but still very dense and crumbly.

Lemon Almond Cake Recipe (Gluten-free)

Super moist, definitely crumbly which is why I recommend letting it cool completely before cutting (and it sticks together nicely even more the day after) with a slightly caramelized “crust.”  I also made a lemon sugar glaze (below) with a few teaspoons of lemon juice and confectioner’s sugar, but this cake is pretty sweet already and doesn’t really need it. Taste it and make it your own!

170g (approx. 3/4 cup) greek yogurt (i.e., one of Fage’s single serving containers)
2 medium eggs, separated
180g (approx. 1 cup) dememara / cane sugar
225g (approx. 1 1/2 cups) blanched almonds (skins removed)
2 lemons (organic / unwaxed/unsprayed skins)
1 pinch salt (optional)

1. Preheat oven to 180C (about 350/355F). Cut a round of parchment paper to fit the bottom of a 9-inch springform pan (optional – I left this step off the second time I made the cake and I liked the crusty bottom better).
2. Zest the two lemons with a microplaner or zester, and mix the zest with the sugar, yogurt, and egg yolks. Beat with a whisk or hand mixer until well blended.
3. Pulse the blanched almonds in a food processor until finely ground (about a minute). Add the almonds to the wet mixture and mix well.
4. Taste the batter for “lemony-ness.” It wasn’t lemony enough for me, so I added the juice of 1/2 a lemon as well (about 2-3 T.) and mixed well. I also added a pinch of salt here, because I wanted to. You can leave it out.
5. Whip the egg whites in a separate bowl until stiff peaks form. Gently fold the egg whites into the mixture with a spatula or wooden spoon until well incorporated.
6. Pour the batter into the springform pan and put into the oven. Bake for 20-25 minutes, checking for doneness after 20 minutes. The cake will brown quite a bit and the center will spring back when touched lightly. Let cake cool completely before serving. Run a knife around the edge of the springform pan before releasing the sides.

 Are you a lemon fan? What about experimenting with recipes, or making your own? How would you tweak this cake to make it your own? 

My other half is now a sommelier through the AIS (Associazione Italiana Sommelier) and that means that wine has now, more than ever, been a big part of our culinary experience. Since we only got a car 3 years ago, it’s been a great excuse to get out and discover the countryside where few buses and trains will go.

Tasting Barolo in Barolo, Italy.

This Easter weekend we went back to Piemonte. We spent Easter there three years ago (you can read about the delicious Easter lunch we had) but this time we went to a different part of the region and focused solely on wine and countryside. I did drive by the Ferrero factory (makers of Nutella) but they don’t allow visits, so you can leave that off your itinerary for Piemonte.

Monforte, Piemonte

The whole driving through the countryside to find wineries to stop in at and taste is not as popular as it is elsewhere, and I’m not sure if it ever will be. Places like agriturismi (bringing tourists to farms, ranches & wineries) cater to tourists, and some wine producers don’t want you showing up at their place of business without an invitation, so it’s best to do your research before setting out. If it’s a nice day, you might still get a great drive out of it, but if you’re looking to taste wine, it’s best you have a plan.

Barbaresco wine country, Italy

My biggest tip is to look for the local “Enoteca Regionale” – the regional wine “repository” or shop – which features local wines; many which are not found elsewhere!  Another name to look out for is the “Cantina Comunale” – the city cantina- this will be much smaller in focus and may feature only uber-local wines and whatever else the people running the shop decide is worth their shelf space.

Enoteca regionale in Barbaresco, Italy

In my experience at the several ones I’ve been to, here’s what you can expect from an Enoteca Regionale or a Cantina Comunale:

• Taste the wine. They will have around 4-6 bottles of wine you can have a taste or glass of directly there.
• Local experts. They will know their wine, very, very well. They probably know the producers personally, too.
• There will be wine there you won’t find elsewhere. Not every wine producer in Italy is in the bigger supermarkets or even the bars. It’s a great way to discover brands and vintages which you might not find anywhere else!
• Tourist information: maybe. They may or may not have information about visiting local wineries or itineraries, or this may fall to the local Tourist information office. It doesn’t hurt to ask!
• No frills & no food. They definitely want to sell some wine, but this isn’t an “experience” where you can park it there all day and have them entertain you. Most will offer the standard grissini, breadsticks, to help you cleanse your palate and put something in your stomach, but most do not have kitchens nor a menu for you to sit and drink. Buy a few bottles, stop by a forno or macellaio (baker or butcher) to pick up some eats, and head to the nearest park for your own tasting session.

Cantina Comunale in La Morra, Piemonte, Italy

If you’re set on planning a wine tasting & touring trip, here are my suggestions:

• Map it out. Roughly map out your trip and take a look at which areas you’d like to focus on. Pick 2-3 towns or spots per day you’d like to stop at, and leave room for that 2-3 hour lunch you *know* is going to happen. Don’t try to rush it all, and especially if there’s sun out, you’re going to want to sit somewhere and enjoy the scenery instead of being in the car all day.
• Call ahead for updated info. Sure, it takes some of the spontaneity out of it, but finding out if someone will actually be there when a guide book (or even their own website!) says they will is a good thing to verify.
• Reserve. Make reservations at a tasting room or lunch spot. During high season, you’ll want to make sure you’re not left eating panini and drinking Cokes on a sidewalk somewhere.
• Go early. If you’re flying by the seat of your pants, go early. That means no later than 12:30 for lunch, or 19:00 or 19:30 to catch the restaurant right when it opens so you can grab that last 2-top table that’s open. And, if you’re early and they still don’t have room, that leaves more time for you to find an alternative.

Barbaresco’s Enoteca Regionale, Italy

Here are a few enoteche regionali to check out – your best bet is to Google first for the area or type of wine you’re interested in and see if an Enoteca Regionale or Cantina Comunale show up!

• Emilia Romagna’s Enoteca regionale
• Enoteca Regionale – Barbaresco
• I definitely recommend Diana’s beautiful B&B in prime wine country – loved staying here!
• Madeline has some great tips on wine tasting in Piedmont

Have you been to an Enoteca Regionale? Do you have any tips to share?

Here’s some of the favorites I’ve seen lately in Italy.

Favorite work-turned-reward in Italy: Not only was cutting my own chocolate so cool, the cremino from Domori was so delicious and my favorite thing from an evening out. They could tell I liked it – they gave me one just for me! I broke it open on a trip down south, and it was gone in 24 hours. 500g of chocolate, gone like that. Boom! A cremino is three layers of chocolate, the two outer being gianduja (hazelnut + chocolate) and the inner layer is often hazelnut or coffee.

Favorite swag in Italy: My macellaio, butcher – who is one of my favorite people now and we often trade iPhone photos of good eats – slipped me this lovely De Cecco pasta grocery bag. I love the blue (yes, my nails matched – that wasn’t planned) and he’s promised to give me a few more to share :)

Favorite accompaniment to my espresso: A little pastry goes a long way – I love it when bars give you free pastries with coffee. Who can resist? This one is one of my favorites – a sospiro, a sponge cake with custard cream in between the layers, and then covered in a sugar glaze. Yum.

Favorite special delivery in Italy: More snacks from Venchi came in the mail! The ones are the left are the Caffe’ Snacks I mentioned in my January favorites post, and the ones on the right are white chocolate with salted nuts – hazelnuts, almonds, and pistachios! I’m not a huge white chocolate fan, but I thought the combination was interesting (and they’re bite-sized). Stuck between dark and white – what kind of a chocolate fan are you?

Favorite continuing education experience in Italy: Olive oil tasting. A few years ago I was obsessed with doing a course in olive oil tasting. At the time, I just couldn’t make it work with my work schedule, but it’s still in the back of my mind. Maybe someday.

Favorite holiday color palette in Italy: Easter. While I love the lights at Christmastime in Italy, I love the array of colors that comes into play in Italy around Easter time, especially with chocolate Easter eggs. Below, some chocolates wrapped up in colorful paper.

Favorite reason to be a snob in Italy: I love confetti, the sugar-coated almonds Italians give out as favors at many celebrations like weddings and graduations. These “Snob” confetti were pretty delicious – almonds covered in both white and dark chocolate, then in a sugar coating. Yum. Red is the traditional color for confetti used for graduates.

Favorite appreciation for hair in Italy: I love eating mussels, and making pepata di cozze, but these cozze pelose, hairy mussels, are worth looking out for.

Favorite sugar packets in Italy: I love Italian coffee, and I drink espresso every day. I love the variation in espresso cups as well as sugar packets. Sometimes they’re just with the name of the bar or blend of coffee, and sometimes they’re fun, colorful, or graphic. These packets from Illy were a fun surprise (pictured with a caffe’ d’orzo, barley coffee, I like to drink in the afternoons).

Favorite replacement for birdwatching in Italy: Watching old men and the sea.

Disclosure: I received a few of these products for free, but I didn’t promise them any website exposure in exchange (nor anything else); I just like them and wanted to share them with you!