travelswithalice

August 22, 2006

Verona- evenings at the opera

I still have to tell you about the glorious evenings at the opera.

Madama Butterfly was beautiful, no matter the last minute change in cast (or maybe because of it?)

Carmen was much the same as the last time and Aida was not very engrossing. (My friend Cecile said her husband missed the animals onstage at the last production.)

But the arena never disappoints. When it comes to the opera in Verona, the medium is the message. The Verona Arena is not a theater, it is theater.

The 2,000 year history of its noble structure; its storied 80 seasons of opera; the exorbitant ticket prices (no refunds even when rained out) and supremely uncomfortable seats; the magical glow of thousands of candles lighting up in the upper sections as daylight fades; the moon floating behind the stage, hardly moving, merely inching sideways as the night deepens; the excited chatter of the house decrescendoing into absolute stillness as the music takes over. And then there's the secret panic inspired by 20,000 or so people in an enclosure with not too many visible exit signs.

But more on all that later.

One of the best times we had at the opera happened away from where the fat lady sings: in the arena's backlot where we prowled through Franco Zeffirelli's spectacular stage sets that littered the grounds.

We wandered in and out of mock ups of Egyptian monuments to inspect gold-leafed metal pipes that make up the menacing pyramid at the center of the Aida set. We watched enormous Japanese lanterns and the stone cliffs of Nagasaki's port being winched into place by cranes setting up for Madama Butterfly.

Labels: arena's backlot, Carmen, Franco Zeffirelli, italy, Madama Butterfly, Verona Arena

posted by Alice Dimalanta Jones # August 22, 2006

Verona

Verona

Due Torri Baglioni’s medieval architecture and elegant décor keep it at the top of Verona’s hotel hierarchy. Sadly, service is clearly not a priority. At the reception hall, there is a lot of loud banter among the hotel staff in their smart dark blue uniforms while they studiously ignore hotel guests who wander about looking lost.

Next door to the hotel is a gem of a restaurant. It looks like a cheap sandwich bar from the outside but quite nice inside. Great for dinners before the opera, away from the crowds and the extortionist paninis and pizzas on the main square.

Sunday lunch at Osteria Sottoriva gave us a peak into local life. Clearly a favorite with the residents, the place was lively, friendly, and full. While we waited for a table, I stood at the bar and watched closely as the barman made sprizzato. A shot of Cynar (an artichoke-based liqueur), spritz of spumante, splash of San Pellegrino, an orange slice, and lots of ice. I’ll surely try this next time we have a party at home.

We finally got a table outside, in the cool shadows under the arcaded portico that lines one side of the street. We sat there for a long time contemplating the menu, drinking our sprizzatos, and watching the world go by.

A walking tour slowly rounded the corner from the bright, sunny lane beside the bar. They fanned themselves with their hats as they trickled past us, the younger and fitter taking the lead, followed by the older ones, then after a long interval, a few unhappy stragglers huffing and puffing, urged on by their flag-wielding guide.

A street vendor offered her wares from a huge wicker basket, a virtual boutique, that she balanced quite effortlessly on her head .

The local boys and girls lounged and flirted.

Lunch was simple, typical regional fare, as pretty Michaela proclaimed. She had pulled up a chair when she heard our brave attempt at ordering our meal, sat at our table, and proceeded to explain the menu. In Italian, no subtitles, but illustrated with elaborate gestures, all the while smiling her mysterious smile, her hair pinned close to her head in a 1930s sort of way, her red and white polka dot dress all frilly and floaty.

We managed to decipher a few key things: horsemeat and lentil salad.

When we asked for coffee, she smiled warmly but shook her head and said,“Vino, pane, bierre. No café.”

No coffee? Are we not in Italy? She did present us though with complimentary thimbles of coffee flavored cream topped with chocolate. It tasted like tiramisu.

Labels: Due Torri Baglioni, italy, Osteria Sottoriva, sprizzato, verona

posted by Alice Dimalanta Jones # August 22, 2006

August 20, 2006

Modena

Our guidebook’s pick as “Modena’s best hotel” was a disappointment. Rather austere except for some unremarkable frescoes in the lobby. On the day we left, the smartly liveried doorman cheerfully called out “Grazie, arrivederci, signora!” as I carried a bag to the car. He made no move to give the signora a hand.

I’ll always remember Modena for the delightful tapas bar around the corner from our hotel.

And of course for the market! What a feast of surely sinful proportions!

We taste tested an array of vintage aceto balsamico and finally bought a 25-year old one.

More later.

Labels: italy, market, Modena’s best hotel

posted by Alice Dimalanta Jones # August 20, 2006

Orvieto

At the moment, we’re at that most civilized time on the continent when everything closes down for the afternoon. We are in Orvieto, tomorrow we head for Rome and then home on Friday or Saturday, depending on whether we get confirmed on the later flight or not. Our hotel, the Palazzo Piccolomini has wi-fi, so I’m updating my long neglected blog.

At a restaurant around the corner, we just had our first sit-down lunch after a long string of on the road picnics of take away food bought in whatever town we happened to be driving from. Those picnics were some of the most memorable meals we’ve had on this holiday.

Lunch was grilled meats including rabbit and the territorial cinghiale (wild boar,) a green salad, a quarter liter of red wine, and lots of mineral water. We have finally sworn off any kind of pasta, no matter how attractively named or seductively sauced. This we had to do because squeezing into our jeans has come to be increasingly difficult as we cover more miles on this eating and drinking tour.

Orvieto's beautiful striped duomo

Dinner was at Osteria San Patrizio. I have to mention here that we are in Orvieto for two reasons. One is the beautiful striped duomo, which I just had to see again, having fallen in love with it on a previous trip. The other is the caramelled figs at San Patrizio that we had read about in our trusty guidebook.

We dined on Chef Eduardo’s recommended menu and left the wine selection to waiter Ricardo.

Ricardo selected the wine

The food was superb. We had chicken galantina with french beans, baccala-filled ravioli, and lamb chops served with melanzane parmegiana.

Three was the magic number for the finish: honey drizzled ewe’s cheese in three ages (the 2-year old proved too lively for me) and a terrine of three kinds of chocolate in a sherry sauce. The Palazzone Armaleo was even better than Ricardo, a certified enologist, promised. Strangely, there was no one else dining there that evening but us. Well, it was everybody else’s loss.

When Chef Ernesto came out to chat I asked about the conspicuous absence of figs from the menu. He explained that because he could not obtain figs of top quality, he was unable to offer the dessert that day as “we are famous for it.”

This is what I wrote in the guestbook: After traveling for two weeks through Emilia-Romagna, Umbria, and Tuscany in search of good food and wine, this is the highlight of our tour. Waiter Ricardo has been a great guide.

We walked back from dinner to work some of it off and stopped by an open air concert at the piazza beside the duomo.

The Chicken’s Funk wasn’t half bad but Frank Zappa wasn’t really our kind of music. It was a delight just being there though, hanging out with the mostly local crowd. We left after about three songs; we sang and danced in the quiet narrow streets as we walked back to our hotel.

Labels: caramelled figs at San Patrizio, food, italy, Orvieto duomo, wine

posted by Alice Dimalanta Jones # August 20, 2006

August 18, 2006

Calice di Stelle in Montepulciano

“Chuiso per ferie” signs had become a familiar sight everywhere we went. We knew that we had come in the middle of Ferragosto, the Italian holiday season, which meant that a lot of places would be closed; but after a while, we got really tired of being off the beaten track and felt like going someplace more welcoming of guests.

After a quick check with our map, we decided on Montepulciano as our next stop. It was a lucky choice. Banners were flying on Main Street and there were signs of activity everywhere, even at the sacred time of the afternoon siesta. The town was preparing for Calici di Stelle, which our hotel manager translated for us as “wine glasses under falling stars.”

For the price of a 10 euro ticket, you get to have your own personal calice or wine glass and a leather sling for it that you wear around your neck. This calice entitles you to five glasses of local wine, the superb Montepulciano, Nobile or Rosso.

An additional 18 euros buys you antipasti, primi, secondi, and dolci in various designated Calici di Stelle stations where the townspeople have prepared low-budget banquets of bruschetta, pasta and grilled meats for wandering partygoers with wine glasses hanging from their necks.

Very sprited and immensely enjoyable.

Postscript

I have since learned that I totally missed out on the significance of this festival. Even if I did enjoy the food and wine and the very fact of being there. What the hotel manager was probably struggling to make me understand then was that this evening had as much to do with the stars as it had with the wine that so captured my attention.

Also known as La Notte di San Lorenzo, this evening is special for stargazers. The "falling stars" of the Perseids meteor shower are sometimes called the "tears of San Lorenzo" because August 10, the date of the saint's martyrdom, corresponds to the peak period of the meteor shower.

And I missed all this! I never even once looked up to the sky! I really must go back to correct this oversight. Soon.

Labels: italy, meteor shower, Montepulciano, Perseids, San Lorenzo, wine festival

posted by Alice Dimalanta Jones # August 18, 2006

August 16, 2006

Perugia

The Brufani Hotel is housed in two medieval buildings located right across from the catacombs. We figured it was worth staying only because the hotel bar managed, even with difficulty and a lot of discussion, to make us sandwiches and coffee although we had not as yet decided to check in. The bar was closed that day except for hotel guests.

After the unbelievable disinterest at the Hotel Subasio, this felt like a hotel that cared about guests.

We were not disappointed. It is a beautiful and well-run hotel.

The heated underground pool sparkles green and blue under the vaulted stone ceiling. On the ground beside it is a fragment of the original Roman stone foundations under glass. The gym and spa are also below ground and all around feels mysterious and luxurious and decadent.

Perugia is an equally beautiful town that casts such a spell that even the tourists are nice. At the outdoor cafés, the only unwelcome guests are the pigeons scrounging for crumbs. It's a delight to walk through the narrow streets that climb steeply under ancient arches towards the center of town. No hawkers or beggars mar the passeggiata.

In the arcade above the catacombs, I bought two beautifully wrought silver rings set with blood-red carnelian stones. One for me and one for my sister Baby.

I just had two glasses of Montepulciano rosso at the Caffé Perugiana in a little square in front of an important looking building. I asked Felipe, our Argentinian waiter what building it was and he had to run inside the café to ask somebody. I wondered if we could have nuts or chips with our drinks.

I asked Felipe. He brought us two complementary plates of delicious bruschettas.

We’ll probably go to dinner at L’Opera, a little osteria we saw in a narrow lane behind the church as we walked back to our hotel. It was still closed but I stopped to read the menu posted at the door and the chef came out to say hello. I asked him what the “dentex” on the menu was. He said dentice is a kind of fish. I didn’t have to ask what “dreaded (sic) sea bass” is.

Stuart says we’ve got three restaurants to choose from, all housed in medieval buildings. I like this town, lucky Stuart decided to stay. It must have been what Rome and Florence looked and felt like to tourists of ages past.

Labels: food, hotels, italy, restaurants

posted by Alice Dimalanta Jones # August 16, 2006

Assisi

Our trusted guidebook’s recommendation for Assisi’s “finest restaurant” is sadly inaccurate. The restaurant is in an underground cavern with a beautiful vaulted ceiling but that’s about the only thing it has going for it. Pity. Everything we ate had at least five times the expected amount of salt in it. Added to which, the lights were too bright, the music too loud, and the room too stuffy. One of the new owners of the restaurant actually grumbled as he turned up the air conditioning when asked to.

The Hotel Subasio is a medieval structure decorated along the lines of a “Room with a View”-type grand hotel.

Located at the edge of the central square of the Cathedral of San Francesco, the hotel commands an unequaled panoramic view of the surrounding plains.

This premier location assures it of top clientele despite an acute attitude problem. Our guidebook warned us but we didn't listen.

One conversation I had with hotel staff demonstrates what I mean. Crowds of eager young people were streaming towards the cathedral late in the night, silk banners flying various crests, flags proclaiming countries represented. Something was afoot.

Question: “What’s on in the cathedral tonight?”
Answer: A shoulder shrug, indicating a total lack of interest, then, “Maybe a concert . . . maybe a conference . . . I don’t know. You have to organize yourselves; we don’t know what goes on there.”

Excuse me? It’s hard to believe that hotel staff of any importance or insignificance, in this case probably the night manager, could possibly be so uncaring and inhospitable!

At midnight, fireworks lit up the sky in Assisi. Something did go on that night but we never found out what it was. Too bad.

Labels: hotels, italy, restaurants

posted by Alice Dimalanta Jones # August 16, 2006

August 04, 2006

Spoleto

“It must have been a zanzara,” the manager at the Hotel Gattapone said doubtfully. He made it sound like vintage wine. “We only have them in July, during the humid days.” I guess the mosquito that bit me in Montepulciano and left three big angry red spots on my face was working overtime off season.

This delightful hotel is perched right at the edge of a cliff. Our room's balcony hangs over trees and shrubs skittering down a wooded gorge within touching distance of an ancient Roman aqueduct.

At an outdoor bar in the square the locals congregated around an improvised dance floor. An early baby boomer band played ballroom music while a suave elderly gentleman single handedly took on ladies of varying ages and dancing prowess. It was all very nice and festive.

But the children were all over the dance floor too, mucking about and getting in each other's way. Before anyone knew what was happening, the veteran dance instructor had toppled over and crashed to the floor, his dancing partner inelegantly astride him. Everyone sucked in their breath and all was deathly quiet for a second or two before the dancers nimbly resurrected and the party went on.

I had a Bellini.

At dinner later that evening, Signora Eros, proprietor and chef’s wife at Il Tiempo di Gusto for some reason reminded me of Anaïs Nin. She explained the menu to us in English.

Although this makes life simpler for linguistically challenged diners like us, it takes the magical veil of mystery away. We’re disappointed that we have chosen another tourist destination. But although most of the diners were tourists- English, American, German- the food did not disappoint.

The restaurant is an ancient stone house, very narrow and climbing steeply from the underground kitchen (partly visible through glass holes on the stonefloor) through two levels of dining spaces, meandering out into a tiny garden for more dining space (obviously in much demand as indicated by the queue that had started to form before we got to our main course,) and finally up some more steps into private quarters.

We had a great view from where we sat at the top of a flight of stairs wedged snugly between a stonewall and a lovely rustic sideboard with calligraphy labels on the drawers.

Dinner was superb. We had been waiting all this time to be overwhelmed by the celebrated gastronomic traditions of Emiglia Romagna and Umbria, but have not been impressed until tonight. (There was of course a very elegant dinner in Gubbio but the food there didn’t surprise.)

The plaintive voice of Billie Holiday singing softly in the background had assured me that we were in the presence of another serious chef at work. (L’Opera in Perugia also played the same CD and that dinner was certainly one of the better ones on this holiday.)

I had a delicious stuffed guinea hen and Stuart repeated his experimentation with cinghiale. We had a bottle of Sagrantino and the waiter was so awed by it, his hand trembled as he poured.

Labels: Anaïs Nin, Bellini, cinghiale, food, italy, restaurants, Roman aqueduct, wine

posted by Alice Dimalanta Jones # August 04, 2006

Deruta

It has been another magical day. On the way to Spoleto, we detoured through Deruta, a dreary town with excruciatingly narrow streets (we crashed into a stone staircase as we backed out of one of several dead-ends) known for majolica ceramics.

We had a surprisingly exciting afternoon. We stopped at a bar for a quick but tasty lunch of white pizza folded over prosciutto and cheese washed down with coffee, all of which the girl at the bar may have undercharged us for, the cost of it seeming so ridiculously low, and it being her first day on the job.

Later, I had a hand at hand-throwing a bowl in the studio of the very charming Mr. Nulli, a local ceramic artist with "many, many years of experience." He pointed out an entry in a guide book that featured him and his studio. He then proceeded to give me a quick hands on pottery lesson.

Across the road, at the Grazia shop, Ubaldo Grazia, fifth generation in the ceramic business, ushered us around several floors of exhibits and studios where 42 artisans work full time.

When I casually mentioned dropping in on the shop of Mr. Nulli across the road, a look of annoyance crossed his face.

“Did he claim to have his own clay?” he wanted to know. “The Grazia family taught everyone in this town everything they know about the business and throughout the years our company has worked hard to make the town of Deruta and its majolica products known all over the world, then these people steal our designs and our customers,” he lamented.

Looking back, I'm not sure what made the town seem dreary. Maybe it was the time of day. Or maybe it was the total absence of any sign of runaway prosperity that to my mind should have been the logical outcome of its centuries of tradition, going back to the Middle Ages, as the center of ceramic art.

Anyway, the afternoon spent in Deruta turned out to be a very pleasant one, made memorable by my one-on-one hands-on training in this very art, right in the town that is famous for it.

Labels: Grazia, italy, majolica ceramics, Mr. Nulli, Spoleto

posted by Alice Dimalanta Jones # August 04, 2006

August 03, 2006

Rome

At the Cavalieri Hilton. Very posh. The flamboyance of the lobby continues into our spacious guest room. It has a large sitting area done in an Italianate garden motif and a roomy balcony where twin banquettes covered in crisp white linen sit across each other under huge marble framed mirrors.

The view is magic: the eternal city spread out behind a line of trees at the edge of a beautiful garden. Stone lions prowl the lushly green lawn that slopes down to the pool. The Coloseum peeks through the pines.

A drink in the garden, then dinner at poolside.

At the far end of the pool, a lady sings Italian and English love songs. Stuart orders a bottle of Brunello and the sommelier rushes to our table to confirm the order. She then proceeds to go through the theatrical and incredibly exciting choreography of pouring, decanting, and peering through candlelight to check for sedimentation.

Any wine that merits this much attention must be truly special. And it is.

That was last night. This afternoon was spent visiting the retail pilgrimage sites of Via Veneto and Via Condotti.

Lunch of ham and cheese and coffee at eminently photogenic Caffé Greco.

Now, back on our balcony, church bells are ringing the hour. Six o’clock. Time for a drink.

Tomorrow I'll start to backtrack on this travel journal and try to fill up the gaping holes I have left, skipping through major parts of this tour. Domani.

Labels: brunello, Caffé Greco, Cavalieri Hilton, italy, restaurants, Via Condotti, Via Veneto, wine

posted by Alice Dimalanta Jones # August 03, 2006

August 02, 2006

An eating and drinking Italian holiday

As this holiday has been officially designated an eating and drinking holiday, I must fill in details of the activities involved.

Gargnano

Meals at Baia d’Oro in Gargnano are made special by the gorgeous bay that nearly always upstages the food and wine. The light here has a luminosity that picks out every color and shape and sears the resulting images into your brain. What chance does grilled corregone have? Or the chilled glass of prosecco that starts every meal?

Dinner at La Tortuga, Gargnano's acknowledged bastion of fine dining in over 30 years, does not suffer from this distraction. Located on the main road (it is the main road even if it spreads out to only a car-width) and cut off from the lakeview, the restaurant is serenely decorated with genteel bric-a-brac and fresh flowers. The use of edgy, arty light fittings rescues the room from being unrelievedly introverted and spinsterly.

Dinner was well executed and highly commendable, just as you would expect dinner at the table of your worldly Aunt Agatona to be. There were no surprises though.

Gubbio

At the Buon Ricordo in Gubbio, the Degustazione al Tartufo was a veritable orgy of truffles. It started with carpaccio, bruschetta, brustengo, all al tartufo; then a procession of truffled everything: eggs, ravioli, and beef fillet with a potato pudding. Even Stuart felt a trifle overwhelmed.

I had poached eggs, truffled and accompanied by a thin julienne of vegetables.

Perugia

At the deeply atmospheric L’Opera in Perugia, we were presented with an English menu. Oops, there it is again. That brief stab of fear. Fear that we had stumbled into yet another tourist trap. We needn’t have worried though. The food was good.

An interesting thing about the menu: at the back is a detailed note regarding the salts, rice, oils, and vinegars used.

English Maldon sea salt, Himalaya pink salt, and American rock salt. Rice is organically cultivated then aged for a year. Oils are Umbrian, Ligurian, Tuscan, Sicilian, and Venetian. Vinegars are Barolo, fig, champagne, sherry, and traditional aromatic of Modena.

Wait till you hear about the food!

There was a rabbit terrine sauced with a vinegar reduction; the promised dentex dredged in maize, thyme, and barley; and the “dreaded” (sic) sea-bass with parsley and cuttlefish ink soup. I would have liked to try the aubergine crêpes with buffalo mozzarella but they had run out, this being their last workday before their holiday.

I didn’t mind; I enjoyed everything I had. It was all good.

Bologna

In Bologna, we stayed at another Baglioni hotel. The Grand Hotel Baglioni though is the real deal: it looks and feels like a grand hotel. Pina at reception is delightfully chatty, cheerful, knowledgeable and always ready to help; surely a model hotel employee if ever there was one.

The breakfast room is pure delight. The courtyard roof accordions open to bring in the sunlight. All four walls are frescoed in cheerful tromp l’oeil.

Dinner at the hotel restaurant, I Carracci, was a somber affair. Beneath the noble vaults of the frescoed ceiling, only three tables were occupied: there was Stuart and me, there was a family of cheerful self-absorbed English tourists, and there was the hotel GM. He nodded to us, we nodded back.

The menu gave a recipe for fruit Bavarian cream with red fruit sauce.

Labels: food, italy, restaurants

posted by Alice Dimalanta Jones # August 02, 2006

August 01, 2006

Gargnano- good hotel, bad hotel

There is something I have to say about this place. We have been coming here fairly often in the last twenty or so years. In the beginning we thought that the appeal of Gargnano was mostly the self-satisfied feeling it gave us that we were the only outsiders in this very insular little town of very few people, mostly very old. We felt like voyeurs sticking our noses in their private lives, barely registering on the local scene as a low-level irritant or a minor nuisance perhaps.

We soon recognized that this was a delusion, that this place indeed was on the tourist map of Lake Garda, no matter how unclearly marked.

At any rate, we first came here lured by an entry in our guide book for “the most romantic hotel on Lake Garda.” Baia D’oro sounded good and indeed basked in a privileged position on this beautiful lake.

We had dinner at the restaurant and stayed at the hotel. We didn’t care to stay another day though; we found nothing to make us want to stay.

That was then. We are now back at Baia D’oro partly because Hotel du Lac doesn’t have a lake view room available for us, and partly because we had come for dinner here last year and we enjoyed it and thought the place merited a second look. Unfortunately, last year's pleasant experience was not repeated this time around.

And once again, this hotel was a disappointment. There is a conspicuous absence of any kind of management- in the restaurant and in the hotel.

Today, the lake is at its glorious best. The water is several hues of blue and green, chartreuse and emerald. The sky is a picture postcard sky throwing shadows of blue and purple on a picture postcard mountain.

We wish we were at Valerio's Hotel du Lac.

Or at his parents' Hotel Gardenia al Lago. We had, in times past, brought our families to stay in their hotels, to meet their families, and to share with us this bit of heaven. We treasure those times.

Labels: Baia D’oro, Hotel du Lac, Hotel Gardenia al Lago, hotels, italy

posted by Alice Dimalanta Jones # August 01, 2006

Gargnano in the rain

Wednesday brings beautiful ferry weather. The ticket office is closed while the ticketman goes off for coffee, so we amuse ourselves at the market set up on the pier.

We’re off to Malcesine for lunch. On board the Tonale, we settle into deck chairs, feet up on the railing. They have brand new red chairs; business must be good.

Lunch at our favorite Pizzeria Mignon is a feast.

As always, my appetizers outshine my main course. Hams, cheeses, grilled peppers, zucchini, eggplant, wild mushrooms, artichokes, olives, all my favorite stuff, plus an enormous salad, and the main course is still to come!

And come it does, soon enough, preceded by the smoky perfume of char grilled steaks, chops, and sausages. A crispy, flakey apple strudel later, then coffee and limoncello, and we are through eating for the day. Maybe for the week.

Thursday starts off very wet. We dash off in the rain to Hotel Bartabel for lunch, second time this week. On the way there, we nip into the lovely 13^th century church on the corner to light a candle for Nanay Salud. The church is nice and warm and dry. There aren’t any candles to light though.

We certainly didn’t pack for this weather so we look somewhat bedraggled when we turn up at the restaurant. No matter, the rain has whipped up an appetite for pasta, something we had sworn off since we went carb-free several excess pounds ago.

So it’s another one of those antipasti beauties, followed by the forbidden tagliatelli, grilled fish from the lake, then pear tart and affogato, my current preferred caffeine fix: vanilla ice cream slowly melting into a shot of espresso. Mmmm, I guess I’m not really done eating for the week yet.

Tomorrow we leave for Verona. I am looking forward to three nights at the opera but rather nervous about the weather. It’s been glorious here in Gargnano, even in the rain, this being one of those locations that manage to look good whatever the weather. The rain has stopped now, the clouds have lifted from the mountains, and the lake is peaceful again.

Splashing about in the rain today is one thing, but getting soaked in the arena in Verona is another. The music of Puccini and the theater of Zeffirelli notwithstanding!

Labels: affogato, candle for Nanay Salud, Hotel Bartabel, italy, Pizzeria Mignon, restaurants, Tonale