La Pasta! [ why I fell in love with italia #4 ]

Tanto amore!

In Portugal, before, I was eating pizza, lasagna and pasta almost every week (not to say everyday!).  The thing is: la cucina italiana is the most international food. But if you think you're eating pasta in the right way, think again! And now I'm putting my inner italiano and going pazzo about food.

Let me say that I tittled this "La pasta", but in fact I fell in love with all the types of italian food (even the ones I knew before), but pasta is a perfect name for every blog post. Ah, wait, not all types of food here, let me put the bread (pane) out of this. Because it's the only italian thing that has no taste, no salt. And yeah, yeah, I know about the Salt War and its reasons, but we already lived more than 4 centuries after that sh*t happened, COME ON!

Well... lets go. The italian food is in fact really simple. For example, in Portugal whenever I was eating pasta and pizza I was putting lots of ingredients to it. LOTS!

And now I must say two things. One of the best plates of pasta I had was just macaroni and pomodoro e formaggio (tomato and cheese). One of the best pizze I ever had was just a simple margherita with egg. 

"I gelati sono buoni... ma costano milioni".

Also, I remember in my first days asking for a caffé macchiato (wich I was drinking also in Portugal) but here it's so different. They do it like it's art with such care, with such  a slow pace, really making it unique. I was amazed seeing them prepare a simple thing like caffé and latte. For them this is just so normal, but for me it was so beautiful to see. And I will not start to talk about gelato, because it's the best thing ever, you cannot eat like this in another part (ok... maybe those Santini in Lisboa. MAYBE!).

Pizza al taglio. The best way to eat pizza.

One funny thing, that sometimes can give you nerves, is that every italian is very strict with how you can eat. For example... in some regions it's safer for you if you're not asking for a plate of spaghetti with 4 formaggi. If you want to have a good stay, avoiding to start an endless discussion about food, ti raccomando! But if you want to avoid them calling the caribinieri to put you in jail, if you want to avoid international relations tension, you better not ask for ananas (pineapple) in a pizza. I know, I know, it's awesome. In Portugal we do it a lot. 

But one day I was talking to an italian about this and 5 minutes later I was fearing deportation. 

I'm not joking!

Ok, I am, a little. But believe me, they are very traditional in these things. And in the end I found this amazing, really amazing! I learned a lot. I will never eat pasta the same way. They made me change and I'm very happy for that.

Piadina. Traditional from my region - Emilia-Romagna. It's one of the best things you can eat in Italia.

I think that like this they are keeping the best things unaltered and this is simply wonderful, because in the end it makes the most international food even greater. It's like... you can eat outside of Italia, but never in the same way. 

And did you knew that italians are really skinny (like the 90% of them). I started to notice this after being here for 3 months. Whenever I was travelling I was thinking about this (because in Portugal and Spain it's REALLY different!).  And then I was like "HOW IS IT POSSIBLE?? IF YOU'RE EATING PASTA, PIZZA, PIADINA, EVERY FUCK*N DAY!!"

But yeah, after a while I realized that they eat in a very very very healthy way, with the simplicity of their plates. 

To end this topic about someone eating pizza everyday and staying skinny, I will just say 3 plates of portuguese food and you will know why: Feijoada, Cozido à Portuguesa, Carne de porco à alentejana. [ if you don't know it, google it please ]