MAR_APR_2014_FINAL_3-15-16

Rouses sponsors the New Orleans Wine and Food Experience, and during the event, we went to a wine dinnerwithfriends fromRepublicNationalDistributing, where we discussed our plans to honeymoon in Italy. They gave us some great recommendations and set up tours for Billy and me. We visited Terrabianca, which not only makes great wine, but also presses olive oils. We then moved on to Il Molino di Grace, which I kept pronouncing as “gra-say” until I found out that the owner is an American, Tim Grace, who fell in love with Tuscany and bought a winery (my new retirement goal!). Thankfully I found out before we visited with him at his beautiful estate. We also went to Rocca delle Macie, where we toured their immense cellar and bottling facility, even though it was technically closed for All Saints Day on November 1 st . We learned that in order to clean their huge barrels, men (we’re assuming pretty small ones), climb in and the hose is fed in to wash them out. Our guide told us that when they forget to let one out, that’s when you get a real full “bodied” wine (ha!). We tasted lots of great wine, and came home with 7 bottles of our own, along with some olive oil! Our favorite tidbit of information learned about the wine was that if you see a black rooster on the neck of a bottle of Chianti Classico, that means that the grapes were grown in the sub-region between Florence and Siena. Another good thing learned was that Billy stopped pronouncing it “chee-ante”. Our next stop was nearby in Florence, where we wandered art galleries and beautiful old churches, saw the magnificent David, and continued our pasta, pizza and wine tour of the country. We also had our first gelato of the trip here, which I had been looking forward to for awhile!

We were greeted with prosecco and made pasta (from scratch! — a first for me), homemade pesto, eggplant parmesan, and potato gnocchi topped with a tomato and cheese sauce. My husband swears it was the best meal we ate the whole trip, but I think he may be a little biased! From Positano we took the train up to the Chianti region of Tuscany, where we visited wineries and ate great, hearty Tuscan food. Truffles were in season, so I took the opportunity to enjoy that treat as much as possible.

Billy & Ali at their cooking class offered by the restaurant Buca di Bacco.

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