Amanda Jack's Turin

We are happy to share a guest post by our Twitter and Instagram friend Amanda Jack 🙆

Amanda is a writer, student, wife, mother and Grandmother. Dividing her time between homes in the North east of Scotland and the Piedmont Region of Italy, she patiently awaits the day she can perfect the Italian language. Until then, she enjoys writing about her adventures and reviewing books, mainly those set in and around Italy. 

Read her blog: http://a-jack-in-a-box.simplesite.com

Enjoy her perspective on Turin and do like her: come over!!

Strolling around Turin

Follow our Twitter friend, Michael Hindley strolling around Turin through his favorite parts of our city.

Michael was educated at London University and the Free University of West Berlin and is a former Member of the European Parliament.
Michael has travelled extensively throughout Europe and Asia.
He writes and lectures on European politics and divides his time between his native Lancashire and Evian-les-Bains, France.
Follow Michael on Twitter @HindleyLancs

Jim and Julia's agnolotti

Here's a second guest post by Jim Dunlop our proud Scottish friend and guest to Turin Epicurean Capital 2016 with his lovely wife Julia - proud Lancastrian.

You can read Jim's first guest post about how to pair Lake Orta with Piedmontese wines here. In fact, When they participated to the third edition of Turin Epicurean Capital, they both said that what really makes our regional food and wines unique is the landscape: our secret ingredient ;)

Take careful notes of the places they went for Julia's birthday, the specialties they enjoyed and the wines they savored!!

Interact with them on Twitter about their many interests, especially: Italy, art, books, Toro (soccer), wine and food!!

Jim: jimofayr

Julia: juliadarwen

Asti's Golden Pitcher

September is the month to be in Asti, Piedmont, NW Italy - the town where Asti Spumante the delish Italian bubbly wine is from, because there are many food and wine events culminating with the oldest Italian palio, in the third week-end (yes, older than the Siena one)!

The weeks before the palio there are: the Douja D'Or wine festival and the Sagra delle Sagre or Food Festival of the Food Festivals, definitely a name that resonates with many foodies:P

In the local dialect Douja D'Or indicates the traditional terracotta pitcher where wine was served, d'or means golden. This is a national wine competition that takes place every year for about 10 days in Asti and that awards the best Italian wines paired with the best local foods. 

Only DOC and DOCG wines can take part and Douja is a truly epicurean competition as the wines are submitted anonymously to the expert tasters who judge them for their sensorial qualities: color, bouquet and aroma. Only the top scoring wines are awarded the golden pitcher - Douja D'Or - a title approved by the Italian Ministry of Agricultural Food and Forestry Policies.

Casa Jasmina techy buffets

Just a week ago, Casa Jasmina in Turin, hosted the Share Festival jury who selected the 6 winners of the 2016 "House Guests" edition. For the occasion Italian astronaut Samantha Cristoforetti and MoMA design curator Paola Antonelli were part of the jury together with the other organization members.

Famous cyberpunk author, Bruce Sterling who is also part of the Casa Jasmina project with Massimo Banzi, THE Arduino man, happens to be "quite the Turin Epicurean fan" and this is how we ended up giving our epicurean touch to this magic day!

Darryl's perspective on wines

This week guest post is by Darryl Baldwin who was a guest at Turin Epicurean Capital 2014.

After working in the City of London for 40 years trading, selling and marketing the whole gamut of financial instruments for various international banks, he and his wife stumbled across a piece of Paradise. It was February 2007 and he had decided the time was right for a bit of permanent R&R. Within a few months they had bought a house in Neive and properly discovered Nebbiolo. They built a grandchildren attractor (swimming pool) and within 2 years, when it was a proven success, decided to sell the house in the UK, help the kids and settle permanently in Italy. They have never looked back and are in love with the wine, the food, the culture and the family-centric approach to life. Slowly but surely they  are educating their English friends that they live in Piemonte where the best wines in Italy (if not the world) are made and not in Tuscany which is the only region they appear to know. You can follow Darryl on his blog Piemonte mio

Nebbiolo!!

Happy WineWed with Nebbiolo!

Nebbiolo grapes

Nebbiolo production area

                                                                        Nebbiolo is a DOC red wine that the Guardian calls the godfather of Italian reds!                                                                                                                                                                    It is one of the staple reds from Piedmont, a symbol of the wine-making tradition and refined wine culture of our region. Nebbiolo vines are planted only on 3% of the total Piedmont territory, in late-ripening vineyards, mostly on the Barolo and Barbaresco hills, where the fall fog - nebbia, wraps its grapes.