Travels and Tastes

Halen Mon Smoked Water Image

Halen Mon Smoked Water

You know Halen Mon‘s carefully hand harvested culinary salts. But have you tried their new addition to the food and beverage scene? Smoked water! This inventive new product is not for quenching thirst, but rather for adding the perfect amount of smoke to flavor culinary dishes and cocktails. Water is filtered and “smoked” in Anglesey, Wales. Producing the water is a 10-day process…

Trikalinos Sardines Image

Trikalinos Sardines

The Trikalinos journey began way back in 1856 when the Trikalinos brothers started Grey Mullet Avgotaraho production and trade in Etoliko, Greece. Avgotaraho—or Bottarga as the Italians call it—are whole mullet roe sacks, dried and preserved in beeswax. I could go on and on about how delicious and healthy Trikalinos’ Avgotaraho is, but I’ve already…

So healthy the benefits have been certified! Image

So healthy the benefits have been certified!

Biolea Greek olive oil earns EU Certification for high levels of polyphenols—meaning great taste and great for you! One of our earlier blogs titled “Greek Superfoods” highlighted—you guessed it—Greek foods that are indeed super, on many counts. One item on the list was the Greek olive oil Biolea (pronounced Bee-oh-lay-ah) for its excellence in artisanal…

Marqués de Valdueza’s New Mill Improvements Image

Marqués de Valdueza’s New Mill Improvements

Making the exceptional even more so with Marqués de Valdueza mill improvements When you already make a world-class olive oil like Marqués de Valdueza, how do you go above and beyond and make the exceptional, well, even more exceptional? Let’s just say it’s kind of high-tech and it involves things like “milking” procedures, a tree-to-deposit…

Gentile Pasta Dinner at Solo Italiano, Portland ME Image

Gentile Pasta Dinner at Solo Italiano, Portland ME

A Dinner with Pasta Gentile at Solo Italiano with Chef Paolo Laboa In a time of big, global business, it sometimes seems that human connections get swallowed up by massive-scale commerce. What happened to people knowing your name? Can family businesses still thrive in this competitive market where speed and low-cost reign supreme over integrity…

Mortadella from Golfera of Bologna Image

Mortadella from Golfera of Bologna

Deep silence and wide-eyed stares often follow the first delicate, velvety taste as the flavors of coriander, white pepper and anise unfold.   All over the United States, time and time again, Italian expatriate chefs finally find the words which are always a variation on the same sentiment: “I am brought back to my childhood. …

Pastificio Gentile: the Golden Pasta! Image

Pastificio Gentile: the Golden Pasta!

  Pastificio Gentile first opened its doors in 1876 and is one of the only remaining historic, artisanal pasta producers that helped to establish Gragnano as the city of pasta. Today, Gentile remains a small family owned company.  Pastificio Gentile – 26 Pasta Cuts Available 100% Native Italian Semolina The selected semolina wheat used in this pasta is…

Flower of the Oil: Flor de Aceite Image

Flower of the Oil: Flor de Aceite

“Once, I dropped in and mentioned that I’d been to Baena to see the Núñez de Prado brothers. His eyes widened. It was as though I’d told a country Imam that I had just returned from Mecca.” So reads a reference in Mort Rosenblum’s book “The Life and Lore of a Noble Fruit” to the…