Rome street food and photo exhibit

Well, I owe my followers a sincere apology: I haven't posted on this blog in over 8 months. But I'm not entirely to blame, it's all my iPhone's fault, and mainly the Instagram photoedit App. The easy share option on that devilish thing makes photo-blogging almost obsolete.

So in a moment of mobile photo lucidity I am breaking that trend, and promise to start posting images here again. Let me tell you about some great news in the meantime.

Sunday May 5 at 6 pm if you happen to be in Rome, do swing by one of my favorite hangouts, Circolo degli Artisti, for an evening of delicious street food, books, screenings, vintage VW Beetles, picnic spreads, a concert, and my "street" photos on exhibit at the Street Food in Circolo event.

The STREET FOOD IN CIRCOLO evening will be packed with activities, flavors and music. Here is a list of participating chefs and restaurants – each contributing a signature dish or street food specialty:

Stefano Callegari – The mastermind behind Tonda, Sforno, and 00100 pizza shrines – will be cooking Trapizzini, triangular pockets of pizza bianca bread, open on one side and stuffed with classic Roman fillings like stewed tripe, braised oxtail, meatballs, and tongue with salsa verde, a garlic & parsley sauce)

Gabriele Bonci – pizza guru at Pizzarium (one of Rome's top pizza destinations), and consultant for No.Au – will grace us with squares of his droolworthy Pizza al taglio

Giancarlo Casa – the pizza chef owner of La Gatta Mangiona – will be frying all manner of supplì and croquettes

Ernesto Fico of world-known Pizzeria Donna Regina in Napoli, will be contributing typical Neapolitan fried pizzelle and "frittatine" omelettes

The Fooders – illuminated gourmet food designers and events catering chefs – will be feeding us their signature "Polpette alla amatriciana" meatballs in amatriciana sauce, folded in tasty focaccia sandwiches

Food on the Road – Rome top delivery that prides in sous-vide and low temp cooking of all-natural and certified organic ingredients, will be preparing gourmet sandwiches and panini, and an "on-the-road" carbonara

Madame Baguette – another healthy food delivery service – is working on treating us with many French specialties

Diana Beltran of Mexican restaurant La Cucaracha, will be inflaming palates with her TexMex street food

Toro y Tapas Spanish restaurant will be titillating us with delicious tapas and pintxos

Sicilianedde Sicilian deli will delight us with savory and sweet local specialties

Ombre e Cicheti – a Venetian bàcaro in Rome – will transport us to La Serenissima with their cicheti typical Venetian aperitivo snacks

No.Au will be spicing up things with their own buffalo wings

Sapori di Gaeta seller of products and specialties of Gaeta and surroundings, will be cooking up Tiella in all its declensions

Move, a natural food restaurant, will bring healthy wraps, soups and American-style desserts

Mozao is feeding us tasty Emilia Romagna typical street food: tigelle and gnocco fritto

V-Ice will refresh the crowd with their artisan gelato and granitas

Emporio delle Spezie will be inebriating us with their world of spices...and crisp vegetable tempura.

If that's not enough to get you to Circolo degli Artisti on May 5, I don't know what will :)
If you can't make it to the event, you can always follow the evening's tweets and Instagrams by checking the hashtag #streetfoodincircolo

Art by @alicepasquini

Ciao!

mistero...

What is this mysterious object? Anyone who's been to Rome has seen it virtually everywhere...
Today is Theme Day in the City Daily Photo community, and the topic of this month is MYSTERIOUS OBJECTS. Please click on the link to see more mysterious objects from around the world!

botticelle

 
Botticelle is Roman for 4-wheeled horse-drawn carriages, and the name derives from the 'botti' (wine barrels) that were transported with such means in ancient times.

Today these quintessential Rome icons are at the center of controversy. Tourists and photographers love them; while wallets and animal rights' activists don't.
Prices are not fixed. They can be influenced by number of passengers and their nationality, chosen itinerary, weather conditions and–mostly–the driver's mood. Starting price for an average 20 minute ride is never below €80, that is if you're Italian... If you're a foreigner, be prepared to weep.

A recent law regulates Eternal City hansoms must display a licence plate, forbids access to steeply inclined roads, enforcing rigid 8 hour-long shifts, in order to make life easier on the pulling quadrupeds. There's even talk of implementing a lightweight electric cab.

Botticelle will furthermore have limited entry in ZTL traffic controlled areas of the city (centro storico, Trastevere, Testaccio and Villa Borghese), and will be allowed only on a selected number of travel-charm areas, like Via Veneto, Piazza della Repubblica and Via dei Fori Imperiali. They will no longer be able to transit on hilly Via Barberini, Via Francesco Crispi, Via Quattro Fontane, Via della Dataria, Salita Del Grillo, Via Panisperna and Via San Sebastianello.

luglio

The heat wave is relentless in the Eternal City. Well, actually no, it did give us ONE day of respite on Friday. Then it was back to +35°C (+95°F) with Borneo-style humidity.
Working in these conditions is not easy, especially if your daily occupation involves walking and showing people around in the hottest hours of the day... Still, I can't complain, because I do have the best job ever.

caldo

It's asphalt-melting hot these days in the Eternal City. Today we even had a mini-earthquake to shake us from our heat-induced lethargy. More and more people are leaving for their summer vacation, so streets are emptying out, and traffic is thinning.
This pictured above is a typical Sunday afternoon situation in my neighborhood (which is usually quite active during the week): me racing my son to the gelato shop.
He always wins, must be the training wheels.

via del governo vecchio

This street is all about the people. But also home to vintage clothing shops, stylish boutiques, funky bookstores and great food.

gps + vespe

Did I mention how much I love riding in taxis?
I don't indulge that often, but lately I've had to rush around town a lot. Waiting for the bus in the scorching Roman sun only adds to the frenzy and frustration, so in the last few days I've been treating myself to the luxe pleasure of il tassì, as we call it here. While I stretch my legs in the air conditioned back seat, I take pictures.
I'm on taxis so often recently, that the other day I even bumped into a colleague who–similarly to myself–has left the movie business, and is now making a living driving a cab!
Lucky him, he gets to ride one every day.

in costruzione

The street where I live is undergoing a major pavement overhaul. The sidewalks fitted with new travertine marble, potholes filled, and the street grated, stripped, leveled and re-tarred. In this procedure, the old level was uncovered. I was surprised to see that under a thick blanket of gravel and asphalt, my street used to be paved in beautiful sanpietrini cobblestones. They have once again sadly been covered, though.

For more UNDER CONTRUCTION theme day thumbnails, please visit City Daily Photo Blog.