Ti penso sempre (I always think of you)

To me, Italy is the country of my dreams and Rome is heaven. I should place a disclaimer on my comment with the fact that I have only been to Rome in Italy, so this opinion may change one day when I get the chance to travel all over Italy, but for now: Roma is Amore.

The title of this post is “Roma Amor.” Roma is the Italian spelling of Rome, and Amor is “love.” Technically “love” is “amore” in Italian, but I always thought it was cute that Roma backwards is “amor.” So close, yet so far away.

My trip to Europe changed my taste for food forever, but the pinnacle of my trip was Rome. I went with the advice of “eat as much gelato as possible.” Now I take advice like that seriously, so what else did I do but eat a lot of gelato? Day 1 consisted of a lot of walking in the sweltering heat, but we found gelato and indulged like it was the best thing we’ve ever had. Here is a chart outlining our gelato consumption over the 3.5 days we were in Rome:

Day	# of Cones
Day 1	2
Day 2	3
Day 3	2
Day 4	1

I am surprised that we did not die from overconsumption of gelato. We went to several famous places including: Cremeria Monteforte, Il Gelato di San Crispino, Gelateria Della Palma, and Giolitti which were all near the Pantheon.

Come sei bella (How beautiful you are)

The ingredients found in Italy are so simple that it’s a wonder how they create such wonderful tasting food. There’s nothing artificial about anything we ate there. The best place to see what fresh food is like was at the Campo de’ Fiori, an open air marketplace. Nearby we ate extremely large servings of salads filled with fresh ingredients. I loved how artichokes, cherry tomatoes and mozzerella could be so delicious despite its simplicity.

Some of the best “old world” cooking can be found in Roma, but if you’re in Italy, what must you have? Pasta and pizza! So after a CRAZY day that nearly ended in us losing all of our belongings inside the Vatican (long story, short: we almost missed the closing time of the coat/bag check at the front of the museum), we ended up dragging ourselves to Pizzeria la Montecarlo di Roma. There we had an amazing pesto pasta and the most beautiful pizza I have ever seen. It was not perfectly round, or did not seem manufactured. In fact, it was a perfectly thin crusted pizza with toppings so lovely

Although Montecarlo takes the cake for best pizza, Antica Taverna wins for the best pasta on our trip. We indulged in mussels and amazing pasta in a simple outdoor cafe. We were in the streets of Rome and nothing could get us down.

Cara mia, ti voglio bene (My darling, I love you)

I dream of returning to Italy again in the near future. Perhaps indulge in La Dolce Vita again and drink another €6.50 iced latte at Café de Paris on Via Veneto. But most of all, to indulge in more gelato and eat everything in sight!

Mi manchi (I miss you)