By Chance

Travelling is one of my passions. Seeing how other people live and what they do on a daily basis always makes me appreciate their culture so much. Of course partaking in their cuisine is always an eye opening experience.

I’ve returned often to Italy, where both my parents are from, and it’s given me an enormous appreciation for Italian culture in ways that I don’t believe I would have gotten from never visiting. I’ve seen a lot of the boot. The vast landscapes and differences in climates have helped me understand why certain areas are more advanced than others. The different dialects have explained what each region or people see as a priority. It’s truly a fascinating sociological and anthropological experiment and experience.

A few months ago the Mexican and I found ourselves in Perugia. A city I had wanted to visit for a long time based solely on wanting to visit the famed Perugina chocolate factory. (Yes, it’s a sad reason to visit a city but I’ve heard worse reasons!!)

We arrived in the early afternoon after missing lunch so I was famished. We had to wait a bit for the restaurants to open but we had a coffee and a panino to tie us over. I had read about a pizzeria in my guide book and decided that I wanted to go there.

A little later we walked over to the place and there was a line outside of the place full of English speaking people. I decided that I didn’t want to go there after all. I was looking for more of a local place where the Perugians themselves went. We decided to walk around a bit and see if we came across another restaurant.

We walked around the corner and discovered a wine bar and we decided to go in and have a glass of wine and ask the locals there if they had any recommendations. But I looked closer at the menu in the display case and it said that this restaurant served dinner as well. And it noted that the menu was whatever the chef wanted to make that day. This sounded just up my alley.

The enoteca was dark enough to create mystery and fragrant with the delicate perfume of grapes. And locals abounded! At the bar and at the tables! We took a seat and the server told us the specials. Specials all so scrumptious sounding that I had to ask her to repeat them so I could decide which ones I was interested in (also translating in between takes a bit of time too).

We decided on the soup and the Mexican got one of the pasta dishes while I got another. The soup made my insides warm and my stomach happy. Not to mention that we got some bread and mortadella to start and they were fantastic.

When my pasta arrived, it smelled glorious and I almost wanted to cry. The Mexican’s pasta looked just as delicious and smelled as tempting as mine did. It was one of the best meals I have ever had. As we walked back to our hotel, the contentment I felt was overwhelming and I slept like a baby that night.

It’s so nice to find a cute little spot and a wonderful meal by chance.