Italian tastes, American influence Bella Luna in Oak Ridge
Carol Shina never planned to open a restaurant. She grew up in New York, where on Sundays, she reveled in the aromas of fresh garlic, basil, mushrooms and Italian sausage, along with the sounds of sizzling pans in her Italian grandmother’s kitchen. Shina and her husband started a nuclear imaging company in their garage; they now have about 40 emplo...
The life and the works of Renzo Piano
Our country is known and appreciated all over the world for the exceptional value of some figures that have characterized recent history. One of the best known is Renzo Piano, one of the most active and prolific architects in the world. Italian Traditions will lead you on the discovery of this important figure for Italian and world architecture. We...
A Clever and Simple Robot Hand
IF YOU WANT to survive the robot apocalypse—the nerd joke goes—just close the door. For all that they’re great at (precision, speed, consistency), robots still suck at manipulating door handles, among other basic tasks. Part of the problem is that they have to navigate a world built for humans, designed for hands like ours. And those are among the...
Tuscan Sun' to downtown Fortville
Fortville is one of Midwest’s many tiny Main Street towns. Three square miles. Population 4,000. Famous for a giant statue of a pink elephant wearing horn-rimmed glasses and drinking a martini outside a liquor store. Not exactly the place you expect to go restaurant hopping. Simone and Elizabeth Lucarini see Fortville another way: a budding, easy-l...
Inside Don Chiofaro’s Long War to Make Boston’s Skyline Taller
Like all great builders, Don Chiofaro wants to see how high he can go. Rocking on the bow of a harbor ferryboat as the sun sets, he points to the horizon, between Rowes Wharf and the Custom House Tower, and describes the tallest project the Boston waterfront has ever seen. His olive-green baseball cap, atop a full head of white hair and a permanent...
My First Taste of Tuscany
Home to rolling hills of olive trees, citrus-colored villas and a sprinkling of statues from antiquity, the NYU Florence campus makes an impression from the first sight. In less than 12 hours of being on the campus, I was taken by how undeniably Italian it was. I had this preconception it’d be an American college campus contrasting its Italian surr...
Norcia Bakery reaches the century mark
CANTON Ownership has changed hands, but the Norcia Bakery recipes are intact, and it seems that everybody loves a pepperoni roll. John Norcia launched the Italian bakery in 1918 and it still is going strong after a century. The Norcia family immigrated from Italy early in the 20th century, bringing the original recipe for bread and hard rolls. Mike...
Keeping the tradition of the South Philly wedding serenade alive
On the first warm night of spring, as the wind began to cool the air and whip around the eaves of the tent taking up a block of Girard Estates, Richard DiGregorio, 29, prepared to take the microphone. "Get some drinks in you, Rich — a half hour goes quick!" the DJ joked. It was time for DiGregorio to serenade his bride, Victoria Fera. Lore has it...
Not Just Dante: Italian Speaking Countries In The World – Part Two
Dear Italy lovers, following the first part of our journey throughout the Italian-speaking countries, we will now find out where else in the world Italian is an official language. San Marino The Republic of San Marino is a microstate of 33 thousand inhabitants. Landlocked by Italy, more precisely between Emilia-Romagna and Marche regions, Italian i...
Ninfa Garden wins prestigious European award
The romantic English-style gardens of Ninfa, situated about 80 km south-east of Rome, have reeived a prestigious European Garden Award from the European Garden Heritage Network (EGHN). Ninfa came second only to London's Kew Gardens in the "European heritage of gardens and gardening" section of the EGHN network which comprises 190 parks and gardens...
Italian Food Comes to the South End’s Culinary Incubator
A longtime Boston chef will revisit his roots during a six-month residency in Boston’s South End. Chef Tony Susi, most recently of Capo, will bring his Italian food prowess to Wink & Nod (3 Appleton St., Boston) with Ripasso, an “Italian pub,” taking his place as the South End bar’s next culinary incubatee. Susi takes the reins from Louis DiBiccari...
Daughter of Italian immigrants put family first
Nothing says love like a bowl of cappelletti soup. The small, hat-shaped pasta bathed in a warm broth was a Christmas Day staple in Mary Moff’s home. It’s an Italian tradition she upheld and passed down to her own children. But it wasn’t just about the soup, her children said. It was the hours in the kitchen — hours spent with loved ones — that mad...