Blog #2

Last weekend we were in Umbria and while it was stunning and the wine was amazing, the food that we were provided was not great. I am assuming that this is because I was traveling with 200+ other college students and we were eating plain meals on a budget but the repetitive pasta, potatoes, and zucchini got old quick. I am a vegetarian and since Umbria is a very meat-based region, they did not really know what to do with me. They gave me tomatoes and a lot of carbs to make up for the lack of food but it did not make up for the lack of protein. The wine at Le Climate was incredible. I usually prefer white wine but now somehow I have developed a taste for red. We learned about the multi-grape blends and something about knowing where the wine came from and eating the actual grapes really made it taste better.

This week’s reading was about bread. I was very interested to see how much technique goes into the actual baking of the bread. They roll it out and put yeast in it and let it sit all for very specific reasons. The way the reading described baking bread was almost as if it was an art and how you almost have to be an expert to make even somewhat decent bread. I also thought it was interesting how much bread itself affects the human culture. A lot of human conflicts has been centered around bread and there are many religions that have important aspects surrounding bread. In the Bible, there are many references to breaking bread showing how it can bring people together and bring people closer to God. For a long time bread has been an essential part of the human diet and is a huge part of human life. I also thought it was interesting that the bread in Umbria had little to no salt in it. We discussed in class that this was because salt used to be expensive but the taste of the people who lived in the area remained even when the price went down and now they prefer bland bread. I personally prefer my bread to have more flavor but it was interesting that even though they can afford to add salt to their bread, they prefer not to.

My family is Italian so I grew up eating bread as a snack almost every day with olive oil and balsamic. My dad makes his own dough to make pizzas in our pizza oven and my mom usually buys our dinner rolls from a bakery down the street. Bread is just a part of my daily diet but also a huge part of my life in general considering how often I ate it and how much of a difference it would make if I did not have it.