Archive for the ‘Restaurants’ Category
Unforgettable Food and Wine at Castello delle Regine
I’m in the beautiful region of Umbria in Italy preparing for the first Umbria for #winelovers event that will take place in the next few days in Terni. It’s a great opportunity to discover the local food and wine culture of one of the most exciting Italian wine regions.
Today I had the opportunity to visit Castello delle Regine, a local winery making good to excellent Umbrian wines. All proven by the very good (and consistent) level of quality at the 2 comprehensive 2001 to 2006 vertical tastings of the 100% Sangiovese and the 100% Merlot. My favorite vintages were the 2001, 2002 and 2004 for the Sangiovese and the 2001 and 2005 for the Merlot. All showing great potential for a good pairing with food.
To test this we headed to the winery’s own Restaurant Podernovo for lunch. A meal with lots of different dishes (see below) where all the meat which came from the winery’s cow farm. Simply delicious ingredients and fantastic wine lunch that has again confirmed how amazing Italy can be when it comes to fantastic food and wine experiences.
Back to School at Cantina da Estrela
I’ve had the pleasure of visiting the Cantina da Estrela restaurant twice before, attending wine related events. This time I came here wanting to have lunch as a normal client and discovered that the experience is well worth the visit.
In one sentence
Go to this restaurant if you love good comfort food, if you’re interested in eating in a calm place that looks like an classic old school and if you don’t mind being served by restaurant students (that actually do a pretty good job!). Nice wine list. Price per person varies (based on on your opinion, really!) but should be between 20 to 25 euros per person (without wine).
The concept
One of the first interesting things about Cantina da Estrela is the fact that you can decide how much the food and the service are worth and (sorf of) pay the bill based on that. In reality you actually have a lower and a upper limit between which you can choose to pay based on your appreciation. Since all of the restaurant employees come from the Escola de Hotelaria e Turismo de Lisboa (Lisbon’s School of Hospitality), this gives you (and them) a way to continuously evaluate their work. It’s a clever (and attention grabbing) idea that I think should be applied in other restaurants.
