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What region is best for you?
Discover what regions offer you the experiences you're dreaming of.
Tuscany
Do you like fine red wines, Renaissance art and art history, a hearty cuisine with strong flavours, beautiful countryside and lovely medieval and Renaissance hill towns? Yes? Tuscany is for you! Especially if this is your first trip to Italy.
Tuscany starts at its coast in the west and extends inland, with Florence as its capital. Of course, Tuscany is famous as the birthplace of the Renaissance, for artists like Michelangelo, for art patrons and bankers like the Medici, for its museums housing Renaissance art like the Uffizi in Florence.
Tuscany is also famous for its beautiful countryside, its olive oil, its fine red wines in Chianti and top red wines south of Siena like Brunello in Montalcino and Vino Nobile in Montepulciano. |
 Montepulciano, home of Vino Nobile |
Tuscany
Towns and Cities
First time visitors to Italy usually visit Florence for its many
famous works of art, museums, historic landmarks like Ponte Vecchio,
palaces, piazzas, variety of shops and beauty. I spent a week the
first time I went, lived there and now return twice a year.
Siena is a beautiful,
smaller city with a wonderful medieval heart often for walkers only
and a variety of lovely architecture like its cathedral and town
hall on the famous Il Campo piazza. I love the frescoes in the Piccolomini
Library off the cathedral and in the town hall.
Lucca, a beautiful
walled city with walkway on top of its walls, is famous for its
olive oil and elegant country villas with magnificent gardens. San
Gimignano is famous for all its medieval towers, enchanting countryside
and fine white Vernaccia wine. Too many lovely towns in Tuscany
to mention here!
The countryside varies in this large region from seaside towns with long sandy beaches
on a plain, to mountains where marble gets dug out, to forests,
to rolling hills with olive trees, cypresses that zig zag up roads,
fields and vineyards.
Tuscany cooking school tours
Cuisine
Some typical plates in Tuscan cuisine: crostini (little pieces of
toast) with chicken liver pate and other spreads, bruschetta (larger
pieces of toast rubbed with garlic) with fresh tomatoes and basil,
ribollita (a hearty soup of vegetables with bread in it), pasta
with porcini mushrooms or with tomatoes & sausage, risotto with
mushrooms or other vegetables in season, Florentine steak, wild
boar, rabbit, game birds like quail, fish & bread stew, grilled
vegetables, almond cookies (biscotti) you dip in vin santo, fruit
tarts, panna cotta with various sauces.
Wines
Tuscany is one of Italy’s top wine regions. The Chianti country
produces some fine red wines. South of Siena, the town of Montalcino
is home to one of Italy’s top reds, Brunello and Montepulciano
makes the great Vino Nobile red wine. The coast area around Bolghieri
and the southernmost part of Tuscany around Scansano make some excellent
red wines. Vin Santo goes well with dessert or with almond biscotti.
For cooking school tours in Tuscany please see www.italycookingschools.com/tuscany2003.html
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