A DAY OF FOOD & WINE IN ROMA!

Yay.

So today is our first real day in Rome. We got here yesterday, but we were just in like this haze of jet lag. We went to sleep at like 7pm last night and slept for 10 or 12 hours, and I think we finally beat it. We're both feeling nice and rested this morning.

Like we mentioned yesterday, we are partnering with Italia Rail and at the lounge, we met this guy that works there. His name is Edmundo. And we asked him for restaurant recommendations in Rome. We told him we only wanted to eat places that are super local and authentic and really yummy. And I think he gave us the best restaurant to go to today.

So that's where we're headed now. We have about a 20 minute walk across Rome, maybe across, I don't know. We're going that way.

We pretty much have the place all to ourselves.

This is crazy. Pack.

Our restaurant is on this road and there are no people on this road. So far, so good. This is definitely a place we never would have found on our own.

All I know about this place so far is that it smells amazing. And they make their own pasta, so I'm definitely getting pasta.

So it's classic Prosecco wine house.

It's Nilo Franco.

This is our menu. We get to pick our main course, and then she's gonna bring us whatever win goes with the course. And it's all Italian wine. And she's even gonna show us where it's from, starting with Prosecco. So before Nate and I started traveling, I really didn't know that sparkling wines were named after wherever they're made. Like champagne in champagne. France. I knew that one, but I didn't really know of any of the other ones. So if you didn't know, Prosecco is sparkling wine from Italy, specifically from Veneto. This one that we're drinking, and it's delicious. We are starting with caprese salad with some bread and olive oil and vinegar. I'm so excited. Our first Italian meal.

Oh, my gosh.

Just cutting through this pasta. I can tell it's homemade. I know that sounds dumb, but I just can't. I'm so excited. It kind of looks like Alfredo. Honestly, I didn't know how to pronounce it on the menu. I just picked it, and I think I made a really good choice.

I feel like I've waited my whole life for this moment eating homemade Italian pasta in the middle of r. Can you tell I'm excited?

I think Italian food's my favorite.

Rice together.

So this is our second plate. I don't know if that's like a thing here, but it was on our menu, and I'll take it. I got eggplant with tomato sauce. I'm sure there's some other stuff in there as well. And it was paired with a wine that their friends made and sent it to them. And she told us that the wine was so new that it didn't even have a label.

Thank you. Thank you so much.

Everything was wonderful. That was a great start to Rome. Also, we never told you the name of this restaurant. That's because it would be really embarrassing if I tried to pronounce it. This is. That's the name.

I highly recommend that place. The service was amazing. I feel like I'm best friends with the waitress. She was so cute. And we kind of messed up. We have a food tour scheduled tonight at 6, which is just in like three hours. We didn't really mean to have these two big food experiences on the same day, but that's just what today's gonna be. Lots of Italian food, and I'm not complaining. So in between this and our food tour, we're gonna go to the Pantheon.

Sorry.

We're going to this really old building.

There's a massive line going into this place, probably because it's free and it's super cool because of how old it is. But we also have an audio guy. Rick Steves.

How awesome is this wide angle lens? I feel like you're seeing exactly what we're seeing. Normally, I'm like, trying to decide what I'm gonna fit in the shot, but this, you might be able to see more than we can in, like, our eyes. We're starting the tour.

Rick Steves is super cheesy, but he's free, and I love him. I think he's adorable. He's very informative.

It's like your friendly grandpa telling you stories about where you are.

So we just finished our 20 minute Rick Steves audio guide of the Pantheon, and we're each going to give you the fact that we thought was most interesting. Just one. We're limiting ourselves.

You want to go first?

Nope. All you.

Okay. I thought the most interesting, interesting thing he said was that the big hole in the ceiling, which is called the Opulus.

Sounds right.

Is the original hole. It was redone in 120ad, but that's the same. And it was their only source of light. And so when it rained, it just got all wet inside. And so there were holes in the floor. And the floor was slanted like this. Like you couldn't really tell. Then after he said it, like, you could really tell because all the water would just go out to the side and drain.

That was a good one. I'm pretty sure you stuck like 4 into 1. How old it was, the hole, the drains. But I give it to you. So what I thought was most interesting is that is the building that the Washington D.C. capitol was modeled after. The big dome in the ceiling seems like a pretty good model. It's something that's been around for almost 2,000 years.

Yeah. They have no idea how they made it so perfect so long ago. There's one more thing that I like, really like.

Okay, go for it.

I didn't know that the Romans invented cement.

Didn't know that either.

That was used.

Super interesting. Okay, I know earlier in this video we said that jet lag that we had beat it. But after that huge lunch and a couple glasses of wine, Food coma, it's back. And we only have, like two and a half hours till our next food tour starts, so we can go back and take a nap.

We have lots and lots more to do the next two days.

Yes.

So we're not just going to be lazy the whole time.

Short naps were taken. Espresso number four is being consumed. Now it's time for food and wine. Round two.

I can't believe we're going to eat more. This is the best day ever. My only complaint about Europe is how tiny the coffees are. How tiny. Then you just get to have more.

We have definitely consumed too much coffee.

Today.

So we're about to go to our first stop with Eating Italy. Our two guides are super cool. They're both master sommeliers. So I'm sure we're going to learn a lot about wine. I'm going to be asking a lot of questions.

First stop was the Sixt.

The Jewish people. It's a Jewish ghetto. So this ghetto was created in this neighborhood. Roma is divided in 50 different priori.

This food tour is off to a great start. It's our favorite kind of food tour. The perfect mix of food and history about Rome. The dish that we just had was potatoes and cheese. Like three different types of cheese. It was so good, and we learned that it was like the poor man's food. During World War II, the farmers would come home and just put all the extra leftovers in one thing and bake it. But now it's like a super delicious.

Popular dish we can't pronounce because it starts with an S and an F. It's like anytime Those two letters are next to each other. We just can't pronounce it, but it was good. We also had prosciutto and a delicious white wine.

We're currently walking through the Jewish ghetto and we just learned that anytime you see one of the golden plaques on the ground, it means that someone from that house was deported to Auschwitz and never came back. He said 2,000 people from this ghetto were deported and only five came back. It's crazy.

And that was the depressing note for the tour.

All the churches in Roma are built on top. The pagan temple. Yeah, because look, this one was the real level of the ancient.

Our second stop is this place with tons of cheese. We're starting with goat cheese, which is my favorite. We're supposed to take a bite and then sit.

That's nice. He said it's supposed to make it taste sweeter.

Sam.

Our third stop is called La Tarria, which means milk shop, because apparently the room that we're sitting in right now used to be a barn and there were cows in it and they sold milk. Now we're having lasagna, and it's my favorite. On the other side of our plate is beef tartare. That was such a good stop. Lasagna is seriously one of my favorite foods, especially if it's white sauce instead of red sauce and they put pistachio nuts in it, give it a little texture. And I really love eating raw meat when it's like, when it's okay to do so. So it was really good.

Pretty positive. That church was not on the itinerary, but our guide is, like, super passionate about his city and we all seemed interested in the church, so he took us in. The entire ceiling is made of gold.

He knows everything.

He's been awesome. Like, I love food tours that, like, just serve really good food because how can you not? But the ones that include history are the ones that, like, we really love. And this one has been definitely one of the most historically informative food tours we've ever been on.

He just casually, like, we walk by anything interesting, he just talks about it.

And in Rome, you're constantly walking by something interesting. Seriously, like, I can't put the camera down. I just keep videoing.

This is awesome.

Today's vlog is going to be so long.

Yeah, sorry about that.

So we are on a food and wine tour, so it's only appropriate that we got wine flavored ice cream. Never had wine flavored ice cream before.

The gelato was our final stop. Hopefully it was not our last time having gelato in Italy because it was awesome and this trip was so good. Marco was the best guide. So if you come and do this tour, you have to get Marco. He was so passionate. It just made me so happy.

Passionate about the food and the city. Like, it was a great combo of both. We said that multiple times, but it really was. This was an awesome first day in Rome. I'm kind of scared. Like, it doesn't get any better than this. Yeah.

Hopefully we can walk it all off.

Tomorrow we are going to the Coliseum more. I'm sure it'll be great.