Day 3 - Settling in at Bologna

 # Campari & Soda: 0, # Gelati: 0

Today I didn't have any special plans, other than puttering around and getting a feel for my neighbourhood.  The weather didn't help.  Yesterday was pleasant with clear skies and a temperature of about 22C.  Today it barely made it to a top of 15C and was mostly lower.

I went out for breakfast to the nearby Pasticceria Antica Bologna.  I had an excellent coffee and a brioche stuffed with a rich tasty pistachio cream.  It was delicious but can't be doing anything that is good for my blood sugar levels.  I should have a sensible breakfast - tomorrow.

After breakfast I decided to explore the city and headed for the Piazza Maggiore which is the centre of everything.  You don't really need to go to museums here.  So many of the buildings here in the historic centre have plaques telling you something or other about them.  All those classes in the Passo Remoto tense weren't wasted after all.  You can easily spend satisfying hours just walking and looking around this city. 

However, after a bit it started drizzling and the wind picked up which took the fun out of just random puttering about.  I ducked into the Museo Civico Archeologico which had the usual Estrucan and Roman displays as well as some very fine Egyptian galleries as well as a lot of pieces from pre-historic times.  One room was full of items dug up from a cemetary quite near to my apartment.  Along with all the standard grave goods - jewellery, weapons and such like - were complete graves like this one.  I wasn't expecting to see actual (extremely dead) bodies.  All a bit startling.

After my museum visit it was time for lunch.  The first place I went to was fully booked for a family party (it is Sunday), the second place had a queue out the door, the third place looked too hip and trendy for me, the fourth seemed a bit too touristy, the sixth looked too busy and unwelcoming for a solo diner, the seventh (right next door) was completely empty which was a worry.  At this point I scolded myself for being so picky and decided to walk into the next place that I came across that wasn't completely empty.  This turned out to be Il Saraceno which actually specialises in food from the Amalfi Coast and was rather more upmarket than I had planned on.  However, most of the other diners were in causal clothes such as jeans.  Also, lots of family groups ranging in age from primary school children up to grannies, as well as two dogs.  Clearly going out for a family Sunday lunch is a thing.  It felt like a friendly place.

For entree I had burrata cheese with tomato puree - their take on the classic Caprese salad.  It came looking like this.  A bit of a change from last night's version.  The cheese was delicious and the tomato full of flavour.  The piece of fried bread was a little odd though. The thing sticking out of the cheese was a plastic tube/syringe thingy full of minced basil for squeezing into/onto the cheese.

For my primi I had tortellacci with melazane filling.  Tortellacci is just jumbo tortellini.  It was tasty but I only know it had eggplant in the filling because the menu told me so.

For secondi I had the sandwich di maialino.  I had been expecting the pork to be slices of something like porchetta but it turned out to be just a hamburger patty made from pork.  There were also slices of fried eggplant along with cheese and some bitter greens made into a pesto.  The yellow blobs are saffron cream. The fillings were tasty but just way too much bread.  A fail for this course.

I didn't have room for dessert so just had an espresso with a few pieces of biscotti before waddling out. I had planned on doing more sightseeing in the afternoon but the weather was getting worse.  It wasn't just drizzling but full on raining and there were thunderstorms in the distance.  I scurried home to my apartment, stopping off at a supermarket to buy (yet more) bread plus cheese and salami for an easy dinner at home.  Must start eating a wider range of vegetables than just tomato (or the odd piece of eggplant) some time soon.