If you’re looking for weekend deals for autumn in Italy, try going to some of the Italian food festivals on in Emilia Romagna in the month of November. The Wine Food Festival is on where you can try all sorts of traditional Italian produce, from chestnuts to balsamic vinegar, culatello cold cut meat, mushrooms and truffles.

The food festival involves the towns of Piacenza and Rimini, and everywhere in between, where you can also experience some of Italy’s most beautiful towns and medieval locations. Try hotel and agriturismo offers in Coriano for the olive festival, while Ferrara is hosting the Festa della zucca or pumpkin festival. The Emilia Romagna truffle festival is on in Mondaino, or treat yourself in Compiano with banquets and health spa retreats.

Continue reading: Weekend deals for Autumn Wine Food Festival in Italy

Italy’s top five destinations for travel, according to the Italians themselves on the Trivago travel site, have turned up a couple of surprises. For future travel tips to Italy, you can check out these destinations yourself, a couple of which are off the beaten track and not part of the major tourist destinations of Rome, Florence and Venice.

The first of Italy’s top travel destinations is Pisa, and not just for the world famous leaning tower. Pisa is known for its agriturismo farm stays, health spa weekends and local cuisine, most of which are particularly popular if you’re travelling in autumn in Italy.

Pisa is hosting a couple of Italian food festivals this month, including the Dolcemente event and “Pisa Vini” from November 25 to 27. The next of Italy’s top five destinations are Padua, Bologna, Mantua and Genoa. For more details, see after the jump.

Continue reading: Italy's top five travel destinations: from Pisa to Genoa and homemade pesto

Autumn in Italy will be celebrated by a flower exhibition and festival in Parma, to celebrate harvest time and the fruits of fall. The stunning location for the “Nel segno del Giglio Autunno” is Parma’s royal palace of Colorno.

The exhibition takes place this weekend, October 10-11, and shows a selective exhibition with autumn flowers and fruits, historic species and new interpretations on the harvest theme. For further details see the Parma events site and Parma tourism site.

Continue reading: Flower festival in Parma to celebrate autumn in Italy

Each year Autumn, the season which is like a door between summer and winter, brings its own delights to the table; from chestnuts and mushrooms to apples and grapes. So those of you who love the flavours of Autumn will be glad to know that in October the small village of Marradi (up in the hills around the city of Florence) will host a chestnut festival. Surrounded by thick woods, the village is famous for its delicious chestnuts throughout the north of Italy, but the big news is that for the next four weekends, the village can also be reached on board lovely steam trains leaving every Sunday from Rimini, Bologna and Florence. Once there visitors will have the chance to attend the Italian food festival and taste such delicious dishes as tortelli stuffed with chestnuts, chestnut cake, chestnut jam and, of course, tons of roast chestnuts. But don’t worry, if you should prefer something different, you can always have polenta with mushrooms and exquisite grilled meat and all of this accompanied by fabulous Tuscany wine. For more information you can call the following phone numbers: 0546.22715; 0546.22177; 055.440311

Photo | Flickr

Continue reading: Autumn in Italy: Chestnut Festival at Marradi, near Florence

Salsomaggiore Terme in Parma hosts the Miss Italy event every year, and so it can be expected to qualify as Italy’s temple to beauty and cathedral of good health. Autumn in Italy is perfect for a trip to a health spa, and the Salsomaggiore Terme are perhaps the historic mecca for health spa enthusiasts here.

Over 4,000 square metres of beauty treatments and health spa services can be found here, from thermal showers to all types of massages (believe me they have everything). The traditional building will give you a feeling of having an authentic Italian health spa experience and if you really want to indulge, hotel packages will give you deals for a weekend or overnight stay.

The Salsomaggiore Terme are located in Parma, not far from Milan, and have health spa packages ranging from one day to a whole week of pampering. For details on what to book and how to get there, see the Salsomaggiore website.

Continue reading: Health spas in Italy and weekend trips from Milan: Salsomaggiore Terme

The town of Bra in Piedmont, famous for its Italian cheese and the Slow Food movement, is currently hosting the Slow Food Cheese Italian food festival. Autum in Italy is THE season for food festivals, so you’d best get your calendar planned.

Bra is famous for Carlo Petrini, founder of the Slow Food movement and the world’s first University of Gastromic Sciences. The cheese festival sees the town’s historic centre turned into a cheese market, in a space more than 3,000 metres square.

The Italian cheese festival hosts over 160 stalls with cheeses coming from around the world to represent their country. The cheese hall hosts some of the world’s most prized cheeses, with more than 130 varieties on display. If you’re going, make sure you taste your cheese with some great Italian wine - we recommend a nebbiolo from the Langhe.

Continue reading: Italian food festivals: Cheese festival in Piedmont celebrates Italian cheese

From November 1st to December 8, the Tuscany councils of Asciano, Buonconvento, Monteroni d’Arbia, Rapolano terme and San Giovanni d’Asso will be the scene for Crete d’Autunno 2008. The event is a series of meetings and shows dedicated to the truffle and the area’s wine specialities, along with trekking in Tuscany and cycle tours.

The Senesi area will be offering discounts on Tuscany accommodation, farmhouse stays and Bed and Breakfasts. Packages include a minimum stay of three nights with one night free, a 50 percent discount on the second night if staying two nights, free museum visits, and tasting of local dishes from Tuscany or restaurant discounts.

For example, three days and two nights in a farmhouse is 88 euros a person, or 116 euros for three nights. In a three star hotel, prices are around 99 euros a head for two nights, 126 euros for three nights, with a traditional dinner included.

For the Crete d’Autunno program, go to the Terre Siena site, information at Vacanze Senesi Incoming, 0577/45900, booking@vacanzesenesi.it.

Source | terresiena.it

Continue reading: Autumn in Tuscany: discounted accommodation

While on the subject of Piedmont, if you’re a food buff and love traditional, fresh produce, Italy has everything you could possibly want. Italy is a mecca for food lovers, and the Piedmont town of Alba, in the Langhe region, is currently celebrating its famous white truffle festival.

The white truffle is a gourmet treasure in Italy, and it’s quite possibly a good year for truffles. The grape harvest has suffered a little due to heavy rains early in the season, and so while the 2008 vintage might not be crash hot, it’s definitely a mushroom year.

The Fiera del Tartufo is held every year in Alba and includes a truffle market, competition, photographic exhibition and a truffle auction with proceeds going to charity.

The truffle of the year prize will be awarded on November 15, though the festival itself finishes on November 9. For more information on the truffle festival, go to the Fiera del Tartufo site (in English).

Source | Fiera del Tartufo

Photo | Flickr

Continue reading: Italian festivals: Piedmont celebrates the white truffle festival in Alba

October festivals in Italy in autumn, could very well include the chestnut harvest and associated festivals. We held our annual (invitation-only) chestnut festival in the Valtellina yesterday (castagnata) and I have to say it’s a good year for chestnuts.

The harvest is later this year due to late ripening, but some lovely fresh chestnuts were around for the picking, which involved a team of us fanning across the terraces above Ardenno to find the fruit. The trick to chestnut picking (or chestnut hunting) is to go equipped with bags or baskets to collect them, and gloves if you’re smart - these guys really hurt.

On having plenty to eat (as usual we exaggerated and possibly put a hole in Ardenno’s chestnut harvest), we took them back to our hillside hut for cooking. Roasted chestnuts are wonderfully sweet, though we’re undecided on whether to cut the shell slightly or not. If you don’t, it appears that despite a few explosions, they roast all the same.

After getting our fingers all black on peeling them, we matched our chestnuts with nutella or honey. Look out for chestnut cakes in Italy in fall as chestnut flour is often used to make the castagnaccio (take a look our recipe in the next few days).

Photo | Flickr

Continue reading: Italian festivals: chestnut roasting and nutella at chestnut festival

While Sicily is generally known as a destination to soak up some rays in summer, it can also be a fascinating place to visit in the low season in Italy, with harvests and plenty of October festivals to be enjoyed. Typical products from Sicily include chestnuts, mushrooms, honey, apples, pistacchios, oil, wine and carob, which invade the island in this autumn harvest period.

If you’re looking for accommodation in Sicily where you enjoy some of these Sicilian festivals, the agricultural town of Zafferana Etnea, on the slopes of Mount Etna, celebrates the Ottobrata Zafferanese - a show of typical products every Sunday from October 5 to 26 which includes tastings, music, exhibitions and cultural excursions.

This is a beautiful area of Sicily which merits a visit. Buses run between Catania and Zafferana and accommodation can be found at hotels, bed and breakfasts or agriturismi. For more information, go to the town’s website.

Continue reading: Festivals in Sicily: typical products at Ottobrata Zafferanese

If you’re looking for some wine tasting not far from Milan this week, you could try the open cellars event in Morbegno, in the Valtellina. About 30 minutes north of Colico, on Lake Como, Morbegno will open its cellar doors to wine tastings of nebbiolo from the Valtellina region.

Various wine tours can be completed, including the green and yellow course which involve the visit to 11 cellar doors and tastings of DOC, DOCG and IGT nebbiolo wines, along with local products such as cheese and bresaola. The cost is 12 euros.

If you want a step up from that, the red course costs 20 euros and involves tasting of the best wines from the Valtellina, including Reserves and Sforzati, served by sommeliers from the Italian Sommeliers Association.

The event closes this weekend, with cellar visits open from 8pm to 11pm on Friday, 4pm to 11:30pm on Saturday and 2pm until 10:30 pm on Sunday. For more information go to the Valtellina website.

Photo | Flickr

Continue reading: Wine tasting tours in Italy: Valtellina cellars

We had already indicated the Eurochocolate festival in our initial post on October festivals in Italy, and autumn events. From Saturday 18 October to Saturday 25 October the Umbrian capital will host the mega-chocolate festival called Eurochocolate.

The program has many events and the brands hosted include Novi, Lindt, Cameo, Nestlé, Toblerone, Milka and others. If you’re interested in checking out the festival, it’s probably best to go during the week, avoiding the weekends, and seel alternative transport options like the train.

The highlight of the chocolate festival is the chocolate sculptures, with blocks of chocolate being sculptured in the streets by various artists. Onlookers content themselves with the chocolate flakes that fly off, some people even picking them up off the street (no comment on the quality of this chocolate).

If you want to avoid crowds and the commercial nature of this event, visiting Perugia at another time still gives you the opportunity of a chocolate experience. You can visit chocolate making facilities, the Perugina chocolate museum (where you can buy chocolate products and Baci Perugina), an antique chocolate gelateria exists (in front of Perugia’s Università per stranieri) and at the moment you can even stop at the exhibition Da Corot a Picasso. All without the crowds and people who will eat chocolate off the pavement.

Photo | Flickr

Continue reading: Eurochocolate 2008: Baci Perugina and Perugia festival for chocoholics