Italian Roast Coffee & Creamer Rave

I am currently obsessed with an Italian roast coffee and creamer right now. It is so flavorful that I have virtually kick my Starbucks latte habit, saving me calories and cash.

First, brew a pot of Starbucks Italian Roast. I always purchase at my local grocery store or Target because it is up to $3 cheaper there, as opposed to buying it from a Starbucks retail location.

This is an extra bold coffee but even though it's dark, it is sweet and smoky, never bitter. If I drank any coffee black, it might be this blend, but I'm not quite that much of a coffee connoisseur yet. Thus, I add a touch of Coffee-Mate Italian Sweet Cream and I'm in heaven.

Use this liquid creamer, and you won't even need to add sugar to your coffee (if you usually take it that way). And at only 35 calories in a tablespoon, it's a delicious treat that's cheaper and less caloric than a chock-full-of-sugar flavored latte.

I have been buying this creamer in quart size and keeping this Italian roast stocked at home. Then I bring it to work each morning, skipping my Starbucks stop altogether. With these new finds, and of course the addition of our new home espresso machine, I think our Starbucks days will be numbered.

Try it! I think you'll like it :-)

Paper Source Goodies

Yesterday, I ordered two little work goodies for myself online from Paper Source, and they are so snappy with their delivery that I had them on my doorstep today! I guess it doesn't hurt that I only live 3 miles from their headquarters :-)

First, was my new desk calendar, the 2010 Cavallini Easel "Italia" Calendar:

Too bad we are almost halfway through January, which features my favorite city we visited, Venice!

Next, I got a Blue Q stainless steel birds water bottle:

I drink water all-day, everyday at work BUT I always use a disposable plastic cup, so why not be a bit greener with this environmentally responsible and day-brightening birdie bottle? This also has two more great purposes...

1) It holds 20 oz. of water so I am making a goal for myself to drink four of these, or 80 oz. of water, a day at work now.

2) 1% of the sale went towards The Nature Conservancy, whose Illinois field office is just down the street from us and also a client of ours at work.

So in a small way with this online order, I just did my part to beautify my desk, my body and the planet :-)

Florence: The Food

Our second stop on our tour of Italy was the beautiful City of Florence.

This felt like a whirlwind because we were only there 2 nights, the shortest stay of our trip. But between the food and the history, I think it needs a few posts.

First, we checked into our hotel, the gorgeous Hotel Principe:

Which faces the Arno River:

And has a beautiful back yard garden:

AND had a balcony on our room (the only one all trip!) with a view of the famous Duomo:

Next, we boarded a bus to Chianti for a tour of the wine region, where we stopped in a few different towns which I'll explain in another post.

The next morning we woke up and headed to meet our tour guide, Eliza, for our Taste Florence tour... one of our favorite parts of our trip!

Our meeting point was in front of the Basilica San Lorenzo:

Which was steps away from the Central Market, San Lorenzo Mercato Centrale, where our wonderful food journey began. We saw yummy things like fresh made pasta:

And not so yummy things like tripe and testicles:

But then Eliza led us through a wonderful wine, bruschetta, cheese and balsamic tasting at Conti in the market. We bought lots of great things to take home from this store!:

After educating our palettes we headed off to learn more about gelato... mmmm. We learned that the bigger, fluffier and more vibrant the gelato in the window the more artificial it probably is! Bright coloring agents and chemicals are what make it glow and make it stand a foot tall in the 90 degree weather. Instead, natural color gelato that looks even, possibly a bit melty and scoopable is what you want to go for. We got our fill at a cute little gelateria called "Perche no!...", meaning "Why not!" which I think is just a perfect name and sentiment:

Here, we tried EIGHT flavor combinations:

If you thought the food tour would be done by now, your are wrong! Our last top was Enoteca Alessi where we learned all about Tuscan wines in a cool, cellar atmosphere and paired our wine with different salume and bruschetta:

Phew! Hungry yet? Well now that I've worked up your appetite I'll follow up my post with another post full of gorgeous photos of the Duomo and other Florence (non-food related) sites.

Buon Appetito!

Venice

The first stop on our tour of Italy was Venice.

Well, technically that is not true; we first landed in Munich, Germany and then hopped a short 1 hour flight to Venice with some of the most AMAZING views of the trip. Can you believe I captured these photos from my window seat?

Then we got transfered to our water taxi:

And we arrived at our beautiful accommodations, Hotel Santa Marina. We had breakfast on this veranda every morning (best espresso & coffee we had all trip!) and then we had night caps here most evenings as well.

Our hotel was a nice stroll from the major sites, including the Rialto Bridge:

And the Piazza San Marco:

We also took a gondola ride and saw many gorgeous things:

We also ate very well, with great views while doing so:

And we had some of the best pizza I have ever tasted. My favorite was Pizza Diavola, the Italian version of pepperoni pizza with a spicy salami on top:

Overall, Venice ended up surprising us as one of our favorite, most stunning stops all trip. It is quite a magical place, romantic and unique. With the absence of motor vehicles and lots of narrow walkways to get lost in, you would never believe how quiet and serene the whole city is which just adds to its appeal.

Next up, we board our train to Florence...

Arrivederci!

Italy. Where to begin?

It has been a full week since we have been back from our wonderful tour of Italy!

All I can say is that it was incredibly amazing, and I have 1382 photos to prove it. If you follow me on flickr you can see them all; if you are my facebook friend you can see a large chunk of them. I feel like I got pretty good at mastering my camera and am happy with the results, making for a great visual record of our journey. That being said, spending 13 days alone with my husband without laptops and internet made for the best memory of our trip.

I think what I might do is dedicate a post to each area we visited, with maybe a few extra posts to highlight special excursions/activites, and go from there. But for now I'll leave you with one my favorite photos from each amazing town.

Venice:

Chianti:

Florence:

Lucca:

Pisa:

Rome:

More to come!

Grab Bags

This is another trip-prep post, and this time it's about travel bags.

Due to the high-risk of pickpockets in Italy, I knew my normal one shoulder purses would not be ideal for our vacation and that I would need to search for a crossover bag. I also brought up the idea to Dave that he might also want to invest in a bag or satchel of sorts as well, to which he just scoffed at first. However, after enough of Dave's coworkers and clients told him tales of pocket slicing and wallet stealing from their European travels, specifically in Rome, he was finally convinced that a "man bag", a "murse" or whatever you call it, might also be a good investment for him. As long as it wasn't called a "fanny pack" I think I could convince him to wear it (which by the way, we found out they still sell under the more modern name "lumbar packs"...lol)

I plan to use my camera bag as my purse for day-to-day tourist activities, and I think it will work nicely. It is a Crumpler 5 Million Dollar Home Photo Bag, in a limited edition olive green/orange color combo. It closes both with very strong velcro & a clasp, fits my DSLR camera body, regular lens, zoom lens and still has a secure pocket or two for personal items, cash, etc.

It looks like this:

But I really wanted to bring one more slimmer bag to wear to dinner, for when we are casually strolling sans the big ol' DSLR and may be just carrying a point-and-shoot, if that.

So this weekend we both went shopping and I found a cute, yet practical bag at Macy's on sale for 25% off that I had previously scoped out on Zappos, but believe it or not with the sale it was cheaper at Macy's than at Zappos, even with our sky-high sales tax. I got the Franco Sarto Big Top Crossbody bag in "Golden", which is a mustard color, and it comes complete with a mini coin purse and tiny travel umbrella. All for $48 total on sale after tax.

I really like the look and the size:

It actually looks a little larger on this mannequin then it does on me in real-life, but maybe that's because of the size two "model":

And the cute polka dot pattern inside:

That matches the polka dot pattern of the cute umbrella:

I like that it zips and crosses my body and I think I'll also get use out of it back in the states when going to summer festivals, concerts, etc. Also, I probably could have gone more practical and picked the black or beige color they had at the store, but then again I always enjoy adding a pop of color with my accessories. In fact, I just realized that I don't think I even own a black purse, which seems crazy and that it should be a staple for most women. Oh well :-)

Dave on the other hand, wanted his man bag to be as dull, masculine and understated as you could imagine, so BLACK it is! Men's bags were very hard to come by when we were out and about. Macy's was a bust, and here in Chicago That's Our Bag had the best selection for guys. He tried on a few there, mostly Timbuk2 small messenger styles, but he didn't fall in love with any. So back home and back to Zappos it was for him!

We ordered two online for him to try, and will just return the one he doesn't choose. He went for the Patagonia Single Shot '09:

And this security-feature-rich Pacsafe Metrosafe 200 bag:

We'll see which he likes best.

And best of all... we are only 2 weeks away from our trip!