Difficulty: Beginner
Italy
Anna and Marika show us the ingredients and utensils necessary for making the classic risotto alla milanese (Milanese style rice). The star of the show is the precious zafferano (saffron), whose history Anna tells us about.
Difficulty: Intermediate
Italy
Anna tells us about the different varieties of rice found in Italy, and Marika completes the cooking of the risotto.
Difficulty: Beginner
Italy
Nobody in the class volunteers to talk about the Molise region, but by chance, Anna gets called on. And we get to learn all about this small region.
Difficulty: Beginner
Italy
Italians love leafy-green vegetables, and especially in the south, there's the predilection for bitter greens, such as chicory. Chicory lends a special taste to this casserole dish, with scamorza [cheese] and cured ham that offset the mildly bitter taste of the chicory. Anna and Marika show us the ingredients and tools we need.
Difficulty: Beginner
Italy
Anna and Marika work in harmony to prepare the chicory timbale and put it in the oven to bake.
Difficulty: Beginner
Italy
Today, Anna is playing with fire because she has to describe the very region her teacher is from. Anna knows her subject pretty well, but so does her teacher. Who will triumph?
Difficulty: Beginner
Italy
Anna and Marika describe the ingredients we need to make this spaghetti frittata. They go on to show us the necessary pots, pans, and cooking utensils.
Difficulty: Beginner
Italy
Marika and Anna cook their pasta, but this recipe is actually designed for leftover pasta. They explain more about this, and show us, step by step, how to make this very special frittata. Buon appetito!
Difficulty: Adv-Intermediate
Italy Sicilian
Agata and Catena have stopped at the Catania outdoor market to do some food shopping. Catena gets to taste some of the delicious local specialties.
Difficulty: Adv-Intermediate
Italy Sicilian
Catena and Agata relax in the garden of Agata's baglio [Sicilian architectural form with buildings arranged around a courtyard]. They're getting ready to cook typical Sicilian dishes that Catena will include in a cookbook she's writing.
Difficulty: Advanced
Italy
L'Eredità [Inheritance] is an immensely popular daily quiz show on the RAI [pronounced rye], the Italian public TV and radio network. This episode benefits the Telethon Foundation, which provides funds for research into genetic diseases, and is based on Jerry Lewis's Telethon. To understand the play on words they use at a certain point, see the various meanings of macchina here. Learn more about this Italian game show here.
Difficulty: Adv-Intermediate
Italy
Francescopaolo, the contestant, is presented with a long list of Italian winners of either a Nobel Prize or an Academy Award Oscar, and has to choose which prize they were awarded.
Difficulty: Adv-Intermediate
Italy
Sara, an attractive girl from the province of Perugia, is up next. In the pairing game, she has to determine whether a traditional dish is cooked or raw.
Difficulty: Intermediate
Italy
This is a great chance to practice bone and muscle vocabulary, since that's what the pairing is about in this episode. The first contestant is named Santo. "Santo" means "saint," so there's some joking about it being just his name, not a description. Carlo, contestant number two is a musician and works in music therapy. He sings a few phrases of an aria from the Puccini opera Tosca.
Difficulty: Intermediate
Italy
Claudio is given a list of Italian places and has to say whether they're in the north or the south of Italy.
Are you sure you want to delete this comment? You will not be able to recover it.