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Provinces, Comuni & Regions of Italy

Until researching the nomenclature of the Italian political subdivisions, I was both ignorant of, and baffled by, the terms that I’d hear bandied about regarding Italian socio-political geography. I thought you might also be a bit baffled, so I decided that it’s high-time for all of us to know a bit more about these areas of Italy. It’s not too hard to understand.

There are 3 terms that you need to know: region, province, and comune. Think of a region as a state in the US. And think of a province as a county, or parish. And then think of every square inch of Italy as being located in one comune or another.

COMUNE (plural is Comuni)

We hear a lot about Italian towns like Roma, Venezia, Milano, Napoli, and the other big towns of Italy. In the US, we would call these ‘municipalities’ or ‘townships’, but in Italy the word ‘comune’ is used to describe these political units.

The comune is the smallest political subdivision within Italy. There are 7,918 of them and all of Italy is contained within some comune. This is in stark contrast to the US, where non-municipal land abounds. Just below is a map showing all of the comuni of Italy

In the map above, can you spot the very large comune of Roma, which is about half way down the Italian coast of the Tyrrhenian Sea. That little speck of a dot in the middle of the comune of Roma is another country…that being Vatican City.

Now, with a bit of enlargement of northern Italy below, it gives you a better idea of how the 7,918 comuni are organized. I’ve circled (from left to right) Turino, Asti and Milano. As you can see, those municipalities are much larger than their surrounding counterparts, and they are like islands in a sea of the other comuni.

A comune is where you would get your birth certificate, or the death certificate of another (obviously not your own), get your deed registered, pick up a marriage license, etc.

You can see a complete list of the 7,918 comuni/municipalities here.

The largest comune is Roma, which is about 25 miles in diameter, and has a population of 2,761,477 inhabitants. You undoubtedly (I have faith in you!) found the comune of Roma, earlier. The smallest comune is Atrani, which tips in at only 1,300 feet in diameter, has only 832 people.

Again, for a comune, think municipality/town/township/city, but with a bit of the flavor of a county.

PROVINCES

The next political subdivision is the ‘province’. Think of a province as being like a US county, or parish if you live in Louisiana. There are 107 provinces in Italy.

The smallest areas shown on this map are the provinces. For now, ignore the darker lines and the shading differences.

REGIONS

Then, we come to the largest of the institutional, geo-political bodies, the ‘region’. There are 20 regions, which you can see displayed in this map. Remember, these are like the states in the US.

On this map, you see the names of the regions, using the Italian nomenclature. For instance, we in the US call ‘Piemonte’ by the name ‘Piedmont’, and ‘Toscana’ by the name ‘Tuscany’, etc…don’t ask me why, and don’t get me started on that…Rome/Roma, Florence/Firenze, Venice/Venezia, etc.

The ‘regions’ of Italy, showing their Italian names

There you have it! The regions (states), provinces (counties/parishes), and comuni (municipalities) of Italy. Each region has its own special character…as well as characters. Some are influenced mostly by the sea. Others by their mountains. While others have lakes as their defining feature. And most have a good bit of wine in their makeup. And of course each region has their own, tasty foods, including the various locally-defined shapes of pasta…but that’s a subject for next week’s article!

Wouldn’t it be great to spend time in each of these regions?! I sure think so. Let’s plot out an all-inclusive route and get going!

Ciao for now,

Steve

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Eat Here: De Pisis

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Are you hungry right now? If you’re like me (and I certainly know I am), then you think about your next meal right after you finish the previous one.

A meal at today’s subject eatery is highly recommended…though you will need to travel to Venice to enjoy it…carry out or delivery just won’t work in this case.

De PIsis is located in the Hotel Bauer. This hotel is one of the up-scale hotels in Venice…a hotel for which we would not normally make a reservation. However, in 2004 we spent a January week in Venice and the Bauer’s rates were such that it was affordable. And yes, it was very nice, indeed. I’ll let you know more about a winter visit at another time.

We’ve dined at De Pisis for both lunch and dinner, and both were wonderful. But, our routine now is to arrive in Venice mid-morning, drop our bags at the Hotel Flora, and then immediately make our way a couple-of-hundred yards to the canal-side terrace of De Pisis, under the red canal-side awnings you see in the aerial photo.

It is such a lovely terrace, situated just where the Canale Grande (Grand Canal) enters the Bacino San Marco (St Mark’s Basin), with a view of the church of Santa Maria Della Salute in one direction and San Giorgio Maggiore in the other.

Today’s article will be short on verbiage and long on photos of the food and revelry of some of our visits. So, here goes.

A Toast to You and Yours!

As we always start our meals with a toast to friends both present and absent, that’s what we do here. Note the beautiful Santa Maria Della Salute in the background. This toast is with Debbie and Scott Kennedy. It is a rare event that Scott eschews wine for a beer…but it was a long, hard journey.

Another time and another toast with in-laws Leslie and Craig Johnson.

The particular toast above is made with Venica’s Ronco delle Cime, which is produced in the northern realm of the Veneto. The Veneto is the region in which Venice is located.

I love the way that Italian wine websites describe their wine ethic. Venica’s states that, “This wine wants to tell the story of a borderland with people and memories related to family’s values and to the region’s traditions.”

After our tasting, we understood the story.

And though we don’t always travel with friends, wife Ellen and I never fail to execute a toast to you.

Though we are pre-meal toasting here, we drank our prosecco throughout our meal.

And which prosecco did we demolish during this meal?

Banfi’s, of course! How does it taste? Let’s check their website. for a description. Oh here it is, “…an edgy, fresh peach and peppercorn-scented sparkler. It’s bright with the greenness of chlorophyll and a peppery burst in the end.” Hmm…bottom line…we like it!

And is that ‘B’ for Bauer, for ‘Banfi’, or for ‘Burkett’? We’ll never tell.

The Meals

Adam has come to tell us that our meal will be arriving “in un momento”.

In the background you can see the church of San Giorgio Maggiore, located on the Giudecca island.

And the meals are here! We’ll start with a salad and move on to the other savory dishes.

The Fish Course

And, let’s not forget a fish course…after all, we are sitting in the middle of a lagoon!

Dealing with a whole fish can be a formidable experience, right? Not so in Italy.

The typical routine is to present the cooked whole fish for your viewing pleasure, and then the fish is disassembled and de-boned tableside.

I don’t have a fish presentation photo from De Pisis, so I’ll use one where Elizabete makes the presentation at La Terrazza Danieli on the Hotel Danieli’s rooftop restaurant.

Our De Pisis waiter is carefully de-boning our fish selection.

And here is our plated fish dish, ready to be placed before us for our eating pleasure.

It’s Over

All good things come to an end…though I’m not too happy about it during this visit to De Pisis. Even the wait-staff seem to commiserate with my end-of-meal blues. The parsley? I’m just NOT going to eat that parsley.

We don’t always finish a meal with wine…sometimes we need a refreshing Coca Cola Lite, or Coke Zero. Ahhhh!

You will see Ellen and me traveling through Italy with friends in many of these articles. I wrote an article on ‘Traveling with Friends’ back in 2015. In that article, I included a short video giving you a whirlwind 3:28 glimpse into a 2012 trip to Italy. Here is that video, should you have missed it.

I hope you enjoyed your voyeuristic meal today at De Pisis as much as I enjoyed bringing it to you. And don’t forget…no carryout or delivery…you have to go in person. How about you join us the next time we’re there? Is it a date? But if your there on your own, be sure and make a reservation for the lunch-time terrace at the bottom of their web-page, here.

Ciao for now,

Steve

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Allegrini Winery

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Any idea how many different wine-producing companies there are in Italy? I don’t know either, but I know that there are a lot of them.

I now have a favorite in northern Italy (Banfi is my favorite Tuscan winery), and it is Allegrini. Read on and I’ll explain why.

Our Visit to Allegrini Winery

We had a lovely 10am visit to Villa Della Torre headquarters of Allegrini wines. The Allegrini winery, situated in the heart of the Fumane region, is a beautiful and historical villa. Fumane is in the Province of Verona, in the Italian region called the Veneto, which is in the northern part of Italy.

The Allegrini family have been active in Fumane since the 16th century. The 6th and 7th generation of Allegrini are actively producing Allegrini wines today.

Olmo guided us around this lovely property. Here he explains the locations of the various vineyards of the Allegrini winery, as we wait to taste the wines of our tasting.

Sister-in-law Leslie looks about on the grounds of the Villa Della Torre.

The Villa Della Torre, was built in the late 1500s. One of the most mysterious features are the fireplaces, shaped like huge monsters…something to do with the Renaissance idea that man can tame nature, perhaps. Whatever the reasoning, the four different fireplaces are quite a spectacle. They represent, from left to right, the devil, a sea monster, angels holding open the mouth of some un-identified creature, and brother-in-law Craig with the lion fireplace.

Here, Olmo explains the soil layers of the vineyard that produces the grapes for the Palazzo Della Torre wine. Yes, this is a quality soil…very low on organics (i.e. dirt) and high on mineral.

The Wines of Allegrini

Below you can see a sampling of the wines produced by Allegrini. From left to right they are their white wine called Soave, the fabulous Amarone, Valpolicella Classico, Palazzo Della Torre, and their recioto (sweet) Giovani Allegrini.

The Grapes of Allegrini

Five grapes varieties are responsible for the red wines of Allegrini. They are (from left to right, below) Corvina Veronese, Corvinone, Rondinella, Molinara, and Oseleta. And a small bit of the Sangiovese grape is used in some of the wines.

The Palazzo Della Torre Wine

As it is an outstanding wine for the price, I will be focusing on the Palazzo Della Torre wine label.

Giovanni Allegrini began to cultivate the abandoned land of the Palazzo Della Torre. In 1978, the grapes grown there were used to make the first Palazzo Della Torre wine, but it wasn’t until 1990 that Palazzo Della Torre underwent a revolutionary technique known as ‘double fermentation’, and this is what put it on the wines-of-Italy map.

In the Palazzo Della Torre wine production, the grapes (Corvina Veronese 40%, Corvinone 30%, Rondinella 25%, Sangiovese 5%) are harvested by hand, rather than by machine.

About 70% of the grapes are pressed for their juice and then fermented in stainless-steel vats to produce a stage-one wine. While this wine is aging, the other 30% of the grapes are set aside for appassimento, or grape drying. These grapes are dried until January, at which point they are pressed for their raisined juice. This subsequent pressing, called a must, is added to the already produced wine, which regenerates it for a double fermentation — this in oak casks. What results is the absolutely delicious and reasonably priced Palazzo Della Torre wine. As it is usually less than $15, it is a fabulous bargain.

Click on the image to the right to see a nice diagram of the Palazzo Della Torre process

The Amarone Wine

OK, this is THE wine of northern Italy. If you want to splurge a bit with a truly fine wine, go for Amarone. Its richness of flavor is not in any way accidental…it is the appassimento process that makes this wine so fine.

Amarone production has similarities to the just mentioned Palazzo Della Torre in that its grapes (Corvina Veronese 45%, Corvinone 45%, Rondinella 5%, Oseleta 5%) are dried from 100-120 days (depending on the winter weather) before they are pressed for their juice. Where only 30% of the Palazzo Della Torre grapes are raisinated through appassimento, all of the grapes for Amarone are dried before pressing.

The soil for growing the grapes for Amarone is varied, but mostly clayey and chalky soils of volcanic origin. Hand harvesting of only select grape bunches is carried out in late September. The appassimento (drying process) finds the grapes being naturally dried for 3-4 months in the drying facility, where the grapes lose 40-45% of their original weight. They are then de-stemmed and soft-pressed in early January.

Appassimento - The Grape-Drying Process

Wonder what those raisinated grapes look like? The two photos below will give you an idea of the drying results.

The drying grapes are spread in plastic racks that are stacked in a drying warehouse. The odor from these drying grapes is marvelously heady.

Here is what the raisined grapes look like after drying.

So, that’s the story of our visit to the Allegrini winery. The visit was great, and the wines that they produce are of exceptional quality. Their Valpolicella, Palazzo Della Torre, and their Amarone come highly recommended by those of us who have tasted them. And then there is their recioto, or desert wine, known as Recioto Giovanni Allegrini…oh, so yummy.

Though you may not be able to visit the winery, you can visit their wines at your local wine store. And, you will probably find me pulling a few bottles off the rack, too.

Ciao for now,

Steve