Eat Italy - Invited for a Saturday dinner #TeamItaly

[ErmesT]

An Italian meal, and above all dinner, is a special time to be together. No matter if you are at home with your family or in a restaurant, good food helps the flow of conversation.

But if you have a guest invited to reach your home for dinner, the meal becomes a very special moment and your kitchen is the stage of a show, to produce the best and unforgettable meal for your friends.

Changing the perspective, what about if you are the guest?

Have you been invited for a dinner in Italy?

Do you have an Italian friend you have known around the world? If you come to Italy, for sure your friend will invite you for dinner. This is great, but please remember that there are unwritten rules to follow.

The guest should “knock on the door with the feet” (because your hands are busy, holding your present for the hosts). What should you hold in your hand? This is the secret of Italianity.

Continue reading, to avoid to be in trouble (in Italian: per evitare una brutta figura)

What do you have in your hands?

• Flowers? Acceptable, but not the best option.
• Wine? Perfect if you know what you will have for dinner. Sparkling wine (preferably Prosecco) is always welcome. If you choose this last option, try to buy it cold (8°C). Most of the wine shops have the blast chiller and insulated bags, so to reach your host with the wine ready to be served. In Italy you will find Good quality wines in every cantina (winery) but also in every supermarket.
• A “cabaret di paste” (tray of pastries)? This is always the perfect solution. Even if your host will already have a cake to be served at the end of the dinner, they will love your pastries. In some area pastries are very big (too big). In this case the best solution is to buy a tray of “paste mignon” (small pastries). The host will put the tray on the table after the dinner, together with the coffee. Pastries help the socialisation, accompanied of course with a glass of cold Prosecco
• Gelato (Ice cream) - Wonderful, but you need to be careful with this last option: Gelato (absolutely fresh made - never buy an industrial product as a present), will be served at the end of the dinner (at least two hours after your arrival) so you MUST be sure your host have the room enough on the fridge for storing it

Be social

A dinner with a friend, or with his family, is a Social event

We are foodies, we love to eat, and we love to talk about food, and we love to talk during the dinner, in any case, so a dinner can become quite long.

Remember that food is always excellent (well, most of the time it is) so “oh my God, this lasagna is sooo goooood” is really appreciated. If the meal has been prepared at home, a question about the recipe will make them happy.

Food is good, so you have to eat all. Leaving something on the dish can be interpreted like an “I don’t like it”.

The best way to say “I like it” in a dinner at home, is what we call “fare la scarpetta”. This should be avoided in an official dinner, or in an elegant restaurant (OMG, food etiquette…), but if you are with friends…

La scarpetta (literally “little shoe”) means “to mop up the sauce from a plate of food with a piece of bread” (Source: World Reference Language Forum). This is the best sign of appreciation you can show.

Are you travelling in Italy as a tourist?

If so, just remember the most important rule: to search for “local recipes” when you go in a restaurant. Don’t ask for Alfredo sauce (doesn’t exist in Italy) but of course, if you are in Rome, you can ask for Fettuccine alla Alfredo (Fettuccine with a sauce of butter and Parmigiano cheese, invented on the Alfredo restaurant on the mid ‘50)

Dear Italian Local Guides: share your view about the Italian food etiquette

Dear NOT Italian Local Guides: What about food etiquette in your area?

Hope you like this post, and dreaming to read about different experiences

Challenge in the challenge: How may Local Guides can you recognize in the photos? Can you tag them?

With this post we want to give an insight of Italianity to @KarenVChin about Steps closer to becoming an Italian

This is a collaborative post by #TeamItaly included in the #TeamChallenge proposed by @ermest. The post is part of the series about Italy: Italian culture between ancient and modern, and Eat Italy - the Italian way of food - #TeamItaly

[ErmesT]

How is your “food etiquette” on a home dinner with a friend, @955HIRO

As you plan to visit Treviso, I want to know what happen is I visit you

What if I come to Buenos Aires @Cecilita ?

Or is I come to meet you, @Patriciapraca ?

[LuigiZ]

Hi @ErmesT ,

very nice post, what well said words about our “Italianity” hehe .

Dinner, yes of course! I fully agree that’s a very social aspect about our culture, sharing a meal and having it as social event where we can spend nice time together. We always invite everyone for dinner haha.

[955HIRO]

Hello. sir @ErmesT

Thank you for posting the topic of dinner with friends in Italy. And I am very honored to tag me. The etiquette of dinner with friends in Italy is wonderful. If I encounter a deliciously delicious dish in an elegant restaurant, quietly hide the dish under the tablecloth so that no one can see it, and then La Laspepetta !

so that no one notices it . If the restaurant clerk behind me is watching my actions, I tell him: Will you do the same as me if you eat the best food that your mom made? Thank you very much. Regard​:it:

[Patriciapraca]

Hi @ErmesT ! We are latinos and we are very simmilar in our table receptions. Your description could be in Portugal but we just “mop up the sauce from a plate of food with a piece of bread” whit our direct family! We also use to take a good wine or dessert to offer. And we usualy drink a glass os Porto wine or Madeira Wine as appetizer or digestive whit the coffee. We wait always for the house owners to start eating also!

Octopus rice is one of my specialities but we have a big tradittion of salted codfish.

[ErmesT]

That’s true @LuigiZ

Please note that @KarenVChin is looking for a long visit in Italy. I bet she’s worried about how to knock on the door

[955HIRO]

Hello. @ErmesT

The etiquette when inviting friends for dinner at home in my country is to bring something delicious or drink. This is a common manner in Japan. When I invite a friend to dinner at home, I prepare my friend’s most disliked food and cook it deliciously so that my friend can eat it. If a friend can eat my food deliciously, I am very happy that my friend’s cooking world has expanded a bit.

[LuigiZ]

Hehehe I think so @ErmesT , be aware @KarenVChin that you are invited for a dinner in Lucca (one of ) … so it is mandatory to come to knock at my door too, in this way we you let you practice how to do it .

[VasT]

What a Lovely post about food etiquette you shared here, @ErmesT ! If you do la Scarpetta in a restaurant in Greece is considered a slightly impolite gesture but if you do it at home is okay. I love gelato. Whoever hasn’t tried gelato in his life must visit Italy at least one time for the ice-cream. However, I thought the flowers were the best solution, especially if the host is female :S.

[ErmesT]

Yes you are right @Patriciapraca , we all enjoy good food and good wine

I actually only tested 10 different recipes with salted codfish, so I believe I have at least other 355 missed.

I would love to try your octopus

[Patriciapraca]

Yes You are right @ErmesT , we have uncountable codfish recipes.

[ErmesT]

Haha @955HIRO

I can imagine you hiding the dish for doing “la scarpetta”. I did it at restaurant with @NatalkaR , a few days ago (Yes, I met her).

Let say as an example that I come to your home for dinner (maybe, why not?). What do I have to bring as an appropriate gift? Do I have to knock the door with my feet?

[955HIRO]

Good evening sir @ErmesT

Have you already done “la scarpetta”! And just a few days ago.!

That’s amazing! It is a proof that you have met a very delicious dish.

I am jealous of you. If you come to my home, the right dish is a la scarpetta dish that you “la scarpetta” a few days ago. Because my whole family wants to “la scarpetta”. I would like to eat with you in good manners and good quality, but that is probably not possible.Because “la scarpetta” with my whole family.

Thank you very much. Regard🙏

[ErmesT]

Hehe, @VasT

I haven’t been in Greece enough time for trying but it seems that at home you do it too. Also if you are the guest?

I love gelato too, but if you want to bring gelato with you, you should inform your host first, to be sure that they can store it

[VasT]

You caught me @ErmesT , I like olive oil too much, to leave it to get waste it. Also as a guest is better to avoid doing it. About the gelato, a warning is a must. I think the most common presents are a bottle of alcohol, what kind of alcohol it depends on the person you visit, and a box of pralines.

[ErmesT]

I love olive oil too @VasT

I bought it directly from Apulia. Just oil and fresh bread, or a bruschetta with a toasted slice of homemade bread, a bit of garlic and olive oil.

What amazed me on Xanthi was to drink ouzo during the dinner. is this common?

[VasT]

@ErmesT it is quite common to drink ouzo at dinner, preferably with fish. However, many people like it so much, it makes no difference whether the main dish is fish or not. I distaste the taste of anise, I prefer instead tsipouro.

[ErmesT]

I just Googled for Tsipouro, and it seems much stronger than Ouzo, or Anice (as we call it in Italy) or Raki @VasT

We use to drink a bit of that level of alcohol just at the end of the dinner with a coffee.

But after dinner a limoncello, or a liquirizie liquor is perfect. Isn’t it @NatalkaR ?

[NatalkaR]

@ErmesT how I could forget about liquors!!! And you know, I tried to find liquirizie in supermarket but I didn’t find… I’ll be back in Treviso - no doubt :-))))))))))))))

[SebaasC]

“La Scarpetta”

What a wonderful thing to do when you end a full plate of pasta with bolognesa sauce!

I remember to do “La Scarpetta” (pasarle el pancito al plato in spanish) when I was a child and my parents says…- Don’t do this! Don’t do this!

I didn’t have dinner in Italy, but I hope some day I could have the opportunity.

Thanks for sharing @ErmesT .