and the journey begins

We landed in Rome, picked up our car and got on the road to Il Pellicano.  You never feel refreshed when you get to Europe so we stopped to fill up the car and fill up on caffeine.  You can find good coffee at the roadside gas stations.

Our first few days are being spent at Il Pellicano where we are literally chilling, reading, sleeping and eating.

 We got to the hotel and went immediately to lunch with a few glasses of wine on the side.  Fried shrimp and calamari.

Il Pellicano salad with mozzarella, tomatoes, greens and avocado.  Perfect.

Took a long nap and then of course it was time for the next meal.  We ate at the hotel restaurant that boasts at 2 star Michelin rating.  The water menu made me laugh.  We went with vintage Italian still water.

The olive oil they served at the table was amazing.  Straight from Sicily.  The big question of the night is do we just pick up olive oil bottles at every stop and bring them home?  This starter was hake with oysters and a shiso sauce.

We also had roasted lobster with marsala sauce, barbary and smoked potatoes.

We split a farfalle pasta with cream of crab, orange and confit sea bream.

Our main courses were John Dory with pecorino sauce, fresh fava beans and mint.

Poached sea bass with celeriac puree with seafood sauce.

We drank a bottle of local white wine and to wrap up the meal we went with the cheese plate.  I hate to say it but the cheese was my favorite.  Each cheese was paired with something from honey to fruit.  Really delicious.

Of course they bring out the tiny desserts just to push you over the edge.

Then something that I haven’t seen before although they do have a chocolate cart at The Modern is a chocolate cart with 3 different types of dark chocolate.

Off to bed and am pretty sure we will be on European time by morning.