Forza Bologna

Osteria del Sole

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Restaurant | "Authentic Italian Dining"

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I arrived in Bologna having spent seven hours on the road driving from nice with my girlfriend and a friend of hers. Therefore, when I got to my Italian friend’s apartment I was in need of a beer. My hunger had been abated on the journey by the series of sandwiches and cakes my girlfriend had prepared. So, with my girlfriend already off shopping, my friends and I embarked on a session of afternoon/early-evening drinking. This proved to be riotously successful as we caught up on old times filled each other in on recent events in our lives and then just talked a great deal of alcohol fuelled rubbish.By around 20h00 we were beginning to feel hungry, so my friend Francesco recommended that we ...Read More

I arrived in Bologna having spent seven hours on the road driving from nice with my girlfriend and a friend of hers. Therefore, when I got to my Italian friend’s apartment I was in need of a beer. My hunger had been abated on the journey by the series of sandwiches and cakes my girlfriend had prepared. So, with my girlfriend already off shopping, my friends and I embarked on a session of afternoon/early-evening drinking. This proved to be riotously successful as we caught up on old times filled each other in on recent events in our lives and then just talked a great deal of alcohol fuelled rubbish.

By around 20h00 we were beginning to feel hungry, so my friend Francesco recommended that we retire to Osteria del Orsa to enjoy a traditional Italian dinner. When we arrived it was extremely busy and we were forced to take a table in the cellar. At first, this sounded like a problem, but the basement was actually rather nice. It was in a very old building so it had an almost crypt-like feel and was furnished with long benches that allowed us to chat easily.

The food at Osteria del Orsa was fantastic. I ordered a Filet Milanese and was astounded. It cost only 8Euro, but was huge and extremely good. The meat was supremely tender and the coating light and crispy. This was accompanied by French Fries but also by a huge collection of different types of local breads all stuffed with different cheeses. It absolutely hit the spot – it was both delicious and plentiful, which are tao key criteria for me! I was also very impressed by the wine. We ordered two large carafes of the house red. Considering it was table wine and came by the litre it was surprisingly good. I would not argue that it was a fine vintage, but it was eminently drinkable and served well to push our evening on into the early hours.

The one downside of Ostaeria del Orsa was the service. It was not brilliant. Our food took its sweet time to arrive and did not seem to arrive in any logical order. The stuffed breads came first, but then kept coming throughout the meal and even after we had finished. It also took a while to get our second order of wine. The waitress who looked after our table was also rather surly – although this could have been because it was a busy Saturday evening and our party was visibly worse for wear.

Dinner at Osteria del Osra cost a very reasonable 20 Euros per head. When we left, we felt genuinely stuffed and had certainly enjoyed our fill of wine as well. I would heartily recommend it to anyone visiting Bologna.
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Member Rating 4 out of 5 on August 12, 2013

Osteria del Sole
Vicolo Ranocchi, 1/d
Bologna
347 968 0171

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The Wall

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It was a Sunday afternoon in Bologna and I was suffering. My friends and I had been out the night before until approaching five. This had left me feeling somewhat deflated and in need of lift. Coffee at around 11h00 had had little impact. So too had the rather lavish we had consumed - neither the fantastic variety antipasti nor the huge pizza I ate could get me into gear. I still felt wretched. Because of this, my friend Sergio decided to raise my spirits. He said, "Paul, let me show you the funniest statue in Bologna". I was not 100% sure what he had in mind, but I decided to follow him regardless.As he began his work as an impromptu tour guide he explained why the statue would be funny: ...Read More

It was a Sunday afternoon in Bologna and I was suffering. My friends and I had been out the night before until approaching five. This had left me feeling somewhat deflated and in need of lift. Coffee at around 11h00 had had little impact. So too had the rather lavish we had consumed - neither the fantastic variety antipasti nor the huge pizza I ate could get me into gear. I still felt wretched. Because of this, my friend Sergio decided to raise my spirits. He said, "Paul, let me show you the funniest statue in Bologna". I was not 100% sure what he had in mind, but I decided to follow him regardless.

As he began his work as an impromptu tour guide he explained why the statue would be funny: "We are going to see the statue of Neptune. In many ways this is just a normal statue. But, if you look at it from a certain angle it looks very different." This confused me a little, so I asked him to explain. As he began to do so, a mischievous grin flicked across his face, "Well, if you see it from a certain angle the hand looks magic".
"How does it look magic?" I asked with a degree of confusion entering my voice.
"It looks like Neptune has a BIG penis."
This little tit-bit stopped me in my tracks. He went on to explain that if you stood at a certain angle behind the statue, Neptune's hand appeared from behind his leg looking remarkably like an amply-sized member.

Simply put, that was a side that - with my infantile mind - I had to see. So, we made our way to Bologna's main square post-haste. Sergio proved to be 100% correct. We stood there and giggled like schoolgirls. Looking around us, it was clear that we were not alone in rather juvenile senses of humour as there were plenty of other people standing in just the same spot.

After a couple of minutes of giggling and smirking, Sergio moved off to join up with our other friends whilst I snapped a few photographs. However, as I endeavoured to get just the right angle for the perfect shot, I was distracted by a far more sober and less heralded sight. About 20. Away from the statue is a wall that is covered in black and white pictures. I had no idea what it was, but the rather patchwork style grabbed me on an aesthetic level and I decided it would be a good idea to investigate. It turned out to be a far more sobering sight than the statue, but was nonetheless extremely interesting. Even though the caption was only in Italian it was relatively easy to work out that each of the photos was that of a member of the Italian Resistance killed during the Nazi occupation in WWII.

The sight was a sobering firstly because there were so many pictures. Each was smaller than a standard post-card and yet the collection of them was the size of the billboard. It was also a deeply arresting sight because it featured actual photos. Many memorials tend to list names - or anonymous nationalities where names cannot be confirmed. This tends to de-personalise the whole experience. For example, the cemeteries in the Somme are haunting places, but this is caused by the sheer heart-breaking scale. They are simply row upon row of graves and huge walls full of the names of soldiers whose remains were never found. However, in that situation, it is impossible to put faces to the names.

The wall was almost hypnotic. It created a sense of investment with the cause and with the sacrifice made by the men (The pictures were predominantly of me) in the pictures. Even though it was a memorial to partisan fighters, the men involved seemed sober and sensible. They looked like school teachers, doctors and bank managers. It was a fascinating little piece of history. As I stood and stared, Sergio came across to speak to me.
"It is not quite the same as the penis. But it is a very beautiful thing. We are very proud of these men". Read Less

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Basilica de San Petronio

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Attraction | "Great Scale and Great Quirks"

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I will begin this story with a little anecdote told to me by a friend of mine who is from Bologna and who is – quite rightly – very proud of the city’s fine architecture and history. He told me that when the basilica was under construction the architects planned for it to become the largest church in the world and to eclipse even St Peter’s in Rome. Apparently, the Pope was massively keen on this idea and intervened to ensure that it would come to fruition. Therefore, San Petronio is only the fourteenth largest church in the world. It is, though, still rather impressive.Architecturally speaking, I enjoyed the church for its lack of gloss and sheen. In the Southern parts of Europe it is easy to f...Read More

I will begin this story with a little anecdote told to me by a friend of mine who is from Bologna and who is – quite rightly – very proud of the city’s fine architecture and history. He told me that when the basilica was under construction the architects planned for it to become the largest church in the world and to eclipse even St Peter’s in Rome. Apparently, the Pope was massively keen on this idea and intervened to ensure that it would come to fruition. Therefore, San Petronio is only the fourteenth largest church in the world. It is, though, still rather impressive.
Architecturally speaking, I enjoyed the church for its lack of gloss and sheen. In the Southern parts of Europe it is easy to find wonderfully polished and beautiful looking cathedrals bedecked in marble that look almost luxurious. San Petronio is not like this. The majority of the building is created out of simple red bricks that give it a much more rustic and, to my mind at least, at much more authentic feel. A few months before visiting Bologna, my girlfriend and I had visited Milan and seen Cathedral Duomo. This was, of course, wonderful as it has a wonderfully delicate exterior. However, San Petronio seemed more alive and homely.
Much of the feeling of realism and imperfection comes from the Cathedral’s façade, which is famously unfinished. The first 40 or 50 meters of it are covered in marble, but as the eye wanders further up, this gives way to good old brickwork. This seems to help it fit in with the surrounding areas of Bologna, which are all built in darker colours of stone and in brick.
The interior of the cathedral is also pretty impressive. However, as I am not particularly religious, I am not going to wax lyrical about the frescoes and statues or the delicately tiled floors. They are all very nice, but didn’t really excite me. Instead, I would like to talk about the clock. Time-pieces may not normally be seen in too many cathedrals,, but in San Petronio there is a fantastic little thing. There is a small hole in the roof that allows a small beam of light into the main area. This light lands on the floor. On the floor, in the area where the beam falls, is a small strip of metal. On the trip are marked various times of day. It was fantastic.
Aside from the rather unusual clock, my favourite part of San Petronio was being able to climb on the exterior. At present, it is under renovation and is covered with scaffolding. This allows visitors to stand atop the scaffolding and look out across Piazza Maggio and over the rooftops of Bologna. This is a truly magnificent sight as Bologna is a wonderfully beautiful city.
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Member Rating 4 out of 5 on July 15, 2013

Basilica de San Petronio
Piazza Maggiore
Bologna, Italy

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Tarttoria Belle Arti

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Restaurant | "Last Minute ... and it showed"

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As it was the Easter week-end, finding a restaurant for a large group of diners at lunchtime was not an easy proposition. My friend Francesco said that he called around twenty different places before he got a reservation at Trattoria Belle Arti. He had begun many of the calls with the following jovial phrase; hoping that his relaxed tone would be enough to secure an opening. He would say, "I am calling with an impossible mission. I need a reservation for Easter Sunday. Apparently, at least three of the restaurants answered in rather succinct terms by saying "Yes, you do have an impossible mission" before putting the phone down.Thankfully, Trattoria Belle Arti did have room, although not a lot o...Read More

As it was the Easter week-end, finding a restaurant for a large group of diners at lunchtime was not an easy proposition. My friend Francesco said that he called around twenty different places before he got a reservation at Trattoria Belle Arti. He had begun many of the calls with the following jovial phrase; hoping that his relaxed tone would be enough to secure an opening. He would say, "I am calling with an impossible mission. I need a reservation for Easter Sunday. Apparently, at least three of the restaurants answered in rather succinct terms by saying "Yes, you do have an impossible mission" before putting the phone down.
Thankfully, Trattoria Belle Arti did have room, although not a lot of it as we were crammed in pretty tight. It proved to be an interesting, if not fantastic meal. As there were around ten of us, we decided to start with some antipasti and a glass of wine. This proved to be the highlight of the meal. We had mini-bruschettas with tomatoes and olive oil as well as a delicious selection of hams and cheese and some fagotti stuffed with goat’s cheese that were simply divine. The highlight, though, was the Buffalo Mozzarella, which was simply out of this world and spurned a wonderfully dramatic conversation between my Italian friends as to whether the majority of Buffalo Mozzarella is authentic due to the large amount of it on sale and the rather small amount of buffaloes currently living in Italy. They came to no great conclusion other than it is difficult to be sure, but that the mozzarella we were eating was very good.
After the antipasti, I must admit to feeling a little let down by the rest of the food we ate. I opted for a pizza. I went for the proscuiutto (ham) variety and was rather disappointed. It was not bad, but was not wonderful. It was a little under-cooked and found it decidedly heavy-going. Similarly, my girlfriend had the lasagna and found it rather hard-work. She said the ingredients tasted excellent, but she felt that it had not been cooked quite long enough and so the pasta was a little tough.
For desert, I opted for a simple cappuccino. As in most cases in Italy, this was very good. My girlfriend went for the pistachio panna cotta. I found this to be a bizarre choice of flavors, but it was not bad. It was unlike most panna cottas as there was no syrup on the top. Rather, it was served with crushed pistachios. It was not bad, but it by no means leapt out as something wonderful.
Lunch at Trattorie Belle Arti cost 25 Euros per head. I would describe this as very reasonable considering we had wine and several rounds of antipasti. However, having eaten like a king the night before in a different local restaurant for significantly less, I was mildly disappointed.
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Member Rating 2 out of 5 on July 15, 2013

Tarttoria Belle Arti
Via delle Belle Arti, 14
Bologna 40126

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The Drive

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A group of my friends, who I had met in China, were planning a European reunion. I live in Nice and two of them live in Bologna and Firenze in Italy. Because of this, we decided that it would be a good idea to meet in Bologna in the spring and then perhaps in Nice during the hotter summer months. So, I got onto Google Maps and plotted my route through Northern Italy. As I did this, my girlfriend decided that she would like to visit the city as it "looked lovely" and was "perfect for taking photos". She also decided that it would be a good idea to take one of her friends with us. This is how I came to be driving to Bologna with two Bulgarian ladies in the pouring rain.Google maps told me that it ...Read More

A group of my friends, who I had met in China, were planning a European reunion. I live in Nice and two of them live in Bologna and Firenze in Italy. Because of this, we decided that it would be a good idea to meet in Bologna in the spring and then perhaps in Nice during the hotter summer months. So, I got onto Google Maps and plotted my route through Northern Italy. As I did this, my girlfriend decided that she would like to visit the city as it "looked lovely" and was "perfect for taking photos". She also decided that it would be a good idea to take one of her friends with us. This is how I came to be driving to Bologna with two Bulgarian ladies in the pouring rain.
Google maps told me that it should take roughly four and a half hours to reach Bologna, I presumed that that figure would eventually be a little higher as we would need to stop en route for a few breaks as only I had a driver’s license and insurance coverage. However, I had no idea what kind of nightmare I would face on the way and how stressful the drive would prove to be. Were Bologna not so beautiful and my friends so cool, I would have very much regretted my decision to go there.
I will begin my tale by describing the route from nice to Bologna. I would split it into three distinct stages. The first leg of the journey on the A8 in France and the A10 in Italy blends mountains and coastline – the Southeast region of France is often called Alpes-Maritime because the mountains come almost to the shoreline. From there on the A26 and A7 in Italy, the road winds through the mountains before reaching flat ground in the centre of the country.
The first leg of the journey is magnificent. It combines a series of high viaducts that run over extremely deep valleys (both in France and in Italy) and long tunnels that cut through the mountains. The views from the viaducts are breathtaking. In one swish of the head you can often take in snow-covered peaks, mountain-top villages, clear blue seas and inviting beaches. The tunnels are also tremendous fun as they genuinely feel like you are in a science fiction movie or computer game and are driving towards the centre of the earth.
As we turned North and inland, the landscape changed; The sea disappeared and the mountains got larger. This meant that the tunnels grew longer and steeper. Ordinarily, the scenery would have been magnificent. However, as the day we had chosen to travel was extremely wet, the mountain highways proved extremely treacherous. At one point, as we headed uphill, the stream of water flowing down was like a small river and the car was barely making any progress. It was all rather frightening stuff, especially as most Italian drivers saw no reason at all to slow down in such hazardous conditions.
Finally, we turned onto the A1, which is the highway that operates down the centre of Italy calling at Bologna, Firenze and eventually Rome. By this point, the mountains had flattened out and it allowed me to catch up some time lost in the mountains. However, because of the conditions, it still took over seven hours to reach Bologna.
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