Torino and Chocolate

7/26 - Leinì to Torino, then by train to Saluzzo
13.25 miles walked

I had said somewhere previously that I wanted to see how a big city developed from a farm. Torino, the fourth biggest city in Italy, gave me the opportunity to do so.

The walk from Leini to Torino was the closest I have come to a landscape I would find in the United States. The two-lane highway, flanked on either side by apartment buildings, department stores, and commercial buildings, reminded me of the kinds of "one street towns" one would find in driving between Missouri and Ohio.

I was excited to make it all the way to Torino, so the time passed rather quickly, and it was not long before I crossed the bridge that led me into the outskirts of the city. Success! I raised my trekking poles up in the air in triumph at having reached this first major outpost, and walked with energy and purpose toward the train station.

Why the train station? Well, as soon as I arrived in Torino proper, I planned to head by train to Saluzzo, a smaller town to the South about which I knew next to nothing. The reason for this excursion was that I had been placed in contact with Anna, who happened to be living there.

As it turns out, my mass email arrived in the inbox of my old friend Susie, who I had met on a three-week-long high school trip to Greece 8 years ago. She and I had kept in very loose contact over the years, but it is a sign of my good fortune and her kindness that she put me in contact with her sorority sister from college, Anna. Naturally, I was very excited for the opportunity to spend a few days with an American who had made her way to Italy and managed to make a home for herself there.

I only had an hour and a half to kill before boarding the train to Saluzzo, so the first thing I did was to make my way to Grom. Anna had told me a few days prior that I absolutely had to try it while in Torino, and when I passed by and saw a line out the door for it on my way into town, I knew that this was no ordinary Gelateria.

Anyone who's been to Italy knows that there is a Gelateria on every corner, and that most of them are delicious. So what was it that made this particular Gelateria stand head and shoulders above all the others? This was not some tourist trap; in fact, most of the people in line were actually Italians, and I even heard the following exchange in Italian of a couple in front of me: "Jesus! are you sure this is worth it?" "Absolutely."

I had chocolate, flor di latte with cherries, and strawberry on a cone. And I make this statement unequivocally: it was the best damn gelato I have ever had in my life.

Apparently, the ingredients are what separate this Gelateria (which has now opened two shops in New York, for those of you in "the City") from all the rest. That, of course, and the buzz of excitement, which tends to make anything taste better.

Since Anna had suggested this place to me, and had specifically expressed her passion for the pistacchio gelato, I tried to secure a half-kilo of it to take on the train with me. Alas, they didn't have a way to keep it cool, and it would have melted, so I had to think of another gift.

By this time it was between noon and 3 PM, which is the time when nearly every store in an Italian city is closed. My options were limited, but lucky enough for me, there was a chocolate store a few doors down from Grom, and proceeding with the timidity and veneration that one must always have when confronted with the mystery and majesty of a high end Chocolatier, I opened the door and let my senses take it all in.

The people that work in a high end chocolate store, aside from showing nearly supernatural enlightenment in their career choice, are also possessed with the uncanny ability to sniff out whether or not you plan to make a purchase, or just plan to B.S. your way into some free samples. For once in my life, I belonged to the former category, and so was treated to various samples as some options were explained to me.

Having made my choices (an assorted bag of chocolates containing the local Gianduia, a mixture of chocolate and hazelnut, as well as various dark chocolates with different percentages of cacao, topped off with two blocks of milk chocolate, my personal favorite), they wrapped it up for me in a bag with some pieces of dry ice (told you it was fancy!). In the meantime, we started talking about what I was doing in Italy.

If you have read the previous posts, I am sure you will have been able to deduce that Italians love to hear when a foreigner shows a genuine and passionate interest in their country. The ladies at the chocolate store proved to be no exception, and I was therefore treated to a magical concoction of dark chocolate and a mountain herb said to have curative effects in small doses. Washing it down with a glass of sparkling mineral water, I chatted with the wonderful Thea (sp?) and her assistent for a few minutes longer, posed for a quick photo behind the counter, and ran to the station just in time for my train.

And that, my friends, is what I had for lunch.