#5 / A walk along the famous “carruggi”

#stayhome and keep traveling with me! Put on a pair of MarcoMoreo because today I’m taking you to Genoa, in Liguria.

No, don't mistake it for Geneva, we’re somewhere else completely!

Genoa is a city squeezed between the mountains and the sea, in an elongated shape reminiscent of theater stalls with the Tyrrhenian Sea as a stage. A true spectacle. 

Together with Venice, Pisa and Amalfi, it was one of the Maritime Republics: powerful and very wealthy city-states that dominated maritime trade between the 11th and 14th centuries. And it is indeed a beautiful city!

We’ll take you for a walk through the old town, along the famous carruggi: narrow alleys (sometimes only wide enough for one person at a time) that snake between one building and another. Precisely because they were so narrow, they acted as a defense for the city, as no army could ever pass through them and only the Genoese were familiar with the intricate maze of streets. Brilliant!

No outing would be complete without a break to taste the local specialties. And in Italy you're spoiled for choice. Did you know that Liguria is the home of focaccia and pesto?

The focaccia here is thin and tastes of olive oil, with grains of salt that crackle in your mouth. Before being baked, it is in fact brushed with an emulsion of extra virgin olive oil (obviously the very delicate Ligurian variety) water and coarse salt.

And don’t miss out on a nice plate of Trofie with pesto! A classic poor man’s dish, trofie are a type of pasta made with flour and water, no eggs; the pesto is simply chopped basil (in theory by hand, in a mortar) combined with oil, garlic, pine nuts and grated pecorino cheese. Delicious.

Enjoy!