Piedmont with Danny Smiles

Benvenuti a Torino. The best place to begin is right in the heart of it all. Upon arrival, settle into the hotel before we gather for our first evening together in Piedmont’s capital. Our first stop is Circolo dei Lettori, a literary salon housed within a historic palazzo, where frescoed rooms and shelves of books carry on Turin’s long tradition of intellectual life.

Here, surrounded by the city’s writers, readers, and thinkers, we’ll take our seats for a welcome dinner. It’s a fitting introduction to a region that takes its pleasures seriously: conversation given time to unfold, good food at the center of the table, and nowhere else we need to be.

This morning, sunlight filters through colonnades and tiled roofs and Porta Palazzo is already humming when we arrive. In Europe’s largest open-air market, the air is thick with the scent of ripe stone fruit, aged cheeses, and just-baked focaccia. Farmers arrange seasonal produce beneath market awnings while shoppers, ourselves included, move between stalls.

From here, we’ll walk through the historic center, pausing at a beloved pasticceria for gelato and piccola pasticceria torinese, the bite-sized pastries that have long accompanied the city’s café culture.  After, you’ll have time to explore and have lunch independently.

As evening falls, the kitchen fills with warmth and laughter for an intimate cooking class: pasta is rolled, sauces simmer, and the day’s market finds are transformed into a shared feast in an edible love letter to Piedmont.

Today, we venture to the outskirts of the city where vineyards share the hills with farms and pasture and find ourselves learning the art of soft cheese with a master cheesemaker. We’ll work our way through mozzarella and burrata, tasting as we go, of course. Lunch follows with local specialties and sheep’s cheese made right here.

Since brilliant cheese requires brilliant wine, we’ll continue onto a family estate just down the road. We’ll trace another expression of Piedmont’s agricultural traditions through the cellar and into our glasses. Dolcetto and Freisa lead to Barolo, the Nebbiolo-based wine inseparable from these hills.

By late afternoon, we arrive in Pollenzo and settle into our countryside hotel. Tonight’s dinner is deliberately light. Tomorrow, there is more Piedmont to taste.

This morning belongs to Alba, the medieval hamlet and undisputed capital of truffles and hazelnuts. Ferrero even has its headquarters in the heart of downtown. With a local guide leading the way, we’ll stroll the pedestrian zone and take in the rich splendor of the architecture, not to mention the thriving art scene. Then we have time to wander on our own, following narrow streets toward whatever café, enoteca, or lunch table catches our attention.

Later, we return to wine country for a visit to a family estate rooted in the hills of Monferrato. Once there, we’ll learn how their vineyards and cellar translate the character of this corner of Piedmont into the bottle, then taste a selection of the estate’s wines.

Back at the hotel, there’s time to rest before we gather again over dinner at a local restaurant.

After breakfast this morning, we find ourselves wandering the rows of a majestic, organic hazelnut grove. Here, we’ll sample all kinds of local favorites, witness their handed-down harvest techniques, and learn how to elevate these nuts with just the right type of chocolate.

Then we follow another Piedmontese ingredient underground and hunt for truffles! Led by an expert trifolau, we’ll retreat to the forest with specially trained dogs for a guided experience on locating, identifying, and cooking up these flavorful fungi. Walking the forests of Langhe is pure magic as we listen for a few secrets and tricks of this ancient tradition.

Hunting for truffles is hard work, but don’t worry, a sumptuous award is in store. Afterwards, we’re welcomed into the hunter’s home for a family-style lunch scented with the day’s finds.

As the late light of the afternoon slips into the valley and make our way to Pollenzo and the University of Gastronomic Sciences. Here, in the place where Slow Food began, we’ll consider the biodiversity, agricultural traditions, and producers behind what we’ve been eating all week. We’ll take a tour of its historic campus and then descend into their coveted Wine bank, which features more than 100,000 bottles of Italy’s rarest and most celebrated wines. 

Dinner follows at a beloved osteria in nearby Bra.

Nebbiolo has spent centuries learning these hills. Today, we follow it into the vineyards and cellars of two local estates, walking their cellars and tasting wines shaped by their particular patch of Langhe soil. By lunchtime, we’re ready for a proper trattoria meal. At a beloved local haunt in La Morra known for its intimate setting and expansive wine list, where even the bread feels reverent, we’ll enjoy regional cooking passed around the table, wine poured alongside it, and no reason to hurry.

Tonight, we gather one last time for a farewell dinner that speaks to the soul of Piedmont. It’s a meal worthy of reflection on wines tasted, friendships formed, and the unforgettable rhythm of this region’s kitchens and hills. We’ll sit down together and toast to an incredible week of discovery and exhilaration.

Arrivederci! All beautiful things must end, and so we go our separate ways. After a leisurely breakfast, we’ll transfer to the airport to catch our flights onward and home. Until next time: Ciao!