ORVIETO

Hello everyone! Today we visited the town of Orvieto. This quaint town had some shops and a beautiful cathedral called the Duomo di Orvieto. We had to ride the bus about an hour and a half up in the mountains to reach the town. 

The best experience of the day was before we ate lunch at II Labirinto di Adriano. We met the owner and she showed us underground caves and ruins that reach 60 ft underground. A volcano is about 15 miles away from the town so the ancient Etruscans were able to dig the caves more effectively due to the volcanic activity. The Etruscans used to throw away their old pottery and household goods in the underground caves, so when they were discovered, many artifacts from the time were as well. Some were displayed under the restaurant as well. 

I tried something interesting today! It was called mozzarella and tomato suppli. It was rice and tomato sauce fried together with mozzarella on the inside. The picture pasted below is what it looked like. It was actually delicious. 

We also got to view the Duomo di Orvieto. This beautiful 14th century cathedral that was dedicated to the Virgin Mary. The artwork was very detailed and basically displayed the antichrist, judgement day, Heaven and Hell. This was really neat to see how much the people of the 14th century wanted to portray what they believed to people would couldn't read but still wanted to understand. 

We left the town and got home just in time to have our final hands-on cooking class where we made Risotto, veal, and a puff pastry dessert. The dietitian who showed us around the University here came for dinner and there was quite the celebration. We are ending the day now by getting some homework done!