During our lessons we watched a video about the British "obsession" with tea. Thanks to this video we've discovered some curiosities about the origins of British tea culture.
After that, we asked our students to talk about their cultural "obsessions".
Italian PIZZA!
Italy is famous in the all world for pizza. When you travel to other countries and say you are Italian, people often say “ah, pizzaaa!!” Pizza can be a reason for hanging out with your friends and sometimes it can even solve your problems!! It is said that in Italy 1.6 billion pizzas are eaten every year between eat-in and takeaway! The story of pizza is very interesting because the way it was born seems a mystery because some sources say it was created on purpose while others say they had mixed the ingredients and it came out. It was born in June 1889 in Naples in honor of the Queen Margherita di Savoia. Pizza Margherita was created by chef Raffaele Esposito with tomato, mozzarella and basil. The colors of these ingredients are precisely those of the Italian flag: coincidences? I don’t think so!
(Luca)
One of the traditions of Italian people is to eat pizza. Italians usually eat pizza on Saturday or on Sunday when they invite their friends at home but they eat pizza also during the rest of the week. For example I prepare and eat homemade pizza usually on Wednesday and I order pizza-to-go on Saturday because my friends always come to visit me and my family. Pizza was invented in Naples but now it is eaten in the whole world. The typical italian pizza is “Margherita” and it is made with tomato sauce, mozzarella cheese and basil. There are many varieties of pizza: my favourite one is with würstel and ham!
(Daniele)
Different kinds of pasta
PASTA for EVERYONE!
Pasta is a good and famous dish famous all over the world but why do Italians love it? Pasta is one of the most important dishes of the Italian cooking. You can eat it with tomato soup, spices or whatever you like. It’s very easy to cook it because you need only some water and a pot where you boil water at 100°. There are a lot of different types of pasta and you can choose your favourite one: Spaghetti, Maccheroni, Pasta from Gragnano and many others… Romans, Etruscans and Greeks knew something like pasta but they didn’t eat the real pasta!! The first pasta was cooked in Sicily, in the Middle Ages, when Sicilians made the first type of pasta like Spaghetti. After that, pasta became famous in all the Italian regions and then it became one of the best dishes! Italians are smart people and for this reason they like pasta: it's very easy to cook it and you can find it in all the supermarkets of Italy or others countries. So, pasta is very tasty and an easy dish for everyone!
(Riccardo)
Italians are so obsessed with pasta, in fact they eat 25 kg of pasta every year on average. They think that pasta is delicious and they can even eat pasta 2 times a day! Pasta is a product based on flour, divided into small forms, that then will be cooked. The origins of pasta are very ancient: it was born in Ancient Greek times. That dish became mass food just in the 1700s, because there was a great famine in which Italian people couldn’t buy any food (meat,fish,cheese,bread…), so they began to cook and eat pasta because it was very cheap thanks to the invention of new tools that led to an easier and faster preparation.
(Gaia)
It's coffee time!
Italians love COFFEE!
In the world a lot of people drink coffee, but Italians drink three, four coffees a day!!! We LOVE coffee…why? Do you know that Venice is the first European city where Café was opened? Venice traded with the East and imported many materials in Italy and Europe! I think we drink coffee because we feel a sense of belonging or because it is a tradition of our country! There are many kinds of coffee…but which one is the Italian coffee? There isn’t one real Italian coffee, because we drink different qualities of it, but usually we drink coffee with a strong taste (our favourite is the Neapolitan coffee), sometimes with a milk. We drink coffee in the morning, after lunch and after dinner, sometimes even during the breaks! We have some “rules of coffee”: for example, we drink cappuccino only in the morning, and we don’t walk when we drink coffee as people do in other countries!
(Erika)
Italians like coffee a lot. They are used to drink it: in the morning, after lunch, after dinner. Italians continue to prefer coffee in the first part of the day in order to wake up: 58% drink espresso for the energy and to face the day!! These are the benefits of drinking coffee: it gives a lot of energy and helps some brain functions, it helps to increase metabolism and to burn fat, it contains countless nutrients, it lowers the risk of diabete and finally it helps to prevent Alzheimer and Parkinson. Coffee also has some "rules": coffee is a symbol of hospitality, there is no right time for coffee, in Italy you don't drink coffee while walking on the street and...coffee first of all!!!
(Julia)
Italian people are very fond of coffee for many reasons. For example we use the coffee time to chat with friends or to relax or to stay awake in the morning or evening. Coffee arrived in Italy, in Venice, in 1570. The merit is of Prospero Alpino of Padua because he brought some bags of coffee from the East. The Venetians first learned to taste the drink. Nowadays the coffee can be a ritual: for example in Naples it's a real tradition: people serve coffee in a cup and then they also serve a glass of water because you have to clean your mouth before or after the coffee! Coffee should be drink without sugar to enjoy the bitter taste!
(Camilla)
Coffee break
Italians are very fond of coffee, just think that 97% of Italians drink coffee more times during the day! At least once a day almost all Italians consume coffee (or coffee-based drinks) of all types, the flavors of coffee vary from north to south of Italy! An Italian spends 260 euros to drink 4 coffees a day on average! Coffee is mainly drunk for breakfast mid-morning and after meals. Usually Italians drink coffee to find the energy needed to face the day, for its taste and because it is a moment of relax. Scientific researches say there is a connection between DNA and a passion for coffee. Italians drink a lot of coffee because there is a gene in their DNA that influences the daily need for caffeine!
(Monica)
HOSPITALITY
In Italy one of the first thing a person does when he meets a friend or a relative is to kiss on the cheek or hug each other; in other countries this is a strange behaviour and sometimes people are even disgusted and astonished. Generally speaking Italy is the country of hospitality! For example Italians like hosting friends: we prepare and share food, we host our friends and let them sleep at our home, we kiss on the cheek and hug our friends because it is a normal thing for us! Another thing we do when a friend or a foreign person come to visit us is to cook typical dishes for them because Italy is famous for food like: mozzarella, pizza, pasta, lasagne..!
(Filippo)