#swiss-italian-culture

#swiss-italian-culture

La Maddalena, Sardinia, is home to the first national park of Sardinia, featuring mostly undeveloped beaches and a vibrant main town with restaurants and shops.

The ritual has been performed for at least 500 years, but nobody knows how or why it began. The ornately dressed mummers, in groups of six, polyphonically yodel and ring bells.

Brought forth largely by the right-wing Swiss People's Party (SVP) and the youth wing of the center-right Free Democratic Party (FDP), the proposition would have cut mandatory annual household usage fees for radio, television and internet from 335 to 200 Swiss francs (370, $430). The fee is the highest in the world and the Swiss government has already moved to broaden payment exemptions and reduce the fee to SF300 by 2029.

There are some variations. So we know yodeling with text. But we have also - mostly we have yodeling without text, and this yodel we call naturjodel. And this kind of yodel works like dialects. So it depends on the region you grow up. So if you grew up in eastern part, it sounds very melancholic. When you grow up in middle part, center part of Switzerland, it's quite loud and sometimes also a little bit fast.

The ravioli-type dish, also known as casunziei all'Ampezzana, consists of homemade half-moon shaped pasta filled with boiled beets, topped with a sauce of melted butter, Parmesan cheese and poppy seeds. It's a simple dish that harks back to the Alpine region's poorer past - long before Cortina transformed into a winter playground for the international jet set. Even in the coldest days of winter, local families had the ingredients in their cupboards.

On my last trip, in Bologna, I found yet another way to enjoy Italian coffee (beyond ordering a doppio). One memorable café topped its coffees with fruit powder-infused whipped cream. They were listed under a section on the menu appropriately named "caffe della gioia" (yes, "joy coffee"). These joyful mugs are topped with a generous mountain of whipped cream that can be folded with fruit- or nut powders, like pomegranate, pistachio, orange, wild berries, and aniseed.

Historically speaking, an osteria was a spartan, no-frills establishment where people would go to have a drink. The original osterias date all the way back to the Roman Empire. If you go to Ostia Antica or Pompeii, you find the osterias of the era. They were like bed-and-breakfasts, with rooms for rent above the dining room where people could listen to music.

Northern Italian cooking is built for long meals, cold weather, and patience, which is exactly the sort of food you want when settling in for hours of competition. From Lombardy and Piedmont to Emilia-Romagna and Liguria, these regions favor slow braises, creamy risottos, rich broths, and breads meant to be torn and shared. Whether you're feeding a crowd or committing to a cozy afternoon

Switzerland will vote this summer on a proposal from the far-right Swiss People's party (SVP) to limit the country's population to 10 million, a move that would threaten key agreements with the EU and, opponents say, cripple its economy. The government said on Wednesday the referendum on the SVP's No to a 10 million Switzerland initiative, which is strongly opposed by both chambers of parliament and the business and financial services community, would be held on 10 June.

Italy's finest ski resorts are often overshadowed by their French and Swiss equivalents. Pity really, as their piste-side rifugi lunches are a divine alchemy of Mediterranean and Alpine cuisine, their hotels, chalets, sunny terrace lunches and ski passes sit at a more civilised price point than the wildly expensive Swiss and French resorts, and their well-connected ski areas wiggle across great swathes of map.

This coccoli, which can be a street food or restaurant appetizer, is truly an icon in Florentine - a term that simply means "from Florence" - fare. The word "coccoli" translates literally to "cuddles," and these fried dough balls do indeed feel like warm little hugs. They're about the size of dumplings; served hot, they've got a crispy exterior to crack into - with just the right amount of grease - where you'll find both fluffiness and chewy doughy-ness all at once.

Pasta and peas was one of the staple meals my mom made for us growing up. We probably had it at least once a week. She learned the recipe from my grandma Tina, and it was a simple, inexpensive dish to throw together-just pasta and frozen peas cooked with a bit of chicken broth and aromatics topped with grated parm.

Last summer, I found myself in Venice during peak tourist season. The crowds were suffocating. Every piazza felt like a theme park, every restaurant seemed designed for Instagram rather than actual dining. Standing on the Rialto Bridge, packed shoulder to shoulder with thousands of other visitors, I couldn't help but wonder: is this really Italy? That question stayed with me long after I returned to London.

Standing among the Alps, it's easy to believe that they will last forever. They seem too big to fail, too old to change. This illusion of permanence has long entranced travelers who have visited to experience the intoxicating feeling of being daunted and dwarfed by a landscape's authority. But even mountains move: This past May an avalanche of ice and rock tore through the Lötschental Valley, erasing the village of Blatten in less than a minute.

On the approach to Arosa in the Graubunden Alps, the road is lined with mountain chapels, their stark spires soaring heavenwards; a portent, perhaps, of the ominous route ahead. The sheer-sided valley is skirted with rugged farmhouses and the road twists, over ravines and round hairpin curves, to a holiday destination that feels like a well-kept secret. On the village's frozen lake, young families ice skate, hand in hand.