The cappuccino is a hot drink of Italian origin consisting of coffee and milk that has been frothed up with pressurised steam. It is traditionally consumed with sugar at or following breakfast, accompanied by a cornetto (croissant) or other baked goods. A cardinal rule of Italian coffee drinking is to never order a cappuccino or …
On a cold wintery day, few things are more comforting than curling up with a bowl of hot minestra (feminine, plural: minestre). Minestra is just one way of saying soup in Italian, and it has a fascinating history as we’ll discover in this article! Learn with our video Although minestra is now a generic term …
The pistacchio, written as pistachio in English, is a member of the cashew family. A common food since 6750 BC, they are native to Central Asia and the Middle East. In fact, Iran was responsible for over half the world’s production of pistachios as of 2017. Origin of the word: The word pistacchio comes from …
One of our readers recently asked us what the expression mangia mangia means in Italian. Before we get down to the nitty-gritty, let’s take a quick look at what mangia means on its own, and how Italians use this word to create various idiomatic expressions. Learn with our video What does “mangia” mean in Italian? …
A question you can expect to hear when visiting friends and family in Italy is Vuoi qualcosa da mangiare? which translates as Do you want something to eat? Learn with our video Let’s take a quick look at the four words that make up this phrase: vuoi Vuoi is the second-person singular of the verb …
Olio di oliva – or olive oil in English – is technically three words, but they appear together so often that we figured you’d let us off the hook, just this once! 😉 Olio is a masculine noun. To create the plural form, just get rid of the ending -o and you have oli, and …