Is The AgroMafia Diluting Your Extra Virgin Olive Oil?

Italian products, from wine and olive oil to Mozzarella di Bufala, Parmigiano Reggiano and Prosciutto, are well known, desirable, and expensive, so when we purchase a well-known Italian brand name we should get what we pay for ... right? Well that may not in-fact be the case.

According to a CBS 60 Minutes story on what is called the "AgroMafia", 50% of extra virgin olive oil on Italian market shelves and 70% - 80% on American store shelves are substandard, sometimes dangerous products black-marketed under well known brand names by the mafia and/or camorra. The problem is not confined to just olive oil, but wine, cheeses, tomatoes, ham and many other Italian products are also being exploited.

View More: 60 Minutes News|Live News|More News Videos

For those with seed or nut allergies, be extremely careful when purchasing Italian products, particularly olive oil, because cheaper seed or nut oils (e.g. sunflower oil) are often used to dilute or replace the extra virgin olive oil. For information on how you can avoid buying and overpaying for substandard products from Italy, watch this 60 Minutes Overtime video:

Follow CombatCritic on ...

Yelp - "Elite '14/'15"

TripAdvisor - "Top Contributor" ... 60,000+ Readers And Growing!

Tabelog - "Official Judge (Bronze)

Zomato - "#1 Ranked Foodie"




TravelValue eZine ... 85,000+ Visitors - Rising Exponentially

... And Don't Forget To Subscribe To TravelValue TV on YouTube

Title: Is The AgroMafia Diluting Your Extra Virgin Olive Oil?

Key Words: Agromafia, agro, mafia, Italy, Italian, olive oil, extra, virgin, extra virgin olive oil, wine, parmigiano, prosciutto, CBS, 60 Minutes, CombatCritic, TravelValue, travel, value, story, black, market, Yelp, TripAdvisor

Translation for Civilians: 

Marina of Ascea, Italy: Super Value, Nice Variety In A Beach Town With Few Dining Options

Da Franco

Restaurant and Pizzeria

Via Elea 213

84046 Marina, Italy

Phone: +39 0974 972979

Facebook Page

Prices: $$$$

For a tourist/beach town, Ascea is noticeably lacking in a selection of decent restaurants, particularly on "the Corso" or main street. We went to Pizzeria and Ristorante Da Franco with a friend who lives in Ascea. The restaurant is at the far end of Corso from the town center and they have a reasonable €15 menu del giorno (tourist menu; primo, secondo, contorno, coperto, servizio) for dinner. It is quite big inside, but being a nice evening we sat on the small terrace in front on the street. The service was very attentive and good. 

I went with the menu del giorno and a primo of penne boscaiola (meat, mushrooms, and peas) with scallopina ai funghi (meat scallops in mushroom sauce) as my secondo and patatine (french fries) for a contorno. The boscaiola was creamy, earthy and robust, the scallopine light and savory, and the fries crispy and hot. An excellent meal at just €15.

My wife and her friend had pizza which was as good as expected in Southern Italy, particularly anywhere within 100 miles of Naples. The crusts thin, yet sturdy enough to hold the toppings without getting soggy with just the right amount of tomato and other ingredients, not too many and not too few.

Da Franco was quite a good value in a beach town with remarkably few options, particularly for those on a budget and is recommended when visiting Ascea.

CombatCritic Gives Da Franco 8 Bombs Out Of 10 ... Bombs Are Good!

Read More Reviews By CombatCritic On Yelp And TripAdvisor ... And Don't Forget To Subscribe To TravelValue TV on YouTube

Title: Super Value, Nice Variety In A Beach Town With Few Dining Options

Key Words: Da Franco, franco, Ascea, restaurant, ristorante, pizzeria, pizza, menu del giorno, menu, giorno, review, travel, value, Campania, Italy, Italian, pasta, CombatCritic, TravelValue

Superb, Inexpensive Local Cuisine In A Countryside Setting

La Cantina di Baffone
Contrada Palombaro
Montecalvo, Irpino, Province of Avellino, Campania
Phone: +39-334-182-5144

Prices: $$$$$

Woman In Traditional "Montecalvese" Dress

An agriturismo in my paternal grandfather's hometown, we discovered La Cantina di Baffone when my relatives took us their for dinner one night. Not far from Montecalvo, a small, hillside town 60 miles east of Naples, the restaurant seems to be far from civilization in a relaxed and peaceful setting surrounded by olive and cherry trees. My cousin Gino called ahead for a table and we arrived at 9:30pm, not very late by Italian standards.

It did not take long for the attentive staff to come by to greet us and give us menus, we quickly ordered mineral water and the local wine with four of six in our party ordering their legendary pizza while Gino and I decided to try the local specialties.

Bruschetta

My grandmother, although she and my grandfather met in the States, was born in Trevico, a small mountaintop town just 20 miles from Montecalvo, so her cooking was very similar to the dishes found in this region. The server, one of two twins that own the agriturismo, quickly brought out two platters of bruschetta (€1.50 each - FYI: the "ch" in Italian is pronounced like our "k', so it is pronounced brew-sket-ah, not brew-shet-a). Montecalvo is renowned for its bread in the Irpino region and it is said that there are so many ovens baking bread in town that it melts the snow on the streets in winter. The toasted slices of pane (bread) Montecalvese were rubbed with garlic and topped with juicy tomato chunks then sprinkled with diced basil and extra virgin olive oil.

Patane e Pupini

The pizzas, none over €5 and the cheapest I have seen in recent memory, were huge and perfectly cooked, the dough thin, but firm (not chewy, not burnt) with abundant ingredients. With the ability to have fabulous pizza around every corner back in Naples, my focus was on the cucina tipica (local cuisine), Montecalvese in this case.

For our first courses (primi), Gino and I both had the Cicatielli e Broccoli (€5). Cicatielli is the local pasta and is used almost exclusively in homes and restaurants. With just the right amount of perfectly cooked pasta, the broccoli was not overwhelmed by the light, creamy sauce holding the pasta together ... Buonissimo!

Gino ordered the Patane e Pupini (€5), a traditional combination of roasted sweet sausage, red and green bell peppers, and potatoes. It was as good as my grandma's with just a little char on the slices of sausage, potatoes, and peppers and delicious along with the local bread. I love veal and when I was told that the Spezzatino Montecalvese (€5) was a "veal stew", I had no other choice. Simmered for hours in its own juices, a little fresh tomato, olive oil, and salt were all I could detect being added to the sauce. The veal was tender, literally melting in my mouth, and the sauce sublime, a perfect yet simple combination of fresh ingredients. My Italian-born wife always tells me that it is "frowned upon" in public, but I could not resist to "fare la scarpetta" (to do the little shoe) with the leftover sauce, using a small piece of local bread to mop up the wonderful sauce I could not possibly have left behind. 

Although thoroughly stuffed, we could not resist the cheesecake (€2.50), a house specialty, coming either plain or drizzled with chocolate, caramel, or in our case a fresh fruit sauce with strawberry, raspberry, and cherry from trees in the adjacent grove. The graham cracker crust was thick and crisp and the filling rich and decadent, a dessert easily fetching more than twice the price in most stateside restaurants.

Cantina di Baffone is one of those hidden gems you come across rarely in life and we would have never gone there if it were not for my cousins, but am I glad we did! For a party of six, we ate extremely well for less than €10 per person, including drinks, making this restaurant an exceptional value. We only see my relatives every couple of years, but the next time we are in Montecalvo we will return to di Baffone for another delicious and inexpensive meal.

CombatCritic Gives Cantina di Baffone 10 Out Of 10 Bombs ... Value Does Not Get Better Than This ... More Bombs Are Better!

Read More Reviews By CombatCritic On Yelp And TripAdvisor ... And Don't Forget To Subscribe To TravelValue TV on YouTube

MENU

\

Title: Superb, Inexpensive Local Cuisine In A Countryside Setting

Key Words: La Cantina di Baffone, cantina, baffone, Contrada, Palombaro, Montecalvo Irpino, Avellino, Campania, agriturismo, restaurant, Italian, Italy, review, menu, CombatCritic, travel, value

Rocco Provides The Knockout Punch To Naples Take-Out

Rocco e Suoi Fratelli
Via San Giacomo dei Capri 155 
80131 Naples, Italy
Telephone: 081 5465302 

Rocco e Suoi Fratelli (Rocco and His Brothers) is a pizzeria not far from my in-laws house in Naples. After my mother-in-law’s surgery and half a day at the hospital, we did not feel much like cooking, so we ordered from Rocco’s to be delivered. You do not get food as good as this delivered in the States.

We started with antipasto (appetizers), a mix of arancini di riso (fried rice balls), fried calamari, potato croquettes, zeppoline (a deep fried puff of dough with bits of algae inside that I can only imagine got its name because of a resemblance to a zeppelin, e.g. the Hindenburg) battered and fried shrimp (gambaretti) and other deep-fried Neapolitan favorites. There went my cholesterol!

My sister-in-law ordered far too much food for three people, so we had lunch, dinner that night, and still had leftovers. Our primo (first course), gnocchi alla Sorrentino (il mio cognome – my surname), was too much to eat with firm, not too hard, not too soft, balls of potato goodness, infused with fresh mozzarella and baked in a light tomato sauce. With just the right consistency of gnocchi to mozzarella to sauce, it does not get much better than this. Delicioso!

For reasons unknown, we also ordered a pizza quattro formaggi (four cheese pizza) that did not even have a dent put in it at lunch. I did have a piece for dinner and for being hours old, the crust was still firm yet pliant and the cheeses gooey and savory. It is well known that I love frierielli (broccoli rabe sautéed in olive oil and garlic), so it was also on the menu. I had some by itself at lunch but having missed my favorite sausage and frierielli pizza for too long, I added some to the pizza quattro formaggi and threw it in the microwave for thirty seconds … buono … yum … scrummy!!!

For take-out, Rocco’s cannot be beat and I am sure that dining-in is likely as good if not better, so I am a fan and as Arnold Schwarzeneggar would say: “I’ll be back”.

CombatCritic Gives Rocco e Suoi Fratelli 8 Bombs Out Of 10 … More Bombs Are Better!

Read More Reviews By CombatCritic On Yelp And TripAdvisor ... And Don't Forget To Subscribe To TravelValue TV on YouTube

Title: Rocco Provides The Knockout Punch To Neapolitan Take-Out

Key Words: Rocco e Suoi Fratelli, Rocco, suoi, fratelli, Napoli, Naples, Italy, Italian, pizza, pizzeria, delivery, menu, pasta, gnocchi, Sorrentino, zeppoline, arancini, calamari, CombatCritic, TravelValue

CombatCritic's TravelValue eZine - Averaging Over 145 Hits A Day!

CombatCritic's TravelValue eZine has recently been averaging over 145 hits a day. Not bad for a small, unassuming food and travel blog from America's Heartland:

Thanks to all of our followers, visitors, and fans for your loyalty and trust ... 

FOLLOW ME TO TRAVELVALUE!