Facts About Food Friday – Parmesan or Parmigiano?
FAF #7
What is the Difference Between Parmesan and Parmigiano-Reggiano?
Answer: Due to Italian D.O.C. laws that protect the names and recipes of certain cheeses, a cheese cannot be called Parmigiano-Reggiano unless it is made using a specific recipe and production method within the provinces of Parma, Reggio-Emilia, Modena, and specific regions in the provinces of Bologna and Mantua. D.O.C laws are meant to preserve the integrity of traditional cheeses by insuring the flavor and quality. Therefore, any cheese made outside of these regions with a slightly different recipe or production method cannot be called Parmigiano-Reggiano .
A cheese called Parmesan is essentially a cheese that imitates the recipe for Parmigiano-Reggiano, but is made outside of the approved Italian regions.
I actually didn’t know this. I knew there was a difference obviously and that authenticity played a part, but I didn’t know all the specific little details. To be fair, I probably won’t remember all the details either, hehe, but it’s cool to read anyway.
I wonder if there are knock-off cheese labeling attempts. You know how companies will slightly change a symbol or rearrange letters a bit. Sharrpies or Adidos anyone? What about Parmesan-Regggiano or Reggiana or something instead?
I bet there’s a whole underworld of cheese scamming now that I never knew about it. Man, why doesn’t anybody ever tell me these things??
Quirky bunny chocolate chip cookies – Why it’s awesome my sister knows about QC
I really, really wasn’t sure about telling my family about blogging. It’s not that I’ve ever posted anything awful or that I would regret, of course.
In fact, my “about me” section on QJ has always included a line about how if I wouldn’t want my mother seeing it, I wouldn’t post it….even though she didn’t know about either site until recently. It’s just a little different when people you actually know are reading what you write.
But then there’s things like the entire BlogHer experience that never would’ve happened had I not told them. And specifically with my sister, there never would’ve been the tons of pictures we took posing with bunnies (or as bunnies, ha). 
And more importantly, she wouldn’t have made Quirky bunny cookies and sent me the pictures. Oh yeah, definite perks to them knowing, hehe.
Pure awesomeness, right??
Here’s some more pictures she sent me of the process and specific bunnies…
Yum! <3
Playing in the sand with Pia – Now if only it had been food, too…
I swear I’ll get back to food stuff soon. In my very next post actually.
But this first. Because this was awesome. And was a cause of yet another high I rode after BlogHer was over.
As I mentioned yesterday, my mom and sister flew out to San Diego to hang out with me after the conference. We basically had less than 48 hours to fit in as much as possible. A friend of mom’s said we needed to go out to the Hotel del Coronado to eat, so off we went.
I wish I could say everything went smoothly, but of course it didn’t. Long story short, we were given vague directions, eventually stopped a cop outside a hospital who called a cab for us, and when we made it to the hotel, we were given two different stories about food options, neither of which was what we were there for, and ultimately ordered an appetizer at a commercial diner in the basement. But hey, we made it! Finally…
And after food, we headed straight out the back and down to the beach. San Diego has *incredible* weather, and this day was no different….it was beautiful. Seeing as how we’ve always lived in landlocked Midwest US and my sister hasn’t gotten to do much traveling, that meant she’d never been to a real beach either, so it was a must-do while in California.
While she braved a bikini and chilly water, I played in the sand…..and later, she did, too. 72 hours straight of nothing but Quirky Cookery talk and it was still on my mind at the beach, so I was writing the name there.
Out of no where, this little girl walks up to me and asks if I know Spanish. I told her I only know a little (5 years of classes and I can read it rather well still, but speaking it isn’t as easy beyond conversational Spanish). Turns out, she spoke English fluently, but told me that she saw me drawing and thought I was drawing in Spanish. Seeing as how Q’s aren’t exactly used much in English, but a lot in Spanish, I’m guessing that’s where the connection was.
So I told her what I was writing and how I was trying to draw a bunny, but I’m not very good at that. She watched and then helped! I know my excitement over this probably sounds silly, but you know what? It *is* silly and that’s why I loved every single second. 
I have a ton of pictures, so I’m not going to ramble on much longer and will just get to those. Briefly after our first bunny was done, we stood up to admire and the tide came in (it hadn’t been anywhere close before then) and washed it away!! She had been trying to catch crabs with her sister and offered to draw another bunny for me when I was done, so that’s why there’s two different sets. And at the end? We tried shadow bunnies. You can’t see them very well, but there’s one where we’re standing together and our bodies ended up looking like bunnies, too! Loved, loved, loved this.
I gave Pia a business card so she could come look, but who knows if they even remembered beyond the few minutes we were at the beach together. For me, though, it was absolutely fantastic experience. <3
^ This is my “oh my god, I can’t believe she just drew me a bunny!!” face.
*Gasp!* It’s gone! You can see my sister’s in the very bottom of the picture, too.
Oops!!
She started a new one in the wet sand, but we decided to try elsewhere instead.
Check out the beach behind us. Stunning.
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