Ragù alla Bolognese

30th November 2025

After a couple of slow news weeks, thank goodness for Bologna and our two days there this weekend bringing a spark of life to our otherwise quotidian existence.

Mind you, Monday was vaguely exciting. There was my morning visit to the dentist for a clean and polish and a check-up. The hygienist sorted the former before leaving the later to Claudia, who gave me the-all clear and lots of praise for being handy with the toothbrush and floss. In the afternoon my new student started, a friend of Rocco’s who’s back in MSP for the interim as his work driving racing vehicles around Europe is over for the season and who is looking to improve his basic English skills.

As far as the weather was concerned it was on again/off again, with a fair day on Monday giving way to a rainy Tuesday then a sunny Wednesday, a day which saw Stephen brave the confusion of Montegranaro post office to collect a parcel that Poste Italiane couldn’t deliver because, they said in the message, the address was wrong or incomplete. It was neither, but their numbering system was definitely not right. Just when it should have been Stephen’s turn, it didn’t so much skip his ticket but start with a new letter code and number sequence. Fortunately, an assistant clocked that he had been waiting, and was looking puzzled, and came to his rescue.

It was a return to old haunts in the evening when we had dinner in the pub for the first time in a very long while. Stephen thinks it was the first time this year, though I seem to recall at least one visit. Whichever, it’s been some time, so when Maddalena messaged Stephen to suggest we meet up with them there it seemed like a good idea, and a happy time was had by all.

The rain was back again on Thursday and considerately kept falling steadily all day, meaning the three of us were soaked three times. Harry, as previously mentioned, was not all that keen about it, but I was all right in my waterproof trousers and super protective rain jacket while Peggy was completely unfazed – so unfazed that she was more than happy to do her pouncing act into the grass at the side of the lane at various points. I had, foolishly, thought that it was all a bit of a game, that was until she emerged at one point with something grey in her mouth. “Not a dead mouse,” I thought correctly because it was a live one. She dropped it quickly when I shook her lead, maybe because she wasn’t that sure what to do next, and it lay for a moment before dazedly wandering back to the channel. It didn’t seem to be in all that much of a hurry, which may be why Peggy, for once, was actually able to catch something.

That wasn’t the end of our encounters with wildlife. It was towards the end of my evening lesson when Luca, Matteo and I were disturbed by Peggy and Harry starting to bark wildly. I was taken aback as it sounded like they were on the drive, but when I went outside and looked up, they were on the terrazzo above the workroom. It was our friend the fox again, Stephen shouted down to tell me as he stood there with the torch, a fox which is becoming increasingly brazen. He explained later, when I went up after the lesson, that it had ambled across the front of the house, stopping by the cars to cock a snook at the dogs and Stephen before nonchalantly continuing on his way.

Friday was dull but dry, though more importantly it was a return to our normal routine, as well as seeing our final preparations for out weekend away. With Rocco back in residence, Stephen magnanimously let me take the hair appointment so I could look my best for Bologna, a great sacrifice on his part given how wild and long his hair was, being all of half a centimetre in length. Just as well he had a selection of caps to keep it covered all the time we have been  away.

In the evening we took Harry and Peggy to the kennels for their own little break. Harry, as usual, was excited as soon as he got out of the car and Peggy was happy enough to go along with him. We left them ensconced in their little enclosure with the two timid-looking dogs in the one adjacent already huddled in a corner – probably knowing they were going to get very little peace with Barky Boy next door. It was then back to pack and enjoy a pizza as best we could without them.

We were up and out early yesterday to catch the 8.09 train, which was on time and almost incident free apart from the man who got on at Rimini and, in that Italian way, said I was in his seat, 9A. Well, no, as the conductor who checked us previously could have attested, and the man himself realised when he consulted his ticket and apologised as he was actually in 10A. We were at the hotel not long after eleven, and while check in was theoretically not till three, there was a room ready and so we were able to unpack and head out for a wander and some lunch.

We played the tourist (which was what we were, I guess) and, it being surprisingly sunny if a tad cold, we ate outside in one of the side streets near Piazza Maggiore, where, while tucking into bruschette followed by tortellini in brodo, we learned from the Americans next to us that despite thinking Irish coffees went out with the passing of Berni Inns, they are still available – and what’s more, they go perfectly with bowls of tagliatelle al ragù. We were much more pedestrian with our half bottle of Valpolicella.

The afternoon was spent shopping - window, browsing and purchasing - something that ended up a game of two halves. The first half was jeans for me (apparently I needed some new dark blue ones, my stylist said) and some flavoured vinegars from the nice shop we found last time we were there (we still have some of their proper, tradizionale balsamic left) before a little rest back in our bijou hotel room. The second half was deciding that the queue for the changing rooms was far too long to try on the cords in Zara (what I thought I needed) but I did buy a woolly beanie from our beloved Scout (not having brought a hat with me, forgetting how cold it is in Bologna) followed by an aperitivo before returning to the hotel for dinner in their very fine osteria, on the same floor as our room.

The food was very good and the atmosphere very relaxing, but the best thing about the restaurant were the three young waiters who were like busy little worker bees, being very smiley and helpful and buzzing around each other in a synchronised operation – including one of them polishing all the freshly washed cutlery as he put it back in the dresser. If only all places had such standards.

Today got off to a good start with a highly recommended breakfast. The hotel, I Portici, was created from a run of buildings and comprises not just the two restaurants and the bedrooms, but a coffee shop, a patisserie and a breakfast room. This latter was reconfigured from the auditorium of a former theatre (of compact proportions; it wasn’t like eating in the London Palladium), with most of the tables and the buffet breakfast where the stalls would have been, and five more, including a table seating eight for larger parties, on the stage.

Resisting the urge to don the greasepaint, we headed out into another dry, if a little cloudy, day to go to Palazzo Pallavicini which hosts visiting exhibitions. We did the double whammy of Visioni e Volti, “…an extraordinary selection of fifty paintings from the fifteenth to the eighteenth centuries from the Civic Museums of Pavia” (ok but not as impressive as that sounds) and Vampiri, “…a unique multisensory experience which transports viewers into dark atmospheres between myth and historical reality” (interesting and well staged but a bit heavy on Vlad the Impaler).

It was then time for lunch and we went in search of something light, which is not always that easy. We drew a blank till, cutting through a side street, we came across Bāo Bros, small-fronted takeaway with some seating, where, through the window, we could see a cohort of Asian ladies of a certain age busily making dumplings. A bowl of noodle soup with wantons seemed a good idea, and indeed it was, as were the pork dumplings and the vegetable dumplings we also polished off. This despite Stephen saying beforehand that he didn’t want much to eat, but there again, he did say afterwards that it was the best meal he’d had all year so one can forgive his enthusiasm. I guess it was like Winnie the Pooh when Rabbit asked him if he wanted condensed milk or honey on his bread, and Pooh got so excited he said both before remembering himself and saying it didn’t matter about the bread.

Fortified it was off to find the trousers that eluded us yesterday. Zara was somewhat less busy with no queue for the changing rooms but the trousers were a no go, so it was back to Scout where a pair of green cords proved just the thing. I wore them later on when we went out to dinner after a couple of hours resting up in the hotel room, though we were interrupted when the phone rang. It was housekeeping, asking us if we wanted our bed sorting as somehow someone had switched on the room occupied sign earlier in the day, which accounted for why it hadn’t been seen to while we were out.

Dinner was relatively early as when I went online to book a table at Trattoria Da Me Nella Torre, the place we had had a plate of very fine lasagne for lunch on our last visit and which we wanted to return to for dinner, they had two sittings, 7.30 and 9.30. We opted for the earlier time and rocked up about ten minutes before, and were a little surprised to find that when the restaurant said 7.30 it meant 7.30, as evinced by the knot of people gathered outside in the small courtyard and the closed door. It was 7.30 on the dot when it opened and we were allowed to form an orderly queue to be allowed in.

That sort of set the tone for the evening, for while the food was very good, the service slick and the place quirkily chic, you did get the feeling that you were on a bit of a conveyor belt and it seemed to lack soul – and I didn’t spot anyone polishing the cutlery.