Italian

Even if you're not yet ready to retire, San Miguel de Allende is perfect for a vacation or long weekend getaway. Getting there United and American airlines offer connecting flights (via Texas) to San Miguel's two closest airports, Leon/Guanajuato (BJX), 90 minutes away, and Queretaro (QRO), one hour away. Round-trip airfares start around $600. Multiple airlines offer flights to Mexico City, which is three hours from San Miguel. When to go January may be the sole inclement month to travel, and even then it's nothing compared to a typical Baltimore winter.

Don't be fooled by forecasts of scattered snow showers; it really is spring and therefore the true start of Italian ice season. To mark the occasion, Rita's is giving a free Italian ice to each customer today. It's an annual tradition going back two decades for the ice and custard stand, now at more than 600 locations in 20 states. Last year, Rita's customers consumed more than 1.2 million cups of Italian ice in ten hours. This year, Rita's is promoting its new loyalty club, Rita's Rewards, by offering free ice in a limited-edition cup. The giveaway runs today through 9 p.m. at all open Rita's.

W hen the Bicycle in South Baltimore closed abruptly this summer, people wondered why the owners, Nicholas and Saundra Batey, continued to work on, and planned to open, another restaurant nearby. The new place would be an Italian restaurant called Ullswater (554 E. Fort Ave., 443-563-1620); and when I heard it had finally opened a couple of weeks ago, I called to find out more. Saundra Batey explained that the couple had bought the Ullswater building, where Sly Fox and Soigne had been, while Bicycle was still open; but they didn't own the fine-dining establishment.

You can hear their passion for teaching the language, a Viva Italia! enthusiasm they hope to make infectious to those who sign up for the courses. For Italian language teachers Catherine D'Ascoli of Wilde Lake High School and Peter DiMarco of Hammond High School, the stream of students interested in the language has been, for the most part, unabated. In Howard County, Italian is taught at Wilde Lake, Marriotts Ridge, Hammond and Reservoir high schools. And though the offerings pale in comparison to those in Spanish and French - which are offered in all county high schools and middle schools - they make Howard a rarity among local schools when it comes to teaching Italian.

The colors of Italy dressed the Associated Italian American Charities' 54th annual dinner dance. The tables at Martin's West were covered in red, green and white, as were the Bali D'Italia Dancers, who performed Italian folk dances for a crowd of almost 800.Among the people decorating the party: Jay Matricciani, AIAC president; Judge Lawrence Daniels and Vince Piscopo, event co-chairs; Paul Russo, Anthony DiPaula and Tony Corbi, the evening's honorees; Guy...

Eight Italian women and men gathered last weekend to share stories about the old country and their present lives in the United States. Conversations in Italian about work, family, church and food flowed as freely as the espresso they sipped from tiny cups.Every other month since January, as many as 15 people have gathered at the Glen Burnie home of Lisa Pitocco to socialize in Italian -- and to eat and drink.Over the winter, Pitocco, 42, received a call from Sister Vera Green at Holy Trinity Roman Catholic Church in Glen Burnie.

Citicorp is considering the sale of its consumer branch-banking businesses in Italy and France as part of its efforts to trim assets and increase its financial strength, news reports and bankers say.A trade publication, American Banker, reported yesterday that Italian bankers said that the Citicorp subsidiary in Italy had not been formally offered for sale, but that Citicorp officials had indicated they would listen to offers.The Italian subsidiary specializes in consumer and small-business banking through a network of 52 branches.

It's Italian and it isn't. The new Josephine's at 2112 Fleet St. is a mid-range Italian restaurant, says owner-chef Ellen Davis; but specialties include a filet Chesapeake - tenderloin with crab and basil hollandaise - and a crab cake. If Angelina's (the Harford Road Italian restaurant famous for its crab cakes) comes to mind, that's not surprising. Davis has worked in its kitchen, as well as the now-closed Stella's in Hampden. As for the Italian food, it ranges from lasagna and meatballs to torta rustica, capellini with red bell pepper pesto and stuffed shells with ricotta, mozzarella and Gorgonzola.

My wife and I were out with another couple recently, and we were talking about ethnicity. We realized that if our friends had a daughter (half Jewish-half Irish) and we had a son (half Italian-half Jewish) who married, our grandchildren would be a mish-mash of cultures, practically deracinated and stripped of any real heritage.That may be true, I said, thumping my chest, but they would have my name. What that name might be worth, in the face of eroding European ethnic identity, is precisely what Bill Tonelli sets out to discover in his sociological picaresque, "The Amazing Story of the Tonelli Family in America."

At parades, festivals and family gatherings across the country, Columbus Day is as much a celebration of Italian-American culture as of the European discovery of the New World - a day when "everybody is Italian." Yet many people, including some Italian-Americans, may be surprised to learn that Italians and their culture were not accepted in the United States until relatively recently. When my maternal grandparents came to the United States from Italy in the early 1920s, Italians, who were one of the largest immigrant groups, were widely considered to be among the least desirable.

Anna Di Pierno's little charmer of a restaurant has been around for about seven years, operating under the name Pasta Blitz. If you go looking for it, though, look for Il Basilico. Di Pierno has taken a deliberate approach to the name change, but the transition is almost complete. The neon sign above the restaurant, located in a Timonium strip mall, still carries the old name, but virtually everything inside is now emblazoned with the Il Basilico logo. The menu has been changing gradually, too. The main part still consists of Italian-American favorites - lots of them - things like veal Parmigiana, homemade lasagna Bolognese and chicken cacciatore.

Zagat released on Wednesday its first-ever survey of Italian food, the favorite cuisine of Zagat voters. According to the survey, 31 percent of Zagat voters report eating Italian food three or more times per week.   The survey was conducted online Jan. 16-25, and the results are from voters who report eating Italian food. Zagat voters say that their favorite pasta sauce is Bolognese, followed by marinara and arrabbiata, and their favorite pasta is pappardelle. Pappardelle? I didn't realize it had such a following.

Attorneys challenging a death sentence before the state's highest court last week dug deeply into online historical documents to divine the intention behind what they think is a never-before-interpreted part of the state's constitution. Public defender Brian Saccenti and a team of lawyers rested their argument in part on a once-famous 18th-century book by a young Italian nobleman named Cesare Beccaria, who suggested that capital punishment should be reserved for treasonous criminals.

Buca di Beppo, a chain of neighborhood-style Italian restaurants, will open its planned White Marsh Mall eatery on Monday, mall representatives confirmed. The Italian restaurant was initially scheduled to open in September. The eatery is part of the wave of new tenants and upgrades that have come to the Baltimore County mall over the past few months, including the re-opening of Boscov's department store in October and renovations to the food court in September. Mattress Warehouse and Deb Shops are among newer tenants as well, and mall officials expect to announce more new stores soon.

Using their keen eyesight, octopi stare at the world from two beady eyes. They maneuver through the sea with four pairs of bilaterally symmetrical arms that bear suction cups. They possess a hard beak - similar to that of a parrot, the only hard part about them - and as cephalopods, they squeeze into and out of tight places, helpful when fleeing moray eels and other predatory fish. Three hearts pump and heat blood that circulates through an octopus' system, and they have demonstrated both short- and long-term memory and problem-solving skills in mazes and in other experiments administered by biologists.

So intent was Riccardo Migliori on his mission - observing the U.S. election and asking questions about the voting process in Baltimore - that he missed the statues of saints and the oil painting of Pope Leo XIII. So foreign was the idea that voting might take place in a house of worship that he apparently didn't notice the brass crucifix on the wall above him, either. In fact, it wasn't until he left the polling place in Little Italy and stepped onto chilly Exeter Street on Tuesday morning that Migliori, a senior member of Big Italy's parliament, realized he had just seen Americans voting in the basement of a Roman Catholic church.

DONA de Sanctis and I sat down in a quiet restaurant in northeast Washington and had a Catholic-on-Catholic discussion that started with a reference to that movie. Well, it was almost Catholic-on-Catholic. De Sanctis said her family converted to the Episcopal faith when she was a teen-ager. I'm a Catholic who has promised to find his way to Mass before the next time Halley's comet appears. But both of us know what the Stations of the Cross are, and their relevance to Mel Gibson's disputed but profitable The Passion of the Christ.

VAL D'ISERE, France -- They came pouring over the mountains from the nearby Italian border, traveling by car, bus and train: thousands of Italians waving signs, banners and 20-foot flags of red, white and green, their faces painted, their voices hoarse.They organized a sunrise march yesterday through the streets of this tiny resort, singing soccer songs, stomping their boots in the snow and waving their arms, making sure everyone in town knew this was the day.Finally, when it was time for the men's Olympic giant slalom, they gathered eight-deep along the finish line to cheer Alberto Tomba.

It is said that if you want really good Italian food, you should go to a restaurant where the chef is from Casablanca, Morocco. Nah, I made that up. But it could be a truism. The kitchen of Salute Ristorante Italiano, just over the Howard County line, in downtown Laurel, turns out some very, very good Italian fare indeed. The 53-seat storefront eatery at 504 Main St. has a theater as a neighbor, and a little bit beyond is a liquor store. This is important information, because although Salute doesn't have a liquor license, owners Abdellah and Meriem Kass invite you to bring whatever spirits you wish to accompany the dinner he prepares for you and she serves to you. My party of four recently visited Salute for dinner, since the restaurant is only open for the evening meal, except if you're planning a large private party at lunchtime.

Annapolis Opera is on fire with excitement about its 40th-anniversary season. That much is evident from its season brochure — the company's best ever — on which a flaming "V" proclaims a celebration of the bicentennial of Giuseppe Verdi's birth. Italy's pre-eminent composer will be honored at Maryland Hall for the Creative Arts in Annapolis Opera's productions of two masterworks — a concert version of "Aida" and a fully staged "Rigoletto. " This season also celebrates the 25th annual Vocal Competition, which introduces outstanding young singers from the Mid-Atlantic region who compete for more than $10,000 in total prizes.