Customer Reviews

Passeport Gastronomique: Italy

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Missing our annual Italian summer eating extravaganza, I decided to take my Passeport Gastronomique to Il Casale in Belmont, MA and pretend that we were in Italy. Anxious to know what I might look forward to that evening, I went on the website and perused the menu. Not having a waiter nearby to ask for a translation, I used my PG to decipher the meanings of sauces and words that looked familiar and I thought I should already know, but didn't. It was great! I especially like the fact that it is not just main ingredients that are defined, but phrases such as "sweet and sour." This feature shedds considerable light on the menu selections. My PG contributed to a lovely meal and was fun to use. I know that it will be extremely helpful when faced with the challenge of an all Italian menu and no one around to translate. I plan to buy the Spanish version for our next trip to a Spanish speaking country. Terrific idea and so much more hip than traveling with a dictionary!

I bought the Kindle version before a trip to Italy, hoping to look a bit less foolish when ordering from Italian restaurant menus. The book looked pretty comprehensive, and it does have a useful list of Italian phrases inside. However, almost every time I tried to find a word or phrase in this book, it wasn't there. Used the Kindle search feature, nothing. Maybe I just had bad luck with the restaurants I visited, but I was not able to use this book at all on the trip. Perhaps it would be useful to someone taking an Italian cooking class?