Not all who wander are lost

At the time we visited All’Antico Vinaio was ranked #1 of all the restaurants in all of Florence on Tripadvisor, which is quite odd for a sandwich bar in a large city that boasts all variety of Tuscan cuisine. I couldn’t believe it when doing research before our trip, but then the cousin of an Italian friend at work recommended it so we decided to give it a try. It’s a tiny hole in the wall joint where you have to line up outside.

To understand what it’s like to be there it will help if you’ve seen that Seinfeld episode with the Soup Nazi. They yell ‘Ciao!’ at you in a way only Italians who know they are making the best damn sandwiches on planet Earth can. Every ‘ciao’ seemed to be singing a different song.

‘CIAO!’ (Our sandwiches will make you fall in love with life again and all your worries will disappear.)

‘CIAO!’ (Today is the most beautiful day, I know it is raining but do you see how the rain droplets trickle off the old building walls like a waterfall from the heavens? It is most beautiful, no?)

‘CIAO!’ (You are beautiful, your friends and family are all beautiful. Life is beautiful. Art is beautiful. The earth is beautiful. Humanity is beautiful. Food is beautiful. Everything is beautiful.)

I think I had been smiling at them, beaming really, for at least half a minute before I realised they were asking me what I would like in my sandwich.

‘Um, um, um, wh-what do you recommend?’ I blurted out in English like an American student on his gap year.

The guy smiled and suggested a salami focaccia with eggplant spread and chili. When they gave it to me I almost fell to the floor, it was so heavy and I could see it was packed with more meat than you’d find at a Brazilian all-you-can-eat BBQ. The price: a measly 5 euro, and if you felt like it and you could pay for a glass of red wine (2 euro).

The focaccia was unlike any focaccia I’d ever tried. This stuff was as fluffy and light as a cloud, but still filling. It was as if they when they were making the dough, someone was blowing tiny little bubbles into the dough with a straw. This wasn’t bread, it was wheat-based cocaine.
If I could take myself back to my childhood, I’d force myself to have started learning Italian so years later I could thank those geniuses at All’Antico Vinaio for reminding me that a simple sandwich could taste so good.

Of course, time-travel is impossible and so all I said to the staff when we left the bar was the one word I was sure would encapsulate it all: Ciao.