Viva l’Italia… A celebration of Italian Food and Wine at Ardkeen Quality Food Store

So many things spring to mind when you think of Italy. A rich and vibrant culture, extraordinary scenery and coastline, a language that seems to sing rather that talk, the list goes on. And on! But chief among them must be Italy’s cuisine. It is known and loved worldwide and this is in no small part due to its long-held philosophy of sourcing quality ingredients and using seasonality to its best possible effect. Recipes are treasured and handed down through generation, cooked and enjoyed with ease and love.

Hand in hand with this food heritage goes Italy’s wine. With more than one million vineyards under cultivation and over 350 grape varieties, Italy is the largest wine producer in the world. Standing as it does among the top countries for life expectancy, it is widely acknowledged that this is in no small part due to Italy’s food traditions.

With all this in mind, we are excited to celebrate all things Italian Food and Wine here at Ardkeen Quality Food Store for the next two weeks. Our buyers have carefully chosen a range of quintessential Italian products that we feel best reflect the richness and quality of Italian food and wine.

With oil from the Ligurian Taggiasca olives (considered to be the best in Italy), sauces and pesto’s from the organic Piedmont Prunotto range, traditional Rustichella d’Abruzzo pastas (spaghetti, linguine, penne etc.) made with durum wheat and bronze dIed to hold that sauce better, we have sourced some of the best Italian food available and all at the keenest prices to offer you an Italian experience with real value.

Wines from all over Italy will be tasted during our many impromptu instore tastings with firm favourites like Montepulciano D’Abruzzo, Salice Salentino Rosso, Pinot Grigio and the Masseria del Fauno range who have Sabino Russo (considered one of the rising stars of Italian winemaking) at the helm.

Our Thursday tasting this week will be exploring the Prunotto range and on Friday we welcome Allessandro from artisan Italian food importer Del Gusto who will be taking us through some of Italy’s finest olive oils. We also have tastings from some of our Irish producers who are making beautiful Italian sauces with D’Vine from Kilkenny on Friday 18th and Joan and Bob’s Italian sauce range tasting on Saturday 19th.

We will be opening delicious wines most days from 4pm with our resident Italian Barista Elia taking a tasting on Friday 11th. Of course, we cannot celebrate Italy without Prosecco (or Peroni for that matter!) so we will have bubbles and Rose ones at that on Saturday to set us up for the weekend so to speak.

We will be posting events as they happen here and on Twitter, Facebook and Instagram so keep an eye out and join in the fun. And all in time to celebrate Italy's National Day, the Festa della Repubblica (Republic Day) on 2 June!

Look forward to seeing you instore.

Viva l'Italia

Julie