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Hidden Gems of Italy

@hiddengemsofitaly

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Explore Italy beyond the usual itinerary 🇮🇹
Authentic stays, food & routes.
Shared through a Lebanese lens 🇱🇧
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🇱🇧🤝🇮🇹 From Beirut to Palermo: the same flavors, the same techniques, 1,200 years apart. Swipe to discover the Levantine dishes hiding inside Sicily's most iconic food.

In Lebanon, tabbouleh is a parsley salad, mostly herb, a little bulgur, tomatoes and lots of lemon and olive oil. In Sicily, the same Levantine tradition became tabulé: cold couscous tossed with colorful raw vegetables. Same DNA, different pantry. The parsley stayed. The grain changed. The spirit is identical. Check out western Sicily to find this dish near Trapani.

A grain shell. A spiced meat filling. Deep-fried golden. Lebanon calls it kibbeh. Sicily calls it arancino or arancina depending on the region. It is its most beloved street food. The name even comes from the Arabic narenj (bitter orange). A 13th-century Arab cookbook already described the concept.

Before pizza was pizza, there was sfeeha. The Lebanese flatbread topped with spiced meat and pine nuts has been sold in Beirut bakeries for centuries. When Arab settlers arrived in Sicily, they brought the same concept: savory toppings baked onto dough, and it became sfincione. The word itself is Arabic: isfanj, meaning sponge.

Both dishes share the same ancient logic: fried eggplant, cooked down in a tomato-onion base, served at room temperature. The Arabs brought eggplants to Sicily from the Levant. Caponata adds the agrodolce twist (vinegar and sugar), the same sweet-sour balance found in Levantine cooking with pomegranate molasses. Msaqa'a is the true Lebanese twin of Caponata and one our favorite dishes.

Muhammara (crushed walnuts, roasted peppers, and pomegranate molasses) is one of the great nut sauces of the Levant. When Genoese sailors brought basil pesto to Trapani, Sicilians adapted it with what the Arabs had left behind: almonds instead of pine nuts, fresh tomatoes, and the same nutty, rich logic. Pesto alla Trapanese is a sauce that bridges Liguria and the Levant in a single bowl.

In Lebanon, marsaban is a pure almond paste shaped into delicate flower cups, perfumed with orange blossom water. In Sicily, pasta reale, the same almond paste, sculpted by nuns into impossibly realistic fruits. The Arabs brought almonds and taken in Palermo, Sicily by @hiddengemsofitaly

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3 months ago

Etna’s current activity has now lasted a week.

That is precisely what makes this moment unusual.On 13 August, volcanologist Gianluca Gambino told Euronews that similar sustained phenomena were last seen in the late 1970s. In recent decades, Etna’s lava fountains and flows more often lasted hours, sometimes half a day.

But Etna’s long memory is measured on another scale. Its 1991 to 1993 eruption ended after 473 days of continuous lava flows. The 2008 to 2009 eruption lasted 419 days.This does not mean the current eruption will last months or years.

It is simply a reminder that in Sicily, the landscape is never entirely finished.

Would you visit Sicily while Etna is active? Comment YES or NOT YET.

#MountEtna #Sicily #Catania taken in ETNA by @hiddengemsofitaly

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2 months ago

Known as the King of Cedars, the Cedar of Lebanon is one of the most iconic trees in history. Native to the mountains of Lebanon, Syria, and southern Turkey, it can live over 1,000 years and grow up to 45 m tall. Its unmistakable silhouette, wide, flat-tiered branches spreading like a natural cathedral, has made it a symbol of strength and eternity across cultures and religions. Introduced to Italy in the early 1800s, it was planted in the parks of noble estates and royal palaces, where many specimens are now over 150 years old and protected as national monumental trees.

📍 Where to find it in Italy:
• La Morra, Langhe (Piedmont), planted in 1856 by newlyweds as a symbol of eternal love
• Villa Mirabello, Varese (Lombardy), one of Italy's largest, with a 360 cm trunk diameter
• Villa Borghese, Rome (Lazio), planted between 1852 and 1854
• Villa Pamphilj, Rome (Lazio)
• Palatine Hill / Colosseum Park, Rome (Lazio)
• Botanical Garden of Lucca (Tuscany), planted in 1822, 22 m tall
• Parco Massari, Ferrara (Emilia-Romagna), two monumental trees at the entrance
• Villa Pallavicini, Arenzano (Liguria)
• English Garden, Reggia di Caserta (Campania)
• Parco Aymerich, Laconi (Sardinia)
• Isola della Maddalena (Sardinia)
• Parco Convitto Mario Pagano, Campobasso (Molise)

3 species of cedars, each one more majestic as the other. Swipe to find out more about where to find them!

The majestic Cedar of Lebanon, the king of all cedars! While very prominent in Lebanon, Italy has a few locations where it can be found. Check out the caption of first slide to see all the locations in Italy.

Native to the Rif and Atlas Mountains of Morocco and Algeria, the Atlas Cedar is Italy's most widespread reforestation cedar, covering approximately 2,600 hectares of planted forest. Upright and pyramidal in shape, it can reach 40 m tall. Its needles range from grey-green to the striking silvery-blue of the famous Glauca variety. Highly drought-tolerant and adaptable to poor, rocky soils, it has been used since the 1960s–80s to reforest degraded hillsides across central and southern Italy. In the oldest plantations, natural regeneration has been documented, a sign the species is beginning taken in Lecco, Lake Como, Italy by @hiddengemsofitaly

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3 months ago

Calabria itinerary this fall: Tyrrhenian coast, Ionian coast, or Sila National Park?

Calabria is not one coast.

On the Tyrrhenian side, think Tropea, Pizzo and Capo Vaticano.

On the Ionian side, build around Crotone, Capo Colonna and Le Castella.

Inland, Sila National Park brings forests, lakes and mountain towns into the route.

Choose the landscape first. Then choose your base. Autumn is a great season to visit.

Save this before planning southern Italy.

#CalabriaItaly #ItalyTravel #SouthernItaly taken in Calabria, Italy by @hiddengemsofitaly

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5 days ago

If you’re looking for a nice idea to spend your Sunday, here’s one just outside Milan:

brunch at @bohemlastazione followed by a walk through the Taxodi Forest, right on Lake Iseo…

📍 Paratico, Lake Iseo

@bomi.experience between Milan, Italy, Lebanon & beyond 🇮🇹🇱🇧 taken in Lake Iseo - Italy by @hiddengemsofitaly

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9 days ago

Planning western Sicily? Put Trapani on your map.

Trapani is a practical coastal base for a western Sicily itinerary. From its port, ferries connect to the Egadi Islands: Favignana, Levanzo, and Marettimo. You can also pair it with the hilltop town of Erice and the Trapani and Paceco salt pans.

If you are planning a Sicily trip beyond Palermo or the east coast, Trapani is worth considering for harbour views, island day trips, local food, and a slower coastal route.

Follow for practical Italy routes.

#Trapani #WesternSicily #SicilyTravel taken in Trapani by @hiddengemsofitaly

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11 days ago

Not ready for winter yet? Italy is not one climate zone.

For an autumn trip, these five regions can offer milder days, each with a different balance of warmth and rainfall.

In this reference-city comparison, Sicily came out warmest across October and November, while Sardinia had the lowest combined rainfall in the shortlist.

The key is choosing the right base: Palermo, Cagliari, Matera, Lecce, or Reggio Calabria can lead to very different autumn routes. Coast, altitude, and the exact town still make a difference, so treat this as a planning starting point, not a forecast.

Save this for your autumn Italy planning, then tell me: which region would you choose first?

**Data: NASA POWER reference-city averages, 1991–2020.

#ItalyTravel #AutumnInItaly #HiddenGemsOfItaly taken in Italia by @hiddengemsofitaly

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13 days ago

Before Rome, Sicily was already part of a much older Mediterranean story.

Mozia, a small island in the Stagnone lagoon near Marsala, was founded as a Phoenician colony in the 8th century BCE. Its first homeland was Tyre, in the ancient Levant, in the territory of present-day Lebanon.

Today, you can still walk among its archaeological remains, surrounded by the shallow Sicilian lagoon that once made it a strategic trading outpost.

A reminder that Italy’s hidden history often begins long before the Roman Empire.

Would you add Mozia to a western Sicily itinerary?

#Mozia #Sicily #HiddenGemsOfItaly taken in Mozia by @hiddengemsofitaly

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25 days ago

October and November are one of the best periods to visit Sicily and we've got the perfect weekend getaway for you.

If you are building your Sicily checklist, add these two towns to it: Scicli + Modica. Both are part of southeast Sicily’s late-Baroque Val di Noto story, rebuilt after the 1693 earthquake.

But this route is less about seeing every church and viewpoint, and more about giving each place time to unfold.

Day 1: Scicli for its palaces, lanes and long lunch pace.

Day 2: Modica Bassa, the climb through Alta, San Giorgio and a stop for Modica PGI chocolate.

Save this for a slower Sicilian weekend. Which would you start with: Scicli or Modica?

#Sicily #ValdiNoto #HiddenGemsOfItaly taken in Scicli, Sicily by @hiddengemsofitaly

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16 days ago

They definitely know how to throw a party 😎

Burgers by Chef @yojitokuyoshi , fries, matcha ice cream, Japanese-inspired drinks, @arca1000000 on the decks, flowers to take home… and buttery chocolate cookies before leaving.

All of this at a gas station during Milan Fashion Week & in great company 💛

Do we need to say more?

Arigato @onitsukatigerofficial @onitsukatigeritaly 🇯🇵

@bomi.experience between Milan, Italy, Lebanon & beyond

Milan Fashion Week taken in Milan, Italy by @hiddengemsofitaly

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17 days ago

This year @anteprimaofficial took us straight into Wonderland for its SS27 show… and of course, the rabbit hole couldn’t be missing ✨🐇

@bomi.experience between Milan, Italy, Lebanon & beyond

Milan Fashion Week taken in Milan, Italy by @hiddengemsofitaly

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19 days ago

Here’s the opening of the new @onitsukatigerofficial flagship store in 📍Piazza del Liberty, Milan

…including a little café & bar corner where you definitely shouldn’t miss their iconic Matcha Spritz 🍵✨ so a perfect fusion of Japanese and Milanese traditions 👌🏻

@bomi.experience between Milan, Italy, Lebanon & beyond 💛 taken in Milan, Italy by @hiddengemsofitaly

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19 days ago