Eataly, Turin

Eataly, as the name suggests, is about eating in Italy. So I'm dedicating an entire post to it.

Eataly was built during the major overhaul done in Turin to prepare for the 2006 winter Olympic Games, and is basically a gourmet grocery store offering all foods Italian. It's divided into sections with meats (prosciutto, anyone? See photo below), cheeses, produce, etc. Many of the specialty sections also have a restaurant-like area, or "restaurantino", which offers a limited menu by a renowned chef.

So ignore the conventional wisdom that says never grocery shop on an empty stomach, and definitely arrive hungry. Not surprisingly (it's Italy after all), you can only eat lunch from noon to 3 pm and dinner from 7 pm onwards.

I wouldn't do much grocery shopping there because gourmet food has gourmet prices, but I definitely recommend browsing the aisles, especially the jams and sauces section, and picking out a few things to buy and taste. I spent about 100 Euros on a relatively small bag of groceries, all of which had to be eaten before I left Turin. But it wasn't a problem: I think I finished off a jar of pickled onions in the taxi (note: I do not normally love pickled onions).

Don't forget to visit the wine and beer section of the store, too. The photo below shows about half of the beer selection – though most of it is not Italian beer.

It's not in the centre of Turin, so take a taxi. But Eataly is a sensory and cultural experience not to be missed.

Photos by Madeline