Tastes of Le Marche, Italian Gastronomy Tour

Hotels & restaurants

HOTEL LEONE
The beautiful Hotel Leone, a luxury boutique hotel in the medieval hilltop town of Montelparo in Italy’s Le Marche region, is run by husband-and-wife duo, Tim and Madeline with authentic Italian charm and is the perfect base for the Tastes Of Le Marche gastronomy tour.

Looking out over rural Italy there is a glimpse of the Adriatic in the distant haze, it forms part of that perfect Italian escape. Dating back to 1501, the once 19-bedroom, 2-bathroom hotel, has been lovingly restored. Picture perfect inside and out, with a façade of medieval stone and preserved interior Hotel Leone offers everything you could possibly want.

The 8 beautiful ensuite rooms combine modern comforts with heritage style, an elegant restaurant, a stylish bar, in-room spa treatments, and an oh-so Italian wine cellar.

Places & attractions

PLACES YOU VISIT
Montelparo
A small, beautifully picturesque, fortified hill village around 1800 feet above sea level has views over to the Adriatic in one direction and views of the Sibillini mountain range in the other. The creamy brick built village, typical of southern Le Marche, is home to one of only two bicycle museums found in Italy. The museum with a unique collection of antique bicycles, carts, hand carts and trolleys used by local craftsmen is well worth a visit. Other Montelparo historic buildings, some dating as far back as the 13th century, include the Sant Agostino Monastery built in 1686 with the added church (1730) and Torre Civica (town tower, 1400). There is also the 18th century Palazzo Communale that preserves a valuable collection of parchments, the church of San Gregorio Magno (1615), and the 13th century Gothic church of San Michele Arcangelo, which has three exceptional portals: one Gothic, two Renaissance, and an interior full of frescoes from the 1500s, such as The Crucifixion, The Pieta and The Holy Father (1527).

Ascoli Piceno
A well-preserved town in central Italy is essentially built of travertine, Ascoli’s local rock. This is a precious stone, similar to marble, that gleams bone white in the midday sun and flushes pink at sunset. At night, in the moonlight Ascoli appears to glow, the towers, porticoes, and streetlights reflecting in the paving, making the city centre look like a mirage.

Attractions include the 13th-century Palazzo dei Capitani del Popolo, a palace built over Roman ruins, and the Piazza del Popolo, an elegant travertine paved Renaissance square at its heart. The Civic Picture Gallery, decorated with Murano glass chandeliers, displays paintings by Titian and Carlo Crivelli, and its Cathedral of St. Emidio has a crypt featuring elaborate mosaics.

Fermo
This alluring hill town, with thirty preserved underground Roman pools built between 41 & 60 BC to conserve and purify the town’s water supply, is full of architectural sights. The fortress which once topped the town, destroyed in 1445, is now the site of municipal gardens that offers wonderful views over Le Marche countryside. Its 13th-century Romanesque-Gothic cathedral, with a very fine rose window, is richly decorated. One of the cathedral’s treasures, now on display, in the adjacent Museo Diocesano, is an Arab-Spanish embroidered cape. said to have belonged to St Thomas a’ Becket, Archbishop of Canterbury between 1118-1170.

Just below the cathedral, is the magnificent Piazza del Popolo, which plays host to Fermo’s summer music festival, and the Palazzo Comunale containing the town’s art collection that includes a 1608 Rubens painting of the Nativity. At the main entrance to the Palazzo Comunale is Sansovino’s statue of the Bishop of Fermo who was to become Pope Sixtus V.

Pedaso
Located south of Porto San Giorgio, it is to be Italy’s Capital of Culture in 2024 and is host to the August annual National Spaghetti & Mussel Festival. Primarily a beach resort town, its beach of sand and gravel, with various chalets, is over 2 km long. Just off the short gravely beach are numerous concrete pillars used for cultivating the mussels. The clear waters, rich in flora and fauna make them ideal for diving and underwater fishing. The hometown of composer Gioachino Rossini, his birthplace house is now a museum, a street, a music conservatory, and the Teatro Rossini all carries his name.

The historic centre with its medieval lanes provides access to its cathedral with its floor of amazing mosaics, dedicated to San Terenzio, the city’s first bishop who was martyred in the third century and is Pesaro’s patron saint. The Palazzo Toschi-Mosca, Palazzo Ducale, are on Piazza del Popolo, as is the Palazzo Almerici, home to the prestigious Biblioteca Oliveriana library with many rare volumes, and an archaeology museum.

ACTIVITIES
Agriturismo Fonte San Andrea – cooking class.
In a renovated farmhouse, close to the town of Montelparo this excellent restaurant provides dishes that are prepared and cooked in the way they were for generations. The pasta dishes are made from pasta produced in the restaurant, which by arrangement offers cooking classes for small groups.

Agriturismo Ramuse – truffle hunting.
The Agriturismo Ramuse, the backdrop of a 2004 Jamie Oliver “good food live” TV programme is located near Force, in a beautiful, isolated valley where the black and rare white truffles can be found. Between May and October, the Agriturismo Ramuse will take our group’s truffle hunting with truffle dogs, and they say, smelling a fresh truffle that you have just found is an unforgettable experience.

Aziende Fontegranne, – cheese tasting and farm tour.
A family run organic farm producer of cheese and artisan meat products, including Salumi & Ciccia, is located at Belmonte Piceno. The historical town with notable Roman ruins and churches, is situated on a ridge that has the role of the watershed between the valleys of the Tenna and of the Ete Vivo Rivers.

Cantina dei Colli Ripani at Ripatransone – wine tasting.
The Colli Ripani is a cooperative winery that finds strength in over 330 indigenous producers. All have a strong desire to enhance their wine production through passion and uniqueness while at the same time protecting the lands that give life to the native Sangiovese, Montepulciano, Pecorino, and Passerina wines.

Domodimonti in Montefiori dell’Aso – wine tasting.
Located in the hills of Offida, the Domodimonti Srl Società Agricola is winery where people have chosen a wellness lifestyle and have a love of their land. Winemaker Francesco Bellini, for reasons of well-being, wanted wines that had no added chemical substances or additives to the natural production process. They employ organic farming methods, pruning and harvesting exclusively by hand and performing a further selection of the grapes at the winery before vinification. The result is in the seven outstanding wines produced today.

Jester Brewery – brewery tour and tasting.
Once a pig farm in Petritoli, a hilltop town above the green and fertile Aso valley, its transition to an award-winning artisan brewery is remarkable. Surrounded by ancient grains and spices and with a passion for beer made from natural local products, the Jester beers offer a unique flavour.

Le Cana at Carassai – wine tasting.
The Le Canà winery at Carassai in the Ascoli Piceno is far from the main roads and where nature reigns. It boasts a history of winemaking spanning hundred years and the Polini family has maintained that history for some four generations. To them making wine is not just a tradition but a choice of life. In 2006 they adopted organic farming methods for innovation, and through research enhanced the native vines of their Pecorino, Passerina, Sangiovese, and Montepulciano grapes they use to produce wonderful wines.

La Mattera Farm – olive oil tasting.
The family run producer of artisanal products, from extra virgin olive oil to tomato sauce, pasta, and jams is located at Torre di Palma with a fantastic panorama of the Adriatic coast. The extra virgin olive oil produced by a first cold pressing of olives from La Mattera Farm offers a range of healthy, genuine, and excellent quality products, inspired by old traditions.

General tour information

LE MARCHE
Located between the Adriatic Sea and Umbria and Tuscany this sparsely populated region can be considered one of Italy’s secret gems. Its hilltop towns and villages set amongst rugged peaks and green valley’s stunning beaches, and underground caves make it a wonderful place to experience Italy without the maddening crowds. Its transport hub is the port city of Ancona, with its international Marche Airport, and ferry port with sailings to and from Greece, Albania, and Croatia.

Its stand-out attractions would include the town of Urbino, the birthplace of artist Raphael with its Renaissance amazing art collection. The Parco del Conero with its glorious coastal stretches of pristine pebbly beaches backed by white cliffs and pine woods, and resorts of Portonovo, Numana, and Sirolo. Ascoli Piceno, translated as “fried olives stuffed with minced meat”, is a bite size local specialty served in numerous bars and cafes, with an amazing historic centre and beautiful piazzas adorned by majestic churches.

Le Marche is also home to one of central Italy’s great wilderness areas, the Parco Nazionale dei Monti Sibillini, hit by earthquakes in 2016, but now well recovered, this unspoiled park could be considered an outdoor enthusiast paradise, with its many hiking and cycling trails. In another remote central hill region, near the village of Genga, is the Grotte di Frasassi. One of Europe’s largest cave systems, the underground wonderland created by the river Sentino, offers guided tours that take in the Ancona Abyss, a giant chamber 200 metres high, and the Gran Canyon with its monumental stalactites and stalagmites.

During the summer months, the hills of Le Marche you might say “are alive with the sound of music” when its hosts two big opera festivals. One in the hilltop town of Macerata, this month-long Macerata Opera Festival, is staged in the outdoor neoclassical theatre of Arena Sferisterio. In Pesaro, the hometown of Gioachino Rossini, composer of The Barber of Seville, there is an annual two-week Rossini Opera Festival, and interested visitors can visit the tall Pesaro town house, now a museum, where Rossini was born in 1792.

Le Marche also hosts a pilgrimage site, every year thousands of worshippers visit the Basilica della Santa Casa in Loreto. The amazing church with a soaring dome and bell tower some 75 metres high, which can be seen for miles around, is known for enshrining the house where the Virgin Mary was believed to have lived. Legend says the Santa Casa, now ensconced in an ornate marble screen by Bramante, was brought from Nazareth via Trsat in Croatia by a host of angels following the expulsion of the Crusaders from Palestine in 1294.