Butcher of Panzano Dario Cecchini - Antica Macelleria Cecchini

Dario Cecchini is known as the Butcher of Panzano, which is located in Chianti near Greve, in beautiful Tuscany.

The Cecchini family in Panzano have been the butcher's of Panzano for 600 years. For six centuries and continuing today under Dario "the Magnifico" Cecchini the Antica Macelleria Cecchini has butchered meet for the world's most famous and fed the most famous in its restaurant.

It is said Dante Aligheri loved to eat here and Leonardo da Vinci was inspired to paint the Mona Lisa after eating the meat butchered by the Cecchini family.

In his book Heat, Bill Buford observed Dario Cecchini is not just a butcher he is a Museum of Tuscany.

WebVisionItaly visited the Macelleria Cecchini and ate a very nice 'pranzo' on the Tuscan hill side. The weather was gorgeous in October and so while we give thanks and enjoy Christmas traditions with family and prepare for the New Year festivals we must include one Italy's great family traditions - Dario the Magnifico - Butcher of Panzano - in our thoughts this Christmas. Preparing wonderful lamb, Bistec Fiorentina etc etc.

Dario prepares cuts of meat in the greatest of Tuscan traditions, which date back to before the Renaissance and Medici family recipes written in books, to when recipes were shared orally from one Tuscan generation to the next. Dario learned to cut by mentoring with a family friend of his own father the butcher after he passed away. When in Chianti a visit to Dario Cecchini's Macelleria and a meal in the restaurant is a must see in Tuscany.

Click to view WebVionItaly's video interview with Dario Cecchini - Butcher of Panzano.

Parma, Emilia-Romagna: Head of Christ Excites Correggio in Parma Exhibition

PARMA, Antonio Allegri, known as Correggio after his birthplace, never enjoyed the fame of Michelangelo or Leonardo da Vinci. But art critics have placed him among the great masters of Italy's 16th century.

Antonio Allegri was born around 1490 in Correggio and then lived in nearby Parma, where he died in 1534.

Now an Italian exhibition in Parma, Mostra Corregio in Parma aims to increase awareness of Correggio's achievements.

Art fans and tourists to Parma until January 25, 2009 may stroll among the Galleria Nazionale, Camera di Sao Paolo, Chiesa di San Giovanni, and Cattedrale.

Inside Parma's Cathedral scaffolding allows visitors to climb into the dome to see Assumption of the Virgin, Correggio's masterpiece gleaming golden infinite sky.

Parma's elegant streets and sophisticated caffe's are buzzing with news that The Head of Christ inside the Parma's Galleria Nazionale fine art museum has turned typical polite discourse sour due to the controversy now surrounding the origins of the painting Head of Christ.

Is it a genuine Correggio, an old copy, or a forgery?

Go see the Mostra Correggio in Parma exhibition if you are traveling in Italy between now and January 25, 2009.

Report back your opinion on the Head of Christ by "Correggio-?" as it was recently labeled.

Click here for more video of Parma.

Click here to see video of the inventions and machines of Leonardo Da Vinci.

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