Rick Stein's Long Weekend in Bologna

I didn't know Rick Stein before November 2015.

"Hi, I'm Elizabeth from the BBC. We are we are planning to film an episode of Rick Stein's Long Weekend in Bologna and I'm looking for a local food expert.
Can you help Rick to find the most traditional food of Bologna, its legends and the best shops and restaurants to taste it?"

I searched on Google.
Wow.
Sneak behind the scenes and see what happened.

Setting the stage for Rick

After this first call, I met Arezoo and Grace, producers of the show, in the early morning of a cold Saturday in January 2016. We spent a full day together, between coffee and smiles, tagliatelle and questions.

They were looking not only for the best food of Bologna but for the right characters that could partner with Rick during the show.

Bloggers and baristas, pasta artisans and university students, chefs and grandmas: I opened my agenda and shared all my knowledge to set the table for the real filming.

Rick Stein in Bologna

The filming took place on a rainy week in March 2016. It was such hard work, but the word 'BBC' opened all the secrets doors of Bologna usually locked. Restaurant kitchens, towers, pasta makers homes.

They even hired a quartet to play violin just under the window of Hotel Corona D'Oro, where the full troupe stayed.

The shooting was intense but at night we had the time with Rick and all the crew to cheer with a glass of Pignoletto wine and share suggestions not only about food.

One funny fact?

​Most of the guys were unprepared for Bologna's winter weather and they ended up sick pretty soon. The bus we traveled around Bologna was delivering not only microphones and cameras but bacteria and sneezes.

Where Rick Stein ate in Bologna

People always ask me the same thing: "Ok, but where did he actually eat?" 
Here's the real list, street by street.

• Aroma Specialty Coffee: where Rick started his mornings before the cameras rolled. Small cups, strong coffee, the kind of place you stand at the counter rather than sit.
• Le Sfogline: the pasta makers you see in the photo above, rolling out tagliatelle by hand. Rick spent a good chunk of the shoot with flour up to his elbows here.
• Banco 32: a fish counter, not a meat one. Rick sat down for stuffed squid here, and it's the kind of dish you don't expect to find in a landlocked city famous for ragù.
• Mercato delle Erbe Bologna's historic covered market, and one of the first places we brought him to set the scene for the whole episode.
• Osteria del Sole: no kitchen, no menu, just wine and whatever you bring in yourself. One of the oldest osterie in the city, and exactly the kind of place that doesn't translate well to TV unless you've actually sat inside it.
• Trattoria Scaccomatto: a proper sit-down trattoria stop, now the place has moved to a beautiful garden hidden behind old walls.

Two more places never made the final cut, but Rick ate there all the same: Osteria Bottega, and Cremeria Santo Stefano, which still serves some of the best gelato in the Bologna. 

Editing a one-hour episode means leaving things on the floor, and those two never got their moment, but they deserve one now.