If you ever find yourself in northern Italy, near Lake Como, I highly suggest a trip to this little place called Alva Market. It's a food mecca; the place Italians make a trip to on a Sunday just to eat good pizzoccheri (buckwheat pasta with potatoes, greens, and cheese) or polenta taragna (buckwheat polenta with a dangerous amount of taleggio cheese). Everything there is homemade or coming from the nearby valleys; they raise their own livestock, make their own cheese, cure their own salumi. My visit is easily one of the best food experiences of my life and the highlght of everything I've done and eaten in Italy.

What they're most known for is their bresaola. The've got a number of different kinds; beef, goat, etc., but what I was most enamored of was the horse bresaola. It was a slender cut of meat, allowing the rosemary, juniper, and other spices to really come through in each slice. The horse itself was quite sweet. Deep purpleish red. Truly incredible.