Food trip to an Italian Restaurant in Philadelphia

The Department of Transnational Italian Studies is delighted to announce a field trip to L’Anima Restaurant in Philadelphia for a culinary experience led by professional Italian chef Gianluca Demontis. 

The tasting menu will include a three-course dinner of authentic staples in the Italian cuisine accompanied by soft Italian beverages. The chef will offer historical contextualization and explanations in Italian about the history and the making of the menu, and a Q&A will follow. The event is organized within Luca Zipoli’s course “Intermediate Italian through Culture II” (ITAL B102) and is open also to students not enrolled in the class via RSVP. Limited seats are available. 

Please contact lzipoli@brynmawr.edu for RSVP and more information.

The event is co-sponsored by the Tri-Co Philly Program.

Start time and location: 5:15 pm at L’Anima Restaurant (1001 South 17th Street, Philadelphia, PA 19146).

Instructions: take the PAO #5438 train that departs from Bryn Mawr at 4:22 pm and that arrives at Suburban Station at 4:53 pm. On the way back take the PAO #9547 train that departs from Suburban Station at 7:15 pm and that arrives at Bryn Mawr at 7:43 pm.

Abstract:

On December 10, 2025, during its twentieth session held in New Delhi, India, the “Intergovernmental Committee for the Safeguarding of the Intangible Cultural Heritage” of the UNESCO (the United Nations Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organization) decided to inscribe “Italian cooking, between sustainability and biocultural diversity” on the “Representative List of the Intangible Cultural Heritage of Humanity.” This deliberation marked the first time an entire national cuisine has received this distinction, and recognized Italy as a diverse combination of multiple culinary traditions connected by techniques and practices that emphasize respect for natural ingredients, conviviality of social gatherings around the table, and transmission of knowledge, skills, and memories across generations. This field trip explores the distinctive features of the diverse culinary, cultural, and social traditions in the Italian peninsula by reflecting recent trends in “Food Studies” scholarship and by blending experiential learning with second-language practice in Italian. 

Speaker's bio:
Chef Gianluca Demontis was born in Rome, Italy, from a family with roots both in the Abruzzo Region and in Sardegna. He was trained at the Instituto Tecnico Alberghiero “Via Tor Carbone” in Roma and moved to the United States in 1997 after meeting his wife Rosemarie Tran, a Vietnamese-American from Philadelphia, during her study abroad at “Temple in Rome.” Gianluca and Rosemarie first opened “Melograno”, in Center City, in the summer of 2003 and two more restaurants followed, with the latest (“L’Anima”) opening in South Philadelphia in 2018. During this dinner, Gianluca will share his love for and the history of the food he grew up with as well as the skills he has acquired throughout the years, with frequent travels to Italy with his family for meals, shared experiences, and family stories that date back generations.

Tri-Co Philly Transnational Italian Studies