Adria
—  Comune  —
Città di Adria
Canal Bianco
Adria Location of Adria in Italy
Coordinates: 45°03′N 12°03′E / 45.05°N 12.05°E / 45.05; 12.05
Country	Italy
Region	Veneto
Province	Rovigo (RO)
Frazioni	Baricetta, Bellombra, Bottrighe, Ca' Emo, Campelli, Canareggio, Canton, Canton Basso, Capitello, Case Beviacqua, Case Matte, Ca'Tron, Cavanella Po, Cavedon, Chiavica Pignatta, Corcrevà, Curicchi, Fasana Polesine, Fienile Santissimo, Forcarigoli, Isolella, Mazzorno Sinistro, Montefalche, Palazzon, Passetto, Piantamelon, Sabbioni, San Pietro Basso, Tiro A Segno, Valliera, Voltascirocco
Government
• Mayor	Massimo "Bobo" Barbujani (since 22 June 2009)
Area
• Total	113.5 km2 (43.8 sq mi)
Elevation	4 m (13 ft)
Population (1 March 2010)
• Total	20,442
• Density	180/km2 (470/sq mi)
Demonym	Adriesi
Time zone	CET (UTC+1)
• Summer (DST)	CEST (UTC+2)
Postal code	45011
Dialing code	0426
Patron saint	Saints Peter and Paul
Saint day	29 June
Website	Official website

The New Cathedral

Adria is a town and comune in the province of Rovigo in the Veneto region of Northern Italy, situated between the mouths of the rivers Adige and Po.

The Etruscan^[1] city of Adria ("Hatria") is below the modern city, three to four metres below the current level. Adria ("Hatria") may have given its name during an early period to the Adriatic Sea, to which it was connected by channels.^[2] Adria and Spina were the Etruscan ports and depots for Felsina (now Bologna).

History[link]

Ancient era[link]

The first settlements built on the area are of Venetic origin, during the 12-9th century BC. At that time the main stream of the Po, the Adria channel, flowed into the sea by this area. The Villanovan culture, named for an archaeological site at the village of Villanova, near Bologna (Etruscan Felsina), flourished in this area from the 10th until as late as the 6th century BC. The foundations of classical Atria are dated from 530 to 520 BC.^[3]

The Etruscans built the port and settlement of Adria after the channel was not the main stream anymore. During the later period of the 6th century BC the port continued to flourish. The Etruscan-controlled area of the Po Valley was generally known as Padan Etruria (Padan meant 'Po River'; cf. Celtic *dānu 'river'), as opposed to their main concentration along the Tyrrhenian coast south of the Arno.

Greeks^[4] from Aegina^[5] and later from Syracuse by Dionysius I colonised the city making it into an emporion. Greeks had been trading with the Eneti from the sixth century BC.^[6]

Mass Celtic incursions into the Po valley resulted in friction between the Gauls and Etruscans and intermarriage, attested by epigraphic inscriptions on which Etruscan and Celtic names appear together. The city was populated^[7] by Etruscans, Eneti, Greeks and Celts.

Pliny the Elder, a Roman author and fleet commander, wrote about a system of channels in Atria that was, "first made by the Tuscans [Etruscans], thus discharging the flow of the river across the marshes of the Atriani called the Seven Seas, with the famous harbor of the Tuscan town of Atria which formerly gave the name of Atriatic to the sea now called the Adriatic." Pliny's "Seven Seas" were interlinked coastal lagoons, separated from the open sea by sandspits and barrier islands.^[8] The Etruscans extended this natural inland waterway with new canals to extend the navigation possibilities of the tidal reaches of the Po all the way north to Atria. As late as the time of the emperor Vespasian, shallow draft galleys could still be rowed from Ravenna into the heart of Etruria.

Under Roman occupation the town ceded importance to the former Greek colony Ravenna as the continued siltation of the Po delta carried the seafront further to the east. The sea is now about 22 km from Adria.

The first exploration of ancient Atria was carried out by Carlo Bocchi and published as Importanza di Adria la Veneta. The collections of the Bocchi family were given to the public at the beginning of the 20th century and comprise a major part of the city museum collection of antiquities.

There are several ideas concerning the etymology of the ancient toponym Adria/Atria. One theory is that it derives from the Illyrian (Venetic language) word adur, 'water', 'sea'.^[9]

Medieval and modern age[link]

At the time of the fall of the Western Roman Empire, the port of Adria had lost most of its importance. It finally declined after the total change of the local hydrography in 589, and Adria became a fief of the archdiocese of Ravenna.

After a period as an independent commune, it was a possession of the Este of Ferrara and, in the 16th century, of the Republic of Venice. At that time Adria was a small village surrounded by malaria-plagued marshes. It recovered its importance when Polesine was reclaimed in the same century.

During the Napoleonic Wars it was first under France, then under Austria, to which it was assigned in 1815 after the Congress of Vienna, as part of Lombardy-Venetia.

Main sights[link]

• Church of Santa Maria Assunta della Tomba (formerly the cathedral), of medieval origin but rebuilt in 1718. It houses an octagonal baptismal font from the 7th or 8th century, with the carved name of the 3rd bishop of Adria, Bono. Other artworks include several 15th and 16th centuries paintings, and, in the chapel, a terracotta relief depicting a Dormitio Virginis, attributed to Michele da Firenze.
• Adria Cathedral, the New Cathedral (Cattedrale Nuova dei Santi Petro i Paulo), dedicated to Saints Peter and Paul
• Museo Archeologico Nazionale di Adria

International relations[link]

Twin towns — Sister cities[link]

Adria is twinned with the following towns:

• Ermont, France
• Kalisz, Poland
• Lampertheim, Germany
• Maldegem, Belgium
• Rovinj, Croatia, since 1982

See also[link]

• Bishopric of Adria

References[link]

Wikisource has the text of the 1911 Encyclopædia Britannica article Adria.

•  This article incorporates text from a publication now in the public domain: Herbermann, Charles, ed. (1913). "Adria". Catholic Encyclopedia. Robert Appleton Company. 
• This article incorporates text from Easton's Bible Dictionary (1897), a publication now in the public domain.

Notes

External links[link]

Wikimedia Commons has media related to: Adria

• Northern Etruria
• Etruscan Engineering and Agriculture
• International Standard Bible Encyclopedia: "Adria"
• Richard Stillwell, ed. Princeton Encyclopedia of Classical Sites, 1976: "Adria (Atria), Veneto, Italy
• Museo Archeologico Nazionale di Adria

This biographical article needs additional citations for verification. Please help by adding reliable sources. Contentious material about living persons that is unsourced or poorly sourced must be removed immediately, especially if potentially libelous or harmful. (July 2010)

Ferran Adrià

Born	(1962-05-14) May 14, 1962 (age 50) L'Hospitalet de Llobregat, Barcelona, Catalonia, Spain
Current restaurant(s) El Bulli

Ferran Adrià i Acosta (Catalan pronunciation: [fəˈran əðɾiˈa]) is a Catalan chef born on May 14, 1962 in L'Hospitalet de Llobregat. He was the head chef of the El Bulli restaurant in Roses on the Costa Brava, and is considered one of the best chefs in the world.^[1]

Career[link]

A liquid olive, one of Adrià's appetizers

Ferran Adrià began his culinary career in 1980 during his stint as a dishwasher at the Hotel Playafels, in the town of Castelldefels. The chef de cuisine at this hotel taught him traditional Spanish cuisine. At 19 he was drafted into military service where he worked as a cook. In 1984, at the age of 22, Adrià joined the kitchen staff of El Bulli as a line cook. Eighteen months later he became the head chef.

In 1994, Ferran Adria and Juli Soler (his partner) sold 20% of their business to Miquel Horta (a Catalan millionaire and philanthropist and son of the founder of Nenuco) for 120 million Pesetas. This event became a turning point for el Bulli: the money was used to finance to expansion of the kitchen and the relationship with Horta opened the door to new clients, businessmen, and politicians who helped spread the word about the creative experimentation happening at the time in Cala Montjoi. ^[2]

Along with British chef Heston Blumenthal, Adrià is often associated with "molecular gastronomy," although like Blumenthal the Catalan chef does not consider his cuisine to be of this category.^[3] Instead, he has referred to his cooking as deconstructivist.^[4] Adrià's stated goal is to "provide unexpected contrasts of flavour, temperature and texture. Nothing is what it seems. The idea is to provoke, surprise and delight the diner."^[5] As he likes to say, "the ideal customer doesn't come to El Bulli to eat but to have an experience."

El Bulli is only open for about six months of the year (in 2010, the season was due to run from June 15 to December 20).^[6] Adrià spends the remaining six months of the year perfecting recipes in his workshop "El Taller" in Barcelona. He is famous for his thirty course gourmet menu.

He is also well known for creating "culinary foam". In his quest to enhance flavour, Adrià discards the use of cream and egg; foam is made exclusively of the main ingredient and "air" (combined in a siphon bottle equipped with N₂O cartridges). Adrià's foam creations include foamed espresso (Èspesso), foamed mushroom, and foamed beetroot, as well as foamed meats.

El Bulli has 3 Michelin stars and is regarded as one of the best restaurants in the world. In 2005, it ranked second in the Restaurant Top 50. It was awarded the first place in 2006, displacing The Fat Duck in Bray, England. El Bulli retained this title in 2007, 2008 and 2009, but in 2010 the title was awarded to Noma of Copenhagen, Denmark.

Adrià is the author of several cookbooks including A Day at El Bulli, El Bulli 2003-2004 and Cocinar en Casa (Cooking at Home). With his young assistant Daniel Picard, Adrià has made almonds into cheese and asparagus into bread with the help of natural ingredients.^[7]

Adrià has been a featured chef on Great Chefs television.^[8]

In the fall of 2010, Adrià and José Andrés will teach a culinary physics course at Harvard University.^[9]

In October 2010, Adrià announces an alliance with Telefónica.^[10]

Controversy[link]

Adrià denounced his fellow 3-star Michelin cook Santi Santamaria who described his approach to cuisine as "pretentious". Traditionalist Santi Santamaria attacked Adrià's dishes in El Bulli as unhealthy, alleging that "Adrià's dishes are designed to impress rather than satisfy and used chemicals that actually put diners' health at risk". Top chefs, however, accused Santamaria, who runs the 3-star Can Fabes near El Bulli, of envy and "endangering the reputations of Spanish kitchens".^[11] The criticism has split top Spanish chefs into pro- and anti-Adrià camps.^[12] Unusual dishes that have been criticized include frozen whisky sour candy, white garlic and almond sorbet, tobacco-flavoured blackberry crushed ice and Kellogg's paella (Rice Krispies, shrimp heads and vanilla-flavoured mashed potatoes).

German food writer, Jörg Zipprick, accused Adrià of more or less poisoning his customers with the additives he uses in his cuisine and said that Adrià's menu should carry health warnings: "These colorants, gelling agents, emulsifiers, acidifiers and taste enhancers that Adrià has introduced massively into his dishes to obtain extraordinary textures, tastes and sensations do not have a neutral impact on health".^[13]

Domestic Commercialisation[link]

Texturas^[14] is a range of products by Ferran Adrià, and his brother Albert Adrià. The products include the Sferificación, Gelificación, Emulsificación, Espesantes and Surprises lines are the result of a rigorous process of selection and experimentation. Texturas include products such as Xanthan and Algin which are packaged and labelled as Xantana Texturas and Algin Texturas respectively.^[15] Xanthan gum allows the user to use a very small amount to thicken soups, sauces and creams without changing the flavour. Algin is a key component of the "Spherification Kit" and is essential for every spherical preparation: caviar, raviolis, balloons, gnocchi, pellets, and mini-spheres.^[16]

Works[link]

• El Bulli 1983-1993 (with Juli Soler and Albert Adrià)
• El Bulli: el sabor del Mediterráneo, 1993, ISBN 84-7596-415-X
• Los secretos de El Bulli, 1997, ISBN 448710002
• El Bulli 1994-1997 (with Juli Soler and Albert Adrià)
• Cocinar en 10 minutos con Ferran Adrià, 1998, ISBN 84-605-7628-0
• Celebrar el milenio con Arzak y Adrià (with Juan Mari Arzak), 1999, ISBN 84-8307-246-7
• El Bulli 1998-2002 (with Juli Soler and Albert Adrià), Conran Octopus, 2003, ISBN 1-84091-346-0; Ecco, 2005, ISBN 0-06-081757-7
• El Bulli 2003-2004 (with Juli Soler and Albert Adrià), Ecco, 2006, ISBN 0-06-114668-4
• El Bulli 2005
• A Day At El Bulli 2008
• FOOD for thought THOUGHT for food (El Bulli y Ferran Adrià), 2009 ACTAR Editorial, ISBN 978-84-96954-68-7
• The Family Meal: Home Cooking with Ferran Adria 2011 Phaidon, ISBN 978-0-7148-6253-8

In October 2008, Ferran Adrià published A Day At El Bulli along with Juli Soler, and Albert Adrià. The book describes 24-hours at the El Bulli restaurant, with images, commentary, photographs and 30 recipes. Most of the recipes included are complex and require many out-of-the ordinary kitchen appliances, such as a Pacojet, freeze-dryer, liquid nitrogen tank, candyfloss machine and Perspex molds.

See also[link]

• Haute cuisine

References[link]

External links[link]

• Great Chefs Biography
• About.com Biography
• Interview with The Guardian