The history of Arista is very interesting, it coincides with the story of the Byzantine Patriarch Bessarion and his arrival in Florence in 1430 for the ecumenical council.
While tasting an excellent pork roast he said “Aristos” greek for the best, excellent. The others sitting around the table thought that he was simply calling the roast pork by its greek name. This is how they started calling pork roast arista.
Now, this little story is interesting, unfortunately it can’t be true since a century before Bessarion’s arrival in Tuscany people were already talking about arista.
Thus, we are left with two possible hypotheses: a) Arista is a greek word and in the 13th century there were greeks living in Florence (they were perfume merchants) and their presence is also testified by the neighborhood and street called “Borgo dei Greci”. b) Arista comes from the latin arista that also means upper part, like the pork shank……??
Why not leave your opinion on this tasty and ancient query?
Here’s the recipe, used in the St. Valentine’s menu and here’s the video:
how to make Arista, a traditional recipe, explained step by step by a tuscan chef.
![[Photo credits: Cooperativa Zenzero http://ow.ly/gJDqq]](http://www.turismo.intoscana.it/allthingstuscany/tuscanycious/files/2012/10/foto1.jpg)
Dear Tuscanycious, this post was very informative. I am Greek so when I saw the word Arista, I knew what the word meant. I did not know the story about the roast pork, or that the Greeks were perfume merchants during the era the story takes place in. Coincidently I work with perfume! OMG! Incredible presentation. Loved your site, very professional. Photos/video were crisp and clear. Recipes concise and easy to read. I shall be back for a bite of more.
Thank you for sharing.
Cheers, Gaby
You can visit me at http://ptsaldari.posterous.com
Your Description about “arista” is authentic, I use to serve to my customers warm with the aux jus on sliced rosemary potatoes and sauteed garlic “rapini”, is a dish that goes very well with a dry Tuscan wine like chianti classico, or a vino nobile of montepulciano, o a nice sangiovese.
Arista if i cooked right is very good the day after in a nice warm Italian “maggiolino” sandwich with a fennel chiffonade a savoy cabbage cold slow dressed with a touch of lemon tangy musturd.
Good Job Oriana on this blog.
Yummy. You have a beautiful blog!