My last trip to Italy, we were all set to book a Ferrari F430 Spider capable of going from zero to 60 miles per hour in four seconds and performing at a maximum speed of over 193 mph. But due to circumstances beyond our control, the hot drop-top Prancing Horse fell through.

It would have been fun zooming around the Emilia-Romagna region of Italy, the home of Parmigiano-Reggiano cheese, prosciutto, and Ferrari, with 479 horses purring under the hood, every head turned on our direction. But I quickly learned that Parma is not conducive to speed. Not if you want to look through the open doors of centuries-old palazzos into courtyards with flowering gardens, or stroll down quaint and winding cobblestone streets much too narrow for a car.

As we wandered in Parma’s historic district, I had to admit we were much better off without the Ferrari. What good would it be to drive a Formula One into the city when the famous Piazza del Duomo doesn’t allow cars? We would have missed the famous fresco by Correggio in the11th-century cathedral and the octagonal baptistery made of pink Verona marble.

By the second day, I was no longer thinking about the car. Cristiana, our bilingual guide, escorted us to a fifth-generation family-owned cheese dairy, one of 600 in the Emilia-Romagna region. "The cheese- maker is the most important person in Parma," she said as we watched him stir the morning and evening milk in huge copper pots, the same way cheese-makers have been doing for 700 years. Cows fed only local grasses and natural vegetable feed produce the milk. The cheese contains no additives, and its particular flavor is a result of natural fermenting. It takes 4.23 gallons of milk to make 2.2 pounds of Parmigiano-Reggiano. Cheese is the DNA of Italians, and Christiana admitted she eats almost a pound and a half of Parmigiano-Reggiano a month. Her father, though, eats a pound a day.

"He would put it in his coffee if he could," she said.

In one corner of the room, a middle-aged woman sat soaking her foot in a large bucket. Christiana explained that there’s always a bucket of whey for the local people because it’s rich in calcium and helps fractures heal faster. She led us to a room with thousands of cheese wheels aging on long wooden shelves for an average of 24 months. All this cheese was making me hungry. Happily, Cristiana invited us to lunch with her friend Mama Rosa, a woman in her 60s who greeted us warmly and invited us into her kitchen.

We watched as she prepared butterflied tenderloin of beef with olive oil, garlic, and two layers of Parmigiano-Reggiano. She put it in the oven and led us to the dining room for an appetizer of small chunks of Parmigiano, over which we drizzled local balsamic vinegar. The cheese was hard, grainy, and richly flavored, and I couldn’t stop eating it.

After that came crepes with asparagus and Parmigiano, followed by anolini, small pasta dumplings filled with Parmigiano. Finally, a freshly baked heart-shaped pie filled with sweet strawberries. I had never tasted food so good, so fresh.

The next day, Simon, a former lawyer who had such a passion for Prosciutto di Parma that he changed careers to work for the Parma Ham Consortium, drove us out of town to a prosciutto producer.

Parma hams must be cured at least five kilometers from the city, where the air is purer. The secret of this famous ham, Simon explained, is the pigs. Only nine-month-old castrated males weighing a minimum of 352 pounds and bred only in certain regions of Italy are chosen for the famous ham. In Parma, 171 companies make Prosciutto di Parma, and last year they produced 9,443,000 hams. I think I saw every one of them as Simon led us through the spotless facility, explaining that the only additive used in Parma ham is salt, and that its amino acid content helps maintain an efficient immune system.

He then took us to nearby Castello di Torrechiara, a 15th-century hilltop castle filled with frescoes including an entire room painted with naked acrobats from floor to ceiling, and a "Golden Bedchamber"

with frescoes devoted to love. The room led to an outdoor balcony with unobstructed panoramic views of rolling hills, olive groves, and farmland. We were only 11 miles outside of Parma, but it felt as though we’d been transported back in time to a place with no streetlights, billboards, or buildings.

Lunch was on the castle grounds at Taverna del Castello, a quaint stone restaurant whose focaccia was fresh out of the oven. We shared huge plates of Parmigiano drizzled in local balsamic vinegar and platters of Prosciutto di Parma. I’m not a big meat eater, but this ham tasted better than the finest smoked salmon. I also don’t eat much pasta or dessert, but how could I turn down pumpkin and spinach tortelli, risotto with mushrooms, and finally pear with chocolate cream in a pastry shell and crème caramel?

For four days, I ate every kind of pasta, from tortelli to tagliatelle. I tried such delicacies as cooked eel, Parmigiana tripe, and stewed tongue with porcini mushrooms. And of course, I had to try every flavor of gelato.

Now that I think about it, I’m glad I didn’t have a Ferrari, because Italy is not about showing off. It’s about enjoying a centuries-old culture and savoring foods that people have been perfecting for generations. For me, it was like walking through a garden and being surrounded by hundreds of different colors and flowers I never knew existed.

Our next trip to Italy, we’ll try Tuscany and Umbria. Or maybe Sicily. Or Verona. It doesn’t matter where, as long as it’s Italy and there’s Italian food. During our entire time in Italy, we never did see a Ferrari. Could it be all the drivers were too busy eating? ET