The second best museum in Rome

It's a relief to get out of the stark summer heat into the cool dark entrance of this museum. It's not my first visit nor will it be my last. This gem lies off the usual tourist beat in a semi-deserted waste land of abandoned and demolished dwellings on the Via Ostiense between Piramide and the basilica of San Paolo outside the walls. To be fair, it is better signposted than it used to be, large fanions mark the entrance with the distinctive burgundy Roma colours.

I've walked over from Garbatella past the new bridge and the vast area that is all that remains of the Mercati Generali, once a lively bustling wholesale food market which has now been moved out of the city.
Centrale Montemartini is a disused thermoelectric plant. In fact, it was Rome's first thermoelectric plant. It was named after Giovanni Montemartini, the city council's 'technology assessor'. He died a year after its inauguration in 1912 during a council session

The plant ceased to function in 1963 and fell into disrepair  It was abandoned for 20 years until ACEA, the owner, decided to restore the building and gather there some pieces of machinery such as a steam turbine dating to 1917and a thirties diesel engine to safe keep what they qualified was the city's industrial archaeology. It took a few more years for someone to come up with the idea of using the space for other than just industrial machinery.

In 1997, the Capitoline museums were undergoing refurbishment and a selection of art works were moved to the Centrale. They were displayed in a temporary exhibition entitle 'God's and Machines'.

What was temporary in 1997, due to its success became permanent in 2011. Over the years, the collection has been expanded, modified and, to date, comprises around 400 works of ancient Roman art. In 2013, the second boiler room was opened to the public to comprise Pope Pius IX's train.
Once past the ticket office I turn left into a small space with a staircase. There are various bits of machinery: pistons, wheels, spanners in front of which are exhibited stone sarcophagi bearing ornate reliefs of daily or imagined Roman scenes from the deceased's life: hunts, children playing in a farmyard, battles, family life...
I head up the stairs to the Engine Room. It contains two huge Tosi 7500 Hp diesel engines from 1930 as well as a 3000 kW turbine. Even though everything is well labeled in the museum I know this last information because it is in the brochure. Come on, I'd never be able to remember it. Grab a free brochure at the ticket desk, it contains small nuggets of information as well as a map of the museum.

Antinous, Hadrian's favourite. He drowned in the Nile.

Agrippina, fourth wife and niece of Claudius.

What I do remember are statues of the goddess Athena; various muses, some of which are gigantic; the busts of Roman gentry, hairstyles for the matrons attesting to period, mostly Repubblican; the Emperor Claudius (later deified), Caracalla, Severus and others as well as Hadrian's favourite Antinous; a black statue of Claudius fourth wife, the murderous (she killed  him) and murdered (her son, Nero, got her) Agrippina. At the back of the room is a pediment of the temple of Apollo Sosianus with a well-photographed classical butt (you'll recognise it when you see it) as well as some eye-catching giant pieces of statuary from the Sacred area of Largo Argentina.

I turn out of the room into Boiler Room 1 (1950s issue) dedicated to the large suburban residences of the wealthy, known as horti. The central mosaics and the large dark boiler dominate the space. Everything is exhibited against a turquoise background. TI'm not sure about the choice of colour. Is it supposed to be appeasing? he room is quiet all I can hear is the hum of the air conditioning system, a lone teenager wanders in and a museum guard is sitting on a chair next to a phone. Two elderly women break the silence and loudly enter the room. They seem to be looking for something. It isn't here. They go.

I go back to the ground floor to the Room of the Columns a significant part of the collection is dedicated to funerary urns, statues and sarcophagi. The hairstyle of one matron sets her in the Republican age, her tresses imitate the hairstyles of the nobility, her husband a freedman stands stern beside her.   A sarcophagus lid shows three brothers, side by side.  One middle-aged man chose to have a statue of himself holding his father and grandfather's heads in his arms. If anyone doubts that baldness is hereditary this should settle their doubts. Other items on display refer to military triumphs and the introduction of luxury items into private residences.

I can hear a voice, rather a drone of a voice. It's rather annoying. It breaks the tranquillity of the museum. A father and his son appear, they start calling for, "mum." I enter a large high-ceilinged room to find myself starring at three train carriages. A video is playing on a loop, I identify the annoying voice. I'm perplexed  What is this doing here? It's Pope Pius IX special train from 1858. There is no explanation as to why it is in this museum in Boiler Room 2, though as I read the information, I realise that the train has been passed from museum to museum. Maybe no one knows what to do with it? It's dark and forbidding and takes up a lot of room. I can imagine the curators of the various museums thinking "what are we meant to do with this one?" - a gift from the Vatican to Rome.The father and son combo have found mum and are pouring into the room, mum decides this is as good a place as any to make a phone call.

I make my way back to the entrance by way of a temporary Etruscan Egyptian exhibition which from my cursory glance seems to have lots of explanatory panels and models and few actual exhibits. The one exhibit that does catch my eye, the Queen Nefertiti, is a copy. Not very interesting this, just trying to fill some space, it looks appropriate for a school trip and a bunch of kids on a fact finding mission. But anyway, don't they find all that information on their phones?
I leave the building into the sweltering hot sun of an August afternoon. Opposite the entrance is a small memorial to employees of the plant who died in the two world wars.

The Centrale Montemartini is an original museum marrying classical works from ancient Rome with 20th century thermoelectric machinery. The stark darkness of the machinery offsets the white statues. It is perfect.

Flat green beans alla Romana

I ponder the same old question in this holiday month: why is it that when you no longer need to rely on buses they're suddenly all over the place? I've done the impossible. I went to the centre (the campidoglio) to get my MIC card and returned home all on the same bus ticket. Bus tickets are valid for 90 minutes. That never happens when I really need a bus, when I have to get to work.
And  the MIC (musei in commune) card, a 5 euro annual museum card for Rome residents, is a great idea, the only one so far that the M5S city administration has had. The Tiber beach, called Tiberis, an idea nicked from Paris, is not such a good idea. Even less so when I read that the local Roma would be in charge of security, though later this was denied by the mayor's office.

I return from my brief errand sweat drenched. When it's so hot heat relief is top of the agenda which means lots of cool drinks, though according to many Italians this is not a wise move as it's bad for the stomach i.e. mega stomach cramping, and large hearty salads, which have to be removed from fridge half an hour before consumption (see above).

A belated discovery was that of large flat Italian green beans, a vegetable I once regarded with suspicion. It wasn't a green bean or a runner bean or a mangetout. It didn't seem to exist in northern climes. It was unwieldy and unattractive and besides how did you cook it?
It turned out to be as easy to deal with as its smaller cousin the green bean. In Rome these big guys are called 'piattoni', literally big flat ones. Throughout Italy they are known as fagioli corallo, which are not coral beans as Google translate suggested. Coral beans are another kettle of fish.

A refreshing Roman speciality is piattoni braised in tomatoes and onions. It's a dish which has the benefits of being low in calories, even better the next day, and even better eaten cold. I like it fridge cold, and ignore the potential threats to digestion.


To make this dish, the fagioli corallo cotto a crudo (flat green beans cooked from raw), take about 500grs of beans. Top and tail them, rinse and cut on the bias in equal size pieces. In a pan put some oil and a finely chopped onion, and if you like some garlic. There is an old wives tale that insists that garlic and onions should not be used in the same dish. Then add tomatoes either open a tin of peeled plum tomatoes or wash, peel, chop some good quality fresh tomatoes, the juicier the better. Mix everything then toss in the prepared beans. Cover and leave to cook for about 40 mins on a low heat as you don't want the tomatoes or onions to burn and stick. You can always add a little water to loosen things up if this should happen, presuming it hasn't happened so catastrophically you need to throw it all away! Once the beans have softened to eatable consistency turn off the burner and let it sit 20 minutes before serving. Add salt, pepper orherbs such as basil or flat pasley, finely chopped.

You may serve the beans as a main dish on their own or with some cold meat or with a fried egg on top or as in the picture with a burrata. It could equally be a side dish, part of several to accompany a piece of meat. Whatever you choose to do with it, remember it's even better cold the next day. It's a perfect refreshing dish for those too hot summer days.