A taste of Italy can be found in downtown Perry at this new market. See inside

Telisa and Daniele Asaro often packed goodies in their luggage from trips to Italy to bring back home to family and friends in Bonaire.

Now, they’re also filling their travel bags with Italian finds to stock their Ciao Bella Market, which opened Saturday in downtown Perry.

The market at 1013 Northside Drive, Suite 102, on the first floor of The Chalet Lofts, is filled with a curated selection of all things Italian.

The couple have deep roots in Italy where Daniele Asaro grew up, and where his family has lived for generations. Born in Milan, he spent his summers in Sicily.

“We obviously love visiting Italy, and we had planned to retire back to Sicily,” Telisa Asaro said. “It’s a slower pace of life … a lower cost of living, and we love it there.

“But then when the grandchildren started coming, like we just knew … we couldn’t leave, so we decided to bring Italy here.”

Come and see this authentic Italian market

Take a walk around the market and you’ll find authentic Italian brands that you won’t normally see in most American stores.

“There are very traditional Italian products here and ingredients,” Telisa Asaro said. “Our drink cooler is full of drinks from Italy. Our shelves are full of products from Italy, so very authentic for the retail side.

“We have home goods. We have some bath and body. We have pastas and sauces and toppings and all the things. But we also have a deli, so we’ll be serving sandwiches and some bakery items, drinks, chips, that kind of stuff.”

The market also offers “jet fuel coffee,” Daniele Asaro interjected.

In partnership with Italian coffee maker Kimbo Coffee, the market offers the brand’s coffee when serving espresso and other coffee drinks. The brand also is available for purchase in a variety of types and sizes in both ground and whole bean.

The market is equipped with two Gaggia coffee makers from Milano, Italy.

“It’s really, really, really good coffee - jet fuel coffee ... We’re going to have … short espresso, long espresso, regular espresso, cappuccino, latte, cafe macchiato,” Daniele Asaro said.

The market also offers the Italian version of charcuterie boards.

“You can eat in. You can eat outside under the umbrellas. You can take it to go. We can box it up for you. We do office orders, corporate orders,” Telisa Asaro said.

The market also offers gift boxes that can be made on site while shopping in the store. Gift boxes already made in the market on a recent visit had a pistachio theme while another had a lemon theme.

In addition, the market offers pasta making classes and Italian language classes and they may add travel planning classes where people can come in and learn the ins and outs of traveling in Italy such as how to book a train.

“So it’s part retail, part deli, part classroom,” Asaro said of the market. “But all culturally Italian.”

What else can you can find at the Italian market?

Much of what can be found in the market is shipped directly from Italy or comes from a U.S. company that is already shipping authentic Italian products.

“Some brands are so ubiquitous with Italy that they are also offered in American markets,” Asaro said. “For example, our San Carlo potato chips. You can get those online.

“Did you know they existed? Maybe not. Have you ever tried the pesto potato chips? Probably not. So we’re still looking for those items that are kind of unknown or unfamiliar, but still very authentic to Italy. Other things, you know, literally, I made him (Daniele) carry in a backpack … from the grocery store through the airport and through border control.”

One of those backpack items was pocket coffee. Similar in size to a sauce packet with a peel back lid, pocket coffees have a tiny straw that pierces the top to access the coffee.

“There’s a summer version and a winter version,” she said. ”The winter version is more of a chocolate candy that’s filled with espresso. But you can only get them certain times of the year.

“So things like that like people here have probably just never heard of it. But it is very popular in Italy.”

While their kitchen goods aren’t necessarily made in Italy, they are made for making pastas, cannoli and other Italian foods.

When stocking the market, the Asaros sought advice from Daniele’s nephew, Emanuele Fornasiero, who worked as a chef at the Four Seasons Hotel in Milan, and now is a head chef at a resort in Bali, a province of Indonesia.

“When I started thinking about what kinds of things we wanted to have on the shelves, I reached out to him and said, ‘What is the most popular like sauces, tomato based products’ — because obviously that’s a staple —- ‘that is not a luxury brand, that is something everybody would know, everybody uses, very popular, and also that I could get shipped here?’“ Telisa Asaro said.

Among his recommendations was Mutti, a tomato concentrate that’s common in most Italian homes.

The Asaros are experimenting with market offerings.

“We’re actually looking to see what people want,” she said. “Opening weekend, the Galantino flavored olive oils sell out, I’m obviously going to go get some more of those.

“If something doesn’t do well, then I won’t buy more of those. But we’re always bringing in different types of products as well. So different toppings, different sauces, different tools … Just whatever I think people might be interested in, we’re going to try it, and we’ll see what does well.”

The market includes a wine closet with the Italian wines curated by Alan Bass, a certified sommelier in Macon. The wine closet is expected to be stocked once the market obtains its alcoholic beverage license.

Legends of Sicily showcased at the Italian market

When guests first come into the market, they’re greeted by Sicilian Moor’s heads. These ceramic decorative vases are based on legends from when Sicily was ruled by Arabs.

As one of the legends goes, a beautiful Sicilian woman who loved to grow plants on her balcony fell in love with Moor and upon learning that he was married with a family, cut off his head in a jealous rage and planted a basil plant in his head.

“You see these all over Sicily,” Asaro said.

What to expect at the pasta making classes

The first round of four pasta making classes will be taught by Chef LeeAnn Evertsen, owner of The Culinary Underground based in Perry. She trained in Italy in Milan and Florence, Asaro said.

“She’s bringing her own stash of ingredients, so flour from Italy that she brought back from a trip last month, for example,” Asaro said. “Then, of course, we’ll have the kitchen tools and things like that, that they use in the class, we’ll have them available for sale in the shop as well.

“We’re sending them (class members) home with an apron and their pasta and a sauce that Chef LeeAnn is going to make … She’s going to create a sauce and have it cooking here behind the counter while people are making the pasta, so then they get to take all of that home.”

The first round of the pasta making classes filled up ahead of the market’s opening.

Some cool finds at the Italian market

• Pastas from different regions of Italy, imported tomatoes and sauces to go with the pastas.
• Mulino Bianco cookies in a variety of flavors.
• A Bialetti moka express pot in the colors of the Italian flag of green, white and red. Asaro said most Italians make their coffee in a mocha pot.
• Heart-shape ravioli stamps, and cutting boards made out of olive wood.
• A “spaghetti alla puttanesca” bowl with an ingredients list painted in the bowl. The name translates “in the style of a prostitute” based on stories of Italian port town prostitutes who drew sailors into their dwellings based on the strong aroma of the pasta dish.
• Chinotto, an Italian herby and bittersweet soda that looks like cola but is not as sweet, and Estathé Pesca, Italian iced tea with a peach flavor. Daniele Asaro said the way to tell if the Estathe Pesca is imported from Italy is that the cap won’t twist all the way off. The cap is designed that way to put the top back on as needed, he said.

Their other business & Ciao Bella Market hours

The Asaros also own Float Robins, a wellness center in Warner Robins that offers sensory deprivation tanks. Other services offered include massage therapy, infrared sauna, red light therapy and halo therapy, which is a dry salt cave.

The couple expect to concentrate on the market, their “new baby,” with a capable manager, Denise “Neisey” Boggs, on site at Float Robins. But they’ll probably be back and forth between locations also.

“Shout out to Neisey,” Daniele Asaro said.

Tip: Sign up for emails on the Ciao Bella Market website to hear first about classes and other offerings.

Market hours are 9 a.m. to 7 p.m. Monday, Thursday, Friday and Saturday, 9 a.m. to 2 p.m. Sunday and closed Tuesday and Wednesday. Classes are expected to be held at 2 p.m. on Sundays. The number is 478-224-CIAO (2426).

This story was originally published November 14, 2025 at 6:00 AM.