7 gennaio
I am in my favorite place in all of Siena—the apartment in P. S. Francesco where I lived the summer I came to language school… Trudy and I arrived here yesterday after spending 3 days (2 nights) in Montalcino and it is just wonderful to have a house and a warm bedroom with down quilts, and a heater that is so warm that it must be turned down at night, and a full kitchen, and a big kitchen table to sit and eat and visit with friends, and all the cooking and serving equipment you could ask for, and a tv that has all the fun Italian channels, plus one BBC … perfetto!
On Sunday morning we left Florence by bus, spent the afternoon in Siena with Pino, had some pizza, and took the bus to Montalcino. We arrived there in the dark, which was ok, since we would return to Siena in the light so that we could see the magnificent country side on the way back… anyways, Montalcino was really beautiful, but the pictures don’t do it justice—the light is flat and gray with this cold weather. It is a perfectly situated town perched on a hill with about 300 degrees of view down to the valleys below, and just a little bit of a hill to the southwest… it is in the Val d’Orcia and is completely surrounded by rolling, cultivated farmlands, dotted by homes and farm buildings on the hilltops… the rows of vines and olives and crops are in patches that have been cultivated for centuries to take advantage of each individual micro-climate that each slope and hillside, and ravine offers to the crops being grown… We are so used to the beauty of “wilderness” and of “natural” (not crafted or managed by our hands) in the US, and in Italy it is the beautiful, rugged, rocky land that has been sculpted by our hands to bring the most delicious wines and olive oil and vegetables and livestock that is the most beautiful thing here. The landscape has captivated people for as long as it has been cultivated, I think, and you can see some of the most beautiful photographs—tens of thousands, I suppose, but none can do justice like seeing it with your eyes, each field and stone house from a unique perspective that no one else has ever seen… The thought of leaving, and of not being able to pick out a house and a farm, and to move in and to live in this beauty… well, those are the thoughts I had riding on that bus coming back to Siena from Montalcino…
Back to Montalcino—we arrived in the dark with no map of the town (it’s tiny!) but with the phone number of the agent who we rented from… with some words on the phone, and with directions from a cute little old wine shop owner, we easily made our way up a street, took the first left, passed through two piazza, and found Camere del Bacco on our left. The woman was there in a couple minutes, and we went up two flights of stairs—the first floor holding a convenient and cute kitchen, to our room on the second floor with a window facing out to the street. I asked the agent for suggestions for dinner and she gave me two—one was Bacchanal, and when we left we went to Bacchus, which turns out to be right before Bacchanal, but in the end we had a delightful experience and a wonderful dinner… We first stopped in a café wine shop (EVERY shop in Montalcino, from the tailor, to the the cafes, to the souvenir shops, are wine shops!) and went into the back room, the brick ceilinged “cantina” and looked over the wine list and ordered two glasses of 2001 Brunello (can’t remember the winery off hand) and enjoyed those glasses immensely, accompanied by the plate of bruschetta that was brought to our table gratis—just a large slice of freshly toasted bread, rubbed with garlic, and drizzled with extra virgin olive oil and a little salt, and a little chopped tomato… mmmm….. it really can’t get much better than that…
So then we went to Bacchus for dinner. The restaurant is two small rooms, the first with just a large deli case with mom and dad and son Alessandro standing behind it, and another room with about 6 tables, and the walls lined with Brunello di Montalcino, and Rosso di Montalcino, and probably a few Chiantis… the wines were available by the bottle, at the shelf price, with a 1Euro each charge to drink it at the table… sign us up! We first chose a Talenti 2003 for 33 Euro, and then ordered—tagliatelle with cinghale (wild boar sauce) and Trudy had some ravioli… Alessandro brought two big Brunello glasses, and one small wine glass, and a decanter, and a glass funnel and the wine… he opened the wine, then poured a small amount into one of the large glasses, swirled to coat the entire inside, then poured that wine into the other large glass, swirled again, then poured that wine into the small glass and gave it to me to taste… interesting, and the first time I had ever seen this done… at first I thought he was rinsing the glasses, and would toss that wine, but no—it was to taste… so I did and it was good:) He then poured us a bit in our glasses, and poured the rest in the funnel in the top of the decanter, which served to aerate the wine as it went into the decanter. Most delicious dinner and the Brunello was outstanding.
We spent Monday walking, starting with cappuccini and coronetti (I think I mistakenly called them brioche earlier, but in Italy the croissants are called coronets) which come either plain, or filled with chocolate, cream, or marmalade… usually when I ask for the chocolate ones they are “already finished,” so settle for plain or cream). Then we walked, starting with the fort at the upper end of the city. To enter and pay the 4 euro to walk up the stairs and to walk around the entire wall, you entered into a wonderful enoteca to pay, then going upstairs there were a series of large rooms with an art show… then up a series of stairs and ladders to walk along the top of the wall, and to climb to the top of the towers at each corner. Wonder views all around, to the town below, the newer outskirts with more modern buildings, then off into the horizon in every direction to rolling hills of farms… Back in town we went into some shops, and found a wonderful jewelry shop—the owner was working in the shop, and she is a Japanese woman, and she spends most months in Montalcino, and a couple in Japan, and one in Canada, and does her buying abroad… her husband is also Japanese but works in international marketing—I think for Italian wines, which she said he is “passionate” about.
We went into a wonderful trattoria and had a plate of pecorino with honey—slices of pecorino and pears, with a little dish of honey in the middle… then ordered two bowls of Ribollata (did I mention that it was still cold outside???) and had a couple of glasses of Rosso di Montalcino and I finished with a café… all in all, a lovely way to spend two hours… then back to the room to relax and write a bit and read. In the room the internet never really came up as being available on my computer, but it magically worked perfectly the two days we were there.
We finished the day with some more walking, and a light dinner at a restaurant in a hotel… it was the only time in Italy that I can remember the waiter being a little pushy about eating more than a pasta plate and wine… he kept asking if we wanted more, bringing the menu by, and we finally relented by sharing a semifredo of chocolate with orange… it was as beautiful as it was delicious.
The next day was Bafana and we planned to leave on the 12:30 bus to Siena. Most stores, and our travel agency, were closed, but the bars and wine shops and some of the tourist shops were open. I went out earlier than Trudy, found tickets for the bus on my second try at a Tobbachi (many important things, including bus tickets, postage stamps, lottery tickets, cards to charge cellular phones, and regular phone cards are sold at the tobacco shops… but take note—most of them close during the ~13:00-15:00 afternoon lunch break.
Bafana marks the end of the holiday season in Italy. On the eve of the holiday (5 January) children put up stockings, and a spirit who seems to be part witch on a broom, and part Mrs. Claus brings goodies for the children, but is also used as a tool to bribe children, as they are told that Bafana can see through keyholes, so they know when children are being naughty… like our Santa Claus, who “knows when you are sleeping, knows when you’re awake, knows when you’ve been bad or good, so be good for goodness sake…). I imagine most cultures and religions have something similar to attempt to make children mind for at least part of the year.
The town was coming out to the central plaza, Piazza Popolo, and the fire department was doing some exercises in the plaza—they had a rope running from the top of the clock tower and tied off on the back of a jeep… They were rappelling down the tower, but no one was holding the other end of the belay rope… then they took that second rappelling rope and tied it off to the jeep as well. A couple of them were getting set up in rapelling harnesses, and were climbing up the tower as we had to leave… we grabbed some pizza “porta via” (to go) at a little bakery right by the jeep, and wanted to watch to see what the next move was going to be, but had to go catch the bus. I figure they were going to do a decent along those two ropes, but we didn’t get to stay to find out. The piazza was full of people and families watching—very festive and fun to watch!
I am in my favorite place in all of Siena—the apartment in P. S. Francesco where I lived the summer I came to language school… Trudy and I arrived here yesterday after spending 3 days (2 nights) in Montalcino and it is just wonderful to have a house and a warm bedroom with down quilts, and a heater that is so warm that it must be turned down at night, and a full kitchen, and a big kitchen table to sit and eat and visit with friends, and all the cooking and serving equipment you could ask for, and a tv that has all the fun Italian channels, plus one BBC … perfetto!
On Sunday morning we left Florence by bus, spent the afternoon in Siena with Pino, had some pizza, and took the bus to Montalcino. We arrived there in the dark, which was ok, since we would return to Siena in the light so that we could see the magnificent country side on the way back… anyways, Montalcino was really beautiful, but the pictures don’t do it justice—the light is flat and gray with this cold weather. It is a perfectly situated town perched on a hill with about 300 degrees of view down to the valleys below, and just a little bit of a hill to the southwest… it is in the Val d’Orcia and is completely surrounded by rolling, cultivated farmlands, dotted by homes and farm buildings on the hilltops… the rows of vines and olives and crops are in patches that have been cultivated for centuries to take advantage of each individual micro-climate that each slope and hillside, and ravine offers to the crops being grown… We are so used to the beauty of “wilderness” and of “natural” (not crafted or managed by our hands) in the US, and in Italy it is the beautiful, rugged, rocky land that has been sculpted by our hands to bring the most delicious wines and olive oil and vegetables and livestock that is the most beautiful thing here. The landscape has captivated people for as long as it has been cultivated, I think, and you can see some of the most beautiful photographs—tens of thousands, I suppose, but none can do justice like seeing it with your eyes, each field and stone house from a unique perspective that no one else has ever seen… The thought of leaving, and of not being able to pick out a house and a farm, and to move in and to live in this beauty… well, those are the thoughts I had riding on that bus coming back to Siena from Montalcino…
Back to Montalcino—we arrived in the dark with no map of the town (it’s tiny!) but with the phone number of the agent who we rented from… with some words on the phone, and with directions from a cute little old wine shop owner, we easily made our way up a street, took the first left, passed through two piazza, and found Camere del Bacco on our left. The woman was there in a couple minutes, and we went up two flights of stairs—the first floor holding a convenient and cute kitchen, to our room on the second floor with a window facing out to the street. I asked the agent for suggestions for dinner and she gave me two—one was Bacchanal, and when we left we went to Bacchus, which turns out to be right before Bacchanal, but in the end we had a delightful experience and a wonderful dinner… We first stopped in a café wine shop (EVERY shop in Montalcino, from the tailor, to the the cafes, to the souvenir shops, are wine shops!) and went into the back room, the brick ceilinged “cantina” and looked over the wine list and ordered two glasses of 2001 Brunello (can’t remember the winery off hand) and enjoyed those glasses immensely, accompanied by the plate of bruschetta that was brought to our table gratis—just a large slice of freshly toasted bread, rubbed with garlic, and drizzled with extra virgin olive oil and a little salt, and a little chopped tomato… mmmm….. it really can’t get much better than that…
So then we went to Bacchus for dinner. The restaurant is two small rooms, the first with just a large deli case with mom and dad and son Alessandro standing behind it, and another room with about 6 tables, and the walls lined with Brunello di Montalcino, and Rosso di Montalcino, and probably a few Chiantis… the wines were available by the bottle, at the shelf price, with a 1Euro each charge to drink it at the table… sign us up! We first chose a Talenti 2003 for 33 Euro, and then ordered—tagliatelle with cinghale (wild boar sauce) and Trudy had some ravioli… Alessandro brought two big Brunello glasses, and one small wine glass, and a decanter, and a glass funnel and the wine… he opened the wine, then poured a small amount into one of the large glasses, swirled to coat the entire inside, then poured that wine into the other large glass, swirled again, then poured that wine into the small glass and gave it to me to taste… interesting, and the first time I had ever seen this done… at first I thought he was rinsing the glasses, and would toss that wine, but no—it was to taste… so I did and it was good:) He then poured us a bit in our glasses, and poured the rest in the funnel in the top of the decanter, which served to aerate the wine as it went into the decanter. Most delicious dinner and the Brunello was outstanding.
We spent Monday walking, starting with cappuccini and coronetti (I think I mistakenly called them brioche earlier, but in Italy the croissants are called coronets) which come either plain, or filled with chocolate, cream, or marmalade… usually when I ask for the chocolate ones they are “already finished,” so settle for plain or cream). Then we walked, starting with the fort at the upper end of the city. To enter and pay the 4 euro to walk up the stairs and to walk around the entire wall, you entered into a wonderful enoteca to pay, then going upstairs there were a series of large rooms with an art show… then up a series of stairs and ladders to walk along the top of the wall, and to climb to the top of the towers at each corner. Wonder views all around, to the town below, the newer outskirts with more modern buildings, then off into the horizon in every direction to rolling hills of farms… Back in town we went into some shops, and found a wonderful jewelry shop—the owner was working in the shop, and she is a Japanese woman, and she spends most months in Montalcino, and a couple in Japan, and one in Canada, and does her buying abroad… her husband is also Japanese but works in international marketing—I think for Italian wines, which she said he is “passionate” about.
We went into a wonderful trattoria and had a plate of pecorino with honey—slices of pecorino and pears, with a little dish of honey in the middle… then ordered two bowls of Ribollata (did I mention that it was still cold outside???) and had a couple of glasses of Rosso di Montalcino and I finished with a café… all in all, a lovely way to spend two hours… then back to the room to relax and write a bit and read. In the room the internet never really came up as being available on my computer, but it magically worked perfectly the two days we were there.
We finished the day with some more walking, and a light dinner at a restaurant in a hotel… it was the only time in Italy that I can remember the waiter being a little pushy about eating more than a pasta plate and wine… he kept asking if we wanted more, bringing the menu by, and we finally relented by sharing a semifredo of chocolate with orange… it was as beautiful as it was delicious.
The next day was Bafana and we planned to leave on the 12:30 bus to Siena. Most stores, and our travel agency, were closed, but the bars and wine shops and some of the tourist shops were open. I went out earlier than Trudy, found tickets for the bus on my second try at a Tobbachi (many important things, including bus tickets, postage stamps, lottery tickets, cards to charge cellular phones, and regular phone cards are sold at the tobacco shops… but take note—most of them close during the ~13:00-15:00 afternoon lunch break.
Bafana marks the end of the holiday season in Italy. On the eve of the holiday (5 January) children put up stockings, and a spirit who seems to be part witch on a broom, and part Mrs. Claus brings goodies for the children, but is also used as a tool to bribe children, as they are told that Bafana can see through keyholes, so they know when children are being naughty… like our Santa Claus, who “knows when you are sleeping, knows when you’re awake, knows when you’ve been bad or good, so be good for goodness sake…). I imagine most cultures and religions have something similar to attempt to make children mind for at least part of the year.
The town was coming out to the central plaza, Piazza Popolo, and the fire department was doing some exercises in the plaza—they had a rope running from the top of the clock tower and tied off on the back of a jeep… They were rappelling down the tower, but no one was holding the other end of the belay rope… then they took that second rappelling rope and tied it off to the jeep as well. A couple of them were getting set up in rapelling harnesses, and were climbing up the tower as we had to leave… we grabbed some pizza “porta via” (to go) at a little bakery right by the jeep, and wanted to watch to see what the next move was going to be, but had to go catch the bus. I figure they were going to do a decent along those two ropes, but we didn’t get to stay to find out. The piazza was full of people and families watching—very festive and fun to watch!
2 comments:
Ciao, Cara,
che incredibile vedere le foto del Bacchus! Ho comprato due bottiglie di Brunello di Montalcino da lui (Alessandro?).
E spero che nel Piazza del Popolo hai comprato il caffe' dal Le Loggie o Caffe' Fiaschetteria! Ah, sono contenta vedere che tutto vada bene per voi.
con i pensieri di te,
Carolina
I'm hungry! Gotta go eat!
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