Saturday, June 10, 2017

A Town Made of Stone Part 2

This is Part 2, continuing our exploration of Lecce, in south-eastern Italy (the "heel" of the boot). 


           We met some locals who have just opened a delicatessen making and selling hand-rolled pasta, done in the Lecce style. 


Alessio and Emanuela at Pasta d'Elite in Lecce
Here's a quick video showing their technique...




          (In case that link doesn't work, try this one:)
               Hand-rolling pasta at Pasta d'Elite

If you're really into it, here is a longer version of the video. Do try this at home!




And speaking of food, here's some local delicacies we've found...



I like the little chickens (pollotto)! Chicken-shaped pastry shells filled with... you guessed it, chicken! And peas. (A chicken-shaped pot pie! Delish.) Directly behind the chickens are spinach pastries, filled with spinach-laced cream sauce. And to the right... ah, the real specialty of Lecce, Rustici (singular Rustco), a pastry filled with mozzarella, bechamel, and a spoonful of tomato sauce. Described by one writer as "If a croissant and a pizza had an even more delicious baby..."
See more local specialties here. I'm particularly keen on the pasticciotto.


Ah, Coffee!!

           Paula and I were doing a bit of exploring the other day. I wanted to sit in a cafe, because we can! In another week the best we'll be able to do is drive someplace to sit inside with an overpriced cup of coffee  (Starbucks, maybe, with their incomprehensible drink names and sizes) and end up paying $5 for an over-roasted something.
Then we saw this sign in front of a cafe (with shaded outdoor tables).
It gives a nice explanation of standard coffee drinks, which differ only in their amounts of steamed milk and foam. I've heard often enough that coffee with milk (any form of milk) is totally unacceptable in italy after breakfast, but clearly this place caters to a more, ah, accepting crowd. It emboldened us to ask the waiter for a cappuccino (at 1:15 in the afternoon!). He readily seated us. But before leaving to fill our order, Paula asked, "Italians don't drink cappuccinos after 10 in the morning, do they!"

"No," he agreed. "But you're Americans, so it's OK!"

Two excellent cappuccinos and two pasticciotti later the cost was... $5


This sign seems to sum up coffee in Italy: "tiny sips of great pleasure"

Take a Walk on the Dead Side

We took a walk through the near-by cemetery and found some extraordinary examples of funerary art and architecture. Not as famous – nor as well shaded – as Pere Lachaise in Paris, it does have some family mausoleums that put those in Paris to shame.



For starters, here's the entry gate

There's not a lot of shaded alleyways, but there is this!

THe mausoleum of some ambitious family; looks like a church in town!
There must be an explanation for the Egyptian theme but I'm clueless
Death head locks on the crypt. How cool is that?!

Small, but one of my favorites. It's wired for electricity, too...


We Celebrate Republic Day

And finally, we come to Republic Day, celebrating the day in 1946 when Italy ousted their monarchy (think: Italian 4th of July). We observed the holiday by going to an evening concert at Divineria, a small local wine bar. It was a great, thoroughly enjoyable evening even though there was only one song we recognized…




                                   Click here if the link won't work


On the Road Again

Our time in Lecce -- and in Europe -- draws to a close. Saturday morning we will once more be out early, trailing our luggage across the cobblestones to the bus, to the airport, to Milano. More exactly, to Ferno, the small town that serves the Milan-Malpensa Airport. We'll spend a couple of nights at a BnB where we've stayed before, run by a  generous and welcoming family. (Shameless plug: Il Gelsomino B and B). We'll get a car and maybe drive to the lake (Lago Maggiore; Lago di Como; one of those).

Then on Monday we fly to Boston, and meet up with Paula's brother. We'll visit with him and his family (and the four grandkids!) for a week before, finally, coming back to home in Los Osos, CA.


           A Parting Shot


I came around a corner in Lecce and saw this archway


Final note: We're now at our favorite BnB in Ferno, a small town near the Malpensa airport, aobut an hour west of Milan. Monday we fly out to Boston, at 6:30 in the AM, which means dropping off the car at 4AM. Groan! But today, Sunday, we'll explore the lakes, Como and a few others, just north of here.

See you soon!




Sunday, June 4, 2017

A Town Made of Stone

4 June 2017
It’s been a while since we’ve published a blog entry. As our time for these travels comes to a close, I feel less and less inclined to write. I don’t know if I am truly “worn out” by travel and am ready to head home, or if it’s just that the calendar says we’ll be leaving soon. But whatever, the words ain’t flowin’!

We’ve been in Lecce, the main town of Salento (the heel of the Italian boot) for a bit over three weeks. It’s a small, quiet town in a rather unassuming area of Italy. So why did we pick it? Tomatoes. Buffalo mozzarella. Basil. Olive oil. In short, food! 

Many areas of the world claim to have special dishes or extraordinary cuisine. Some do, some don’t (in fact, I feel a rant coming on… but we’ll save that for another blog posting). But Italy delivers on the food front. And the freshest food is in Puglia, the south-eastern region of the country. (I have to be careful here, because every region in Italy is proud of their specialties!)

So yeah, Puglia.* Why Lecce, specifically? Well, did I mention it was a small, quiet town? I’ll add amazing buildings, a very walkable old town, and not far from beaches on two different seas (the Adriatic to the east, and the Ionian to the west). We were here three years ago, for only a couple of days, and it certainly seemed worth revisiting.
* Puglia is the entire south-eastern shin of Italy, from the bone-spur of Vieste to the stiletto tip of Punta Ristola; Salento is just the peninsula south of Ostuni or so.

What’s remarkable about Lecce is the buildings. Made of a local stone (Pietra leccese) that is both strong and soft. Strong, for solid buildings; soft, and so easy to carve. And nearly every building is decorated with elaborate carvings. Today’s prominent buildings were built in the 17th century, at the height of the Baroque period, when every artistic expression – painting, sculpture, dance, architecture – was elaborately over the top. It was a “visceral appeal aimed at the senses. It employed an iconography that was direct, simple, obvious, and theatrical…”.

Let’s have a look:
                       

Chiesa del Gesù (day)

Basilica di Santa Croce (undergoing repairs)

Porta Rudiae, one of the entries through the original walls
One of our favorite streets in Lecce -- love the flower boxes with red geraniums!
The city takes on a whole new aspect as night falls -- Chiesa di Santa Chiara

Chiesa del Gesù at sunset


Sant'Oronzo Column, honoring the patron saint of Lecce

The thing about Lecce is there are no specific “sights”, no famous tower or impressive ancient ruins. But as we stay here longer, I’ve come to appreciate the small pleasures; coming around a corner and seeing this:








Red geraniums!

It's a look faux painters can only dream of achieving...


Or these little guys, in a side-chapel of the main cathedral:







The spiral pilasters (the twisty things on the sides of the painting) are typical of the Salento


Aside from photographing buildings, what have we done?

            We rented a car for three days and visited the coast south of here, steep and rocky, reminiscent of the Big Sur coast.







pool at Grotta della Poesia



Faro di Puna Palascia, eastern-most point of Italy and spitting distance from Albania
Cathedral in the city of Otranto; rather dull on the outside...
... but rather fabulous inside...
... with amazing mosaic floors


The Otranto marina, in the impossibly blue Adriatic


            We got a visit from our dear friend Maureen (a little bit of home!), and the three of us took the train to Gallipoli, a smaller city on the Ionian Sea due west of Lecce.



We found this cute cart full of ice and wine along the sea front. What's not to like...?


Us (left), with the Fortress (right) and Gallipoli's Big Ugly Building (center)


Lunch, back in Lecce!
Next up: More on Lecce, food and, uh, the cemetery...