Lunch at the alimentari in Lucignano d’Asso

Lucignano d’Asso is a hamlet located about 25 miles west of Montepulciano. The paved two lane road closest to the hamlet is Provincial Route 14 which is slightly more than a mile to the west. Lucignano d’Asso is located where three “strada bianca” come together. (Strada bianca are “white roads” or what we would probably call graded dirt roads.) 

The area is agricultural. The area is also scenic. Three hundred people lived in the hamlet in the 1950s; the population has shrunk to about 50 people today.

There is larger town named Lucignano to the east. This hamlet with a similar name is near the Torrente d’Asso, a creek that fills when the weather is rainy and drains to the west. It must have been dry when we visited. We couldn’t find the Torrente d’Asso.

The hamlet of Lucignano d’Asso has two commercial activities of which we are aware. One is a small resort called Borgo Lucignanello. Here is the link to the website for Borgo Lucignanello which contains some photos of the area. The name Lucignanello is the diminutive form of the name of the town which is strange since the town itself could not be more diminutive.

The dirt road to Lucignano begins

The only other commercial activity in the hamlet is an alimentari, a tiny convenience grocery store, something like a bodega in a big city or a Seven-Eleven along the highway in the suburbs. An alimentari, however, sells only food and wine, never gasoline, cigarettes, lottery tickets, or windshield washer fluid.

The road turns right

The alimentari in Lucignano d’Asso was mentioned in A Culinary Traveller in Tuscany: Exploring and Eating off the Beaten Track, a book we picked up some time ago. We were interested in what we read so we drove down the narrow twisting dirt road toward the town. Dirt roads in Tuscany always seem to be white, we suppose, because the top soil has been stripped away from the road and the clay underneath has been exposed. The clay is white and very dusty when it’s dry and very sloppy when wet.

The road turns left

We found the alimentari easily just past the stone lion that was observing those few people who pass by on the main (and only) street. Inside we greeted the proprietor and surveyed the little store. Canned goods, some fresh fruit and vegetables, and an Etruscan tomb in the back where she had stored soft drinks, wine, and beer. There was no sense of irony in the plan for storing the drinks. The drinks had to be stored somewhere.

Guarding the town

As the book had described to us, there was a display case with cheeses and cured meats. The cheeses and meats were all produced by local people, by farmers in the area. The alimentari offered a selection of sliced cheeses and meats for lunch which was the reason why we had sought out the place.

The alimentari

"What would you like?"

Etruscan tomb in back

We took seats outside in a building that is open on the sides, a sort of pergola built out of stone and brick appointed with potted plants. 

The dining room outside

Geraniums

The valley beyond

There were lovely views across the valley. 

Waiting for lunch

Lunch is served in the pergola

Admiring lunch

After a wait of ten minutes or so the proprietor arrived with our lunch which included two “summer ripe” tomatoes, some thick slices of crusty fresh bread, some fruity olive oil, wine and water. All this was served with plastic plates and plastic silverware.

Two other diners

The meal cost 28 Euro or about $40 in today’s weakling dollars.

We weren't the only ones enjoying this lovely lunch on a warm spring day in a hamlet in quiet corner of Tuscany.

You’re back in the same apartment again?

Yes, we’re back in Montepulciano and we’re staying in the same apartment. We’re very comfortable in the town because the town is so beautiful and there are so many interesting things to see and do in the area. And we’re comfortable with the apartment, partly because the apartment includes parking for our rented car. But mostly we’re comfortable with the apartment because the beautiful garden that is part of the grounds of the apartment.

Here are some photos of the garden.

Pathway through the garden

Gate to the garden

100 year old pine tree at sunrise

Steps to the apartments

Steps in the garden

Vines on the walls of the building now budding

Part of the garden wall

Wild flowers in among the rosemary

Stand for a plant when the weather warms

Part of the garden wall

Blossoms on a flowering tree

Flowers on a garden wall

... and then there are the views from the garden

Fruits and vegetable stands at Mercato Sant’Ambrogio

This is what remains of the walls
Dentro le mure to the left
Fuori le mure to the right

Our apartment is in the old part of Florence but about a half mile from the center of the city. Florentines describe the location as “dentro le mure”, that is inside the ancient walls of the Renaissance city. Most of those walls were torn down in the mid-1800s to build a six-lane boulevard around the city but the Florentines remember well where the walls were and whether they live inside (“dentro”) or outside (“fuori”) the ancient walls.

A gate in the "walls" called
Porta La Croce

We like the neighborhood because it is mostly residential and is a half mile from the crowded center. We also like the neighborhood because it has a market called Mercato Sant’Ambrogio that is open every day but Sunday. Most days we begin with a visit to the market to pick up what we need for breakfast and dinner. Breakfast is fruit, fresh cheese, jam, and bread. In the evening we normally have a light dinner of meats, cheese, bread, salad, and wine.

We visit the fruit and vegetable stands at the Sant’Ambrogio market most days. The stands are outside under permanent roof that is open to the air on the sides. We’ve taken many photos of these stands over the years because they offer such photogenic scenes. (The bright light entering from the sides is a problem. The backgrounds in the photos are often washed out.) 

Italians are picky shoppers. Everything must be fresh and wholesome. The offerings at these humble looking stands are better on a consistent basis than anything we see at home. Better even than Wegmans.

We frequent one of the fruit and vegetable stands. We go to that stand because the fruits and vegetables seem to be the best. But all the stands offer excellent quality. Why did we end up choosing that particular stand?

The other day we heard the person who operates our favorite stand talking to himself/herself about the need to straighten things up and something about colors and the importance of getting the colors arranged well. We watched the person work for a minute or two and realized that the stand not only had excellent quality fruits and vegetables but that the fruits and vegetables were arranged with a discerning eye.

Here are photos of six fruit and vegetable stands, all taken late in the day just before lunch. The market closes just before the lunch hour, at around 1pm, so lots of things have been sold, some containers on the stands are empty, and the merchants must be tired from a day that began much, much earlier.

Which stand is most attractive to your eye? We’ve just realized that we’ve been attracted to the stand that was most attractive to our eye. Email us what you think and we’ll let you know if you’ve selected that fruit and vegetable stand that we’ve been going to for years.

Fruit and vegetable stand #1

Fruit and vegetable stand #2

Fruit and vegetable stand #3

Fruit and vegetable stand #4

Fruit and vegetable stand #5

Fruit and vegetable stand #6

A pasta adventure

It’s a struggle to find a bad meal in Florence. It’s a struggle to find an ordinary meal. 

Italians are so accustomed to fresh ingredients and fresh preparations that meals prepared in restaurants, no matter how humble, are always good. The rule applies whether the meal is cheap or overpriced, whether the meal is served by uniformed wait staff or served by people in t-shirts who all look alike (because they’re all family members), whether the restaurant in mentioned in all the guide books or the restaurant is unknown.

A brief aside.   If you scan a menu in a restaurant in Italy you may find an item with an asterisk. The asterisk takes you to a note at the bottom with a mention of the term “surgelato” which means a “frozen food”. According to law, if a dish listed on a menu contains any ingredient - any ingredient! - that was frozen, then that fact must be divulged in the menu with an asterisk. Interestingly, you don’t see asterisks very often.

Can you imagine what our menus at home would look like if we had this law. Yes, the menus would be constellations of asterisks.

Stuffed pasta

We were shopping at the Central Market in Florence, the very large market in the center of the city. The market in our neighborhood is very good but it’s much smaller. The larger Central Market has many more merchants and a number of specialized shops. Some of the specialty shops sell prepared foods.

Varieties of pasta

We stopped at the fresh pasta shop. We’ve admired this shop many times before. There are glass walls on the side who you can watch the pasta being prepared in the machines that they use. The store front has glass cases with all kinds of pasta including pasta stuffed with all kinds of things. The choices are rich.

Sauces for pasta

Since it was just before lunch and we were hungry, we lingered longer than we would normally in front of the display case of ravioli and tortellini. Then we admired the green tagliatelli (marked with the yellow arrow) and wondered what kind of sauce would be a good match. Nearby in the same case were a number of freshly made sauces and we settled on the ragù alla bolognese, a rich tomatoey meat sauce (also marked with a yellow arrow.)

... and then there were tagliatelli

We asked for enough green tagliatelli and ragù alla bolognese for two people.

The person behind the counter surprised us. She lifted up a plastic sheet that was covering sheets of freshly make green noodles. Each sheet was about 16 inches by 16 inches.

She took two of the sheets to a machine that was just behind her and cut the sheets into tagliatelli. Done! Each little sheet became a serving of tagliatelli. The tagliatelli were dropped into a bag along with some coarse ground flour so the strands would not stick together. A container of ragù sauce was prepared and sealed. 

The total cost for sauce and pasta was a little over 6 Euro or about $8.00. 

She told us to cook the noodles for two minutes after we had dropped the fresh noodles in boiling water and the the water had returned to a boil.

Uncooked

Later at home we grated some parmigiano. We heated up the sauce. We followed the instructions and prepared the noodles. Drained the cooked noodles. Tossed the noodles in the sauce. Smelled the results. 

Ahhhh.

Cooked

The tagiatelli tasted of the fresh spinach that must have been used to make the pasta. The interplay of fresh flavors between the ragù, the slightly spinachy noodles, and the grated parmigiano was as good as any of the servings of meat sauce and pasta that we had had in restaurants.

Fresh is good.

Ahhhh.

Immediately before the application of forks

Urban canyons and private interior spaces

In the center of Florence the streets and the sidewalks are narrow. The streets are so narrow that there is little on-street parking. In the places where parking is allowed, there isn’t much room left for driving or walking. The sidewalks are so narrow that when people meet while walking in opposite directions, one of them often has to step into the street to allow the others to pass. On a rainy day walking on the sidewalks with umbrellas can be interesting. Who dips their umbrella and who raises their umbrella has to be worked out as people pass each other.

1 Via dell'Agnolo

Three photos show the streets around our apartment. The first photo shows Via dell’Agnolo. The address of our apartment is Via dell’Agnolo 47. This is a main thoroughfare for driving into the center of Florence and there is a steady stream of cars, small trucks, bikes, motor scooters, and motorcycles going into the center. As you can see there is no parking on Via dell’Agnolo. The street is mostly residential; there aren’t many active store fronts on Via dell’Agnolo.

There is a yellow asterisk over the door to the hallway that leads to our second floor apartment. By the way the green cross up the street marks the location of a pharmacy. This is standard in Florence.

2 Borgo Allegri

The second photo shows the side street, Borgo Allegri. There is parking on this street for both cars and motor scooters. The sidewalks are narrow and the sidewalk on the side of the street where parking is allowed is difficult for pedestrians so people commonly walk in the street.

3 Via Ghibellina

The third photo shows Via Ghibellina, the street parallel to Via dell’Agnolo. This is a main street for driving out of the center of Florence and, again, there is a steady stream of traffic. There are more active storefronts on Ghibellina and proprietors dump water and sweep the sidewalks at least once a day. The sidewalks in front of the stores are clean and the windows are always perfectly clear.

A parking solution

The scenes in these three photos are typical of the center of the city. Streets are narrow, parking is jammed or is not permitted, buildings are built aggressively toward the streets so sidewalks are very narrow. When it is absolutely essential to park their car, Florentines hit their flashers and pull two wheels up on the sidewalk. But parking tickets are expensive.

The plan for the center of Florence was not really a plan; the streets, the sidewalks, and the buildings developed organically. The streets the city form urban canyons with buildings that are only three, four, and five stories tall but the buildings come very, very close to the streets and precious little space is left for pedestrians. Fortunately, many of the streets in the center are closed to traffic and traffic is aware of the presence of pedestrians (despite the undeserved poor reputation of Italian drivers.)

But there are a lot of open spaces and even green spaces within the blocks of buildings that make up the center of Florence. Click on this link 

Via dell'Agnolo 47 Florence Italy 

to view a Google Earth map that is approximately centered on our apartment. Check the screen capture to the right to see the actual location of our apartment at the yellow asterisk. The yellow arrows labeled 1, 2, and 3 show where the photos of Via dell’Agnolo, Borgo Allegri, and Via Ghibellina were taken.

Notice that there are interior open spaces and even green spaces among the urban canyons. Just to the south of our apartment is jagged open space that runs east and west parallel to Via dell’Agnolo. You'll get an better view with the Google Earth view from the link above.

Chasing pigeons

No dogs!

A few of these open spaces are public parks such as the Giardino di Borgo Allegri shown by yellow letter A. This is rare in Florence, a gated park operated by the neighborhood for the benefit of children, their parents, and their grandparents. For obvious reasons, no dogs are allowed in the park (“Vietato l’accesso ai cani” = Access for dogs is forbidden.)

The park is locked and closed at night. After dark the park does not attract teenagers or broken glass.

Many green spaces such as those on either side of the yellow letter B are purely private. You must live in one of the buildings to have any access. We’ve never seen these interior spaces. We certainly are curious, however.

The green space labeled C is a park with a high wall. The park is open only in warm weather and all we can see are the tops of the trees as we walk by. Again, we are curious.

From the back window of our apartment we have a view of the non-green open space just to the south of our apartment. It is an interesting sight.

Open space behind our apartment

The view out of our apartment window is of the backs of a number of buildings with washing hanging to dry on the lines. (There are no dryers in homes in Italy. Electricity is very expensive and there are never sanctions, social or legal, for drying your clothes on a line outside a window or on a terrace.)

Looking down the open area is divided into a number of private areas. We see at least four such private areas in the photo, two of which are immediately below our apartment window.

Patio with plastic furniture

Looking down to the right is a small patio of sorts with some plastic furniture, some plants, and an old bike. (All the bikes in Florence are well used. The only time you see new, flashy bikes is on the weekends when weekend warriors put on their colorful gear and take their expensive bikes out of hiding.) The patio is not in great shape but it is March and the people who live below us are beginning to clean up from the moist, cool winter that is just now passing.

In the air photo of our neighborhood above there is a bright white area to the south of our apartment. This area is the concrete floor of this small patio. 

Work in progress

The second area below us is to the left and looks more like our garage at home. Stuff is piled up haphazardly, some of the stuff probably long forgotten. Projects have been begun and then abandoned.

A quiet space

Still quiet

What signs of life do we see? 

People regular show up at the windows and stare out at the open space or down at the space below. It’s a quiet, private space in a city that is otherwise full of people and activity.