Sagra!

We have mentioned before on several occasions how much we love the history and traditions of Italy. I’m sure that history and tradition is greatly enhanced when you have hundreds of years to draw upon, but I also think that Italians are more tradition oriented in general than we are. Italy is not as progressive of a country as the US. In the America we are constantly evolving, therefore at times leaving the past behind, where in Italy life can at times seem to be stuck in neutral (This is also a part of Italy’s problem). There are so many examples of life being lived exactly the way that it was centuries ago. Case in point is Sagra…

Sagra, simply put is communal dining. As you may have gathered by now, Italy is checkered with literally dozens of small villages, many which never show up on a map. These villages each have their own Sagra, which is basically a food festival for the town. The festival takes place over one evening only.

Sagra happens throughout the year, but is at its peak in Spring when most towns have their annual gathering. When walking down the streets of Florence, you see posters on the sides of buildings advertising local Sagras. As an example, the town of Pontessieve just hosted their Sagra a few weeks ago with Cingiale (Wild Boar) as the featured dish.

Alex has been telling us about sagra for months and we chose to drive together to the mountains for Sagra in a small town called Borgo San Lorenzo. We arrived in the early evening in the small town and signs pointed us to a dirt lot that had a large tent erected in its center. Inside the ten were dozens of tables that sat approximately twenty people.

The menu was pretty simple, the featured dish was a fried bread that was simply to die for. The kids could not stop eating it and neither could I! There were a few different pasta dishes (I had ravioli with meat sauce), wine, water, soda, steak and the Olivia’s absolute favorite Italian food Rosticiana (Grilled pork ribs seasoned with salt, pepper, good olive oil and various other herbs. Livy gets it just about any time it’s on a menu. The Rosticiana at this sagra was easily the best we have ever had. It melted in your mouth and exploded with flavor.

The experience of eating at communal tables with other people in a little Italian town is not only unique but something that could have taken place 500 years ago in the exact same manner (Minus the tent of course!)

As we were leaving the tent (That had a wait outside) Alex looked at me and said, “Look, you are the only American in this entire place! In fact, there aren’t even any people from Florence here much less any where else in the world! How does that make you feel?”

Terrific I replied, just how we hoped :>)