Weekend happenings

As the weather gets gloomier the festivals get heartier...

In Trieste Tra un Mese è Natale (a month until Christmas) a fair of Christmas gifts (and I assume tasty treats) has been on since the 21st and finishes on Sunday. The only handy thing I got from the website was the location: da Piazza Cavana a Piazza Hortis. Lots of towns are having similar festivals at the moment; Turismo FVG and Giro FVG have more info about these.

Chocofest (in Gradisca D'isonzo) starts tonight and continues over the weekend celebrating all things chocolate, coffee and cream.

Purcit in Staiare is a festival to celebrate pig slaughtering by eating tasty piggy products. Blatantly using the information given here, purcit is the name given to Friulian pork and staiare is an ancient Friulian dance. So Purcit in Staiare is a party to relive the joyous events following the late November slaughtering of the home pig in the Friulian villages and the subsequent preparation of porky products that supplied the villagers with their protein and fat needs for the year. There is a free bus from Trieste to the festival on Sunday so you can eat, drink and be happy.

Aquiliea and really old stuff!

We finally made it to Aquileia last weekend and it was well worth the visit. We took the bus from the Cervignano train station and got off at the first stop in Aquileia to go to the Paleocristiano Museum (free entry). I can recommend the bar opposite the bus stop for coffee and pastries. Aquiliea was first established in about 183 B.C. and was a very important city up to the end of the 4th century AD. In 452 A.D Attila the Hun completely destroyed the town and, understandably, everyone ran for the lagoons (starting the establishment of Venice and Grado). The Paleocristiano Museum is built over the ruins of a 5th century basilica that was later used as a monastery. As well as the ruins, the museum has some marvellous examples of 4-5 century mosaics and stonework, the patterns and pictures used in this time period are a lot different from what we've seen in other churches; geometrical patterns (very Celtic looking) and animals and plants were used a lot.

Floor mosaics in the basilica; I particularly liked the squids in the bottom left photo.

We walked from the museum along the Porto Fluviale, this is a lovely tree lined path between the ruins of the river port that joined Aquileia to the sea. Our walk was accompanied by the soft sound of gunfire in the distance...I think it's goose hunting season (yee-haw). The Porto Fluviale ends at the rather impressive basilica. The basilica was built on the site of an early church and contains floor mosaics dating from the 4th century and frescos from the 4th to the 12th centuries. The Crypt of Frescos in the basilica. The frescos tell the story of Saint Hermagoras and the chopping off of his head. Against one wall of the crypt are boxes containing the bones of creepy dead people.

Connected to the basilica is a 5th century baptistery, it seems to be around this time that baptism for the young started to become the norm. In the 4th century, apart from emergency baptism of children, people seemed to hold out from baptism until they were getting on in years. This way they could do all the naughty things in their youth and then have the slate wiped clean.

The fifth century baptistery; seems rather pagan to me...standing stones, hexagons...

The Archaeological Museum (€4 entry + a DVD in English or German) is packed full of old bits and pieces and is one of the few museums we've been to where the staff actually seem eager for you to come in. A building in the garden contains the remains of a Roman boat that was found near Monfalcone. Aquileia itself is a living museum with ruins dating back to 1 A.D., and active dig sites dotted all over the place so just wandering around is an experience in itself.

Autumn and the grumps

Autumn seems to be well and truly here, it's cold and we have been living in a cloud (really,  the dew point has been verrry close to the temperature). On the plus side the leaves are all turning delightful shades of yellow, orange and red (and then a dead brown looking colour). This colour change gives me a thrill because in Australia most of our trees are evergreen.

The weather has ruined our weekend plans a few times, making for grumpy people, because we tend to like tramping around the outdoors.  I made a Grumpasaurus in appropriate Autumn colours to laugh at when this happens. Marito particularly likes the shoes. I shouldn't complain about the weather too much, my home state in Australia is currently roasting and some areas have a catastrophic fire warning, this warning basically means pack your bags and go...yesterday. The warning system was recently upgraded to include the catastrophic warning level following the fallout from the Black Saturday fires in Victoria.

We're going to try to go to Aquileia this weekend - last weekend was a washout - and then maybe into the Val Rosandra for more Autumn goodness.

Fiera del Dolce Tipico

Fiera del Dolce Tipico (fair of the typical sweet) started in Trieste yesterday and continues to Sunday evening. We had a look-see this evening, there are so many sweet treats we didn't know where to start...or where to finish! We're off to Aquileia tomorrow to play among very old stuff, then I think we'll be back at the fiera for dinner supplies...I count strudel di mele as a dinner option.

All Triestini get yourselves down to Piazza Sant'Antonio (the piazza at the end of the canal) presto!

Lard!

How things have changed...this morning I had to double back in the supermarket because I had forgotten to get some pancetta. For those not in the know, pancetta is cured pork belly, this site may help to explain http://www.pancetta.org/.

Pancetta is mostly lard (lard, lard, lard, lard) with a bit of meat, some salt and sometimes some other tasty peppers or spices. Coming from a country currently paranoid with the consumption of saturated fat I always have a little giggle when buying pancetta...but it is tasty. We're using it to make a little roasted chicken dish. Using very thin slices of pancetta, the recipe is thus: put some pancetta on the bottom of the dish, put the chicken fillets on top, put some more pancetta on top of the chicken, making sure all the chicken is covered so the lardy goodness will protect the (skinless) chicken from burning. Surround with parboiled tatties, then bung it in the oven. Serve with veggies. Yummy!

Once more all together now: "lard". Oh, and since coming to Italy and including such things in our diet, Marito has lost over 20 kilos, go home cooking!

Festa della Zucca

On Sunday we walked about 5 km south of Cervignano to the small village San Martino for the Festa della Zucca (festival of the pumpkin). The Italians do love a good food festival and I find the festivals are handy for knowing what veggies are in season (bring on pumpkin soup). As well as generally celebrating pumpkins, there was a re-enacted wedding with people dressed up as noble folk, plebs (I particularly liked one fellow who looked like Baldrick from Blackadder), knights and other sword wielding characters. There were a bunch of stalls selling something for everyone - wooden weapons, all things pagan, religious items, herbs and spices...

The pumpkin sculpting entries were a highlight, our favourites generally being the pirate based ones. There were a number of cigarette smoking pumpkins...did I mention these were made by children? Hmmm.

Anyho, to food, we started off our eating experience for the day with chocolate coated fruit skewers, this was followed by pumpkin gnocchi with butter and sage, polenta and cheese frico. Oh, and roasted chestnuts. Yummy!

Strassoldo

Yesterday we went to Strassoldo, a small village about 5 km north of Cervignano di Friuli. We walked from Cervignano train station, most of the way along a very good bike path which is part of the 175 km Alpe Adria bike route. Strassoldo has two old castles which are only open to the public twice a year. The castles were packed full of artistic folk selling their wares, a lot of it a bit fussy for my tastes, more suited to nonni I think. We had a bit of a disappointing lunch but the day was saved when we later discovered frittelle di mele. These are basically apple circles that are covered in batter, deep fried and then coated in icing sugar, brilliantly tasty and warming on a cold day.