Most days we walk through the Piazza Signoria, the living room of Florence. The guide books say that in 1258 there was a major conflict between the dudes that supported the Pope (Guelphs) and the dudes that supported the Holy Roman Empire, who you would think was the Pope, but was a secular faction (Ghibellines). Anyway, the Pope’s dudes defeated the secular dudes and tore down their houses. They thought the ground was cursed so they outlawed building there, giving us a nice big Piazza to sit in and have drinks.
The Palazzo Vecchio is the main civic building from the 14th century that is in the Piazza Signoria. The fake David is in front of the Palazzo Vecchio. We learned from our guide book that there is a male profile carved into a stone of Palazzo Vecchio. This is thought to be a carving by Michelangelo, just sitting there, no plaque, no cover, just sitting there.
Also in the Piazza is the Loggia della Signoria, built in 1376. It is a covered porch with 3 arched columns and contains some kick-ass statutes. Like the Michelangelo carving, they are just sitting there, being used by pigeons. Things like an original ancient Greek lion sculpture and a giant statute of three figures carved from a single block of marble in 1583 by Giambologna. It is a big free museum.
We were taking our leisurely morning stroll to buy some shoes (for me) when Arnie spotted a gaggle of plumed hats ahead in the Piazza Signoria. Then we heard the marching band and followed the music to a grand celebration. We still don’t know what it was about, but, it was very fun. Men & women in very colorful military uniforms were on horseback; men with 4 stars on their shoulders were strutting about; one man wearing a sash was being saluted; and all this to the rousing music of a military band standing in front of the Loggia. It was a great mix of old and new except the marching band uniforms were not what you call modern. The junior officers (guys with no stars on their shoulders) were trying to keep the crowds back from the band when a 3 star guy told them to let us be. So, the “no stars” and the “3 stars” stood among us great unwashed and listened. Then, the 3 star told the no stars to part the waters so that the band could march away. They did, but the band marched in the other direction. (We saw the same band the next day in our Piazza. I guess if you have those uniforms dry cleaned you want to get more than a few hours use out of them. Also, finally I had fitting background music for my entrance into the Piazza.) What a morning! We skipped the shoes and just went to lunch.
Here is the link to some of the celebration pictures:
http://www.flickr.com/gp/25519767@N06/63xc2S
I’ve read about Zibibbo Trattoria, Via di Terzollina 3r, for years. Benedetta Vitale owns the restaurant and is the co-founder and former partner of the restaurant Cibreo. In her new restaurant she emphasizes traditional Tuscan cooking with local ingredients. The quality of the food was superb especially given the reasonable prices. Arnie was very taken with the breath and good pricing of the wine list. The reason it took us so long to go there is that it is outside of the city, a 15 minute cab ride away. Every article spoke of taking the number 14 bus, however, we would never have known where to get off of the bus. As it turns out, her restaurant is just steps away from the end of the bus line. Now that we know how easy it is to get there we will be back-even if not on this trip.
We started with a warm salad of puntarella, aTuscan spring green, just a bit bitter, kind of like asparagus. It had a light dressing of anchovies and olives. Boy, was that good. It tasted like they picked the greens when we placed our order. Arnie ordered the Ziti with cicoria and taleggio cheese (Pictured above). Now, that sounded pretty ordinary. Not. The Ziti was clearly homemade. The cicoria tasted like sautéed leeks. The taleggio cheese gave it a subtle kick. I had the tagliatelle with asparagus in a parmigiano cream sauce. Can you say rich?? The tagliatelle had the perfect bite and the parmesan sauce was to die for. Arnie was more daring for his second course. He ordered the squid cooked in spicy squid ink sauce; Inzimino di calamari. It was served on 2 slices of Tuscan bread to absorb all of the good sauce. It was so spicy his head was sweating. I had THE best roasted pork served with spicy applesauce. The pork was so tender I didn’t need a fork and it tasted like veal. For dessert we had a light chocolate tart. The room was very spacious and the windows looked out onto the Tuscan hills with large Tuscan estates sprinkled hither and yon. As always there was theater. The restaurant is near a hospital. Two gentlemen came in for lunch and one was clearly a doctor. He answered his cell phone 3 times within minutes of sitting down and was saying something about a Melanoma (skin cancer). His friend wanted to order a bottle of wine; he said no, no just a glass. The waitress poured them each a glass of house wine and he commented that it was a very big pour. She then left the bottle on the table and, sure enough, the doctor helped himself to a second generous pour. One hopes he remembered the poor guy with the Melanoma.
We saved the 20 euro cab fare and took the bus home. What a great day.
I have more food stories but that is enough for today.
Here’s the link to all of the Zibibbo lunch pictures. http://www.flickr.com/gp/25519767@N06/D84PWZ
