The Festa dell’Uva in late September in Panicale offers far more than top wines from the celebrated grapes in three days of enticing events.
Wine, logicamente, stars in this “festival of the grapes” but in 10 cantine (wine cellars) created in the winding allewyays throughout this medieval town, guests sip wines while nibbling an array of local products which accompany the many wines.
Both the wines and the accompanying local enticements may be purchased, of course.
In one cantina, Pino tasted the salami produced by Andrea Mencarelli and family – and decided to purchase:
The Mencarelli family’s azienda agricola (farm) also produces cheeses, especially pecorino (sheep’s milk cheese). Mencarelli warmly offered tastes of those cheeses, too, to guests – including a pecorino alla cipolla (“sheep’s milk cheese with onions”).
And naturalmente, the wines offered were not to miss:
In another cantina, as a pairing with wines offered, Signor Filippo had prepared couscous topped with his buonissimi garden vegetable sauces.
Those “Filippo temptations” included eggplants preserved in olive oil, bell peppers in olive oil, zucchini sauces, winter squash slices and winter squash patés, tomato sauces and sun-dried tomatoes in olive oil:
In another cantina, Davide was heating up his sauce of aglione (a giant garlic typical of the Val di Chiana in Tuscany):
The tasty sauce was served to us on tidbits of bread…
Davide also sold slices of dried onions….
…as well as slices of dried winter squash.
And at this festival honoring those grapes which are turned into fine wines, wine-tastings were certainly not restricted to the cantine: carri allegorici (“allegorical floats”) – decorated by local groups with the grapes/wine theme – circled around Panicale’s medieval walls.
……and wines were offered to all from the back of the carro allegorico. Grapes, too. The small scooter truck called “ape” (“bumble bee”) was a favorite vehicle to transform into un carro allegorico. .
We both enjoyed the vino bianco from the ape float called “Aperivino” (rather than “aperitivo”):
On another small float, even a wild boar – surrounded by grapevine leaves – was ready to offer visitors wine and grapes:
Tractors, too, were often the carri allegorici:
Wine and grapes were offered to all, including to those dressed as monks.
Children participated with enthusisasm, too, and the young majorettes beat out their rhthyms with molta passione:
.The majorettes pranced through the main square where the fountain celebrated the “festa dell’uva” motif.
Not far from the fountain, visitors gathered view Lake Trasimeno below Panicale. Many were still sipping their wines from recent cantina visits:
Panicale merits a visit – and not just during la Festa dell’Uva. And other lakeside towns entice as well. Come soon
Read this note on aglione
See my video on the Festa dell’Uva
