It’s a travel day! It’s always fun to be off to someplace you’ve never been to before. In this case, we’re on the road to Alba, in northwestern Italy. To get to Alba, we’ll drive up the beautiful Italian coastline from Santa Margherita Ligure to Genoa – you know, where Christopher Columbus was born. At Genoa, we’ll turn inland and head northwest toward Asti, (as in “Asti Spumante”), and then into Alba. Let’s go!
Alba is in Piedmont, or in Italian, “Piemonte.” Piemonte occupies the northwest corner of Italy. It’s bordered by Switzerland to the north and France to the west. It’s known for its wine, cheese, truffles, and exceptional food.
Bel Piemonte
Back home, when it comes to Italian wines, we’re most familiar with chianti and other Tuscan wines. But over here, it’s generally accepted that the best Italian wines come from Piemonte. If you don’t believe it, just ask any Piemontese!
Two hours after leaving Santa Margherita Ligure, we arrived at Alba – an easy drive. Our hotel was in a good location, just at the edge of central Alba, where we’ll be hanging out most of the time. Unlike the other hotels we’ve stayed at on this trip, this one is sleek and modern. Comfortable for sure, but not with as much character.
We checked in, unpacked, and headed out to go exploring. The first thing that struck us was the medieval feel of central Alba. Buildings made of stone line narrow pedestrian streets. The layout is the same as it was hundreds of years ago, when a massive wall surrounded the city.
Besides just looking around, we had two things we wanted to accomplish. We wanted to stop at the local Tourist Information Center, (the “TI”), to find out about visiting local wineries, and we wanted to inquire about tickets for the upcoming donkey races. That’s right – donkey races.
The annual Truffle Festival has been underway all week in Alba. It will be capped off this week-end with a parade and then the famous donkey races of Alba. Well, famous to donkey racing aficionados the world over, whoever they may be.
We found the TI, located on a square in front a big cathedral. The people inside were very helpful. They had information on anything you could possibly want to know about this whole region. There were numerous wine-tasting options. We could visit a small operation, or one of the more commercial ones. We opted for a small one. (We’d find out just how small later).
The girl helping us called the place and made a reservation for us the next day. Bing, bang, boom – everything was taken care of. That was too easy.
We Need to Eat Again
By the time we had left the TI, we were hungry. We had made a mistake by not eating sooner, because now it was past the normal lunch hour. After 2:00, most restaurants and cafes here stop serving food. Hopefully we’d be able to get something to eat. There were certainly enough places to choose from.
We picked a café where quite a few people were still having lunch. We sat down at an outside table and started to make ourselves at home. Pretty soon a young guy showed up and asked us what we’d like to drink, so we ordered some vino. It looked like we had picked a good spot.
When he came back with the wine, we tried to order something for lunch, but he informed us apologetically that the kitchen was closed. He must have noticed the forlorn look on our faces. Before we could say anything, he said he’d see what he could do, then continued making his rounds.
We settled in and sipped away. We were at a table on one of the busier pedestrian streets – a perfect spot for people-watching. That was great, but by this time, we were seriously hungry.
Charcuterie from Heaven
After a while, our server reappeared with a large plate with all kinds of goodies on it – cured meats and salami, at least a couple of different cheeses, bread, a little bowl of marinated olives with herbs. It was beautiful. There was more than enough to provide a substantial lunch for both of us.
We dug in. Everything was so good. Incredible, really. We ordered more vino, people-watched, and nibbled away until everything was gone. It had been a fine little feast. When it was time for us to leave, our server brought us the check. I looked it over, but I couldn’t find any reference to the plateful of charcuterie.
When the young guy came back, I pointed out that the food was missing from the bill. We thought he’d left it off by mistake, and we didn’t want him to get in trouble. No. It was on the house. He insisted.
We felt terrible, (well, perhaps “terrible” is a slight overstatement), because first he had to go scrounge something out of the kitchen during off-hours just for us, and now he wasn’t even charging us for it.
I tried to get him to charge us, but again, he insisted – no charge. Well, if this was any indication of how they treat visitors to Alba, we’re going like this place very much!
To be continued…
Photo at the top of this post of Piedmont with the Alps in the background. Credit: Gerald Smith/Wikimedia.org
