From Hot-Air Balloons to Contemporary Art: A Day in Gallarate

A lovely day out, in a city of art on the banks of the Arno and with a view of the snow-capped peaks of the Alps? This too is possible, and without even having to drag the Alps to Tuscany: just go to Gallarate, in the province of Varese, about half an hour's drive from Milan. Of course, the Arno is the stream, also called Arnetta by the people of Gallarate, but the Alps on the horizon are the original ones and in good weather offer a breathtaking panorama. As we approach the city, we notice from afar the mountain ranges that blend with the blue of the sky, but it is easy to see the white of the mountains standing out behind an old church or a historic building even in the centre. It may also be for the beauty of that horizon that the people of Gallarate have been attracted to flight for centuries, a field in which they boast numerous excellences.

In the days of hot-air balloons, some in the neighbouring towns would tease them by branding them “brusabalun”, that is balloon-burners. But this certainly did not stop them taking off: as early as 1910 the important aeronautical industry of the engineer Gianni Caproni was present in the city, along with pilots such as Gustavo Moreno, Oronzo Andreani and the famous aviator Francesco Baracca. Gallarate was once called the city of a hundred chimneys, but here too, as in Busto Arsizio, the most important industry was textiles. Today Gallarate, whose name would derive from the Gauls, is a modern city, and the recently built buildings and shopping streets coexist naturally with Liberty buildings and ancient churches, such as the Basilica of Santa Maria, the 16th-century Church of St.

Anthony Abbot or the Church of San Pietro, which dates back to the 11th century and for a period was even used as a carpenter's workshop and later as a butcher's shop. But the art of our own era also plays an increasingly important role in this city: the Museo Arte Gallarate, known as MA-GA, inaugurated in 2010, is a prestigious and functional centre for contemporary art, which immediately managed to attract the interest of the general public with exhibitions such as “Il mistico profano”, dedicated to the pictorial research of Amedeo Modigliani. After this walk through the history of Gallarate, we decide to stop at the Ristorante Alla Contrada, whose name keeps making us think of the town's ancient traditions.

We settle into the elegant and very bright dining room, furnished in a modern style, and as we begin to study the menu, we let our imagination take off on a tasty journey as far as the sea. Some of us immediately go for the pizzas, choosing the Pizza della Contrada, with tomato, mussels, clams, prawns, scampi and king prawns. The seafood pizza is also popular, as well as the vegetarian one and the pizza with prawns and rocket. The rest of our group, however, cannot resist the restaurant's specialities, starting with a rich seafood appetiser: tuna tartare, tuna carpaccio with rocket and fresh cherry tomatoes, prawn tails in sauce and warm octopus with potatoes. A couple of our “carnivore” friends stay instead with land dishes, enjoying a beef fillet carpaccio with rocket and grana. We continue with spaghetti allo scoglio, and the fantastic bavette with half a lobster.

Among the risottos we choose the one with cuttlefish ink and the one with scallops and scampi. Lovers of land specialities opt for the porcini and truffle cream risotto, continuing with fillet tartare, tagliata with artichokes and fillet with porcini mushrooms. Our seafood dinner continues instead with succulent grilled fish: baby squid, tuna and sea bream fillets, as well as swordfish fillet Sicilian-style. We finish by giving in to the sweet temptations of the dessert trolley, and we return to our city with the blue colours of the Gallarate sky in our eyes, enriched by a beautiful experience that we are sure to repeat soon.

Francesca Bertha

FOR INFORMATION:

Ristorante Pizzeria Alla Contrada Via Croci, 1 Gallarate (VA) Tel.: 0331/786793