A convivio with Alfieri and the ghosts in petticoats: a day in Asti between history and good food

"Come away, come away, come away with me", sings Paolo Conte, and this time we took the words of the famous song literally, coming to visit Asti, the birthplace of the great singer-songwriter. Known in ancient times as the city of a hundred towers, Asti, a free commune in the Middle Ages, with the right to mint coin, was always an important artistic, commercial and also banking centre, thanks to the so-called casane, the banks that carried out currency exchange and pawn lending activities. Famous for its wines, including Asti spumante, the city hosts an important wine competition every year, the Douja D'Or.

But medieval tradition also finds space among the city's most beautiful events, thanks to the very ancient Palio, which takes place in September and culminates in the very colourful horse race in which the twenty-one participants compete for the win: fourteen from the city's borghi and seven from the pertinenze and the communes of the contado. We start our walk in the city from the Cathedral of Santa Maria Assunta, built in typical red terracotta brick on a previous basilica, and which inside preserves the works of important Asti painters and sculptors. In the Collegiate Church of San Secondo, on the other hand, in 1535 there was a Eucharistic miracle: upon breaking the consecrated host during mass, drops of blood are said to have trickled into the chalice and onto the paten.

Walking around the characteristic streets of Asti, you often end up walking with your nose in the air, admiring some of the numerous ancient towers and fortified houses that in their own way tell small and great stories. A sixteenth-century engraving makes the bell of the Torre dell'Orologio, erected from the end of the twelfth century, a kind of "talking bell". The inscription indeed says: "I once marked the hours of the day. Because of the war I was turned into a machine. Now I am restored to my original task." The Torre Comentina, on the other hand, was used for several centuries as a command post during the horse race of the Palio. Asti was also the birthplace of one of the most important intellectuals of the eighteenth century: the poet and playwright Vittorio Alfieri, to whom a square of the city is now dedicated.

But speaking of writers, the multifaceted Giorgio Faletti was also from Asti. When we arrive at Palazzo Catena, an important medieval building of the city, we meet a lady who tells us a mysterious story that reminds us of the atmospheres of Faletti's books: in this palace the ghost of Iginia d'Asti, protagonist of a tragedy by Silvio Pellico, is said to still live. If this were true, Iginia would be in good company, because legend has it that another female spirit also wanders in the centre, that of the restless countess Adelaide, descendant of Arduino d'Ivrea, king of Italy in the tenth century.

If here history is breathed in every corner, the same is true of the area where the restaurant where we stop to taste the specialities of the territory is located: Il Convivio – Vini e Cucina, located in via Giovan Battista Giuliani, in the heart of the city a stone's throw from the Collegiate Church of San Secondo. The place is in a period building overlooking a characteristic street and the atmosphere inside is in full harmony with the context in which it's set: the rooms are furnished in a sober and elegant style, with great attention to detail. During the renovation of the historic location, the utmost attention was also paid to the needs of the disabled, who can in fact access the restaurant without difficulty.

While we wait to taste the first specialities, our gaze wanders among beautiful period prints on the walls that evoke historic moments of the city and the life of the winegrowers, underlining the restaurant's bond with the territory and its traditions. A bond that is also very clearly perceived in the cooking philosophy that distinguishes Il Convivio, owned by Mr Danilo and Mr Giuliano, partners who have always run it together since 1986 and who now welcome us with great kindness, revealing a few details about the restaurant. "When we opened, the historic centre of Asti was a bit neglected, but our intention was to create a "home" that was an integral part of Asti's history, as our cuisine also is. The menu changes every day and is always based on fresh, seasonal products, strictly from the area, if not zero kilometres, certainly few kilometres," Mr Danilo explains to us.

After the exquisite starters we gladly taste a tasty soup that isn't just a soup, but an authentic philosophy of life. "For us, soups are a true praise of slow living, capable of enhancing simple ingredients, as well as the time needed to cook them," Danilo confides in us. His thought is shared by many loyal guests who don't forgo soups even during the warm season. You also have to devote time, and plenty of it, to searching for truffles, another flagship of the restaurant. The legendary white truffle of Alba is the king of the autumn dishes that we have the pleasure of tasting: local specialities sometimes revisited with imagination, but always respecting tradition.

The tuber that Gioacchino Rossini defined as "the Mozart of mushrooms" delights us in the tasting of dishes such as vegetable flans, scrambled or sunny-side-up egg, the legendary raw sliced meat seasoned only with extra virgin olive oil and a pinch of salt and pepper, but it remains the protagonist also when we move on to the delicious first courses such as risottos or tajarin. We wash these delicacies down with excellent wines from the rich cellar that offers over two hundred carefully selected Italian labels, with particular attention to Piedmont and the Asti area, a land of great wine-growing tradition in which the excellence of Asti spumante stands out.

We continue with exquisite meat main courses, while our friend enjoys the vegetarian menu instead, increasingly popular also because it offers a sensory experience among the delights of the Asti vegetable gardens with the pairing of the very good Piedmontese cheeses that we too taste at the end of dinner. The wonders of the Piedmontese dairies such as Castelmagno, Bra duro or the Raschera from alpine pastures will be among those very good reasons, together with the tasty homemade desserts of Il Convivio, for which we won't hesitate to return to Alfieri's city as soon as possible, hoping perhaps to be able to attend the next Palio too.

Francesca Bertha

FOR INFORMATION:

Ristorante Il Convivio – Vini e Cucina Via Giovan Battista Giuliani, 4/6 Asti Tel.: 0141/594188