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Settembre-- Pienza 7 |
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written
by Megan Brewster / 07.04.2004 |
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Itinerary |
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On the way back from Siena, we dropped by Pienza for the annual pecorino cheese rolling festival and to hang out. The town was in full-swing, showing off its convivial spirit with cheese and wine samples.
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Highlights |
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WALKING AROUND. Pienza is considered to be a "manifestation of dreams" of Plato and his followers. For more details, please see the Location Database, linked below. The town was made for walking around: consistently beautiful buildings and extensive hilltop views. Many of the streets were adorned with bright potted flowers and cats. One piazza, Piazza di Spagnia, was especially harmonious: a rectangular piazza with the longer sides facing east and west for maximum sunlight, pale yellow and pink buildings with contrasting dark green shutters, women chatting from their windows across the alleyways.
CHEESE ROLLING. Pecorino is a diverse family of cheeses: types of milk, age, hardness, and use are just a few of the varying characteristics. However, differences aside, they are all made in the shape of wheels, making them perfect for rolling. The Pienzians take advantage of this specific aspect every year for their cheese-rolling contest, and we were lucky enough to see the rollers warming-up for that evening. The square field is approximately five meters long and fenced off in the middle of the town’s main piazza. In one corner, a rug; on the opposite side, a chalked bull’s eye with a vertical stick marking the target’s center. Rollers took turns kneeling on the carpet, cheese wheel in hand, and, with a swift flick of the wrist, rolled the cheese over the uneven brick ground, which followed an arcing path towards the target. After a cheese was rolled, one of two young boys would run onto the court to retrieve it. And the crowd was into it: clapping if the cheese hit the vertical stick, silent disappointment if it rolled into and then out of the target’s rings. Interestingly enough, the variations in success of a Contestant’s three warm-up rolls makes the viewer wonder if there is any skill actually involved in the rolling: one wheel may end in the center of the bull’s eye, while its predecessor rolled off into the crowd. Of course, the author does not at all doubt the many hours the Rollers must have spent developing that skillful wrist flick and studying the effects of a brick’s defects on the rolling of a pecorino wheel.
TASTINGS. The main drag was littered with stands selling and sampling pecorino cheese and wild boar. The author managed to try a sampling plate at one of the local restaurants: one was distinctly sheep’s milk, the softest and freshest of the bunch; one with peppercorn, a clever zest to accent this pecorino’s delicate taste; one with some indescribable aftertaste (the author’s favorite); and one that is probably eaten with pasta, as it was dry and sharp. The wild boar was sliced right off of the fully-exposed body, and the head of the animal was displayed proudly as close to the crowd as possible. The town was also sampling some of the local wines (especially Montelcino’s renowned Brunello and the less-expensive Rosso).
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Images |
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The images of the day show the main entry to the town, pecorino wheels at a typical sidewalk stand, a wild boar decorated by sausages, the cheese rolling field, and a concentrated Roller. Beyond what is shown in the first image was the main drag lined with sampling stands and tourists, flanked by unbearably picturesque alleys, shutters, and doorways. The second and third images lack, due to their inherently visual nature, the smell: pecorino, sharp and fresh; boar, sweet and meaty. While the concentration of the Roller in the fourth picture is interesting, I found the onlookers' responses to his rolling more entertaining: the competitors watched intently while most of the crowd was distracted by the cheese samples. One way or another, the atmosphere was in every festival, with laughter and plenty of food.
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