Dear San Gimmies,
St Christopher, the patron saint of Travellers, must have been looking out for us as we made a reasonable recovery to head to San Gimignano (San gimmin-yanno phonetically) next day. While still snotty and sore throatish, we decided to drive the 35 mins to see this extremely well preserved medieval town.San Gimignano is referred to as the "Medieval Manhattan". Within it's amazing walls remain 14 of the original 72 Towers that were built as a status symbol by the important families that lived there remain and it creates an impressive skyline indeed.
What a lovely place when it first comes into view,high upon a cliff top and you understand why these folk built such impressive fortresses in the locations they did. You would see an enemy coming for miles and miles around. We had been told by fellow guests how difficult it was to get parking outside the city walls as SG had been the first city to ban motor vehicle traffic from it's centre. But we lucked it without problem at all and saw no tour buses whatsoever throughout the day.
We wandered around and fell upon Sandi's recommendation of the WORLD'S BEST GELATO. And it was. We had two scoops each of some amazing gelato but decided against the Gorgonzola gelato or the Prosecco with ameretto flavors and went for raspberry and pistacchio di bronte - brilliant! Thanks Sandi!
Siobhan had had a coffee earlier in a cute but unusual bar that had disturbing calendars of naked women which is something you don't see every day in downtown catholic tourist land, we would have to admit!! Still, the coffee was great.
We had great lunch of; translation- chicken under a brick- a crispy skin quarter of chicken with herbs and spices the colonel would have never thought to use,whilst Siobhan had a slow cooked braised Tuscan Beef with porcini mushrooms and chianti which was gone in 0.5 seconds flat. Accompanied by a stellar wine - life was good.
We wandered some more through the streets and alleyways and came across a brilliant place called Il Cantina Convento- an Enoteca in the old convent where you can taste local and neighboring wines using a wine card that you purchase, and say you put 20€ on the card, you then place your glass under the bottle of your choice, it has a nominal tasting fee, you get about 30ml and you try what you like. Anything you don't spend, gets refunded at the end of the tasting. Siobhan didn't have any to refund - she needed to top up her card!!
The lovely fellow that ran this establishment was called Lorenzo. And before we started "officially" tasting he gave us some freetastings of his own wines as well. Siobhan then proceeded to work her way through three whites and five reds. Her faves were the Brunello and also what is called a Super Tuscan which retails for a lazy 88€ !!!! The good stuff is seriously good and the affordable gears just great value.
If that wasn't enough, we also tasted some of the most beautiful aged balsamic vinegars with cheeses and some dessert wine that we simply had to purchase!!! We also had to buy some paste that you serve with cheese that, like quince paste, but is made with chianti, Brunello, and Vernaccia grapes, so looking forward to serving that up with our cheese platters this summer.
Lorenzo is the most knowledgable and delightful man so if you find yourself in San Gimmy - please seek him out. He is just so lovely!!!! We brought our platter of goodies from a local salumni Alimentari in San Gimmy and with a crisp bottle of white settled in back at our agritorismo for an early night.
A great day out.
Salute Friends
Kelly & Siobhan
Xxx
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