Cormòns, Cividale del Friuli, and Palmanova

Now and then I’ll get a text from our friend Robert in Washington. Where are you on 26 May? Can we meet in Cormòns? Or, Flying in on 6 October. Cormòns? I always answer, Where shall we eat? This time he’s chosen Trattoria Al Piave, a place just outside town. We’ll gather at eight. This will be a special event: We’ll meet his fiancée.

These felicitous times together in Friuli began about ten years ago. Robert wrote to us in Cortona: You need to know La Subida. Let’s go. We went. There’s mystery at the heart of places that seem to belong to you. From the day he arrived, Robert experienced the same colpo di fulmine, lightning strike, that we felt our first summer in Tuscany. He began to come as often as possible.

Over the years, he’s become local, at home in every restaurant and in the local enoteca where the great winemakers gather. He’s accumulated that daunting kind of wine knowledge that includes the exact percentages in blends and which grapes are indigenous. With him, we got to know the Sirk family at La Subida, the epitome of regional cuisine and the meeting point of several cultures in one kitchen. We met Robert’s friend Giampaolo Venica, whose family makes white wines you could weep over. Not your house sauvignon blanc, their whites are as complex as any red. Venica & Venica’s sauvignon Ronco delle Mele is a big favorite of mine. We also visited vineyards, and collected cherished bottles of Edi Keber, Franco Toros, Schiopetto, and Gravner. What luck to have a friend who knows both terrain and terroir.

OF ALL THE undiscovered places in Italy, this little-visited corner bordering Slovenia remains an open secret. It has the Friulian Alps for skiing and hiking, pristine lakes such as Sauris, Adriatic beaches around Grado, the Duino coastal walk that inspired the poet Rilke, plus the capital, Trieste, with a strong Austro-Hungarian heritage. Sopratutto, above all, Friuli produces some of the tip-top wines of the world.

And it’s close to Venice, where everyone goes. The Floating City suffers a plague of tourists, and rightfully so: Venice—where dreams rise out of the waters, where color spangles in your eyes everywhere you look, where the subconscious and conscious merge, where the mysterious east touches the west, and where any fledgling romance flourishes into full-blown passion. Being there saturates me quickly. Three or four days, bliss, then I’m ready to go. The Veneto and Friuli are perfect extensions to a Venice trip.

CORMÒNS, APPEALING AND livable, has a major attraction: Enoteca di Cormòns, owned by a consortium of vineyards for the promotion of local wines. And as a gathering spot for themselves. Many such tasting rooms around Italy are for tourists. This one is full of the local growers and winemakers every evening. How different they are from the slender Tuscan aristocrats in Ferragamo and Zegna. Their hands aren’t soft, and some broad faces show Slavic heritage. Some are unshaven, all are full of zest. Because Robert knows many of them, they send over tastes and come to talk, mostly to joke with Robert. The women pouring all know him, too, and they serve us boards of cheeses, prosciutto, and smoked trout.

Cormòns straddles two major growing areas, Collio and Colli Orientali (Hills and Eastern Hills). Ah, Italy’s finest wines are produced by these men laughing over their glasses. In other areas where I’ve tasted, the wines can seem similar. In these zones, even ubiquitous pinot grigio rises way above its station. With each glass, I’m sure these men with their eyes closed can identify a hillside slope, a slant of sun. Across five Friuli wine districts, the grapes play the music of their own plots. Easy to fall in love with the wines of the area when the vibrations of their very terroir rises from the ground you stand on.

WE’VE STAYED AT La Subida and at Castello di Spessa in Capriva, both of which we love. This time we check into La Casa di Alice, a jasmine-covered B & B with a pool and garden in a leafy residential neighborhood. Anna Brandolin converted her grandparents’ barn and farmhouse and named her B & B for her daughter. For guests, she has four large rooms, each decorated in a bold color: yellow, blue, green, or red. We are put in the red, which is like being inside a big glass of wine. The atmosphere is light-hearted and Anna is sympatica.

We have the day and much to see, so we drop our bags and drive through the spring countryside over to Cividale del Friuli, only nineteen kilometers away. The thrill of the drive: With windows down for the freshest air, we pass fields of white asphodel in bloom.

WE ENTER THE storybook town over a high, double-arched bridge, Ponte del Diavolo, first built in the fifteenth century, destroyed in the infamous World War One Battle of Caporetto in 1917, then rebuilt by the Austrians after the war. The bridge spans the emerald-green waters of the Natisone. Why is it called the devil’s bridge? He allowed it to be constructed in exchange for one soul but the canny builders delivered him instead the soul of a dog. Devilishly clever.

Parking is easy and soon we’re under Gothic arches of the brick town hall that was started in 1286. We’re looking out at a statue of Julius Caesar. He built a forum in 50 B.C. and started the town on its way. (The word Friuli derives from Forum Julii.) Pigeons poop on his head but still he surveys with dignity the ancient town.

Down the street, we try slices of gubana, the signature dessert of this area. The leavened dough is rolled around a filling of mixed nuts, candied fruits, raisins, and orange peel, then swirled into a cake pan. When it’s sliced, you see a spiral of the filling. A lot like pastries I tasted in Hungary, even similar to strudel but cakier, gubana tastes of mitteleuropa. The name probably comes from Slovenian, guba, bent. I’ve read that it’s sometimes served with a splash of grappa.

So pretty, Piazza Paolo Diacono, surrounded by three- and four-story palatial buildings in pastel colors. Paul the Deacon: his piazza. That’s his chalky-white frescoed house. A monk and writer who lived in the eighth century, he chronicled the history of the Longobards. That he wrote a poem to San Giovanni Baptista fascinates Ed because the first syllables of the first six stanzas—ut, re, me, fa, sol, la—inspired Guido d’Arezzo to use them when he invented the musical scale.

The artistic remains of the Germanic Longobards, who arrived in 568, bring many to visit this town. After them, and after an incursion from the patriarch of nearby Aquileia, Charlemagne took over in 774 and the town came under the dominion of the Franks, who bestowed the name Civitas Austriae, eastern city, which evolved into Cividale. Longobards. Long beards. We find their Tempietto Longobardo, miraculously surviving from the eighth century in the oratorio of the Santa Maria in Valle monastery complex. Though small in size, this is the fullest expression of Longobard art and architecture remaining in Italy. The space is very pure, very pale, with exquisite stucco grape clusters and vines surrounding an arch, and a stunning row of six female statues above. “What do they remind you of?” I ask Ed.

He stares a while longer then nods. “The women in the mosaics in Ravenna. Same elongated archaic shapes.” Just what I thought, too. The overwhelming impression is stillness, silence.

In the outer room, under restoration, we can only glimpse intricate choir stalls, and another arch with curly vines and grapes. We’ll be back another day. The walkway out gives us a pretty view of the river, houses perched along it, and distant mountains.

Other Longobard relics are displayed at the Museo Archeologico Nazionale, along with finds from earlier and later times. Most arresting, an S-shaped fibula (garment fastener brooch) in gold set with garnet and amber; the jewelry found on a female skeleton—ring, belt buckle, hairpin, comb made of bone; sixth- and seventh-century necklaces of beads, filigree, glass, and amber. Take these home and wear tonight! Ed calls me over to look at a gold cross I could hold in the palm of my hand. It’s embossed with vegetal designs, delicate and highly worked. Another, even more cunningly worked, has an antlered deer carved into the crux of the cross. Those Longobards—not just Frankish hordes from the north but skilled and aesthetic artisans.

Cividale is a town that takes outdoor life seriously. Bars and cafés with umbrellas and flower boxes are everywhere, and the townspeople are out strolling the appealing streets. Friuli is prosperous; local shops prove that. Along Corso Mazzini, a window shows exquisite embroidered linens. We pop into Scubla Antica Drogheria, now a gastronomy emporium, and buy polenta, biologico (organic) fruit jams, and vialone rice. Profumerie (perfumes and beauty products), hair salons, cool shoe and clothing stores are plentiful. My favorite shop, in the arcades on Piazza Paolo Diacono, is A Occhi Chiusi (“To Closed Eyes”). They sell exotic teas, spices, infusions, essential oils, and tea-making articles in a curated, attractive nook.

We stop for a light lunch (after all that gubana) at Enoteca de Feo, where we’re surrounded by young businessmen in fitted suits and dress shoes with no socks. Very cool and likely to stay that way. Friuli is justly known for San Daniele prosciutto, which we’re able to buy in Cortona. With our Montasio aged cheese, we’re opting for D’Osvaldo prosciutto, arguably more delicate. Transparent slices seem to melt in the mouth, imparting the gentlest sweet-salt tastes. We’re sitting at an outside table because the day is perfect, sipping a glass of Friulano, which used to be called tocai. The Hungarians won the right to tokay and tocai, and local makers renamed theirs Friulano. The elixir in our glasses is Schiopetto’s Friulano Collio.

From the corner of two pedestrian streets, we see bicyclists’ baskets blooming with fennel fronds, a toddler in red running away from his mother, and a tall teenage boy, insouciant of his beauty, who could have stepped out of a Bronzino painting. He will never lack someone to love him.

HARD TO PULL away from Cividale. In the afternoon, we push on for a look at Palmanova, only a half hour away. I was first curious about this town because of reading W. G. Sebald’s Austerlitz. He was fascinated by the architecture of star forts such as Palmanova’s. By the time they were built, interim advances in armaments eclipsed the tactical advantages offered by the star-shape design. They were obsolete before they were finished, blending into his sense that enterprise is dispersing even as it is conceived. Sebald saw in this a deeply melancholy philosophy that puts life always in diaspora. Our reach never grasps.

On approaching, the lineaments of Palmanova’s star are clear. Inside the walls, we come immediately into a grand piazza, center of the town plan. The center hexagon has eighteen concentric radiating streets and four ring streets intersecting the radials, a mesmerizing spider web. Built by the Venetians in 1593, Palmanova was meant to protect the area from raucous invaders, especially Turks, but the plan wasn’t just for defense. The Venetians believed beauty promotes the general good, and designed accordingly. Their intention was utopian: Equal land was given to everyone.

The surprise—no one came to live there. Too perfect? Too regimented? (There is something deadening about planned communities.)

Finally, in 1622, the Venetians released enough prisoners to occupy the ghost town.

What elaborate preparations, all for battles that never happened. Without military parades or festivals, what to do with such an immense piazza? A playground makes a tiny dent along one edge. Some old wooden hoists used in the original construction occupy another small space. A café intrudes a few meters. Mostly, though, it is empty, a space still waiting for something to happen.

AS EVENING FALLS, we park in front of Trattoria Al Piave in Mariano del Friuli. Right on time—it’s eight o’clock. Behind us, Robert and his fiancée, Kirsten.

Robert is one of those friends you pick up with as though you’ve seen each other last week, when it has been six months. And this beauty whom we already know to be brilliant, too—what a pleasure to meet her. The trattoria owner, Patrizia, throws her arms around Robert. Her family-operated place is welcoming, too—a fireplace, bucolic mural, white tablecloths. We’re seated in an intimate garden drenched with the scent of jasmine. Patrizia brings out prosecco. There’s catch-up, there’s getting acquainted with Kirsten. Travel. Books. Politics. Food. News. Projects. Out come the house-made breads, a potato strudel with bruscandoli and ricotta with cubes of tomato. What luck, this is the season when it’s possible to try bruscandoli, the mild green top shoots of hops. Pasta with raunchy wild greens and rabbit. Fall-off-the-bone veal shank. The wine honors go to Robert. He chooses first the Sturm Andritz Rosso Collio 2011, and when we have turned up our glasses for the last sip, he orders Raccaro Collio Malvasia 2016, both new to us. Best to trust Robert, who knows his way around Collio wines!

We love the old-fashioned trattoria, the owners’ dedication to the gifts of the land. Love being with friends for a great feast to pull us back together again. Now we go in different directions. Next year? Same place?

IT’S LATE BACK at La Casa di Alice but we sit by the pool for a few minutes, letting the day settle into place, revisiting the menu at Al Piave, admiring the food of Friuli and the Slovenian, Austrian edge.

“What’s better than frico? Like hashbrowns but not. I could eat frico every day,” I muse. The shredded potatoes are mixed with the local aged cow’s-milk Montasio cheese and sautéed until crisp. Some versions include apples or herbs.

“Genuino, that sacred Italian word.” Genuine.

“Yes. Don’t you love the frequency of woodcock, venison, and goose on the menus?”

“And fat white asparagus, best I’ve ever tasted; canerino, that canary-yellow radicchio. And all kinds of mushrooms…”

We trail up to bed in the red, red room.

ANNA’S BREAKFAST IN her big sunny kitchen: crostata with apricots, lemon, nuts. She’s set out, too, local caciotta cheese with herbs, and a basket of breads. Anna is a sunny presence herself. We look with her at some of her cookbooks, then she takes us around the garden. This is like visiting a friend of a friend.

We stroll around Cormòns while it’s still early. Ed beams as we pass a vending machine that dispenses bicycle inner tubes for seven euros. His kind of town. We greet Massimiliano I, his statue a vestige of the Hapsburg era of the town. The Maria Theresa yellow of several buildings also connects to the long Austrian heritage. The other color of Cormòns I like is a pale blue, ashen and calm. Particular to Friuli is the centa and we look into the entrance to one. Centa, from the word for “belt,” I presume, is a single or double row of houses arranged in a U; they protect a church, nested inside.

Cormòns is an elegant, low-key town. Will Robert someday buy a house here? Maybe this one, with a celadon-green door and shutters, an arching bower of white roses tangled with wisteria, a calico cat on the step, and a red vintage Fiat Cinquecento parked outside.

NOTES:

Robert Draper’s article on his Cormòns adventures in Smithsonian magazine: https://www.smithsonianmag.com/​travel/​venice-friuli-wine-region-vineyard-enoteca-italy-180956875/

UNESCO site on Palmanova: http://whc.unesco.org/​en/​tentativelists/​1154/

Interesting connection: Plaza del Ejecutivo in Mexico City was based on Palmanova’s design: http://worldurbanplanning.com/​plaza-del-ejecutivo-mexico/

Gnocchi con La Lepre

GNOCCHI WITH WILD HARE, SERVES 4 TO 6

Hare is relished in Italy. Milder and readily available, rabbit is sold in most butcher shops, which every town has—we can shop at four in our immediate vicinity. Neither hare nor rabbit is easy to find in the United States, but there are online sources for ordering both. I hope this is not heresy, but this recipe from Chefs Patrizio and Stefano Fermanelli also works with chicken.

FOR THE GNOCCHI

  • 2 pounds russet potatoes, peeled and freshly boiled

  • 2 cups all-purpose flour

  • 2 large eggs

FOR THE HARE SAUCE

  • 3 tablespoons sunflower oil

  • 1 whole hare (or rabbit), about 4 pounds, cut into pieces

  • 3 onions, chopped

  • 3 carrots, sliced

  • 2 cloves garlic, minced

  • Rosemary, sage, marjoram, QB

  • 4 juniper berries

  • 3 tablespoons sweet paprika

  • 1 bottle red wine

  • 2 cups chicken stock, plus more if needed

  • Salt and pepper, QB

  • 2 tablespoons all-purpose flour

Prepare the gnocchi: Crush the potatoes and let them cool in a medium mixing bowl. Add the flour and eggs and mix until the flour is completely integrated. Let stand for about 10 minutes. By hand, make cigar-shaped cylinders with the dough, about 1 inch thick. On a floured counter, slice the cylinders into ¾-inch pieces.

Prepare the hare sauce: Add 1½ tablespoons of the oil to a large skillet and brown the pieces of hare over high heat. Remove and add the remaining oil to the skillet. Sauté the vegetables, the herbs, juniper berries, and paprika. Return the pieces of hare to the pan and add the wine and stock. Bring to a boil, cover, and simmer until cooked, 20 to 30 minutes, depending on the size of the pieces. Take the hare out, remove the bones, and cut the meat into small pieces.

Remove any excess oil from the skillet with a spoon. Pass the vegetables through a food mill or coarsely purée in a food processor, and return the mixture to the skillet. Season, then add the flour and mix quickly with a whisk to avoid lumps. The sauce should not be too liquid or too thick. At this point add the pieces of hare. Thin with stock if needed.

Cook the gnocchi in plenty of boiling salted water until they just come to the surface. Drain them and top with the sauce.

Trattoria Al Piave, Mariano del Friuli, Friuli Venezia Giulia

Torta al Limone e Ricotta

LEMON RICOTTA TART, SERVES 8

Anna Brandolin serves this for breakfast, but I’d like a late-night slice and a glass of malvasia to take out to the pool.

Preheat the oven to 350˚F.

Line the bottom of a 9-inch tart pan with parchment and butter the sides.

Make the pastry. Cream the butter and sugar together in a large bowl. Add the lemon zest. Add one egg yolk at a time, and combine well. Add the ricotta and continue mixing. Beat in the lemon juice.

In a medium bowl, combine well the flour, almonds, vanilla, and baking powder, then add the ricotta mixture.

In another medium bowl, whip the egg whites until they form soft peaks and then fold into the ricotta mixture.

Pour into the pan and bake for 40 to 45 minutes. Test for doneness with a toothpick. The tart will be very umida (moist) because of the ricotta.

Unmold the tart, and let it cool for 5 minutes before sifting confectioners’ sugar over the top. Serve at room temperature with fresh fruit, crème fraîche, or whipped cream.

La Casa di Alice, Cormòns, Friuli Venezia Giulia