Bologna 2018 – Tuesday

Foodie Heaven

Tuesday 8th May 2018

Our bedroom had external shutters, so it was very dark in the room and I slept very well. We had a cappuccino and a croissant (called a brioche in Italy) in the cafe in the street close to the flat and then set off to explore the Bologna. The commercial and cultural heart is Piazza Maggiore, a beautiful square surrounded by imposing brick medieval buildings. On our arrival, we saw lots of police in the piazza, and then heard lots of loud car horns and air horns. A procession of white taxis drove slowly into the square and parked outside the town hall. They were protesting about something, but I don’t know what! We were told that Uber is banned in Bologna, so it wasn’t about that.

The Basilica of Saint Petronius is a huge church in the Piazza but is half finished. Originally it would have been bigger than St Peter’s in Rome, but the Pope took some of the funds to build the university. Consequently, the front is only half covered in marble, and the transept was never built. The interior is spacious and lined with twenty chapels and two organs, one of them from 1480.

The Palazzo D’Accursio is a huge palace which is now the town hall. Inside there are staircases which can be ridden up on horseback, but are not so easy to walk up on foot. It has some very grand staterooms with frescos and portraits of the great and the good of old Bologna. In an office the revolting taxi drivers were meeting local officials surrounded by media folk, so we kept clear of that.

 

At 12.30 we climbed the 480 steps to the top of the Asinelli tower. It is a narrow wooden staircase all the way up, and it takes about ten minutes to climb. The view is magnificent and well worth the ascent. We got in behind a group of lively school students, and even they briefly stopped taking selfies to take photos of the wonderful views of old Bologna.

 

 

All those stairs gave us an appetite, so we explored the Quadrilatero district to find some lunch. It is a grid of bars, cafes and food shops near the Piazza, and is a real foodie heaven. There are shops full of handmade pasta, Parma ham, meringues, Parmesan, cakes, fancy bread – everything deliciously Italian. It was hard to decide which place to go in, so we randomly chose Tamburini, which is a self-service cafe, which was a very good choice. I had braised beef with sautéed potatoes, Julie had tortelloni and cannelloni, both were very very good.

 

 

You could spend the whole day grazing in the Quadrilatero, but you would end up very fat and poor, not enviable conditions to be in. We explored the Piazza San Stephany with its Seven Churches, which are, in fact, four churches (still standing) all joined together into a single complex. Some of the buildings date back to Roman times, so it’s all terribly old and quiet and was good for an hour of peace and quiet.

 

 

 

 

Julie then wanted a drink at the nice bar in the square, but I didn’t want to spend five euros on 330 ml of lager. So she got the justifiably got the hump at my stingy attitude, but I eased her pain with a glass of sparkling wine in the Mercato di Mezzo for three euros – result! I saved two euros, which is the same amount I donated to St Stephano church to ensure my entry into heaven.

 

 

We returned to the flat for a rest, a breadstick and some San Miguel beer, I know it’s Spanish, but it is darned good. Thus replenished, it was time for an aperitif in Piazza Aldrovani. The Aperol Spritz came with a selection of snacks and we watched some drunken people at a table across the pavement, it was gently entertaining. Our evening was topped off by pizzas at Pizzeria al Rustica in Via San Vitale, accompanied by some Sangiovese wine. Not a sophisticated meal, but a tasty belt buster.