See You in the Piazza

by Frances Mayes

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  BY THE TIME we check into Vico della Cavallerizza, our centrally located B & B, Lecce is just reopening after the pausa. We have been here before, but only for a morning, when the cruise ship where I was guest speaker docked south of here at Gallipoli. We came in by bus for a whirl of a tour. The majesty of the city imprinted and I’ve always wanted to come back. Cartapesta, papier-mâché, is Lecce’s unusual craft, especially figures for crèches, but also life-size religious figures for carrying in processions (so much lighter than wood), peasant figures, and accessories for the crèche such as trees, animals, fireplaces, and blacksmiths, candle makers, and butchers working at their crafts. And angels! I bought an ethereal one with billowing skirts for our Christmas tree. Every year since, I think of Lecce when I affix her to the top.

  Perfect for walking, with its low buildings and flat terrain, Lecce feels open to the sky. Once a four-gated city, its remaining magnificent arch, Porta Napoli (1548), could be at home on a significant Roman triumphal route.

  Lecce is a town for those hundred thousand people who live here, not a tourist town. The ornate palazzi look private; I long to go inside one pale confection made, it seems, by a wedding-cake baker. Most buildings are ornamented to the hilt with Baroque carved supports for balconies, surrounds of doors and windows. The local sandstone, pietra leccese, was easy to carve into beasts, beauties, acanthus, flower medallions. Then it hardens. By now, much is worn. Lions have lost their fierceness; the dresses of caryatids are pocked; putti are missing their wings. We look into one extravagant church after another. Right in the center, the ruin of a Roman amphitheater reminds me of a long history behind the flamboyant Baroque era. Only excavated in 1938, it’s still not fully explored. A few intact seats remain where people watched barbarous animal torture games. At the center of the piazza stands Sant’Oronzo, the saint we met in Ostuni. His statue is surrounded by shops and Caffè Alvino, a righteous coffee stop.

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  LEADING OUT OF the Piazza Sant’Oronzo on via Trinchese, we find Natale, a glamorous pastry shop already full of fanciful giant chocolate Easter eggs and lavishly wrapped panettone. We select some chocolates, which are then packaged like gifts for royalty to nibble. The tarts and cakes are flounced and dolloped and edged with lime-green or pink ribbons of icing, feasts for the eyes. On this street are modern shops, including Zara, which at the end of the day resembles a place that tornadoes blew through. The sales staff looks defeated over the heaps of clothing strewn on the floor and a million lopsided hangers. Dusk, everyone out. Lecce is a university town, which guarantees liveliness. Also guarantees bookstores. I spend time in Cartoleria Pantheon, the booklover’s companion store, full of journals and agendas in leather and paper, real ink pens, wrapping paper that is so pretty for lining drawers, and nice notepads and leather satchels.

  * * *

  BROS’! THEY MIGHT not, with their hard-edged décor and idiosyncratic presentations, think they’re in line with the Baroque but I do. Playful, way over the top, dramatized, but still taste-forward, this restaurant belongs to Floriano Pellegrino, a bright light born in 1990. The super-talented pastry chef, Isabella Potì, was born in 1995. They represent a youthful version of Lecce. We are the only ones dining except for a lone woman with her laptop open on the table. Ed thinks she must be a Michelin reviewer. Olives are served in a hand of ice made by freezing water in a rubber glove. Mushrooms appear on a mossy log. Jellied kumquats on a bed of charcoal. And what are these, salted plums lined up on a piece of driftwood? The bread is beautiful on a simple board.

  For antipasto, there’s a roasted red onion with ribes, currants, and tiny pearls of tapioca; a soft cheese with lavender and cress; a little terrain of sedano rapa, celeriac. Everything is gently treated and delicate. We’re rolling with this. Onward to the primi. Lentils with coconut and dill. Big fusilli with scampi and black sesame. The waiter suggested Taersìa, a white of the area. The chef comes out to chat. Our secondo seems almost ordinary, crunchy-skin duck breast with green apples and juniper. Ed doesn’t mind that the duck is so very rare, while I’m slicing around for the more done edges. We’re given a glass of a local big blood-red, though we never find out what it is beyond negroamaro. In advance, we ordered one of Isabella’s gossamer cheese soufflès, what the angels eat. Before we go, the waiter brings a citrus soup with floating jellies in the shapes of B R O S. What fun.

  * * *

  EARLY, WE’RE OUT. Piazza del Duomo, the grand heart of town, is one of Italy’s finest. Its drama is increased by the entrance. Curved walls topped by statues narrow then open into the vast space occupied by the Duomo (1114), its sixty-eight-meter-tall bell tower, the elegant bishop’s palace, and other buildings that look important enough to host world-changing councils. The scale and harmony stop me with awe. A tiny bodega, squeezed in among the grandeur, belongs to an artisan cartapesta maker. A group of Dutch tourists jams into his shop, where he has almost nothing for sale but is gamely explaining the process. The large figures are first made of wire and stuffed with paper, then the wet strips of papier-mâché are wrapped around and shaped and dried and sanded and…We slip away. The tour guide is outside smoking and looking at her phone. She’s seen this before.

  * * *

  ERENE, WHO WORKS at our B & B, sends us around the corner to La Vecchia Osteria. It’s crowded. We meet true-blue regional food. Wonder if the Bros’ cooks eat here on their day off. We order the vegetable antipasto, six small bowls of chicory greens, peppers, mozzarella, cabbage, mushrooms, and potato croquettes. Puglia is a great choice for vegetarians; the repertoire weighs heavily that way. Then ciceri e tria, chickpeas and tria, a local broad, flat pasta topped with crisp fried strips of chickpea batter. Big seafood fritto misto. Orecchiette, the favored pasta throughout Puglia, appears on the menu with cime di rape, turnip tops. What makes it great, the waiter says, is a few pounded anchovies. Everyone around us seems to be ordering the same things we are, and also the bright red raw beef or horse meat. Horse figures prominently, with tomatoes and chili peppers, as escalope, and as a filet. I’m studying the menu because this represents fully the Leccese traditions. Lamb rolls with heart, liver, and lung. Snails. And a whole page of grilled fish and other seafood.

  Tonight, further forays into the heart of the Puglian kitchen at Alex, a glassed-in restaurant in a park. ’Ncapriata, a fava bean purée, wild chicory, olive oil, garlic, and red pepper. This has to be straight from the cucina povera tradition. Then there’s braised beef glossy with kumquats, a gratin of eggplant with smoked mozzarella, almonds, and sweet-sour cherry tomatoes. Just a glass each of Masseria Maime, Negroamaro, 2011 Tormaresca, and lots of sparkling water. All bright flavors in the florid atmosphere of a garden room.

  * * *

  AFTER BREAKFAST WITH other guests—a group of young Chinese travelers who innocently arrive at breakfast in their pajamas—we leave for the day. We finally find the lot where we’ve parked the car and drive into the Salento, the far south of Puglia. First stop, Corigliano d’Otranto, intriguing because it is one of nine villages where Griko, a dialect surviving from when this area was Magna Grecia, still can be heard. A Bandiera Arancione, Corigliano is immediately appealing.

  We walk to the striking, symmetrical Castello di Monti with four round towers, then to La Chiesa Matrice di San Nicola. As we’re admiring the rose window and statues on the façade, a slender middle-aged man wearing a suit introduces himself as the town historian. Would we like to see the church? Originally a much older church, the current one was built in the sixteenth century, then renovated in 1622. On the bell tower, there are letters carved in Greek that were found in the medieval era. As he opens the door, light falls down the center aisle in a burst. “The mosaic on the floor,” he tells us, “is the tree of life.” Highly stylized figures. The trunk of the tree runs all the way from the door to the altar, with biblical scenes along the branches. I can’t place the era. “No, not old,” he says in answer to my que
stion. “Only 1878. The brothers Maselli accomplished the work and design.”

  I don’t know who these brothers were, but they were bold. He tells us more about the town history and its current ambiance. “We are only six thousand. With many philosophers.” I forget to ask if he speaks Griko.

  We walk out through a park with a row of weird ceramic sculptures, each one emblazoned with the name of a different philosopher. Later, I read that the mayor has employed a philosopher to be available to discuss problems and issues with citizens one afternoon a week. Special town!

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  NEXT STOP: SPECCHIA. On a nice inland rise that protected citizens from Saracen coastal raids, Specchia began in the ninth century. Driving through olive groves and wildflowers, we pass a pajare, one of the ancient stone agricultural buildings that look like an upside-down flower pot. Some of these have spiral stairs. Lookouts? One source suggests a climb for star-gazing.

  The square Piazza del Popolo, flat-top buildings, palm trees, balconies all give a fleeting impression of North Africa, or southern Spain. Castello Risolo, also looking quite Moorish in design, lines one side. This is a distinctive small town; it’s easy to see why it has been named one of the listings in I Borghi più belli d’Italia.

  Where is everyone? Any minute a hand might part curtains and peer down at us for a better look.

  At least the Pasticceria Bar Martinucci is open. One of the delights of Italy is that every bar has freshly squeezed orange juice, spremuta d’arancia. Here I try spremuta di melagrana, juice of pomegranate. This is going to become my afternoon drink in Puglia—what Persephone must have drunk to increase her powers on the way down to Hades. We’re the only customers and the barista wants to chat. He recommends their pasticciotto, which is a favorite and famous pastry of the Lecce area. “You need to try the chocolate,” he advises, but we split the one filled with pastry cream and wild cherries.

  “Wouldn’t this be good for breakfast?”

  “Anytime,” Ed says. He’s had more than his share. Pasticciotto is made in a small oval mold. The old ones were copper. Pasta frolla, a soft pastry dough, is formed into a cylinder, then cut in little slices that are pressed down by hand and put into the form. Next comes the filling (chocolate does sound good), and then another flattened oval of dough over the top. We buy a few mustaccioli to go. This chocolate-covered cookie, popular in Naples as well as this part of Puglia, has a soft, cake-like interior flavored with spices, honey, and candied fruit.

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  I CAN’T OVERSTATE the beauty of the Salento coast. We spend the afternoon driving to different beaches—walking, stopping for a sandwich and coffee, sitting on bluffs watching the mesmerizing colors of blue shift to turquoise and back to blue. Oh, for a boat to wend our way along the shore. The clear water reminds me of Lawrence Durrell writing about Corfu. He’s tossing cherries and watching his wife dive down to the white sand bottom and bring them up in her teeth.

  About transparent water, there is something life-affirming. Even if summer is crowded, there are so many beaches that it must be easy to find a plot of sand and immerse yourself in the delicious water. I am ready to come back to Torre dell’Orso with its gentle swath of beach and the two monumental off-shore rocks, Due Sorelle, two sisters. Also Torre Saracena, with dramatic rock formations, and the sandy inlets around Melendugno. If I could forecast an ideal time for the Salento, I’d say early June; although, for me, the spring offers solitude and a chance to be alone with Ed and the beauties of this coast.

  * * *

  FOR DINNER, OUR last night in Lecce, we choose Osteria degli Spiriti, a family-run restaurant with the cozy atmosphere of a home. We order fried mixed vegetables, beef filets braised in negroamaro wine, and salads. The Polvenera Primitivo 17 is from seventy-year-old bush vines. It’s deep red in the glass, with purple fringes. Lecce at night looks glamorous and, in places, almost unreal. Few are roaming about at this hour. “Do you think we’ve somehow ascended into heaven?”

  “No. They don’t have espresso in heaven.” Last coffee of the day. Ed always has a nip before bed, as he thinks it gives him the strength to sleep.

  * * *

  WE DEPART LECCE early on our way north to a cluster of small villages around Troia and Lucera. Today’s detour, a half hour south: Otranto on the coast, the ancient port for trade to Greece, Turkey, Asia. Albania is only a sail away, less than a hundred kilometers. Otranto was strategic and often raided. A Turkish attack in 1480 was unusually brutal. After a wholesale slaughter of the citizens, the remaining eight hundred were offered their lives if they renounced Christianity. They did not. Their bones remain in Santa Maria Annunziata. More uplifting to see in that church is the mosaic tree-of-life floor and the portrayed seasonal activities as in old books of hours. Ah, the brothers who accomplished the tree of life in Corigliano must have been inspired by this.

  Long ago and far away, I first heard of this place in high school when I read The Castle of Otranto (1764) by Horace Walpole. This book birthed the gothic novel. The real fifteenth-century Castello Aragonese dominates the town, but looks less forbidding than the one I imagined when reading Walpole’s book.

  Strife now seems remote in this centro. On summer evenings, it must hum with contented beachgoers, through for the day, and ready for strolls and dining in a charming town.

  The wind is pushing us through the streets where most of the tiny shops catering to tourists are shut. We find an open bar for cappuccino and a cornetto.

  “End of April,” the barista tells us. “That’s when the town wakes up.”

  * * *

  “YOUR ROOM IS ready. Documents, please.” As we check into the hotel in Lucera, I open my handbag and realize that I left my passport, camera, and wallet in the drawer of the bedside table in Lecce.

  NOTES:

  Mamma li Turchi is a phrase known all over Italy, a cry of alarm when danger of intruders arises. Or, used ironically for other invasions such as a swarm of tourists descending. Mama, the Turks are coming!

  A must to read in this part of Puglia: Honey from a Weed by Patience Gray, eccentric Englishwoman who lived, foraged, and cooked in a primitive house nearby for many years.

  When I get back to Lecce, I’ll book at La Fiermontina. I saw photos from friends who stayed there and raved. www.lafiermontina.com

  Fusillone, Scampo, Sesamo Nero

  LARGE FUSILLI, PRAWNS, BLACK SESAME, SERVES 4

  A wildly inventive and surprising restaurant, Bros’ is in the hands of Chef Floriano Pellegrino, still in his twenties, and also the young and gifted pastry chef Isabella Potì. Their playful recipes usually feature at least one rogue ingredient. Here we get to play with toasted black sesame seeds (I order them online). He recommends Gentile fusillone, made in Naples, but large fusilli is widely available. The philosophy of the plate, Floriano wrote to me: “In this dish, we wanted to use in a different way the usual toasted broth soup, combining vinegared shallot with bitter black sesame.” For the broth, I recommend first sautéing the shells in olive oil, then adding 1 cup of water.

  16 raw prawns, scampi, or large shrimp, shelled and cut in half lengthwise (reserve shells)

  Salt, QB

  ½ cup white wine vinegar

  4 shallots, thinly sliced

  ½ pound toasted black sesame seeds

  5 tablespoons sunflower oil

  1 cup broth

  ¾ pound fusillone

  4 tablespoons extra-virgin olive oil

  Fine salt, QB

  Make a broth with the shells by simmering them with salt in a small pan of water for 30 minutes.

  Pour the white wine vinegar into a small bowl. Add the shallots to the vinegar.

  Toast the black sesame seeds in a 300ºF oven on a parchment-lined sheet pan for 4 minutes. When cool, emulsify with sunflo
wer oil in a food processor.

  Cook the fusillone al chiodo, nail hard, in enough boiling salted water and 1 cup of the broth.

  Sauté the scampi for about 3 minutes in the olive oil.

  Serve with sesame sauce on the bottom, then the fusillone and prawns, and finish with the shallots in vinegar.