Music and Markets - - Following the Music

Day One in Cremona

Saturday, January 5, 2008

We started the day at the nearest supermarket, just a block or two from our pretty golden apartment building, and stocked up on kitchen supplies for dinner at home tonight. What a welcome change after eating at restaurants for the last 10 days.

We found the tourist
information office helpful
and picked up info about the hotels and restaurants in Cremona and about a guided walking tour we’ll check out on Monday.

We took Salvatore up on his first recommendation (last night)for lunch – La Botte – in the historic center of Cremona, down a lovely little cobbled lane.

It’s the entry room for a large former palazzo. The room is literally a cube with the ceilings as high as the room is long and across – about 30 feet.

They’ve built a four posted gazebo in the center with wine barrels (botte) across the top. There’s a huge fireplace and fish tank and lots of interesting framed posters and photos of Cremona on the wall.

The city’s signature dish is marubini in brodo and their hot chicken broth made me wish I had a cold because I’m sure this broth (brimming with meat-filled tortellini) would make me well if I did. Anne had a very flavorful tortelli di zucca– pasta triangles filled with pumpkin in a butter and cream sauce. Since we’d heard they specialize in seafood we ordered Bronzino in Sale and when our waitress brought it to our table to de-bone it, she first had to smack it repeatedly with the side of her big spoon to break off the thick crust of salt. The salt surrounds the whole fish and keeps the moisture in without making the fish taste salty.
We walked all over the main square again ending up at Hotel Impero in a gorgeous building on a tiny square called Piazza della Pace.
We checked out a room and will consider it a possibility for Music and Markets Cremona Tour this September.

A civilized afternoon stop for warming up was called for so we snuck into Pasticceria Duomo for coffee and pastries. The inside is furnished like an old pharmacy
with dark wood shelves, paneling, and moulding. They said, though, that it has always been a tea and pastry shop as far back as 1883.

We spent some time learning about Cremona and the craft and traditions of violin making.

It's often mentioned that you can see where the violin masters got
their ideas for curves and embellishments as you walk through the streets of Cremona, lined with intricately decorated mansions in molded (and sometimes painted) terracotta.

Once again, we walk along the streets gazing upward, snapping photos of sumptuous facades.

I read about a Cremonese violin maker named Andrea Amati who, before Stradivari’s time, refined, evolved, and defined the shape of the violin from what looked something like a little one armed shoe box with strings tied to it. His big break came when Catherine de Medici, mother of
Charles IX, king of France ordered a 38 piece string orchestra from him in 1566. These were played in the courts of Paris and Versailles until the 1789 revolution when all but four instruments were destroyed. For dinner, Anne tossed an arugula, apple, walnut, and gorgonzola salad together. She also stirred up a nice Zuppa di Zucca a la Mantovana (pumpkin soup in the style of Mantova, where we’ll be going later this week.)
I stayed up late trying to get the Redskins radio broadcast on the internet but didn’t succeed until late in the fourth quarter when it was Seattle up 13 to 6. Then it went to Redskins up 14 to 13. Then after a Seattle touchdown drive and an interception returned for a touchdown, I turned it off and went to bed after 1AM. While I was falling asleep, Seattle returned another interception for a touchdown. August, when we all get our hopes up again, won’t come soon enough.

posted by Anne and Kirk @ 11:05 AM