A day in Alba

3/30/18

The plan for today was to do laundry and explore Alba. Success on both fronts! We got the first load of laundry in the machine and headed out. Alba is a small enough town that it can easily be covered walking. We are on the main pedestrian street (see post from yesterday for pic) and after going to where there was supposed to be a tourist info office per the map (not there), we walked the pedestrian street into the main square (the square of the duomo of course) and there was the tourist information office.
A rather simple duomo

We picked up some maps and brochures and continued meandering around the town. There is food of all sorts everywhere you look! All very tempting to try everything but reason prevailed. After coming back to take care of the first load of laundry and to start the second, we went to lunch at Osteria del Vecchio Gallo (osteria of the old rooster.) It's a very small restaurant that was very nice and we had a really excellent lunch. We first discovered a new white wine varietal totally by mistake. The menu said "favoriti" and Dick assumed they were "favorite" red wines and ordered one. It was white! Turns out favorito is a white varietal. It was very good but wasn't going to go with lunch so we had the waiter cork it to bring home and ordered a red to go with a rabbit stew for Dick and grilled lamb chops for me. We started with an appetizer of onion stuffed with a meat mixture with some sort of delicious creamy sauce. Tasty! The main courses were really excellent and the wine was really good also.
Lamb chops and grilled vegetables
Rabbit stew and a lamb chop bone on the side


I had coffee panna cotta for dessert, a flavor of panna cotta that I've never had before and it was yummy!
After lunch there was more dealing with laundry then we went out for some more exploring of our town. Alba is the center of the white truffle madness.
How to dry laundry in Italy
Though they aren't in season right now there is still plenty of stuff about truffles including a store that specializes in truffle products, We checked it out and bought a few truffle items to bring back to the U.S. We happened upon a shop with the back door open where we saw a guy making pasta which just added to the feel of the town.
We had had enough walking by then and came home to chill out for the rest of the late afternoon. Dinner is whatever we can find in the fridge (which includes leftover pizza!)

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