Only one Negroni for me per favore

September 10, 2010

Only one Negroni for me per favore

Florence - Septmber 9^th

Today was our giant tourist day. 9 AM was the Uffizi gallery followed by trippa and lampredotto. After lunch Linda had been wanting to see the Pitti Palace and the Boboli Gardens. This was her payback for putting up with my tripe sandwiches. We also had a 4 PM appointment at the Academia to see the “real David”, Michaelangleo’s masterpiece. We probably walked about 5 miles in a little over an hour to get from the Boboli Gardens to the Academia. By now I’ve got my first blister of the trip and after the Academia we were both pretty shot. On the way back to our neighborhood, thru the narrow streets of Florence, there’s a little section where the pavement is really bad, but there’s a little café (Bar Café Mingo) there with tables and chairs outside. We had seen this place before on our travels and decided to stop for drink. The negroni is a traditional Italian cocktail or gin, vermouth and compare in equal amounts. It’s really kind of a bitter drink but the Italian’s are quite fond of it. Bitter is something that the American palate doesn’t do well with. I kind of like it. So we order two. As we are stitting there drinking our Negroni and some peanuts that the nice waiter had brought us, we start looking around and realize what a pleasant spot this is. Completely shaded from the sun, quiet, with a nice little breeze blowing through. Linda noticed that it looks like there’s a little church on the corner, it has little icons above the doorway. The waitress was a really nice little Phillipino woman overhears us and starts giving us a impromptu tour of this little corner of Florence. The church that Linda had noticed is the smallest church in Florence, I’m not sure how old but she also points out the tower which we were sitting about 15 yards away from was from the 1100’s. Just across the street was Dante Alegheri’s house, Tuscanys most famous poet, of “The Inferno” fame. They she shows us a little walkway 3 stories up that connects 2 building. This is how the King and Queen were able to move around without having to walk with the “great unwashed”. Unbelieveable that we were sitting in the middle of all this history and didn’t have a clue. Back to the Negroni’s. The first one was great so we decided to order another. We didn’t have any place to be and I was enjoying Linda’s company and she was not yet sick of me. That will come later. The waitress this time comes out with two tall glasses of Negroni’s, about 1/3 bigger than the first ones. So now I need some salumi to was the negroni’s down and we ordered the Antipasto Toscano. Salimi, procutto, mortadella and prociutto cotto. After finishing the salumi, and the negroni’s walk back to our hotel which was only about a block or two away. Nap time to sleep of the negroni’s. I could barely wake up from my nap although Linda was wide awake and reading and not letting me get away without taking her to dinner. Next time I’m only having one negroni.