One of the most popular products of the Piana del Sele and of Campania comes from Battipaglia, is the mozzarella! We went to the Battipaglia 2019 Festa della Zizzona to appreciate its most extreme version!
After 3 years of the Throne we finally find ourselves talking about something of our house and we begin with something so symbolic, so loved and talked about as mozzarella.
If you talk to a mozzarella battipagliese, you should know that it's like arguing with a Slavic of the Balkan War, the subject is delicate.
Everyone has his favorite dairy, his favorite format (cherries, bocconcini, braid or mozzarella?) And woe to those who touch it!
In all this delicate balance in the first decade of 2000 the bomb was dropped: The Zizzona. And the Feast of the Battipaglia zizzona it is one of the most loved in Campania.
Not that the giant format didn't exist, but it was a mythological and vaunted variant, a gargantuan exaggeration at the head of the table, and now it's reality and routine instead.
In the forest of murmurs on those who still prefer this to that someone decides that this cumbersome milk-based creature deserves an evening in itself.
It is here that a sort of groove is basically drawn for me, because if at first, between technical trials and festival attempts, it is difficult to find a suitable format, it is equally true that the city finds itself celebrating one of its many typical products so far unfairly ignored.
If another city had had such a heritage we would be at the 100th edition, but no.
Can a city without a historic center and a young but troubled history afford to ignore such an opportunity? For me no.
Now it's serious
From this year on, things start to get serious, there Feast of La Zizzona of Battipaglia finally takes on the characteristics of a real festival, taking its dates on the calendar and becoming a party awaited by locals or not.
We talk to Enrico, who reveals how the tactical position, in the junction between the end of the state road, the start of the highway and the large parking lot of the stadium has favored the arrival of Cilentani and inhabitants of the provinces of Salerno and Naples. Almost more than those of Battipagliesi themselves, it seems, but this is a classic of the town of the Piana del Sele, no one is a prophet at home, especially here.
The super Zizzona comes here proposed in a completely modern and playful key, free from the schemes of an antique product, but versatile and able to express itself in all forms in a current and bold concept.
The cheeky menu
We therefore find it in the form of a giant fettona in all its extension to cover a fried pizza with sauce (and you should feel the pleasure of that juice that mixes with tomato and drips into your hands, wrists and arms at the first bite!), or as a classic cut into strips on a bed of rocket with cherry tomatoes.
We see it enhancing another local product that in my opinion deserves all the attention possible: the buffalo meatball.
Really excellent both for idea and for taste.
We find it sealed by the fire covering a slice of bread also toasted in a modern and gourmet version of the hanged caciocavallo, or arrogant in its presentation filled with gnocchi with sauce (an idea developed by a fortunate and inspired collaboration with Italy Food Porn ) or in its variant born from the thrust of the fans with a filling of eggplant parmigiana (My God.)
But also “very delicate” (cit) in the form of a dessert similar to lemon delight, besides my favorite part, devoured to the sound of enthusiastic moans.
In short, we finally find a party, worthy of the name, which exalts a local product that deserves every type of celebration, in a modern guise but which has above all, the desire to grow, without too many ties, with the desire to amaze and with the coherence and strength of a devastating product.
We will see some good ones in the years to come.
Ah, the mozzarella eaters challenge he will give us pearls, real ones.
- Falcon
