Italians love street fairs and know how to do Street Fair Food

The Sunday morning crowd.

So we went to a street fair this weekend. Italians seem to love street fairs because there have been at least 4 in the time we have been here.  This one was the biggest by far, featuring food from around europe.  Gyros from Greece, pretzels from Germany and Austria, BBQ'ed meat from Brazil, Sausages and Bratwurst from Germany, Coconut puffs from Belgium and lots of other stuff.  And from the length of the lines, even at noon, (I say even at noon because usually Italians don't seem to eat lunch at noon.  It's closer to 1 or even later) Italians love foreign food.  

A Bratwurst with cabbage and mustard.

This was the crowd on Sunday.  And even though Sunday is the day to go to church, it doesn't seem like many people go.  Or perhaps if they do go, its early in the morning or late at night.  The line  for the Funicular to go up to Citta Alta was nearly a block long.  

There were stalls and stalls of cheese and salami.  Smoked meats, sweets and candies.  

The grill at the Gyro stall.  Everything was grilled fresh to order

So much meat!  Sausages, kabobs, gyro meat.

 I was lucky to be able to eat at the fair Thursday, Friday, Saturday and Sunday.  I had a German Bratwurst with homemade sauerkraut.  The saurkraut was the nice thinly shredded kind that I like.  The Bratwurst was "spicy" even though that seems to mean with spices and not hot enough to burn your lips.  I had a Greek Gyro with chicken that they sliced right off one of those big cylinders of meat.  You could choose between Pork or chicken.  They did not have one of those brownish-greyish cylinders of meat that we get in the US at the Mall Food Court Gyro place.  The Gyro came with fresh yogurt sauce, onions, tomatoes, lettuce, feta cheese and french fries.  I chose not to get the french fries on mine because that is just wierd.  French Fries stand on their own.  I don't understand this Italian predilection to put it on pizza, burgers, gyros... or anything else.

I also had a chicken burger that was OK, but the notable thing about the BBQ Burger stall was that they had real, American style bacon.  That is pretty rare to find here.  Like Cheddar cheese, the grocery store we shop at has one brand of American style bacon.  If you don't like that, you're stuck with prosciutto (which is delicious, don't get me wrong, but it doesn't crisp up like American bacon. Mmmm... Bacon).  And then today, since it was the last day, I had another Gyro.  I also tried a german pretzel, but I got a sweet one.  Technically, as Aaron said, it wasn't really a pretzel so much as a giant pretzel shaped donut.  Sprinkled with sugar, it was delicious.

Hand painted Italian ceramic vase

The other cool thing at this fair was the stalls of handmade items.  There are stalls of hand woven Italian wool ponchos, bags made from Italian leather.  There was an amazing stall that had German wooden Nutcrackers and those little things that spin around when you put a candle on them. Hand carved ornaments with Christmas scenes burned into them.

There was Sicilian pottery hand painted in bright colors.  Bags from India woven with rainbows of colors.  Cookware from France with every utensil one might need including a Madeline pan.  I finally found my spring loaded tongs at that stall.  I have searched many Italian cooking stores and only could find wimpy plastic tongs that can't grip anything.  I was so happy with my discovery, I bought two pairs of French tongs.

When we returned to Citta Alta, there were more handmade goods at little tents.  We bought Emily another handmade dress because they are just so adorable.  We found some really cool Christmas ornaments that were made out of recycled paper, plastic bottles, and cans.  There were beautiful Italian sun catchers, jewelry, carved wooden items.  There were other hand woven clothing that were really beautiful robes and full skirts, jackets and other old fashioned styled things.

All I can say is, I do not take enough pictures.