Gander and Wild boar festival

Game, Gosling, Wild boar

Original name: Sagra del Papero e del Cinghiale

Place: Cerreto Guidi, in Florence province, Montalbano area.

First year of the festival: 1998

Opening hours: every evening at dinner, except Mondays.

2023 scheduled on: from 29 June to 16 July

Local specialties:

• Appetizers: Tuscan appetizer (antipasto toscano), stuffed gander neck (collo di papero ripieno)
• First courses: wild boar pappardelle (pappardelle al cinghiale), gander pappardelle (pappardelle al papero)
• Second courses - gander stew (papero), wild boar stew (cinghiale), t-bone steak (bistecca di vitello), pork steak (bistecca di maiale)
• Side dishes: beans with olive oil (fagioli all'olio)

Gander (papero) was once a great favorite of meals with many guests. Especially when reaping wheat fields, peasants needed help from their neighbors and finally a big meal was offered them, just to celebrate and to thank everybody for the help. This kind of feasts were a great tradition in all Tuscany. That's when ganders were often cooked; tasty and big enough to give meat to many people. There's hence a strong sense of past memories in gander's sagras.

Here in Cerreto Guidi, you can have some of the precious ancient recipes as gander neck (collo di papero), here served as appetizer: don't miss it! As second course, gander is delicious too; wild boar, due to their increasing numbers, it's more common nowadays, but clearly wonderful and tasty. You can have also a Tuscan pasta dish, pappardelle, with gander or wild boar sauce, and the grilled meat, with choice of veal t-bone steak or the smaller pork steak... all these dishes are highly advisable.