Pastrignocchi pasta and Cuculo cake festival

Original name: Sagra dei Pastrignocchi e del Cuculo

Place: Cetona Municipality, in Siena Province.

First year of the festival: 2008

Period: first days of June

2023 scheduled on: 1-2-3-4 June

Opening times: Thursday and Saturday dinner from 7.30 pm, Friday and Sunday also lunch from 12.00 am

Local Specialties:

• First courses: pastrignocchi, local pasta dish;
• Second courses: fegatelli, pork liverì; trippa, tripe; carne alla brace, grilled meat;
• Dessert: cuculo, local biscuit.

This sagra is only ten years old, but the two specialties in honor of which the sagra itself is held, they are both very ancient and a true symbol of the local culinary tradition. Pastrignocchi are a kind of pasta which can be found only in Cetona and in a small area around. These pastrignocchi are a sort of pici but with a more squared, rough shape; made mostly on working days, it was a classical recipe of what we call in Italy "cucina povera": literally a "poor cuisine", created with cheap ingredients, to everyone's reach. In this sagra, you can choose the pastrignocchi with ragù, meat sauce; aglione, garlic and tomato; alla cetonese, with a beans and vegetable sauce typical of Cetona; and funghi e salsiccia, mushrooms and sausage.

Cuculo biscuit is an ancient recipe common to only a part of south Siena province, a simple cake, made traditionally as a snack (merenda) for the peasant workers. "Cuculo" is the Italian word for "cuckoo" and this name was given to this biscuit because the peasants used to eat it in the middle of the afternoon, during the summer when the cuckoo bird is very vocal.

In the sagra menu you'll find other important Tuscan specialties as fegatelli, pork liver cooked with laurel; trippa, tripe, another very cheap dish which was therefore in everyone's tables; and grilled meat.

Ballroom groups and a more modern concert are scheduled at 9 pm, while other various events will take place on the four days of the sagra, as an historical parade and sports.