What a night! It was magical. Tonight, we were welcomed into an Italian family!
Because we had both an osteria and a trattoria experience, I am breaking this article into two sections. Section1 focuses on Osteria Caprini, while Section 2 is about Trattoria Caprini.
To avoid a bit of confusion between the osteria part of this establishment, and the trattoria part, I’ll simply refer to the overall establishment of both the osteria and trattoria as ‘Caprini’…after all, they are both in the same building…just different doors.
Caprini’s Beginnings
In 1907, two young newlyweds decided to open Caprini, serving traditional dishes and Valpolicella wine in a simple and unpretentious manner. Four generations later, Caprini is still run by the same family…both as an osteria and a trattoria.
Torbe di Negrar is a small hill town surrounded by vineyards. Caprini is designated within the red circle on this aerial view.
Osteria Caprini
First, an osteria is like a tavern or corner pub. The food dishes are simple and the atmosphere is unpretentious. In other words, it’s casual and typically delish, but the menu is rather short.
We parked our rental car across the street from Trattoria Caprini in the Valpolicella-area hill town of Torbe di Negrar. Our intent was to go immediately to dinner at Trattoria Caprini, but as we crossed the street we were hailed with “Come down here!” from a small crowd outside the door to Osteria Caprini. Really, that’s what they were shouting over-and-over — “Come down here!”. What to do? We were in no hurry, so we said, “Sure!”, and we went down there to the entrance to Osteria Caprini.
What we found was Csaba’s birthday party. That’s Csaba to the left in this photo.
Csaba, Dennis, Patty and others were celebrating, and asked the four of us to celebrate with them. So, we did. Wine was offered and wine was gladly accepted.
Csaba is one of those remarkable people that you are instantly drawn to…a great smile and a welcoming spirit. Hungarian citizen Csaba works at the local NATO facility. Dennis retired from said facility awhile back. Patty is Dennis’ wife. Though they are Americans, Dennis and Patty have a house nearby…as well as this itsy-bitsy car that I’m inspecting.
We felt so much at home. We were among old friends, newly found for the first time. And, we were warmly welcomed with copious toasts of wine. It’s impolite to refuse wine, isn’t it? Plus, you know what the Romans say, right? “When in Italy, do what the Italians do!”
Here is wife Ellen, Patty, and sister-in-law Leslie.
And, behind the osteria’s bar was beautiful Maria (aka Mama Maria). She’s run the bar for many, many years. This lovely octogenarian was an excellent hostess.
See this early 20th century photo taken in front of Caprini? That’s baby Maria sitting in her mother’s lap!
We fell in love with Mama Maria because of her charm, graciousness and spirit. But also because she poured us a glass of Amarone produced by her husband and son.
This Corte Martini Amarone knocked our socks off! Really – one moment we had on socks, and the next moment, they were gone!
This wine was everything that brother-in-law Craig and I had been looking for in our two weeks in northern Italy -- put away the Barolo and pour us another glass of this awesome Corte Martini Amarone! [A further description of this Amarone and its equally outstanding Recioto partner will have to wait for another article.]
Also shown in the photo is the smaller bottle of Recioto della Valpolicella, which is a very tasty dessert wine.
Here are Csaba, Craig, me, and Dennis.
Are our glasses empty? Yes. That means it’s time for a refill.
Many celebratory things were uttered as we toasted and re-toasted Csaba’s birthday!
After an hour in the osteria, we bid Csaba and friends a final “Happy Birthday!”. And, with hugs all around, we said good bye to our new friends as we headed upstairs to dinner at Trattoria Caprini. It turned out that our pleasant evening was to continue.
Trattoria Caprini
The formality — or lack thereof — of a trattoria is much like that of an osteria, but the menu is more extensive and the decor is kicked up a notch.
Sergio, the family member who supervises the dining room and wine cellar led us through the menu and helped us make our decisions. My selection was also the local favorite of Lasagnette al Ragu della Pierina (that’s pasta with Pierina’s famous meat sauce). I dove right in and had eaten the whole thing before I remembered that I was going to photograph this dish! Dang! Trust me – it looked as good as it tasted.
Here are a couple of photos of other dishes eaten at our table.
The wine we ordered with dinner? Of course it was the Corte Martini Amarone. We just couldn’t stop toasting! We had now moved into the wine-drinking-excuse toasts.
Here you see brother-in-law Craig sitting beneath a painting of a part of the town of Torbe di Negrar. Trattoria Caprini is the building with the green awning on the left.
As mentioned in my article titled Eat Here: Enoteca della Valpolicella, we had purchased a book of Italian recipes during our trip. Lo and behold, the recipe for Pierina’s Lasagnette al Ragu Della Pierina is in that cook book. As we just happened to have it with us, we asked Pierina to autograph our copy, which she graciously did.
Here is chef Pierina posing with Leslie and Ellen.
And, once again, we get an autograph from an outstanding chef.
And surprise of surprises, that’s Pierina herself on the cover of our cookbook, making her homemade lasagnette pasta.
You can order this cookbook here — be sure to get the Italian-English version.
Do you have meals that you will always remember? Evenings where magic surely played a part in your enjoyment? This evening – with Csaba’s birthday party, Mama Maria’s charm and Pierina’s great food – is one of those for the four of us.
I hope that you can make your way 11 miles north of Verona to the town of Torbe di Negrar so that you can meet Maria, Sergio, Pierina and the rest of the family. And, if you are there on October 2nd, you will surely find Csaba and friends in the osteria celebrating another birthday. Hopefully, we’ll be there too. After all, we need to go back to get our socks!
Ciao for now,
Steve
p.s. Thanks to Silvia of Salvaterra Winery for recommending Trattoria Caprini
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