When to Visit Italy For Food Festivals. In October? From the February Food Fight to sweets and crumbly almond cake in October. Sbrisolona, Other Sweets, Olives and Savouries

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The flag of Italy, the tricolor, or three colours, is often featured in food such as the starter made of green avocado, white feta cheese and red tomatoes.

 All over Northern Spain and Portugal I enjoyed almond tart for breakfast and dinner. Italy has something similar. An almond crumb cake comes from Mantua, also called Mantova, in the Lombardy region of northern Italy. It is featured in a food festival. 

Sbrisolona. Photo from Wikipedia.


The city of Mantua has had a Sbrisolona festival. The second one was Oct 13-15 in 2023. The next one is 18-20 Oct 2024.

Any month is a good time to visit Italy, but October is the month of the Sweet and Sbrisolona Fair. 

Festival of Sbrisolona, Mantua, Italy. Photo by Franzk in Wikipedia.

The distinctive features of this almond cake are that it is crumbly and it is made with orange instead of lemon zest. Some recipes add white wine and hazelnuts.

It is also made from corn meal. (Not finer cornflour.)  Cornmeal comes in three textures and the heavy and medium are used for muffins and heavy cakes and gritty foods such as American grits. They have stronger flavour. 

The finer ground cornmeal is used to make polenta.

Cornflour is always powdery and used for pancakes and batters and the pancake like Mexican tortilla. And waffles.

Gluten is in wheat, not in corn. So you will see ads proclaiming that cakes are gluten free.

Where recipes call for wheat flour or cornflour or cornmeal, the proportions of each will be different. According to the website kitchen substitute, 

Italian towns and cities have all kinds of fairs. What is our favourite Italian food? Olive oil? Tomatoes? Whatever your favourite food is, some city or small hamlet has a festival to celebrate the crop or concoction. 

Italian Almond Tart Sbrisolona

https://www.bing.com/search?q=ialian+almond+tart&pc=GD03&form=GDAVG1&ptag=7301&showconv=1

Mantua and Shakespeare

If the name Mantua is familiar to you, even though you have never been there, perhaps you have heard the word in one of Shakesepears' plays or a commentary on his works.

https://go.gale.com/ps/i.do?p=AONE&u=googlescholar&id=GALE|A116597352&v=2.1&it=r&asid=85b06ef6

Here is a list of other food festivals in Italy, according to the month you might be planning to visit the country.

Food Festivals in Italy

Jolly JANUARY (in Italian the month of Gennaio)

FEBRUARY Fun food

FEBRUARY
  1. February 5th is World Nutella day. Nutella is a Ferrero brand.  Ferrero Rocher often produces limited edition new products for Christmas and Valentine's Day.
  2. Battle of the Oranges. A food fight in February in Ivrea.
  3. Venice Carnival (Carnevale) last two weeks of February. Donuts soaked in alcohol.
  4. 3rd Sunday in February, in the town of Spello in Umbria, the festival of olives and bruschetta. Museo dell'Olivo in Torgano., Umbria. Umbria also has a wine museum near the olive museum.
MARCH Marvels Munching
  1. March 19 Father's day San Guiseppe (St Joseph). Fried donuts.
  2. Taste Fair in Florence. 3 days Taste Tour Taste Shop.
  3. Truffles.
  4. Eurochocolate Spring.
APRIL Aprile 
  1. Fried artichoke festival near Rome.
MAY More magic

JUN
  1. The caper festival in Salina island, JUNE 2nd 2024.
JULY
  1. Tomato festival in Umbria. Tomatino festival in Puglia, southern Italy in July. (An even larger one in Spain. More in the USA, Florida and Pennsylvania.
  2. In Lucca the fish and chips festival, Pesce e Patate. July-August.
AUGUST
  1.  The Sfogliatella dessert festival on the Amalfi Coast in August.
  2. The eggplant festival in Milazzo, Sicily, in AUGUST.
SEPTEMBER
  1. The Piadina Festival in Bellaria Igea Marina. Piadina is a flatbread. From Emilia Romagna. 13-15 September (Settembre).
  2. The Cous Cous Fest in San Vito Lo Capo, 20-29 SEPT 2024
OCTOBER
  1. Truffles and woodland October-November Città  di Castello
NOVEMBER
  1. 15-24 November 2024. see 
  2. https://www.eurochocolate.com/
  3. Free entry. See chocolate sculpting. Lasts ten days. Some people recommend going on the first day.
  4. Eurochocolate festival in Perugia, capital of Umbria, was previously in October but this year moved to November. Giant chocolate sculptures displayed in the museum. Perugia's chocolate company Perugina and you can visit their shop and see their chocolates everywhere. (Perugians are very proud of Perugina. It is now owned by world wide chocolate and food company Nestle They have a chocolate school in Perugia, a stunning hillside city with a giant Etruscan gate and an underground, in the hillside city of historic arched tunnels, now a shopping mall.) Their distinctive chocolates under the brand Baci are hazelnuts in chocolate, with a foil wrapper. 

talyfoodies.com/blog/12-months-of-food-festivals-in-italy#January%20-%20Gennaio

Vhttps://www.bbc.com/travel/article/20120416-shakespeares-italy

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Food_festival

https://www.ferryhopper.com/en/blog/featured/best-local-food-festivals-italy

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