Annual Italian Club Festa Luncheon

The Annual Festa Luncheon sponsored by the Italian Club of Seattle will be held this year at the prestigious Seattle Yacht Club overlooking Portage Bay. The date is Friday, September 16th, from 11:00 AM to 1:30 PM. The Seattle Yacht Club offers us a beautiful dining room, great food and free parking, all for the reasonable price of $55 per person. Tickets are on sale now.

Awards

Festa Italiana is happy to announce that this year’s Gill Centioli Award winner is the beloved and admired Borracchini Family who served Seattle and the Italian Community with fresh bread and famous cakes for over 100 years at the Ginger Belle Bakery. And also for 2022, the recipient of the Patricia DeLaurenti Volunteer of the Year Award is Steve Spellman, creator and web guru of www.FestaSeattle.com, this very website.

Keynote Speaker

This year’s Keynote Speaker will be Joseph Petosa Jr., President and CEO of Petosa Accordions Inc., the last U.S.-owned and operated accordion manufacturer. Started by Joseph’s grandfather, Carlo Petosa, who immigrated to the United States from Italy in 1906, Petosa Accordions is now celebrating 100 years with the release of An American Accordion Story, which chronicles the history of the accordion in the United States.

Joseph began to learn the accordion at age seven and played professionally for fifteen years. He started working alongside his father, Joe, at age ten, gaining more than fifty years of accordion artisan expertise to pass on to a fourth generation, his son, Joseph “Joey” Petosa III.

Join us to learn about this local Italian-American family business and how the accordion was transformed from an instrument associated with the folklore of European immigrants into a popular formal instrument found in concert halls, jazz clubs, and all levels of society.

Joseph Petosa Jr., President and CEO of Petosa Accordions Inc.

Tickets

Tickets including lunch are $55.00 per person. For more details and to make reservations, call (206) 779-7325, send a check for $55 per person to:

Audrey Manzanares
829 NW 54th Street
Seattle WA 98107-3646

Or you may purchase tickets via Eventbrite (there is a processing fee of $3.95 per ticket)

Italian Food Quiz and Presentation from the Dante Alighieri Society

Quiz and Presentation

For the past several years, Domenico Minotti has prepared a quiz for Festa Italiana, an annual celebration of Italian culture, food and music held each year at the Seattle Center at the end of September. Since this year’s Festa Italiana will be virtual, Domenico has prepared a virtual quiz to go along with that. The quiz was premiered September 9th 2020 at the Dante Alighieri Society’s English Language meeting held virtually on Zoom. Links to PDFs of the quiz and the answer key along with the presentation are available below.

Presentation

English / Italian

Virtual Festa Italiana Quiz

English / Italian

[Festa Quiz 2020 Answer Key]

About Domenico (“Nick”) Minotti

In the late 1920s, Nick’s parents emigrated from Sant’Angelo, Limosano, a small hilltop town in Molise. The population at that time was about 1000 but is now 345 as Nick learned on a visit last year. The family spoke their dialect at home. Nick studied Italian at Columbia University and Perugia and got lots of practice while on Fulbright study grants in Milan in the mid 60’s. Nick returned to the states and to his first love, medicine, at Georgetown University and came to Seattle in 1976 to work at the US Public Health Hospital on Beacon Hill, better known as the Marine Hospital. He and his father Pasquale would attend Dante meetings back then but took a break until retirement a few years ago. Nick serves as a Consigliere for our Dante group.

Roberto Mario Tacchi, memorial collection

A special memorial collection of works has been added to “Le Arti della Festa Italiana” Art Exhibit at the Italian Festival this year in honor of Roberto Mario Tacchi whose elegant woodcarvings adorn Seattle public spaces and personal collections and who passed away May 15, 2019 at the age of 80. Born in Florence Italy, Roberto learned his craft from his father, becoming the seventh generation of woodcarvers in the Tacchi family.

As opposed to his large public works, this collection will be of “chamber pieces” that he carved primarily for family, friends and private collectors. They will be on display in the Armory on Saturday and Sunday, September 28 & 29, 2019 from 10 AM – 5 PM each day. Admission is free. Patrons of the “Taste of Italy” Wine Tasting on Friday night, September 27th will also be able to view the collection.

His public works present in the Seattle area include the exterior doors of the First Presbyterian Church in downtown Seattle, the chapel at Providence Marianwood in Issaquah and a memorial display in the Bell Harbor Conference Center. Surely even more treasured are the frames, sea shells and other carvings found in the homes of the many people who sought out his work for its elegance and sensuous beauty. When the Henry Art Gallery at the University of Washington obtained the loan of Leonardo da Vinci’s Salvator Mundi painting in 1982, they commissioned Roberto to carve a Late Gothic altar and triptych in order to properly display this revered work.

Galbani’s Celebrity “Chef Marco” Mark Sciortino

Mark Sciortino “Chef Marco”, owner of Marco’s Italian Restaurant, in Buffalo, NY, has been creating and serving traditional, family–favorite, Italian dishes for over 30 years. He also owns the locally famous Marco’s Italian Deli, tagged as “Home of the Original SANGWICH!” which is a term used by many Italian communities in place of “sandwich”.

Lactalis American Group, Inc., headquartered in Buffalo, NY, is a subsidiary of Parmalat S.p.A., an Italian public entity majority-owned by France-based Groupe Lactalis – the world’s largest producer of premium cheese. They hired Chef Marco in 2008, to be their spokesman for Sorrento® and Precious® Cheeses. He demonstrated creative and fun cooking tips using their products for three national TV shows. Due to his immense success as a TV personality, Chef Marco continues to make appearances. He performs cooking demos from coast to coast, for the cheese company’s many sponsored Italian festivals, under their new name Galbani® Cheese – Italy’s #1 cheese brand. Along with the festival cooking demos, Marco has appeared on numerous morning shows in Los Angeles, South Florida, and New York. He was also the featured chef for many years on “Come Dine with Me WNY!” and “Winging it Buffalo Style,” local TV shows in Western New York.

To find out more information about Chef Marco visit www.galbanichefmarco.com

About Galbani®

First crafted in Italy by Egidio Galbani in 1882—Galbani® has long been the #1 cheese brand in Italy. For over 130 years, Galbani has been delighting families all over Italy. Today the Galbani brand brings its timeless tradition from Italy to the American table with the delicious taste of mozzarella, ricotta, fresh mozzarella, and snack cheese made and sold in the United States. Galbani® cheese is a leading brand of Lactalis American Group, Inc. (“LAG”). Headquartered in Buffalo, NY, LAG is a subsidiary of Parmalat S.p.A., an Italian public entity majority-owned by France-based Groupe Lactalis – the world’s largest producer of premium cheese. LAG produces a wide array of cheese products, including a variety of specialty cheese available to retail, foodservice and industrial customers.

Festa Italiana Luncheon