LA CORSA DI ALCIDE- X Edition

13-14-15 May 2022

History

It was the ’20s when he began what could be called the modern history of Alcide, the restaurant (and later hotel), more than any other it has been linked to the town of Poggibonsi, where in fact born in 1849 (160 years! !): ancient history is made by members of the family Ancillotti of which now has lost the visual memories, while the people who gave life to the actual history of Alcide are always present and alive in the memory of  Poggibonsi’s people, but I would say the people of Tuscany why so much was, and is, the fame of this outstanding restaurant.

Alcide Ancillotti ‘s sons, namely, Giuseppe , Sandro, and Maria gave the right impulse to grow the business “Alcide”, an activity that was not just food. In fact already in the twenties Alcide began the practice of the wholesale fish that grew exponentially in the next decade with the sons Sandro and Beppe, especially Beppe, who just at fifteen years old  was around Italy by train to find fish in town of the cost  just to buy and  send in Poggibonsi.

The trade of fish was great, and Beppe e Sandro were just those that bought and transport the fresh fish  (in that period  existed only fresh fish); so the Ancillotti’s Company bought a lot of little trucks  to transport the fish directly from the cost to the interior part of Tuscany . Thus began the time of the races: the trucks were not refrigerated so to bring the fresh fish you had to run, the streets for the cost  were not as now, and travel times  were endless. A maze of small trucks and vans that marked his time in the valleys, who traveled to get inside, towards Siena and Florence, with a precision of a Swiss watch, because the deliveries were to be made on time.

This system went on just until the early ’60s, when they bought  refrigerated trucks and the roads were greatly improved.  The races finished, everything took a calmer and less frantic developments: the fish could easily stand in refrigerator trucks for several hours.
From that time everything has developed  so quickly: by the modern trucks the fish can arrive from Sicily in few hours. We lost the magical world of sacrifices and many hours to drive to bring a good fish on the Sienese and Florentine board, which in those days it was difficult to enjoy in the city.
Even Alcide has come a long way since then: the business has grown greatly, and the activities of restaurant and hotel have made a fortune. But in Ancillotti family and in his heirs, who still leads the restaurant for 160 years and 6 generations , still lives the memory of those glorious times that they have laid the foundations for the next great development of family activities.
Just in memory of those days that  born the idea of ​​ an event that want to give glory to Beppe and Sandro’s exploit, who contributed substantially to spread the consumption of fish in our areas.