One day in Cocconato — the Gothic town hall, Cocchi vermouth and the Riviera del Monferrato

Cocconato sits close to 500 metres up at the northern tip of the Asti province, and the air is soft enough for olive trees, mimosa and the odd palm in the gardens. That mild climate earned it its nickname, the Riviera del Monferrato. It carries the Touring Club's Bandiera Arancione and is one of the Borghi più belli d'Italia, yet it's awkward enough to reach that even holiday weekends stay fairly quiet. One day is the right size for it: a brick Gothic town hall, a lone pieve on a hilltop with the whole Monferrato around it, one of Piedmont's great vermouth houses at the edge of the comune, and a family terrace for the last glass. Here's how to fit it together.

Morning: coffee on the Ponte, then up Via Roma

Start at the bottom of town, where everyone else does. Piazza Cavour is still called the "Ponte" by locals, after the drawbridge of the Radicati counts' castle that once stood above it, and the terrace of Caffè Bar Roma looks straight onto it. A young crew runs it from breakfast through to aperitivo, and the outside tables fill with locals. Have your espresso there and watch the village cross the square. You'll probably be back this evening.

From the Ponte, Via Roma climbs through the old centre on stone paving, under wrought-iron balconies and past carved doors. Look for the 17th-century Santissima Trinità with its arcaded side portico, and for the 18th-century pharmacy that's a shop now but still has its original fittings. Then the street opens onto the reason you came: the Palazzo Comunale, a 15th-century brick town hall and one of the few Gothic civic buildings anywhere in Piedmont. Its pointed-arch porticoes bend with the line of the street, and the tall windows are framed in moulded terracotta. Walk through to the Cortile del Collegio behind it, named after a grammar school founded here in 1754. The courtyard works as the village's outdoor room, and the Palio banquet, the patronal-feast dinner and the autumn bagna càuda all happen there or in its hall.

Keep climbing. A cobbled ramp takes you up to Santa Maria della Consolazione, the big red-brick parish church at the top of the village. If the door is open, go in to see the frescoed nave and the 1731 altarpiece by Vitaliano Grassi, which has the oldest known view of Cocconato painted into it. On summer evenings, swallows and house martins wheel around it while people gather for the concerts it sometimes hosts.

Just west of the church, the round crenellated tower you've been seeing from every bend of the road is the Torre del castello dei Conti Radicati. Don't go looking for a way in. The French destroyed the Radicati castle in 1556. The medieval tower that survived carried a Napoleonic optical telegraph, then came down in 1836 to make way for a windmill. The windmill's tower, later folded into a private villa, is what crowns the hill today, and it opens only on very rare occasions. Admire it from the lanes below, the way everyone in town has always done.

Late morning: the old pieve and the full circle

Now go and see Cocconato from outside. A little over a kilometre east, alone on a vineyard hilltop, stands the Madonna della Neve. It was the original parish church, first recorded in 1250, and excavations have traced it back to around the 10th century. You can drive up, or walk out on a path through fields and woods (ask at the tourist office for the way). The church is small and carefully restored, and it's almost always locked, so don't expect to see inside. You come for the view: a full 360 degrees of Monferrato hills, with vines running off in every direction. People who know it say it's best at sunset, so if your evening doesn't end on a terrace, come back up.

A tasting at Bava and Cocchi

Carry on east for roughly another kilometre and you reach two houses that share one site and one tasting room. Bava built its first Cocconato cellar in 1911 and farms about 50 hectares across the Monferrato and the Langhe. Giulio Cocchi is the vermouth and sparkling-wine house a Florentine pastry-maker founded in Asti in 1891, and the Bava family has owned it since 1978. One request form books both. The cellar door is open every day, and at weekends it stays open through lunch.

If you only have time for one visit, make it the Cocchi vermouth and aperitivo tasting. You walk through the Botanical Library behind the recipes, then taste four vermouths and aromatised wines with some time on how bartenders mix them. The Storico Vermouth di Torino and the Barolo Chinato are the bottles to take home. For wine, the historic cellar tour and tasting goes down through the old cellars and the barrel room before pouring a sparkler, two reds and a vermouth. Barbera is the backbone of the house, so look for the Superiore 'Stradivario' and the Nizza 'Pianoalto'. If you'd rather have bubbles, the Alta Langa tasting in the Pupitres Room shows you the wooden racks where Cocchi riddles its vintage Pinot Nero and Chardonnay by hand, then pours three cuvées in about 90 minutes or five in two hours.

Recent visitors describe generous, well-explained tastings in good English, and Alessandro's name comes up again and again as the host to hope for. A couple of older reviews complain that the cellars weren't shown on the day, so confirm what's included when you book. The team doesn't watch the clock too closely either: one couple who turned up close to midday were sent off to lunch first, with a table booked for them, and did the tasting when they got back.

Would you rather taste organic, with the family who grow it? Skip ahead to the evening and do your tasting at Poggio Ridente instead.

Lunch: the tasting menu or the osteria

There are two good ways to do lunch, depending on whether it's the main event or just fuel.

On the way back towards town, a kilometre short of the centre and close to the pieve, Cantina Nicola is the restaurant people plan the whole day around. Chef Alessia Rolla cooks three tasting menus (meat, fish and her own) from Piedmontese produce, plates them precisely and pours wines made on the estate. The dining room is elegant, there's a fireplace for cold days, and the chef often comes out at the end to ask how it went. This isn't a place to drop in on spec. Book ahead, and know that dinner runs past €100 a head. Lunch is the gentler way to try it, and the midday room is more relaxed.

If you'd rather eat in the middle of the village, Osteria Bell'e Buona on the main square does Monferrato classics in generous portions at fair prices. Expect raw-beef albese, vitello tonnato, tajarin with rabbit and black truffle, and agnolotti several ways: roasted, with sage, or with peas and lemon. The drinks list runs to vermouth and Barolo Chinato, and if you ask, they'll pour a chinato with the sage-and-lemon crème brûlée. The osteria shares an owner with Marchetti, the gelato makers, so finish with a scoop. Two honest warnings. Book, because service slows once the room fills. And the outdoor tables sit beside a road that's open to traffic, so take a table inside.

Afternoon: walk, ride or go to the bench

There are three ways to spend the afternoon. Each fills it, so choose one.

On foot. If you ate at Cantina Nicola, Parco L'Alberone is a couple of hundred metres away. It's a forest park laid out to show off the native plants and wildlife of these hills. A signposted woodland loop of about two and a half kilometres has the plants labelled as you go, plus three timber shelters along the way: one by a small pond with a picnic table, and another that's a lookout over the hills. Parking at the entrance is free, and some of it is shaded. Don't believe anyone who calls it a stroll. Some stretches climb and drop steeply, the paths get muddy after rain, and in summer the mosquitoes will find you. In proper shoes, though, it's a quiet hour in the woods.

On a bike. Poggio Ridente rents e-bikes with a GPS-marked route through its own vineyards and out to the viewpoints around the village. A half day is about four hours and costs from €50 a head, booked online. The ride finishes back at the farm with a tasting and a board of local products, so choose this and your aperitivo is already taken care of.

To the bench. Drive south on the road towards Piovà Massaia to Big Bench #156. It's one of Chris Bangle's oversized benches, painted orange, and it looks back at Cocconato on its hill and, on clear days, out to the Alps. The bench is in full shade all morning, which helps in July but not for photos. It's less than five minutes on foot from the road. Leave the car before the lane narrows, because there's nowhere to park further up, and be aware that there are steps and no ramp. Someone looks after it lovingly: wooden bunnies at Easter, crochet and lights at Christmas, and a phone stand on a post by the tree so you can get yourself in the shot. A couple of hundred metres away on Strada San Sebastiano, Azienda Agricola Paoletti is a young couple's winery. Daniele and Martina pour a white, a rosé and a red and explain what they do in the vineyard and the cellar, and you can buy bottles on the spot. There's no website, so phone first.

Aperitivo: the Vallìa terrace, or back on the square

Finish high up. Terrazza Vallìa is Poggio Ridente's tasting terrace, on the western edge of the village above the family's Vallìa vineyard of Barbera, looking out over the hills towards Piovà Massaia. Cecilia Zucca farms the estate organically with her husband, the oenologist Luigi Dezzani, and their children, and it's often Cecilia or her daughter Eleonora doing the pouring. The organic wine tasting starts at €15 for three wines, or two plus their vermouth (made on an orange wine), with a board of local products. The white blend and the Grignolino are the ones visitors single out. The Premium gives you two hours and six wines with Luigi, in Italian or French only. Book through the online calendar, although on quiet days people who rang a few minutes ahead have still been seated. Park in the marked lot on the main road where the unpaved track up to the terrace starts. To make the evening of it, book the sunset picnic: three traditional Monferrato dishes with the farm's wines, served out in the hills around the vines. It takes about three and a half hours and costs €37 a head.

Or stay in the village. Back on the Ponte, the terrace of Caffè Bar Roma at aperitivo time is where Cocconato catches up. Tell them what you like and let them make you something, or order a glass of rosé and watch the square. Toasties, piadine and simple pasta are there if the aperitivo turns into dinner.

Dinner, if you're staying

Keep it simple. Cantina del Ponte, right on Piazza Cavour, is run by the family behind Maciot, the biodynamic estate just east of town. They pour their own wines alongside pasta, slow-cooked beef and pizza, and it's popular, so book. For pizza, Al Combrì bakes light, Neapolitan-style pies in a wood-fired oven, with farinata and gnocco fritto with local prosciutto on the side, Baladin beers to drink, and long waits on busy nights. Pizzeria Cocconato next door is the modern alternative, with a light dough and nearly gourmet toppings. Cannon d'Oro is the hotel-restaurant in the centre that hosted Cocco…Wine's Friday-night dinner in 2026, and it has plain rooms upstairs, some with balconies, if you'd rather not drive anywhere after the day you've had.

If you have a second day

There's more wine. At Maciot, Paolo Macchia has held Demeter biodynamic certification since 2013. Phone a few days ahead and he'll show you around himself, sometimes with a ride out to the vines and hazelnut groves, before a long tasting in his cellar. The wines are distinctive and a little unconventional, and the orange-style Sauvignon and the Grignolino get mentioned most. Dezzani, founded in 1934 and now sold in some 50 countries, is the biggest name in Cocconato wine. It's a working winery rather than a visitor estate, but its Wine Boutique on Corso Pinin Giachino sells the whole range on weekdays. It was Romolo Dezzani's son Luigi who went on to make wine at Poggio Ridente, further along the same road. In the hamlet of Cocconito, north of town, Benefizio di Cocconito is Pino Bo's small estate, making the fresh Barbera d'Asti 'Duveis' and the oak-aged Superiore 'Cocconito'. It has no website and no tasting programme, so ring before you go.

If it rains, book a cooking class at Hub Casa Bacolla on Vicolo Goito in the old centre. The hands-on classes cover fresh pasta, risotto, gnocchi, bread and sourdough, pizza and focaccia, for private parties or small groups and in more than one language. Check the course calendar, or email to ask for a date.

When to come

Cocconato's calendar is crowded in September and again over Christmas.

September is the big month. Cocco…Wine opens it on the first weekend (4–6 September in 2026). It has run since 2002, with the local cellars pouring along a route from Piazza Giordano up through Piazza Cavour and along Via Roma, and you buy a glass and a carnet of tokens and taste at your own pace. The Festa Patronale "Serate in Riviera" comes around the second Monday: food stands from half past seven and live music from half past nine in Piazza Giordano, a seated Sunday dinner in the Cortile del Collegio, and the fair on the Monday. The weekend before the Palio is the Fiera Medievale. On the Saturday night Via Roma is lit only by torches and lanterns, and each district runs a tavern serving bollito with bagnet, porchetta and zabaglione. Last comes the Palio degli Asini, raced since 1970 on the last Sunday of the month (27 September in 2026). After a long parade in medieval costume behind an ox-drawn carroccio, the donkeys race from Piazza Giordano up to Piazza Cavour and back down the narrow Via Alfieri. Nobody rides them; each district's grooms run alongside and urge them on. Buy a chair or a grandstand seat, and know that the district that finishes last is handed a salted anchovy.

October brings the Bagna Càuda night, on Saturday 24 October 2026 at 8pm in the hall of the Cortile del Collegio. The Pro Loco and the village associations serve terrines of the garlic-and-anchovy dip, with a garlic-free version made with topinambur, followed by raviolini in brodo and bollito misto. It costs €30, or €27 if you bring your own burner, and €10 for children. Book and pay by 20 October at the Tabaccheria Noto. The same month Bava's truffle hunt and wine tasting starts its October-to-March season. It's about three hours in the woods around the estate with a local trifolau, then the cellars and three wines with whatever turned up. Anything you find depends on the weather and the week, so treat it as a bonus.

Christmas starts with the one-day Mercatino di Natale along Via Roma on Sunday 29 November 2026, with craft stalls, polenta and vin brulé. Then from 8 December to 6 January, Il Borgo e i suoi Presepi turns the old centre into a nativity trail. There are cribs in shop windows and odd corners, an artists' presepi show in the Salone Comunale (which keeps shorter hours), and on the parish church steps a life-size scene of "babacci": the carpenter, the knife-grinder, the basket-maker and the blacksmith of a village market, lit after dark. Come in the evening, when the floodlit town hall is the backdrop.

Whenever you come, take a bottle of vermouth home along with the Barbera. On the drive down, the tower stays on the skyline behind you for longer than you'd expect.