Day 3: Cloudy with a chance of Qofte

The Stage

Today was a 160 km loop in the southern coast of Albania, starting and ending in Vlorë. The day started off cloudy but otherwise the weather was good as riders rolled through some beautiful countryside with mountains in the distance. At one point a goat ran across the tail end of the peloton, but the riders managed to stay upright despite the disruption!

Loose goat runs through the peloton!
Source: https://bsky.app/profile/inrng.com/post/3lovh2jpmv222

The stage featured two categorized climbs, with riders climbing 2,800 m over the course of the day. The riders had a major climb — 10 km, with an average gradient of 7 percent — through Llogara National Park (which is shown in the header photo) after which they had a 30 km final stretch to the finish line.

Mads Pedersen won today’s stage in a sprint finish and regained the leader’s jersey on the GC (General Classification) as well. After so many top 10 and podium results earlier in the season, Mads is really crushing these early stages of the Giro.

The Dish

For today’s stage, I decided to make one of the national dishes of Albania, qofte. I’ve made my qofte with a lamb and beef mix. Qofte is distinct from other types of meatballs because of the herbs; I made mine with fresh parsley and dehydrated a few leaves of mint to add dried mint, per the recipe. I served it with some rice to round it out as a dinner, but it would also work nicely as part of a meze.

For a wine pairing, I went with a Sicilian Nero d’Avola. It was a good pairing against the lamb and beef but without overwhelming some the flavor of the seasonings.

Reflections

The first realization I came to when I started making the qofte was that I severely underestimated how long it would take to make them. Grating the onion took me a long time, as did chopping up the parsley and mincing the garlic. However, the effort was definitely worth it! They were definitely uniquely flavored, due to the mint. I wasn’t sure how the mint would do in a savory dish but it was yummy! I would definitely cook them again!

The qofte ended up more burger-y than meatball-y.

Tomorrow is a rest day so you will hear from me again on Tuesday when we are finally in Italy!