Casalini in Valle Festival

A festival that rekindles a forgotten village

Some festivals are born around a product, others around a place: the Casalini in Valle Festival definitely belongs to the latter. The event takes place in Sala Consilina, in the province of Salerno, in the heart of the Vallo di Diano, and is staged in the Casalini district: not just any square, but the very first settlement around which the town grew over the centuries. For three summer nights, that network of alleys, stone steps, and courtyards—long left on the fringes of city life—fills up with people, lights, and the aromas of home cooking.

The idea comes from the I Ragazzi di Castello association, a group of local youths who chose the most direct and effective way to help their fellow citizens rediscover Casalini: bring people inside, give them something good to eat, and a good reason to stay until nightfall. Following the first edition in 2024 and its consolidation the following summer, the event has become one of the most anticipated dates on the Salese summer calendar.

The culinary trail: the cuisine of the Vallo di Diano

The heart of the festival is a scattered culinary trail: the stalls are not concentrated in a single area, but distributed along the narrow streets of the village, so that eating also means walking and looking around. The menu is entirely based on the peasant repertoire of the Vallo di Diano, using local raw materials:

• Appetizers — bread and oil, bruschetta, ruospi, and fried zucchini flowers
• First courses — cavatelli with tomato sauce, the local traditional cavati
• Main courses and specialties — ciambotta alla salese, roasted caciocavallo, and sausage sandwiches
• From the oven — pizzas and cuzzitiello
• Desserts — stuffed donuts, sweet cavati, crepes, and waffles

A special note: the organizers provide an area dedicated to gluten-free and lactose-free dishes, with ciambotta, caciocavallo, pizza slices, and sausage sandwiches in versions suitable for those with intolerances. A choice that is not taken for granted for a village festival, and one of the features that visitors mention most often.

Folk music, concerts, and comedy

Each evening features its own show, always outdoors and always free for those in the village. The artistic line-up alternates between Campanian and Southern Italian folk music—tammorre drums, accordions, and folk groups that get the squares dancing—with live bands playing more contemporary repertoires and comedy nights entrusted to well-known names from the Neapolitan scene. Throughout the evenings, the musical selection continues even off-stage, so that the party doesn't fade when the concert ends.

Over the years, a cultural component has been added to the music: photographic exhibitions dedicated to Casalini, with archival images and contemporary shots that tell the story of the village's evolution, its inhabitants, and the crafts of the past. It is the way the organizers hold together the two souls of the event: the convivial one and the one of memory.

Casalini, where Sala Consilina began

Understanding Casalini helps to understand the festival. Sala Consilina develops along the side of the Maddalena mountains, overlooking the wide plain of the Vallo di Diano, and its oldest part was formed at altitude, around the castle and the first farmhouses. Casalini is precisely one of these original nuclei: huddled houses, arches, stone stairs, the typical structure of mid-slope southern villages. With the shift of life towards the valley floor and the main road, this upper part has gradually emptied. The event was explicitly born to invert the gaze and bring the people of Sala back, at least for a few nights a year, to where it all began.

Why it's worth the trip

Those arriving from outside will find a festival that is still authentically local, without tourist filters: you eat well at popular prices, you are among the locals, and you listen to music that is still truly played at these latitudes. The setting—a historic stone village overlooking the valley, with the cool evening air coming from the mountains—does the rest. For those on vacation in Cilento or traveling through inland Campania, it is a stop that restores a very concrete idea of what community festival still means today.