Some came for the memories and to see old friends. Others came to introduce a fourth and even fifth generation of local Italian-Americans to enduring traditions. Almost everyone came to taste the sausage and peppers, the pasta e fagioli, and the fried mozzarella Yet others come to plumb the mysteries of the secret sauce.

Those were some of the reasons why hundreds of people gathered on Chapel Street near Wooster Square Thursday afternoon and evening to mark the opening of the four-day “festa” or festival organized for the 118th consecutive year by New Haven’s venerable Saint Andrew the Apostle Society.