Bringing Italy home with us

If you are like us, you get a taste of Italy and you don’t like letting go. We just got back from Italy but some part of us feels that we’re still there basking “Under The Tuscan Sun.”

But! Did we tell you we’re working on a way to stretch out that “being there” feeling? That’s why we’re helping start the first ever Italian Life Expo in Portland, Maine. June 9-11th at the Ocean Gateway right on the harbor, across from lead sponsor Auto Europe’s world headquarters.

madampresidenteDozens of exhibitors including generations-old, but undiscovered family vineyards from Lake Garda to artisans in copper from Montepulciano, prosciutto and cheese makers from Parma to tour operators from Siena, so many shiny objects to hold your attention.

Here’s Midge outside Spannocchia who, with Institute for Italian Studies, are lead presenters of the Expo. One day last week, after this picture was taken, Midge, Paul Turina of Turina Italian Wines, and other board members went into Siena for a festive dinner at Antica Osteria da Divo by Chef Pino di Cicco. Everyone came back raving about him and counting the minutes till they could see him again at the Expo.

Good times coming. If you are in New England this June, the Italian Life Expo may be your ticket to Italy. It’s never been closer.

Tickets go on sale this weekend. Check it out.

See you in Italy!

Stew Vreeland

Slow Food? Funny, it doesn’t last long on my plate.

“Oh, waiter, table for sixty, please. And could we sit outside?”

Cavolfiori does these marvelous dinners all around Italy. this one was at Spannocchia outside Siena.

This is where I was a couple days ago. And a world away. May Day Celebration of Spring and an Italian Slow food event at the 1,100 acre non-profit AgriCultural estate of Spannocchia. It is just outside Siena in Tuscany. And only an hour from our house in Panicale, so we find ourselves there often. There are several mini videos below of the festivities so you can enjoy the sights and the sounds of Springtime in Italy.

boragefarroradish1

“OH, WAITER, TABLE FOR SIXTY, PLEASE. AND COULD WE SIT OUTSIDE?”

Cavolfiori does these marvelous dinners all around Italy. Check their site to see where their next event is. Come hungry.

longtable

THE MENU FOR THE DAY WENT SOMETHING LIKE THIS

Farro, asparagi, fave e uova.
With Bianco Toscano 2008 vintage grown right there at Spannocchia. As were all the other ingredients for this course. Farro is an ancient type of grain grown here that has been rescued from obscurity in recent times. They told us there is something about this grain’s tassels that tickles their tusks or in some way bugs the wild boars and those cinghiale won’t eat farro any more than kids will eat broccoli. Big benefit / built in defense system for farro.
Isn’t it interesting how they sliced the asparagus long ways and made it look so different? At a glance it seems to be something else. It looked fantastic and with a hint or two of lemon it just took you away on this sunny day.

Crema di borragine, ricotta di pecora, with more white wine
Borage is basically a weed, harvested by a New Zealand lady staying at Spannocchia. We sat with her at the table and went on a plant identification walk she led after. Oh, the blue flower is the borage flower. And the green is the warm borage colored, potato-based soup you pour around the sheep ricotta. Sure. We eat like this at home, too. Pretty much. In our dreams

Coscia di Suino Cinto nel forno a legna insalata di campo.
Full leg of Spannocchia pig (The famous cinta senese. They are black with white belt like a Belted Galloway cow) slow cooked in a Spannocchia wood oven with Spannocchia wood, too. With a red 2007 Spannocchia wine

Brownie, yogurt e mele
and there were tiny flowers involved, tiny pale yellow flowers. If I knew what kind of flowers they were, I’ve forgotten now. Note number of wine courses. Forgive, forget.

2006 Vin Santo dessert wine from Spannocchia.
Very light, very drinkable. We did. See above.

The whole meal presentation was a thing of great beauty. Afterwards we went on a forage-for-borage walk-about with the lady from NZ who sat with us. She harvests whatever greens she needs from whatever woods she’s in. She was an inspiration. And a font of logic. Made it all sound so reasonable. Biggest tip on eating weeds? Shouldn’t have to actually say this but . . . tiny bites. And, remember “no mushrooms please.” Just don’t. We ate tons of what she had harvested at the meal. That crème of borage soup was wonderful and bright, bright green poured around fresh white ricotta and garnished with the ever helpful borage’s blue flowers. Startling colors of white blue and green on my plate. I was so surprised it was warm and served in glass pitcher. I’ve got to get out more. Really, I do.

The photo of the camera is mine. As are the clunky videos. The luscious food photos were by our buddy Paul Avis. He is a pro. I’m a pro too. But just at eating all the food they put in front of us. Slow Food group was doing this food fest two days in a row there. All sold out. We just barely got squeezed in. glad we did. What a day. Roses in bloom up to the top of the third story of the villa. Wisteria all about, lemons on the trees in pots, grass was green green. Fine, fine, memorable moment

cameratablewisteria
About the camera that sat on the table next to me. Its owner was Francesco, a Roman from Naples he said. His wife from Sardinia. Tan, with slicked back, pewter gray hair, black wrap around sun glasses, articulate, wry sense of humor, very sociable, laid back. I can see him contentedly filling his pipe from its leather tobacco pouch. I want to be him when I grow up. Just dying to be cool I think Mick Jagger might say. For contrast, I had my rats’ nest of iPhone, italian cell phone, Flip cam and old pocket camera. All of which are disposable at some level. He had this show piece. The word pristine does not do this 1957 Leica justice in any way. He bought it new. The case gets polished. The camera is more pristine than the case. And he had little accessory leather covered parts. Separate but right at hand. Right there. How does this happen?

Anyway, this is a case where the camera does tell a story.

The mid afternoon in seventy degree breeze and the sun and the food made for a day that was off the tracks good. I was like Where ARE we? I knew but it was a kind of out of body experience.

TABLE TALK VIDEO

TALK ABOUT SOME WHITE WINE! THE VIDEO

MAY DAY, MAY DAY, ITALY IS ON FLOWER!

And to go backwards, just in time. Let’s talk about the May day celebration at Spannocchia that happened just before the Slow Food lunch. Everyone in folk costumes, bandanas, woven hats with flowers in them, and even one with tomatoes. hopefully fake. There were flowers in baskets, flowers growing up the walls around us. No question it was spring and we were all glad to see it and celebrate it. Farm manager Riccio’s merry band started entertaining at ten in the morning. From Spannocchia they headed out and entertained in towns all over the region. Coming home at ten that night well fed and can you say well drunk? Not really but just happy, lubricated and probably ready for a long night’s well deserved sleep. The videos here are a snatch of folk singing and then a quick view of the chaos around the snack table right after the singing but pre lunching. The fun never quits at Spannocchia on May Day.

SINGING FOR YOUR SUPPER VIDEO

YOUR SUPPER VIDEO

Ok, party on,

Stew

“Follow us” to Italy? Daily, on Twitter.

Come along with us on Twitter? We’ve already started posting Italy-related tweets daily. Check out today’s post on the fab Grape Harvest Festival gala weekend in Panicale that starts on the 17th of Sept.

follow2italy2Ciao, ciao amici!

Our long-overdue, much-postponed, trip to Italy is FINALLY coming right up. We’re looking forward to seeing friends and new real estate listings October 16th – Nov 7th. Come along with us? Following our 1960 Vespa will be counter-productive. What with the annoyance of the Atlantic Ocean and all. But you can easily follow us on Twitter. We’ve already started posting Italy-related tweets, daily. Check out our post on the fab Grape Harvest Festival gala weekend in Panicale that starts on the 17th of Sept. Here’s how: Go to Our Twitter Home Page and hit the “follow” button in the top left. You’ll be right there with us as we visit places like Panicale, Siena, Torino and who knows what other shiny objects Italy will dangle in front of us.

TWITTER + ITALY = TWITALY?

Call it what you will, we have broadband at our place in Panicale and our intent is to use it to post something “short and tweet” every day. We’ll include iPhone pictures, a couple of words and interesting links.

There’s a blue Twitter “T” logo on the top of every page on our site now – so you can get to our Twitter page that way, too. Isn’t technology grand?

See you in Italy! In October. And right now on Twitter.

A presto,

Stew Vreeland

Two daughters. Two weddings.

we did two major Italian weddings in 36 hours. In two different towns in two different provinces, even.

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Well, yes. But then again, no. Yes, in the sense that both of “our Italian daughters” did visit us and we did go to two Italian weddings that same week, but no in the sense that neither of our daughters got married during that week. Not that we know of.

But still, we did two major Italian weddings in 36 hours. In two different towns–in two different provinces, even. Yes we can. And yes we did.

SIENA, Tuscany. We had a lovely cup of coffee with our Italian daughter from Torino, Roberta, and her boyfriend, Stefano. Then they took off for a day cruise of Lago Trasimeno and the islands. And Midge and I fooled around in the garden and did laundry in the hot sun and the next thing we knew OMG it’s time to leave for the long awaited wedding at Spannocchia. Our friend Erin Cinelli is the director of the foundation there and we’ve known her since she was Only This Tall.

They started this wedding right, with an awning over tables of Prosecco. Then a beautiful sunset ceremony at one end of the rose covered villa. The bride and groom said their vows and strolled through their friends and family as newlyweds and the wine began to flow and the food too. Very fun food. They had an almost happy carnival like device that fried every kind of fresh vegetable, zucchini blossoms on down. They were served in paper cones for your walking and talking pleasure.

I said sunset didn’t I? But somehow it was really more than that. This was a nuclear powered sunset. Must have been something in the air this particular week because once again on this trip we were brushed an unreal shade of gold. Literally living in a gilded age. The perfect end to a perfect day. But wait. There’s more? A sit-down dinner in the lemonaia and white tents stretched out around it. The tables were set up in white linen and a sort of tan tapestry brocade on the chairs. But the luxury of this was wonderfully broken by the skirt under the linen flowing down to the ground. It was made of burlap. Just the right textural touch. This IS a working farm. Sure it’s a farm with villa and chapel and towers from the 11th century, but make no mistake, Spannocchia is a working farm. Texture was a knockout. And so was the infinity of food and good company.

Wedding dinner in tuscan limonaia complete with swallows. In the air. Not on the menu.
Wedding dinner in tuscan limonaia complete with swallows. In the air. Not on the menu.

DINNER AND SWALLOWS

We happily shared the gastronomic moment with resident swallows who flitted in and out the whole night like they owned the place. Which they really do. After all, they are here saving the world from bugs one mosquito at a time, every day of the year. I’ve given up mouth-open dives off castle heights hoping to catch fresh nutrients on the wing. You can be in the same room with them. They aren’t like gulls. We really don’t compete for the same food. So they were just lovely visual ornaments for a dinner that needed none at all.

The bad news was we had to duck out early, pre-dessert even. Being Italy, that meant about 10:30 or 11. About that time we decided that if we really were going to go to another wedding that started first thing in the morning – in another province, we’d better get going.

Working our way across the lawn we came up a set of stone stairs to the door of the villa, whose hallways we’d follow out and to our car. My hand touched the massive studded doors and I said to Midge, “Oh, we have to stop a moment. Look at this. Look where we are.” A sky full of lucky stars. Cypress in full moonlight. White roses reaching almost to the top of the villa’s roof bathed in the light. The musicians were just out of sight around a corner of the tent, we could see their silhouettes through the white canvas and could hear the squeak of the accordian and the whine of the violins tuning up for the dancing on the lawn that was about to start. And that we’d be missing. Drink it in, lap up as much as we can. Appreciate every moment.

Now lets get in that car and get back to Panicale before the next wedding starts. Like most of our “rest and relax” times in Italy, we’re having fun as fast as we can. Stay tuned. Wedding Two is the next blog.

What to do what to do?

Friends dropping into our garden, painters painting the house, Paul Turina’s wine, flag throwing in Cortona, the great Lombard/Umbrian sausage cook-off

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PANICALE, Umbria–What is there to do on a typical Italian weekend? People will once in a great while say to us, “Oh, I could not imagine having a vacation home in the same place all the time. I’d get so bored, Don’t you run out of things to do?” Maybe if we were in Old Overshoe, Nebraska, but not in the middle of Umbria. It’s consistently crazybusyfun here.

We must be in better shape than I thought. We’ve been partying from dusk to dawn. Well ok, not so much on the dawn part, unless the sun is coming up around ten AM in Italy. Could that be? Regardless we are sleeping like pashas and keeping up with the prevailing party attitude here. And in the last couple days we had done what almost constitutes “heavy lifting” – for tourist’s anyway. Because it is all going by in such a blur, I had to check my hurriedly scribbled notes. Calendars and watches are just annoying distractions to tourists on holiday. Because we had done so much, in so little time, on this sunny Sunday siestatime we were sitting back and basking in all our accomplishments. Lets see, we’d been to a town-wide wedding in Panicale, and seen costumed flag throwers in Cortona, and an airshow in Castiglione del Lago. cortona italy in full costumeAnd a motorcycle show in the piazza yesterday. Don’t forget that. And half of what we’d done had been unplanned and extra wonderful for falling into our hands just for being here. Almost as much fun to look back on as it was when it was happening in real time.
prosecco kind of afternoon in Panicale Umbria

WON’T YOU BE OUR NEIGHBOR?

What is that I hear? It sounds like Midge talking to someone in the garden and the voices getting nearer and nearer. Houses and society are so open here in Italy, sound travels in strange and new ways. Our windows, sans screens, are usually thrown wide open. Where are the bugs? I really don’t know. Once in a great while a harmless bug will fly in but its not enough to make us shut the windows. And even when it’s too bright out we close shut the wooden shutters but still leave the windows open to let in the fresh air. And the sounds of Italian life passing by on streets on both sides of our house. Amazing what snatches of conversation you can pick up in the time it takes for a conversation to fade in and fade out as it passes by.

Because this conversation, with Midge in it, is almost upon me, I hit “save” and poke my head out into the garden where Midge is opening the door to the garden for some new English friends. He’s a veterinarian back in the UK and thanks to our web site and its match making powers, they have bought a home on some lovely private acres outside the city walls and just past some other friends’ home. So, they are going to be our neighbors in Panicale!

Perfect excuse to pop the cork on another of Paul Turina’s pretty in pink sparkling rose. Hey, it is almost five. Somewhere. And wait, what is that on the horizon of the garden? Buildings block the lake view through most of the town, so the spot on the street above our garden it is the first high place where you can actually see the lake. Which is why people so often stop right there to pose for pictures of themselves or to snap shots of Lago Trasimeno. It’s rarer to have someone setting up a canvas on an easel.
bills painting on the street in Panicale, umbria

HOUSE PAINTING IN UMBRIA

Oh, it’s Bill the painter, another New Englander, who’s earning the money for a several month long stay by painting up a storm of paintings on commissions from all his friends back in the states. Clever boy. Friends give him an agreed upon amount each, he then owes all of them a certain number of paintings and when he gets back to the states, he throws a party and by lottery his patrons chose their paintings. He says it works swell and everyone is as tickled as he is. Note: you have to be a good painter to get away with this. And he is. We’ve seen his work around town and his lucky friends are getting lovely things. “HEY, Bill!” I yell with a wave toward the house “Come get some bubbly” But he’s trying to work so he declines. So, fine. I point the bottle up at him and pop it and darn near wing him. He’s a marvelously fast and efficient painter and he did his work and still caught the end of the bottle. We were inside toasting his new work when I heard Bruno calling me from the calling spot above the garden. Did I understand, he wants to know, that we were invited to the special town dinner tonight? Whu? Missed that memo. Wasn’t the entire town eating together at the wedding feast, last night? He says invite all those people too, pointing at our guests. But, I’m not at all sure what we’re getting into here so I’m leary of that. Should have. Bad, timid Nordic anglo Stew. Loosen up already. It’s Italy and food, how bad can it be?

LOMBARD VS UMBRIAN. DUELING ITALIAN SAUSAGES.

A few hours later, we were still stuffed as Christmas geese, from the feast the night before. But yet, here we were headed for another food oriented event. Traipsing down the coliseum-like steps of the amphitheater to the town’s canvas-sided and canvas roofed Party Barn “sotto la pizza” as Bruno describes it. This is a tall town and a lot of things, like the party barn, are under and over other things. Houses are piled high like a wobbly stack kids’ building blocks. The houses are almost on top of each other other but because of the steepness of the hill so many people have so many great views. Our skinny house, for example, has five levels. Our lower street, Via Grossi level where our cantina is. That level leads up to the garden by one set of stairs, the first set of stairs in the garden leads up the level of our kitchen and living room and then the next set of garden steps takes you up to the Via del Filatoio level. At that level we have bedrooms and bath and entryway and then, through a door that can be locked or not, usually not, you come to the entry hall for our friend Kiki’s apartment. And on wards upwards, always upwards you follow her wide, curved scala nobile to her lofty perch with its fifteen foot tall ceilings. Whew. From her lakeside windows it is a dramatic five stories down but, from her windows on the uphill side of her apt you are looking at Klaus’s garden. And his place goes up another five stories from there.
italian campers from lombard dueling sausages with umbrias in panicale,
Where were we? Oh, yes, “under the piazza” at the party barn. We could smell and hear the sizzling sausages before we rounded the corner and saw them on the industrial sized community grill. There’s Bruno’s wife Linda, Aldo and Daniela too. Shouldn’t the Gallos be in a coma somewhere after hosting 500 of their closest friends last night at that epic wedding party? Nope, nope they area fresh as a pair of Margherita daisies and ready to party and be social again. Turns out this is a cross-cultural dinner for the throng of Lombards campers parked next door to the Party Barn their RVs lined up soaking in the view in Panicale’s award wining and way user-friendly Camper Park.

This is to be a Lombard vs Umbrian Food Fest. Dueling Sausages etc. Some of the Lombards’sausages are almost pitch black and are simply called Nero. We’d call them blood sausages? We’re sitting between Aldo and the new lady mayor. She’s one of the few people in town I can honestly say I don’t think I’ve ever laid eyes on and she will talk to me, but only sort of, warily. I’m sure she’s wondering who the heck I am. Aldo tries to tell her but she is distracted, thinking of her welcoming speech which, after taping on a glass, she gets up and gives to us and the Lombards. They respond with applause and toasts of their own and thank her for hosting “this bunch of gypsies.”

SOME QUESTION ABOUT WHERE WE REALLY ARE.

The speeches stopped, the plates of food start coming and about that time Midge said “I give up. WHAT is going on? Who IS that lady beside you and who ARE all these people? And why are the sausages black?” You have to know Midge is a much better listener than I am. In any language. No one needs to translate for her when we’re in Italy and though she usually lets Gabby Stew do most of the talking, she is great at that too. When I’m not around. I find her in stores and piazzas in Italy and she’s always right in the middle of a fine conversation. But tonight, with all new food, new people, their accents etc. she’s really washed up on a foreign shore. In her home town no less. So, she and the mayor were pretty much both wondering What are we doing here?
lorena serving proper cappucchino in Panicale, umbria, italy
The food, in general, wasn’t wildly different that the Lombards brought. Rice instead of pasta was the most obvious difference and it is actually a difference that you notice. When I think of Italian food I think of porcinis and panacotta sure, but it is pasta I think of first. But they started off with a rice, bean and cheese combo that was very good. About half way through the list of every dish ever cooked, the Sainted Aldo excused himself saying he needed to get up to Bar Gallo to spell “the kids.” After their big, long, late night, wedding celebration, they had opened the bar at six or seven in the morning and been on their feet for another fourteen hours slinging coffee. With a smile on their face, no less! What vitamin supplements are they taking and can I have some, please? I’m in awe of their social/work ethic but not going to make any attempt to mimic them. Not in THAT good a shape.

See you in Italy,

Stew Vreeland