GRAN FINALE to the 2011 U.S. Tour

2011 U.S.Tour, U.S. Cooking, U.S. LecturesLeave a comment

My stay in the Washington, D.C. area was a perfect wrap-up to a memorable 7-week (almost!) coast-to-coast U.S. cooking lessons/lectures tour. It synthesized what my annual U.S. tour is about: connecting with family, old friends and former tour guests via my lectures or cooking classes of Umbrian rural cuisine. In the D.C area, five superb cooking classes were the gran finale: such an interesting variety of people involved in stimulating and interesting work (consider the area!). I learned much in conversation with many of them while cooking…
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Blessed Easter Abundance in Umbria

Festivals, Food/Wine Lore, Italian 'Passione', Recipes, Rural Friends, Rural Life, Video Snips5 Comments

Driving through the Umbrian countryside during the week prior to Easter, you’d note whiffs of smoke drifting up from the outdoor stone bread ovens fired up by the farmwomen. Holy Week for the Umbrian farmwomen is a busy one, an exhausting one: making the torta di Pasqua (“Easter cake”) or pizza pasquale, as it is often called, in the stone bread ovens is a major task. The traditional Easter “cake” or “pizza” is a raised cheese bread, make of eggs, flour, olive oil, salt, pepper and three kinds of cheeses: parmigiano, pecorino and groviera…
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Spello’s Infiorate: Flowers of Passione

Festivals, Folklore, Italian 'Passione', Umbrian Hilltowns17 Comments

It all started on a late June Sunday in the early 1900’s when an elderly woman from Spello (Umbria) scattered shredded bunches of brilliant yellow wild broom and mossy green wild fennel on the cobblestone street in front of her home. She had scrambled the slopes of Mt. Subasio, backdropping Spello, to pick the fragrant broom and pungent fennel for her floral “carpet” laid out to welcome the Communion Host venerated by Catholics as the true Body of Christ. It was carried through the streets by the bishop on the Feast of Corpus Domini…
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Bevagna: Passione for the Middle Ages

Festivals, Folklore, History, Italian 'Passione', Umbrian Hilltowns2 Comments

I often tell my tour guests that appreciating Italian passione is key to fully understanding the Italians. Passione is the underlying theme of all things Italian: from the elegant presentation of colorful gelati behind pristine glass to the artistic display of meats on butcher’s shiny metal trays to the full involvement for months of all the townspeople in preparation for the many local festivals which bring alive Italy’s culture and history.
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How Much is Quanto Basta? (Mar 20, 2011)

2011 U.S.Tour, U.S. Cooking2 Comments

“Q.b.” for quanto basta (“as much as you need”) is the most common annotation in Italian cookbooks. It’s a secret I like to share at the start of each cooking class, whether here in our Assisi area farmhouse or at U.S. cooking classes each winter. Paulette and Jim’s group really took the quanto basta to heart when we cooked together in Ft. Washington, Maryland, at their home in mid-March, 2011. When anyone asked me about the right amount of olive oil or wine or salt or vinegar needed in the recipes, my most frequent response was “q.b.”…
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Sing for Your Supper? This Class Could Have…! (Mar 19, 2011)

2011 U.S.Tour, U.S. CookingLeave a comment

No one would want to hear me “sing for my supper” but many at a delightful cooking class in Rockville, Maryland certainly could have done so! Starting with hosts, Dick and Mary – and their co-host, Lyn (who opened her home to us, along with husband Larry): last September, Dick, Mary and Lyn reveled in the Berkshire Choral Fest week of Umbrian hilltown touring (how great to guide this wonderful group!) and singing (voice study in the afternoons, with their conductor)…
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