Heading to L’Aquila is always a ride of stunning splendor as we head through the mountains in southeastern Umbria into the region of Abruzzo. And on a recent trip, splendor awaited us in L’Aquila at lunchtime: of a gastronomical sort. The sizzling meats on the grill near the entrance were the sign: Massimo Madama and…
One day in early April, I found myself again on top of a Vespa: a trio of appassioned Vespa-drivers from Emilia Romagna – Roberto, Stefano and Stefano – had insisted on boosting me onto one of their Vespas for a photo. They’d just arrived in Assisi for three days of festivities sponsored by the Vespa…
Notre Dame’s most sacred relic, the Crown of Thorns, escaped the devastating fire of April 15, 2019. The circulet of rushes is thornless as the thorns had been dispersed throughout the world over the centuries as gifts from the emperors of Byzantium and later, from the kings of France. There are seventy thorns claiming authenticity…
Keegan and Francesca missed the traditional Holy Saturday blessing of their Easter cheese bread – but the one they brought us on Easter day was one of the most delicious we’d received. Easter cheese breads reign at our table on Easter Sunday morning: Peppa’s, too, was buonissimo – and the largest…
Outside of the French cloistered Franciscan Sisters’ convent, il Monastero di Santa Colette, small groups of grandmothers and grandchildren, parents and children, waited in anticipation, gaze directed up the street. A bespectacled nun in beige sweater and black veil waited too, hands folded, just outside the open door of their chapel. Up the street, the hollow deep…
On a recent jaunt into the Valnerina area near Norcia, what pleasure for the eye enroute (….and later for the palate). Like bright pink flaming sentinels, Judas trees line the winding mountain roads through the Valnerina (Nera River Valley): Medieval hilltop villages precariously top mountain outcrops Here and there, a church spire or a medieval…
I’d just intended to buy a thyme plant at Spello’s early April mostra-mercato (literally, “show/display market” or let’s just call it a “show-and-sell”). But there were other enticements, too, at this three-day market called “Subasio con Gusto.” Mount Subasio backdrops Spello (and Assisi) and this street fair centered on the herbs, plants as well as the…
Peppa – now in her late seventies and still working full days on her land – is beginning to feel the effects of years of hard labor. More and more often, a “local” will be with her to assist in seasonal tasks. Like the pruning of her ninety olive trees. When I arrived there one…
Even Sandri’s pastry shop on Perugia’s main thoroughfare, Corso Vannucci, celebrated the early April Festival Internazionale del Giornalismo – with a white sugar sign (complete with festival hashtag) taking center stage in their display window (while the Easter cakes and almond paste serpenti were set off to the side): Over six-hundred journalists, photographers, professors, intellectuals, more than one hundred…
A “cooking lesson” is a banal understatement to describe our day at the farm estate near Spoleto of Gianluca Polidori. Here’s a tidbit of his invitation to an event centered on “food & territory promotion criteria based on the maintenance of a strong territorial identity”: “The laboratory kitchen is the beating heart of a stately…