A culinary highlight of an Umbrian springtime? Wild asparagus. Just ask Novella, selling it at her stand in Assisi: …or our rural neighbor Raul, foraging for it in the wood behind our Assisi house: I remember many a past hunt in our woods, sometimes with Pino: …now and then, with our Maremanno sheep dog,…
We don’t see Aldo with his sheep any longer as they graze on the hill behind our farmhouse. He’s nearly ninety now and lives with his children near Deruta. We miss seeing him in springtime up on the hill above our farmhouse with his sheep and sheep dogs. So does our daughter Giulia who remembers…
After you explore Tuscan gem Siena, do detour to take in the Etruscan and Roman wonders of medieval Tuscan hilltown, Volterra. On a recent blustery, biting January day, just a few bundled-up locals walked the winding medieval alleyways. Only a couple Volterra restaurants were open: we stopped for lunch at the first one we passed,…
What better way to experience Italy than to know the artisans? Join us in Deruta to meet “an artisan duo”: creators of maiolica masterpieces and culinary artist, farm friend Giuseppa. Kara and her family topped off their Umbria Christmas trip with a memorable “Deruta duo.” First stop: in Deruta at a small family-run maiolica factory…
At the end of December, people from all over Italy head to that medieval gem, Orvieto, to take in five days of jazz, blues – and not only. We never miss a few days of Umbria Jazz Winter festival; after all, what better way to celebrate our anniversary (late December)? Our Orvieto stay will always…
No where we’d ever be at the end of December except in Orvieto for the Umbria Jazz Winter festival. During our late December Orvieto stay, we never miss the jazz lunches at Ristorante San Francesco. Once a medieval Franciscan monastery refectory, jazz and blues now fill the vaulted space where centuries ago, friars ate in…
For years, we’ve celebrated our late December anniversary in Orvieto at Umbria Jazz Winter. We always stay a couple days in the home of Signora Liliana (nearly ninety years old!) and take in jazz and blues performances throughout the stunning hilltown of Orvieto, perched on a volcanic rock plateau. Venues include the 13th c civic…
New this year at the late December Umbria Jazz Winter festival in Orvieto: spaghetti whipped up on stage for the public as the five young musicians of Spaghetti Swing – a Cooking Concert brought alive the music and 1950’s life style of Italy, land of la dolce vita. And why not this connubium of spaghetti…
Near Montepulciano in the small southern Tuscan town of Acquaviva, don’t miss lunch at Ristorante/Pizzeria L’Angolo. Before lunch, the butcher shop around the corner is worth a stop. Pino had been there before for salami varieties you can’t find here in Umbria. Beneath dangling prosciutti topped with evergreens in red bows and ornaments and red-ribbon-bound…
Pino and I knew that garlic (“aglio”) highlighted the tangy tomato sauce for a favorite southern Tuscan pasta favorite, pici all’aglione, but now we know that not just any garlic will do. The garlic for this dish must be the ivory-colored aglione della Valdichiana, indigenous to the southern Tuscan area, now recognized officially as an…