This year the end of summer brought a mixture of nostalgia and relief. They have been exhausting months, not only for the heat and for the long working hours spent in the kitchen. The arrival of Teo, a two-year-old white Spinone dog that we adopted from a rescue house, has…
It was the beginning of June, summer was nothing more than a promise in the air. Tommaso and I drove to Val d’Orcia to meet Sabrina and Barbara, the two sisters who own Villa Pienza. It was our first time there, though we felt at home as soon as the…
To visit the hill town of Gambassi, a few weeks ago, we took the road to the Tuscan coast, passing from Volterra. Shortly before Volterra, we took a detour. We drove through oak woods and Mediterranean scrub, in a wild landscape that first brought us to the mountains and, immediately…
I have a dream... Yes, I have a dream, and it smells of ripe fruit. I want an orchard. A few years ago, we planted a dozen fruit trees in the olive grove, local species and heirloom varieties, investing in hope and patience. It's been three years now, but they…
Our holiday in Salento has become a habit. Tommaso and I go to Puglia to visit his uncle and aunt, his nonna, their house a few steps from the sea, where over the years I learnt to recognize the light and the rhythms. Now I know where the dishes and…
Nonna still keeps her big book on herbs and flowers on a bookrest in her living room. It has a central position in her home. When I was a child, I could spend hours leafing through that massive, fascinating volume, full of drawings, photos, recipes and remedies. Summer had the…
I started to look at recipes with a different perspective. While I am preparing dinner for us, on the marble table upstairs in our house, or while I am cooking during one of the classes, where many hands and experiences meet around the same wooden table now marked by time,…
Summer began on Friday, around five in the afternoon, when I arrived at home. As soon as we got out of the car, I immediately felt the heat rising from the sun-baked stones. Grandma was outside, in the garden, hanging out the clothes on the drying rack, hidden in the…
Preserving is also one of my favourite way of procrastinating. When I am busy with deadlines and projects, this is when I try to steal time to preserve.