I was offered the chance to buy turkey from our favorite restaurant Calagrana. Thanks to Ely and Alberto we had a lovely Christmas lunch here at home. It was nearly 60 degrees today not terribly christmassy. Enjoy your day everyone!
Today was a nice day. We got together with friends for a holiday lunch. Three friends, all of whom moved here since the beginning of the year. All near Spello. Roselyne and Steve live in Spello Centro Storico. An excellent apartment with great terraces which have country and mountain views and a front balcony above the main street going up the hill. Right in the action. Doug lives in a sweet house situated on Monte Subasio. I don’t know his elevation but it has views across the valley to die for. He is in the very beginning of renovations.
We chose to meet in Assisi. There is a nice restaurant there called Osteria Piazzetta dell’Erbe. It is just off of the main piazza which has the Assisi Comune. It also has the temple of Minerva and lots of cafes and shops. Today, it was empty. I don’t think I have seen Assisi as empty and quiet as today. The restaurant welcomed us. It wasn’t very busy. We have been going to this restaurant since a 2011 trip with my sister and her husband and another couple. It is still good. It is nice in summer as it has probably the only trees in Assisi. They have two menus, one Traditional and one Fusion. I love the fusion choices. Here are a few pictures. The first one is fried artichoke/carciofi in a cheesy sauce. Very delicious. It does look a bit phallic. Three of us got this.
It was a really nice get together. We won’t be doing much this Christmas. Nothing in fact. Which is kind of sad. But it is what it is. Happy Winter Solstice, here’s to longer days…if not warmer ones!
It hasn’t been as cold but, boy! has it been rainy! The Tiber got very high and jumped its banks, but it has subsided. It is still running fast and muddy but staying behaved in it’s banks now. This morning I woke to sunshine. Nice for a change.
Out and about for a nice walk and visit to our local market. First I bought the vegetables I thought I would need. I got one of those beautiful romanesco broccolis. So pretty and so alien looking!
And I got beatole, the big meaty and leafy green I use in soups a lot. Along with a couple nice leeks. Now I have to decide how to use them.
I dropped off the veggies inside our door and went for a walk. I always like to have an aim for a walk and this time I wanted to replenish my depleted bay leaves. When I first came here I tried to buy bay leaves in the store. There were none. I was baffled. Eventually I learned that bay laurel trees are everywhere and you just pick off a leaf or a branch when needed. I went looking and sure enough, I found the town bay tree. You can see that the whole bottom of the tree has been sculpted as people pull off a branch or two.
Just next to the tree are a series of orti or vegetable patches. There are still a few hardy winter veggies like cabbages, but not much else.
I turned up-river and took a couple pictures. Tiber a bit high.
You can tell when we have had a lot of rain because this small “river” called a torrente, which is normally a trickle actually lives up to its name! Here it is joining its bigger brother the Tiber.
Last night I went to the Christmas open house at Books for Dogs – Libri per i Cani. I think everyone who reads this journal knows about this charity which supports two local canile which care for abandoned dogs. It was a nice little gathering. I saw some folks I knew, and met some I didn’t know. I snapped a couple, pictures in the town as I went home.
Ciao for now!
Tonight, on my way back from my doctor appointment. It was about five-ish PM. We are nearing the solstice so our days are short. It was dusk. The sky turquoise. Is this not beautiful?
This next photo is going to be one of my all time favorites. You know why? Because of the Ape parked in the foreground. It is pronounced Ahh-pay. It is one of the ubiquitous Italian three wheel workhorse trucks seen everywhere here. Somehow it makes the composition just right. To me this photo is perfect.
Today was our usual Saturday market. It poured rain all night. And continued throughout the day. Here is a picture of the Tiber which is muddy and full.
We went out because we needed a few things. It wasn’t cold at all. Just wet. We visited the Carrefour grocery a few steps from the Centro. We picked up some things we needed. I always laugh at the baby food when I notice. I bet you can’t get Coniglio, which is rabbit — baby food!
After the grocery we got some vegetables from the vendors in the pizza. Then I paid a visit to Books for Dogs to make a donation and also visited Laura at her ceramics shop, CeramicArte. You may remember her from posts last year. She is very skilled and will make things to order for you, personalizing them. I wanted to ask about buying a new Deruta ceramic table for our new house. We sold the round table we had made for our terrace with this apartment. The new place has a larger space with room for a bigger table so I thought it would be nice to get one that seats six. I got quotes from her and will drive to Deruta, probably next year, to the factory where she said there were lots of tables all ready to buy.
As always she has lots of great gift items in her shop. Here are just a few.
These are by another artist Carol Brannigan. A very different style, but very nice.
I love the snowman, which is a bell. She had several similar ones hanging on the mantelpiece. If you’re in Umbertide, stop by her shop.
We are told a frigid air mass will be hitting Italy starting tomorrow. Time to batten down the hatches! Buona domenica!
A very pretty, tall and stately tree. We walked through the little Christmas fair for the kids and also small booths selling things. The first picture is where Babbo Natale awaits visits from the children. He is inside La Rocca, our fortress.
Today we had a pizza lunch at Calagrana. Albi had fired up the wood oven. Delicious.
It was all delicious. The day was mild and I didn’t have to wear a coat. Our friends Jane and Christie are just here until next Tuesday. They return to the US and their adventures there until next spring when they will return and move into our apartment. Big adventures to come for us all.
The weather is still vile. Not terribly cold, in the 50s in the daytime. Not cold at night. We did get down to 3C last week. I see next week it will become a deep freeze with temps to -3C at night. Time to cover the lemon tree!
We have been entertaining (!) ourselves getting some needed things done as you know from the last post. Yesterday we went to Città di Castello to Mailboxes Etc to mail a package to my sister and send Luther’s Passport off to the Embassy in Rome for renewal. What an ordeal. The instructions were to specifically “go to Mailboxes Etc” to mail and get a return envelope. The woman at the shop had no idea how to do this. Doesn’t seem they actually “have” return envelopes! So why would the Embassy website specifically instruct us to go to Mailboxes Etc? We hope what we did will work. Hopefully the embassy will call us if there’s a problem. We can always go to Rome to pick it up.
Then we drove past the Poste again, and it was again very crowded. So we skipped that. Finally we stopped at the little shop which does stuff for cars and drivers licenses etc. My license will expire on December 28 so I got the ball rolling to renew.
Later in the afternoon we were off to Perugia to have an adjustment done on Luther’s new hearing aids. They do seem to help. It is bad enough when you can’t hear well, but not hearing well in a foreign language sure doesn’t help with comprehension! We drove back along the E45 super strada. Bad traffic jams. Rain and dusk and road construction didn’t help. After we broke free we admired the trucks as they approached us on the other side of the highway. Some of them are amazing with all kinds of lights. A lot have lights in green red and white of the Italian flag. Many have the drivers name in neon lights in the front window. We oohed and ahhed. Luther said it was like looking at Christmas lights! Hah! It was!
~~~~~~~
Now for the BIG news…we got our closing date on the new house. January 23. A little longer away than we thought but it will work out ok. Now at least we can DO some things to prepare. We contacted the moving company and they gave us dates of 23-25 January to pack and move us. I decided I cannot pack the entire house myself. They will pack for us but it is an extra cost. So we opted for that and now I will stop packing. I sent out a request to reserve a place for us to stay for a couple days during the actual move. Someplace to take the cats where they will be out of the way and safe. And we need to order two beds and a mattress from our old friend Mr. Tiziano. We bought quite a bit of stuff from him when we moved here in 2014. If we’ve got beds, then at least we’ll have a place to sleep. It feels better that I can start working now!
~~~~~~~
They put the lights in the Christmas tree on Monday. Now it awaits it’s grand lighting ceremony tomorrow on L’Immacolata.
Lunch today was my old friend Zuppa di Cicerchie . You may remember this pea from previous posts. Here is what Wikipedia says about it: “Lathyrus sativus, also known as grass pea, cicerchia, blue sweet pea, chickling pea, chickling vetch, Indian pea, white pea and white vetch, is a legume commonly grown for human consumption and livestock feed in Asia and East Africa.”
Who knows how it came to Italy. It is common in the central Italian areas of Tuscany and Umbria, parts of Lazio and Abruzzo and the Marche. It fed the poor when nothing else was available. It is essential that it be soaked for at least 24 hours and the water be changed several times. It removes the toxins in the grain. It does make a delicious winter soup!
Alla prossima! 💚💚
Even though today is one, vile, day we decided we couldn’t put off our commissioni another day. I fear the Umbrian winter has set in well and good. Rain, gray, dark and cold for the foreseeable future. It is not like people picture Italy, all sun and aperitivo on the piazza. The weather will remain like this for the next two – three months. We stay mostly inside with the stufa. It is quite cosy.
Today we had a number of things we wanted to get done. It started with the Saturday market. We bought what we needed there and walked to the photo store to get a photo of Luther for his passport renewal. ☑️ Then we walked back to the Carrefour to get a couple things. ☑️ Next up, the bakery to order our Christmas panettone. Last year we missed out because we were too late. This year it seems we were too early! But we got on the list for when they start making the cakes on December 15 ☑️
Then we walked to the car and drove to the big wine basement nearby. It is quite the place. Lots of great wine and all kinds of other booze. But, they also have seasonal things and they sell custom baskets full of good things to eat. Take a look at some snaps I took.
I think my favorite thing about many (most) Italian stores and hospitals and even gas stations is they have pictures of Mary or Jesus, or a crucifix or even more! In this shop, just above the cash register they have an array of religious photos. Mary, Jesus, Pope Francis…
We bought our wine and I decided to buy a panettone to share with friends since we couldn’t yet get one from the forno. ☑️
Next we headed to the Poste to see if we could pay a bill for a friend. It was jammed with people lining the sidewalk. First part of the month is a busy time there for pensioners getting their checks and all sorts of other business. The Poste is not just the Post Office but it is a full service bank and where you pay your bills. Anyway, we decided to try again next week. No check. 😞 Next ATM and last to the pellet store for more pellets. ☑️
Then for the hard part for Luther…the toting the purchases up 53 steps. Our neighbor said he couldn’t help carry the pellets because he has hurt his back. But he did help with one box. When we move the elevator will be our favorite thing!
I hope your weather is better than ours!
We really don’t go out at night often. Mostly we are tucked inside watching a movie after our dinner at 8:30. That’s why we seldom have pizza. Around these parts they only make pizza at night. Never at lunch, except for pizza by the slice in some take out places. It is because it takes a long time to get the oven up to the optimum temperature. Here it is — fiery hot!
There’s a place in the next town north called Pizzeria Nestore. We’ve passed it countless times but it always looked closed up. That was in the daytime. At night it is brightly lit and inviting. Tonight we decided to try it with Christie and Jane. We got there when they opened at 7pm. Good thing too, because it gets very full, very fast. A bottle of water and a bottle of wine and we looked at the VERY extensive list of pizzas. There must have been 100 different kinds. And all the kinds I alway hear Italians don’t eat were included. Like pineapple pizza. Yes, it was there.
We all ordered and shortly after we were delivered four big pies. The crust was quite thin. I would call it Roman style. I will put what they were in a caption.
All of us ate almost all of our pizzas! They were delicious. Christie couldn’t quite finish hers as you can see below.
I thought Nestore pizza was good, but not extraordinary. Every Italian town is chock full of pizzerias and they are for the most part very good or they wouldn’t stay in business. Italians are very picky about their pizzas. I guess we need to explore the ones here in town. I will report back if we do! Ciao a tutti!
They kept us waiting this year. But today was the day the town Christmas tree arrived! My last tree while living in Centro so I savored the experience. I got a much appreciated phone call from Paul who could see the tree from his apartment as it was maneuvered into the Piazza. They don’t truss trees here so they are very bushy. They needed a crew and cherry picker to keep the street lights from being sheared off the buildings. As a friend said this morning, The Italian ability to get things through tight spaces should be the envy of the world. And I have to agree. I had to wait…and so did everyone else…anticipation!
Previous post with all trees from 2014 to 2020. For 2021 see last December.
Finally the tree is in the piazza. It looks to be a beauty!
The tree hung in mid air for a while.
Then they settled it into position.
I shot two videos of the maneuvering.
The tree will be lit on Thursday December 8, L’Immacolata, a National holiday. I will post pictures.