As I mentioned in the last post we were going to Calagrana. It was coolish but nice and sunny today. Good Thanksgiving weather! We drove Christie and Jane along with ourselves. At table was a great mix of people. There were fourteen of us. The restaurant had two other tables of two and one of four.
It turns out I knew some people either actually or virtually at all the tables. Two were people I was only Facebook friends with Joan and Giovani who I enjoyed meeting. They live in Deruta – the Ceramics town. And Cathy and Sal who we met a few years ago when they viewed our apartment. They ended up buying out in the country in the beautiful valley south of Gubbio. Then there was Tanya, Lisa, Nigel and Michael who are local friends.
At our table were six Italians, one British, and seven Americans. A great mix with me getting to use my Italian because I was near the Italian group. The Italians are all enthusiastic Thanksgiving fans. Especially Fabio 😁. We buy our olive oil from him.
The meal. Ely had made a lovely group of four finger foods. I know there was date wrapped in prosciutto, arancia, and two others I couldn’t identify. I am missing one in my picture because I ate one before remembering to take a picture 🫤
Then came a delicious risotto with zucca and Scamorza cheese. Smoky flavor. Albi is a Milanese and risotto is their special dish. The rice was al dente, it had a very, slight crunch in the mouth. Perfetto!
Then the feast. Turkey with all the trimmings. The bird was 18 kilos or about 40 pounds.
Sweet potatoes
The dessert was a ricotta tart with candied fruit and vanilla gelato. A treat because they don’t often have vanilla here.
Our friend Christie who was one of the couple who bought our previous house can really sing well and she gave us a song. The song was, Put Some Sugar in My Bowl. 🙂 Oh la la.
We arrived at one pm and left at five thirty. A normal Italian pranzo with friends. I thank Susan and Gary for treating us to our meals. Luther and I provided the wine. I thank Ely and Albi and Ristorante Calagrana for the feast! And I am thankful for all the people I can call friends here. Makes me very happy.💕
On our way out, I paused to take this photo of the valley from the restaurant at dusk. The half moon had risen. It was lovely. I hope that all that celebrate it, had a nice Thanksgiving.
We are in Thanksgiving week. There are a few other things happening. We have done some doctor stuff. We got our flu shots Tuesday. But we want a Covid booster and our doctor said we need to go to the health department (CUP). Well I asked in the Facebook group for expats here called Umbrialiens and got some interesting insights. I got a link from a friend for online appointments and was surprised that none were nearby. Another friend north of us said the Upper Tiber Valley, where we are, has a shortage of vaccine. Only health care people and over 80 years old can get it. I guess that explains the lack of locations near us. I really don’t understand how our little area doesn’t have vaccines when the rest of our region does. 🤦🏻♀️. Mystifying. Anyway, we made an appointment in a town near the lake and will go in December. I know so many people with the virus. I really don’t want to get it, or if I do, I want it to be not terrible. ~~~~~~~~ I had a lovely coffee with a good friend, Elizabeth today. She is doing well and expecting a lot of guests in the upcoming months. She wrote a book a few years ago about the Upper Tiber Valley called Sustenance which is a wonderful chronicle of the artisanal producers in the valley. ~~~~~~~~ We had a lovely dinner with our friends Susan and Gary last night. We went to Grace, our nice neighborhood restaurant. Good food. Great to catch up. You may remember they were our first friends here and had the small apartment we stayed in during our first renovation. And another bigger place. They have sold both so they won’t be here often and we miss them a lot. We are simpatico is in all ways. Hard to meet people like this. We did plan a vacation together next year for October. Should be fun. To the Loire. We are compatible travel companions and always have fun together. 🥰 My most interesting dish from dinner was a red cabbage soup. I love the color!
I also met with my architect, Irma, at Nicoletti, the falegname (cabinet maker) who will be making our cabinets. It turned out to be productive but somewhat stressful. The decisions I was making I’ll have to live with for a long time. 😳 I was surprised to see the list of orders for custom made cabinets included the UK and France. It was cheaper for Nicoletti to make them and ship them than to have them made in their own country. I went into the factory part which was a beehive of activity. They can make ANYTHING exactly like you want. Pretty impressive. Anyway, now I’m in the queue. They will make them in January or February and install them in March. Hopefully the first two weeks of March since we will be in the US after that. I don’t really want my house-sitters to have to deal with it! I could always put them off until we return I hope! ~~~~~~~~ Tomorrow is Thanksgiving. We will go to Calagrana which will be making the traditional meal. The evolution of Thanksgiving at Calagrana is interesting. Ely being British and Alberto Italian didn’t know much about the feast. About 9 years ago our friends Susan and Gary wanted to have thanksgiving but they couldn’t cook the huge turkey at home. So Susan hired Ely to roast one for her, plus appetizers etc. Ely was up all night roasting the 35 pound bird and talking to her sister in Philadelphia who collaborated. We picked up the turkey and had the feast at Susan and Gary’s house. That was the same for the next year. Then we decided it was easier for us to go to Calagrana than to bring the bird from there to us. Ely and Albi invited us into their home since the restaurant was closed for the winter. That went for a few years. Then, Ely having become an enthusiastic Thanksgiving fan, decided to open the restaurant for the feast to anyone who reserved. So now that’s what we do. Tomorrow we are guests of Susan and Gary and we will be a table of ten I think.
I am thinking that next year, once I’ve got a kitchen, I’ll have a meal at our house maybe for our single friends who would enjoy coming together for the feast. And some of our other new friends. Since Susan and Gary now live in Florence and have sold here I’m not sure how often we will see them.
HAPPY THANKS GIVING. EVERYONE! There will be a post about our meal soon.
Mundane things we got done this week. Some good, some not-so-good. ~~~~~~~~ I forgot to mention that we had a call from our Polizia Municipale on Saturday. They had a citation for us and had to deliver it. We said we were home so he came by to our house with it. (So weird that they do this.) Turns out we were on vacation on our cruise when this infraction occurred so that meant it was our house sitters. They did tell me they went to the Adriatic coast and that is where they got this speeding ticket. Luckily it wasn’t too much over the limit so no need to ask for their drivers license info so we can say who was driving. No points involved. We paid the fine and will wait to see if we get any more to decide whether we will bother with asking them to repay us. Sometimes it’s not worth it. ~~~~~~~~ Monday we spent 3 hours at the ginormous Perugia hospital waiting — and 15 minutes of that time was for procedures. Ugh. I’m getting an orthoscopia of my sinuses and had to do pre-op tests and an interview with the anesthetist because I will be asleep for the procedure. So that’s done. Now I wait to find out the date for the procedure. I just hope it’s not on Thanksgiving or just before since we are going to Thanksgiving lunch at Calagrana with friends. Here is the waiting room…tick…tick..tick. ⏰
~~~~~~~~ Tuesday I drove to Sansepolcro in nearby Tuscany for my, much needed, haircut. I love that little city. It’s in the upper Tiber Valley just like we are. They are right up at the end of the valley where the big mountains start. The town has just over 15,000 people so just slightly smaller than Umbertide. It was a gray day and I had a little time so walked a little into town from the gate and took a few pictures. None are very good. The town has all their Christmas lights up already.
V
I may be wrong but it seems like the people in Sansepolcro dress more stylishly than in Umbertide. I think I’m right though. Umbertide is a working class town for the most part and Umbrian to boot. Tuscany is, well, you know, Tuscany, so it is a little more posh. 😁 ~~~~~~~ Wednesday brought a meeting with my architect, Irma. I think all the details are nailed down now. She and I will go to the Falegname (cabinet maker) Nicoletti here in town who will custom build our cabinets. I will pick the color then. I’ve already chosen the countertop color and the color for the floor. Still must chose appliances, sink, faucet but that should be it. Today we decided to replace one narrow cabinet with a wine rack. The work won’t start until January which is pretty perfect actually. We will be here. We won’t have any guests. Hopefully it will be done before we go home to the US for the first time in four years in March. Here’s the plan before. Today we decided on cabinets that lift up rather than open normally. And the narrow cabinet on the left will become a wine rack.
~~~~~~~~~ Thursday, I worked in the gardens in the morning. I cleaned out and cut back the lavender and a big pink flowering plant that got huge, also the hostas and the ornamental grass I planted. There is still more to do but it’s better now. I also planted all the bulbs that my friend Jill gifted to me. Lots of flowers this spring! Won’t that be something to look forward to?
At a little after eleven I left to meet my bestie, Jen, in Passignano sul Trasimeno for lunch. It’s a pretty lakefront town. I think there are about 8,000 people and it is on the main train line. My friend lives in Foligno and doesn’t like to drive so this worked for us both and I love the lake. Here are some pictures from around town.
Along the lakefront promenadePretty park along lakeAlong the lakefront promenadePart of the old castle fortress above the townGlad these aren’t my stairsSomebody likes wineCastle fortress built on a cliff
We ate at Trattoria Pescatore. This place, like most restaurants around the lake, specializes in lake fish. Some of it is regional and specialized like they catch and eat eels, usually made into stew. I’ve had it and it’s actually pretty good. The food is very good. I had risotto with zucca and scamorza. That’s risotto with puréed winter squash and the smoked cheese they make here. Very good and perfect for a one course meal – rich. Jen had the Tuscan soup. It was a bit chilly so the food was quite warming. Here is the restaurant interior, very snug and cozy, and my risotto.
In summer they have a pretty shady garden area. It’s right in the Centro Storico. This photo is the walkway outside covered in vines.
Lago Trasimeno is the fourth largest lake in Italy and the largest on the peninsula. In summer it’s very busy and all along the shores are camp grounds and discos which close in winter. Pretty tacky. In winter the area is quiet and tranquil.
Tomorrow, Friday concludes the week with my Italiano class. It was a productive week!
So sorry I’ve been MIA. I’m here to fix that. 🙂 it isn’t like nothing’s has been happening. They are bits and bobs as the British would say. I have been doing a lot of the stuff for my sinus infection. I have gotten the second radiograph and gone back to the doctor. He wants to rule out teeth as the cause so I have a dentist appointment for next Monday for that. But the doc has already put me into the system for the scope of my nose. I was pleased about that so if the teeth are ruled out the scope will go forward asap. Enough of this medical stuff!
We had Pino, our electrician come to fix a few things. He is really a piece of work and I like him a lot. Speaks not a word of English, nor Italian. As far as we can tell he speaks mainly Umbertidese, our town dialect. He talks to himself in dialect all the time as he works, but as Luther says, he is extremely resourceful. He fixed our electric garage door, figured out why our doorbell wasn’t working, and fixed the lights on the terrace. Happy days!
Speaking of our doorbell. This is super annoying. Our bell stopped working a while ago and we contacted the condominium. They sent someone who said it was the button and got it working for a short time. When it quit again we contacted them, and the condominium, but got no response. Finally the condominium said it was our own problem because ours was the only bell affected. They said they could fix it for €900 (!). When we saw what Pino did, we realized it was a plastic plate with all four doorbells on it. Our piece of it was broken off. This is not a problem for just us. So now we will go head-to-head with the condo. It is easy to think they are trying to take advantage of us foreigners but that is not a given. We DO need to push back now so they know we are not easy marks.
We had lunch with some friends who are here part time and a couple we know from Foligno who have been here as long as we have. Lively and lovely lunch at C’Era una Volta next door to us. Dessert! It was a torta with cachi, also known as persimmons. Here persimmons grow abundantly everywhere and are big and delicious. They are ripe everywhere now.
I am reading a new book called Still Life. It begins in Tuscany during the Second World War, segues to England afterwards with our main character Alyssis. And now I’m back in Florence where Alyssis has inherited a property in Santo Spirito, a neighborhood of Florence from a man who was saved by him during the war. He was helped by his Notaio, Massimo, and Alyssis came with a small entourage of his former wife’s daughter, age five, by an American soldier during the war, an older man friend, Cressy, and an African blue parrot. Yes, an interesting group. The house they got was big and in a small piazza and of course everyone all around knew he had inherited and was coming. All the talk in the neighborhood. To cut this short, the house had a refrigerator. No one had their own refrigerator! They all used the local bar’s refrigerator. So when Alyssis asked Massimo if they could get a telephone his reply was, “Oh no no. Too soon. Too soon? Trust me. Too soon. Not after the refrigerator.” Too funny! Anyway, I kinda let this get away from me, but I recommend the book to people who like Italy.
Tonight is pizza night with our friends Christie and Jane. The weather is pretty vile. It’s been very windy and pretty wet. Gray skies make it dreary, and we went to standard time last weekend so now the night falls very early. Heading into the season I loath the most here. We lit the stufa for the first time this week.
I will publish this now but hope to post again soon. Ciao for now!
We have a few loose ends to tie up. We had a nice lunch with new friends who own a house in Centro. I gave them a little help by accepting their Amazon deliveries before they came. We went to Vineria Carmine for lunch. It was a windy day and a little cool but we did sit outside. We also asked if we could see the kitchen since my architect was also the architect here. (There will be a posting soon about my kitchen) Here are a few pictures.
~~~~~~~ Yesterday I “harvested” my olives from my little tree 😂 hahaha. I may cure them. There aren’t many, but it would be an exercise!
Speaking of the raccolta – harvest, we are awaiting news from friends who may allow us to help them harvest again this year. It has been very spotty here in Umbria. I know some who had none, but most had some. Our friend Fabio is in the middle of his harvest and says he has less olives but the quality is good. I will buy some oil from him. ~~~~~~~~ We had friends join us for Pranzo last week. This is how we manage to entertain on the terrace without a kitchen upstairs. We use my little cart and it goes up on the elevator. The next one is the table all set.
It is the weekend. I went to the Saturday market and then Luther and I went to Bosco, a town south of us, to buy beef and pork from our favorite butcher. Their meat is amazing. And they have cuts not seen in normal butchers here. I bought two tomahawk pork chops, one tomahawk steak, their primo hamburger patties, and filet steaks. All this was not all that unusual. We also got skirt steak and flank steak. Neither is found here and I do miss them. They also gave us a regalo, gift, of some interesting looking popsicles…just kidding…they are like pork (or maybe beef) cylinders on sticks to grill. THIS should be FUN!
Popsicles!Etrusco burger!Flank steak
Our weather is still fairly nice. We had storms come through yesterday and now it is cooler but not bad. Tomorrow should be fine, so let me wish you all a buona domenica!
Umbria is a heavily agricultural region. I have written about the four main crops, winter wheat, corn, sunflowers and tobacco. Today I got to see a farm with animals. It was the first time I got a real idea of how this all works here. Many of our guests have commented on the fact they never see pastured livestock. Yes, sheep are often seen but cattle are not. They are mainly kept in the barns and fed or they have small outside pens. No pastures. It is due to the lack of manpower, fencing, space.
Today, I was part of a group of women, our former apartment buyers and two of their friends who are friends with Angela Pauselli, the daughter of the farmer who makes this pasta. I was happy to give us all a ride over there. I bought a lot! More than this picture!
This is an artisanal pasta maker here in Umbertide — Pauselli. They use old wheat varieties milled special for the pasta. We have purchased from them before but the shop is simply never open so I haven’t been able to get more. Sadly they are farmers and not marketers. They don’t promote the product or try to sell it. It makes me sad because it is very special and a very excellent product. It will disappear soon with no one to help. I am betting the slow food people would want to promote this. I will try to see what I can do.
We got a tour of the farm facilities from Angela’s dad. It is an extensive farm with a lot of livestock. They have a large solar farm so are somewhat sophisticated. Plus, as always they grow grapes (make wine for the family to drink), grow olives for oil, I saw a peach orchard, there were maybe 30 chickens. And pigs. The cattle were segregated into barns. The first was all the castrated males, destined to be butchered at about age two for meat. These cattle live in a barn. They are not pastured. Not the best life 🙁.
The castrated boys destined for butchering.
Animals are not generally pastured here. They are in the barns or in small enclosures. They feed them from the enormous, round hay bales they harvest during summer. The “girls” who were all together, along with the bull, and away from the young castrated males were mostly Limosine, Chianina or Charolais cattle. Almost all pure white. In the past the Chianina were used for all facets of a farm. They pulled the plow, pulled the cart, provided milk and provided meat. To me they are beautiful, large and known for their gentleness and docility.
Mom and calf.The bull. He was huge but seemed sweet.Bales of hay for the fodder.Spewing the hay into the troughs.Future prosciutto.Happy chickens!
When I got home I made pasta for dinner, 🙂, what else! I used my butter roma tomato sauce and some guanciale and pecorino romano. Mmmm.
After Rachel and Alex left we managed to squeeze in a lunch with friends. Our weather is still amazing so we MUST take advantage of it since winter is not far away. The “gang of five” met up at Lago Trasimeno in a restaurant called L’Opera. Our “gang” are Doug, our friend who has been keeping busy renovating his home here and now is studying for his Italian drivers license, and Roselyne and Steve. They live in Spello and came here from Miami. Roselyne is French with an EU passport making their move here easier than it is for most of us. We meet up as often as our schedules allow and always enjoy each others company.
The view from the restaurant patio. Photo by Roselyne.The gang, minus Steve and adding, Georgia Doug’s sidekick. Photo by Steve.
The restaurant is all seafood and the owners are Sicilian. Consequently, there are a number of Sicilian dishes which I love!
Raw seafood starter Pasta with gamberetti (small shrimp) in a pistachio cream sauce. Delicious!Couscous with mixed seafood.
They grow a lot if pistachios in Sicily so they use them in a lot of ways. Palermo was conquered by Arabs who brought along couscous which you’ll still see on the west side of Sicily. ~~~~~~ We had a nice lunch at Calagrana Sunday with the purchasers of our former apartment, Christie and Jane. They are always fun and the food is always delicious and as I can’t help saying – again! the weather was amazing. I took a photo of this Range Rover convertible (I had no idea they made a convertible) sitting next to a vintage yellow Cinquecento.
I had two of the best things I’ve ever had there. An asparagus appetizer with a fried egg and black truffles. It was perfect. My second course was a ravioli whose filling was ricotta, sultanas, pear, pumpkin. It was served in a butter sage sauce. Delicious. Pictured below. And the next picture is Luther’s veal chop with arugula and tomatoes.
On Tuesday our friends from Florida who have a house in Pisticci in Basilicata down south drove up to visit a couple days. We had Christie and Jane over for aperitivo and we all had fun. I didn’t take a picture!
Meanwhile we had been dealing with getting blood work done for the Great White Cat, Rocky. Both of our cats are 14 now and we wanted to check Rocky. The first test came back that he is hypoglycemic which gave us a scare. They retested after we made him fast overnight and happily, he is fine. Whew.
Sadly, the weather will be changing for the worse next week. Rain and much colder. And we have not gotten our stufa cleaned or pellets and wood ordered. I guess we better get crackin’!
Managed to pay for the refrigerator today. Luther went back, repeatedly (three times) to get the bill to pay. Italy is the only place I’ve lived where you’ve got to chase them down to pay them. The thing is, we buy our appliances from a store here in town called Formica. Family run and they will get anything you want. Yes, you pay a bit more for it but they bring it, set it up and if there’s ever a problem make sure it gets fixed. Plus you support a local family and store. And yes, you’ve got to chase them down to pay them! But it’s all good.😁 ~~~~~~~ I had lunch with a new friend in Assisi today. What a cool location. The hotel, named Borgo Antichi Orti has indeed got an ancient vegetable garden. It sits beneath the basilica of St Francis. The lunch was nice and meeting my new friend for the first time was great.
On the way to lunch I got stopped in a random traffic stop. These are common. The Carabinieri hold out what everyone calls a “lolypop” looks like one, it is red and means pull over. They check the cars papers and your driving license. This was a first for me. Luther has been pulled over three times.
Here is where we ate lunch. The glass doors were the restaurant and looming above was the Basilica of San Francesco in Assisi. Amazing.
Scorpion – first one I’ve seen in this apartment. Rocky was playing with it. Luckily they are not dangerous here. But still creepy. ~~~~~~~ Today was a rainy day, the first one since back in the spring. I like the occasional rainy day. I puttered about the kitchen, using up ingredients I bought to make random things. First, I parboiled and peeled some Roma tomatoes from the Saturday Mercato so I could make more of the delicious butter sauce.
Then I spent a looong time chopping 3 bell peppers, 4 cucumbers and 2 onions into tiny dice to make sweet pickle relish. You can’t buy that here so I’ve taken to making my own. Now I prefer it to store-bought. It is easy to make but there is a lot of chopping!
Last I roasted some of the recent tomatoes from my garden which, as is expected, aren’t as good a summer ones. When you roast them with olive oil and slivered garlic it makes a delicious sauce and resurrects a poor tomato. This was dinner tonight. Felt kind of Greek. I liked it but it isn’t a keeper.
The weather today must be one of the top ten days ever on this beautiful earth! Cool breezy, sunny, puffy clouds, crystal clear air. Simply amazing. View from terrace at Calagrana. Am I right? Is it not perfect?
We joined four friends from Canada. One old friend and three new ones. Our friend Karen comes every summer and rents in Tuscany but not terribly far from here. They were blown away by the beauty of the restaurant and it was perfect as always. I loved my starter. In fact four of us got this. It sounded so good. Grilled peaches on a tomato bed with prosciutto.
Next will be some of our pastas. One a tagliolini in a creamy sauce with truffles, the other Fishioni (a type of pasta) with sausage ragù, arugula and pecorino cheese. So good!
The dining terrazzo full of happy diners.
Great seeing friends and sharing a delicious meal. Buona domenica a tutti!
The story of our Italian family is a long one. In a nutshell, it started as soon as we moved into our last apartment. The place was full of the dust of construction and everything needed cleaning. My friend Susan introduced me to Vera, who cleaned her house. A super interesting and intelligent woman from Bosnia originally and then Slovenia. To avoid an arranged marriage (Islamic parents) she fled to Italy and became a nanny. She met her future husband, married and had two beautiful girls. And she began her own business.
Vera cleaned for us and we engaged her to chat with us in Italian after cleaning. Time passing and we became good friends. Eventually we were adopted by Vera and family and we adopted them. We all love good food and relish the different cuisines. Not normal for Italians. So that’s the back-story.
Sunday Lunch was the first in months. I hadn’t seen Vera since February. Now that we have a table and furniture we asked them for Pranzo. I decided an American lunch was the best thing given the heat. The menu was chips and salsa to start, sweet and spicy. Pulled pork sandwiches with hot sauces and coleslaw, grilled hot dogs with the fixins. Potato salad. And for dessert, peach tiramisù.
It was so nice to see everyone again. I had missed them so much. It was a lot of fun. Here are some pictures. Graziano is very tall and has made some tall girls! And beautiful redheads.
