Category Archives: Umbria

The Christmas season

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For us it has been a lovely time. We welcomed guests, had a small get together with the guests and friends, a beautiful Open House that we attended, a pizza Christmas Eve with friends, and a lovely Christmas lunch at Joseph and Paul’s house to which we all contributed.

Our friends arrived on December 18. There were three of them, two who live in Doha, Qatar and one in Jersey City, NJ. I know George from when he was a colleague of mine at MITRE Corp in the 1980s. We kept in touch and George and Mary visited us in Germany in the 1990s. Since then we know where each other are but seldom see one another so we were very happy that they got the time to come to Italy for Christmas. I am sure it is very different from Doha!  Warren, their friend from NJ, we had not met but were very happy to make his acquaintance. We only had a short time so we took them to Assisi, which is the top stop in Umbria. It was lovely for Christmas dressed up with many Creche. The Basilica of San Francesco took their breaths away as it always does mine. I was absolutely amazed. When we arrived– We. Were. The. Only. People. In. The. Upper church!! I have been countless times but not in December. Wow. It was a very spiritual experience. We have always jostled with crowds. The vistas from the town, even though the weather was spitting rain, were pretty. We had a special lunch at Piazetta delle Erbe, our favorite restaurant there. It was very good here are a few pictures of the beautifully presented food.

Risotto
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Salmon
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Pork
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The next day we stayed in Umbertide for the morning market. Everyone tried the Porchetta, a local specialty of slow roasted pork with cracklin’. On a roll it makes the perfect breakfast! We perused the produce and checked out the “walmart” come to town with other wares. Afterwards they shopped at Buscatti for Umbrian textiles and the cashmere shop for beautiful fashions from Umbria. I bet many people don’t know Umbria is well known for it’s wonderful cashmere made right here.

We headed to lunch in Montone. a nearby hilltown, at a place called Tipico. Excellent, locally sourced Umbrian dishes. The day was beautiful. Not at all cold and blue skies. The views from Montone are spectacular.

This evening I had invited most of our American neighbors over to meet our guests and have a little refreshment. It was very much fun, I think, for all. Here is a very bad picture taken with my Ipad. Sorry.
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Alas, all good things must come to an end and we escorted them to the train station and sent them on their way for a few days in Venice. It should be pretty at Christmas. Italian towns go all out with the decorations and Venice, with it’s canals, must be beautiful with the lights.

Now things have settled down for a long winters sleep. We watch the fields that, even now, are awakening with the winter wheat, bright green. January and February are long, dark and cold but we take heart that the days grow longer now and spring comes here in March. A belated Buon Natale and I wish you all a Buon Anno!

See the tree, how big it’s grown…

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We brought the Christmas tree that we bought the first Christmas we were here inside for the season. It lives out on the terrace throughout the year except for December. This is the 2016 tree. it is sitting on the floor.
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And THIS is the itty, bitty 2014 tree. It is sitting on a stool to make it taller. That’s no longer necessary!
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Here is our town tree all lit up.
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Today was an exceptionally foggy day. And, unlike many days, it lasted all day. I braved the cold and went out to see what sort of images I could get. I thought they would look better in black and white. Very atmospheric. Here are a few. Click for a larger version.

This is la Rocca or our fortress with a smoking chimney in front of it.
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The bridge over the Tiber.
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Road along the river.
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Interesting tree.
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The town walls and houses above it from across the river.
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And finally, a lone fisherman.
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Umbertide scenes

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Another gorgeous sunset. Mountains in the background and the river in the front.
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Autumn’s last gasp. A few leaves hang on.
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The town  Christmas tree has arrived. It’s a bigun’ this year.
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Maneuvering…dsc06532

Decorating begins. It will not be lit until the beginning of Advent on Sunday.
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So, you decided to move to Italy…

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I just put up a page, accessible from the top navigation, with a summary of information about moving and living in Italy. It is called “So you’ve decided to move to Italy”. I will constantly update it with things I learn that I think will be useful. Go to the page here.

Wending our way through August

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We are having spectacular weather. Highs in the 80s and cool at night. We have been enjoying it with the occasional Gelato or Aperol Spritz. Last weekend we had the local Vespa club arrive in all their thundering glory.

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We also had a great time creating and attending a BBQ at an Agriturismo of friends, Simone and Simona. They are from Milan and now living rough, off the grid on the old family farm of Simone. It was abandoned for many years and they have spent years working mostly on their own to make it into holiday apartments. They first fixed up the old barn for themselves. And have spent a LOT of time just on the structure of the old buildings. It is in an earthquake zone so there are lots of rules for stabilizing and protecting everything. They are now getting ready to finish the first apartment inside. Here are some pictures.

This is the main building. Underneath are the large, airy barns where the animals used to live.DSC05939

The views are nothing short of spectacular. They are very high on a ridge. The electric grid stops before their property. They use mostly solar and batteries.DSC05945

The picturesque old chimneys. I love these. They are all over our part of Italy.
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The BBQ grill with Fabio and Gary.
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I had initially invited everyone to our house and was going to make the ribs. But Simona wanted us all to come there. So I got up early to prepare the ribs. I wanted it to be all American so I brought spicy guacamole, spicy salsa with the wonderful tomatoes we have now, and my moms potato salad. We found tortilla chips in the store! Everyone was open to the experience and had fun. We also had great, grilled vegetables, and one of their chickens. He was supposed to be grilled but he was deemed too tough so he was stewed. Dessert was a very light cheesecake and cool watermelon. What could be more perfect?

Random scenes. Here is the wind ruffled Tiber one afternoon.
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I found CORN!! it is one of the things I miss most about the US. Summer, sweet corn. Alas, it was not to be. Tough as an old shoe. Horses probably wouldn’t touch it! BUT the good news is that I have started volunteering at the Books for Dogs booth at the market. It is run by mostly British women. They take donated books and DVDs and sell them to support several dog sanctuaries. Anyway, one of the ladies also bought corn. Later I asked her if we could plant a few rows next year in her garden. So MAYBE next year we will be able to taste that sweet summer corn!DSC05935

Impending storm.
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Volunteer sunflower against a blue sky.
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The placid river in morning.
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Here is a spider who has caught a tasty fly on our pepper plants. If you click you can even see the spiders little face. It looks so much like a human face.
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Finally, we are looking forward to welcoming our next guests, Mary and Lenny! Their first trip to Italy and great old friends of ours. They will be with us for five nights and we will do some lunches, markets, wine tastings and sightseeing. Stay tuned…

Goings On…

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Spring has sprung when the Monk’s Beard shows up and here it is!
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I also decided to ask our butcher for flank steak. I know it exists and I wanted to make fajitas. One of the butchers speaks some english so I asked him if he was familiar with them. He said yes and trotted off into the back. He brought out what is the most enormous flank steak I’ve ever seen. He held his knife on it to see how much I wanted. So what I ended up with was this.
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As you can see it is a very thick steak and I got a chunk of it. I grilled it in the fireplace without marinating it or anything else. It was a tasty bit of meat and worked fine in the fajitas. Always something new!

Our weather has been unrelentingly gray and wet but not particularly cold. The Tiber overflowed its banks again but not as bad as last year. All the little rivers were roaring torrents! And we’ve had some storms. This one loomed up over the mountains with the sun still shining in the foreground.
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This week we finally saw some relief…So when we saw the sun was going to be out we planned a trip to a winery in the Montefalco area. We head for one in particular but as often happens ended up at another because we couldn’t find the first one. We ended up at Antonelli. This is a very big operation for that area. They were very nice and poured generously for the tasting.

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Nina the dog liked attention.
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Packing up the purchases.
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The tasting room.
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They also produce olive oil and were pruning the trees back. See the piles of branches?
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After the tasting we went into the town of Montefalco and tried to visit the museum but it was closed on Tuesdays. One of these days we’ll get to see the purportedly beautiful frescoes of the life of St. Francis. We chose a little enotecca with restaurant and had a pleasant lunch. There were even two brave tables of folks sitting outside in the sun.

Montefalco piazza.
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View from Montefalco across the valley to Monte Subasio.
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An artist paints stylized pictures of local scenes. Here is one that was hanging in the restaurant. I want to buy one of his paintings sometime. I’ve seen them in a shop in Assisi.DSC05301

Finally, I wanted to address something that I have been hearing over and over in the US press. And this is not a political opinion at all but it does have to do with the presidential election. It is the fact that many people are looking for so called “exit strategies” if Trump gets elected. Wanting to immigrate to Canada, or Mexico, or wherever to get away. Well, as an expat who has already exited let me tell you…you can run but you can’t hide.

As a US citizen anything that happens in the US affects all of us no matter where we live. We, as Americans, still have to file and pay US taxes every year. I was surprised to get a letter with an additional tax form I have to file this year to prove I have enough health insurance over and above my Medicare. This is a new one for me. It will be amusing to see how my accountant handles it! As most of you know we are in the Italian health care system.

We also have to comply with a lot of regulations that Uncle Sam creates just to keep tabs on us and on all our financial dealings. For instance, FBAR (Foreign Bank Account Report) and FATCA (Foreign Account Tax Compliance Act). Depending on our situation we must file these before June or face fines and possible criminal charges.

Yep, the long arm of Uncle Sam will always find you. You might as well forget that “exit strategy”.

Tasting the oil

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On Saturday we drove over to Calagrana where Ely is being held hostage by her son who has broken out in Chicken Pox! She put some of the Olio Nuovo into two small tins for us to try.

First I toasted the bread on the stovetop (wish I had had a fire to toast it over!) until it was nice and charred.
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Next I drizzled the pretty green oil over it.DSC05200

My report. It was delizioso!! Peppery and acidic. Nothing like I have ever had in the U.S. Ely tells me it is best used for drizzling on bruschetta, soups, meats, or salads rather than using it for cooking.

We are enjoying a really, really beautiful November here. The temperatures are near 70F every day with bright blue skies. We are so lucky! It has been nothing like the last two years which, the locals say, were very uncommon.

Here is the river with the changing trees.
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Finishing the picking and our visit to the oil mill

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What a day! We started out early to Calagrana to begin picking at 9AM. Ely had an appointment at the mill for between 2:00 and 2:30. There were seven trees left to pick. The crew was: us, Ely, Ely’s friend Catarina, one other woman and the gardener. We picked non-stop until around 1:00 when we were pretty well finished. We left Ely to load up two vans with the boxes of olives and we were to meet her and follow them down to the oil mill in Pierantonio, the next town down from Umbertide.

The mill was a busy place! It being all new to me I was fascinated. Ely and Catarina drove the vans onto the scale. They weighed them and then we unloaded the olives. Then they moved the vans back onto the scale to be weighed empty. Turns out we picked 700 kilos of olives! Next they load the olives into a giant vat and the olives are sucked down from the bottom where they climb a sort of ladder and blowers blast the leaves and stems away. Next they go into the washer and up a ramp and into the hoppers. There were essentially five hoppers so they could process five people’s olives at once, each in turn being finished into oil. In the hopper there were big, round blades that blended the olive paste for 45 minutes. While this was going on as each other hopper was ready they turned a handle and the paste drained out, under the floor, and was separated into the glop, the oil and the water. The oil then trickles out, through a filter and then into the containers.

It was fun watching the other people as they waited for their oil. Everyone was happy and smiling at everyone else. The olive harvest is a happy time! The work is done. The trees have done their work as have the harvesters. Happy customers carried heavy containers of oil to their vehicles. There was an amusing group of 5 “boys” (all looked to be in their 60s or 70s). They had a shared grove and they worked together to harvest it. Then they had to divide it up. It was amusing to see them watching that scale like hawks to be sure no one got more than anyone else!

The final numbers for Ely’s harvest were…700 kilos of olives, pressed into 88 liters of oil or about 12%. So 12% of the olives were oil and the rest – skins, pits and water. Ely was happy but not ecstatic. It was a good-ish year.

Here is the off-loading of the fruit from the vans into the big vat.
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The vat filled up with “our” olives.
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The ladder where the leaves are blown off.
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The washed, de-leafed and de-stemmed olives.
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The hopper full of our olive paste. This was after about 45 minutes. You can see the pooled up oil on the right of the container.
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Anticipation!
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Here it comes!
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Liquid gold. So fine!
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Finally, after Ely got home she drained a little into a glass jar for me. I will pick that up tomorrow and we will have some bruschetta. I’ll report on that next.
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Helping with the harvest!

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I was so excited to find out our friend who owns Calagrana was harvesting her olives and needed help. I had a couple of reservations as to whether I could hold up to the physical effort (not as young as I used to be!) but thought the opportunity was too good to pass up.

We didn’t leave Umbertide until around 11AM so they had been working a couple of hours. The olive grove is way up on top of the mountain spread out around a lovely casale (big farm house) owned by Ely’s English friend. Ely and Alberto tend to the trees and manage the harvest and production and share some of the oil with her. A win-win situation. She had a neighbor helping her plus a couple of other pickers and the gardeners of the grounds. Her neighbor had brought what Ely called a basher. It had long tines which vibrated in different directions. You lifted it up into the tree to get at the high branches and it shook the olives down.

We helped spread the big, green nets to catch the olives and put up stakes to hold up the down-hill side so the olives wouldn’t roll off. We hand harvested the lower branches. There was a mixture of black, fully ripe ones and green ones. The mixture makes the oil more flavorful. We worked until about 1:30 and had to leave because my Italian class was at 2:30. Also we discovered that you must dress in layers as the morning is very cold and by noon it is hot in the sun while working (we were baking). Dress like an onion, Ely said. We told Ely we’d come back tomorrow (properly dressed this time) to help finish up and accompany the fruit to the mill for the crush. Here are some pictures:

Luther managing the nets.
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Tree partly harvested.
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You place the metal stakes at the downhill side to catch the rolling olives.
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Bin full of olives. The leaves need to be mostly removed from the box.
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After you knock them all off the nets are gathered and the olives are rolled into one spot, then dumped into the crates.
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Olives ready to be harvested.
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Ely and Luther hand picking while Catarina works the “basher” on the opposite side.
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My visit to the Italian Dottoressa

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Well I couldn’t put off visiting my doctor any longer so I steeled myself to do it last week. The way the Italian health care works is like this. You go to the Sanitario office at the beginning of each year. I wrote about that experience earlier this year in this blog. At this time they assign a doctor. I was assigned to a woman doctor who was an OB/GYN as well but she would be my primary care doctor. I had gotten her name from friends who had been through a lot of health care issues and had finally found her. We all speak some Italian but when dealing with something like your health you want to get it right. You don’t want to misunderstand.

I had looked my Dottoressa up on the internet and had her hours. Off I went. After a little trouble I found her office but her hours were completely different than the site said. Dutifully I wrote down the hours that were posted on the door. Rats. So yesterday I went back arriving just before the opening time to find several people there ahead of me. I noted my place and after about 30 minutes I went in. I introduced myself in my best Italian and then politely asked if she spoke English. And she did, and it was good. I had checked my blood pressure myself and it was somewhat high so this was my primary reason to go. She agreed to put me on some medicine for it. She commented that she had not seen me in any of the bars and did I only associate with other English speakers. I got the feeling she didn’t like the expat community. She said she would speak to me in English but if she met me somewhere else she would speak to me in Italian. Fair enough!

As we talked I was surprised at how, how to say it…maybe unprofessional… she was at least when compared to a US doctor. She asked if my husband came to her and I said no he went to a different doctor. When I told her his name she snorted in derision. I asked her if she did not like him and she replied, “have you met him?”  I don’t think a US doctor would do that to a colleague. We talked about her daughter who has several degrees. I commented that she should be proud. She talked about the person who headed the Umbria Sanitario office who had “only a high school degree!!” and SHE was trying to tell the doctors what to do, how to save money… I commented she must know people in high places. She replied she was F***ing everyone! OKAY then. So this was my first visit to the Dottoressa.

Weather is a-changing
Fall is here. The temperatures have been quite cool but nice. The morning fog is again enveloping the big city. It usually burns off by mid-morning. The farmers are bringing in the biggest cash crop around here right now – tobacco. Everywhere are tractors with trailers full of the bright yellow leaves. Sprinkled throughout the countryside are tobacco drying buildings with ovens to partially dry the leaves before shipping to the big tobacco companies. Umbria is famous for it’s tobacco, primarily for cigarettes.

The sunflower fields are now just stubble. The corn is mostly harvested. And so are the grapes. It was purportedly a good year for the wine. Happy happy for the vintners after such a poor year in 2014. Next we hold our breath to see if the olive crop is OK this year. Last year it was devastated by an insect because the winter had been too warm to kill them off. Last year would have been my first olive harvest season. So I am eagerly looking forward to this years harvest and the production of the Olio Nuovo or New Oil. Umbrian oil is particularly peppery and grassy and brilliant green. So good on toasted bruschetta. Can’t wait.

Yesterday we had a gentleman named Marco come and take a look at our big fireplace in the kitchen. We are going to have him make glass and steel doors that fold back for it. He “said” he could get it to us by November. It is Italy after all…Our friend Vera just said to him “before Natale?” (Christmas) He laughed and said November! We shall see… Maybe I will be able to try it out this winter.

This week we have had a lot of storms rolling through. A lot of times they stay west of us, behind the mountains. The Tiber river tells the tale of what is happening up-stream. It is brown with mud and very high. I must have taken 100 pictures to get this one picture of the light show we were having.
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