Today is Festa della Republica – Italian Independence Day. The day Italy voted the Monarchy out just after WWII. Big doings in town. Antique and cool cars and motorcycles near La Rocca.
I went down to the Piazza to meet my friend Elizabeth for a Caffè. Or rather, I should say i went to ”take a caffè” which is the Italian way to say it. It was pleasant, as it was still morning. Record heat for today through the weekend in Italy. It will be hitting 40C or 104F in the south. I snapped a few pictures. Our comune with flags. Not as spectacular as the fly over but still festive.
And our two Bars in the Piazza. Bar Mary and Café Centrale. Bar Mary has really upped their game this year, adding planter boxes with trellis’ to delineate their space and new black umbrellas. They intend to get two more umbrellas to complete the look. It is quite inviting now, I think.
May is the season when the hard work on the Umbrian and eastern Tuscan farms begins, the hard work of the tobacco planting. I can see it around in all the valleys now. Not to mention the planting summer and fall crops and the beginning of the harvest of the spring bounty. The book “The Tuscan Year” by Elizabeth Romer, from which I have been excerpting monthly this year, is all about the planting this month. And when this work starts our hero Silvana has to feed sixteen to twenty-four people every day for Pranzo, lunch. They need a hearty lunch from the hard morning work and to continue into the afternoon and evening. Silvana must serve three courses every day. A pasta, or soup as the primi, a meat or fish as the secondo, and fruit for dessert plus strong coffee to wake everyone up afterwards. Home-made wine is served throughout the meal.
The book spends time explaining that Italians, even farm workers, all have very high culinary standards. It is true. Everyone is a critic. She has a lot to live up to. It is important to balance the meal with different tastes and textures in the courses, and to vary it every day, to keep it interesting.
Fish in Umbria and this part of Tuscany is shipped in from the coasts. But in the area near Lake Trasimeno there are a lot of lake fish. Silvana doesn’t like lake fish. She serves trout from the small river running through their farm or she serves baccalà. Baccalà is salt cod. It has been consumed all over Italy for centuries. Back in the past it was the only available fish in the interior of Italy so it was very important for the mandatory fish on Friday meals. Baccalà served that purpose. It is salt cured and you can buy it just as it is or you can buy it already processed to soften it. Silvana soaks it for 24 hours under slowing running water. I have made it and I just soaked it and changed the water often, every hour or so for at least 24 hours. I thought I would pick a recipe from the book for baccalà which I have actually made and I like.
Take the already soaked fish, about 1 kilo or 2 ¼ lb for six people, 500 grams or 1 lb 2 ozs of potatoes, peeled and sliced into thin rounds, a large tuft of parsley, olive oil, salt and pepper and a little water.
Spread a little olive oil on the bottom of a very heavy and shallow saucepan, then oil and arrange a layer of potato slices, season and trickle on a little more oil. Next sprinkle on an even dusting of chopped parsley, then a layer of baccalà cut into small pieces. Drizzle the oil over the fish, then more parsley and another layer of potato and so on until the pan is full. Add a little water to prevent the fish from sticking to the pan. Let it cook over a very low flame for at least an hour until the potatoes are tender and the fish is cooked through; add more liquid if needed. This dish can also be cooked successfully and more simply in the oven where it will just require olive oil for moisture. To vary the flavor you may put a layer of thin pieces of onion on top of the potato and a layer of tomato slices on top of the fish.
Credit https://cucinaconmegraziellaeraffaele.it
And finally, an excerpt from the end of the chapter. After the work is done and the day’s heat has lessened….
Later in the afternoon Silvana will go out into her garden and do a little work there; she may potter in the small corner set aside for the flowers, mostly dahlias, Sweet William, snapdragons and Michaelmas daisies planted amongst sage bushes and hydrangeas. She goes into the vegetable garden to pick vegetables or salad for supper, and to see what is ripe and what is coming up; the cool late afternoon is also the time when she does her watering. Sometimes she picks up an old sack and a small sharp sickle and wanders off into the fields to pick specially planted vetches to feed her rabbits; they will enjoy the herbage and ultimately the family will enjoy the well-fed rabbits. Occasionally she will take a kitchen chair out into the courtyard and sit in the shade of the house, her hands busy with a pile of mending, while the hens scratch about by the doorway and the old black sheep dog sits companionably by her side.
I love the peaceful feeling this little excerpt evokes. The calm, the smells, the sound of birds, as she sits in her garden with the knowledge that the wheel will keep turning and the seasons will repeat along with the rituals. Or we hope it will continue for all time… if we can safeguard our poor world. I would hate to think of the loss of such beauty.
I guess it is nearly time to say goodbye to May and hello to June. Summer is acoming.’ Ciao! Happy Memorial Day to everyone!
~~~~~~~ From time to time Luther sends me a recipe he likes. Truth be told, he sends me at least one a week. They come from the Italian newspaper or from the Dr. Wine site. He complains that I don’t make many of them. I admit, I don’t. Friday, I made a zuppa that he sent. Zuppa di legumi misti, mais, e orzo perlato. It is a mixture of dried beans, farro, lentils (your choice of the mix) with corn and orzo. This is another oddity. Orzo, in the US, is rice shaped pasta. Here, orzo is barley. Here’s a picture. (I added short pasta and potatoes)
~~~~~~~~ I love this time of year. Gone is the winter produce. Now we see ruby red radishes, piles of fava beans and new peas ready to sbucciare, my new word for today. As in to shell, or to peel. Luther will sbuccia all of them for me, and then I do the cooking part 🙂 There is asparagus in heaps, of course. Beautiful bitter greens like arugula, called rucola here. And lettuces. The baby zucchini are just coming in and the cucumbers. I impatiently await the tomatoes but they won’t be here until July, maybe late June.
Today I bought something interesting from one of our nice cheese mongers. She had in her case containers of Sardinian potato dumplings that she had prepared (she is from Sardinia). All I have to do is boil them and serve with a good tomato sauce with basil. I also bought a container of fresh ricotta.
~~~~~~~~ Lunch out Saturday! With friends. We decided on a restaurant in Montone, a nearby hill town. This restaurant has been there since we’ve lived here but in typical Italian fashion it was never open when we tried to go. I heard from friends that it is open now, under new management. It is called Taverna Del Verziere. One of the best features of this place is the views from the walls across the valley from their terazza. Spectacular and oh so pleasant on a summer day.
It is a family run place and they were all super welcoming. I was glad I had reserved since it was pretty packed. Their antipasto menu was interesting. We tried a couple new-to-us things. I had the papapomodoro with seasonal vegetables. A typical Umbrian recipe using stale bread soaked in tomato juices. The veggies were either roasted or pickled. Susan got the roasted purple carrot Hummus.
We both enjoyed them. Luther and Gary got the tagliata with lardo for their secondo. It is grilled steak sliced and they put a very thin piece of Lardo on top. Lardo is a speciality of northern Tuscany. Pork belly lard, the purest white, is packed with herbs into giant marble boxes and left to cure for eight months. Then it can be thinly sliced. When it is placed on hot meat, it melts and adds wonderful unctuous flavor.
Montone is a walled town with several gates through the walls. I love this one and the view.
The Italian language never fails to surprise – and make me crazy. It makes me realize how descriptive English is. As in it has so many different and nuanced ways to use the language. Here, I have always been frustrated by the words hot and warm. In Italian if it is hot it is caldo, and if it is warm, it is caldo. Even worse the words niece, nephew and grandchild are ALL nipote. I just don’t get that! I wanted to say sibling today, so I looked it up. It was fratello. But , I said to myself, that’s the word for brother! So there is no distinction between brother and sibling. What about the girl siblings? ~~~~~~~~ Now is the season of the red spiders. They are on all flat surfaces by the thousands. They are very small. The sun really brings them out. If you wear socks on the terrace the soles become red with squished spiders. It is impossible not to mash them. This is an annual occurrence. It doesn’t last long. Thankfully!
~~~~~~~~ We just read that Italy will require all new construction, both public buildings and private homes, must include solar panels. I think this is such a good idea. It should be just part of the price of building. ~~~~~~~~ This is also the time of May snow (neve a maggio)! One tree here lets loose its fluffy seed puffs into the air. It is so thick in the air it is just like snow. We are lucky to have installed screens in most of our windows. Italians don’t normally have screens. Our big picture window in the living room has no screen. It tips in so we can let in fresh air. But now we cannot open it. It actually will build up until you are wading through heaps of it on your floors. Below is the river, which has a lot of the fluff build up.
Today is a beautiful, if cool day. We heard about a little French fest in Città di Castello, this is the next town north of us in the Tiber valley. Luther, myself and our friend Jen decided it would be a fun outing. Off we went in the brilliant sun and blue sky day.
Città di Castello is about twice the size of Umbertide. It has a complete ancient wall enclosing the old Centro Storico. It also has some beautiful towers and buildings.
Wisteria terrace!
We park in a free parking lot. It is just outside the walls. There is a crosswalk and a small door through the wall and then escalators up. It is not that far because Città is not a hill town. You come out in a lovely park just next to the Duomo. Then it’s a short walk to the main piazza. All the vendors are French. It was nice to hear French. We first came to a spice and tea vendor. These two are the ones I bought. They smell devine!
We walked. And looked. We were here on the first day of the fair and many stands were not finished setting up. On the good side, there were no crowds. I am sure tomorrow and Sunday will be very crowded. We also bought French soap, mustard from Dijon, and cherry preserves. I bought a new scarf, because a lady can’t have too many scarves!
Suddenly! There were cheeses! Beautiful French cheeses. We used to live in Germany very near France. The Alsace was our favorite place. Lo and behold there was Munster cheese. It must hold the prize for the stinkiest cheese. But it has a lovely mild taste. It has been many years since I had it. I bought half a round of it. and another very pretty cheese. Here’s a picture.
The next stand had a guy behind a plastic partition with multiple ovens and he was producing the most amazing things to eat. I bought a lovely baguette and a seeded bread to go with the cheeses. We bought lunch, I got a baguettino with goat cheese and almonds. Jen got the same. Luther got an individual quiche Lorraine. All very yummy.
It was an excellent outing to enjoy this cool spring day. ~~~~~~~ Today, we also have an apartment viewing at 6 o’clock. We have been working very hard to not open the frig because inside lives the Munster cheese. And honestly, it can permeate the entire house with its pungent aroma in an instant! Could be off putting to potential buyers. 😁
Buono fine di settimana…much easier to say have a good weekend!
Yesterday, we dumped the last bag of pellets we had bought this winter into our stufa. We declared it officially Spring! We went through around 80 sacks this year at €5.50 each. We know the amount because this year we had most of them delivered and hired people to carry them up to our apartment. The pellet stove keeps our living and dining room nice and warm all winter… and it saves on gas.
I bet most people don’t know that the Italian government regulates when you can start and must end using your heat. Umbria is in Zone E. This zone is second to the longest allowed time (meaning we are second to the coldest region). We are allowed to have the heat on 14 hours a day from October 15 to April 15. They also regulate the temperature. The warmest you can set the thermostat is 20C or 68F. This explains why such a large proportion of the population use wood or pellets as a supplemental (or primary) way to heat.
Just this week Italy announced that this year they will also regulate, and limit, the use of air conditioning, but only in businesses and schools. Italy imports 95% of its gas, and 40% of that comes from Russia. Italy says we will stop importing any gas from Russia within 18 months. Applause! We have two air conditioning units but very rarely use them. Perhaps on the hottest days of August we use it for around three or four hours in the living room since it gets the full afternoon and evening sun. Otherwise, it cools off very quickly in the evening so the windows are open to the night breezes.
We took a nice drive over the weekend. Down through the mountains. I got this castle photo in the town where we ate lunch, Capodacqua.
Yesterday was Liberation day, a big holiday here. 25 Aprile 1945, the end of WWII for the Italians. It’s complicated! In Umbertide is is even more complicated because the very same day but one year earlier in 1944, the Allies dropped 2 bombs on Umbertide while trying to destroy the Tiber river bridge. Seventy-eight citizens were killed and an entire block of houses destroyed and never rebuilt. So it is a bittersweet day here. Anyway, all over Italy one hears the Bella Ciao! song. Here is a still of of our marching band and all the citizens entering the Piazza. Photo borrowed from a video my neighbor Christie got.
Bella Ciao! By a local group – Nuova Brigata Pretolana. A rousing rendition!
It’s been a while…so to do some recap. We have been working on the Certificato d’abilita’ and I will report back once we have gotten it. I visited the Saturday mercado which was pretty sparse. The vendors who came had very limited produce because we are at the changing seasons. One vendor, who wasn’t there yesterday, had sweet radishes last week (I know, an oxymoron but it this case true ) and also local asparagus, so I was hoping for that. I was sorry he wasn’t there.. I settled for local potatoes, onions, lettuce and spring onions.
After my shopping we had a meet up with friends who live in Foligno. We hadn’t seen each other since pre-Covid…about four years. We met up at Ristorante UNE for lunch. I posted about this restaurant recently. It did not disappoint. Here are pictures of our lunch.
Gifts from the chefPancake stuffed with cheese and topped with grape jellyTrumpet mushroom with white truffles and sour creamLocal artisanal beans with smoked eel from Trasimeno lake – amazingLamb with cauliflower two waysDessert – pain perdu with gelato.
Today I made a soup. It is cold and very windy outside. It feels like soup weather. Soon, it won’t be soup weather anymore. The soup is made from a legume native to central Italy, so it is not something a person can make elsewhere. The legume is Cicercchie. I posted about it previously. It must be soaked and rinsed for 24 hours because it has neurotoxins. They are not dangerous if not eaten everyday. If you visit Italy keep an eye out for some.They are delicious. Here is the previous post.
My soup today is super easy. Cook a chopped onion until soft. Add water or stock and soaked and drained (several times) Cicercchie legumes plus 3 peeled and cut into chunks potatoes, salt and a sprig of rosemary. Cook 1+ hours until the soup is thickened. Adjust salt, add plenty of ground pepper. Serve with parsley, good olive oil and cheese if desired. So good, and healthy too.
In Italy, there is a word they use often, ”Lo stress”. Yes, it means exactly what it sounds like – The Stress. Today, we are dealing with lo stress of dealing with the Italian bureaucracy once again.
If you’ve been reading this journal for a while you know of what I speak. For those who don’t know — a short recap. When you move to Italy, after you get your Visa, the first thing you need to do is apply for your Permesso di Soggiorno (Permit to Stay – PdS). It should be done within eight days of your arrival. I won’t go into details of how you get one but suffice it to say it takes time, several appointments, and money. In Umbria, one must apply to renew it every year before it expires. The process can take a year and then you begin again. The light at the end of the tunnel is the possibility, after five years continual residence, of getting the Permesso di soggiorno UE per soggiornanti di lungo periodo (ex carta di soggiorno) – elective residence. This is a permanent long term permit to stay. Need I say this is a coveted thing?
We will have lived here eight years in June. We are past due for this card. Covid interfered with us pursuing this. We tried last year but two documents were expired. So this year, we try again. Today was our appointment at the Questura. We expected to find out if we would be getting the Card. I bet, no matter how thorough you try to be when you apply, they will find something that you missed. Today, we found out the two things that we are missing.
One item is a document from our Comune which attests to the fact that our house meets the standards for two people to live here. We had our Geometra do the assessment and we included this in the packet, apparently, they need this other form. We visited the Ufficio Technico where we found out what to bring to get this document. Fifteen minutes later we returned with said papers and the office was locked. We checked the hours. They were supposed to be open. Sigh. Happens all the time. We will try again tomorrow. Comically, I can look right into this office from my Living Room window!
The second item is a 2022 tax form certifying our income from 2021. We contacted our commercialista – she said the form does not exist until June. And that the 2021 form is in force. Sigh. I think we should just take the email we got and the form for last year back to the Questura. Luther says he will call them.
To be honest, I think this is not too bad. It looks like we will, eventually, have these two items. The only issue is when…and whether, in the meantime, those two time sensitive forms will expire — again. It is always something! ~~~~~~ Let’s talk about something more fun. I am a notoriously poor baker. But I threw caution to the wind and decided to make a quiche for dinner last night. First hurdle was making the crust. I tried a recipe I had and miracle of miracles, it came out perfect! Then I used another recipe for quiche I but substituted the vegetables, using some things I got at the market yesterday. I used leeks, mushrooms and broccoli rabe. It called for cheddar cheese but that’s very hard to come by around here. So I used the cheese most common here, pecorino fresca. I added an extra egg and a little more cream because the eggs here are not graded by size. No such thing as extra large eggs. These were fresh eggs from local chickens. Anyway, the quiche came out perfect and it tasted great. I served it with a green salad…a perfect dinner.
We have had visitors the past few days. They arrived in Malpensa in Milano and made their way to us on the train. They have a house in Basilicata, in the south. They will head off to Rome tomorrow and from there, onward to their wee house. Unfortunately the weather was pretty awful so we didn’t do too much. We did manage a nice lunch on Sunday at Calagrana.
Delizioso risotto!My friend
Finally today, Monday was a nicer day. Blue skies and warm if you’re in the sun. We had decided to visit a house that a friend of ours is buying on Monte Subasio between Assisi and Spello. The house has spectacular views. It has it’s own olive grove. It is springtime so everything is green and flowery.
Home to be…What a view!
We decided to stop into Santa Maria degli Angeli. It is the town just beneath Assisi, which sits on the mountain above it. It is an important catholic center. The basilica was constructed between 1569 and 1679, enclosing the 9th-century little church, the Porziuncola, the most sacred place for the Franciscans. It was here that the young Francis of Assisi understood his vocation and renounced the world in order to live in poverty among the poor, and thus started the Franciscan movement. St. Francis died in the Porziuncola in 1226.
This is the Porziuncola inside the enormous space that is the Basilica.The fresco inside the little church.
We walked around the little town a bit then we went to a small restaurant and had a nice lunch. A nice day with friends…at last ☀️
Here it is already Thursday. It’s been a very cold week. It would be nice if we could get some warmer weather. I didn’t write about our lunches out with friends last weekend. There were good things, and bad things but it was great to see friends.
Saturday we went to our nearby Restoro restaurant with friends who own a home here. The last time we were there was in the summer, when we had to fight off the aggressive chickens. This time we were treated to a show by the resident peacock. I prefer Mr. Peacock! I think he was showing off to his own reflection in the door. Gotta defend his territory from all intruders!
Photo credit – Bob Camastro
Our friend kindly brought Luther some cigars which he ordered and had sent to them. They also brought a roll of reed for my basketmaking. Thanks! Lunch was not terribly remarkable. But the company was great. My tagliatelle with bolognese ragu. Good.
On the way home, Bob was driving, they were pulled over for a routine traffic stop. Bob and Debbie are dual Italian/American citizens. This allowed them to buy and register a car. So when the cop sees the Libretto for the car is in his name but he doesn’t have an Italian drivers license, he upbraids him for driving illegally. He says, if you live here more than a year you must have your Italian Patente. We had even discussed this at lunch and I was unsure of how the law applied to them. Anyway, to keep the nice police person happy Luther drove back. Then Bob drove home.
For those who don’t know, if you are a resident of Italy, after one year you are required to get the Italian Patente. Since you cannot buy a car until you are resident, if you own a car this tells the police that you are a resident. There is no way around the rule to change your license to italian. If you are a US citizen there is no reciprocity. Some think they can just keep their International driving permit but that is merely a translation of your US permit so it is not legally a drivers license. The test is notoriously difficult and it is only given in Italian. Many people say it is the most difficult thing they had to do to live here. The page I created on this website explains the whole thing and gives links to the practice tests and to other peoples testimonials. Scroll down to the section on cars and driving.
But wait! There’s more! It turns out that our friends are a special case. They are dual citizens registered in A.I.R.E. (Anagrafe Italiani residenti all’estero). This allows them to buy a car without being residents. If you are not a dual citizen you cannot buy a car in Italy until you have become a resident. So they own a car, but are not residents. If you come here to LIVE full time, you will be a resident. If you are not a resident then you do not need to change your license to an Italian one. The police person didn’t know this. It is an unusual situation. So from now on, Bob and Debbie will carry the Decreto which says they can own the car but are not residents. They can show this to the cops if stopped again. Whew, what a relief! ~~~~~~ For our lunch on Sunday we met Steve. He and his wife bought an apartment in Spello and he is here to get things moving on the renovations they want done before they move here in June. He also was kind enough to bring us things we needed from the US. Cigars for Luther, what else? And vitamins for me. Not that I cant get them here but they are super expensive and sold just 30 pills at a time. I’m used to the mega bottles of hundreds of pills. Anyway, thanks to Steve, we are all set.
We decided to meet in Bevagna. Oddly, Spello, which in all other respects a nice town, has no decent lunch restaurants. Dinner, yes, but not lunch. So, Bevagna it was. The restaurant is Delizie del Borgo Bevagna. I loved this little place situated in a park just outside the walls. I also loved the people. They were all super friendly and nice service. But, sad to say, I didn’t like the food much. To start I chose the insalata di carciofi. Below is a picture. it was very thinly sliced raw artichokes, lightly dressed in oil and maybe vinegar. On a bed of lettuce with grated cheese. At first it was pretty good. Super hard workout for the jaws chewing. Crunchy. After maybe half of it, my mouth completely puckered up inside. It was not pleasant. I love artichokes any way, fried, boiled, raw, but I’ve never had so many raw at once. Cumulatively they are 😳 in the mouth!
The boys got the polpette but it was one, gigantic meatball. I think they liked it OK.
My primo was cappolletti in brodo. Cappolletti means little hats. A small stuffed pasta. It was good, if unremarkable. The best thing the lunch had going for it for me was that it was light. Luther got the steak. It looked not very appetizing, but it did taste good. I forgot what Steve got.
We loved the little cups they served the coffee in. Local ceramicist.
It matters not, we had fun and it was good conversation. I wish Steve all the luck with getting his house into shape. I look forward to visiting Roselyne and Steve once they get settled. ~~~~~ Now I want to mention how I feel about this horrible war in Europe. Other than the fact that the price of gasoline and diesel in Italy is the equivalent of $10.00 a gallon. That doesn’t matter to me. It is nothing to what the Ukrainians are suffering. My heart is with them. We are watching the news every night on CNN. Horrible. A number of people have asked if we are worried here in Italy. Some of the young Italiani we know are quite scared. I am not really worried per se but I grew up in the Cold War. So this is not as frightening for me. I’m just so sorry that this nuclear sabre rattling has recommenced. I thought the world had dodged this bullet. That said, should Putin decide to use his nuclear arsenal it will be the end of Europa, and the US, too. It is just as easy for him to hit the US as here. I pray somehow we can figure out a way out of this. Maybe the sanctions will prove too much for the Russian people and they will rise up. After all, Putin, who says he is saving the Ukrainians, is actually destroying them. He says they are Russians…so why is he killing his own people? Andrà tutto bene 🌈 Speriamo di si…😕
