Our Terraces part III

Sunday, as you may have gathered from my 2 last posts was pretty much a write-off, raining all day. Monday morning the rain held off long enough to plant out the last of the tomatoes (we’ve got 41 plants in total, not counting the ones that seem to have sown themselves out on our compost, which is now spread amongst the courgettes), weed amongst the peas and nipping some bamboo shoots in the bud (or should that be butt?).

Today rain was threatening all day, but never materialised at all. So we got a good days work in, in ideal condition: not too warm, not too cold, nice damp soil for sowing and transplanting; didn’t even need to water things in. Susan started off with sowing cayenne chillies into the poly-tunnel, which previously held the volleyball-size radishes (we thought we’d eat them before they reach basketball-size…). She went on to sow more radishes and a mixture of lettuces next to one of the pea beds. I, in the meantime, sowed out dwarf runner beans (can’t be bothered with building great support systems), together with some savoury. Those two don’t only go together on the plate, they also make excellent companion plants, so much so that the Germans call it Bohnenkraut, bean… well you all know what a ‘kraut’ is.

After that I got on with transplanting some peppers out and some gherkins. I am absolutely addicted to pickled gherkins and I don’t know why I have never tried growing any (they don’t come pickled on the plant obviously, you have to do that bit yourself). Susan meanwhile got on with some vigorous digging on the terrace below (terrace 16, for those who follow the series; bet you can’t wait for that episode). Oh and of course I sowed out some basil on the rows between the tomatoes. Another good companion plant combination as well as working well together in culinary terms. Funny the way that happens, if it tastes good together it will be mutually beneficial if grown close together.

Oh and I almost forgot, I also secured the end of the potato terrace, which had experienced a bit of a landslide after some of the torrential winter rains we’ve been having. I now have an exceptionally deeply dug level bed between the last olive tree and a fledgling fig tree. I intended to sow some artichokes out on there. I only just read though, that the seeds should be soaked in water for a couple of days before planting, so it’ll be done day after tomorrow now.

And now for part III of the series ‘OUR TERRACES’!

Terrace 5 is what you could call our living room. At the very near end is a mature apple tree. On the slope on the right we planted a little herb garden with rosemary, sage, thyme, oregano, marjoram and chives. The table is made from a solid marble slab, which we found pretty much where it is now. The barbecue has seen action this year already, when (for complex reasons I don’t want to go into at the moment) our freezer was temporarily out of service, and we had to use up all the meat stored therein quickly.

The structure, well disguised under a giant, man-eating ivy, is what currently goes as our shed. It does not cease to amaze me that it’s still standing and holding off some rain. However, it is doomed for destruction. We are busy scouring all rubbish tips for scrap material for a new and larger one. We’ve designated the area behind the current shed, so we can start building before tearing the old one down and then not knowing where to store all the tools in the meantime. It’s new location will be between a plum and a pear tree.

Terrace 6 is where our water barrel lives (which, if it isn’t raining, gets filled up from the tap on the terrace above, I failed to mention). It is also home to a very large and rather useless olive tree. It is so tall, that you would need a 30 foot ladder to pick its olives. I haven’t dared chop it down yet either and turn it to firewood, because olive wood is bl***y heavy, and a ton of olive tree falling you’re not sure in which direction is no joking matter. In the back there is a sickly peach tree and a sickly pear tree and a bed with currently, hmm can’t quite remember, weeds? No some lettuces I think and some Swiss chard, plus some cabbages, which aren’t showing anything yet.

PART IV OF ‘OUR TERRACES’ SOON TO BE SEEN ON A COMPUTER SCREEN NEAR YOU!

'Critical Wine' Tasting

I meant to give you all an update over Easter and wish you all happy holidays, but Telecom Italia spoiled those plans. Yet again we were the entire Easter weekend without a phone line! This time there was a thunder storm just in the vague vicinity and bang Saturday morning the line was down. Of course they don’t work over the weekend, so it wasn’t fixed until Tuesday some time. I’ve had about enough of this company: they can’t do us a broadband connection for our computer and every 6 to 8 weeks at least the line is down for 3 or 4 days. What am I paying service charges for? If anyone knows of an alternative telephone service provider in Italy they can recommend, please let me know.

To all those who have asked about the Abruzzo earthquake, thankfully we were far enough away to not have been affected by it or even have noticed it. We don’t know anyone in the L’Aquila area either, but it does make you think, an event like this. You feel all snug and safe in your century old, solid stone building and there even historic churches fall over like card houses. To those of you who can afford it, do give to the various appeal funds to help the victims who are now staying in tents. We heard reports on the BBC channel that Silvio Berlusconi told those victims that they should see the fun side of it all and treat it as a “camping weekend”. Significantly this wasn’t reported by the Italian media and our neighbours were disgusted when we told them, quite rightly so!

Right, now that I have got rid of my two annoyances of the week, ‘what did we get up to over’ Easter, I hear you ask. The weather has been good despite forecasts to the contrary. Only today the Scirocco is blowing rain in our direction again. We planted out some more tomatoes and we’ve been harvesting our first broad beans, lettuces and radishes (the size of golf balls!). Just in time, before we start suffering from malnutrition.

Good Friday I made my traditional Swabian ‘Maultaschen’, a kind of German Ravioli stuffed with spinach (or Swiss chard in our case, can’t grow spinach to save my life in this climate) and minced meat served in a broth. The Swabians being a very religious, but also very cunning people, try their hardest to stick to lent and not eating meat during the run up to Easter. However by the Thursday before Easter (they call it Green Thursday for some reason) they get quite desperate. So they disguise the meat with the green of spinach and stuff it inside the pasta, in the hope that the Lord above doesn’t see them cheating.

On Saturday I still had so many Maultaschen left, that I took them across to our next door neighbours, Marco and Susannah, and we had them together with them, followed by a secondo of lamb chops. It was a lovely evening and with our and their food combined we had the best meal in a while.

Easter Sunday we went to a wine tasting in Montaretto near Bonassola. The title of the even was ‘Critical Wine – Terra e Libertà’. I wasn’t sue exactly what to expect, but with that title it was bound to have something to do with wine. We took a morning train to Bonassola, a pretty little Ligurian seaside resort on the other side of the Cinque Terre.

From there we could either take the shuttle bus, which winds itself 10km around bendy mountain roads to the village of Montaretto, or we could take the shortcut up a steep 3km footpath. It was a nice day so we opted for the latter. The views became more and more spectacular as we fast ascended above the sea. We heard Montaretto before we could see it. The whole village, a place about the size of our small village, was in party mood. On the outskirts an ad hoc campsite had sprung up on what normally served as the football pitch. A remarkable number of long-haired, flower-power hippy types seemed to be around for this 3-day festival. I was glad I hadn’t donned my business attire for the occasion, I would have looked a right fool.

Despite all that it was actually a serious wine event showcasing mostly organic wine producers and leftish-leaning co-operatives (sometimes combined). Most producers came from Liguria, Piemonte and Tuscany, but other regions were also represented. It was interesting to taste these wines. I must say though that many a small producer uses the tag organic as an excuse for dirty winemaking techniques. Quite a few had a tendency to be oxidised and just lacked definition. Others have produced good wines though, so I shall use some in upcoming tastings. As one of the suggested tastings I am offering is organic and biodynamic wines, as I do get asked a lot about the subject.

To name a couple of the highlights of wines you can also look up on the internet, there were Chianti Montalbano from Fattoria Castellina on www.fattoriacastellina.com, Candia dei Colli Apuani (Just down the road from us) Vermentino (tastes of Banana!) on www.viniapuani.it, Barbera Colli Tortonesi (Piemonte) from the Co-op Valli Unite www.valliunite.com (especcially their Vighét 2005, made from old vines) and a lovely Verdicchio di Castelli Jesi from La Marca di San Michele, www.lamarcadisanmichele.com. In addition to wines, there were offerings of beers, preserves, Sicilian bread, honey, organic beef, donkey salami, sheeps cheeses, etc.

Despite the fact that Susan in the end was a little unsteady on her legs we walked back down along a different, but no less scenic route again.


Maybe next year we’ll return to this event and join the tent colony, so we won’t have to wobble down the steep mountain after drinking large quantities…

Almond tree etc.

Well, you’ve got to feel for them. Our friends James and Alison from Northampton come over for just a few days and the weather, as always, is at it’s worst. They arrived on Saturday morning and landed in Pisa in the middle of a thunder storm and they left again today, finally seeing a bit of sun, but in between… , Saturday it rained all day, Sunday and Monday most of the day with another spectacular thunder and hail storm last night. We had them and our neighbours around for dinner on Sunday. I made a curry for a change: chicken in curry and yoghurt marinade, Saag Aloo (replacing spinach with Swiss chard), a spicy dhal, basmati rice and chapattis.

And this morning we woke to clear blue skies and fantastic views over the Versilia. By mid-morning we were on our patch at Arcola and doing basking shark impressions (i.e. we were basking in the sun… Why do they call them basking sharks?). We planted the almond tree, which got a good watering. You can see Susan standing proudly behind it above. And we cleared another terrace and a half of vines and weeds; 11 ½ done, 4 ½ to go. We got back early, because Susan had not done her homework yet for tomorrow’s class. I busied myself sowing a few more things indoors: white and red cabbages, parsnips and corn lettuces. The weather is to remain fine for a few days, so hopefully we are going to get plenty of work done.