Local people

Collepino Goodness

Only about ten people live in Collepino today, “including le badanti (the caregivers),” Daniele told me as he served up our cafe’ and limoncello. Once a feudal fortress, the tiny walled village of Collepino on the slopes of Mt. Subasio was a thriving agricultural community about forty years ago. Today, only a few elderly… View Article

Our Assisi Apartment Connects to “the Locals”…and not only

Kevin (from Massachusetts) just left for home after nearly a month in our Assisi rental apartment Il Nido Tranquillo (“the tranquil nest”) and his Assisi “last supper” was with us at our Assisi farmhouse -and a visit afterward to farm friends: not his only dinner in our home, not his only visit to our farm… View Article

The Sign of an Umbrian November? Chestnuts!

“Nel tempo delle castagne il porco ride e la pecora piange” (“At chestnut time, the pig laughs and the sheep weeps”), says an Italian proverb. Yes, the pigs relish the earthy goodness of chestnuts, but the flavor is not enticing to a sheep. For me, the rich taste of roasted chestnuts is a sign of autumn about to slip away, winter creeping in. When the weather chills in Umbria, the rural people gather around their woodstoves at night.

Assisi Ceramic Wonders of Enrico Marrani

As you head up from the Basilica di San Francesco in Via San Francesco, you’ll probably still have visions in your head of the fresco masterpieces in the Basilica, arguably declared the world’s greatest 13th/14th-century fresco cycle. But keep your eyes open for the botteghe(“workshops”) of the many modern-day Assisi artists. In Via San Franceco,… View Article

Creating a Nest: il Nido Tranquillo

The idea to look for an Assisi apartment to rent came to me last fall. I did not look long. I knew that I wanted something small and in the quiet backstreets of the centro storico of Assisi. The apartment was furnished but not in a way that appealed to me.

Holding All the Cards…

Briscola, scopa, tresette, centocinquantuno: the names of Italian card games are as intriguing as the motifs on the cards. Every small town – and not only the small ones – has a cafe’ where i giocatori gather after lunch and after dinner, at outdoor tables in good weather and inside in front of the ubiquitous… View Article

The Assisi Printer

Over eighty years old, Gastone Vignati is a retired printer now doing what he loves: lineoleum-block prints of “the city I so love, my Assisi”. As a young boy, Vignati worked alongside his father in the family print shop as his father had once done with his father. Pino and I came to the Assisi… View Article

Pan Caciato

You know fall is in the air, when the Pasticerria Sensi on Corso Mazzini in Assisi has pan caciato in the window. “Cacio” means “cheese” in Umbrian dialect (“formaggio” is the word in Italian) and this tasty fall bread is made with pecorino (sheep’s milk cheese”) and walnuts.

Gina, an Assisi Treasure

As you walk Assisi, especially, “Assisi di Sopra” (or “upper Assisi”, ie, the area round the Cathedral of San Rufino), you might be lucky enough to run into Gina, perhaps just back from a foraging trip in the mountainside fields just outside of the town.

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Local people

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