Mark and Jan decided to host 38 friends at two villas in Tuscany and asked us to come a few days early to help set up. We tacked a few extra days on so we could spend some time in Florence beforehand and then headed an hour and a half away to the very beautiful walled city of Sansepolcro. According to Sansepolcro-info.com:

“According to tradition, Sansepolcro was founded in the 10 C by two pilgrims, Arcanus and Aegidius, who, returning after a long stay in Holy Land, brought with them a fragment of the Holy Sepulchre. They constructed an Oratory, which, because of the holy relic, became an important spiritual site. The first historical records date from slightly later and refer to the construction of a Benedictine Abbey. The historical centre Sansepolcro reached its current size around 1400, and in 1500 Giuliano da Sangallo ordered the construction of its walls.”

 So. Let’s say it’s old.

The area is rich with farmland, and with that a new form of travel – agriturismo. Mark chose a property called La Conca, 4 villas and farm buildings high on the hillside, basically straight up the hillside, along with a shop selling local goods. This is all on 741 acres, fenced in with security. The two villas he rented were ten minutes apart on foot through woodlands with hiking and biking trails, beautiful views and the occasional wild boar. Each had a swimming pool and ours had a commercial kitchen. Thank you Jesus. The fireplace in our main building was built in the 1500’s. Thankfully everything was historically rebuilt yet upgraded with modern appliances, and while rustic it was still very well appointed and comfortable. And there was a cuckoo outside our window. I never saw him but I heard him. Everyday. The cheeky bird wouldn’t let me see him… but click on the audio file to hear him:

I can’t say enough about the owners of this property. They manage the villas and run a farm and logging operation, and are the loveliest and most responsive hosts one could ask for. Chiara, our contact, delivered everything we requested quickly and happily; she was a joy to work with. From wine deliveries to restaurant reservations to tablecloths to all the questions Mark and I peppered her with before we left the states and all the questions I peppered her with after we arrived she was nothing but graceful and accommodating. She is a gem.

Our three days prior to guests arriving were full. Grocery shopping, food prep, room prep, event prep and keeping ourselves fed took up most all of our time. One load of laundry took most of a day. The machines are efficient, but small and take forever. Line drying follows. Make that 2 days.

Food shopping was a hoot. Most Italians shop pretty much daily for what they’ll cook that night, we were loading up to feed 40 people breakfasts and a couple of dinners over a week. Three overfilled carriages made the locals laugh and the cashiers cringe. And it all took so much longer as even though I had translated my grocery list into Italian and metric it seemed when I chose grams they chose kilos or liters or something. And they sell confectioners sugar in 125-gram packages, which is just over 4 ounces. Do you know how many I needed to buy to frost a wedding cake? I think we wiped them out of eggs, several wheels of cheese, a gorgeous half a taleggio, a scamorza, yogurt, Philadelphia cream cheese, mushrooms AND confectioners sugar. And Mark bought a hunk of a prosciutto leg and got really good with the knife. One thing I will say for the grocer there, good flowers. I lucked out on flowers. They had peonies in tight balls that I knew would be open in time for the events, white roses and ranunculus. When delivering the van Hertz had given Mark and Jan a beautiful arrangement with huge magenta roses, baby white roses, greens and fillers that I took apart and mixed with the others to create 6 arrangements for the tables. And along with the 9 electric candles I brought from home we’d make a beautiful table for their vow renewal.

To be clear, I wasn’t cooking all the meals. We were preparing a welcome meal for the Saturday arrivals; soup, bread and charcuterie with Vin Santo and cantucci for dessert; lasagnas for another night, and I was making Mark and Jan’s wedding cake for their vow renewal as well as Mark’s 60th birthday cake. I even brought flour and oil from home to make sure I had the right stuff. Mark and Jan had smartly hired a private chef and local restaurant owner Giulio Calisti of Ristoro Calisti to do a pizza night (the building has a built in pizza oven!), their vow renewal dinner and Mark’s birthday party. And there is a nearby bakery that provided us with fresh croissants, bread and pastry most every day. And the cherry jam we picked up was luscious. We did take breaks to swim and relax, though Steve has dishpan hands after being my daytime cleanup crew, and Patrick grabbed the nightshift.

We also had the great pleasure of having Ciro Amato, the Italian speaking owner of Goldie’s Restaurant in Naples, Florida on the trip who cooked breakfast singing Italian songs from his Spotify account played through Mark’s portable speaker system. Our villa was a few steps away from the kitchen, and the first morning he cooked I got chills as I walked up the hill, smelled the food and heard the music. Magic!

Here are some photos of the Villas, the prep, the welcome party and the pizza party. I want to thank the photographer Andrea Settanni for his wonderful professional photos in all of my posts, as well as others who contributed, including Jerri and Mike Campbell, Key Powell and his creepy drone, and, of course, Mark. Enjoy!

 

Deborah