Download or read book A Thousand Days in Tuscany written by Marlena de Blasi and published by Ballantine Books. This book was released on 2005-09-27 with total page 370 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: They had met and married on perilously short acquaintance, she an American chef and food writer, he a Venetian banker. Now they were taking another audacious leap, unstitching their ties with exquisite Venice to live in a roughly renovated stable in Tuscany. Once again, it was love at first sight. Love for the timeless countryside and the ancient village of San Casciano dei Bagni, for the local vintage and the magnificent cooking, for the Tuscan sky and the friendly church bells. Love especially for old Barlozzo, the village mago, who escorts the newcomers to Tuscany’s seasonal festivals; gives them roasted country bread drizzled with just-pressed olive oil; invites them to gather chestnuts, harvest grapes, hunt truffles; and teaches them to caress the simple pleasures of each precious day. It’s Barlozzo who guides them across the minefields of village history and into the warm and fiercely beating heart of love itself. A Thousand Days in Tuscany is set in one of the most beautiful places on earth–and tucked into its fragrant corners are luscious recipes (including one for the only true bruschetta) directly from the author’s private collection.
Download or read book A Thousand Days in Venice written by Marlena De Blasi and published by Algonquin Books. This book was released on 2013-01-01 with total page 257 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: De Blasi, a chef and food writer from St. Louis, begins a whirlwind romance with a man in Venice.
Download or read book The Lady in the Palazzo written by Marlena De Blasi and published by Algonquin Books. This book was released on 2008-01-01 with total page 338 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: A transplanted American chef and food writer continues the story of her life in Italy, describing her and her husband's move to Orvieto as they search for and find the perfect home, which turns out to be the former ballroom of a fifteenth-century palazzo.
Download or read book That Summer in Sicily written by Marlena de Blasi and published by Ballantine Books. This book was released on 2008-08-05 with total page 320 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: NEW YORK TIMES BESTSELLER “At villa Donnafugata, long ago is never very far away,” writes bestselling author Marlena de Blasi of the magnificent if somewhat ruined castle in the mountains of Sicily that she finds, accidentally, one summer while traveling with her husband, Fernando. There de Blasi is befriended by Tosca, the patroness of the villa, an elegant and beautiful woman-of-a-certain-age who recounts her lifelong love story with the last prince of Sicily descended from the French nobles of Anjou. Sicily is a land of contrasts: grandeur and poverty, beauty and sufferance, illusion and candor. In a luminous and tantalizing voice, That Summer in Sicily re-creates Tosca’s life, from her impoverished childhood to her fairy-tale adoption and initiation into the glittering life of the prince’s palace, to the dawning and recognition of mutual love. But when Prince Leo attempts to better the lives of his peasants, his defiance of the local Mafia’s grim will to maintain the historical imbalance between the haves and the have-nots costs him dearly. The present-day narrative finds Tosca sharing her considerable inherited wealth with a harmonious society composed of many of the women–now widowed–who once worked the prince’s land alongside their husbands. How the Sicilian widows go about their tasks, care for one another, and celebrate the rituals of a humble, well-lived life is the heart of this book. Showcasing the same writerly gifts that made bestsellers of A Thousand Days in Venice and A Thousand Days in Tuscany, That Summer in Sicily, and de Blasi’ s marvelous storytelling, remind us that in order to live a rich life, one must embrace both life’s sorrow and its beauty. Here is an epic drama that takes readers from Sicily’s remote mountains to chaotic post-war Palermo, from the intricacies of forbidden love to the havoc wreaked by Sicily’s eternally bewildering culture.
Download or read book Antonia and Her Daughters written by Marlena de Blasi and published by Allen & Unwin. This book was released on 2012-05-01 with total page 338 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: The next volume of memoir from the author of the international bestseller A Thousand Days in Venice introduces the extraordinary Antonia, imperious matriach of four generations of strong-willed Tuscan women The renovations to 34 via del Duomo now complete, Marlena de Blasi, the bestselling international author and "the woman with the fairy-tale life" needs to find time and space to finish a book. Lured by the offer of a simple stone cottage in the remote, mountainous region of western Tuscany, distant from the distractions of her everyday life with Fernando in Orvieto, she sets off for some much-needed solitude. But her plans to live simply, in peace and quiet, are overturned when she meets the imperious, tempestuous Antonia, the still-stunning, elderly matriarch of a large, complicated family of four generations of beautiful blue-eyed Italian women, all with stories and ideas of their own. Antonia dislikes tourists and outsiders, and so Marlena at first spars and clashes with her before they reach an understanding. Over feasts and family dinners, walking in the dark before sunrise to harvest wild lettuces, preparing meals and exchanging recipes, the two women joust, joke, exchange confidences, and grow closer and closer until finally Antonia reveals the terrible secrets behind the vivid beauty of Il Castelleto. Evocative, powerful, and haunting, this is a compelling insight into Italy's recent past and a revealing glimpse into one extraordinary woman's story and her kitchen.
Download or read book Vanilla Beans and Brodo written by Isabella Dusi and published by Simon and Schuster. This book was released on 2002 with total page 484 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: When Isobel Dusi visited Italy with her Australian husband Lou, little did they imagine that life would change forever. But, utterly besotted with the fragrant warmth and good-natured conviviality of Southern Tuscany, they decided to sell up their lives in the big city and move thousands of miles to follow the dream of a life more in keeping with ancient rhythms and time-honoured traditions of the Mediterranean. After months of searching they settled upon Montalcino, an intriguing hilltop medieval village with a reputation for some of the finest wine in Italy. VANILLA BEANS AND BRODO is an account of Isobel's hard-won acceptance into this tempestuous, warm-hearted and proudly independent community, whose voluble passions for home grown wine and Tuscan cuisine, for football and ancient traditions and festivals, puts paid to the myth that life in rural Tuscany is tranquil. Isobel and Lou are gradually transformed into Isabella and Luigi in this charming account of Tuscan village life that really gets to the beating heart of an Italian community - its joys, pleasures, anxieties, but above all, its absorbing eccentricities.
Download or read book A Taste of Southern Italy written by Marlena De Blasi and published by Random House Digital, Inc.. This book was released on 2006 with total page 0 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: In this sequel to Regional Foods of Northern Italy, Marlena de Balsi continues her exploration into the foods of the different regions of Italy. For the many readers who love Marlena's books, here are stories of Italy told in the same moving voice, alongside delicious recipes from the region. Not just a cookbook, but a poignant look into Italian life.
Download or read book Not in a Tuscan Villa written by John Petralia and published by Chartiers Creek Press. This book was released on 2013-08 with total page 290 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Newly retired and looking for more than a vacation, John and Nancy Petralia intrepidly pack a few suitcases and head to the "perfect" Italian city for a year. Within days their dream becomes a nightmare. After residing in two Italian cities, negotiating the roads and health care, discovering art, friends, food and customs, the Petralias learn more than they anticipate -- about Italy, themselves, what it means to be American, and what's important in life.
Download or read book In Tuscany written by Frances Mayes and published by Crown. This book was released on 2021-12-07 with total page 272 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: A lavishly illustrated ode to the joys of Tuscany’s people, food, landscapes, and art, from the bestselling author of Under the Tuscan Sun and See You in the Piazza “A love letter to Italy written in precise and passionate language of near-poetic density.”—Newsday In Tuscany celebrates the abundant pleasures of life in Italy as it is lived at home, at festivals, feasts, restaurants and markets, in the kitchen and on the piazza, in the vineyards, fields, and olive groves. Combining essays by Frances Mayes and a chapter by her husband, poet Edward Mayes, with more than 200 full-color photos by photographer Bob Krist, each of this book's five sections highlights a signature aspect of Tuscan life: La Piazza: the locus of Italian village life. With photographs of the shop signs, the outdoor markets, medieval streets, people, their pets and their cars, and snippets of conversations overheard, Mayes reveals the life of the Piazza in her town of Cortona as well as out-of-the-way places such as Volterra, Asciano, Monte San Savino, and Castelmuzio. La Festa: the celebration. Essays and photos of feasts and celebrations, such as the Christmas dinner for twenty-seven at a neighbor's house and a donkey race around the church at Montepulciano Stazione, illustrate how the Tuscans celebrate the seasons--their open ways of friendship, their connection to nature, and most of all, their sense of abundance. Il Campo: the field. Here Edward Mayes evokes the deep sense of the shift of seasons as he picks olives before he and Frances head off to the olive oil mill and enjoy the first bruscette with new oil. La Cucina: the kitchen. An intimate view of the all-important role of the kitchen in Tuscan culture, including photographs of her own kitchen and gardens, menus from great local cooks, the elements of the Tuscan table, dishes with cultural and culinary notes on each, and, of course, delectable recipes. La Bellezza: the beauty. From the quality of the light falling on sublime landscapes in different seasons and Tuscan faces in moments of laughter to a silhouette of cypress trees in the early evening and a wild bird perched on a neigbor's head, In Tuscany features views of beauty that reveal the singular splendor of one of the world's best-loved and most artistic regions.
Download or read book The Reluctant Tuscan written by Phil Doran and published by Random House. This book was released on 2012-09-30 with total page 288 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Rising From The Mist in the sun-blushed hills of Tuscany is Il Piccolo Rustico, a 300-year-old stone farmhouse that Nancy Doran dreams of lovingly restoring into an idlyllic home. All her husband Phil can see is a crumbling money pit that, as far as dreams go, is more of a nightmare. Reluctantly leaving behind high -octane, air-conditioned Los Angeles where he lives and works as a writer-producer, Phil is uprooted to a strange country intoxicated by O sole mio, virgin olive oil and oak-aged Chianti. The local village reveals itself to be a hive of seething passions, secrets and age-old blood feuds, and the newcomers find that life is not all strolls around town during the passagiato and relaxing under the awnings of picturesque cafes. Beset by a rift of exasperating challenges - from the cunning tricks of the Pinatore family to an infuriating Byzantine Italian bureaucracy - it is only with an inspired touch of the 'Inner Italian' that Phil and Nancy finally manage to soften the hearts of their neighbours and are embraced by the community.
Download or read book Bringing Tuscany Home written by Frances Mayes and published by . This book was released on 2005 with total page 226 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: In her inimitable warm and evocative tone, Frances Mayes helps readers develop an eye for authentic Tuscan style, with advice on how to: Choose a Tuscan colour palette for the home, from earthy apricot tones to invigorating shades of antique blue; Cultivate a Tuscan garden, adding fountains, vine-covered pergolas, and terracotta urns among the herbs and flowers.. Make prime finds at their local antique markets - and to truly bring Tuscany home, shipping advice and market days for several Tuscan towns are included. Set an imaginative Tuscan table using majolica and vintage linens; Enjoy the abundant flavours and easy simplicity of the Tuscan kitchen, with details on everything from olive oil and vin santo to pici and gnocchi, plus special, homegrown menus and recipes.
Download or read book Sicily It s Not Quite Tuscany written by Shamus Sillar and published by Allen & Unwin. This book was released on 2012 with total page 422 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Packed with history, culture, misadventure, and a little Mafioso action, the story of a newly married couple and the year they spent in Sicily Gill and I had dreamt of living in Italy for as long as we'd been together. This is the story of an Aussie couple who sought a Mediterranean Sea change only to find themselves in the sprawling Sicilian city of Catania—the "anti-Tuscany" of Italy. There, any romantic visions they'd had of restoring a villa or stamping their entwined feet in vats of Chianti grapes disappeared faster than the chief witness in a Cosa Nostra trial. Shamus and Gill's tiny apartment in Catania was located in a grim neighborhood opposite a triple-X cinema and a shop selling coffins, nearby Mount Etna erupted soon after their arrival, a mystery ailment left Shamus in a neck brace, they crashed a Vespa, and they had regular dealings with at least one Mafioso. This, then, is an Italian sea change with grit. But it's also a story of optimism, endurance, and acceptance; an exploration of the minutiae of Sicilian culture, history, food, and religion; and an example of how to find beauty—and humor—in the most unexpected of places.
Download or read book Regional Foods of Northern Italy written by Marlena De Blasi and published by Three Rivers Press. This book was released on 2003-06-15 with total page 0 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: This is a cookbook like no other. It evokes the essence of Northern Italy's traditional foods in a beautifully wrought amalgam of recipe and narrative. It beckons you across the wet stone of Venice's Rialto bridge into a candlelit fifteenth-century cantina. It invites you down a forest road in Umbria, where grappa-fortified fishermen toss trout onto a wood fire and stage a sunset feast. It proffers nearly two hundred recipes from the heart and soul of Italy's North, including: - Risotto allo Zafferano Milanese - Arista! Arista! - - Pasta delle Sfogliatrici - Pesce in Saor - - La Salsiccia alla Moda di Lucrezia Borgia - Fegato alla Veneziana - - Carbonada d'Enfer Arvier - Pesto di Mandorle e Noci Ferraresi - - Pollo alla Marengo - Cialzons della Famiglia de Galateo - - Pagnotta di Patate - Pasta e Fagioli - - Sogliole in Gratella - Caffe alla Valdostana - Tiramisu - This remarkable world within a book reflects the honest, authentic tastes of a people for whom food is a cardinal passion. With it in hand, you will perfume your home with the ancient and divine scents of glorious food, calling forth the ineffable essence of this land and its bounty. Let the adventure begin. About the Author Marlena de Blasi is an American living in Venice with her husband, Fernando. She has traveled extensively in her adopted country, stopping to savor each region's abundance. A food and wine journalist and culinary historian, her articles on food and travel have appeared in "The International Herald Tribune, The St. Louis Riverfront Times, and "Sacramento magazine. She is presently writing this volume's sequel, "Regional Foods of Southern Italy. "From the Hardcoveredition.
Download or read book Simply Tuscan written by Pino Luongo and published by Broadway. This book was released on 2000 with total page 0 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Renowned restaurateur, bon vivant, and armchair philosopher Pino Luongo presents a year of Tuscan menus, with recipes for living the good life. Pino Luongo is Tuscan to his toes--by birth, in sensibility, philosophically, and in the way he lives his life. To be Tuscan, Pino says, "is to honor all your senses." And he believes that everyone would benefit from having a little bit of Tuscany in his or her life, which is why he has written Simply Tuscan. Welcome in the spring with a menu of quintessentially seasonal recipes, such as Artichoke, Romaine, and Pea Soup, followed by Roasted Veal with Lemon and Sage, and sweetened with Panna Cotta with Strawberries and Balsamic Vinegar. Or welcome your in-laws with a meal they'll never forget: Zucchini Soup with Mint, Ricotta Ravioli with Osso Buco Gremolata, and Upside-Down Warm Apple Tart. Follow Pino to the seashore in summer, where, as he says, "the beach makes us wild with energy," to partake of a Summer Night Seafood Extravaganza--Crispy Fried Shrimp with Summer Vegetables in Sweet and Sour Vinaigrette, Trout Roasted Porchetta-Style, and Lobster and Cannellini Beans in Guazzetto. Celebrate Thanksgiving Tuscan-style and, Pino promises, it will give you something else to be thankful for. Start the meal with Farro, Swiss Chard, and Butternut Squash Soup. Follow it up with Goose with Vineyard Stuffing instead of the usual turkey. Try Mashed Potatoes with Leeks in place of the candied sweets, and finish with Spiced Poached Pears with Vin Santo Sabayon. Winter means comfort food all over the world, and in Tuscany this might mean Oven-Baked Leg of Pork Glazed with Chestnut Honey, a Carrot and Apple Puree, and Caramelized BabaScented with Orange. All of these recipes and many more, accompanied by Pino's wise and witty commentary on the occasions for which they were devised, are intended, in his words, to "convert you to Tuscanism...once you get a taste for it, there's no turning back." And this beautifully designed, lavishly illustrated, deliciously tempting book of recipes is certain to do just that. Some of the recipes, such as Cacciucco, a fish and shellfish stew, or the Easter Torta with Cheese, are totally, typically, traditionally Tuscan; others, like Crabmeat Ravioli in Ginger-Scented Vegetable Broth and the Bay Scallop and Asparagus Risotto are modern interpretations, which, nevertheless, remain truly Tuscan in spirit. SIMPLY TUSCAN is intended, in Pino's words, to "convert you to Tuscanism--once you get a taste for it, there's no turning back." And this beautifully designed, lavishly illustrated, deliciously tempting book of recipes is certain to do just that. -->
Download or read book The Umbrian Supper Club written by Marlena de Blasi and published by Allen & Unwin. This book was released on 2015-04-01 with total page 370 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: 'The only sauce is olive oil - green as sun-struck jade - splashed in small lustrous puddles, through which one skates the flesh, the fat, the bones, the potatoes, the bread. In the last, best drops, one skates a finger.' Luscious and evocative, The Umbrian Supper Club recounts the stories of a small group of Umbrian women who - sometimes with their men and, as often, without them - gather in an old stone house in the hills above Orvieto to cook, to sit down to a beautiful supper, to drink their beloved local wines. And to talk. During the gathering, the preparation, the cooking and the eating, they recount the memories and experiences of their gastronomic lives and, as much, of their more personal histories. For a period of four years, it was Marlena de Blasi's task, her pleasure, to cook for the Supper Club - to choose the elements for supper, to plan the menu and, with the help of one or another of the women in the club, to prepare the meal. What she learnt, what they cooked and ate and drank and how they talked is the fundamental stuff of this book. Including a dozen recipes, drawn from the Supper Club, The Umbrian Supper Club is a delight to read and to taste.
Download or read book A Tuscan Night written by Kostas Krommydas and published by Independently Published. This book was released on 2019-11-13 with total page 0 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Some trips start with a suitcase in hand. Other, after a fight. And some when a new job forces you to drop everything and leave. Some journeys have been engraved in our souls. Because they hurt us. Because they made us hurt our loved ones. And some trips are governed by a crazy love. They make us forget what it's like to live and cause the pain of unrequited love. But the thing you may only realize when it's too late is that the best journeys are the ones you never made. The ones you never dared, the ones you never tasted... My journey started on the day I was told that I only had a few months left to live... and it was the most beautiful I have ever made.
Download or read book A Thousand Days in Tuscany written by Marlena De Blasi and published by . This book was released on 2005-07 with total page pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt:
