“Vino bruciato”

Archive for the ‘Tuscany’ Category

“Vino bruciato”

Still a lot of sunshine in Cortona, but it’s finally getting colder..
So let’s warm up with some delicious mulled wine,
here’s a simple recipe:

INGREDIENTS:

1 untreated Orange
1 untreated Lemon
2 cinnamon sticks
8 cloves
½ nutmeg
1 litre of full-bodied red wine (some good Chianti if you can!)
200 gr caster sugar

Grate the nutmeg and thinly cut wide sections of the orange and the lemon’s peel, being careful not to get the white part as well.
Put the sugar, the peel and all the spices in a large steel saucepan and pour the red wine.
Set the pan over a medium heat and slowly bring to the boil.

Let it boil for about 5 minutes until the sugar has dissolved ;
now (carefully!) set fire to the top of the syrup so that the alcohol contained in the wine burns out, let it burn until it extinguishes on its own.

Filter the wine with a very fine knit colander and serve warm.

Tasty vin brulè to everyone!

Chestnuts, wine and olive oil.

It’s Saint Martin’s day today,
and one of the most great Italian poets from the 19th century, Giosuè Carducci,
wrote a poem dedicated to this day, called “San Martino” which begins:

La nebbia agli irti colli piovigginando sale…

“Drizzling, the fog the steep hills climbs…”

Fog?????
Not this year, for sure, in Cortona!
We are enjoying a very unusual weather for this time of year: warm and sunny.
It’s like September but with yellow leafs on trees!

I know it’s not good, but I’m secretly glad the bad weather’s been put off for a while..

Castagne alla brace.

Also, without fog, you can fully enjoy the beautiful autumn colours of our hills, and nobody says you can’t bake those amazing chestnuts you find in the woods and eat them along with some delicious mulled wine…

Plus, with the good weather our people have already been able to pick their olives and make the long-awaited,
new,
incredibly green,
prickly
olive oil.

Bruschetta all'olio nuovo.

I’M HUNGRY.

For cat lovers.

Cortona is crowded with cats!

I’ve seen
cats on rooftops,
cats on top of cars ,
cats underneath cars (sleeping),
cats in shops,
cats in churches,
cats in my garden,
cats in the park,
cats on window ledges,
cats at the kindergarten,
cats in restaurants,
cats in bathrooms,
cats on kitchen tops,
cats on office desks
and
I think I saw a cat wandering around in the local museum,
I’m also pretty sure I saw the ghost of Emily, my ex cat.
I once caught a cat giving me the evil eye,

but the best ever
was the faithful one:

Jesus, Mary and the cat..

Tourists and Locals.

Lately I keep noticing the difference between tourists and locals:
the first walk with their heads up, the second heads down.

But we should always look up!
There’s always something new to discover, even if we’ve been in that place a thousand times.

Curiosity is life.

Cortona...up above.

The art of shaping.

Antonio Massarutto is an artist from Northern Italy.
An all-round sculptor, he moves easily from one material to another. Lines and forms play a crucial role in his universe.
But his true inclination is to investigate materials, whether stone, marble, wood, clay or metal, in order to reveal their hidden soul.
This quest has brought him to Tuscany, the cradle of man’s cultural heritage and an area with a centuries-old artistic tradition,
and so an ideal place to pursue his art.

In the vicinity of Cortona Antonio discovered ideal locations for finding materials to sculpt: the numerous local pietra serena (sandstone) quarries, travertine marble near the spa town of Rapolano Terme, clay in the nearby Siena hills or Crete as they are known, and noble marble from Carrara. His knowledge of three-dimensional arts has inspired him in creating stunning jewellery.

In Arezzo, one of Italy’s major areas for gold working, he began collaborating as a designer with major companies, at the same time learning the latest goldsmith’s techniques. In a short time Antonio had gathered the secrets of the great Arezzo gold working tradition of ancient Etruscan origin. From lost-wax casting of metals such as gold, silver and bronze (a technique very similar to that used by the Etruscans in ancient times), the designer creates forms and concepts that are closer to artworks, particularly to contemporary sculpture.

For your special gifts, the artist’s showrooms are located in
via Nazionale and in via Guelfa, Cortona.

Scents and scenes.

Piazza della Repubblica. Cortona.
Late September morning.

I walk through the square,
sunny stone all around,
chatty tables outside “Bar Cristallo”,
the clock tower is watching over:
our old men
sitting on benches
talking about weather and bones;
tourists walking, admiring, taking pictures, laughing…
they have the “I’m so lucky to be here” look over their faces.

Suddenly:
an amazingly strong scent of red wine pervades the square.
Deliciously unexplainable.
A dream?

No, in the middle of the square I see
a man picking up the rests of three bottles of wine
from the ground.
(Cheeky plastic bags!)

With a big smile and an “I don’t mind, because I’m happy” look on his face
he elegantly reaches the nearest trash can
holding his wasted “souvenirs” he had just bought in the Piazza.

Life is a play.

School trips and Etruscan fun!

Sometimes, at night, walking around Cortona, you could meet a group of teenagers in green t-shirts, flashing torches, writing on notebooks and reading rhymes…
They certainly are students from European international schools enjoying original activities in the town.
The night activity is called “Alley-Cats” and the children have tremendous fun!

They usually come to Cortona for a week with their teachers and follow very interesting schedules organized for them by CREA: Cortona Recreational Educational Association.

CREA has been successfully running fieldtrips for students from European International schools for over ten years. The activities are specially designed to suit all classes. Programs have a special focus on subjects as varied as medieval studies (heraldry, wax seals, drama, art history, map reading and studying the Etruscans and Romans). Itineraries always include a choice of visits to Arezzo, Assisi, Florence, Orvieto and Siena;

Also… Cortona guided tours, ferryboat rides in lake Trasimeno with island treasure hunts, medieval banquets, museum games, jousts, mosaic activity, pizza evenings, disco nights at a privately hired discotheque, drama games with a professional animator, demonstrations of specialized activities with students’ participation in: medieval flag-throwing and crossbow shooting. The staff is composed by professional teachers from different countries, specialized on several subjects.

CREA reserves the possibility to organize different itineraries on the basis of cultural and touristy demand. So if you are a teacher interested in giving your students a great experience in Italy, or an involved parent willing to suggest new original activities to your children’ school, click HERE for more information!

Italy for your holidays in 2012.

view of La Sorgente

Back on Classic Tuscan Homes’ listing is La Sorgente,
a beautiful country house suited for a family group of 6 to 8 persons yearning for the peace and quiet of a timeless Tuscan retreat among the beautiful Cortonese olive groves.

Only 10 minutes’ drive from Cortona!

Secret Artist – Donatella De Palma

After being the most rational girl in the world,
at the age of fifty has a complete change of perspective, embracing art in all its unpredictable ways.
She starts one day in the middle of a sunny June 2006, in Cortona’s beautiful countryside and falls in love with colours and brushes and hands and eyes and any paintable surface.

In 6 years she goes through so many artistic periods that Picasso himself would be amazed! …the black pen period, the sphere period, the silhouette period, the blue pen period, the phosphorescent period, and many more…

Unfortunately, every now and then, she also goes through a “painting-on-top-of-finished-paintings” period, which sometimes causes the loss of very beautiful artwork.
She is also a very inspired interior designer and a curious photographer.

People are her favourite subject, but not the only one…

“I love to find out who they are! I don’t know the people I draw…
they are just ‘my people’ whoever they are and wherever they may exist..”

Casa Chilenne

One of the best times of year to be in Cortona?
September.
Where to stay?
Bed and Breakfast “Casa Chilenne”.

Jeanette’s breakfast is delicious.
It makes you want to stay forever…

The roof terrace that overlooks via Nazionale, Cortona’s main street, makes you feel very lucky…

Luxurious rooms and bathrooms, decorated in Belle Epoque style, give you the warmest of atmospheres…

Run down the stairs, open the door,
you’ll find yourself in the heart of one of the most ancient towns in Italy.
Amazing.

Further information and bookings HERE.