Sunday 16th October

This was to be a no work day except for Stefania who planned a big family lunch. Emanuel’s and Elisabetta and Emanuele’s friend Alfredo would be coming as well as a couple of their friends Marco? And Antonia? Of course Angelo and Gianna would also be there. In order to make some room we took a walk down the road in the beautiful fall sunshine and I talked to Helen on the phone  and caught up with her news.

Then we awaited the arrival of the guests. We had a glass of wine before lunch and the music started playing and Stefania and Bruno had a brief dance together. The chatter grew louder and more animated and the party had begun. We sat down to lunch and dish after dish came out, fried zucchini, cold meats, cheese, fried broccoli with cheese and more, all washed down with wine. Then the main courses arrived with lasagne and porchetta and a large number of arosticinis, the wonderful Abruzze lamb skewers which Angelo grilled on the special grill. Could it end without dessert? Nope, there was lots of that too brought from Pescara by Emanuele and her friends. Then coffee and food coma!! The party went on all afternoon with a card game and just general conversation. It was not until late afternoon that’s farewells were said and those from Pescara left and Angelo and Gianna departed for Naples.

Olio nouveau!

During the meal and after we talked quite a lot to Elisabetta who will spend three months in London to learn English from late November until February. We linked her up with Millie and hope they will be able to get together during her time in England.

When we arrived back from our walk in the morning, the large crates of olives we had picked were out at the front of the driveway. In late afternoon, after everyone had left, Stefania said would we like to go and see the oil processed. We drove into Cugnoli to the processing plant and our olives had already been processed and we were able to pick up the product and take it back. What an amazing turnaround. The plants was huge and very mechanized. The olives are put into a hopper and magically, all the leaves are separated out and just the olives left. These are weighed and then go into the presses and out comes the oil. The pits are used as BBQ fuel and the leaves discarded as they are too strong to be used for any purpose. We took two large drums of the oil back and Stefania filled a large can for us to take back to the US. The whole process in the space os a couple of days picking the olives to getting the fresh peppery oil.