About twenty years ago, my mother gave me a little sapling that had sprung up beneath a big, spreading tree in her backyard. She’s been gone for a long while now but that sapling is now a big, spreading tree in my backyard and to sit under it and look up to the sunlight trickling through the leaves is just magic.
Pikelets and scones…
These lovelies are some baking treats from having more time in the kitchen of late (and there’s been some fiascos as well as triumphs, I admit!) Roger is the scone baker in our house so gets credit for these. He likes following set recipes, while I’m more of a ‘bit of this and that’ cook, assessing as I go. The last time I baked scones was in a school ‘home economics’ class where the teacher said my hands were too warm for the dough (cool hands are better so scones aren’t tough apparently).
Great-grandma Charlotte was the scone baker in my family. She even entered some at the Ipswich show and gained second place for ‘best plate homemade scones’ in 1927 (her breads won several firsts!) Her daughter, Lorna, my grandma, preferred talking politics with a cigarette in hand than cooking, though she did make a mean fried rice. I feel for her as she’d have been great in a professional career but most women in those days didn’t get that chance. I had a thing for pancakes and pikelets from a young age and that page of my first cookbook is splodged with attempts. Just like the kitchen now wears flour over the benchtop and a bit on the floor too.
The thing about home cooking is, it doesn’t matter if it doesn’t turn out quite right. When there’s that comforting, cooking scent in the house (if not too burnt!), a cloth spread over the table and a cup of tea or coffee ready, eating what you’ve cooked while it’s still warm can unexpectedly bring back happy memories and stories of people loved, now long-gone, and just for a little while, all feels well.
Filed under dishes + recipes, kitchen stories
Lorna, Aunty Kate and Maddalena…
I just heard someone in the neighbourhood practising the Last Post to play at dawn for ANZAC Day tomorrow and it gave me goosebumps. As we bring to mind all those affected by war and I think especially of those men in my family who served in both world wars and Vietnam, I thought this year I’d share with you another perspective of how it was for three different women in my family during war…
Lorna, my Australian grandmother, volunteered during WWII for the Women’s National Emergency Legion (WNELs) based in Brisbane. This auxiliary provided first-aid, radio communications, mine-watching and transport driving and mechanics, particularly for the US troops’ Pacific base and among her duties Lorna would drive large transport trucks and buses with her service also taking her to Darwin.
Katherine, her grandmother, who everyone called, Aunty Kate, was born in Australia after her family emigrated from German Württemberg in 1854. Her son, Lemuel was 20 when he signed up to serve in WWI in the 26th Battalion from 1915 until 1919. She received a telegram in 1917 to say he’d been wounded and while he survived some of the worst fighting in Europe against German soldiers he was sent back for more. The family were loyal Australians but how it must have been to have relatives still in Germany on the other side of the war, possibly even fighting against Lemuel.
Maddalena, my great-grandmother, was stranded in Italy with her young son, Elia from 1939 until 1948 throughout WWII and the trying years after. Not able to have contact with her husband and elder son, both interned in Australia, (a particular injustice for Vitale who’d fought with the Allies during WWI), Maddalena persevered through nearby bombings, a visit from German soldiers who took their little food, killed their donkey and chickens and wrecked sown crops, and then, the years of scarcity that came after.
For all those who have been affected by and endured war in all its forms, thinking of you with much respect and compassion.
Filed under inspiration + history, italy, old photographs + art
From what seems impossible…
“La Spagnola” was what Great-Granny Maddalena called the Spanish influenza pandemic. When it reached Abruzzo, she was twenty-five and yet to marry, with a broken engagement behind her, and working in her parents’ butchery and grain mill in Poggio Picenze. She told my father that after the end of World War I, she remembers seeing young soldiers walking across the valley returning home to their mountain villages after years away fighting. (One of them, my Bisnonno Vitale, an Alpini soldier from Fossa, who hated war, she’d marry just a few years later.) Most of these young men were traumatised, many with missing limbs and no help from authorities for them to recover.
As they returned to their families and small villages, many unknowingly arrived carrying the Spanish flu with them, which tragically caused more loss after their homecomings. It’s no wonder Granny Maddalena didn’t want to talk about this time much. Her father, Emidio, died that same year in 1919 and I’m not certain if it was from la Spagnola, since many doctors put pneumonia or septicaemia on death certificates instead. However, as he was only 61 and his sister and brother aged 60 and 59 both died in 1918, it’s very possible they all succumbed to what was known as the Spanish flu. From 1918 to 1920, 500 million people across the world suffered from the pandemic with the death toll being at least 50 million, though some estimate it closer to 100 million.
There are stories across the world from this time of parents warning children to behave or “the Spanish lady will get you” and children’s rhymes that began, “I had a little bird, its name was Enza, I opened the window, and in-flu-enza…” Fortunately such fearsome ways are mostly relegated to history, however, in our present uncertain period, this Australian, 1919 drawing by May Gibbs to help children understand what was happening at the time shows perhaps a gentler way that is almost as relevant today.
In what is set to continue to be a challenging time in coming months, I wish you forbearance, a little humour when needed, gentleness and care. For me, if there’s perhaps one thing to hold onto, judging by how people have overcome brutal times in the past including some in my own family, it’s that even when confronted by that which may seem almost impossible to face, it is possible to face it and be stronger than you thought you could be.
Much love, Zoë xx
Filed under inspiration + history, italy
Carnations, kindness and minestrone…
Thank you to great-granny Maddalena who showed me about forbearance, cheekiness, growing vegetables and cooking minestrone and great-grandma Charlotte for her work ethic, kindness, growing gerberas and carnations and baking scones.
I’m forever grateful to have had two great-grandmothers in my childhood from two of my ancestral cultures and many older women who’ve guided me with their wisdoms and care throughout my life so far.
To all those kind, strong, gentle women out there and the men who support them – happy International Women’s Day. Zoë xx
Filed under inspiration + history
Red Hill Skate Arena…
Certain places give a funny feeling when you return to them decades on. Perhaps it’s something that’s more inside yourself than in the building with its recognisable, old glimpses and smells, even if these are veiled in years of change. I found myself back at the Red Hill Skate Arena for the first time since I last roller skated there when I was 13 in the 1980s. (And in another layer of family history, my Mum and Dad had a ‘skate date’ there back in 1967!)
Before it became a skate arena in the 60s, it was ‘Pop’s Picture Theatre’ from the 1920s, so it seems fitting it’s back to being cinemas once again. So pleased the modest, old building survived a fire and dereliction to live another day. 
As you may recall from, Joe’s Fruit Shop and Milk Bar, when I went to locate the places I was writing about, it was sad to find most had disappeared beneath ash, bulldozers and high-rises – the milk bar, Astoria Café, Regent Theatre and Trocadero to name a few.
Life goes on, change happens, good and bad. And in the same way that the old skate arena has changed, now being middle-aged I’m a long way from that teenage girl in the 80s, but sometimes it’s perhaps good to remember the 13-year-old who loved skating and the history that is within us all and the places we live.
Filed under inspiration + history
Reading aloud…
My Dad shared a sweet story with me today… in the Italian class he teaches, a student told him they’ve lent my book to a friend and each night the husband is reading it aloud to his wife. What a lovely thought! I felt really touched to hear this. (And in a curious twist, today happens to be “Read Aloud Day”.) I loved it as a child when one of my parents read aloud to me each night and I always begged for ‘another story’ rather than go to sleep.
The Enchanted Wood was a favourite read to me and then I read over and over myself. I still have this 1956 edition Mum’s father gave to her when she was eight. Mum then gave it to me at about the same age, but when I was older and moved out of home, I left the book with her, knowing how she treasured it. Then, just two months before she died, Mum gave me this book again, wrapped as a present on the night I graduated from my Masters degree, and I can’t tell you how precious it is to me, even if very marked and foxed and falling apart!
(If only my name inside in my grade 3, ‘running writing’ – yet to graduate from pencil to pen – was as elegant as my grandfather’s cursive script. Mine’s really only got worse, not better!)
Happy reading aloud!
Zoë xx
Filed under books + writing
a basil forest…
Amazing how a much longed-for pour of rain a few days ago has brought about a basil forest in the vegie patch! So, it’s all things basil for a bit with this beautiful harvest… homemade pizza with basil, tomato and mozzarella, basil pesto with orecchiette and crispy prosciutto, as well as bruschetta with basil, tomato and balsamic. (Any other ideas for basil are most welcome. As is a little more rain all round for everyone in Australia!) And I have to say that Costa Georgiadis’ gardening tip of pinching the tops off when harvesting basil is a great one. I reckon it has quadrupled the crop. 🌿
Filed under dishes + recipes, garden + vintage linens, kitchen stories
Milk Bar… open 7 days
Thinking of all those volunteering and working over this time when many get to take a break. It still amazes me how my grandparents opened their milk bar and fruit shop 7 days a week from early morning ‘til late at night with only two days a year off – for 20 years straight! And then ‘scaled back’ to 5 days a week for the following years.
Nonno Anni worked for 36 years before his first holiday and Nanna Francesca wasn’t far behind. It makes me feel blessed and so grateful to write for a living, something I dreamed of from when I was 7 and found out the stories that I loved writing could actually be a job.
Thank you for your lovely comments and messages throughout the year. It is always wonderful to hear from you. Fingers crossed I have some book news I can share with you in 2020! In the meantime, whether you are working, volunteering or taking time out over this time, please stay safe and all the very best for the coming year. Tante belle cose! Zoë xx
Filed under inspiration + history
Water… and figs
Our two birdbaths and various ground dishes about the place are being visited and almost emptied every day by both day and night visitors to the garden. 😊🐦🐝🐞🐾
And the fig update is… the tree net has certainly worked with several of these beauties about ready for picking. We have tank water and are using it sparingly so it’s incredible how generous nature can still be despite the heat, the dry, the smoke and hot winds. Please send us all a decent drop of rain soon… but not floods!! 🌿
Filed under garden + vintage linens
Tanti auguri a zio Vincenzo… ottant’anni
Happy 80th Birthday to my great uncle, Vince. Lovely to celebrate this milestone with him on the weekend. To me, he’s always been a gentle soul and am so glad we’ve stayed close.
A wonderful ballroom dancer, loves local history and photography, was born and grew up on the family’s Applethorpe farm and I also have great memories of him working hard on tomato day bottling the passata, making Italian biscuits with Nanna Francesca and looking like an Italian Elvis with that wonderful hair slicked back.
Older members of a family are so important and I never tire of sitting listening to the old stories and memories. Buon Compleanno Vincenzo! Tante belle cose. xx
Filed under inspiration + history
When the past catches you…
Doing things like an Italian you’d never have thought you would when growing up…
“Putting on the tree net to protect the figs.”
Yes, I did this last weekend and those familiar with Mezza Italiana will know there was a time I would never have imagined myself doing so. (Not sure my modest tree and net is any match for Nonno Anni’s past efforts! Although I think Roger’s makeshift stake of a star picket and old piece of hose is in keeping with honouring making do and not letting anything go to waste – no matter how it looks!) 😁😊💛
Filed under garden + vintage linens, inspiration + history
Saluti a Nonno Anni…
It’s Nonno Anni’s birthday in a few days so there was once a time when all the family would be getting together this weekend at my grandparents’ house. Several tables would be pushed together, Nanna Francesca would cook huge bowls of pasta and either polpette or cotolette, and of course there’d be cake, champagne and maybe Franjelico, or Sambuca with a coffee bean lit on top.
Although Nonno Anni has been gone some while now, I still miss him terribly but I’m so grateful for the times we had and so on October 21st will raise a glass, or a polpette, to Annibale (Joe) who continues to inspire me. xxx
(For the record, that air-conditioner behind Nonno Anni in this photo is the one I wrote about that Nanna Francesca refused to let me turn on even on the hottest days because it created a ‘cold draught’!!) 😊
Buon compleanno, Nonno, con amore sempre. Tante cose belle. Zoë xx
Filed under books + writing, inspiration + history
The mysterious… spigarello
The mysterious… spigarello, this ancient, Italian, wild green that seems also called cima di rapa, cavolo broccolo, getti di Napoli, spigariello and mistero nero. Some say it’s part of the broccoli family, others dispute it. I found this bunch at a roadside stall in southeast Queensland hinterland, a long way from southern Italy where for centuries women have picked and gathered into their upturned aprons this bitter green from the mountainsides.
And I can say when tasted fresh, it is quite bitter! But when cooked this mellows to an intense, unique, grassy flavour, much more complex than kale and tastes so healthy it must be doing you good. Many traditional recipes suggest frying it in olive oil with garlic and salt, others add lemon zest, pine nuts and raisins or put it in what is called ‘black soup’.
When trying to find out more about spigarello, I often came across words like – ancient, mystifying, heirloom, unexplained, unusual. Not sure why that makes me like it more but there’s something about finding and cooking with ‘mysterious’ Italian greens that have such ancient history behind them.
Filed under dishes + recipes, kitchen stories
Bushfires at Applethorpe and Stanthorpe…
It’s been a tough past few days for those facing bushfires and an incredible effort by people banding together to fight fires and help people and animals. The resolve and grace of those who have lost so much is extraordinary.
Among the fires still burning are those at Stanthorpe and Applethorpe where, as many of you will know from my books, my Dad was born and three generations of my family previously lived at their Applethorpe farm.
According to QFES, firefighting is currently focused around the very roads bordering the farm. I can’t help but feel the area has had enough to deal in recent times with their water supply almost gone due to drought and now must face unprecedented fires. Really hoping for a reprieve all round very soon.
(Nanna Francesca beside the packing shed her father built and Nonno Anni pointing to the farmhouse – so him to get up on the fence!)
Update: While nearby paddocks got burnt out, relieved to say the house and sheds have survived thanks to the fantastic firefighting crews. That said, when an event like this occurs , it’s often a long time for things to return to ‘normal’, particularly for those who’ve lost much and especially an area already doing it tough and almost out of water. Really hoping for some decent rain soon.
Filed under inspiration + history
Family history by chance…
Looking closer at this old photo from the Brisbane Ekka (exhibition/show) that recently appeared on several local history sites, I couldn’t believe it when I happened to see my Dad in it. In 1971 he worked at the chairlift after he and Mum returned from travels and working overseas for a couple of years and he did other work until he resumed his teaching job. (Dad is one of the blokes in red and white and is under the OR of the Escort sign above).
It’s the first photo I’ve seen of him working at the chairlift (unfortunately, I don’t know who took this photo to credit them) but incredibly there’s more to this photo than first realised. In the foreground, a short, brown-haired woman in pale blue looking toward my Dad appears to be Nanna Francesca. What is especially poignant is that they’d been estranged for a few years after my parents’ cross-cultural wedding (not so accepted back in the 1960s) and it was when they accidentally first saw each other at the Ekka chairlift that my Dad and his parents reunited and became close again.
Little did the person who took this photo know they’d captured such a time in my family that we’d only happen to see almost 50 years later.
Filed under inspiration + history
Four ingredients, four steps, three photographs…
Crispy Carciofi alla Giudia are said to be one of the most popular local dishes ordered at restaurants in Rome. So, artichokes cooked this way might be perhaps best kept for only now and then considering the oil needed for frying, however the way the artichokes open into crisp, crunchy flowers makes this centuries-old, Jewish-Roman dish well worth making on occasion. Great as an antipasto and usually a springtime dish but these artichokes were selling cheap at my local market and winter here hasn’t been too cold.
Four ingredients:
1. artichokes, 2. lemon, 3. olive oil, 4. salt.
Four steps:
1. trim artichokes, 2. soak in water mixed with lemon juice, 3. fry in hot olive oil, 4. sprinkle with salt.
Filed under kitchen stories
Margaret Fulton’s cookbooks
Vale Margaret Fulton (1924-2019).
Her person, her cooking, her books…My Italian grandmother gave me a lot of cookbooks over the years but these two Margaret Fulton ones were given the special place of being my 18th and 21st presents. I know I didn’t appreciate them enough when I was young but over time they’ve been used often with many pages tagged and splotched and I love that Nanna Francesca wrote in both of them.
Filed under kitchen stories
Cooking caponata…
There are as many versions of caponata as there are cooks… so it’s said. The first written recipes date to the early 18th century but of course it’s one of those dishes handed down over many centuries from mother to daughter (and hopefully a few fathers and sons too). While it’s famously Sicilian, other regions like Calabria also have versions and most likely my (very rustic!) caponata will be completely different when I next cook it. This time I went with pretty much what I had on hand that would suit and baked it instead of frying (although frying creates more caramelisation and is very tasty). I’m guessing many of you will have your own delicious recipes perhaps handed down through generations, such a lovely tradition of cooking and passing on family history. xx
Ingredients (on hand!) for this version of caponata.
Chopped and tossed (in olive oil, balsamic vinegar, brown sugar, salt and lemon juice).
Baked and ready to serve (warm or cold).
Filed under kitchen stories
old photograph, blurry, creased, precious…
My grandparents, circa 1950.
…small moments of beauty.
Filed under old photographs + art
un viaggio in Italia…
So lovely that Mezza Italiana has been picked in conjunction with Amazon US as one the best books to inspire a trip to Italy. Especially to be in the company of some great authors. Many thanks to Red Around the World. xx
48 Of The Best Books Set In Italy To Inspire Your Next Trip
Filed under books + writing, inspiration + history, italy
Restoration e la storia…
Around 800 years ago, Benedictine workers built this structure in Fossa on top of a 9th century AD Roman-Byzantine temple. And that was already on top of a crypt where for centuries BC and up until 391 AD, the Vestini tribe honoured Vesta (pagan goddess of hearth, home and family).
It’s survived more than 17 earthquakes over many centuries as well as WW2 bombings close by.
While humble outside, painted inside its walls is some of the oldest, most precious art in Abruzzo. Gothic-Byzantine frescoes that depict scenes like the last judgment (said to have inspired Dante to later write the Divine Comedy after he visited Fossa in 1294) and the pagan agrarian calendar so central to a rural community and to show stories for those not fortunate to learn to read.
Recently it reopened, a decade on from its damage after the 2009 earthquake. Beliefs aside, it’s significant to see its art restored, not just for those at present but for generations to come, for it’s a story of the area’s people and even the tiniest villages high in the mountains have their own potent stories.
(Santa Maria di Cryptas, Fossa, Abruzzo.)
Filed under inspiration + history, italy
Keeping the past…
Came across this in an old, cardboard box of photographs of my grandmother’s:
Fossa, 1975 – Nonno Anni looking melancholy (his first time there again since 1939), and Nanna Francesca, sleeves rolled, her usual harried look when about to get back to a pot on the stove or the washing or something. So very them.
Have kept it in a frame on my wall and whenever I wish I could seek their advice or miss just having a chat, it’s a comfort to remember how they were at times. (I think Nanna Francesca had almost this same look peering from the doorway when I arrived in Fossa for the first time 20 years later!!) xx
Filed under italy, old photographs + art
10 anno anniversario…
Thinking of all those who lost, and all still waiting, and hoping, to return.
Abruzzo, 6 Aprile 2009 – 6 Aprile 2019.
Filed under italy
Italian days
Filed under italy
Beautiful curling branches…
Came across this lovely tree when I was walking from the house in Fossa along the road to the village cemetery. It stands looking to the Aterno Valley and the Apennines in Abruzzo with Gran Sasso in the distance.
* Interestingly, the oldest (scientifically dated) tree in Europe is in southern Italy. A craggy pine (Pinus heldreichii) that is 1230 years old and called, Italus (and is still growing).
Mar 6, 2019 · 1:09 pm
Abruzzo Economia interview…
Italian magazine, Abruzzo Economia, recently interviewed me for their Lifestyle section and it was lovely to speak to Raffaella Quieti Cartledge about Abruzzo and writing Mezza Italiana, including some questions I’ve never been asked before about the area. The article in Italian may be read here…
Abruzzo Economia – Una scrittrice australiana Mezza Abruzzese
or you may read an English version below…
An Australian writer who is half-Abruzzese…
by Raffaella Quieti Cartledge
Australian and author of the autobiographical book, Mezza Italiana, Zoë Boccabella describes her discovery of Abruzzo, her familial origins in Fossa (AQ), and her subsequent trips to the region and the rest of Italy. The memories of her grandfather’s stories come to life in the family home while Abruzzo reveals a part of itself that will transform her forever.
What inspired you to write the book?
The first time I arrived in Abruzzo where my family came from, I had a feeling of coming home, even though I had never been there before. I stayed in the house in Fossa that had belonged to my ancestors for centuries and my grandfather, Annibale, who was born in Abruzzo, told me stories of when he grew up there, the history of the area where he lived and how he left part of his heart behind when his father sent for him to join him in Australia in 1939. The experience had such a profound effect on me. Walking around the villages, hillsides, forests and deserted castles, I felt at once that Abruzzo was a very special place. Each time I returned and explored the area more, I wrote down family folklore, village stories and began to think more about my experiences growing up as an Italian-Australian, how I felt ‘half and half’, not like I fully belonged to either culture.
Who is your main audience and please tell us about them.
I began writing what was to become Mezza Italiana at the kitchen table in the house in Fossa, not thinking it might become a published book one day. Over time, I added more research and stories as I discovered them. Then the 2009 earthquake occurred in Abruzzo where my family’s village was and it was important to include this too. Especially when I saw how the Abruzzese handled the tragedy with such grace, strength and forbearance.
I wrote what I saw and felt, rather than thinking about who might read it one day. And because I grew up as a descendant of Italian migrants in 1970s and early 80s Australia when it wasn’t as accepted to have a Mediterranean background like it is now and migrants weren’t always treated well by everyone, I did come to hope that by sharing my story perhaps just one person who read it, who was a migrant descendant and feeling confused or ‘half and half’, might not spend decades surrendering part of themselves as I did.
Are you going to have the book translated in Italian and how many copies have you sold so far?
It has been such an unexpected and lovely surprise that Mezza Italiana has become a bestselling book in Australia and the best part of that has been hearing from so many different readers who shared similar experiences to mine. It has recently also become available in Italy, the rest of Europe, the UK and US as well.
What is it of Abruzzo that strikes you as different from other regional characters?
Secluded by the magnificent Apennines, in many ways Abruzzo remains untamed, natural, beautiful, but still accessible, with wonderful, down-to-earth people, talented artisans in centuries-old crafts and culinary traditions, and medieval architecture unchanged. When writing both my books, I travelled throughout Italy from the north to the south and in between and whenever Italians in other regions asked where my family came from and I mentioned Abruzzo, their responses were very positive with much respect for Abruzzese, who are well known to be forte e gentile – strong and kind.
What do you think is Abruzzo’s main resource (in every way, geography, people) and what do you think Abruzzese should do to stimulate its economy – attract niche tourism?
Because I live in Australia I can only answer from the perspective of a visitor to Abruzzo, even if that includes staying with family there. For me, the charm of Abruzzo is its many untouched landscapes and traditional ways. I understand it is important to be economically strong in the best interest of the Abruzzese people while protecting its valuable assets of the natural beauty and historical art and architecture of the region, so there is a fine line. To me, Abruzzo’s great strength is having more green space than almost any other region of Italy, as well as its fauna. This is a great tourist enticement.
A popular, growing part of tourism is photography tours where serious photographers are led by tour guides to photograph wildlife, flora and scenery. I believe Abruzzo’s renowned national parks, lakes, mountains and forests, brown bears, chamois, eagles and wolves among other wildlife are a superb attraction.
Abruzzo has a very rich art history and again this would suit tailored tours as well as culinary tours that could include local feste, not so well-known and waiting to be discovered.
In the past, due to its untouched areas and medieval buildings, areas of Abruzzo have also been used as locations for films, including Hollywood’s ‘spaghetti westerns’ and films such as, In the Name of the Rose, Ladyhawke, The American and The Fox and the Child and the region could continue to be a place that hosts international and local film locations.
Should the region establish better contacts with the descendants of Abruzzese ’emigrati’ abroad through their associations and bring them over to visit the land their grandparents came from?
This is an interesting question. Visiting the region did strengthen my ties to the area and prompted me to encourage more people to discover it too. For descendants of migrants, it can be such an enriching, valuable experience to see where their parents or grandparents came from. Some in Abruzzo may not be aware that many migrants in Australia continue to carry on traditional Abruzzese and Italian ways to this day – bottling their own passata, making pasta alla chitarra, sausage making, and celebrating traditional festive days – all to respect and keep alive their heritage.
How did the discovery of your grandfather’s region change you?
The first time I went to Italy I was unaware Abruzzo was about to have its way with me. As I journeyed up into the Apennine Mountains to L’Aquila and then Fossa, it was as though the Italian blood in me suddenly surged with recognition and I couldn’t resist the magnetic pull the place had on me. Abruzzo completely exceeded my expectations in its special beauty and gave me a sense of ‘coming home’ and belonging. Family history and ancestral links have an instinctive pull and over the next two decades I felt compelled to return to the house that had belonged to my family for centuries and for longer periods of time.
Curiously, as much as Australia is my home, going to Italy felt like going home too and each time I returned with my heart more open. It made me feel proud of my Italian heritage when I was back in Australia and of course to write about that and to share it with others. When I first stepped onto Italian soil, I was hopping off a train and a bird dropping landed on my shoulder. This is meant to be ‘a positive sign’ according to Italian folklore and I guess for me it truly was!
Filed under books + writing, italy
Sightseeing in Assisi…
Always seems to be a little story happening in scenes from Italian towns.
(Sculpture by Norberto Proietti (1927-2009), Pellegrino di Pace – Pilgram of Peace, 2005.)
Filed under italy
In the valley below Mount Warning…
…no phone reception, no traffic, and then, among the serenity, come three lovely chooks to drink at the creek.
Filed under inspiration + history
1970s Christmas from afar…
Christmas Eve, 1970s, Nonno Anni shouting, ‘Everyone get ready!’, Nanna Francesca already with tears in her eyes, family crowding onto the plastic runner over the carpet in my grandparents’ narrow hallway, the clunky, black, Bakelite corded phone ringing with that booked international call to relatives faraway in Italy. A few precious, expensive minutes to talk at a time when overseas holidays weren’t so common or affordable and relatives far away were sometimes never able to be seen again.
Wishing you much happiness at this time whether near or far, however large or small your day may be, hope the coming year is wonderful! Thank you for all your messages and support over this past year, it really means a lot to hear from you. Zoë xx
(Top left, lane outside Fossa house 1970s, and below, town hall Xmas tree Brisbane same time.)
Filed under inspiration + history, italy
Mixed grill and pineapple phosphate soda
An Astoria Café 1940s menu from when my Italian grandparents, Annibale (Joe) and Francesca waited tables there during World War 2.
With many American GIs in Brisbane at the time items like ‘Yankee Lemonade’ and ‘American Beauty sundae’ made it to the menu along with the expected ‘Mixed Grill’ type of fare and perhaps surprisingly – ‘Double Decker Spaghetti Sandwiches’!
The Astoria Café was at the busy corner of Edward and Adelaide streets and an office building now sits at the spot – 243 Edward – though I dearly wish the Astoria was still there.
Filed under dishes + recipes, inspiration + history
Small moments of beauty
Granny Maddalena harvesting from her vegie garden before going inside to cook for all the family. Sometimes it’s the simplest things…
#worldkindessday
Filed under garden + vintage linens, kitchen stories
Australian spring…
Some lovely, spring, vegie patch colours…
and a fellow pretty happy catching insects.
Filed under garden + vintage linens, inspiration + history, kitchen stories
Curious folk artes…
Not quite Halloween but this fellow can seem a bit scary. It’s a traditional, 19th century pipe – said to be hand-carved by a shepherd in Abruzzo’s mountains – that I found in an antique shop in Paris of all places. The pipe is close to a metre long and designed so its bowl sits on the ground. Such an unusual and rare piece from Abruzzo, I decided I couldn’t leave him in Paris so he’s had quite a journey over the past 140 years or so from Italy to France then Australia – ironically the same course my Bisnonno Vitale took before he arrived in Melbourne in the 1920s.
“Verses carved on staves by shepherds, with an infinity of patient ornamental detail, are strongly reminiscent of old Etruscan myths and beliefs long since forgotten, but which have left behind them curious customs and rites, the traditions of which still cling to the newer generations who do not seem able to break away from them.”
Vincenzo Balzano from, ‘Peasant Art in Italy’ edited by Charles Holme (London: 1913).
Filed under inspiration + history, italy
“C’è bellezza che aspetta in natura se speri di vederlo”
“There is beauty waiting in nature if you hope to see it”
~ Italian old folk saying.
At Lake Moogerah, Fassifern Valley – just managed to capture this fellow taking flight!
Oct 8, 2018 · 3:48 pm
Fossa’s village windows…
Following the photographs of Fossa’s doors, it seems fitting to share some of Fossa’s windows too. So many beautiful and distinctive windows throughout the village (and to me, so much more character than most modern ones these days).
These photos were taken over the past 20 years or more so some are a bit grainy since I had an old Pentax camera with film back then. I could have perhaps photoshopped them but that didn’t seem being true to the era of even 15 or 20 years ago.
I didn’t realise just how many photographs I’d taken of Fossa during my visits, especially windows! (And no, I didn’t peek in any!) But I loved the resonances of village life you’d hear drifting down from them as I walked along the lanes – loud conversations in rapid Italian I mostly couldn’t understand, the aroma of a pasta sauce simmering on a stove, a tv set blaring, someone singing… all lovely. xx
Filed under italy, old photographs + art
Stanthorpe Border Post article…
For those in the Stanthorpe area or with a connection to it, the Border Post interviewed me recently about parts of the books set there. It was a pleasure to spend time in the area when researching the books, especially going back to where my family’s orchards stood, and always such a privilege to interview older, local people and learn their stories. xx
Filed under books + writing
conca d’Abruzzo in Australia…
Received this lovely gift from a reader, Augusto (who doesn’t mind me sharing that he lives in Australia, was born in Fossa, Abruzzo and was pleased to discover the books). At 80, for the first time he’s learnt copper smithing and made me this little, copper conca and ladle, like those larger ones traditionally used in Abruzzo to collect water (women like my bisnonna Maddalena carried them on their heads).
Thank you to Augusto, such a beautiful kindness. I will treasure it always! And many thanks to all who’ve connected through messages and letters. It’s such a pleasure to hear from you. What most drives me to write is to preserve experiences of ‘everyday’ people and their often overlooked yet I believe significant parts of history. Thank you for your interest (and I’m working hard on the next book!!) xx
Filed under books + writing, italy
Looking out from Fossa to the Apennines and nearby towns…
When I think back to first leaning on these railings more than two decades ago, the unexpected sense of belonging to a place that until then I’d only heard about, amazes me even now. Such a beautiful landscape in all it holds, its timelessness, change, ancestry, scars, history and splendour. xx
“Nonno Anni’s face creases in smiles when I join him. He leads me out to Piazza Belvedere and we lean on the railings taking in the magnificent view of the Aterno Valley. Nonno Anni straightens and takes a big breath. He slaps his chest, encouraging me to take some deep breaths of the pure mountain air with him.”
from Mezza Italiana
Filed under italy
Cooking pancakes with Nanna… Nonna
Came across my first cookbook, given to me when I was five by Nanna Francesca (signed ‘Nonna’ while I called her ‘Nanna’ in our Italian/ Australian tussle). My favourite pancake recipe pages are still splotched and dusty with flour!
I read that in the 1960s/70s, Ursula Sedgwick’s cookbooks were supposedly often given to granddaughters by worried grandmothers as mothers left the home for the workforce! This wasn’t so for me (and in actuality Sedgwick herself was very much a career woman, advocated for women’s rights, raised three sons with her husband and was a journalist, copywriter and later a magistrate) but my grandmother did persist in giving me cookbooks over the years.
Perhaps in her determination to show me how to cook she hoped to impart something that was a tie to her birthplace and upbringing (her Nonna was a baker) or to her parents whom she’d lost early, both who cooked well (her father, a cane gang cook known for his puddings). I’m not sure, maybe she just wanted me to know how.
While at times I resisted cooking and argued with Nanna/Nonna about it, the irony was, I did come to love it and am thankful she persevered. Nanna Francesca didn’t get to see me achieve other things as I may have hoped yet seeing me come around to cooking made her very happy. I guess sometimes it’s the little things you don’t expect that bring such contentment, however humble they may seem, and near enough is good enough (a bit like how some of my pancakes turned out!!) xx
Filed under kitchen stories
19th June, 1943…
On this day 75 years ago, Francesca and Annibale (Joe) married. It was wartime, the first priest refused to marry them due to Annibale being an Italian internee, his father was interned, his mother in Italy cut-off from them in Australia. Francesca and Annibale were just 17 and 19, their partnership to be both in life and in business. The challenges to come they met with stoicism and compromise (particularly on Francesca’s part as for many women of the era).
They were married for 60 years and I was there to celebrate this final milestone with them that occurred a few months before Francesca died. By then, my grandmother was quite unwell and didn’t really perceive the letters of congratulations from the Queen and other dignitaries. But I watched my grandfather treat her with loyal, gentle care in a way that can be summed up by this, their only wedding photograph and I have so much admiration for their partnership that spanned all those decades. With love. xx
Filed under inspiration + history, italy
Mezza Italiana released in the US!
Mezza Italiana has been released in paperback in the US! With many thanks to HarperCollins 360, Mezza is now available at US bookstores, online or to order in.
So lovely and incredible to think this book that was first written on a kitchen table in Italy has made its way across another ocean! Thank you for embracing it!
Tante belle cose, Zoë xx
Mezza Italiana
Filed under books + writing
the “good” cabinet….
The “good” cabinet – filled with items only to be used for special guests, certainly never for family. These were Nanna Francesca’s modest, glass-fronted cabinets of hi-ball glasses, espresso cups, coffee pots and bonbonniere of figurines and sugared almonds (left) in the late 60s and (right) in the early 70s with me, Mum and Nanna Francesca (same Christmas tree).
By then, my grandparents had an additional “good” cabinet and covered the VJ walls of their Queenslander house in fibro sheets painted with white, high-gloss for a “fresh, clean look” (p.6 Mezza Italiana).
And yes, this was the era of the plastic hallway runner over the carpet. What I’d give to be able to see it all again! The cabinets themselves were lost in Brisbane’s 2011 flood but below right are some items from them I managed to salvage beforehand (they don’t look Italian at all?!!) haha. And the same clock now sits in my living room. Something nice about seeing it each day knowing it was in my grandparents’ living room all those years.
Filed under italy
Fossa’s village doors…
Walking around Fossa, along lanes that become so steep and narrow they merge into steps or descend into tunnels, I began to notice all the different doors I passed. Some with stylised, door furniture of lion heads or dragons and beautifully varnished wood, others crude, weathered timber, or painted mission brown.
Several were fastened with long, draw bolts that looked like from another era, stable doors with cobwebby corners, cat holes cut into the bottom by kind residents looking after the village cats. A few of Fossa’s resident animals managed to get into some of my photographs. I took these in the village four years before the earthquake. Perhaps one of the doors you may recognise as yours! xx
Filed under italy, old photographs + art
from Abruzzo to Australia…
Joe’s Fruit Shop and Milk Bar continues each weeknight on ABC Nightlife – thank you to all who’ve sent messages upon discovering the book – lovely to hear from you!
By chance, I came across this photograph when looking for something else for the next book and realised it might be the only one to show the family unit of Maddalena and Vitale and their two sons Elia (left) and Annibale/Joe (right) taken not long after they were reunited in Australia.
Financial hardship, separate migration, the Depression and WW2 forced Vitale and Maddalena apart for all but about three of their first 26 years of marriage, the boys without their father, and then Maddalena and Annibale apart for a decade after he migrated at 15. So lovely to see them reunited here. They remained close for the rest of their lives in Australia with Maddalena and Vitale even living with Annibale and his family for many years.
Filed under italy
a little bit of mezza Italiana/Australiana…
Came across this little bit of ‘mezza Italiana/Australiana’ at the beach on the weekend… a surf rescue boat emblazoned with the word, Arancia (orange). I realise it’s a NZ brand name but for some reason it just felt great to see this Italian word on something such a part of Australian life in beach and flood rescues.
Recently, I heard a radio discussion about foreign languages currently taught in Australian schools. Of the six languages most commonly learnt, apparently Japanese is the most popular followed by Italian, Indonesian, French, German and Mandarin, each being classified as business or heritage. They said, Italian is a heritage language taught due to the contribution of its large migrant community and their descendants over the past century or more. Pretty lovely to hear.
Filed under inspiration + history
“Joe’s Fruit Shop and Milk Bar” broadcast…
From tonight, ABC Nightlife will broadcast the audiobook of Joe’s Fruit Shop and Milk Bar read by the very talented, award-winning actress, Daniela Farinacci (who was absolutely lovely to work with!)
Many thanks to Bolinda audio, ABC Books and Nightlife.
Filed under books + writing
Aunty Fred’s orchids…
First flowering after five years in wait… orchids from a cutting my godmother, ‘Aunty Fred’ gave me from her garden, from a cutting that was from her mother’s garden.
Have these lovelies on my desk today to remind me that some things can be a long while in the creating but hopefully something worth all the work will emerge in the end.
Filed under garden + vintage linens, inspiration + history
My Nonni from Abruzzo….
Life in Abruzzo is currently doing a series called, My Nonni from Abruzzo that looks at how such migrant heritage may reach well beyond its original Italian borders to other areas of the world through the influence of grandparents. Such a pleasure to be asked to contribute and be among these family stories.
If you’d like to read the article you may do so here… My Nonni from Abruzzo
Filed under italy
Old pictures and pikelets…
Nanna Francesca’s birth date is today, the 12th, though her birth certificate states February 19th due to its delayed lodging as her parents fought over naming her after their mothers. Tradition prevailed. She was named for her paternal Nonna in possibly the only argument won by the usually quiet, laid-back, Domenico over my grandmother’s maternal side, the indomitable Carrozza women (short, stout and strong).
This photograph was taken on Nanna Francesca’s birthday 40 years ago at my parents’ Red Hill house. It was the era when I’d often stay over at my grandparents’ place and Nanna Francesca took me to the ‘pictures’, as she called it, and afterwards lunch at the Coles cafeteria where I mostly had hot chips in a cardboard cup then pikelets. Of course, being a kid, I took it all for granted then, but am so grateful now to look back on those times and for the time she gave me.
Buon compleanno, Nanna Francesca. xxx
Filed under inspiration + history
Back roads beauty…
This hillside speckled with wildflowers could perhaps be out of Little House on the Prairie but is in Abruzzo (where, incidentally, many spaghetti westerns were filmed in the 1960s and 70s).
Took this photograph near the farmhouse where I stayed after the 2009 earthquake (as my family’s village of Fossa was evacuated). This was just outside the village of Sant’ Eusanio Forconese, population around 400, with the hilltop castle (pictured) of the same name.
At the time, I was too overwhelmed by the earthquake to take it in much but later found out this castle was built in the 12th century with walls around a metre thick, up to seven metres high and also a moat, enabling it to retain its defenses for nearly 600 years.
Such a quiet, tucked away spot, easy to rush past, yet as always, the landscape in Abruzzo’s Aterno Valley never ceases to amaze me in its history, varying beauty and terrain.
Feb 2, 2018 · 11:55 am
Backyard summer crop…
Returned to the vegie patch after a spell to find the tomato plants now trees and despite the inattention I must be forgiven as they continue to be generous in the summer heat (the cucumbers trying their best also!!) Always a thrill to harvest such beauties from the backyard…
Filed under garden + vintage linens, kitchen stories
Reading about Abruzzo…
Quite a thrill to see Mezza Italiana among such good company – thank you Life in Abruzzo!
A Traveller’s Companion: Top 15 Books on Abruzzo
Filed under books + writing, italy
New year harvest…
Buon anno a tutti and warmest wishes!
The new year was generally start of harvest time at my family’s Applethorpe farm, with various fruit and vegetable picking over the first four months or so. Seeing photographs of that time, I’m taken by the generous camaraderie that comes across among the hard work and summer heat, especially knowing family and friends came from near and far to help my great-grandmother, Cesca and her youngest two left alone on their farm after her husband Mico’s sudden death at fifty-three.
At my desk again for the first time this year, while I await the next step on book three I am making a start to some research, a bit like ‘harvesting’ snippets and stories, that I hope (and I can’t believe I am writing this) will become book four!! Again, best wishes for the year and tante belle cose. xx
Filed under books + writing, inspiration + history
From that first trip to Fossa…
With Nanna Francesca and Nonno Anni outside the family house in Fossa when I arrived there for the first time all those years ago (bearing in mind by then I’d been travelling and living out of a backpack for several months!!)
Little did I know how much this first trip to see where in Italy my family came from would come to have such an effect, and when this was taken I certainly didn’t imagine that Mezza and Joe’s would follow. Have just completed work on the next book (fingers crossed!) and wanted to take this opportunity to thank you for joining me here along the way. It’s so lovely to have your support and to know you a little through your messages. Thank you!! Xx
Filed under books + writing, italy
via dei Beati… and being almost home
Coming up this street in Fossa always feels like being ‘almost home’ whether returning from nearby L’Aquila or a long flight from Australia. For just around the next corner is my family’s house and while it has centuries of history, to me it also has that comforting feel like coming to stay at your grandparents’ house.
In recent years, this street was renamed via dei Beati for two saints born here, Bernardino in 1420 and Cesidio, 1873. But for me, this is also where Granny Maddalena stood not far from the church door you can see and watched her son, Annibale, then 15, walk away from her as he carried just one port to start his journey to Australia. It changed the course of our family history from then on, but his keeping a part of Fossa in his heart to one day share with us showed me that in a way it was part of us too. (For which, after resisting it a long time, I’m now very grateful!)
Filed under inspiration + history, italy
Dancing with my great-grandmothers…
Dancing with my great-grandmothers, Maddalena and Charlotte when I was two. They were of such different Italian and English backgrounds yet had much in common in their day-to-day lives really. This is my only picture of the three of us. Apparently, from when I was very little I loved to dance and often got people up to join me!
Most of all, I love the joy in this old photograph and am so touched by the generosity of two women in their eighties in getting up to dance for their great-granddaughter. Wishing you much joy. xx
Filed under inspiration + history
From blossoms to broccoli…
Came across this photograph of my family’s Applethorpe farm in the 1950s with the orchard in flower and realised when I was there doing research for Mezza and Joe’s, I happened to take a picture from almost the same spot 60 years later.
Filed under inspiration + history, old photographs + art
patting ‘the little pigs’ for luck…
Patting il Porcellino, ‘the little pig’ for luck, (left) in Sydney, (right) in Florence. These bronze, wild boar (cinghiale) sculptures are replicas of the original by Pietro Tacca (1577-1640) commissioned by Cosimo II de Medici in 1621 that is now in the Museo Bardini. Apparently since at least 1633 visitors to Florence have ‘rubbed the snout’ for luck and to ensure their return to the city and tourists now rub it so much they have to replace the sculpture every decade or so.
The Florence ‘piglet’ is located in Mercato Nuovo also known as the Porcellino market and the Sydney one, (donated by Marchesa Fiaschi Torrigiani in 1968) is outside Australia’s oldest hospital, Sydney Hospital, in Macquarie Street. There are dozens of others around Europe, America, Canada, the UK and Asia so perhaps unlikely I’ll get to pat them all but hopefully might have just enough luck from these two!
Filed under italy, old photographs + art
sign of the old shop…
In this photograph of my family’s fruit shop and milk bar in its earlier days, it’s apparent how it began very modestly with my grandparents standing on the footpath in Ann Street selling produce from a ‘hole in the wall’ before they expanded the space to include a milk bar. Visible in the top left is some of the sign that hung over the footpath from around the early 1950s. It was white with ‘milk bar’ in red Perspex letters and lit up at night.
Below is the only part of the sign we managed to salvage after Brisbane’s 2011 floods (and happens to be the bit seen in this photograph taken almost 70 years ago!) It might be broken but it’s one of only a handful of items my grandparents kept when they closed their milk bar and with now no trace that it ever existed, it seems lucky to have this piece left.
Filed under books + writing, old photographs + art
the gentle work of nest building…
Have some long, solitary hours ahead for a little while as I do the edit on the next book… so it was lovely to sit at my desk this morning and look out into the tree to see a honeyeater building a nest right by my window. I may even get some baby birds for company come spring!
A while back I read in a book (Nest: The Art of Birds by Janine Burke) that as well as using their beaks to build their nests, birds also press their breasts against the inner wall to make it round, imprinting their shape on their home and forming it with their beating hearts. As I sit here I can see the bird doing just that! (Apologies the picture isn’t better but didn’t want to move too much and scare her off.)
Filed under books + writing, inspiration + history
From Monte Circolo…
My grandfather, Annibale, on the eastern edge of Monte Circolo near Castle Ocre looking over the Aterno Valley (with Fossa just below) in 1975. It was the first time he was able to return to the village and was so happy to revisit all the places of where he’d grown up.
Exactly 30 years later, I took the other photo from almost the same spot. I didn’t know about this photograph of Nonno Anni at the time but I think one day I’ll have to attempt to replicate it by standing on the same rock. He was about 52 in that photo, perhaps when the time comes I should try getting the similar shot at the same age!
Filed under inspiration + history, italy
Beyond the earthquake…
Since the earthquake, my family’s house in Italy remains too damaged to stay in. Much of the village remains empty. And now, thieves have broken into the house. They mainly upturned drawers adding to the mess of earthquake damage, since belongings inside are mostly of sentimental value, but of course it is another blow.
For the past week, my cousin has been there cleaning up and an unexpected side to what’s happened is that she’s come across old documents, letters written by our great-grandparents and photographs, including this lovely find!
My mother (on the left) was just twenty-two at the time when she and my Dad were the first to travel back to the house after the family migrated to Australia decades earlier. Pierina (on the right) is the relative who lived in the house and kept it maintained all those years before the family could return. This was taken in Fossa just before Christmas in 1970.
Filed under italy, old photographs + art
Sitting still…
Sometimes it’s those little slivers in a day that you remember and miss most when you are far away… like stepping onto the balcony of my family’s house in Italy in late afternoon to sit overlooking the laneway seeing people stroll by below, hearing a Vespa buzz past and with the only thing to think about perhaps cooking dinner.
Filed under italy
Connecting through old cookbooks…
I love cooking from old cookbooks for their connection to the past and family recipes.
This 1934 Goulburn Cookery Book belonged to my grandmother-in-law whom I didn’t get to meet but I know and much admire that she cared for her eight children in their country town through prudent circumstance and for many years independently after she was widowed.
I love that her middle name was Philadelphia and that in this cookbook she pasted cut-out recipes and wrote some in as well. (Roger has made the grapefruit jam like his grandmother’s handwritten recipe.)
There’s even a recipe for Eggs in Purgatory, albeit a bit different to the version likely cooked in 1930s Italy or the ‘eggs in tomato’ my great-granny Maddalena cooked!
Interestingly, recent studies have revealed that despite the use of ingredients like butter and eggs, most recipes in 1930s cookbooks have a third less calories than current ones, often due to their smaller portion sizes.
Filed under inspiration + history, kitchen stories
Festa della Repubblica from afar….
Brisbane’s Victoria Bridge lit in the colours of the Italian flag for Festa della Repubblica – Italy’s national day… if only my grandparents and great-grandparents could see this!
So lovely to have my hometown honour its history of Italian migrants in this gesture. Auguri per Festa della Repubblica to all those with an Italian migrant connection!! xx
spaghetti per cena…
This is one of the first photographs I chose that I hoped would make the cover of Mezza Italiana (it’s on the back). Taken in the 1960s, it was dinner for my uncle’s birthday and one of the rare times the family got to eat together since one of my grandparents were usually doing a shift at their milk bar.
I love how the young, fair-haired friend (second from left) looks happy to be at the dinner table eating spaghetti among three generations of an Italian family (reminds me a bit of how Roger was when he first came to eat at my grandparents’ house). And of course that is my Dad in the front right corner, being his usual larrikin self!
Filed under books + writing, kitchen stories
pasta arrabbiata and an almost full moon…
A little while ago I mentioned some wood-smoked chillies that I’d bought from a roadside stall. I’m going to use some as a bit of a twist on pasta arrabbiata.
In Italian, ‘arrabbiata’ means ‘angry’ and refers to the heat of chilli peppers in this sauce. The recipe varies but usually has some type of chilli mixed with garlic and herbs in a tomato passata. This time I’m also adding red and spring onions.
As for the pasta, I couldn’t resist these little moons and stars… looking out the window I think it is sort of a half moon tonight although almost full! (I will hold back from making any puns about the dish being heavenly. Knowing how hot these particular chillies are, I think it will be the one having more of a say!)
Filed under dishes + recipes, kitchen stories
Cocullo serpent festival…
This Thursday the festival of the snakes will again happen at Cocullo in Abruzzo as it has each year on the first Thursday of May from at least as far back as 1392. It still has an impact when I think back to when I saw it twelve years ago. The crowds, the food, the anticipation, the snakes… Most of all, I came away with a feeling of euphoria. I mentioned in Mezza Italiana that I reached out and touched one of the snakes (it was one of those held in the third last picture). I wasn’t sure how I’d be around literally hundreds of snakes for the first time but I have to say I felt compassion for them more than fear. The last picture is a painting Estella Canziani did of the festival for San Domenico back in 1913. Compared to when I was there 92 years later, it seemed little had changed…
Filed under italy
Some of Fossa’s laneways…
… at around dawn while most of the village still slept.
These are just a few of the lanes that wind under, over and around the village and to me they are magical. Some tunnels have small frescoes and lanterns in them.
Most are just wide enough for a tiny car, others only able to be walked. The dog on the steps is Musso Nero, the village dog who was looked after by everybody {page 328, Mezza Italiana}.
I took these photographs with black and white film and an old Pentax camera more than a decade ago while staying in the village writing Mezza Italiana.
Filed under italy, old photographs + art
Mezza Italiana to be released in the US next year….
I’m thrilled to say that in 2018 Mezza Italiana will be available in the US in paperback and ebook.
Many thanks to ABC books, HarperCollins AUS and HarperCollins360 US.
More closer to the date! xx
Filed under books + writing
Pasta alla chitarra…
Making pasta alla chitarra just as my Abruzzese great-grandmother, Maddalena used to make. The shoebox-sized wooden box strung with steel wires must be ‘tuned’ like a guitar (chitarra). A sheet of pasta is laid over the strings and pressed through with a rolling pin, slicing it into strips. And the pasta sauce is like the ‘gravy’ Nanna Francesca cooked (with a few extra greens I added!)
I certainly don’t use the chitarra too often unless I have a few hours to spare but it was lovely to make this and remember my grandmothers. I like how in a way cooking can bring together different generations, even after some are long gone, as only handed-down recipes can do.
Filed under dishes + recipes, italy, kitchen stories
Old photographs and family stories…
Even though Joe’s Fruit Shop and Milk Bar is completed, it is a pleasure to keep hearing more stories from my older relatives who always seem to have a little more to reveal about this era of their lives.
Talking to my great uncle Vincenzo recently I found out the varieties of produce they grew on the family’s Applethorpe farm included Granny Smith and Delicious apples, Santa Rosa and Wilson plums, Packham pears and green beans, also known as French or string beans. And the beans were the easiest to pick come harvest time.
(My great-grandmother – back left – was in her 50s when this was taken and though having recently lost her husband was working hard to keep the farm going.)
Filed under inspiration + history, old photographs + art
back roads…
Love roadside stalls with honesty boxes… cooked with some of the wood smoked chillies last night and they were actually pretty hot!
Filed under kitchen stories
Dolci con il caffè…
The dilemma of what to have with a coffee… took this in the gorgeous Gran Caffé, Assisi.
{Music: Coffee Cold by Galt MacDermot.}
Filed under italy
From a laneway in Fossa…
I took this from the tiny balcony of the house in Fossa. As Roger walked along the laneway below on his way to the Boccabella shop and passed someone on their phone, he had no idea I was taking a photograph from above.
It is some years ago now, at a time when we were staying in the family house at the village in Abruzzo for a month and I was starting to write Mezza Italiana. It feels so strange to know that the damaged house now stands empty and the village a ghost town since the earthquake.
But I also feel so fortunate and grateful for the times I got to the experience the village at its happy and lively best, the connection it gave me to family and for the stories it has given, and hopefully will continue to give.
Filed under books + writing, italy
First of the purple snow peas…
…keeping up with the eggplants (see previous post). Not sure what it is but there seems to be quite a bit of purple produce creeping into the vegie patch this summer. This is the first time I’ve grown these heirloom variety purple snow peas so (apart from eating one to try first up straight from the garden) I’m thinking of putting them in a salad or perhaps a stirfry.Filed under garden + vintage linens
in the vegie patch…
The first of the eggplants are starting to emerge…
I’m already thinking melanzane involtini, eggplant lasagne, baked, stuffed eggplant and slices grilled on the barbecue and preserved in smoked salt and olive oil!
Related article: Involtini di melanzane al forno…
Filed under dishes + recipes, garden + vintage linens, kitchen stories
buon anno a tutti…
A much younger me at the window of the medieval Castle Ocre above Fossa in Abruzzo…
It’s now more than 20 years since this was taken on my first trip to the village in Italy where part of my family came from. I never expected the impact this journey would have, how it would come to be something I would write about or that the castle would be badly damaged by earthquake and partially collapse thirteen years later.
Change is constant – both the good and the difficult. I hope this fresh year brings you a lovely, new experience no matter how small or large that may come to make you look back and feel such surprise and gladness. Tante belle cose, Zoe xx
Filed under italy
Christmas shopping…
Couldn’t resist taking a quick picture of these Italian products I saw as part of a Christmas display in the general supermarket of a country town in Australia. And both northern and southern Italy represented!
There was once a time when it was unusual to see even a panettone in the supermarket of an Australian capital city let alone a smaller town. So lovely how food can quietly keep on bringing different cultures together!
Filed under italy
pomodori verdi ~ green tomatoes…
Unexpectedly found these beauties growing behind another plant in a pot on the balcony. Completely self-sown! There must be at least thirty cherry tomatoes on the plant. A lovely, surprise present from nature. Can’t wait for them to ripen!
Filed under garden + vintage linens
Stitching, thread and pine needles…
Came across this lovely linen, hand towel, circa 1940s/1950s, hand-embroidered to be a keepsake from Norfolk Island. (The picture frame is circa 1920s that I already had and happened to be a lucky fit!)
As some may know from my books, collecting hand-sewn, vintage linens began for me with pieces I inherited from my Australian and Italian grandmothers. Continuing to collect such pieces crept up on me and took hold after I found myself sorting through a trestle table of vintage linens at a market stall in L’Aquila.
Good sellers of vintage linens will always have them in neat, clean condition, usually ironed and often starched too. I love to wonder about who may have taken the time and effort to have made that item many decades before. Perhaps this one was sewn by someone snug inside on a windy, wintry day on Norfolk Island!
{Linen is from Geordie Lane, Maleny.}
Filed under garden + vintage linens, inspiration + history
Spaghettini with lemon, chilli, garlic and herbs…
Looking forward to cooking spaghettini with these lovely fresh ingredients!
The ‘dosa spaghetti’ implement for measuring out dry spaghetti portions comes from a little shop in Orvieto, Umbria.
Still often cook too much though…
Filed under dishes + recipes, garden + vintage linens, kitchen stories
From over the Aterno Valley, Abruzzo…
The steeple of Santa Maria Assunta in Fossa… the church that sits opposite my family’s house in Abruzzo. It was lovely to walk along the lanes below and listen to the bell tolling the time of day or to hear it from afar when you were on your way back to the village.
When I took this in 2005, it was a beautiful, serene day with no hint that just four years later the steeple’s turret would be gone when the earthquake caused it to crash down through the church roof.
Originally built in the 1200s, the church was expanded during the 1400s and then partly rebuilt following the earthquake of 1703. (At this time, my family’s house was about a decade old and had experienced its first terremoto.) I took this photograph with my old Pentax camera on black and white film. Although just over a decade ago, I didn’t yet have a digital camera then!
Filed under italy, old photographs + art
from Italia to Australia…
Another piece from my Italian great-grandmother, Bisnonna Francesca’s glory box… (Cesca in my books). This hand-embroidered pillow sham from 1920s Calabria travelled in the hull of a ship across the world to a new life in Australia and remained tucked away for many decades… a keepsake of another place and life that might have been.
Filed under garden + vintage linens, inspiration + history, italy
flowers and the scent of memories…
The first carnations are in bloom in the backyard and have a lovely scent…
I could smell their perfume on the breeze as soon as I walked outside. Decided to grow some of these to remember my great-grandmother, Charlotte who had them in her front garden. (Charlotte got a small mention in Joe’s Fruit Shop and Milk Bar when I wrote of her scones, along with Granny Maddalena’s frittata, revealing a bit of their everyday lives through what they cooked.)
Perhaps carnations are considered somewhat old-fashioned at present but I never worry about fashion when it comes to things like flowers, to me they’re all lovely and bring a little happiness…
Filed under garden + vintage linens, kitchen stories
a stone house among the lavender…
Swiss Italian, Aquilino Tinetti originally built this stone farmhouse at Shepherds Flat in central Victoria circa 1860. He and his wife Maria had thirteen children and the 100 acres were run as a dairy farm for the next 120 years.
In the 1980s, Carol White purchased the property, restored the historic stone buildings and planted lavender and it is now called Lavandula.
It is a beautiful place to visit and as part of research for the next book especially interesting for me to see the original 19th century farmhouse set up including a great cellar below a very steep, internal staircase, and also some friends in the kitchen garden…
Filed under inspiration + history
first fig for the season…
Usually we end up eating most of these picked straight from the tree in the backyard but perhaps this year some might last long enough to cook with…
Filed under garden + vintage linens, kitchen stories
with needle and thread…
Another piece from the chest of drawers containing linens sewn by my grandmothers… since it was last a picture of my Italian great-grandmother’s initialled linen pillow cover (or pillow sham) from 1920s Calabria, it seemed fitting this time to take out this doily with embroidery hand-stitched by my Australian grandmother, circa 1950s in Brisbane – mezza italiana/mezza australiana….I currently have it on top of a duchess, as in furniture (now there’s a term that possibly makes me sound Iike I’m about a hundred years old!)
Filed under garden + vintage linens, inspiration + history
Earthquake in central Italy…
Stretti abbracciati to all in Accumoli, Amatrice, Arquata del Tronto, Pescara del Tronto and the surrounding towns to have faced the most recent earthquake in central Italy. I have not experienced such a terremoto though being in Abruzzo weeks after the 2009 earthquake I saw up close the devastation on towns and the despair and pain wrought on people and animals. I keep thinking of those who are currently living through this tragedy and those survivors of 2009 who felt the quake being fifty kilometres south. Both quakes occurred just after 3.30am, the most dangerous time when people are vulnerable in sleep. While the people of the Apennine Mountains in central Italy are strong and know living amid such exquisite beauty has its underside, this is a great blow to bear when recovery is still ongoing from the 2009 earthquake. There were those who experienced it and moved north to be safer and have now had the trauma of another. Again, abbracci to all…
Filed under italy
Late winter rain bringing the lemon tree back to life…
Chatting over the fence my Sicilian neighbour, who is in her eighties, recommended to put a lemon leaf under polpette (those Italian slightly egg-shaped meatballs) when frying them in olive oil in the pan – not necessarily to eat the leaf but for it to impart flavour during cooking. I haven’t tried that yet however seeing these fresh young leaves I might need to give it a go.
Books update…
Mezza Italiana and Joe’s Fruit Shop and Milk Bar are both now in bookshops in Italy!
It is such a thrill, especially to think back to when I first started writing Mezza in a notebook on the kitchen table in the Abruzzo house of my family. What might the generations who sat there before me have thought?!
Thank you to all of you who have shown such affection and support for these books (and to those who’ve messaged me after spotting the books already in Milan and Florence!) I am very grateful! Tante belle cose, Zoe xx
Filed under books + writing, italy
To come from what is left behind…
As much as migrants love and embrace their new country, many cannot help but feel they’ve left a piece of themselves behind… and often those born in later generations still feel that bind as well.
This poignant sculpture at Marseilles is by Bruno Catalano, Moroccan-born in a Sicilian family who later moved to France. Being ten years old and watching from a boat his native land fade away had a profound impact that would stay with him throughout his life.
Bruno Catalano
Filed under old photographs + art
From the glory box of my bisnonna…
The initials of my great-grandmother, bisnonna Francesca Carrozza, hand-stitched onto this linen pillow cover in 1920s Calabria for her glory box that was to end up in 1930s Australia. I didn’t fully appreciate these linens when I was young but they have since become precious to me.
Filed under garden + vintage linens, inspiration + history, italy
Mini ‘tomato day’…
When I came across cherry tomatoes selling cheap a little while back, I couldn’t resist. This was my mini ‘tomato day’, well, couple of hours, not with all the family but just me, and not to make passata but to make ‘sun-dried’ cherry tomatoes.
A little olive oil and smoked salt, a couple of hours in a very slow oven and once cooled they were ready to put into jars drizzled in more olive oil to preserve them (not that they lasted too long!)
Filed under kitchen stories
Books update…
Mezza Italiana now available in the UK
Including at bookstores such as Foyles, Waterstones, WHSmith and others as well as online stores.
It is available in paperback, ebook and audiobook.
Many thanks to ABC Books and HarperCollins 360 UK!!
________________________________________
Filed under books + writing
From 6th June, 1946…
Today it is 70 years since my Italian grandparents, Nonno Anni and Nanna Francesca signed the lease on premises to start up their fruit shop and milk bar in Australia.
And so began many years when they opened the shop from 7am until 11pm, only the two of them working there (with a baby in tow) and closing just two days a year at Christmas and Easter.
Thinking of them with much gratitude for all their hard work and sacrifice to make it such a success.
Filed under books + writing, inspiration + history
the Violet Coast of west Calabria…
Costa Viola…the Violet Coast of west Calabria (when I took this the violet colour of melding sea and sky seemed even more vibrant in reality).
This view of the Tyrrhenian Sea is what my Italian grandmother, Nanna Francesca, saw from the balcony of her childhood home – her grandmother’s house – where she and her mother lived after her father went to Australia in 1927.
The house is now gone but I took this from the street where it stood. Those hills across the sea in the distance are in Sicily. Closer are some of the palm trees that give the small, coastal town that was my grandmother’s birthplace its name – Palmi. Though hard to spot, the tall-masted boats on the sea are sword-fishing boats.
Filed under italy
Last of the summer basil…
Time for an Italian classic…a take on Pizza Margherita.
I can’t claim any credit for this one – it all goes to onorario italiano Roger who has perfected pizza dough alla casa.
For the topping this time…San Marzano tomatoes, mozzarella di bufala and the last of the summer basil from the vegie patch.
Buon appetito!
Filed under garden + vintage linens, kitchen stories
Ethel’s Chooks…
Perhaps it’s old-fashioned but I still have a wall calendar where I write up all that’s happening. This year it features paintings by William T. Cooper (1934-2015) an Australian artist who painted mostly natural subjects, especially birds. He painted with extreme precision so if there were a certain number of a certain colour feathers then that is exactly what he depicted.
While he painted many exotic species too, I love this painting, Ethel’s Chooks, which Cooper painted of his neighbour’s chooks that free ranged around the farm. When I sit down to my desk each day, seeing the work and precision Cooper put into his art is inspiring. His career as an artist spanned more than 50 years and he continued to paint into his 80s.
Filed under inspiration + history, old photographs + art
Seven years on from the earthquake…
On the anniversary of the 2009 Abruzzo earthquake today, I’m thinking of the 309 people who lost their lives and the many thousands who continue to reside in temporary housing seven years on.
This recent article from the Irish Times sheds some light on where reconstruction efforts in L’Aquila currently stand…
Seven years on, shadow of earthquake still hangs over L’Aquila.
As well as the damage to the Abruzzo capital, many surrounding small towns also continue to be affected in the aftermath including the villages where my family comes from and the house that has belonged to the family for generations. Many of these once lively villages remain almost ghost towns while it is assumed they have been rebuilt.
Stiamo pensando di tutti voi.
Filed under italy
Italian Australian Easter…
With Easter coming up, I was asked about my Italian family’s gatherings for part of an article in the latest issue of Brisbane News. In the photograph, I have in front of me a Colomba di Pasqua, an Easter dove cake similar to the Italian Christmas panettone.
I also fondly recall Nanna Francesca making Pane di Pasqua, Easter bread, with whole eggs in their shells tucked among the plaited dough (the eggs became like hardboiled as the dough baked).
By the way, to the left in the photo is her Sunflower coffee set, which I treasure. It is now almost 70 years old!
Buona Pasqua!
{Click on article for a larger version.}
Filed under kitchen stories
Backyard harvest…
From the Isabella vine that grows over the pergola, some of the grapes harvested this year (in one of Nanna Francesca’s salad bowls circa 1960s/70s.) Each year the grapevine yields enough to make about half a dozen bottles of wine…a modest, homemade vintage but a tiny bit of Italy in an Australian suburban backyard.Filed under garden + vintage linens, kitchen stories
Window light….
This window in the small house in Italy, that has sheltered different generations of my family for centuries, is my favourite. It is the tiniest and gives a view out over the village of Fossa like peering from a cubby house. I also love that it shows how thick the stone walls are.
Currently, the house still stands uninhabited and damaged as it was from the day of the earthquake back in 2009 but the good news is, after a long wait, it seems several villagers are now in the process of their houses starting to be repaired.
Filed under italy
Grandmother memories ~ memorie nonna…
Today, my Italian grandmother, Francesca, would have been 90 years old. This is one of my favourite photographs of her, taken with friends in the Botanic Gardens circa 1950s.
Although it has been some years now that Nanna Francesca has been gone, for me she lives on in memories of our cooking, shopping and going to the ‘picture theatre’ together, and every time I put one of her tablecloths on the table or there is simmering ‘pasta gravy’, made just like hers, on the stove.
Con amore, molte grazie e auguri, cara Nonna Francesca. xxx
Filed under inspiration + history
Hand-bound books…
In Bendigo not long ago, I came across a bookbinding shop that is the most similar I’ve found in Australia to the one I came across in Florence (p.212 Mezza Italiana). I couldn’t resist these handmade books and the owner kindly offered to emboss my name on them.
I wrote the first draft of Joe’s Fruit Shop and Milk Bar longhand in foolscap exercise books. The pens I used were cheap, plastic biros. The ink ran out in close to a dozen by the end. Mezza Italiana also began in longhand, at the kitchen table in my family’s house in Italy. That time I wrote in several diary planners that were out of date, with similar plastic biros.
These hand-bound books are so beautiful I feel almost afraid to write in them!
Filed under books + writing, inspiration + history
The path toward a fresh year…
A new year stretches ahead and there is something thrilling and also sobering in not knowing where our paths may meander as the months unfold. Hope this year is a wonderful one for you that brings much happiness! I couldn’t go past this beautiful painting by L’Aquila artist, Juan Alfredo Parisse to begin the year. He painted it on the road below my family’s village of Fossa in the Aterno Valley of Abruzzo and it is called, Verso Fossa.
Filed under inspiration + history, italy, old photographs + art
Italian Christmas sweets…
Time for some Italian Christmas treats… these poco zeppole {zippoli} are flavoured with citrus zest and Boronia Marsala {yes, the bottle with the little horse and cart on the label for those in the know}.
This small, bite-size version of the dumplings is very light {making them dangerously moreish!}
We always ate them on Christmas Eve at my Italian grandparents’ house after another Italian tradition, the fish dinner the night before Christmas.
* Recipe on p.338 of Mezza Italiana
Filed under kitchen stories
keeping the past present…
I have been in central Victoria doing research for part of the next book and am completely taken by all the beautiful, historic buildings still being utilised and looked after in so many towns. This hotel in Trentham was badly damaged by fire a decade ago and yet rather than being given up on, it is great to see it brought back to its former self. Seeing the new corrugated iron roof you can almost imagine it when first built back in the 1860s…Filed under inspiration + history
Milk bar glassware, circa 1950s…
Original, circa 1950s glassware from Nonno Anni and Nanna Francesca’s milk bar… milkshake glasses, the glass for the homemade orange drink and the bowl used for ice cream sundaes and fruit salads.
Built to last, once they were used everyday, often banged down on the milk bar counter and washed ready for the next customers. Funny how time changes objects – these days I keep them in the ‘good’ glass cabinet in the lounge room – smiling.
Filed under kitchen stories
Tower of Palazzo Vecchio and the Galleria degli Uffizi in Firenze…
…taken in 2005 when I was about to join the queue to the gallery. At the time, it was 240 years since the Uffizi Gallery officially opened to the public in 1765 and I love the thought that perhaps standing in this spot a couple of centuries ago with everyone wearing the clothing of the time, we could still look up and see almost the same view…
Filed under inspiration + history, italy
pizzette fritte…
A decadent version of little pizzas with the fluffy dough fried then oven-baked – pizzette fritte. {Apparently, considered the way pizzas were first made.} They are very light and if made well in the traditional way, should not absorb the olive oil.
On the left, pesto, prosciutto e parmigiano. And to the right, tomato, basil and bocconcini. Buon appetito!
Filed under dishes + recipes, inspiration + history, kitchen stories
the Astoria Café…
The Astoria Café in Brisbane, where my grandparents worked in the 1940s, had long been demolished by the time I wrote about it. I relied on my grandparents’ stories and old pictures and wished it had still been around for me to see.
Recently, I was in Sydney to talk about Joe’s Fruit Shop and Milk Bar at a conference and author, Estelle Pinney, who’d been in the audience, approached me afterwards. Estelle told me she’d enjoyed reading Joe’s very much and that she had frequented the Astoria Café many times in the forties. (I don’t think Estelle will mind me saying that she is now in her eighties and extremely sprightly!) It was wonderful to hear her recollections of the café and as always, I’m so grateful for the insights into the past that writing this book has opened to me.
Thank you to all of you who have shared how Joe’s has connected with your own lives, past and present.
Filed under inspiration + history
the “cash register”…
The “cash register” at my grandparents’ fruit shop and milk bar was this wooden cash box. For decades, pounds, shillings and pence made their way in and out of it and for the final few years, dollars and cents. All calculations were made in one’s head (and no doubt at lightning speed when the pressure was on with a crowd of customers waiting!)
The wood feels very battered from much use, the lid has come off its hinges and has some watermarks as though much opened with hands damp from retrieving wet bottles of soft drink or making ice-creams. I love how a band-aid has been stuck on the bottom corner where the wood began to split! It looks like an old timber box perhaps ready for the tip but for me it contains so much history as an integral part of the fruit shop and milk bar.
Joe’s Fruit Shop and Milk Bar
Filed under inspiration + history, kitchen stories
Inside the milk bar…
Nonno Anni behind the counter of the milk bar – one of very few photographs taken inside. Great to see the milkshake machines to the right. It is difficult to decipher some of the brands of sweets, cigarettes and biscuits around the counter though I can see Mars chocolates {first made in 1932}, Violet Crumbles {since 1913} and a sign for Peters ice-cream {since 1907}.
Filed under inspiration + history
milk bar glass, circa 1950…
An original glass {circa 1950} from Nanna Francesca and Nonno Anni’s milk bar. These were mostly used for my grandfather’s sought-after, homemade orange drink but customers would also request milkshakes in them too if they preferred glass to one of the metal canisters.
The milkshake flavours available at the time were chocolate, strawberry, vanilla, custard, lime and caramel, with chocolate always the most popular. The only flavours I had in the house to make this one were maple syrup and vanilla bean, which turned out quite delicious. And yes, that is an old-style, waxed paper straw!
Joe’s Fruit Shop and Milk Bar
Filed under books + writing, kitchen stories, old photographs + art
Classic lasagne…
Traditional lasagne, for me, is in the same category of favourite, comfort food as a good, old-style hamburger with the lot. {Perhaps a reflection of an Italian-Australian upbringing!} I learned to make lasagne when I was about 11 or 12, and must have made hundreds over the years.
Recently, I cooked the first in my new lasagne dish from Umbria. My previous lasagne dish that my Mum gave me I used for 20 years {sadly, it got a large crack in it}, so this dish has some work ahead of it!
Some say Italy didn’t have spaghetti until Marco Polo discovered noodles in Asia and that may be the case, however Italians did already have pasta. In Roman times, they cooked sheets of pasta in a dish similar to lasagne and therefore it is possibly one of the original pasta dishes.
Filed under italy, kitchen stories
Italian internees, Australia 1942…
Italian internees at the ‘secret’ Western Creek internment camp in 1942. My grandfather, Annibale (far right, standing) was 18 years old and working as a farmhand at Applethorpe when he was interned.
Those familiar with Joe’s Fruit Shop and Milk Bar will know that despite much searching I have to date been unable to uncover any document that officially shows this internment camp existed. This is despite much anecdotal evidence gathered from internees, a guard and residents of the nearby Queensland town of Millmerran. As well as photographs taken inside the camp (see tent to left) and a tiny newspaper article that appeared in The Western Star and Roma Advertiser in 1942.
Filed under books + writing
Joe’s milk bar, circa 1950s…
One of the very few photographs taken inside my family’s milk bar in the 1950s (and also one of my favourites). Nonno Anni is behind the counter and Bisnonno Vitale is leaning on it.
This is the era when my grandparents were working 7am-11pm, 363 days a year at their fruit shop and milk bar. My great-grandfather Vitale helped out at the busy times yet continued in his own job at the Brown and Broad sawmill beside the Brisbane River in Teneriffe.
Joe’s Fruit Shop and Milk Bar
Filed under books + writing
Slow-roasted artichokes, fennel and red onion…
Slow-roasted artichokes, fennel and red onion… perhaps not as pretty as when in their natural state {see link below} but a little more tasty. These I roughly chopped to similar sizes and slow-roasted for about an hour drizzled with olive oil, balsamic vinegar, and a sprinkling of salt, brown sugar, smoked paprika and rosemary leaves.
Related post: From the kitchen table…
Filed under dishes + recipes, kitchen stories
From the kitchen table…
…beautiful shapes and colours. Thought I might try these three together for a different take on roast vegies…
See them straight from the oven: slow-roasted artichokes, fennel & red onion
Filed under kitchen stories
the fairy tree dwellers…
Part of The Fairies Tree in Fitzroy Gardens, carved in the early 1930s by sculptor Ola Cohn {1892-1964} as a gift to the children of Melbourne. Though my own childhood is distant, I found myself rushing through the gardens to find it. And while there were plenty of beautifully carved tree folk to capture, I was taken by this little group hiding in a notch near the base of the trunk, and especially like the owl.
Afterwards, I read, “A Way with the Fairies”, Ola Cohn’s autobiography, and it was interesting to learn more of this Australian sculptor and philanthropist. For many female artists of a certain era, sadly, their work did not always receive all the recognition it may have merited.
A gift to the children of Melbourne…
“I have carved a tree in the Fitzroy Gardens for you and the fairies, but mostly for the fairies and those who believe in them. For they will understand how necessary it is to have a fairy sanctuary – a place that is sacred and safe as a home should be to all living creatures.” Ola Cohn
Filed under old photographs + art
basil pesto orecchiette with crispy prosciutto…
So many traditional Italian dishes were created by combining leftovers, which I love as I can’t stand wasting good food by tossing it out. And while I know I would definitely not be the first to try this, it was a happy discovery when faced with some leftover prosciutto to fry it, sprinkle it and taste for the first time – basil pesto orecchiette with crispy prosciutto.
Several different Italian regions from north and south getting together cheerfully on a plate…
Filed under inspiration + history, kitchen stories
Mercers Lane Mosaic…
A beautiful, mosaic artwork is emerging along Mercers Lane in Ingham, Queensland to commemorate the history of the local sugarcane industry. Really inspiring to discover around 2000 local volunteers and tourists so far have taken part in creating the mosaic and it’s wonderful to see local history recorded in art like this, particularly all the different cultures that have been a part. 
Filed under inspiration + history, old photographs + art
shelling peas…
Each day the peas in the vegie patch are getting plumper and I can’t wait until they are ready to be picked, not that any will make it to the pot. Since childhood, I’ve loved fresh peas straight from the garden. And peas seemed to have worked their way into both my books: Nanna Francesca, her mother and grandmother in Calabria, sitting on their balcony overlooking the sea, shelling peas and feeling the breeze as lightning licked the horizon… And the pea patch Nonno Anni grew in his New Farm backyard in my childhood… Even now, though both my grandparents are gone, when I look at my own, much smaller, pea patch, I’m reminded of happy memories being a child among their pea plants that were taller than I was – my own little forest. Winter sun warm on my shoulders as I would make my way along the rows, eating the peas, my grandparents not far away…
Filed under garden + vintage linens, kitchen stories
New life between beautiful old walls…
Recently, I have been travelling in southwest Queensland for research for the next book. In the main street of Laidley, I happened across this beautiful old building that was originally a bakery when it was built back in 1905. It is currently empty and seemed to be being renovated inside. Lovely how so many country towns value and utilise their historic buildings. Seeing the words ‘Soft Drinks’ in faded paint across the glass over the front entrance, I could not help imagining turning it into an old-style, 1950s milk bar…
Filed under inspiration + history
home-baked focaccia e tramezzini…
Home-baked focaccia with rosemary from the garden and Australian-grown garlic and olive oil. Although I had a very brief knead of the dough, the credit all goes to Roger for this one. A lovely way to eat it is to make tramezzini by slicing the focaccia in half, spreading the inside of each piece with basil pesto and then for the filling, adding pieces of grilled haloumi, slices of barbecued eggplant marinated in olive oil, ripe tomatoes, a handful of rocket, roasted capsicum and thinly-sliced, roasted pumpkin.
Filed under dishes + recipes, kitchen stories
Stonehenge Boarding house…
Stonehenge Boarding house at 157 Leichhardt St, Spring Hill, Brisbane, where three generations of my family lived during the 1940s. It is amazing to see how steeply pitched the roof is considering my father climbed to the top of it when he was not quite three and a half and my Nonno had to get him back down. Sadly, this house, built circa 1859 of convict-hewn stone, was demolished in the 1950s.
Photograph courtesy of the Fryer Library, University of Qld and http://www.yourbrisbanepastandpresent.com/
Filed under books + writing
Eggplant harvest…
The two eggplant bushes must be very happy in their spots in the vegie patch (despite their relative lack of attention!) Picked these three beauties this morning and there are many more growing. Looks like it will be eggplant parmigiana cooking in our house this weekend. Might also grill some sliced melanzane on the barbecue and bottle it in olive oil too…
Filed under kitchen stories
Sicilian orange and fennel salad…
I had never tasted this before but decided to make it anyway. Sliced fennel, orange segments, a drizzle of olive oil and some salt may sound like a curious combination of flavours but I was pleasantly surprised. Delicious on its own or great accompaniment to slow roasted lamb.
Filed under dishes + recipes, kitchen stories
Official opening of Anzac Square, Brisbane…
Official opening of Anzac Square in Brisbane on 25th April, 1930 (taken from Ann St looking towards Adelaide St).
– image courtesy State Library, Qld.
{For those familiar with the Astoria Café in Joe’s Fruit Shop and Milk Bar, this building can be seen in the far right of the photograph.}
Filed under inspiration + history, old photographs + art
one-pot cooking…
… ‘meat and veg Italian-style’ – polpette, melanzane e piselli in passata con due formaggi – meatballs, eggplant and peas in passata with two cheeses.
{Yes, there are vegies in there – under the cheese…}
Filed under inspiration + history
Queen Street, Brisbane in 1939…
….as it looked when my grandfather, Annibale arrived alone in Australia at the age of 15. Met by his father, Vitale, who took him straight from the ship dock to this street to buy some new work boots. The very next day, they left Brisbane for Annibale to commence work at a farm 200km away. After seven years apart, father and son got to spend just 24 hours together.
{image courtesy State Library, Qld}
Joe’s Fruit Shop and Milk Bar
Filed under inspiration + history, old photographs + art
Milk Bar in the Regent Theatre, Brisbane circa 1936…
{image courtesy State Library, Qld}
Filed under old photographs + art
a seat by the cove…
— Farm Cove, Royal Botanic Gardens
So lovely that whenever in Sydney, despite the hectic traffic and millions of people, it is still always possible to find an empty seat to watch the harbour…
Filed under inspiration + history, old photographs + art
Bisnonna’s frittata…
For my Great-Granny Maddalena’s frittata, the main ingredients were eggs, some salt and flat-leaf parsley. She also used a lot of olive oil (her frittata never stuck to the pan!)
In Italy, she included ‘mountain greens’ that she’d collected from the hillsides in her apron, such as agretti, wild asparagus, nettles and an array of ‘wild greens’.
The frittata may also be baked in an oven rather than in a pan. This is a version of her frittata I made with asparagus and red onion – I stress this is ‘home cooking’ not ‘chef cooking’!!
Filed under dishes + recipes, kitchen stories
from Italia to Australia…
The Italian ship, ‘Remo’, which is linked to four generations of my family… my great-grandfather, Vitale arrived in Australia for the second time aboard it in 1932, my grandfather, Annibale sailed from Italy in it when he was just 15 in 1939, my father was named after it, and my nephew shares with it his second name.
Filed under italy
‘Sali e Tabacchi’…
This sign might be familiar to those who have bought a bus or lottery ticket, tobacco or, until recent years, salt in Italy. Yes, the traditional ‘Sali e Tabacchi’ or ‘Salt and Tobacco’ shop was for a long time the only place to buy salt while it remained a monopoly of the state, (a nod perhaps to ancient times when salt was worth as much as gold!)
However, we took this photo in Australia, not Italy, after spotting the sign hidden along a Melbourne laneway. Another little bit of Italy in the hearts of those in Australia. Looking forward to heading back to Melbourne again in March!
Filed under italy
uno zufolo ~ an Italian folk flute…
Giuseppe (Joe) Castellana was taught by his Nonno in Sicily how to play the zufolo (an Italian flute dating back to the 14th century). After he migrated to Australia, Joe continued the tradition – playing the folk music that he learnt from his grandfather in Italy at performances in Australia over many decades.
He swapped between playing the zufulo and the accordion at the launch for Joe’s Fruit Shop and Milk Bar and I was touched when, at the end of the evening, Joe, who is now 82, gave me a zufolo that he had hand-carved himself.
Filed under italy
Chiacchiere… chitter-chatter ~ carnival sweets
My Italian grandmother made these all the time so I thought it fitting to serve them on one of her Florentine, painted wooden serving trays on the terrazzo table that sat on my grandparents’ patio for decades.
These crispy ribbons of pastry dusted with sugar are a sweet popular for centuries throughout Italy and across Europe and Asia. In Italy, they are traditionally eaten at the time of Carnevale, when cities, towns and villages celebrate their historical connections. The ‘chitter-chatter’ pop up under the guise of different names in different regions – chiacchiere, crostole, bugie, cenci, sfogliatelle, nodi, ali d’angelo, frappe, cioffe, galani, sfrappole…
Beware, for chiacchiere or ‘rumours’ can be addictive. They are best if light and flaky but still crunchy with some substance.
Ingredients:
- 450g plain flour {plus extra for kneading}
- 3 free range eggs
- 50g butter
- 100g caster sugar {raw, unbleached if available}
- 50ml Marsala {grappa or brandy may be substituted}
- 1tsp vanilla bean extract
- oil for frying
- extra caster sugar or icing sugar to sprinkle
Method:
- Sift the flour into a mixing bowl. Make a well in the middle and add the eggs, butter, sugar, Marsala and vanilla, mixing thoroughly to create a dough.
- Turn the dough out onto a floured surface and knead until smooth {dusting extra flour across surface to prevent sticking as needed}.
- Use a rolling pin or a pasta machine to roll the dough to lasagna sheet thinness.
- Cut into strips roughly 4-5 cm wide, or to your liking {an alternative is using a fluted, pastry/ pasta wheel cutter to give a crinkled edge}.
- Heat the oil in a deep frying pan and fry several strips at a time until they are golden.
- Remove with a slotted spoon and drain on absorbent kitchen paper.
- Sprinkle with caster sugar while still hot, or allow to cool completely then cover with sifted icing sugar.
Serves a good gathering chatting over coffee or sweet fortified wine.
Filed under dishes + recipes, inspiration + history, italy, kitchen stories
vino e formaggio…
Fossa house, Abruzzo, a decade ago… pecorino cheese made by two women on a farm down in the valley, olives from the L’Aquila market, cerasuolo wine from a nearby vineyard, the paisley tablecloth Nanna Francesca purchased from a travelling merchant who drove from village to village in his small truck full of wares, an Italian folk song blaring from speakers to notify buyers he had arrived.
Filed under italy
the first copy…
An advance copy of Joe’s Fruit Shop and Milk Bar arrived on my doorstep today… It is quite incredible to hold the book in my hands, flick through the pages and smell the scent of the paper. I have known since I was teenager that this was a book I one day hoped to write so in essence it’s been 25 years in the making! I also received some posters like the ones that will appear in bookshops, which makes it all feel that bit more real. Only three weeks until Joe’s Fruit Shop and Milk Bar will be on bookshop shelves!
Filed under books + writing
Italian street painting in Sydney…
Giuseppe, aka Pepe, is a Madonnaro whom we came across by the harbour at Circular Quay in Sydney. Since the 16th century, Madonnari from Puglia in Italy’s south have been itinerant artists who originally went to cities to work on the cathedrals and when the job was done found a way to make a living by recreating paintings from the church on the pavement. Aware of festivals and holy days in each town, the Madonnari would travel to different provinces throughout Italy to eke out a living from observers who would throw coins if they approved of the work. Pepe explained he makes a living based solely on donations and never sells his paintings. Once they are completed, he gives them away to charitable organisations that then raise money by auctioning his paintings. His most recent work sold for $16,000.
Filed under italy, old photographs + art
December red…
…so many delicious berries in season perfect for a summer Christmas!
raspberries ~ cherries ~ redcurrants
Filed under kitchen stories
sweet dumplings…
These little doughnut balls are also known as zippoli, zeppole or sfingi in Italy depending on the region where they are cooked. (I’ve also tasted the German version quarkbällchen – known too as ‘Bavarian snowballs’ – from a roadside stall not far from Schloss Neuschwanstein.) There’s something about eating them fresh and hot from the pan, dusted with sugar! Often a Christmas treat – although they are good any time of year – I have treasured memories of my Italian grandmother cooking them to have after dinner on Christmas Eve.
Filed under kitchen stories
the Book House…
Happened across this gorgeous Little Free Library in Maple Street, Maleny where you can leave a book and swap it for another. Such a lovely idea. I’m definitely going to take a couple of books to leave there next time…
Filed under books + writing, inspiration + history
Mulberry pie for supper…
On a Sunday afternoon walk, we discovered mulberry trees growing wild along the creek and were not the only ones who picked the berries – the largest, plumpest and sweetest we’d come across in ages. Almost half an hour later the trees were still heavy with fruit, plenty left to share with others, the birds and flying foxes. That night Roger made mulberry pie with crumbly, buttery shortcrust pastry for supper. A little bit of ‘Sunday afternoon’ to last throughout the week…
Filed under kitchen stories
un piccolo pezzo di paradiso…
Along the Hermitage Foreshore track in Sydney Harbour National Park a couple of Sunday mornings ago…. absolute magic!
Filed under inspiration + history
Zoë Boccabella 