Focaccia is ready!

Looks really good, but I haven't tasted it yet. It is cooling. When Gene gets home he can render a verdict.

Back to the basics

It's Thursday morning and I think I am finally over my jet lag.  This was the worst I have ever experienced, probably because of all the stress before we left.  Gene has gone to Lugano with Dennis Bava, our friend who has an apartment in Menaggio.  They are going to get new tires for Dennis's car and visit some banks.  I stayed home and continued  the adventure of making focaccia.  The adventure began with the search for yeast.  I bought ammoniaca, agente lievitante, which turned out to be baking powder.  Then we bought lievito per dolci which is baking soda and finally we bought lievito di birra which turned out to be yeast.  I assembled the dough, kneaded for 10 minutes and it is now rising for an hour.  I will post a photo of the finished product even if it doesn't turn out the way it is supposed to.  We had listened to Frances Mayes book "Everyday in Tuscany" on our last car trip to the Bay Area.  Included was a CD of recipes she made in Italy.  This is my first attempt at a very easy recipe.  We'll see if I do any more.  I am determined do more cooking this year even if it contributes to more weight gain.  Tomorrow we will head to the consorzio in Menaggio to purchase some tomato and basil plants and get our garden started.

We had dinner with Dennis and Anna at Pizzeria Lugano the other night.  They had just arrived in Menaggio and will  be here a few days before returning to Milano.  They will be back and forth all summer.  It was great to see them.  Dennis is recently diagnosed with cancer and is proceeding with the necessary treatments, so he is not feeling too great.

It is wonderful to be back at Villa degli Angeli.  The owners, Helmut and Gundel Heppner, stayed at our home in Phoenix this winter, and made us very welcome here on our return.  They provided us with an Italian cell phone for which we buy minutes.  This is very helpful as we then don't have to use our American cell phones at .99 per minute and people here can call us without incurring an expensive charge.  There is a new flat screen TV (not large enough for Gene of course).  We have been watching some of the World Cup games with the sound turned off as the commentary is in German.

Time to check my focaccia.  Stay tuned for the results.

Joan

The sun is shining

Good morning from Mezzegra, Italy!  It is Tuesday June 22, 2010 and the sun is shining brightly on Lake Como and the beautiful surrounding majestic mountains. it is around 6:25 am here in Italy , nine hours ahead of the of the West coast of the US.  Joan and I arrived last Friday morning one day ahead of our scheduled 10 week stay here at Villa and took a hotel room in Como.  After getting checked in we had a nice outside cafe lunch, took a walk and then headed for bed.  As usual the first night sleep was fitful and pretty much restless.  Breakfast started at 7 am at the hotel and we were the first to sit down.  Oh, did I say we went to bed around two the previous afternoon?  All those hours didn't seem to make much difference.   After breakfast we headed out for a walk through the walled city of Como. Very quiet but as usual very beautiful, except for the graffiti on half the buildings! Como is situated at the end of the lake and there is no outlet for the water.  If you look at a map the lake is shaped like an inverted "Y". At the opposite end of the lake is the city of Lecco which does have an outlet which eventually flows to the Adda river which eventually flows into the  Mediterranean Sea. The lake has a constant source of water from the Swiss and Italian snow melt

  After our walk we packed up and headed for the Villa with a stop at the supermarket for some essentials. Please remember what the Italians call a villa we would call a very comfortable three bedroom three bathroom home. Situated on the mountainside we have a beautiful view of the lake with lots of lush greenery. Please see posted pictures!  Mario Prestinari, the caretaker, greeted us and had everything ready for our stay.  The property owners are from Germany and live in the Munich area.  We had the opportunity to meet them last year and had a delightful dinner with them and Mario and his wife, Geraldine.  This last winter Gundel and Helmut stayed at our house in Arizona for two weeks in February so we "traded" for two of our ten weeks here.  Very, very nice people. In fact, knowing I enjoy good German beer,They left a case of their country's finest for me to enjoy!!  Very much looking forward to consuming it!!  But now with the brilliant sun, no clouds and weather in the 70's, today we should be ready to really enjoy our stay.  We had 2 days of rain so it is great to see the sun.  It's Tuesday and we will be going down to the open market in Lenno about a half hour walk or a two mile drive.  I think today we drive. I wouldn't want to tire myself out!!!

Gene

First days

Snow on the mountains

View from the house early in the morning

We're back!

Gene and I are back at Villa degli Angeli.  This is our 4th year at Lake Como and our 3rd year in Mezzegra at this villa.  We arrived yesterday and will be here until August 28.  Once we are over our jet lag we will begin to post our adventures.  Hopefully there will be some new ones.  We love to have comments so....  Back soon.

Joan

Golfing in Italy!

Yesterday I got to play my first round of golf ever in Europe. Denis Ducey, his son Nathan and I met Dennis Bava at his home and drove over to the Menaggio and Cadenabbia Golf Club, the second oldest golf club in Italy, for the beginning of a delightful and as usual frustrating round of golf. Dennis is currently suffering from a painful bout of arthrothus so was unable to play but his local knowledge of the course, his banter and playful criticism only added to our experience. For those who might be following along on a map the course is just slightly north of Menaggio away from the lake off the road to Lugano. Switzerland. There is a natural cut through the mountain range allowing this curvy and picturesque passage. The small town of Croce is the actual home of the club. The whole facility is just breathtaking, from the club house to all eighteen holes of golf. A two word description of the course: Tight and Hilly. We didn't hesitate to take golf carts although there were some hearty folks who walked. We teed off around 9:30 am in warm sultry weather and finished around 1:30 pm in hot humid conditions. However, there wasn't a cloud in the sky throughout the day and that made the viewing of each hole that much more beautiful. I felt that I should have been taking pictures every 100 feet as the scenery just got better and better. Look for the pictures elsewhere on the blog. The quality of play was certainly lacking but each of us hit a few good shots. The highlight of the day was Denis hitting a ball on a very uphill par three that had the pin covered the entire way. The green was blind but we all thought his shot had to be close. Upon arrival at the green Denis found his ball nestled within two feet of the hole. We all held our breath as he calmly knocked in the short downhiller for a two!! A great shout went up from the four of us! That was fun. Nathan hit some booming drives and I hit a few that found the green in regulation. The course record was certainly safe throughout the day but we did need to apologize to the head groundskeeper for a few rather large divots taken from his pristine Italian soil. Afterwards we retired to the clubhouse for (another) outstanding lunch. Thank you Dennis for arranging for a great day.

Menaggio and Cadenabbia Golf Club

Garden for the club restaurant


Fairway


Fairway


The golfers, Denis, Nathan and Gene


Dennis Bava at the pin

Funicular Como to Brunate

Yesterday, Thursday Gene and I drove to Como to take the funicular from the lake up to Brunate. It wasn't a very clear day but we had been wanting to do this for the last three years and we were going to do it no matter what. It was extraordinarily steep and after the spectacular view of the last weeks the views were OK. We had lunch at the top and then proceeded to Bennet to do grocery shopping. Denis arrrives today and we are having Dennis and Anna and two of Anna's friends for dinner tomorrow night. Last Tuesday night the owners of the villa took us out to dinner in Lenno along with the caretaker, Mario and his British wife Geraldine. We had a lovely evening and we sat and talked for over 3 hours. Our hosts are German, Mario is Italian, Geraldine British and Gene and I American. Quite the United Nations.


Cooling off in the lake


View from the top


On the way up


Disembarking at the top


Looking down on the way up

Monte Bisbino

The GPS view of the twisty road to the top(the upper white line)


Local traffic


Lake Como


The Alps in the background


Monte Generoso


Looking down at the road and the lake


Lake Como

We drove to the top of Monte Bisbino this morning via Cernobbio. It was 40KM, one way, from the house with at least 15KM of single lane, tortuous switchbacks. The day was clear and the views were incredible.

Gorgeous views

Day to Day

Gene has written about our big adventure to Monte Generoso. I'll fill in about what we have doing day to day. Much of our life revolves around going to the grocery store, whether it be to the big Bennet in Como or the smaller markets in Lenno or Mezzegra. The stores are closed from 1pm-330pm each day and on Sunday afternoons. One buys bread each day and fruit and vegetables are sold ripe so don't last more than a day or two. There are no giant boxes of cereal or large size packaging of anything. We are always running out of something. We have been eating a lot of tomatoes(the ones we planted have fruit but it will be awhile before we'll be eating those)and always need those. We were always searching for orzo which is a rice shaped pasta that I will occasionally cook in Phoenix. Gene and I searched many pasta aisles in various grocery stores looking for orzo. I was making a recipe for a dinner I was preparing for our guests Dennis and Anna. It turns out that orzo in Italian is barley not pasta and what I call orzo is called risine. We've been to grocery stores in Lugano(Migros), in Porlezza(Standa), in Como(Bennet), in Menaggio(Pellicano), in Lenno(Sisa and Dinos) and in Mezzegra(Pellicano)searching for items found everyday in stores in the USA.

During the last week we went to Lugano where a bird crapped on me as we were walking. Just got me on my shorts which was better than last year when Gene got it on his shoulder and neck. We walked to the market in Mezzegra on a very hot, humid day. We've had some sunny, hot, humid days, some thunderstorms and hazy days. We've been to dinner at Dennis and Anna's place in Menaggio and had them over here for dinner. We tried a new restaurant in Menaggio, The Lido, with Dennis and Anna the other night. Yesterday the owners of the villa came by in the morning to try and get the wireless internet set up. We have internet but we had very long cables to our computers. After some hours of trying we gave up. Later that day I Skyped Peter asking if he could help with this setup. After almost 2 hours of trying and with remarkable patience(he is not known for his patience)and after the 4th remote access connection was lost, he said he could do no more. The site for the router was in Italian and he kept losing remote access. The site for the router was still up when I resumed control of my computer and after selecting something that I thought was promising, I tried the wireless and it finally worked. I don't know what Peter did nor what I did but we are estatic and I'm sure that Denis is too.
Denis arrives on Friday and without wireless he will not be able to follow the Dodger games in the middle of the night. Denis is bringing some memory cards for Gene's computer which I ordered from Dell and had sent to his home. Since we have been here Gene's computer has been getting the "blue screen of death"(BSOD) almost every day. I had been on the phone with Dell support for over 2 hours one night trying to figure out the problem. He needed new memory. Since the night Dell worked on his computer the BSOD has not appeared so often and once we install the new memory it should be fine. Thank God for Skype.
Life goes on, the pace is slow. We are loving it.
Ciao.

Monte Generoso

Gene on the trail


Parking lot below BellaVista


1 hour to the top


The path up


The view


Train station at BellaVista


Wildflowers


A lonely bloom


Back at BellaVista: The end of the hike


On the way down

The road home

WE DID IT!!!

All last summer Joan and I talked about walking to the top of Monte Generoso, a mountain that is half in Switzerland and half in Italy. The summit is 1704 meters, around 5400 feet, but until last Thursday we took the easy way, namely, the cog wheel train! It is a beautiful ride but obviously not very strenuous. The train starts in Mendrisio, Switzerland, passes a beautiful overlook called “Bellavista” and then continues to the top. It is very important to pick a crystal clear day to make this excursion because at the top of the summit you have a 360 degree view of the cities of Maroggia, Melide and Lugano in Switzerland and all the way to Milano in Italy. However the truly beautiful lakes of Lugano and Como are the best views of all. Now it seems so far this year the clear days have come on the weekends when the traffic can be very heavy and since weekends or week days make no difference to us we decided it would be best to avoid congestion and proceed on a weekday. We finally decided that last Thursday was THE day for our Monte Generoso walking excursion.

Now remember this was going to a walking experience! The logical spot to start the walk was at the Bellavista overview. There are many, many trails surrounding the mountain and obviously they all intersect at the summit. After a lot of research and map studying this was the logical spot for us. From Mezzegra, our home base, to Mendrisio, Switzerland is a drive of about 25 miles. From there we started our accent to the trail head. The 10 km drive to Bellavista from Mendrisio was rather breathtaking and a little nerve racking. Generoso is a very steep mountain, nothing gradual about it. The road, of course, is two way except that it is only a car and a half wide. One must be very careful going around turns and curves to avoid a collision with oncoming traffic , another reason to pick a weekday for the trip. We proceeded at a clip of about 20-25 miles an hour which was probably too fast. Joan helped a lot with the braking as she kept on pushing the nonexistent brake pedal on the right side of the car. I told her I didn’t think it helped much but she kept on trying. When we did encounter a car both vehicles stopped and you decided who had to back up and nestle against the side and let the other car creep by. I don’t know if my nerves could have handled it if I didn’t have that bottle of Jack Daniels under the front seat!!

OK, we are now safely at the parking lot of Bellavista and ready to start our hike. We packed our lunch, had plenty of drinking water and some of our favorite cookies so we were on our way. It was cool and sunny but unfortunately too hazy for our liking and my photos show it but what the heck, let’s go. As I mentioned we were heading to about 5500 feet in elevation and we started at 3800 feet. The signage for the trail system is very good and the sign said one hour to the summit. Damn liars!!!

We started off in a heavily wooded area and eventually got above the tree line out in the brilliant sun. The scenery was gorgeous but too hazy for quality pictures. The scary part was that if you misstepped and left the trail there were many places where you would slide down at least 500 feet without being able to stop yourself. It looked harmless because the mountain was absolutely covered by a vibrant green fern. It looked “soft” but I think the fern would hasten the speed of the fall and if you looked closely you could see plenty of rocks lurking under the ferns. It would be a very nasty fall to say the least. We were very, very careful. The hike was long but the worst thing was the hordes of flies that bombarded us as we trekked. They seemed to keep up with us no matter how much we tried to swat them away. Luckily they didn't bite. As we approached the top of the mountain Joan found herself really struggling for breath. I was very concerned for her and we stopped a lot for rests. She was really feeling lousy as we got close to the summit. It must have been the altitude and her lessened lung capacity that was making it so hard for her to breathe. I asked her if she wanted to turn back? “No way!” Why didn’t that surprise me? We finally made it and were quite relieved. Oh, and yes, it took us almost two hours to summit rather than one. There is large building at the top with a restaurant and lots of comfortable seating, inside and outside. I got Joan a diet Coke and, of course, a beer for me and we had a delightful lunch. It’s always good not to die on the trail!

About an hour later we both felt fine and started back down. Of course respiratorily it was very easy but it was somewhat tough on the legs and the toes. I told Joan I was getting blisters on my toes but I would just keep walking and not check them out. I felt like someone was holding a flame to my feet. We did not lollygag at all, made very few rest stops and it took us an hour to return to Bellavista. So the sadist who put up the sign that said one hour to the top really meant to say it took one hour to walk down hill to the bottom. I checked my feet and found no blisters at all but the temperature of my toes was 175 degrees or so. It was so nice to get back in the car and drive down the one way- two way 10 km road.

That night we had a quick dinner and went to bed. The good news was that no one died, we got some decent pictures and enjoyed another adventure in Italy!

Come rain or come shine

Villa Melzi


Villa Melzi


Villa Melzi


Villa Melzi


Villa Melzi


Third choice of restaurant in Tremezzo


Lenno


Ducks waiting for the ferry

We had a lot of rain the last few days, finally getting some sunshine on Wednesday. On Monday we took the Rapido to Como for lunch and for something to do on a bad weather day. Didn't stay too long as we have been there many times before. On Tuesday, again trying to do something in heavy rain we drove to Porlezza which is on the way to Lugano to try out a new grocery store. We liked that store and will return again as it is closer than the Bennet in Como. Wednesday we woke up to sunshine finally, walked into Lenno, checked out the olive oil factory to inquire about shipping to the USA and of course bought some fresh bread at the market. The local outdoor market is on Tuesdays but it was raining so hard that day we haven't gone yet. I was able to do some washing that day. My clothes dryer is sunshine so one has to wait for a good day to get the washing to dry. We went out to dinner that evening planning to go to the place in Lenno that serves the tortelloni with butter and sage. Closed on Wednesdays. Our second choice was the Red and White in Tremezzo that Gene had read about. Closed on Wednesday. We ended up eating a the place next door and the food was pretty good. We sat next to some Americans so we had some pleasant conversation over dinner. Today, Thursday, we drove to Bellagio going around the lake, about 55k. Beautiful scenery and over an hour drive. We had lunch and then toured the Villa Melzi which we had never before visited. Beautiful gardens. We took the ferry back to Cadenabbia which took about 10 minutes and we were back at the house 10 minutes after that. You are wondering why we drove over an hour to get to Bellagio when we could have taken the ferry and been there in a very short time. Ask Gene, the driving machine. This afternoon I am enjoying the sunshine while Gene is taking a nap. Hopefully our rainy days are over and we will have a lot more sun to enjoy.

Ciao,

Joan

Shopping for bread on Domenica-Sunday

After two days of rather rainy weather and after having a fabulous dinner at the Bava’s last night in Menaggio Joan and I decided to take a walk down to the town of Mezzegra and purchase some bread for our lunch. Bread in Italy is a necessity not just a staple. In fact, for me to try to make it through a day without the three “B’s” would be an impossibility! The three B’s of course are beer, bread and butter. Yes, I know as half Italian I should be consuming wine but at home I’m a beer guy so in Italy I’m going to be a beer guy. And, hey, butter? Well can anyone get through a day without putting at least a cube of butter on just about everything one consumes? I think not! But these two commodities pale in comparison to the breads available in Italy. Damn, my mouth is watering. So off we go on out jaunt downhill to find some bread. I decided not to blame Joan for running out when I remembered it’s always my job to purchase it. I’m the idiot this time. We meandered through the neighborhood choosing a different route down as there are many small paths, trails, side streets and crossing small vegetable gardens to give one a slightly different view of Lake Come every step of the way. It is a great opportunity to gaze into people’s yards, etc. (we never gaze into people’s houses as this is just as taboo in Italy as it is in the US) , although I do remember seeing some eighty year old guy in his Speedo out on his balcony last year. Very difficult on the eyes. I couldn’t eat for two days with that view in my mind!

Our walk was very pleasant and very scenic. I took a number of photos on the way down but started to get a little apprehensive as we got closer to town. We’re out of bread and could the stores be closed? I’m thinking the town bakery is probably closed but since they also supply the retailers such as the two small grocery stores we should be OK. Much to my chagrin we immediately see that the two grocers are closed on Domenica. Damn. I’m already starting to go into withdrawal. I told Joan our last hope is that the bakery is still open. We walk around the corner along the main street, which, by the way, is a small area where you must walk in the traffic lane since there is NO room between the buildings for anything excepts cars. We turn the corner again to find the hidden bakery CLOSED! Oh no! Joan said, “ oh well” and I threw myself on the ground in a small temper tantrum. But being the mature person I am I quickly got up and decided to use my wits in my pursuit of pane. I noticed that there was a secondary door open and thought maybe the janitor might slip me a couple of stale, day old loaves. I looked in and saw no one and thought the hell with it. I started to walk away but then thought I’ve come this far I’m going to go even further into the store. I knock on the wall and call out. Who appears but the women who usually waits on me during opening hours! Now this woman I remember from last year. I was always convinced that she thought I was the village idiot because as many times as I went in there she always smiled at me an immediately started speaking to me in Italian. Of course she heard back from me in English and some rudimentary pronunciation of numbers in Italian. Same thing every time I went in there. Well, today, I guess she thought they let me out of the asylum on a Sunday and she took pity on me. We had the same bumbling conversation, she had the same dumb smile on her face and I, well I was just so happy to have my bread that tears were at streaming down my face.

Joan says I really need to get a life!

In the neighborhood

Garden at the Municipal building


Looking up at Mezzegra


Basil and tomatoes in our garden


Narrow streets of Mezzegra


The vegetable garden at the church


The church at the top of the hill


Stormy Saturday