CASA NATIA - A SICILIAN DREAM

Have you ever dreamed of a holiday in a Sicilian paradise, near both a world-renowned centre of culture and beautiful beaches, with the opportunity to gather, if you wish, your own organically grown fruit and vegetables? 

Well, now you need look no further than Casa Natia on the Marina di Modica, run by my good friends Giorgio and Giovanna!

Situated only 6 km from both the sea and the centre of the UNESCO World Heritage Site of Baroque Modica, at Casa Natia you can gaze towards the Sicilian Channel from the windows.

Surrounded by 15 hectares of grounds [150,000 sq. metres] on which Giorgio and Giovanna produce organic meat, vegetables, pulses and fruit [grown by rotation - no chemicals are ever used], both for their family and for sale, at Casa Natia you can pick, completely free of charge, all the tomatoes, aubergines, peppers, onions, zucchini, cabbages, celery and parsley you can eat. In addition, you can put out bottles for fresh milk from the property in the mornings or you can even milk the cows yourself! Fresh eggs are also available. Should you feel inspired to bake your own bread whilst at Casa Natia, you will be given flour from Giorgio and Giovanna's granary. Believe me, you will never have tasted bread like this before! Imagine lying on a sunlounger on the ample terrace with the aroma of freshly baked, genuinely Sicilian bread drifting towards you.....  If you like the olive oil produced in the grounds, you can order some to take home.

Upon arrival you will find a welcome basket full of traditional, local products, including focacce and arancini made by Giovanna and a welcome brochure to read at your leisure. In addition, and at an extra charge, Giovanna is available to give lessons in Sicilian and Italian cookery. If you would like to have a family dining experience whilst in Sicily, you can arrange, at a very reasonable extra charge of €20,00 per head [including wine], to spend an evening with Giorgio, Giovanna and family. I can personally guarantee that Giovanna's cooking has no paragon.

As mentioned above, the sea and the centre of Modica are within easy reach of Casa Natia and Giorgio and Giovanna will always be on hand to help you arrange excursions: An accompanied sea excursion is available at an extra charge, with optional packed lunch. [Giorgio's boat has room for seven passengers.] Other paid excursions by minibus to Noto, Marzamemi, Capo Passero, Etna, Taormina, Agrigento and into the Sicilian countryside can be arranged, as can an excursion to Malta by katamaran from the Port of Pozzallo [ten minutes away by car and two hours to Malta].

Casa Natia was built by Giorgio's ancestors in 1866 and was renovated this winter. It has five bedrooms [four double and one single] and room for nine people to stay at one time. One en suite bedroom is downstairs. There are three bathrooms, a well-equipped kitchen [supplied with basic foodstuffs, machines to make whatever kind of coffee you prefer and a juice squeezer for the basket of citrus fruit you will receive each week], a large lounge, a barbecue with ready-cut wood, a swimming pool with its own shower surrounded by carob and olive trees, air conditioning, a fireplace for use in winter, satellite TV and Wi-Fi. Interpreting services are available upon request. There is safe, covered and uncovered parking and if you want to have a party, there is no one around to disturb so feel free to enjoy yourself and play loud music to your heart's content! You can even bring your pets [subject to airline and local regulations].

Casa Natia is open all year round - it is an ideal place for a winter holiday too -  and is 40 minutes by car from Comiso Airport and one hour from Catania Airport [Fontanarossa]. Further details and prices can be found here, as can details of a smaller property owned by Giorgio and Giovanna, Villetta Nausicaa [150 metres from the sea at the Marina di Modica].

Whichever you choose, you'll be happy to arrive, delighted with your stay and sad to leave!

CHOCOSHOCK

It seems I wasn't the only person in Modica to be a little perplexed a few days ago to see "Cioccolato di Modica" advertised in the Lidl leaflet at €1,49 per bar [the usual price being around €2,00]. Some citizens have gone into what I will call "chocoshock" at this underselling of a traditional product of which the city is justly proud and which certainly interests tourists.

It must be said that the chocolate maker who landed the contract had a perfect right to do so, if these bars are being made by traditional Modican chocolate methods, but other chocolate makers and some politicians here feel that it is high time Modican chocolate received Igp [ EU Protected Geographical Indication] status.  A dossier applying for this has been in preparation for some time and is said to be "almost" ready [which, given Italian flexibility, could mean tomorrow or five years from now]. Then there will be an interminable wait for a decision.

This is one case in which that plentiful Sicilian quality, pazienza, is likely to melt away.

Chocolate being made to traditional recipes at Bonajuto, Modica

MULTILINGUAL CAROL SERVICE 2015

I always think that Christmas has been well and truly declared when we have our multilingual carol service in Modica and this year has been no exception.

We again opened with Venite Fedeli, included the famous Italian carol Tu scendi dalle stelle and closed with  verses of Silent Night sung in English, French, German, Italian and Spanish. Other carols were sung in all these languages and there were readings in other languages including Malagasy:

I read from Mary Jones and her Bible - not particularly Christmassy but a nice story. I'd been thinking about Mary Jones a lot this year because Mary Jones World was opened in Bala, North Wales at the end of 2014. [One day I'll get there!]

As my contribution to the feast, I made my "Christmas chews" again, as I did last year.  As always, there was delicious food from every country represented:

It wouldn't have been a proper British contribution if someone hadn't made yummy mince pies and Christmas cake......

.... and it wouldn't have been quite Modican without several kinds of focaccia!

AUTUMN - 2

Real, but not what they seem:

They are, as regular readers will know, frutti di Martorana.  They are made from pasta reale [almond paste]  Legend has it that the first ever batch of Martorana fruit was made on the orders of the mother superior of the Martorana Convent in Palermo. She had wanted to impress her bishop during his visit so the nuns obediently prepared the “fruit” and hung it from the cloister trees; so “real” did it look that the bishop declared that a miracle had happened, as all the fruits had appeared in the same season!  

On 2nd November, I Morti [the Day of the Dead] children receive Martorana fruit as presents from deceased relatives who still wish to watch over them. Some think that this tradition is morbid but it seems to help children to accept the transitory nature of this life.

Sadly, the Martorana Convent has long gone but the Church of Santa Maria dell'Ammiraglio, of which it was a part, still stands and is often called the Martorana. It is part of this.

FRIENDS AND FOCACCE

Just take a look at the wonderful focacce my friends made for Christmas Eve!

There was also this pastella fritta [fried batter], which was delicious:

I took along my second Christmas cake of the season. [Thank you, Nigella.]

I had Christmas lunch with the same friends, and made this old favourite of mine:

A friend had made these crispelle, dripping with honey:

"For tomorrow we may diet."

"O, MACHINE!"

"O, Machine!" exclaims Vashti in E.M. Forster's short story The Machine Stops and I must admit, that is how I felt when my repaired fridge was delivered back to me the other day. 

I am old enough to remember a time when the domestic fridge was deemed an innovation but I don't really remember how my mother kept food cool before we had our first one. We did have a pantry and that helped and as, until I was nine, we had a sweet shop, my Dad used to plonk scoops of ice cream from the shop freezer into glasses of lemonade in summer - much as Sicilian bar-keepers will offer you a scoop of granita in your cold tea on the hottest days.

As far back as the Greek era, Etna snow was being used to cool wine and that must have been lovely provided you had servants to go and fetch it for you. Rich Victorians had daily deliveries of ice but how did the less fortunate manage? It is important to remember that food shopping for more than one's daily needs is a fairly recent development and there are still countries today where not even staples are stored in the home. Those who dwelled in the countryside often grew vegetables and raised their own livestock but, in places like Sicily, meat was considered a luxury. When it was used, it was often washed in milk and boiled several times.  

The stone houses which many Sicilians lived in were cool and then there were the myriad means of preserving food, above all, in olive oil but also by salting [the technique of salting fish was brought here by the Arabs] spicing and using sugar [also brought by the Arabs] in sweet preserves. Some food was kept in cellars or even nearby caves and there were also ceramic water coolers. Those lucky enough to live near a lake or river sometimes kept food in it in well-sealed containers, too.

All of this sounds quite exhausting so I'm off to coo, "O, Machine!" to my dear old fridge once again before bed.

I

LE FRITTELLE DI SAN MARTINO

When you have forgotten it is your favourite saint's feast day, walk into a bar and are offered a frittella in his honour, you remember why you love living in Sicily.

Frittelle are traditional for San Martino di Tours because in times gone by they could be made by rich and poor alike: They contain few ingredients, can be fried using the new oil of the season and also go very well with the vino novello which is opened on this day! In this post from 2007 I included some photos of frittelle being prepared.

According to legend, in the fourth century San Martino met a starving, freezing beggar at the gates of the city of Amiens. He cut his cloak in two with his sword and gave half to the man. For this reason, San Martino is a saint associated with the poor. It is also said that the sun came out at the very moment he tore his cloak and that is why an Indian summer here is known as an estate di san Martino.

San Martino is the protector of soldiers, innkeepers, hoteliers and beggars. He died in Candes, now Candes-Saint-Martin, in 397.

NEW YEAR RICHES

Even in Roman times, lentils were a symbol of abundance and all over Italy they are eaten on New Year's Eve in the hope that they will bring prosperity.  They are often eaten with sausages and, even though there is a proverb saying that given a choice of lentils, chickpeas or sausages the sausages are tastiest, I think we can  do our lentils more justice than that.

Last night I made this brown lentil and red chilli pepper loaf. It's a dish I often made in the UK but this was the first time I'd made it here and it was as good as I remembered.  

The recipe is in a rather old Vegetarian Cooking edition of the Australian Women's Weekly Home Library series. I used to collect these colourful cookbooks in the UK and, once I got to grips with Australian measures - we British don't do "cups" and an Australian cup is different from an American cup - they served me well.

Every lentil you eat on New Year's Eve symbolises a coin so now all I have to do is wait for the money to roll in!

OF EATING AND BEING MERRY

Christmas really began for me on the evening of the 21st, when the Modican "foreign legion" held their annual multilingual carol service.  We were a little quieter than usual, having lost a dear member, but we did our best to sing out for her.

Chiara had decided that it was more important than ever to spend pleasant times together, so another gathering took place at her house on Saturday morning.  This is where the serious eating began!  Christmas just isn't Christmas without hot mince pies, and there were plenty of those:

I had made a batch of Welshcakes with cranberries:

Chiara had made a lovely Christmas cake

and Roberta had made these yummy, nut-flavoured "thins":

 There was homemade shortbread, too

and it wouldn't have been a Sicilian "tea" if someone hadn't brought along some ice cream!

Later on Saturday, we held a little Christmas party for students over at English Matters.  Our clever secretary, Martina, made these exquisite chocolates

and this was my go at making Nigella's chocolate Christmas cake:

 These delightful creations came from a Modican pasticceria:

Then suddenly it was Christmas Eve, which I again spent with Linda, Chiara and  family.

As I don't eat fish, I had to pass on these salmon appetisers but I'm sure they were delicious:

Don't you love the way these little appetisers are cut?

There was calabrese salad

 and it is traditional to serve several kinds of focaccia:

I hadn't made pumpkin bread for a while, so prepared some of that to take along:

I had to pass on the salmon with beignets too, but I loved the presentation:

Then there was one of my favourite Christmas Eve dishes, roasted artichokes:

Chiara had made another Christmas cake and it was scrumptious:

And finally, there was warm panettone:

"See you later this morning", we called as we parted and within a few hours we all met at Grazia's for Christmas lunch.

There was pasta, of course:

Linda provided the British elements and very good they were:

I had to pass again on these:

Here comes Grazia's pollo ripieno, with a garnish to gladden this blogger's heart:

And where there is Grazia, there will be excellent homemade pane condito:

I had made my standby semifreddo di marrons glacés. This time I added a little more cocoa powder for the colour and a few drops of cinnamon liqueur.  [The recipe for this is in Il Cucchiaio d'Argento.]

One of my young friends had made this pretty lemon cake and served it with justifiable pride:

The parents of Grazia's youngest guests had hoped that this chocolate crib, made and sold by a charitable organisation, would be opened and consumed on New Year's Eve.  Needless to say, it wasn't to be:

Then there was more warm panettone:

We all felt very lucky to have been able to celebrate Christmas together this year.