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chef's day off:
sleep til 10, bike 1hr to the sea, stop at fruit vendor for peaches, stop at bar for cold water + chat w/ old men, park bike at the beach, cafe shakerato, swim + sun for hours, stop at bar for more water + chat with old men playing cards, bike home, jump in pool, shower, wine + bed.
l'ultima spiaggia: the last beach when you cross from Tuscany to Lazio in italy
photo: WINERIST.com
I'll be spending 4-weeks this summer working as a private chef in Italy! This probably doesn't come as a shock to those of you know me. Packing up my apartment, putting things into storage and taking off with a one-way ticket is just another adventure in the life of CHEEKY. Sometimes when I run into friends in New York, the first thing they ask is if I'm living here now and for how long. "Design a life you love and never look back."
The nearest town is the medieval village of Capalbio in Maremma Grossetana, an area of southern Tuscany (just 90-minutes north of Rome). Villa Pinciana is part of a 54-hectares wine estate in the Maremma. The landscape is a perfect blend of leafy rows of vineyards lining rolling hills, cyprus trees along dirt roads, blackberry bushes and rosemary near the driveway, sage colored olive orchards and a small "orto" vegetable garden behind the house. During aperitivo, we drink wine on the veranda and you can watch the sun set over the walled village of Capalbio nestled on the hilltop.
I worked at this winery for a month in the summer of 2013 cooking for lovely people from London, Rome and Zurich. Now I'm returning to cook for Swiss clients as they rent this gorgeous home on the Villa Pinciana winery property. The photo above is the saltwater pool in the backyard of the villa where I will live! Every morning, I wake up and run to town to get a coffee in my favorite bar, bullshit and flirt with the locals, buy some freshly baked bread then head back to the house. I will be cooking for two families on holiday and I am responsible for breakfasts and dinner every day, with a few hours in the afternoon to catch some sunny rays on my bike rides to the sea. non è male
Now, if I can avoid my tomato farmer boyfriend from two summers ago, all will be well in the Maremma.
Off to Grosseto!
Finally, southern Italian wine is on the up-and-up internationally! We are starting to see little sparkles of Sicilian nero d'avola or frappato wines popping up on restaurant lists among the occasional Primitivo from Puglia or a Greco di Tufo from Campania/Calabria. However, getting southern Italian people to drink southern Italian wines is another great feat - to be conquered at another time and by another guy (read as Silvestro Silvestori's new wine program cheekily called "TERRONIA").
After living for one year on the largest family-owned wine estate in Sicily, I thought I had a good start to learning about Sicilian wines. Here we are four years after my first visit to Palermo and those bright virgin sips of catarratto. Working with Fabrizia Lanza at Case Vecchie, we served the cooking school guests a wine for aperitivo, two or three wines with dinner and sometimes a dessert wine or homemade liqueur after the meal. I tasted my way through every single label of those Tasca d'Almerita wines at Regaleali -- but still, so much more to learn.
Along comes my friend Silve: a handsome smart guy from Puglia who is a certified sommelier, a Southern Italian wine expert and freelance writer for Wine & Spirits magazine. "Wanna go on a cycling trip around Puglia to visit wineries for a couple of weeks?" After convincing him to move the trip to Sicilia, this cheeky chick was on board.
Here's a little wine update from the #CHEEKYbici trip. I am no expert so I'll generalize and break it up this way: There are incredible white grapes growing on the west side of Sicily and killer reds on the eastern side (with bits of overlap, of course). There are certainly great reds that grow all over the island and vice versa with the white grapes. Sicily also has a history of growing international varietals (chardonnay, cabernet, merlot, syrah, etc.) in many different parts of the island, and a few drag-queens, as I'll call them, like perricone (red grape on the west side) and carricante (a white grape from the east) who dare to be different because of their complexity.
catarratto | grapes produce a golden-colored wine + they are planted all around the island. this is the most common white grape used for marsala wine.
grillo | a true westcoaster grown in Marsala, Palermo, Trapani and Agrigento. grillo wines have a deep yellow color and they can actually age fairly well.
inzolia | also known as "ansonica", can be used in making marsala. inzolia has a greenish hue with a very strong herbal aroma.
zibibbo | also known as "moscato di Pantelleria", brought to Sicily by the Romans, these are grown mainly on the island of Pantelleria where the grapes are dried and made into a dessert wine called passito.
pericone | a.k.a. pignatello is the most planted grape in all of western Sicily, perricone is found mostly in the regions of Palermo, Trapani and Agrigento. these special wines have a medium body and red candy cherry flavor like cocacola and they are best if you drink them while the wine is still young...this is not an ager.
Bosco Falconeria, Catarratto IGT from Alcamo
Tasca d'Almerita, Grillo Cavallo delle Fate, Sicilia DOC
Cantine Barbera, Dietro le Case, Inzolia Menfi DOC
Donnafugata, Ben Ryé, Passito di Pantelleria DOP
The core muscle-building biking days of the CHEEKYbici Sicilian bicycle trip were along the route to Menfi. I call these the "Kardashian-booty-training days". We were riding up to 70km per day from Trapani through Marsala to Mazara del Vallo on the first day and Mazara, Campobello di Mazara, Castelvetrano to Menfi on the next. This was pretty much the same route on the way back as well. We started along a country road near the salt pans that line the coast from Trapani to Marsala, stopping to take photos and change flat tires (Silvestro's, not mine). At the halfway point, we took a break for a quick lunch in the main piazza of Marsala and shared salami sandwiches, a container of buttery green olives and a bag of sesame cookies called biscotti regina before taking a little cat nap in the sun. It was Palm Sunday when we first stopped in Marsala so there were little kids learning how to braid palms to sell in front of the church.
From Marsala, the next stop was Mazara del Vallo a main port city on the southwest edge of Sicily. We rode into Mazara del Vallo over a long high bridge just as the sun was setting; wind blowing in our hair (well, not Silvestro's), sun on our faces, with a feeling of peace and complete open mind and heart. Of all of the breathtaking views on the trip, all of the rolling green hills covered in tiny white and yellow wild flowers, all of the baroque cities built like little wooden carvings into a mountainside...the moment we rode over that bridge into Mazara will still be one of our shared favorites of the trip.
After a night in a rented apartment (in let's call it the shadiest of our hotel choices), we said arrivederci to Julio (a made-up name that I gave him) the skeevy groundskeeper, and took off verso Menfi to finally hit some vineyards! As we rode along the sleepy flat roads through Campobello di Mazara and Castelvetrano, we stopped to take photos of a sweet contadino (farmer) named Vincenzo pruning his grape vines and a shepherd with a flock of sheep and a flock of dogs to match. Silvestro's pro-tip is always stop and talk to people. There was a great encounter with Vincenzo as he showed us how he dry prunes and twists the branches along wires to train them to grow how he wants. On the other hand, my girly intuition to stop and take photos of the fat old shepherd and his fluffy white sheep was quickly put in check by Silvestro's warning to "stai attento" because these lone shepherds are stereotypically the horniest guys we'll meet on the road. Sicilians will take one finger and pull it down under your eye as a sign to be careful and keep an eye out. That's pretty much the vibe I got but I wasn't afraid of an old pervy shepherd; he couldn't catch us on the bikes anyway.
Here's some photos from the west side of the island and a quick video of Vincenzo explaining his pruning process on the Catarratto Lucido vines.
Vincenzo pruning his vines near Campobello di Mazara, Sicilia
Tenuta Pianogrillo, Chiaramonte Gulfi, Sicilia
Back in New York City, I have a collaborative partnership with the italian import company Gustiamo. I first met Danielle Aquino (the newest part-owner) while we both were working in Sicily. After graduating with a masters from Bocconi in Milan, Danielle moved back to the U.S. to join Gustiamo full-time. Now, I have started using more and more Gustiamo-imported products in my private chef and catering work. Besides the perfectly plump capers packed in salt from Pantelleria, my favorite go-to product is the Extra Virgin Olive Oil from Tenuta Pianogrillo near Ragusa in Sicily.
Lorenzo Piccione di Pianogrillo, the owner of Tenuta Pianogrillo, is a true "renaissance man." He is simply dolcissimo and completely impressive in his wide variety of talents. Lorenzo is an artist, a concert pianist, a farmer, a winemaker, and most importantly - an incredible olive oil producer. He is very savvy with social media (follow on instagram @pianogrillo_farm) so I felt like I've known him for awhile before actually visiting the farm. I sent my friend Anna Watson Carl (The Yellow Table cookbook author and contributor to Saveur.com) with a little checklist of things to do and people to meet in Sicily when she went for the first time in January... a Palermo Street Food Tour with Salvo Agusta, winery visit to Arianna Occhipinti, Modica chocolate shop to meet Pierpaolo Ruta at BonAjuto, and a trip to Chiaramonte Gulfi to see the Pianogrillo olive orchard.
When I was joining Silvestro Silvestori on this #CHEEKYbici bicycle trip through Sicily, he had just a few requests in the planning: if I wanted to visit any Sicilian ex boyfriends or try to track down long lost family members, I needed to take a few days and do that on my own. The agreement was this: my family is 100% Greek-American so we're all good there and if we plan to avoid Palermo and a few small villages surrounding Regaleali, we would have no trouble with i fidanzati siciliani. As we planned part of our trip around discovering the delicious DOCG Cerasuolo di Vittoria wines near Ragusa, I booked us an afternoon with Lorenzo at Pianogrillo!
Following the perfectly positioned street signs directing us towards Contrada Pianogrillo (yes, this sounds completely unbelievable In Sicily) we were greeted with open arms by Lorenzo Piccione; a tall, happy, salt-and-peppery bearded man wearing knee high riding boots. What a sight! After a few long exhausting bicycle trips around Ragusa, we were so happy to pack up the car, visit Lorenzo, then head north towards Mt. Etna for the rest of the trip.
At Pianogrillo, they are situated near the Iblei mountain range which is where the name for the olives comes from. The olives that are used for the Sicilian extra virgin olive oil that Gustiamo imports into the US are 100% tonda iblea - a special bright green, round olive that can be pressed for oil and also "da salare" to preserve and eat!
The property at Pianogrillo has a 30-hectare orchard of bio olive trees, and another 30 for grapes, citrus trees, gorgeous stables for horses and animals like the suino nero black pigs, little rabbits, chickens + goats. The new addition is the farm-chic cantina for winemaking. We tasted Curva Minore (a frapatto and nero d'avola blend) right from the barrels in the cantina and had a nice snack of salame, pane ragusano and a bottle of Grillo in Lorenzo's kitchen.
Silvestro, a true Pugliese olive oil snob, even purchased two cases of oil to bring back home. He loves the bitter boom-boom-pow that you get with oil from Puglia but was happy to try out the grassy buttery tonda iblea oil and even bring some mini cans back as gifts for his staff. Lorenzo packed us up with wine, estratto di pomodoro, salsa pronta made with cherry tomatoes, loads of olive oil and even two of his homemade black pork salami to smuggle back through customs.
It was such a special visit with Lorenzo Piccione at Pianogrillo in Chiaramonte Gulfi. Not every private chef has a chance to meet the people who make their ingredients or actually visit the small farms or vineyards where they are grown. I'm so lucky to be a Chef in a place like New York where there are companies like Gustiamo to help source these great international products for me. If I can't have a hotel with a garden near the sea in Sicily just yet, I'll stick with my importer to bring all the good italian stuff right to my front door in Brooklyn.
Azienda Agricola di Pianogrillo, Chiaramonte Gulfi (Ragusa), Sicily | www.pianogrillo.it
buy it from www.gustiamo.com | discount code: cheekychef
Lorenzo Piccione + Linda Sarris
pane ragusano, a special semola rimacinata bread baked in the region of Ragusa, Sicily
Lorenzo's kitchen
proper street signs? che cos'è?!
Grillo 2014 from Azienda Baroni di Pianogrillo
in Lorenzo's kitchen
Tenuta Pianogrillo, Chiaramonte Gulfi, Sicilia
the little baby suino nero black pigs
Silvio (berlusconi) the hog at Pianogrillo
The Awaiting Table cooking school in Lecce, Puglia
my partner in crime, Silvestro Silvestori
Calabria
his fancy expensive bike had more flat tires than my shitty old trooper. holla!
How do you pick a partner for a 20 day roadtrip? We were finding someone to spend 24-hours a day with, eat every meal together, sleep in the same room, exercise/sweat/stink together, and only have privacy when the bathroom door closes or when we're fast asleep. It's not easy.
Most people know I'm pretty low-maintenance (as any girl would like to think she is) but ask my nearest & dearest and they will be a bit worried I'd get sick of someone very quickly. Other than best friends and boyfriends, I've only successfully spent a week with one other guy so far without going mad. It was one week in June of 2014 at the seaside with my best italian friend Alessandro on what we called our faux honeymoon. For this year's biking adventure, Silvestro Silvestori asked me to join him for almost 3 weeks on the road, just the two of us, and I couldn't have found a better partner. We were both lucky I think.
Silvestro owns the cutest regional food and wine school in the south of Italy. He started The Awaiting Table about 12 years ago in his home in Lecce, Puglia. The school focuses on the food of the Salento, a special section of Puglia, surrounded by two seas at the bottom of the boot's heel. I feel like I've known him for years thanks to blogging and social media but we finally met in July 2013 when I visited his school for a cooking course.
When I arrived in Lecce, we packed up saddlebags for the bicycles and did a test run to make sure I didn't pack too much stuff. To think the only things I actually left behind in Lecce were a bathing suit and a couple extra lipsticks, I think I packed quite well. We loaded up Silvestro's car with two bicycles, our bags, my Spotify account packed with killer jams for the ride and a small wooden box with two wine glasses and a bottle opener (in case of emergency). We were ready to roll.
Driving through Puglia, Basilicata and Calabria I was falling in love with the south. Silvestro is a true cheerleader for the south of Italy and repeatedly told me that the things I am so in love with about Sicily are also true of the whole south. I think he's finally cracked through my tough candy shell. Puglia is filled with olive groves and fields of artichokes with no rolling hills to block your view for miles and miles. Basilicata had orchards of breathtaking purple flowering trees (maybe apricots or peaches) that got me so excited to see Sicily's almond blossoms but actually the timing was not right. The coast of Calabria had bright blue water like the Caribbean and we stopped at a lookout point to see a beautiful castle on the sea with a veg vendor parked in front with a truck full of dried chilies. It was like a postcard.
This was probably Silvestro's 9th biking trip, having done this before with other female partners whether they were long-time friends, work acquaintances or girlfriends. I guess we both took a risk when I booked my flight to Brindisi without much of a plan for our cycling trip to visit Sicilian wineries. He tried to keep me calm and trust that he's done this trip before and it's not easy to make a plan for wine tours, hotels or meeting up with producers and friends. We never know how long it will take to bike from city to city, if there will be rain or if we have bicycle trouble - so to ditch work for 3 weeks and take off across the ocean without a plan wasn't exactly comforting for me. The capricorn ex-project manager in me was about to freak out but having someone as patient and smart as Silvestro on my side through this adventure was really my little rabbit's foot.
The Awaiting Table Cookery School
Otranto, Puglia, Italia
Our first day biking to Otranto in Puglia was a great start to the trip. today we left the city of Lecce and went out towards the Adriatic Sea, bikes south through a national wildlife park called Le Cesine, to the city of Otranto and back. 98km in about 6 hours, butt bones are killing me but all n all feelin good! today we will pack the car and load the bikes for a drive from Puglia to Sicily.
andiamo 🚲
La Riserva Naturale dello Stato Oasi WWF