055: Spring in Puglia

Living Villa Cappelli

Another quick catchup episode, talking about spring in Puglia, our new dogs, our spring projects, and other odds and ends of life in our villa in Puglia, Italy.

Topics we cover:

• How we lost our dog Orso recently

• And how we decided to get some new puppies

• Mina came to us from a farm in the Mugia

• Mina is a girl, which is what Paul wanted

• Mina is also a Maremmano, here’s a little about that breed:

- An Abruzzo sheepdog

- Used for centuries by Italian shepherds to guard sheep from wolves

- They have a solid, muscular build, a thick white coat, a large head and a black nose

- The coat is thick and long and forms a thick collar (or mane) around the neck

• How Mina was terrorizing the casts, so we had to get Mina a playmate

• He is half Maremmano and half Dogo Argentino, though he looks all Dogo Argentino

• He has very distinct markings, and after a lot of suggestions from our Instagram friends (link), Logan came up with the name Duke

• A little about his breed:

- A large, white, muscular dog developed in Argentina

- Their primary purpose was for big game hunting, like wild boar

- Some say they look similar to American Pit Bull Terrier

- While breed as big game hunters, they are also trained for search and rescue, police assistance, service dogs, military work, and more

• Here are some pictures of them:

Un post condiviso da Italian Villa Rental & Food (@villacappelli) in data: Mar 4, 2018 at 10:00 PST

Un post condiviso da Italian Villa Rental & Food (@villacappelli) in data: Gen 29, 2018 at 1:06 PST

Un post condiviso da Italian Villa Rental & Food (@villacappelli) in data: Gen 4, 2018 at 10:01 PST

• Our off-season projects

• How we replaced our wooden raised beds with some beautiful stone raised beds

• The walls of the beds are drywall, meaning they don’t use any mortar

• The artistry of constructing these walls. Here is a video:

• Then we constructed a beautiful shed in the back corner of our garden

• Here are some pictures of the shed as well

• All the materials we used to build the shed

• Paul’s other project, making olive wood cutting boards

• Here are some pictures of his work

• Here’s his holy cutting boards as well

Un post condiviso da Italian Villa Rental & Food (@villacappelli) in data: Mag 31, 2017 at 9:36 PDT

• Here’s a link to the story about the Virgin Mary Apparition appearing in a window: http://www.tampabayskeptics.org/v9n4rpt.html

• Our winter weather here in Puglia

• We had a very good olive harvest this year, but it was a very late harvest

• Our new 3L tins

• We have a few new products:

- Some anchovy fillets

- Colatura di Alici, like an anchovy fish sauce

• The Colatura is sort of like Garum, which was a fermented fish sauce used as a condiment in the cuisines of ancient Greece, Rome, and later Byzantium

• Paul helped come up with the name of company who makes the products in Amalfi, and the company’s name is Amalfin

• If anyone is interested in us carrying their line of tun products, let us know.

• It is high-quality tuna packed in oil

• Paul wants to know what it is called “Tuna fish”? Why not just “Tuna”? Is it a marketing thing? Does anyone know? Please let us know in the comments!

• Our new ceramic jugs to decant our 3L into a pouring jug

• How olives are drupes, making extra virgin olive oil essentially fruit juice

• Drupes include coffee, jujube, mango, olive, dates, coconut, cashew, almond, apricot, cherry, damson, nectarine, peach, and plum.

• Anyone interested in our culinary tour, there is still room. Click here for more information.

• Michael’s podcast that we mention is here, so you can enjoy his playing on our out of tune piano.

• Our hashtag promotion. Just snap a dish you made with our products or you with our products, and hashtag #villacappelli on Facebook, Instagram, and Twitter. We will be choosing at random, one lucky winner each month to get a free bottle of our extra virgin olive oil.

• Sign up for our 3-Point Thursday emails below!

• How Saint Joseph’s Day is Father’s Day in Italy.