Americans know it as Happy Hour-- that magical time between work and dinner where you kick back a drink or two, a beer or glass of wine, and if you're lucky, maybe you'll get some peanuts or pretzels.  Some bars lure customers with a full buffet to encourage buying more...

In addition to the abundance of the harvest, the fall season in rural Italy is a harbinger of many vaguely pagan festivals and traditions, celebrating Nature's bounty with events and rituals that bring communities together and deep down, show gratitude for Earth's offerings. Here are a few that we experienced...

I felt melancholy being abroad over the Thanksgiving holiday, so we expats took matters into our own hands and invited our Italian friends for an improvised feast

Our travels this summer and early fall took us from the north to the south of Italy. Up and down the whole of the country, the landscape abounds with olives and grapes. Different varieties, different growing methods, with Emilia Romagna's abundant fruit in the middle, it binds the country.

The earth yields its bounty to us lucky humans, and makes plenty of work for cooks in the kitchen!

The five routes on our trip were well engineered-- plenty of challenging hills (up and down), relatively traffic free, splendid landscapes.  There were extra loops for the more avid bikers who wanted more exertion. The landscape each day was varied and otherworldly.  Miles of dry-stone walls typical of the region demarcated...

We have eleven trees. Five are very young -- we planted them ourselves two years ago -- and as expected, each only made a handful of olives this year. Our two older trees produced like pro's, and the others were negligible.  Since the press will only take customers with a...

This year, on the fall trip to our house in Le Marche, we flew to Rome and made a stop in Perugia, a city we'd never really visited. We packed a lot into two days, including the 2017 Eurochocolate Festival, and it was well worth the detour.

Going to the beach, visiting medieval towns, experiencing food specialities of the region-- these are the main activities we plan when guests arrive for a visit. We love these rituals and never tire of sharing them with our friends. Here's what you can do in our part of Le Marche.

It takes years to develop a garden. I've been working on my gardens in both Le Marche and Brooklyn through the perils and challenges of garden pests, weather and general geographic conditions. The resulting joys are the same; the many challenges are entirely different!