Well, its holiday time and finally the long-planned trip back to my indigenous country (Torino district, Italy) is about to happen!
I will be going for 5 weeks, catching-up on gossip, family dramas and sourcing the great knowledge of wild food which is my mother.
It will be great to keep mine and my two daughters genetic connection alive.
It will be cold at the moment, frosty and foggy, and on the mountains snow would glare.
This is the time of the year farmers catch up with crafty tasks, like making handles for hoes and pitch-forks out of willow branches. I will try to update this blog on my activities and rediscovered weedy business.
Last time I was there it was in autumn, time of the year for wild sweet chestnuts and mushrooms gathering, like those Famiole (this is the endemic language name, not sure about the Italian or English one) below.
Famiole in Piedmontese means “little families”, probably related to the cluster habit of this delicious seasonal treat.
Note the famiole are surrounded by blackberries
