Furci, Abruzzo

Last week, Gianluca Giorgi and I went to Furci in Abruzzo to film two fab Pasta Grannies. We were shown round the little hilltop town where everyone, it seemed, was hard at work preparing food: chilli peppers hanging out to dry; an old man cracking almonds with a brick and hammer; three neighbours preparing tomatoes for bottling.

The latter I noticed in an empty shop. They were crouched at the back, huddled around a box of tomatoes (covered with a cloth to encourage them to keep ripening while they waited to be sliced) and surrounded by buckets – one for skins, the others for pulp. The light in the room, with the grey floors really made the red ‘pop’. And Anna and her friends didn’t mind at all when we disrupted their morning and took photos. I was struck by people’s friendliness.

And then we were treated to a salume tasting at Ventricine Racciatti, which I’ll write about in the next post. Meantime, I hope you like the pictures – I haven’t colour corrected any of them.