Puglia, Episode I: It’s Grandma Time

Note: A few names have been changed.

I took the train from Tuoro to Rome and when I arrived, to my surprise, my host was standing at the door with his bags completely packed.

“We’re going to Alberobello,” he said.

This is Francesco. He was my host when I first stayed in Rome, months back. You may remember him. He and I went to pizza my first night and I told him of my dream of interviewing the Nonnas in Bari. “I’m from Puglia!” he said, Puglia being the southern region where Bari is. “Get in touch with me in July and I’ll connect you with people down there.”

Sure enough, Francesco followed through. He said to come to Rome and that we could ride together to Alberobello, a small town an hour from Bari, and that I could stay with him as long as I’d like. Extremely gracious.

Alberobello is a famous town in Puglia known for its trulli. It’s one of those places that, as soon as you see a picture, you just have to visit. A trullo is a small, adobe-like home of all white cement with a gray roof shaped like a Hershey’s kiss. It looks like where a Smurf would live. Originally they were built for day laborers. Now, ironically enough, they’ve turned into luxury condos and hotels. Trulli were designed for maximum efficiency — the natural materials keep them warm in winter and cool in summer. Aesthetically, of course, they’re gorgeous, and the entire town is a white composite of trulli. It’s truly stunning to see (pun not intended).

My surprise came though as our plan was to leave the next day, not that night. This would be a sign of things to come. In any case, we arrived at around 1am that night and my Pugliese adventure would begin.

Alberobello.

This all started, really, in 2019.

I was reading a Sunday New York Times in a coffee shop in Portland. One story immediately grabbed me. It was called A Crime of Pasta. Essentially, it was about the Italian government cracking down on the old women who make pasta by hand in the streets of Bari. The article was interesting, but what really intrigued me was the personalities of the Italian women, specifically Claudia.

Though there are about 10-12 women who sit on the streets and make orecchiette — the ear-shaped pasta the region is known for — Claudia is the most famous. Not long ago, southern Italian cuisine started trending in the food & travel world, and Claudia became the poster child for the movement. Her crowning moment came when she visited New York City in 2019, the first time ever coming to the States (“But why are the coffees so big here?!” She exclaimed). Joining her was the mayor of Bari himself, who stood proudly beside her as Claudia sat at a table at an international food conference and hand-rolled one orecchiette after the next. Crowds formed. People were delighted. The world fell in love with Pugliese cuisine and more specifically, with Claudia.

And with that, a star was born.

What inspired me about that NYT article though wasn’t the politics of the situation — it was the passion for orecchiette. This was a tradition handed down for hundreds of years. “You must make it with love,” the women would say, among many other truisms. These women were concerned, though — the current generation of women are more interested in college and careers, leaving the tradition of orecchiette in doubt. I wanted to know: Why is it so important for them to preserve this tradition? And how would they continue it?

This was the question I dreamed of asking them for years. Not just that, but I wanted to spend time with these funny, wise, cantankerous women and learn what pasta has taught them about life. I talked and talked about it, with friends, with family, with writer friends and mentors. And though I came here to cook and travel and meet interesting people, Bari was always my goal.

Everything was leading up to this.

Meanwhile I’d be with Francesco. And staying with Francesco is a hoot.

Francesco’s a musician who lives in Rome. I’d guess he’s in his early 50s. Like many Italians, he bucks the summer heat and heads for the coast until September, specifically Alberobello. He stays in this gorgeous two-story apartment that’s been in his family for generations (his grandfather, a noted journalist, was once the mayor of Alberobello).

Francesco is a force of nature. I don’t think I saw the man eat a single vegetable in the week I stayed with him. Some days, our diet was a croissant for breakfast (or donut), then panzerotti for lunch (fried bread filled with tomato and cheese), then ice cream in the afternoon, and finally pasta — all punctuated with potent cups of espresso. For our living arrangements, he and his 11-year-old son stayed on the floor above while I stayed in the apartment below. Whenever Francesco walked in, he was a storm of kinetic energy. He would begin talking as soon as he entered, in very fast Italian, opening and closing shutters and turning on lights and dusting tables. I would comprehend a third of it, just smiling and saying, si, si, certo (certainly). And before I knew it, he’d be gone.

That said, Francesco was an absolutely fantastic host. I was only his guest from AirBnB, he didn’t know me particularly well, and yet he took me in like family. I was with him and his son every day and by the end of our week together, we were a crew. We felt like the Italian version of Two and a Half Men. This was great as I didn’t know a soul in Alberobello, nor Puglia in general. Also, up until this point, my trip had been pretty planned; now, I was going on the fly.

Speaking of plans: Making them was an adventure in its own right. What often happened was I’d get a text from Francesco around 9am. This had a rough outline of that day’s itinerary. The only thing that wasn’t clear was where exactly we’d be going and what time it would happen and whether or not I was actually invited. I had to forcefully learn to go along for the ride.

Fortunately, the ride was quite divine. Day one, he took me to the most gorgeous swimming spot I’ve ever been in my life. We got a bag full of focaccia and panzerotti (I’ll tell you this — eating these foods, with salty hands from the sea and the breeze blowing and the green sea in front of you, with the prosciutto and cheese and tomato sauce melting out with each bite, was its own form of nirvana). We went to art exhibits, to rooftop concerts, to small coastal towns, to restaurants I’d’ve never have gone to were it not for him.

As wonderful as our experiences were, I was getting pretty lonely. I was worried that I was a strain on Francesco’s plans. The language barrier was also tough — we could understand each other, but my Italian wasn’t good enough to hold a meaningful conversation. I wanted to assert my independence, but I was also desperate to converse in English.

I hopped on CouchSurfing and started scrolling for nearby folks. One guy was in Martina Franca, a town about 30 minutes away, and we made plans to meet a few days from now. The day before we were set to meet, he messaged to say his sister had Covid. I admit, I went into a mini-spiral. “Why does this always happen to me?” I started thinking. “Am I out of flow? Am I not meant to be here?”

I told Francesco about my plans falling through and he got excited. There’s a festival on Sunday, he said. Now I can join them.

Cue the split screen:

On the left, we have what I thought he said: We are going to a cultural festival to honor this patron saint; it’s a public event with food and wine and stuff like that. I pictured a street fair of sorts. I’d bring my digital camera to document this cultural gathering.

On the right, we have reality: We pulled off the highway and down this long country road. We arrived at a gated home in the countryside where a few folks were sitting around a table. I get a warm hug from the host who speaks a bit of English and tells me, assuredly and excitedly, that we have a man here who speaks English, an American no less. “He’s from Boston!” she said. “So you’ll be okay!” Okay, I said. And I quickly realized this indeed was not a street fair, and there would be no patron saints. This was a house party.

The most beautiful swimming spot in the world

I’m not one to post cathedral photos but this one was spectacular.

The sparkling waters of Monopoli.

We started by munching on antipasti — a few meats and cheeses and taralli, the famous dried crackers of Puglia. As we sat and noshed, car after car started pulling up — each person carrying at least one large tray of a different food. Cousins, nephews, siblings, friends all poured in. It was a constant chorus of cheerful “Ciaos” and double-cheek kisses in every direction. And starting from 1pm onwards, the food and the wine simply did not stop.

We had one man shucking oysters, serving up plate after plate of them with oil and lemon and parsley. A short, stocky Italian man started yelling as he walked through the crowd: “Nobody eat the oysters! I can assure you they are bad!” He then looked at me with a sly grin and wink: “Instead, you must save them for me.” We had cold cuts and smoked mozzarella (affumicato), easily the best cheese I’ve ever had. We had plastic gallons filled with white and red wine. We had bean salad, grilled vegetables, baked pasta, regular pasta. We had riso, cozze, and patate — rice, oysters, and potatoes, a famous dish in Puglia. “Harris! Vieni, mangia!” I kept hearing every few minutes, and a different fried food would get thrust onto my plate.

I was truly treated as “the guest,” which meant I had to try every single food, constantly had my wine filled, etc. Many of the people spoke English, so I definitely got my social cup filled. It was one of the warmest gatherings I’ve ever been to. Everyone was eager to talk and get to know me. But one of my favorites, of course, was Stefano.

Stefano had tough, tan skin, thick glasses, and gray hair that stuck out wildly in all directions, like Doc Brown from Back to the Future. When I first saw him, I thought he was a fisherman. But Stefano’s not a fisherman, he’s an artist — specifically, a writer and theater director.

“I’m incredibly lucky. I got to make my talent my job,” he said. “But it wasn’t easy. I persisted. You must persist!” He got really excited. “You will get adversity. It can be hell, I promise you. But you do it because you have to.”

“What do you mean?” I asked.

“For an artist, creativity is life,” he said. “We do it because we have no other choice. It’s the most important thing for us. It’s our oxygen. It’s how we breathe.”

“It can be hell,” he said again, then looked at me a wild, passionate look in his eyes. “But I see no other way to live.”

I was thoroughly and sufficiently fired up. Then, toward the end of the party, I met a couple that lived in Bari named Danny and Nicla. They’re in their early 60s. I told them of my dream to visit the Nonnas. “Ah, you want to see Claudia,” they said, smiling. “Tomorrow, you can come with us. We will take you to meet her.”

Oyster madness

Francesco, me, and his son Filippo

That next day I went with Francesco into Bari. He’d go to visit his mom, I’d go to meet Claudia. First, though, I dropped off my broken camera at a camera store. When the man looked at it, the prospects didn’t look great. “I’d give it a 50/50 shot,” he said, and that he’d let me know in two weeks. I’d have to live with it.

Then I met up with Nicla and Danny. They also brought their son, Mariano, who’s my age and also speaks English (Nicla and Denny’s English is decent but not fluent). Together we’d go to meet Claudia.

Bari’s a port town on the Adriatic coast. Claudia lives in Old Bari. It’s the “historical district,” right on the sea — a small area of twisty, windy streets made of old white stone, with arched entryways and flowers hanging from balconies. It has a very relaxed feel to it. Folks sit outside their homes on fold-up chairs as they drink beers and smoke cigarettes, holding conversation and playing cards and simply keeping watch over things.

Relaxed as it was, I was nervous. This was my dream for over three years. It was the light at the end of my Covid tunnel. Every single night I strolled up to that lit up tree in my Portland neighborhood and prayed for the opportunity to walk down this street. This was the culmination of years of dreaming, of angst, of excitement, of patience, and finally, of reality. I kept telling myself: Nothing needs to happen. Just meeting her is enough. If my opportunity came to push the conversation, I’d take it, but I wouldn’t force anything.

As we turned onto that famous pasta-making street, Strada Arco Basso, I tried to contain myself. But when I saw that first woman sitting at a small wooden table covered in handmade orecchiette, I got emotional.

I made it.

And then we saw Claudia.

You can hear her from down the street — a loud, booming voice. You can hear the scrape of her knife against the table as she rolled one orecchiette after another. Perfect shape, perfect texture. Tourists swarmed and surrounded her, asking questions, taking selfies, buying bag after bag of homemade pasta. Her hands never stopped moving.

Here, Claudia holds court. Clearly, this is her block. She’s a big woman, with wide arms and tough hands. She’s bellowing to the other women down the street, making jokes in Barese dialect, cracking jokes with tourists, laughing and smiling as people crammed around her.

Meanwhile, we stood and waited. We made our way to the front and Nicla introduced us. She told Claudia how much I’ve admired her, and how badly I’ve wanted to meet her. I was speechless — like Luca Brasi in The Godfather as he’s about to address Don Corleone. “Salve, Signora. É un piacere,” I said quietly. Claudia smiled back and continued rolling out orecchiette. Soon, the crowd dissipated and we were amongst the last few standing. A question came to mind. I’d shoot my shot.

“Scusi, signora. Una domanda,” I said nervously. “É il mio passione cucinare il cibo italiano. Dov’e imparo fare orecchiette di mano?”

Claudia looked up at me and smiled. “Domani,” she thundered back immediately. Tomorrow. “Come here at 9am and I will teach you. Just call me when you are on the way.”

I was shocked.

“9am! Yes, you got it!” I shot back. “See you tomorrow! Tomorrow at 9am! I’ll be here!”

We all walked away, Danny, Nicla, and Mariano and myself, and I was flooded with emotion. This was it. Everything I asked for and dreamed of happening had just went down. Nicla saw it. She grabbed my hand and gave me a big wet kiss on my wrist.

The four of us walked the streets as they showed me the rest of the city — the cathedrals, the castles, and more. But I wasn’t fully there. I was on another level. I tried to see the cathedrals but I couldn’t. I just had one clear thought I kept saying over and over:

It’s fucking game time.