Exciting news!! The Scrumptious Pantry has teamed up with tour operator and travel agency Callisto Tours and Willett Travel to give you – our customers – the unique opportunity to visit Tuscany with a small group of fellow food lovers, meet the big family of producers behind The Scrumptious Pantry and take an in-depth look into the beautiful and tasty food world of Italy.

So excite your tastebuds by embarking on an epicurean olive oil experience this November! Tuscany is the perfect location to taste the world of olive oil and enjoy beautiful scenery and historic capitals such as Florence, Lucca and Siena.

We will be learning all about olives and their cultivation, the production of olive oil, how to use it in the kitchen and how to choose the right variety to match with which food. We will be tasting mono variety oils and classic blends in the Chianti Classico, visiting Cosimo (producer of olive oil for The Scrumptious Pantry) and joining the olive harvest in the hills of San Miniato (where we will take advantage of the white truffle season). We will learn about different extraction methods by visiting farmers and oil mills in the mountainous region around Lucca and finally taste the difference the sea makes at the coast of the Maremma, prized for its enormous wines such as Sassicaia and Ornellaia.

You will meet food artisans producing olive oil and wine, pasta and white truffles, chocolate and sweet delicacies, sun dried-tomato spreads and tomato jam.
You will discuss different farming methods, production techniques and ask every question that you always wanted to ask an Italian food artisan about his craft.
You will eat well, joining family style lunches with our food artisans, discover hidden wine bars and typical osterie, and celebrate happiness at a closing dinner with white truffles (hunted by ourselves) in a historic Bonaparte villa.
You will make new friends in Tuscany, being welcomed by our family of producers into our Scrumptious Pantry family.

For further info and booking please contact our travel partner:
Callisto Tours in association with Willett Travel
11365 Ventura Boulevard, Suite 100, Studio City, CA 91604
Phone 818.508.7619 or 800.994.5538
Pamela Abraham at PamelaA@WillettTravel.com
Or go to: www.WillettTravel.com/grouptravel.html
(CST# 2002558-10)

Updating...

These are difficult times. Agriculture in Tuscany is being drowned to death this year - at least so it seems. In the occasion of the visit of Jeff and Donna Chandler (parents of Emily who owns the spectacular Piazza Italian Market in Easton, MD), we visited a lot of our Scrumptious Pantry producers yesterday. Everyone was complaining about the continious rain.

Barbara was telling us that she is expecting to harvest about 30% less of her second most important crop - The San Miniato artichoke. Too wet, no sun, to harvest! Luckily enough she has not lost her smile, as you can see in this picture with Donna and Jeff.

Roberta and Giulio have similar problems - some of their plants have been replanted three times already, because the first plantings just died off with all the water. And this third planting does not look very good either. The peperoncino, for example (hot chilli peppers) did basically just spring up now. Whatever will be harvested here this year, it will be with a delay of two months compared to a "normal" year (In the picture you see Roberta as she presents a bouquet of chilli peppers and grains to Donna, it is supposed to be good luck).

So we can start discussing what "normal" might be. Since 2001 every year here has been somehow exceptional in terms of climate conditions. Too much rain in 2002, not enough rain in 2003... and so it goes. I am not a scientist, so I do not want to try to contribute to the "who's fault is it" debate, but something is surely going on!

This is the period of the year in which foodies anxiously await rain, because the moisture is needed to fuel the growth of mushrooms and the precious white truffle. A delicacy that is currently sold at around 3.000 eur/kg, the white truffle cannot be farmed and is very difficult to find. Contrary to popular belief it is not hogs looking for truffles, though, but trained dogs. The hog is perfect for finding the truffles, but unfortunately it prefers to eat them itself. And have you ever tried to tame a 200kg hog? Dogs are the better truffle hunters (at least from our selfish human perspective), cause they can be trained and convinced to trade a truffle for a biscuit.

Unfortunately this truffle season is not going too well in one of Italy's main truffle regions - San Miniato in Pisa Province. It has not been raining for two months (actually while I am writing this we are actually getting some drops, which lets us hope for more), so the truffles are small and are not as intense in smell and taste as they should be in this period. The season for the white truffle is from mid-September to the end of January, but it is late October and November when the truffle is at its best - usually.

Nevertheless I feel it is time to eat some truffles - what am I in Italy for at this time of year otherwise - so I join Riccardo and his dog Nebbia for a walk in the woods. It is the funniest thing seeing Nebbia running around like crazy once she gets to the forest. She seems really anxious to get started in her search, as she buzzes in and out of bushes, jumps over tree trunks and pushes through fallen leaves. A dog like her is priceless - or almost. A trained truffle dog will cost about 5.000 eur (that is 7.000 usd). A puppy bred of noted truffle hunting parents around 300 eur (420 usd). Riccardo though looks at me very disapprovingly when I ask about Nebbia's value. "How could I sell Nebbia? Do you have an idea what we two have been through together in the last three years? No matter what the weather, we are out here 4 hours a day together." Plus, selling a trained dog would mean that one would also give away one's truffle grounds, as the dogs return to the places where they were trained to search.

Families of truffle hunters are dynasties, eagerly safeguarding the spots they know grow truffles. Information about under which tree to dig is passed on from father to son. The truffle grows in the root network of oak, hazel, poplar and beech trees. To make sure that more truffles will grow in those roots the next year, it is important to carefully harvest it and to close the hole. Otherwise the root dries out and with it this piece of truffle hunting ground is lost forever.

And truffle hunters are determined "If there is a truffle, I will get it - from anywhere", Riccardo states as I wonder aloud how we could ever get to Nebbia, who is balancing over a steep hillside, curiously sniffing down a hill that I would have only approaced with mountain gear. Luckily she decides that there are no truffles, so Riccardo does not need to be challenged. Not that I doubt for a second that he would not have developed James Bond like qualities at the sight of the precious tuber.
After a couple hours of walking, Riccardo counts five truffles in his bag and one more that Nebbia has eaten before we had a chance to get to her and her find. But even without that last one, we have our feast: some beautiful crostini with truffle cream - the easiest snack when you have a dinner party, just grate some fresh truffle into mascarpone cream and your done - followed by truffle risotto.

Now, some more rain, please!