Celebrating a Birthday in Sicily

Hello dear readers. I'm back home in hot, southern California.  My trip home was quite uneventful (thank goodness), and all is well here.  Lilly was so happy to see me.  Our good friends came by each day and provided excellent "catsitter" service.

While my family and I were on vacation, my daughter celebrated her birthday.  We were in the port of Messina, Sicily on her special day and mother and daughter went to Azienda Trinita where we toured the botanical gardens and enjoyed an authentic Sicilian cooking lesson.

We arrived late morning at the estate and this is the church across the street from the property...

Here is one of the buildings with it's beautiful garden architecture . . .

My daughter, Heidi, on her birthday at the estate . . .

We took a tour of the gardens on the estate before the cooking lesson.  I loved this quaint pond on the property . . .

There was also a small vineyard.  The current owner of the property is an landscape architect along with being a botanist.  We picked lemon leaves off the lemon trees to use for the cooking lesson . . .

The main course consisted of meatballs wrapped in lemon leaves . . .

This is a photo of Maria who was our teacher.  She is originally from Rome .. .

The first course consisted of zucchini ribbons in a vinagrette . . .

The lemon leaves wrapped meatballs before cooking . . .

 

We retired to the rustic style dining room and awaited for our food.  It had such an authentic, rustic charm . . .

This property has been in the same family for eight generations.  Salvatore Bonajuto is the current family member who is in charge.  The property is not that large but it does have some separate cabins you can rent.  We met a nice couple from the Netherlands who had rented from Airbnb and they accompanied us on the garden tour.

Our cooking lesson included these five items:

     - Antipasto (zucchini ribbons with lemon vinagrette and grated parmesan)

     - Carponata (eggplant and tomato served on bread)

     - Polpettine (meatballs wrapped in lemon leaves)

     - Spaghetti Eoliani (pasta with fresh tomato sauce)

     - Torta (Apricot tart made with a buttery crust)

And, we drank a red table wine made from the estate's vineyard.  It was a wonderful way to spend the afternoon together, mother and daughter, doing one of our favorite things; cooking.  When we returned to the ship, we celebrated in the evening as all of the family was present.

I hope that you dear readers are enjoying your summer holiday.  We returned home Tuesday evening and have been busy taking care of our home and garden.  My husbands tomato plants were stripped bare by some large, pesky tomato worms :(  But, the fig trees are bearing figs so that is good.  Please feel free to comment and share what has been happening in your part of the world.

With my best wishes,

Pat

Linking with: Five on Friday . . .