It was 2001. Two weeks shy of my 21st birthday, exactly 15 years ago. I arrived at the Santa Maria Novella station in Florence after flying halfway around the globe to Rome to start a semester-long etching course as part of my Fine Art degree.
I had a suitcase and a few Italian lessons behind me — not enough to understand a conversation but maybe to figure out a menu, for the most part. I had no idea where I would even stay the night, let alone live for the next few months. Somehow this didn’t bother me, but it did bother my parents, who to this day still love to tell this story to anyone who asks about how I came to live in Florence:
I was approached by a man in the station with a flyer for his hotel — he beckoned me to come, assuring me, in English, that it was very close by. I also had with me in my scrapbook the phone number of a cheap place to stay (cheap being an important detail as I was on a student budget), which just happened to be a stunning villa on Viale Michelangelo, on the outskirts of town, run by nuns, the Istituto Suore di Santa Elisabetta. But it would involve me having to phone and ask in my very rough Italian for a room — and they might not. Or it might be too far from the centre.
I picked up the pay phone and called my parents in Australia to tell them I’d arrived and ask them for advice on where they thought I should stay, not realising that to them the man offering to take me away sounded highly suspicious (they had yet to ever visit Italy at that point and I suppose they were a little nervous about sending me so far away to a place unknown to them) — but before they could scream at me, stay with the nuns! The phone cut out. And they didn’t know until the next day where I ended up going.
I did go to the villa-convent, in its beautiful setting on Viale Michelangelo, which leads up to Piazzale Michelangelo. And, being that it was before a time when smart phones, wifi (I still had to go to the internet cafe to send emails and call my boyfriend and family from pay phones and an International calling card!) and laptops were regular accessories, I scoured the expat hangouts that I knew of at the time, like the English-language bookshop, Paperback Exchange, for signs advertising rooms for rent for students, and found a warm, quirky apartment near Santa Croce to share with a group of wonderful international students that quickly became my new family. When I first walked in and saw three of the girls cooking and congregating in the kitchen around the marble-topped table, I knew it was the place for me.
What I remember most about that time was feeling completely blessed to wake up every morning in Florence. Every day just walking across the river to my etching school, in a converted horse stable, was a revelation. It rained a lot that autumn — practically every day — but even the wet, cold days couldn’t dampen how much I was falling in love with the city.
Actually, that cold, dreary weather I think made Florence even more romantic — being rugged up in hats and scarves is something I still prefer to sweltering in unrelenting heat.
And there are the christmas lights that start going up in November and are absolutely irresistible. The reflections of palazzi in deep puddles and the twinkling, curly street lights in piazza Santa Croce at night time. Foggy mornings. Warm, sticky cornetti with a cappuccino on foggy mornings (and on at least one occasion on a very brisk morning, a cheeky caffe corretto to warm up). Spying (and succumbing to) schiacciata all’uva — the focaccia made with wine grapes that Florentine bakeries make every September and October. The little old couple that make chesnut crepes called necci, one by one, in piazza Santo Spirito once a month on a Sunday. Little glasses of red wine to warm you by flushing your cheeks — particularly after one wet day where I got caught in the pouring rain and my jeans had soaked up puddles all the way up to my knees. It was all these little things I found instantly attractive. I couldn’t get the feeling of Florence out of my head after that autumn stay.
So I came back and experienced Florence in all the other seasons and found many ways to fall in love with it all over again throughout the year.
In the snow, and the view of the snow-capped Duomo from my tiny bathroom window, pots of ribollita to feed an army, truffles, roasted chestnuts and Tuscan kale for weeks on end. Christmas lights. Old ladies dressed in their best in huge (often fur) coats. A warm, juicy panino of lampredotto with salsa verde, eaten on the street. Winter sagre with deep fried things.
In the spring. Watching the landscape — the hills around Florence in particular — change colour and come to life. The creamiest fresh ricotta ever. The open market stalls in Sant’Ambrogio filled with long-stemmed artichokes. Easter holidays, feasting, fireworks. Roses and wisteria peeking out in unexpected places.
In the sweaty, humid summer amongst the crowds and the mosquitoes. Really seriously good peaches and figs and tomatoes that make it all worth it. Panzanella. Melone e prosciutto as an entire meal. Gelato more than once a day. Long days with late night strolls along the river and roof top bars to cool off.
Nearly a decade after that first fateful stay in Florence, I started this blog to talk about Tuscan (and other regional Italian) food traditions from the point of view of someone who didn’t grow up with them, but was adopting them and living them every day. It was a motivating side project, a much-needed creative outlet, something to plan for and be excited about every week. It is what led me to dedicate my first cookbook to Florence, fifteen years later — fifteen years of falling in love with Florence, even with all her faults and imperfections.