The area around present-day Vairano has been inhabited since prehistoric times: first by the Oscans, the Etruscans and then the Samnites.  In 290 B.C. the territory was conquered by the Romans.

After the fall of the Empire the region was overrun by a series of barbarian tribes. The Longobards lived here in the 6th century and were themselves conquered by the Normans in the 11th.  These in turn built a fortress designed to defend them from Saracens invaders. In 1191 the fortress was given as a gift to the Abbot of Montecassino by Henry VI of Hohenstaufen.

In 1590 Vairano was purchased by Baron Mormile who turned the military fortress into a residential castle where generations of his family lived for over two hundred years until the year 1806.
In nearby Teano the treaty of the Unification of Italy between Garibaldi and Victor Emmanuel II was ratified in 1860.

Housed in what was originally the manor built into the battlements of the ancient fortress, the restaurant overlooks the medieval town of Vairano Patenora and its fertile green fields.

Restaurant owner and chef Antonio Ruggiero is a well-known expert on wines and oils and offers creative renderings of traditional dishes.

Program
10:30am - Arrival at Vairano Patenora
Sample Menu (recipes will vary depending on the vegetables that are in season)
Ravioli made with borage and stuffed with meat, mozzarella and tomato concassé
Black Casertan Pig with pappacelle (pickled peppers)
Baked Sheep Ricotta
Diced oranges with citrus-flavoured bavarian cream and extra-virgin olive-oil sauce

After lunch you will visit the Franciscan Monastery at Roccamonfina.

Price: 120,00 euro per person (4 people or more)
200,00 euro per person (2-3 people)

price includes: cooking course, ‘Oil Apèritif’, meal, wine, personal guide and interpreter

It is possible to visit a mozzarella cheese producer early in the morning.

An Italian Notebook original article.

“First impressions are so important. And in Naples it’s the vegetable antipasti that belt our a trumpet fanfare for the dishes that follow.

“The bright and shiny skins of tomatoes from northern Europe promise much but deliver only bland and wooly interiors.  Instead, make a food pilgrimage to Vesuvian soil and savor the pomodorini grown in Campania.  What’s so special? The siren song of volcanic minerals in every local vegetable.

“If not bruschetta, or a platter of eggplant, carrots or zucchini presented under a film of olio al peproncino (chili oil), choose a plump, delicately-scented mozzarella combined with prosciutto.  The local white wine. Falanghina, provides essential counterpoint.

Or order any vegetable antipasto della casa, most often a self-serve buffet affair, and brace yourself for a veritable Hallelujah Chorus to set before you!”

A lot has been said about olives and most of it has to do with extra virginity.

So imagine my surprise to learn that olive trees get intimate and are either male or female.

So how does one distinguish the machos from the maidens? First of all the male trees are bigger, stronger, have more vegetation and are a darker shade of green; the females are slimmer and more silvery in color. (does this sound familiar?)  The shape of their fruit is also revealing: the male olives are longer and pointy whereas the females are more rotund. (hmmm…)

The correct proportion of males to females is one in ten (which doesn’t seem fair) but then pollination occurs by means of the wind.

This discovery has left me very upset. Is there nothing sacred anymore? My perception of olive groves has been shattered!  Just imagine: those wise, ancient, dignified and austere beings - are actually having an orgy!

(After this article was published on Italian Notebook I received an email from a reader who, in an effort to calm me down,  thought he’d better send me THE FACTS about olives.  Many varieties of trees are actually self-pollinating (are you thinking what I’m thinking?)  However, I have heard the male/female version so many times from local oil producers here in Campania, that I’m assuming ours must be the latin lover variety!)