Hey, did you know that, when you grow them high, very high, the tomatoes with a teardrop end (pomodori con il pizzo) cannot see water? I don’t care about what farmers do elsewhere, for example on the Vesuvian dorsals: I guarantee , for what I know of the agricultural practice, which is common on the Ischia summit, the Epomeo, which is surrounded by vineyards, orchards and galactic vegetable gardens. In these parts, you pick the tomatoes, take them to the kitchen, you slightly (but not even that) wash them; you split them in half, you season them (a little), place them on bread cut into thick and wide slices and, if you like, toasted; between rubbed garlic, white onion and plenty of basil. Here we are: the strong colours, the nibbly consistency and the sweetness celebrating for you, even before biting. So, what? Come on! Go for a post-afternoon feast. Call them, if you want, mountain bruschetta.
The backstory is that the trek what not planned. We decided - with Fedra and Antea- authors of these and many other photos - at the last moment, because the idea what to explore Piano Liguori, on the Sirocco coast.
And instead, the Epomeo sunset has teased us, to conquer afte the not short climb, to snort in harmony, reaching to only insular place where you do a pirouette, smile and see the whole paradise (pretending to ignore the crap appearing here and there on the horizon). The blow of Nature is incredible, the dense forest vegetation backlighting the Falanga is dazzling to the west; the mountaineering challenge to the north, of Capo dell’Uomo surrounded by white clays rich in fossils, is a dream; the perspective of the sea to the south is dotted by the buzzards flying between the boiling air flows. While the retreat and the small church of Santu Nicola that are at your feet remind you of the gift of silence, and that there has been a miracle: those which roam, hunting in the September sky are the buzzards escaped from the brutal fire which, at the beginning of August 2017, devastated the vertical of Forio, from Montecorvo, attacking also the Frassitelli. Thank God.
Speaking about animals, along the uphill path - the mule track of the good times - a kitten called Cip (with a collar) literally jumped suddenly on Fedra’s shoulders to play, purring, huh, huh, after a fake ambush… It waited for us on the way back, and it decided to accompany us for a stretch, zigzagging between our legs. So cute. For a few minutes we thought it was lost. But no, it lives there, in the “Porta di Agartha” which is also… a meeting place for seekers of Chthonic mysteries.
Okay, we return to the top of Epomeo. And totomatoes, princes reigning in the tuff. “I water the plants a couple of times, only after having planted in the ground”, Then, they look for water on their own!”. The dawning dew and the brackish humidity which does a long trip before laying down, marry… with the green thumb.
This quote is by Fiorenzo Mattera, who is here, in “La Grotta da Fiore” (it is more than a restaurant, and it is open until November - phone: 339.1654739 and 368.559916) to continue with his family the heroic mission of Orlando Fiore Trofa and Maria Nocera. Fiore did it all by himself, it was 1965, and he dug by hand the cave connecting the southern and northern sides, which are thirty steps below the blue extremity of Ischia, at 778 meters on the shoreline. Visionary and brilliant.
Fiore’s daughters, Teresa Trofa (in the kitchen) e Fiorella Trofa (in the dining room), have around them a court of brilliant young people, as well as Fiorezo: Antonio Mattera, Ursula Mattera, Cesare Mattera. I repeat for all of them this surname, deeply rooted between the hilly districts. As well as Trofa, which is probably more exotic: I would like it to be derived from τροφή (trofì) that means “food” in Greek, but it is not excluded that it is linked to the Neapolitan noun indicating a shrub, “trofa” if I remember correctly. Maybe, otherwise, it has Lusitanian origins, who knows. The Trofa family travelled around the world, in Algeria as well, and such a long time has passed…
Fiorenzo studied at the Hotel school, when the principal was Giuliana D’Avino and- we found it out together, revealing ourselves, by insisting and repeating so much that “your face is familiar to me” - and he was a student, no less, at one my courses as an expert in gastronomic Culture. Few yeas ago, but not too many. Fiorenzo and the others cultivate at Pietra dell’Acqua (but the property is really extensive: five hectares nearby) a demanding plot: “I have done the second tomatoes seeding at the beginning of August, and here they are, ready, pretty tough and tasty, dry: so, are bruschetta yummy?”
Antonio tells me that “finally the Germans are back”. This means that the season restarts with the lovers of the rarefied atmospheres up here, of the glass of wine, of the archaic enjoyment of the Grand Tour. Cesare, in the meantime, writes by hand some notes for me, taking care of the calligraphy…
