I knew by the ring of the church bells that it was time for lunch, but I was in no rush to climb down from the olive tree. The view from up there—rolling green hills splashed with red-gold autumn vineyards and the distant ivory hilltop town of Montepulciano against the warm blue sky—was divine. I’d been picking olives in this grove since early morning and had the scratches on my arms, the buzzy vibration in my palms, and full crates of purple-black, gold-green fruit beneath the trees to prove it. The traditional Italian harvest method, called brucatura, pulling one olive at a time off the full branches, had brought me to a euphoric state. Back home in Los Angeles, it takes hours of yoga to get this feeling. But here in southern Tuscany, it came to me through good old fashioned farm work, by pitching in with the olive harvest, or as the Italians say, the raccoltta.
The raccoltta yields one of Tuscany’s most treasured products: olive oil. It begins the first week of November, which was when I arrived to volunteer at Reniella, in Montefollonico (population 700), nestled in the Chiana Valley. Reniella is an organic agriturismo, a working farm with guest accommodations, vineyards, fruit trees, a vegetable garden, a flock of sheep, a couple of pigs, chickens, and 400 olive trees.
With such a workload, the British transplants who own Reniella—Elfride (“Elf”) and her husband Bob Vaughan—welcome travelers to help out. They offer harvest volunteers two choices: full board and one of the spare rooms in their house for free, or visitors can rent their adjacent two bedroom agriturismo for a break in price, depending on how much work they’re up for doing. Since I was traveling solo and glad to find a bargain (especially in Tuscany), I went for the free option.
Living and working with the Vaughan family, which includes their seven year-old son Owain, a precocious Harry Potter look-alike, gave me the chance to get an insider’s experience of Tuscan country life. Unlike other Montefollonico ex-pats—British, American, and German retirees who bought property, hired locals to do the heavy work, and kicked back to indulge in their “Under The Tuscan Sun” dream—the Vaughans have blended in with the town. They took on the challenge of Reniella five years ago without any previous farming experience. What they did have was loads of energy, a passion to learn, and, most importantly, a shared sense of humor about the whole venture. “That first year,” Bob told me, laughing, “I butchered a pig with a knife in one hand and a manual in the other.”
The older farmers in town were impressed by the Vaughan’s determination, and began stopping by to offer help and advice. With their assistance and Bob and Elf’s hard work, Reniella got up and running.
In the damp chilly mornings, after Bob had taken Owain to the school bus stop on the back of his motorcycle, we’d head out to the grove, set up nets under the trees, and start picking. The Reniella trees represent the region’s typical olive varieties. I learned to recognize those little hard to pull off green moraioli, the easier corregioli, the large shiny black leccini, and the small green-black olivastre. We’d click into a rhythm, climbing up and down ladders, our conversations running from books to movies to life stories, with the rustle of olive branches, birdsongs, the distant muffled shots of pheasant hunters, and neighbors picking on nearby farms filling up the background.
Elf had warned me, “Careful not to get whacked in the eye by an olive branch,” but during my first enthusiastic hour of picking, the inevitable happened. Elf snapped into maternal mode, putting salve on it and apologizing as if it was her fault. “It’s my initiation rite,” I laughed, putting on my Jackie-O sunglasses to avoid another incident.
A whack in the eye seemed a small price to pay to become part of a 2,000-year-old tradition. Olive cultivation began here during Etruscan times and took hold during the Renaissance when the ruling Medicis offered farmers free land if they planted grapes and olives. Over the centuries, workers have had to endure all kinds of hardships, including winter freezes, the most recent in 1985, which wiped out two-thirds of the region’s trees. The Tuscans’ perseverance and commitment to quality through all the ups and downs has resulted in their olive oils being ranked among the most prized in the world.
At Reniella, time-honored harvest traditions are followed. Oil comes from fruit picked by hand rather than rake or machine, just before it ripens, and is brought to the mill as soon as possible to be put through the cold press process.
Though I tried to blend in during my week’s stay, my awe over the whole process set me apart from the Vaughans and the locals. To these people, doing these patient, labor-intensive tasks was second nature. The bleary-eyed overworked laborers at the family run frantoio where we took the olives to be pressed laughed at me as I snapped pictures of them running our olives through the old stone mills to make a paste that filled the room with a thick heavenly smell.
Rizzi, the Vaughan’s seventy-five year old neighbor who I found high up on a ladder harvesting at an admirable break-neck speed with his wife Marcella, laughed as he showed me his scratched, arthritic hands. He kept repeating “la bestemmia, la bestemmia,” ranting about the curse of this work he’s been doing ever since he could stand up, as he happily picked.
Laughing off the challenges went along with celebrating the raccoltta. At an olive festival in nearby Montissi, I wandered the torch-lit medieval alleyways, stopping at tables set up outside restaurants and shops, to sample olio nuovo from the nearby farms. A band played in the town square, sausages were grilled, and last year’s wine was uncorked.
The celebration of the raccoltta at Reniella happened with less fanfare everyday at lunch. Though it was glorious to be in the trees when the sun was shining, ultimately the sight of Elf setting up a picnic brought me down to join her and Bob in the shade. We piled our plates with pecorino cheese, thick crusty bread, tomatoes, slices of salami, peppers, and fennel, as Bob poured us tumblers of full-bodied Reniella wine.
And finally, we passed around the olio nuovo, cloudy green-gold oil which came from olives that had been in our hands just days before. As I tasted it, I got more than its peppery, grassy fresh flavor. I got the feeling that comes with joining in with the raccoltta—peace from doing work that feeds body and soul.
If You Go:
Agriturismo Reniella
53040 Montefollonico
E-mail: reniella@libero.it
Telephone and Fax: 011-39-0577-660449
Rates for Apartment (sleeps four)
2 Bedrooms, 2 bathrooms, fully equipped kitchen, deck: 480-660 euro
Italian Government Tourist Board
630 Fifth Avenue
New York, NY 10111
www.italiantourism.com
212-245-4822
AlItalia Airlines
www.alitaliausa.com
1-800-223-5730
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