Podcast From Italy: Ashley & Jason Bartner

A little holiday recap and memories of La Befana and the living nativity scenes of years past. Jason shares a local boar sauce recipe after the hunters left us a nice little thank you gift! And we return with a listener favorite and name the winner of a 'major award'... Join us September 5-8 for the Polenta Feast & Ugly Club (Club dei Brutti) festival in Piobbico and get evaluated and inaugurated into the internationally famous Ugly Club!Thanks for listening!

We are finally back after a great season of guests with stories about the farm, animals, guests and of course Gaggi!

Spring is in full swing and we decided to procrastinate on a rainy evening & instead of working down our to-do list we recorded a new episode! We share crazy and funny wild life encounters at our farmhouse and along our road throughout the last 16 years! An update on our wifi (thanks to all that reached out with ideas!!), the garden, pigs and other projects. Plus we are now living that sweet warehouse life! Jason talks gelato now that we finally have a machine, he's busy recipe testing away!

Happy Easter from Italy! We've been busy with Spring projects as usual during early Spring but for the first time Jason was at the helm of the tractor when we prepared the soil! Was it all he had built up in his mind over these past 15 years...? The pigs have finally arrived and making themselves at home nicely, it's really feeling like a farm now!  We discuss an interesting theory by a local butcher on why our cured sausages were a total fail. An update on archery and is this considered LARPing?!  And of course since it's Easter we talk pane brusca or crescia di Pasqua or savory Easter bread, a local tradition in our neck of the woods.  

This episode we connect the dots between our archery classes and the Ferrari Formula 1 racing team - we have something very funny in common! Our thoughts on "Clarkson's Farm" along with seed planning for this year. Then hot talk on appliances! It's a wild one! After that, stick around because I read a chapter from the book! Thanks for listening!!

We’re getting pigs! An update on their arrival and the winter weather along with water cooler talk about what everyone’s talking about in Piobbbico…!! We take a little getaway to Lake Garda and visit Verona for the European Outdoor Show. There’s a short break in the podcast when Gaggi calls for an update on the weather and then promptly tells us we must be wrong!  An update on our energy bill and a disgusting story about country living and a major bullet dodged! Plus listen to the end to find out our new exciting hobby…! Thanks for listening!

A festive holiday recap - from dinner on Christmas and New Year's Eve with good ol' Dr. Gaggi to a satanic ritualistic sacrifice of sorts in the main piazza of Urbania during the La Befana children's festival vs. our memories of the same even 15 years ago and my has it changed! The sausages & salami have been made and hanging from the rafter, find out from Jason how he thinks they will turn out due to all this warm weather. Plus a sneak peek at the 2023 calendar as we discuss ideas for  Meat Week in September. But the most exciting news - Friday we are one step closer to getting pigs! Thanks for listening!!  

Ok so maybe this has become a bi-annual podcast! For those of you still listening, we start back in June and summer weather and the garden, then a hilarious story about our getaway to the Mediterranean where everything went wrong. An update on the "animal zone" including our newest edition to the farmhouse - Leroy our big blue Great Dane puppy! On to autumn and truffles, the soaring cost of energy and then remembering a few of our favorite Christmas markets in Italy and Europe! Happy Holidays!!!

It's been six months since our last podcast, there's a lot to catch you up on! From 'what's new in 2022' including my big ticket impulse purchase & an update on our citizenship to our 'new' tractor, and daily life in Italy: cyber attacked, cow herding up the mountain, the cost of la dolce vita is going up and so much more!

A review of my trip to FICO Eataly in Bologna, tales from an Italian hospital for foot surgery and Jason's new adventures with our neighbor's farm animals! A jam packed, hilarious podcast that's for sure. Thanks for listening!!

From an overpriced wine tasting to tractor shopping, a hilarious Gaggi story and memories of Thanksgiving past - we hope you enjoy the latest episode!

After a 6 month podcast hiatus we are BACK! With a hilarious update on life in the Italian countryside! From the glory garden and dry hot summer to a random rave, citizenship updated and meet the newest cat tiktoker! We share a few of our summer travels to Ravenna and Civita Nova Marche and laugh about my terrible ordering choices at a fancy bar. Thanks for listening!!

This week we are on fire, a lot has happened in our neck of the woods since the last podcast! From vongole shenanigans with Gaggi & Rossana, road work update, a "new look" for our old grocery store, a trip to the Farmer's Union, new tools for the garden, and answering questions about salt & yeast! Thanks for listening

After the snow the air has changed and it feels like Spring! We are busy soaking up the sun while working outside with the usual late winter cleanup of brush and tree trimming. Local gossip: the road meeting happened, we'll see if any action is taken. We answer a few of your questions until Jason is annoyed. And I read another chapter of the untitled, unpublished, unfinished book about our first year in Italy! Thanks for listening!

A Tim Dillon inspired podcast about conducting Fake Business of all sorts in Italy! A lunch in Fano with Gaggi & Rossana and an update from our neck of the woods with a breakdown on what we've learned about the Eco Bonus to restore a property.   The Covid Questionnaire to enter Italy: https://infocovid.viaggiaresicuri.it/returningtoitaly.html Check out the Tim Dillon Show Podcast - https://www.timdilloncomedy.com/  

Finally, a new episode! An update on the snow and salami curing, what we've been up to the past 3 months, along with our quick thoughts on 2021 travel and the big talk of town, the Euro Super Bonus! We're thinking of restoring a ruin...!

Road trip! The first week of September we visited the Cinque Terre for the first time, along with Carrara and Lucca. We share our favorites - focaccia, beach and the best way to see the famed five villages (hint it's not hiking!) As usual our travels revolve around food and the real objective to our stop in Carrara was for the local lard! Once back home we have been prepping early for winter plus a fish feast with Gaggi & his hunting buddy as a preemptive thank you for their morning coffees during the hunting season. It's a jam packed podcast!

Our days are spent jarring tomatoes, berry picking and not much else. Our big event this summer was Ferragosto and the old school Polenta Feast! We tell stories from this years festivities plus we read a another chapter from the book and it’s all about the first polenta festival we held at our farmhouse 13 years ago! An update on our immigration and listener Q&A: How to get a driver’s license in Italy as an expat.

We give you an update on how the surgery went for Jason's torn rotator cuff in a humorous recount of his hospital stay. A garden update - what to do with hundreds of kilos of potatoes?! Then we answer your questions about moving to Italy and starting a business along with sharing Ashley's dinner/cooking playlist favorites!

An update from sunny central Italy! While the virtual Move to Italy Workshops have been a great success (we are extending them thru the summer!), the virtual cooking classes are a technological fail due to our shoddy satellite internet. The garden is growing and looking amazing, eating beats, radishes, lettuces and carrots already! We take a few trips out and discover our new favorite way to eat out without worry of social distancing. Then a bit of immigration frustration and bitchin' about bureaucracy. And the biggest update - Jason needs surgery after tearing his rotator cuff and we weigh the options of private vs. public health care and the pricing.