Podcast Content


Inspired Cooking with Chef & Blogger Giangi Townsend

Our guest today is Giangi Townsend, creator of Giangi’s Kitchen, a top-rated food and recipe blog. Back in the 1980s, Giangi’s desire as a working mom to provide healthy and delicious food for her family has since grown into a full-blown business featuring tons of recipes, an online shop, virtual cooking classes and her favorite cookbooks, including one of her own, Back to Basics – Cooking 101.

Giangi's childhood was spent between Southern Italy in the Summer and Paris in the Winter with her French father and Italian mother, it's no wonder she ended up as a fabulous chef! We talk about the importance of food and gathering for dinner, what led her to become interested in cooking and blogging, her favorite recipes and cookbooks, and tips and tricks in the kitchen and in life!

Checking in with Elizabeth Wholey in Umbria, Italy

This episode of Inspiring Living features one of our dear friends from Umbria, Italy, Elizabeth Wholey. We met Elizabeth many years ago during our Candelaria Design Tour Italy adventures and she has been our on-site chef and host for over ten years now when we stay at her Farmhouses while in Umbria.

This is Elizabeth's third appearance on our podcast and she gives us an update on how things are going there in Italy with the whole Covid-19 Pandemic. It is very interesting to get her perspective on how Italy has been dealing with the pandemic, especially over the course of the recent holidays, and shares her thoughts on how this might play out over the course of 2021.

We have scheduled our 2021 Candelaria Design Tour Italy thinking and hoping we might be able to pull it off this year. This will be our 16th Tour Italy over the last 20 years, so you do not want to miss being a part of this experience and get to meet Elizabeth for yourself. Our dates are set for September 15th - 29th starting in Florence, a week in Umbria and Tuscany, and finishing with a stay at the Villa d'Este on Lake Como. Click on the link for more info on our tours: https://www.candelariadesign.com/sign-upitaly2020

Follow Elizabeth on Instagram at https://www.instagram.com/elizabethwholey/
Facebook at https://www.facebook.com/elizabeth.wholey
Elizabeth is also an amazing chef and has written a wonderful book about the cuisine and culture of Umbria: https://www.altabella.com/sustenance__an_italian_culinary_guidebook

Checking in with our Friends in Italy

IMG_7255.JPG

Today's podcast features a collage of friends and contacts all with ties to Italy. A few of them are actually in Italy and all will share their insights and experiences relating to how Covid-19 has been affecting them. 

From my friend Elizabeth Wholey in Umbria who runs the farmhouse we stay at during our Tour to Italy, AltaBella, as she just returned from the US and now is in quarantine in her home in Umbria. (Pictured above)

IMG_0168.jpg

To my friend here in Scottsdale, Marco Felicioli, of Artitalia Group, a leading manufacturer of custom retail displays & fixtures, hospitality & restaurant furniture & flooring & more. He supplies many of us here in Arizona with fabulous products and materials from Italy. He will share his experiences of not only what is happening in Italy through his contacts but what he experienced the night of rioting as he sat and defended his showroom in Old Town Scottsdale. 

Then we go to London, England and check in with my friend Flavio Casagrande, who is an Italian window rep for Ital windows and is in lockdown in London while he waits to return to Italy and/or the US. He shares his insights on what he sees both in London and hears from Italy. 


Finally, we will touch base with another great friend from over 20 years, Gabriele Belli, from Porte del Passato in Central Italy. We have worked with Gabriele for many years including recently on a fabulous home in Desert Mountain built by Manship Builders. 

YVOIU4lUSzKq%2BurUxneE2A.jpg
IMG_8904.jpg
Eliz, window, geraniums, lipstick.jpg

Elizabeth Whoely has led our cooking class at the Umbrian farmhouse we stay in during our Tours to Italy for the past 10 years and has become a good friend.

Today, she still coordinates and leads cooking classes and tours, is a member of Slow Food Alta Umbria, the International Association of Culinary Professionals (IACP), the Mediterranean Garden Society and is the author of Sustenance: Food Traditions in Italy’s Heartland.

IMG_2858.jpeg

Flavio Casagrande sells fabulous windows manufactured in Italy! He is currently in lockdown in London and will give us his views both from England and his contacts and family in Italy.

You will enjoy hearing their perspective on what they have been experiencing in Italy, which was particularly hard hit. Elizabeth will share the details of her flight from San Francisco to Rome from just a few days ago and Marco will tell you about his wild night defending his showroom the night of the riots in Old Town Scottsdale. 

Elizabeth Wholey:

Farmhouses in Umbria: https://www.altabella.com

Book: https://sustenanceinitalysheartland.wordpress.com/

Instagram @elizabethwholey

Flavio Casagrande:

http://italwindows.com

Instagram @casaflavio

Marco Felicioli:

https://www.artitaliagroup.com/

Facebook facebook.com/ArtitaliaGroup/

Gabriele Belli:

https://www.portedelpassato.com/attivita/

Instagram @portedelpassato  

Facebook Facebook.com/gabriele.belli.37