• THE FACTOR HOUSELuxury Villa Rental in Tuscany

  • SPECTACULAR SCENERYand every “room with a view”

  • SWIMMING POOLwith panoramic views

  • DO COME INWe look forward to welcoming you…

 

Latest Blog Posts

When are tortelli not tortelli?

As the suggestion of summer warmth takes over from the dewy freshness of spring, Saturday morning finds me hard at work alongside Paola, a cook renowned locally for the quality – and bounteous quantity – of her authentic Tuscan fare, as we make batches of stuffed pasta for this evening’s dinner.  For a group of The Factor House guests are celebrating an important anniversary and have elected to use the services of one of our chefs for the memorable occasion.  A sensible choice, I muse, because however competent you might eventually become in the art of Italian cookery, and however slavish you might be to the authenticity of your recipes, you will simply never be able to source ingredients like a local.

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What to do with a desiccated lemon

A breath-taking spring morning here in the Garfagnana, home to The Factor House – the type that starts with an unmistakeable dewy freshness, but is full nonetheless of the promise of a balmy afternoon – finds me staring forlornly at a stylish arrangement of twigs in a handsome terracotta pot.  Not an as yet untested and contemporary approach to Tuscan garden ornamentation, but the despondent remains of a previously robust lemon tree, the leaves stripped by a single night’s unexpectedly bitter wind which swept down unannounced from the majestic snow-tipped Apuan Alps opposite – mockingly visible on this pellucid crisp morning.

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Winter’s bounty: a culinary cornucopia

You might think that – here in the Garfagnana, home to The Factor House – winter would herald the limit of the land’s largesse, leaving only memories of a summer when we were obliged to make ever more inventive use of unceasing amounts of invitingly coloured and lusciously fragrant fruit and vegetables.  But, no – changing pace a little, and slowing perhaps in productiveness – the orto (vegetable patch) goes on magicking all manner of tasty things.

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