As with the first installment, it is my privilege to lovingly preserve my father's memories. I have carefully rewritten and expanded his original manuscript, adding historical context, family history, photos and details originally left out, while remaining true to his voice. These are his stories—carefully polished and thoughtfully enriched so they can be shared with future generations exactly as they deserve to be remembered.

Deborah Dale Blackwell

Growing Up in Bend

I don’t think there could have been a better place to grow up than Bend when it was still a small mill town of barely 10,000 people. Back then, Bend felt more like a big neighborhood than a city. Everyone seemed to know each other, kids roamed freely from morning until dark, and the forests, canals, and open fields became our playgrounds. It was a place where a boy could grow up with dirt on his boots, freedom at his doorstep, and adventure waiting around every corner.

When I was seven years old, we moved from the Kearney house to a place on the corner of Third Street and Norton. When I was twelve, we moved again — this time out to what my folks simply called “The Acreage.” The house sat on five acres just south of town overlooking the lumber mill, with an irrigation canal running through the property. To us kids, it felt enormous and wild, like living half in the country and half in town.

The house itself, however, was tiny.

Dad immediately went to work transforming it the only way he knew how — with determination, plywood, and whatever materials he could get his hands on. He partitioned off bedrooms inside a large shop using sheets of plywood and slowly began expanding the little one-bedroom, one-bath house into a three-bedroom, two-bath family home. Like so many families of that generation, my parents built their lives a little at a time, improving things whenever there was enough money, time, or energy to do so.

Looking back, I don’t think I ever lived in a completely finished house until I left home for college. There was always a wall half-built, lumber stacked somewhere, tools lying around, or another addition in progress. But to us, it never felt unfinished. It felt alive — a home constantly growing right alongside our family.

My summers were spent delivering newspapers, when I was 11 years of age I got a job carrying for the Oregon Journal. This was a Portland newspaper, about one person per block subscribed to this paper so my route was very long. It ran from Franklin to Revere and from 3rd to 5th St. When I turned 12 I would be eligible to have a Bend Bulletin route. Just about everyone subscribed to the Bend Bulletin, On the 4th of July I turned 12! I happily delivered 100 papers to a 4 by 4 block area- it was still quite a ways to ride my bike from the “acreage” to the downtown Bulletin office and back home.

The summer I was 15 I quit my paper route and got a job working in Grass Valley for Ivan Bragg, who was my cousin Dorothy’s husband, driving a hay truck. The next summer I had my drivers license and I was able to drive a wheat truck which was enormous fun. It felt pretty great at 15 years old to pull up the wheat truck into the Grass Valley wheat elevator and get in line with the other truckers.

Every summer my family would either spend a week in Florence, Oregon on the coast or time in Lebanon and Sodaville with relatives. I would spend a week or two with my cousins Jim and Doug Coyle back on the old Skeels Farm again.

The two things I enjoyed most growing up were horses and skiing. I had a friend over in Metolius who owned a horse, and we rode every chance we got. At Allen Grade School, kids were even allowed to ride their horses to school on the last day of classes each year, which tells you a lot about what Bend was like back then. Horses were simply part of everyday life, and from the time I was young, I wanted one of my own more than anything.

When we moved out to “The Acreage,” that dream finally became possible. The Brooks-Scanlon Mill used draft horses to pull lumber carts around the mill yard, and I loved hanging around the barn watching Mr. Foley, who managed the horses. He handled those massive animals with such calm confidence that they seemed to obey him effortlessly. To me, the horses were magnificent.

One day I finally worked up the nerve to ask Mr. Foley if he would help me find a horse of my own. He agreed and took me out to the Redmond Stockyards, where a fresh group of range horses had just been brought in. We walked slowly around the corral several times, studying the horses. Then Mr. Foley stopped, nodded toward one mare, and quietly said, “There’s your horse right there.”

We brought her home, and I named her Babe.

She was the finest horse I ever owned. She carried a ranch brand on her rump, so I assumed she had come off a cattle ranch somewhere. She looked to be at least three-quarters Thoroughbred and was incredibly fast — I never lost a race riding Babe. She had a long, smooth stride with an eight-inch overstep, but what made her truly special was her trust. Babe never second-guessed anything I asked of her. If I pointed her down a steep hill, she would slide down on her hindquarters without hesitation. If I rode her to the banks of the Deschutes River and didn’t stop her, she would walk straight into the water. I always dreamed of swimming her across the river, though I never quite found the courage to try it.

From “The Acreage,” I could ride for miles. I followed the Deschutes all the way to Lava Island or headed east toward Bessie Butte and Swamp Wells. There was a spring at Swamp Wells and an old corral where I could leave Babe and camp overnight before riding on into the Paulina Mountains the next day. To a young boy growing up in Bend, it felt like having an entire wilderness right outside the back door.

My second favorite pastime was skiing. During World War II, the Army formed a special unit known as the 10th Mountain Division. These soldiers fought the Germans high in the Apennine Mountains of Italy wearing white camouflage suits and traveling on skis through deep snow and rugged mountain terrain. After the war, military surplus equipment became available, and I managed to buy a pair of those white Army skis with old bear-trap bindings.

At the time we were still living in the house on Third Street, so I practiced skiing down Norton Hill right in my neighborhood. Later, after we moved out to “The Acreage,” I carried my skis up the sides of some old pumice pits nearby and skied down the steep slopes there. In those days you didn’t need a ski resort or fancy equipment — just snow, a hill, and the desire to go fast.

When I turned sixteen, everything changed. I got my driver’s license and bought a 1940 Ford coupe from my friend Hap Taylor for one hundred dollars. Suddenly, freedom opened up. Now I could drive myself up to the Skyliners area and ski whenever I could manage it. Around that same time, I bought my first pair of breakaway bindings from Mr. Olaf Skjersaa, who at the time was selling ski equipment out of his garage. Olaf would later open Skjersaa’s Ski Shop, which became Bend’s first dedicated ski shop and is still a well-known part of Bend’s ski culture today.

Our football coach warned all of us players not to ski because we might get hurt and miss football games. That was when I realized something important: I would much rather get hurt skiing and miss football than get hurt playing football and miss skiing. So I ignored the advice and kept skiing anyway.

That decision stayed with me for the rest of my life. I skied well into my early eighties — a little slower perhaps, but loving it just as much as I did when I first pointed those old white Army skis downhill. Over the years, skiing became more than a hobby to me; it became part of our family life. I eventually taught all nine of my children how to ski, and some of my happiest memories are of winters spent together on the mountain, watching them discover the same joy and freedom I had found there as a boy growing up in Bend.

The Ranch Years

When I turned sixteen, my friend Hap Taylor and I got jobs working on the GI Ranch. Leonard Lundgren had recently purchased the vast 96,000-acre ranch located about sixty-three miles east of Bend. To a couple of teenagers, it seemed like an entire world unto itself.

My first job was irrigating. I spent my days driving from field to field, moving water and keeping the ditches flowing where they were needed. It sounded simple enough, except that the rattlesnakes seemed to enjoy the water as much as the cattle did. More than once I found myself giving them a wide berth as I made my rounds.

When the haying season arrived, I graduated to driving a mower, which I considered a pretty important responsibility. The workdays were long, but I loved every minute of it. We left Bend at four o’clock on Monday mornings and stayed at the ranch bunkhouse all week. Saturday afternoon couldn’t come soon enough. As soon as work was finished, we would race back to Bend to clean up and spend the evening with our girlfriends. Hap’s girl was Sandy Elder, who would later become Sandy Taylor.

Those were the days.

One summer, Mr. Lundgren hired an airplane to help round up a large band of wild horses running in Hampton Butte county. The pilot would sweep low over the hills, pushing the horses out of the rough terrain. As the frightened animals emerged from the sagebrush and timber, we picked them up on horseback and drove them toward a catch fence and eventually into the ranch corrals.

Those horses were as wild as a corral full of elk.

As I watched them milling around the pens, one little mustang caught my eye. She looked to be about two years old, alert and spirited, with the kind of intelligence that made you take a second look. I asked Mr. Ferris, the ranch foreman, if I could buy her.

Without saying much, he rode straight into the middle of the nervous herd, swung his rope, and caught the little mare. She fought and kicked every inch of the way as he dragged her over and handed the rope to me.

“Here you go, son,” he said.

The rest of the horses were eventually loaded onto trucks and hauled away, but my little mustang stayed behind. Over time, I worked with her until she was gentle enough to ride and handle. It took patience, persistence, and more than a little stubbornness on both our parts, but eventually she came around.

I paid fifteen dollars for that horse and later sold her for thirty.

At the time, I thought I had made a killing.

Looking back, the money wasn’t really the point. The real reward was the experience itself — working cattle, riding horses, sleeping in bunkhouses, and learning lessons that couldn’t be taught in any classroom. For a young man growing up in Central Oregon, it felt like an awfully good way to spend a summer.

The following summer I moved from the GI ranch to work at the mill (Leonard Lundgren Lumber Co.) I worked in both the Bend and Sisters mills. I worked for Leonard over the next 4 years until I graduated from Portland State.

Those summer experiences were only part of my life in Central Oregon in those years. Another experience, far more sobering, came on Christmas Day in 1957.

Leonard Lundgren and his family lived in a large, three-story home on the east bank of the Metolius River, about four miles downstream from Camp Sherman. The house had been built roughly thirty years earlier by John Zehntbauer of Portland’s Jantzen Knitting Mills and was described at the time as being lavishly furnished.

Early on Christmas morning, December 25, 1957, fire of undetermined origin consumed the Lundgren home. Leonard and Evelyn Lundgren barely escaped with their lives. Five of their children also escaped unharmed, but their five-year-old daughter, Megan Suzanne, was lost in the fire. Leonard suffered burns and badly cut arms and wrists when he tried to smash through a window of the burning house in an attempt to reach his daughter. Evelyn was also treated for burns, and Leonard’s sister Christine, who was visiting the family for Christmas, suffered severe burns.

In the days that followed, Leonard asked me and my best friend, Hap Taylor, to stay at the property and keep watch over what remained. Beginning on Christmas night, Hap and I camped beside the burned-out house for several nights, guarding the family’s belongings and anything that might still be salvaged.

It was a very different kind of Christmas for two young men. The house that had been filled with a family only hours before was now a blackened ruin, and the quiet of the Metolius surrounded us as we kept watch.

I have never forgotten those nights.

From:  The Medford Mail Tribune Dec. 26, 1957
Girl, 5, Dies As Blaze Destroys Metolius Home Bend (IB A five-year-old
girl died early Christmas day and other members of her family barely escaped with then
lives when fire of undetermined origin consumed the three story family home on the Me
tolius river four miles down stream from Camp Sherman.
Three persons were hospitalized. Victim of the fire was Megan Suzanne Lundgren, daughter of Mr. and Mrs. Leonard Lundgren. The parents were treated at St. Charles hospital in Bend,Mrs. Lundgren for burns and her husband for burns and badly
cut arms and wrists suffered when he tried to smash through a window of the house.
Five Children Escape Christine Lundgren, about 40, Lundgren’s sister who was vis
iting the family for the holidays, was taken to the hospital here with severe burns. Five other children of the Lundgrens escaped injury. Lundgren operates a large
lumber company in Bend. The home, lavishly furnished, was built about 30 years ago by
John Zehntbauer of the Jantzen Knitting Mills, Portland. The place, about 40 miles from Bend was on the east bank of the Metolius.

I met my first wife, Helen, in Bend. I had noticed her walking down the same street every day, at about the same time. She was beautiful, and I found myself looking forward to seeing her. Before long, I knew I wanted to find a way to meet her.

Helen was working for a lawyer in town, and one day I timed her lunch hour just right. I happened to be standing at the crosswalk when she came walking across the street. I don’t remember exactly what I said to her—but whatever it was, it worked. She agreed to go on a date with me.

Her name was Helen Elizabeth Boyle, and before long, we fell in love. We were married between my third and fourth years of college.

Becoming a Stockbroker

One of my college classes involved learning about the stock market. As part of the course, each student was given an imaginary $10,000 to invest. Over the course of the quarter, we tracked our investments and compared our results at the end.

By the time the quarter was over, my portfolio had grown by $2,000.

I remember thinking, Wow, why would anyone want to do anything else? This is both fun and easy.

Of course, I would later learn that investing isn’t always quite that simple, but at twenty-one years old it seemed like I had discovered the perfect career.

With youthful confidence and not much else, I sat down and mailed letters of application to brokerage firms all along the West Coast, from Seattle to Los Angeles. During spring break, I packed my bags and drove down the coast to meet with as many firms as possible. It was an adventure in itself for a young man who had grown up in Bend.

The most promising opportunity came from a small brokerage firm in Beverly Hills. They offered me a position as Administrative Assistant to the West Coast General Manager. To me, it sounded like the opportunity of a lifetime.

I was excited, ambitious, and ready to see what the world had to offer. More importantly, I believed this job would allow me to earn a salary while learning the brokerage business from the inside. It seemed like the perfect combination of education and opportunity, and I was eager to get started. Little did I know that the move would take me far from the forests, ranches, horses, and ski slopes of my youth and into a completely different world.

Music Was Always There-

Throughout my life, many of my most memorable musical moments seemed to involve unexpected mishaps. Music was woven through every stage of my life. Long before I ever sang a solo, it filled our home through the instruments my family played, and long after I lost my voice, music continued to fill the rooms where our family gathered.

A big part of my life revolved around music. My mother played the piano and the accordion. My father played the saxophone, accordion and piccolo. My sister LeAnn played the violin and later the flute. And I sang and played the guitar.

My fourth-grade teacher asked if anyone in the class would like to perform and told us we were welcome to share a talent. I went home and excitedly told my parents. The very next day, I rode my bicycle to school with a banjo uke strapped to my back. I can’t remember what song I sang, but that moment marked the beginning of my brief musical career!

Later, when I was twelve, I was asked to sing a solo during a Sunday church service. I stood up to sing, but the organist didn’t start playing the introduction to my song. I turned around to look at the organist, Nina Niskanen, and saw that she was on her knees with her head under the organ. The sheet music had fallen, so I just started singing without the accompaniment.

Nina finally got the music back in place, but she didn’t know whether I had started in the correct key. She simply began pressing the organ keys and hoped for the best. As it turned out, I was spot on.

After church, Nina came over to my mother and said, “Your son has perfect pitch.” Truthfully, I don’t have perfect pitch, but I do have a good ear for music.

As a senior in high school, I was chosen to attend the All Northwest Choir in Missoula, Montana. While I was there, I was offered a music scholarship, which I turned down. From Missoula, I drove to Sun Valley, where Hap and Sandy were skiing. We spent the next few days enjoying my favorite sport and having a wonderful time together.

Another memorable musical moment came when I was singing at a wedding in the Methodist church with Mrs. Coyner accompanying me on the organ. A photographer in the basement was testing his lights and accidentally blew a fuse that happened to be on the same circuit as the organ.

The organ didn’t simply stop. Instead, it sounded like a fire truck whose siren had been switched off as the air slowly escaped from its pipes. As the sound faded away, I heard Mrs. Coyner mutter- “Damn it.”

When the organ finally fell silent, I finished the song a cappella.

After the wedding, Hap Taylor Sr. walked up to me and said, “You are going to sing at my son’s wedding.”

Another time, I was scheduled to sing at a winter wedding, and I figured I had plenty of time to get a few runs in on the mountain beforehand. What could possibly go wrong?

Well, I lost track of time—which, as any skier knows, is remarkably easy to do when you’re having fun on the mountain. By the time I realized it, I had missed the bus. And I absolutely could not be late for this wedding.

So I skied down, took off my skis, got to the road, stuck out my thumb, and hitched a ride to the church. I arrived just in time, still looking more like a ski bum than a wedding singer.

I pulled off my hat, grabbed a choir robe, and, in my clunky ski boots, made my way to the stage. Somehow, I managed to look the part once I was behind the robe—and I sang my way through the wedding as if arriving by hitchhiking in ski boots were perfectly normal.

I suppose when you’re young, you have a little more confidence in your ability to pull off just about anything.

In college, I was chosen to sing the tenor lead in the musical South Pacific. I thoroughly enjoyed the experience and the opportunity to perform before a large audience.

When Helen and I moved to Los Angeles, I joined a beautiful choir at a large Lutheran church with an excellent director. Singing with that choir became one of the highlights of my life there.

One year, the director asked me to sing ‘O’ Holy Night’ during the Christmas Eve service with the choir providing the accompaniment. It became a tradition, and for the next three years I sang the solo each Christmas Eve.

Then, in the fourth year, a new fellow joined the choir. He had been a soloist on the The Lawrence Welk Show, and because of his professional background, the director decided to give him my solo.

On Christmas Eve, I sat in the front pews with the congregation. Since I didn’t know the choir’s part, I couldn’t sing along, but I followed the song in my head as the service progressed.

Partway through the solo, the singer became lost. He had forgotten the words. The director looked panicked as she tried to keep the performance moving. Then she pointed directly at me.

I stood up and came in on the next line, picking up exactly where he had left off. I finished the song while the choir accompanied me, and I don’t think most of the congregation ever realized anything unusual had happened.

The soloist never returned to church after that night.

Music followed me through many seasons of life. Sometimes it arrived with careful preparation, and other times it came with dropped sheet music, blown fuses, forgotten lyrics, and unexpected surprises. No matter what happened, the music somehow carried on. Looking back, I realize that music was never just something I did—it was always there.

My Life in Decades

The first decade of my adult life was both the best of times and the worst of times.

The best of times came from raising a young family. Helen and I welcomed five children into the world: Catherine Sue, Cary Joy, Deborah Dale, Mark Brandon, and Taylor John. Whatever challenges existed between us, there was never any doubt that Helen loved her children. She enjoyed people, loved being around family and friends, and brought energy and fun wherever she went.

We built a comfortable life in Thousand Oaks, California. I enjoyed my work, we had a beautiful home, the house had a large coral for horses and we had ponies for the kids, we had land, a huge deck and room to grow. Looking back, those years were fast, arriving home from work each day, I had a gaggle of happy children waiting to welcome me home, there were s twelve foot Christmas trees, horseback rides, and the joyful chaos that comes with a house full of young children.

But beneath the surface, life was becoming increasingly difficult.

By 1965, we had four children, all very young and close in age. Anyone who has raised children knows how demanding that can be. Looking back, I sometimes wonder how much of a toll those years took on Helen physically and emotionally. At the time, little was understood about postpartum depression, hormonal changes, or many of the emotional struggles that young mothers could experience. People simply carried on as best they could.

Then came my diagnosis of thyroid cancer.

The doctors could not promise a successful outcome, and the uncertainty frightened me. For months I kept the diagnosis to myself because I didn’t know how to tell Helen, and truthfully, I wasn’t sure how to process it myself. When I finally shared the news, the burden on our family grew even heavier.

Helen began struggling emotionally and eventually required psychiatric care. Whether it was the strain of raising four small children, concern about my illness, her own physical and emotional challenges, or some combination of all of them, none of us really knew. We only knew that she was suffering.

Then, during the birth of our fifth child, Taylor, Helen suffered a fatal aneurysm.

She was gone at just thirty years of age.

Suddenly I found myself alone with five children under the age of ten. There was no time to retreat from life or spend years mourning. The children needed both a father and a mother. They needed stability, a home, meals on the table, clean clothes, and someone to tuck them into bed at night.

Fortunately, I was not completely alone. My parents came down from Oregon and stayed with us for several months. My mother (Gladys Skeels Blackwell) stepped into the breach without hesitation. She sewed clothes for the children, got them ready for school each morning, welcomed them home each afternoon, and prepared meals while I returned to work. My father helped wherever he was needed. Their love, support, and steady presence carried our family through one of the most difficult periods of our lives.

Whatever grief I felt had to exist alongside the immediate realities of raising a young family. There were lunches to pack, bills to pay, children to comfort, and a future to rebuild. Looking back, I do not know how I would have managed those first months without the help of my parents. Their willingness to drop everything and come to our aid was one of the greatest gifts they ever gave me and my children.

A new beginning in Colorado

That chapter slowly closed and another one opened. I was then the money manager of the money management division of a New York member firm, as well as the portfolio manager of an in-house mutual fund. Janine Henson had worked for the firm before I was hired. She moved into my department, and we worked together for a couple of years.

After Helen died, Janine looked at me one day and said, “Are you okay?” We went out for coffee and talked. I told her everything that had happened. It was a weight off my back. We became friends, then we began dating, and eventually we took a ski trip to Vail, Colorado. She had grown up in Fort Collins, Colorado. I proposed to her on Number One Chairlift, one of Vail’s original lifts. By the time we reached the top, we were engaged. That chairlift is gone now, but in those days it carried us up the mountain and into a new life together. I fell in love with Janine and Colorado at the same time.

I will always be grateful for what Janine brought to our family. She had been married before we met but had not conceived. When she married me, she didn’t just marry a man—she married a family. She stepped into our lives and became my children’s mother. She taught them the important things: honesty, morality, and how to get along with one another. She brought a sense of family and togetherness that we needed. She became their mother then, and she still is.

Our life in the Colorado rockies was special, we hiked on weekends in the Fall months, taught the kids to Ski in the winter months and rode horses in the Spring and Summer time.

Looking back now, I can also see that I was not always easy to be married to. I was forever chasing the next adventure, whether it was skiing, flying, horses, or a new business idea. Those pursuits brought me great joy, but they also required time, money, and attention. While I was busy pursuing the things that fascinated me, Janine was often left managing the day-to-day realities of a large family and a household deep in the mountains.

At the time, I don’t think I fully appreciated the weight she carried. Raising six children, keeping a home running, stretching a family budget, and creating stability for everyone was no small task. Janine took on those responsibilities with remarkable dedication. Looking back, I understand more clearly that the life which felt like paradise to me may not have felt quite the same to her.

In 1979, we moved back to Bend. I was no longer working for a brokerage firm and was trying to find my way on my own. I began writing investment newsletters for paid subscribers and spent time working on a book about investing.

My longtime friend Mark Haroldson had written a highly successful book on how to make money in real estate. He encouraged me to write a book on how to make money in the stock market, which he would publish and market. I enjoyed writing it, but we soon discovered that a book based on the theory of contrary opinion was not destined for the mass market.

Those were busy years, with a lot of changes taking place in all of our lives. And somewhere along the way, Janine and I began to grow apart. There were many things at play, and eventually Janine told me she wanted a divorce.

I was devastated.

The end of our marriage was one of the most painful experiences of my life. Janine had been my partner through two decades of raising children and building a life together—a life that was peaceful yet filled with adventure in the beautiful Colorado Rocky Mountains. More importantly, she had stepped into a family that was already formed and given our children love, stability, guidance, and a sense of home when they needed it most. She married not only me, but five—later six—children who needed a mother. For that, I will always be grateful.

The Next Chapter Held Unexpected Happines

I was living alone in an apartment in Portland overlooking the Hawthorne Bridge and the Willamette River. Christmas was approaching, and I was feeling sorry for myself. My adult children would all be spending Christmas with Janine, and for the first time in many years I found myself facing the holidays alone.

One evening I opened the newspaper and saw that guitarist John Fahey was performing his annual Christmas concert just a few blocks from my apartment. I decided to go.

When I arrived, I discovered the show was sold out. The man at the door told me I could stand near the bar if I wanted, so I took my chances and squeezed in.

A few minutes later, a sweet, five-foot-two blue-eyed lady stepped up beside me.

She later told me that I looked “safe.”

The neighborhood was a little eclectic, and after the concert ended, I asked if I could walk her to her car. She said yes. We talked the entire way, and before we parted, I decided I had nothing to lose.

“Can I have your phone number?” I asked.

She said yes again.

The next day I called and invited her to join me, my six children, and two grandchildren for a performance of The Nutcracker.

She said yes once more.

After that, I don’t think we were ever apart for more than a day or two over the next ten years.

We married and eventually purchased a farm in Butteville, Oregon, fulfilling another dream that had been sitting on the back burner for years. I had always wanted a farm in the Willamette Valley, and now I had one.

Together we raised three boys—William Davis, Michael Wallace (Micky), and Robert Delaney, (Robbie)—and a menagerie of animals that seemed to grow by the month. There were cows, horses, sheep, pigs, chickens, rabbits, bees, and even a llama that wandered into our lives and decided to stay. I named her Dolly Llama.

Those were wonderful years. After heartache and loss, I had found happiness again.

By the early 2000s, however, I felt another change coming. My years in the investment business had taught me to recognize speculative bubbles, and both the stock market and real estate market looked dangerously overvalued to me. Bubbles, I had learned, always pop eventually.

I closed my money management business, scaled back the farm operation, and together we embarked on a year-long adventure in southern France with our three boys.

That trip awakened something in me.

Ginny had already begun building a business called French Property Shares. Her idea was simple and brilliant. She purchased classic French homes, furnished them with carefully selected antiques, and sold ownership shares to people who wanted to spend part of each year living abroad in a home of their own.

The business took off quickly and showed great promise. Then came the market crash of 2007. As financial markets unraveled around the world, sales slowed dramatically.

Fortunately, we had sold the farm near the top of the market and relocated to Canandaigua, where Ginny had grown up and where much of her family still lived. We purchased a beautiful home built in 1856 on a tree-lined street lined with historic houses dating back to the early nineteenth century.

But sometimes what seems right on paper doesn’t feel right in practice.

After spending my entire life on the West Coast, New York never truly felt like home to me. And despite her hopes, Ginny never fully reconnected with her family in the way she had imagined.

As the boys grew older and began making lives of their own, our visions for the future slowly diverged. My dream was to travel with Ginny and continue exploring the world together. Ginny’s dream was different. She wanted to spend longer periods in Europe and focus on growing her business independently.

Neither dream was wrong.

They were simply different.

Eventually, our paths separated.

Once again, I found myself living alone. But by then I had learned something important. Life moves in seasons. Some people walk beside us for a lifetime, while others accompany us for only part of the journey.

Through every season, however, one constant remained: my children. They had always been there, and they always would be.

My Last Decades

I was born on July 4, 1937, but looking back, I realize I inherited far more than a birthday. I inherited the stories of generations of pioneers, builders, soldiers, dreamers, and survivors. Their stories became part of mine.

Many years ago, I read about the ancient concept of Yin and Yang. The idea is simple: within every darkness there is a seed of light, and within every light there is a seed of darkness. Nothing remains fixed. Everything is in motion. All things are in change.

As an investor, I came to recognize this principle in the stock market. Periods of great optimism often create bubbles, and bubbles eventually pop. Periods of fear and despair eventually give way to recovery and growth. The pendulum is always swinging.

The same is true in life.

Charles Dickens began A Tale of Two Cities with the words, “It was the best of times, it was the worst of times.” Looking back over my own life, I understand exactly what he meant.

I have experienced joy and sorrow, success and failure, sickness and health, adventure and disappointment. There were times when life seemed to unfold exactly as I had hoped, and other times when it took unexpected turns. I have stood on mountain peaks and walked through deep valleys. Through it all, I have been blessed with family, friendships, opportunities, and experiences that have made life an adventure worth living.

Yet through all the changes, one thing has remained constant: life keeps moving forward.

As I enter my final decades, I understand more clearly than ever that the world is always turning toward the light. There may be periods of darkness, loss, and uncertainty, but within them lies the seed of hope. New opportunities emerge, families grow, friendships endure, and another sunrise always follows the night.

I have lived a full and fortunate life. The journey has taken me farther than I ever imagined as a boy growing up in Bend, Oregon. For the adventures, the lessons, the people I have loved, and the family that surrounds me still, I am grateful.

The world keeps turning, and it is always turning toward the light.

When we were little, Dad always told us that the fireworks on the Fourth of July were for his birthday. Several of us were born close to the Fourth, so over the years our birthdays often became one big family celebration on July 4th. We believed him, of course. And even when we grew old enough to know better, I think a part of us still liked to believe that the fireworks were for Dad.

Perhaps, in a way, they always were.

Children of Henry Dale Blackwell & Helen Boyle

Catherine Sue Blackwell b. 1959 Los Angeles, CA.

Cary Joy Blackwell b. 1960 Van Nuys, CA

Deborah Dale Blackwell b. 1961 Van Nuys, CA

Mark Brandon Blackwell b. 1963 Van Nuys, CA

Taylor John Blackwell b.1969, Van Nuys, CA

Child of Henry Dale Blackwell and Janine Henson

Ann Janine Blackwell b. 1974 Boulder, CO

Children of Henry Dale Blackwell and Virginia Bumpus

William Davis Blackwell b. Sept. 1990

Michael Wallace Blackwell b. 1992

Robert Delaney Blackwell b. 1994

A Daughter’s Introduction

This story began with my father’s memories- over the years, my father, Henry Dale Blackwell wrote down pieces of his life—stories of growing up in Bend, family history, his family’s wartime memories, childhood adventures, his love of music, years of skiing, and horseback riding, and the many experiences that shaped him.

After my family recently returned to Bend, my sister Ann emailed us all a typed manuscript Dad had written called The Life and Times of Pampa, “Pampa” being the name given to him by his first granddaughters, Megan & Shaun Morgan.

Over the past months, I have taken Dad’s original writings and carefully rewritten, organized, expanded, and researched them, adding family history, photographs, historical context, and memories of my own. My goal has never been to change his story, but rather to help preserve it for future generations.

I have had the privilege of reading much of this manuscript to my father, now eighty-nine years old. While age has made it more difficult for him to express his thoughts and memories as clearly as he once did, his eyes still light up—and sometimes fill with tears—when he hears these stories. As I read about the people, places, and adventures that filled his life, he would often smile and say, “I remember that!”

I wanted to share this revised story with our family on July 4th, Dad’s 89th birthday. It seemed especially fitting. Not only was he born on Independence Day in 1937, but this year marks America’s 250th anniversary—a milestone that invites us to reflect on our history, our heritage, and the generations that came before us. However as life does, it gets busy and projects get pushed into the future. I will now publish when it it ready.

Dad’s story reflects many of the qualities that defined his generation—hard work, resilience, optimism, love of family, and a belief that life’s greatest adventures are still waiting around the next corner. As our nation celebrates 250 years of history, it feels like the perfect time to preserve and share the story of one man whose life spanned nearly a century of that American experience.

This publication is dedicated to my father, Henry Dale Blackwell, and to the generations who came before him and after him. May these stories remind us where we came from, help us understand those who walked before us, and encourage us to preserve our own stories for those who will follow. Also a very special shout out and appreciation to my sweet Uncle Joe, who is married to my Aunt Joy- my mothers sister. Who, upon retirement took upon the project of researching our family history, and sharing his work, a wonderful gift.

— Deborah Dale Blackwell

My Fathers Story in his words —and mine

My Mothers Side of the Family

On my mothers side of the family were the Skeels clan who migrated from Scotland to North America in the mid-1600s, first settling in Canada before eventually making their way to Vermont. Generations later, my great-grandparents, Nelson and Lucinda Skeels, headed west to southwest Washington, where my grandfather, Walter H. Skeels, was born in 1873.

As a young man, Walter, moved to Salem, Oregon, and found work as a butcher. It was there that he met Nellie Smithson, the woman he would later marry. Together they had two daughters: Grace Audrey born 1901, and my mother, Gladys Winifred Skeels, who was born on June 14, 1908.

In 1914, Grandpa Skeels bought a farm in Sodaville, Oregon— the place our family would forever call “the old Skeels place.”

After purchasing the farm, Walter returned to Salem, loaded all of the family’s belongings into a wagon, hitched up a team of horses, tied the family cow to the back, and began the long journey to their new home on the side of Middle Ridge.

My mother was eight years old at the time. Her sister Gracie was eighteen.

When my mother graduated from high school, she dreamed of going to nursing school. But her father firmly believed nursing was not a respectable profession. Why he felt that way, I never understood, but my mother listened to his wishes and reluctantly left for Monmouth, a tiny Willamette Valley town built around Oregon’s teachers college.

That same year, tragedy struck the family. Her mother, Nellie, became gravely ill with aplastic anemia, and Mom returned home to care for her. Sadly, Nellie died not long afterward.

My mother never returned to Monmouth Teaching School. Soon after, she met and married my father- Henry Brandon Blackwell.

Years later, Grandpa Walter remarried a lovely woman we knew simply as Grandma Mary — the only grandmother my siblings and I would ever know.

My mother never completely gave up on her dream of nursing school. Nearly thirty years later, she went back to school, earned her nursing degree, and eventually worked at St. Charles Medical Center in Bend.

My mother’s family, the Skeels family, helped shape the values and traditions that would remain part of our family for generations.

As I worked through my father’s memories, I found myself thinking often about my grandmother, Gladys Winifred Skeels Blackwell. Dad’s stories tell us where she came from and the path her life followed, and I know there are many more but he is no longer able to tell them. As her granddaughter, I remember the woman herself.

Grandma Blackwell was one of the warmest and most loving people I have ever known. She was happiest when surrounded by family and was rarely far from a garden, a canning kettle, or a kitchen full of something wonderful baking in the oven. If fruits or vegetables could be preserved, she canned them. Her pantry shelves were lined with jars of the season’s harvest, and she was especially proud of her pickles, which she made using water from the famous Soda Springs near the old Skeels farm.

Most of all, I remember childhood summers in Sodaville.

Every year, our family would visit my grandparents, and my father’s sister, LeAnn, would arrive with her three daughters—Dawn, Linda, and Karen. To us children, those visits felt endless and magical. We spent our days outdoors exploring, playing hopscotch at the famous soda spring, and making up stories about abandoned farm houses being haunted.

One of Grandma’s favorite jobs for us was blackberry picking. Mornings began with her handing us buckets and sending us out into the brambles. We returned scratched from the vines and proud of our harvest, and our reward was always the same: large bowls of fresh blackberries topped with cream and sugar. To this day, I can still taste them.

The blackberry picking was only the beginning of the day. Every afternoon, Grandma prepared a large supper and served it on a large back deck that overlooked the garden and fruit trees. The table would be covered with casseroles, fresh, canned peaches, homemade dinner rolls. I especially remember corn on the cob and fresh beets, both generously slathered with mayonnaise, just the way everyone seemed to enjoy them in those days.

The afternoons stretched into early evening, and eventually the kitchen would be cleaned up while the adults adjourned to watch The Lawrence Welk Show. But we were already gone—out on another adventure, or splashing in the above-ground pool, or inventing games that made the daylight last longer than it should have. Just a few houses away was the old Sodaville store, a small wooden building with a front porch and a swinging screen door that slapped shut behind you in the summer heat. A faded sign hung from the little overhang promising “sundries,” though what mattered most to us was the candy—rows of it, sold by the piece for a penny each. We would gather our pennies during our outings, saving them like treasure, and after supper it was often our first stop before the evening stretched out ahead of us. My favorites were licorice strips and Jolly Rancher hard candies green apple and the red hots.

Looking back now, I realize those gatherings were about far more than food. Grandma and Grandpa created a place where family came together, where cousins who didn’t live close - picked up where they left off the summer before, and where ordinary summer days became cherished memories. When I think of Gladys Skeels Blackwell, I think of her big hugs, her love of laughter and jokes, blackberries in a bowl of cream, canning jars, the smell vinegar and dill when canning pickles, her delicious warm cinnamon rolls, she played the piano at home and the organ in church, Grandpa played whatever he was handed most often the acordian. They loved to play music whenever they could. It was a home filled with love. Those are the memories that remain long after the dates and facts have faded. (Deborah Dale Blackwell)

My Father’s Side of the Family

The earliest ancestor we have been able to trace is Kinnard Kenard, who was born in 1664 in Prestbury, Gloucestershire, England. In 1682, he married Elizabeth Cherrington, and together they began a family line that would eventually lead to mine.

Their eldest son, William Barradale, was born in 1688 and later married Jane Batsford. Their only son, John Barradell, was born in 1727 and married Sarah Hill in 1756. John and Sarah had four children; Robert Barradell, John Barradell, Mary Barrdell and William Baradell. The eldest Robert Barradell, born in 1764. Robert later married Henrietta (whose maiden name has unfortunately been lost to history). Robert & Henrietta had 7 children, all born in Whittington, Gloucestershire Englad. They are; Mary, William, Hannah, Robert, John, Simon and Kenrod Barradell.

Robert and Henrietta’s daughter, Mary Barradell, married George Blackwell, joining the Barradell and Blackwell families. They had five children and adopted one child. Likely adopted from family of deceased relative or something of that nature- as formal legal adoption did not exist in England until the Adoption of Children Act of 1926. Before then, children were often raised by relatives or taken in informally, but those arrangements rarely generated official "adoption" records. The Children of Mary and George are Henry Blackwell, Elizabeth Blackwell, Sophia Blackwell, John Blackwell George Blackwell and James William Blackwell (adopted). Their eldest son, Henry Blackwell, was born in 1839 and married Amanda Van Loon in 1869.

By the mid-1800s, my great-great-grandparents, George Blackwell and his wife, Mary, left their home in Leckhampton, Gloucestershire, England, and immigrated to Holmes City, Minnesota. Like so many families of their generation, they crossed the Atlantic in search of new opportunities, beginning the American chapter of our family’s story.

Henry Blackwell, married Amanda Van Loon in Meeker Co., MN, in March of 1869 Amanda is the daughter of Minor Van Loon and Charity Davenport.

Amanda and the elder Henry Blackwell had three sons, the eldest Stephen A. Blackwell, born 1878 in Santa Clara, California, siblings include Mary Janette, Frances, William Minor, John and Emma.

Stephen later married Hilma Brandon. Their first son — my father, Henry Brandon Blackwell — was born in 1904.

The elder Henry Blackwell worked as a surveyor, a profession well suited to those pioneer years, when towns were still being mapped and the boundaries of farms, roads, and communities were just beginning to take shape across the Midwest.

I once read a newspaper article about my great-grandmother, Amanda VanLoon Blackwell. Just two years after she married the elder Henry Blackwell, Minnesota was swept into the violence of the U.S.–Dakota War of 1862, what many newspapers of that era called the “Great Indian Massacre.” Several homes in their area were destroyed, and many of their friends were killed during the unrest.

Amanda and the elder Henry fled to Alexandria, Minnesota, where they stayed inside a military fort for nearly two years before it was considered safe to return home. When they finally returned, they went back to their farm on Blackwell Lake.

Blackwell Lake is in Douglas County, Minnesota, and was reportedly named after George Blackwell, one of the early pioneer settlers in the area.

I traveled to Blackwell Lake several years ago. What was once frontier farmland is now surrounded by housing developments — a quiet reminder of how much the world had changed since my ancestors first settled there.

In the mid-1920s, the Blackwell clan moved west to Oregon and purchased a farm near Sodaville, not far from “the Old Skeels Place.”

When my father turned twenty-four, he left the Willamette Valley for Bend, where he found work with Oley Grub at the Deschutes County Shop. Oley was someone he had known from his Minnesota days. Dad also lived at the fire hall, where he doubled as a volunteer fireman.

On one memorable occasion, after battling a fire all through the night, the exhausted crew returned to the fire hall at daybreak to find Klondike Kate inviting them over for breakfast at her little cabin across Franklin Avenue.

(Klondike Kate, born Kathleen Eloise Rockwell, was one of the most celebrated entertainers of the Klondike Gold Rush. Known as the “Queen of the Yukon,” she earned fame and fortune as a singer and dancer in the booming gold-mining town of Dawson City, Canada where miners showered her with gold dust and admiration. After her years in the North, she homesteaded near Brothers, Oregon, and eventually settled in Bend in 1917. There she became one of the city’s most colorful and beloved early residents. Locals affectionately called her “Aunt Kate,” and she was known for her generosity, support of the volunteer fire department, and charitable work within the community. Her home on Franklin Avenue became a Bend landmark, and her legacy remains visible today through historical markers, museum exhibits, and local stories that continue to celebrate one of Central Oregon’s most fascinating pioneers.)

My fathers life changed when the stock market crashed in 1929. Oley regretfully told Dad he would have to let him go because he needed to keep his married men employed. Dad moved back to Sodaville, and it was there that he met my mother, Gladys Winifred Skeels.

They were married in 1933, and Dad took over running the Skeels farm. My sister LeAnn was born September 9, 1935 in Lebanon, Oregon and I arrived two years later, July 4th 1937.

My father was never truly cut out to be a farmer. He disliked the damp Willamette Valley weather and longed to return to Bend and the dry climate east of the mountains. Eventually, he convinced my mother that they should move back to Bend.

Before making the permanent move back to Bend, our family took one last memorable trip. In 1940, we traveled to Minnesota to visit the places where Dad had grown up. My only memory of this trip was being chased by a gaggle of geese in a field.

After returning to Lebanon, Mom and Dad packed up all of our belongings — including our dog, Rusty — and headed for Bend once again.

Dad drove an old farm truck loaded with nearly everything we owned, while Mom followed behind with LeAnn and me in the family’s 1937 Ford. I remember the trip well because the old truck overheated constantly. Each time it did, Dad would grab a bucket, scramble off the side of the road searching for water, and pour it into the radiator before we could continue on our way.

More than a century after Grandpa Walter first hauled the family to Oregon by wagon and team, the old farm is still in the family. My Aunt Gracie & Alton’s grandson restored the property, which was recently designated a Century Farm in recognition of its remaining in the same family for over one hundred years.

Meanwhile, my parents purchased two lots on Kearney Avenue in Bend. The property already had a foundation and a tiny two-room cabin with an outhouse out back. The whole family crowded into the little cabin while Dad began building our new home.

My father was truly a jack-of-all-trades. He designed a house to fit the existing foundation and then built, wired, and plumbed the entire thing himself. The house he built still stands today at 446 East Kearney.

We were happy in Bend, and for many years it was my sister LeAnn and I, and then came a wonderful surprise. My mother had another baby—born on December 7, 1937, a boy they named Terry Lynn.

Terry was ten years younger than I was, and for much of the next decade he became my constant shadow. If I climbed into my car, Terry would jump in right beside me and ask, “Where are we going?”

Although we were not close in age, we shared many interests. We both enjoyed reading, painting, skiing, and flying. Through the years, we remained connected by those common interests and by the bond that only brothers can share.

Terry met Linda in the second grade, they were -as they say “boyfriend and girlfriend” from the moment they attended school together.

Terry and Linda Walkup married on July 11, 1969 in Bend, Oregon. Together they built a life centered on family, friendship, faith and love. For a brief time, Terry and Linda lived in Colorado while Janine and I were there, allowing us to create even more special memories together.

Terry and Linda were blessed with two sons, Tory and Tyler. Tory was full of energy, curiosity, and adventure. He embraced life wholeheartedly and never seemed to shy away from a challenge, leaving a lasting impression on everyone who knew him.

Like all families, ours has known both great joy and profound sorrow. The unimaginable happened when Tory’s life was tragically cut short at the age of sixteen—a loss that forever changed our family.

Through that heartbreaking chapter, Terry, Linda, and Tyler faced their grief with remarkable strength. Anchored by their faith, they found the courage to move forward while holding tightly to the kindness, humor, and love that have always defined them.

My sister LeAnn married Ben Dean and had 3 daughters. Ben passed away several years ago, LeAnn is 91 and lives in a nursing home close to her devoted daughters, Dawn, Linda & Karen.

Dawn Dean McAllister born 12/13/1956 Dawn is married to Bob McAllister. Dawn had three children from a previous marriage; Stephanie Martin Rosevear, Ben Martin & Katie Martin McAllister. Stephanie Rosevear had two children, Liam Rosevear and Leighann Rosevear.

Linda Dean Dickson was born 7/5/1958 and did not have children.

Karen Dean has one son, Sam Dean born 10/14/1998

As I look back on those years, I realize that every generation carries only part of the family's story. Memories fade, distances grow, and life has a way of scattering loved ones across different states and different paths. Yet the ties that bind a family are never completely broken.

Part 3, the final pages that I will next post turn from our family’s earlier generations to continue my fathers life—his childhood, the experiences that shaped him and the family he was blessed to have. Like every family, ours would know seasons of happiness, challenge, love, and heartbreak, and each chapter would become another thread woven into the continuing story of the Blackwell family.

A Fourth of July Reflection

This year, as America celebrates the 250th anniversary of its founding, many of us will gather with family and friends to enjoy picnics, parades, fireworks, and the freedoms that generations of Americans have worked to preserve.

As I continue rewriting and preserving my father’s memoir, I realized that one chapter deserved to stand on its own and be shared on this special day.

Like so many families, ours was touched by World War II. My father, Henry Dale Blackwell, remembered the war from the home front as a young boy growing up in Bend, Oregon. Two of my father’s cousins, George and Clark Tucker, answered their country’s call and found themselves in the middle of some of the most brutal fighting of the Second World War.

Neither brother spoke much about those years after returning home. Their story became part of our family’s history, passed down through conversations, memories, and the remarkable recollections of Clark’s wife, Verna. What follows is my father’s account, expanded through those family memories so that future generations may know what they endured.

As the generation that fought World War II slowly passes from memory, preserving these stories becomes more important than ever. They remind us that history is not only found in textbooks. It lives within our own families—in faded photographs, treasured conversations, and the memories passed from one generation to the next.

On this Fourth of July, as our nation celebrates its 250th anniversary and as my father celebrates his 89th birthday, I offer this story in honor of my father, Henry Dale Blackwell; his cousins, George and Clark Tucker; and the countless men and women of the Greatest Generation whose courage, sacrifice, and quiet determination helped preserve the freedoms we celebrate today.

May we never forget their service, their sacrifice, or the stories they entrusted to those who came after them.

What follows is my father’s story, told through the memories he shared with our family and preserved here in his honor.

— Deborah Dale Blackwell

War Years — My Father’s Story

While our family was settling into life in Bend (1940’s) and adjusting to a growing household, events unfolding across the world were about to change everything.

The Japanese attack on Pearl Harbor in December of 1941 changed the world overnight. In a single afternoon, half of the United States Navy was destroyed, and suddenly the entire country was at war.

Every few nights, air-raid sirens would sound through Bend. All the lights had to be turned off for blackout drills. I still remember sitting beside the glow of our wood-burning stove with blankets covering the windows, waiting for the all-clear siren to finally blast through the darkness.

The whole country seemed to unite overnight. Anyone old enough to walk wanted to enlist.

Bend quickly became a center of wartime activity. The Army engineers trained at Camp Abbot — now yet known as Sunriver Resort — where they practiced building massive log bridges across the Deschutes River in preparation for the Allied invasion into Europe and the eventual crossing of the Rhine River into Germany.

Only recently did I learn, while reading a book about Vandervert Ranch just south of Camp Abbot, that there had also been a prisoner-of-war camp there holding captured German soldiers. At the time, the information was classified and unknown to the public.

Meanwhile, the airport in Redmond was taken over by the Army Air Forces and became a busy military airfield.

One afternoon, my mother was outside hanging wet clothes on the line when a military plane flew low over our house. She grabbed a pillowcase and waved it toward the pilot, and to her delight, the pilot dipped the plane’s wing in response.

The most memorable part for me was watching the Army tanks. They arrived on rail cars, were unloaded, and then driven down Kearney — which at the time was a dirt road that ended at our house. The tanks would rumble past our place and head out onto the Oregon high desert for maneuvers.

Once they reached our house, they crossed over a rocky bluff and disappeared down into the juniper and sagebrush below. From there, they made their way around Pilot Butte and out across the open desert. There was only one house below ours, making it the last home between us and Pilot Butte.

A few weeks later, the tanks would come roaring back up the hill and past our house once again. As they climbed the rocky bluff, it looked as though they were pointing straight up into the sky, and all I could see was the underside of the tanks. The soldiers always waved as they passed by our house.

The World War II training exercises that took place around Bend and at Camp Abbot — included massive troop maneuvers involving tanks, armored vehicles, and more than 100,000 soldiers during the 1943 “Oregon Maneuver” was led by Alexander Patch.

World War II was a very different war than the wars that followed. The United States was united in a common goal — to protect America and defend the free world.

My father, Henry Brandon Blackwell tried to enlist, against Mother’s strong objections, in a branch of the military called the SeaBees, but he was turned down because of his age. Meanwhile, Mother went to work delivering parcels for the Post Office because there was such a shortage of workers on the home front. She delivered mail by bicycle so she could save gasoline ration stamps for our family car trips.

There were shortages of nearly everything — food, gasoline, and especially anything made of metal. The government issued ration books filled with stamps, and once your stamps were gone, you could no longer buy certain foods or gas.

One day, as a young boy, I decided I wanted to be a mail carrier like my father. I gathered some envelopes and a book of sugar ration stamps, carefully placing the stamps on the envelopes before setting out to deliver them to our neighbors. When Mother discovered what I had done, she took me by the hand and together we went door to door retrieving both the mail and the precious sugar stamps I had so proudly delivered.

If you saw a soldier hitchhiking during the war, you stopped and picked him up. If possible, you drove him wherever he needed to go, or even brought him home for a hot meal. At one point, an Army brigade was camped in pup tents on the land below our house. One weekend, the neighbors who lived below us returned home to discover someone had broken into their house. The only evidence left behind was an extremely dirty bathtub and towel. In good humor, the neighbors laughed and said that, judging by the condition of the tub, that soldier surely needed a bath.

The day the war ended remains one of the clearest memories of my childhood. The city of Bend erupted into celebration. Everyone was in the streets — dancing, cheering, hugging, and celebrating. Even the Baptists!

Years later, I heard a friend tell a story about that day. He was riding in the car with his father when a man in the car beside them was honking his horn and shouting excitedly. My friend’s father rolled down the window and yelled back, “Move over yourself, you son of a bitch!”

My friend replied, “Dad… he didn’t say ‘move over.’ He said, ‘THE WAR IS OVER!’”

Two of my uncles, Burton and Lynn Blackwell — my father’s brothers — along with three cousins, Harvey Cutts, Ivan Blagg, George and Clark Tucker, all served during World War II. Like most GIs of that generation, none of them ever wanted to speak much about their experiences. The war had been too horrific, and they preferred, whenever possible, to leave those memories in the past.

Lynn returned home both physically and emotionally damaged from fighting in the Pacific. His wife, Zola, once asked him why his body was covered with scars if he had served as a medic helping others rather than carrying a gun. Lynn explained that during one battle, Japanese soldiers had dropped out of the trees onto him and the others, forcing them into hand-to-hand combat with knives in order to survive.

When Lynn came home, the war never really left him. He could not sleep in a bed and instead sat in the corner of the room with his back against the wall. If he heard even the slightest sound — someone walking down the gravel road, for example — he could be on his feet in an instant, knife in hand, ready to defend his life. Not long after returning home, Lynn died.

One memory of him has always stayed with me. Before shipping out, Lynn came home on leave and took me fishing. He caught a small fish, and when we brought it home, he proudly told Mom that I had caught it. I felt torn. I loved Lynn dearly, but I also did not want to lie to my mother. Later, when we were alone, I quietly confessed to her that I had not caught the fish — Lynn had.

She smiled and said, “It will taste the same no matter who caught it.”

The Tucker Brothers; George & Clark

The Long Road Home

Perhaps the most harrowing war stories for me were those of my cousins, the Tucker brothers, George and Clark. This story was relayed to me years later by Clark’s wife, my cousin Verna June. George, the older brother, enlisted in the Army Air Forces and served as a tail gunner on a B-17 Flying Fortress. His job was to sit alone in the small Plexiglas turret at the tail of the bomber, scanning the skies for enemy aircraft approaching from behind and firing at anything that threatened the plane and crew. Toward the end of the war, George’s plane was shot down over Germany and crash-landed behind enemy lines. German soldiers dragged him from the wreckage and sent him to a concentration camp prison. He later said that his only food was a single boiled rutabaga each day.

After several months in the camp, a German guard announced that trucks would arrive the next morning and all prisoners were to board them. Something about it did not sit right with George. That night, weak and starving, he slipped out and hid in a nearby tree. At dawn, trucks rolled into the camp and the prisoners were loaded into the backs like cattle and driven away. When the camp finally quieted, George climbed down, slipped through the open gate, and began the long journey home to Minnesota.

He traveled only at night, hiding during the day and surviving on whatever scraps of food he could find. Somehow, he made his way to the Alsace region near the French border, where German forces were gathering for what would become known as the Battle of the Bulge. George managed to slip through enemy lines and continued another thousand miles toward Marseille, France. Eight months after escaping the camp, he walked into the airport there wearing the same tattered uniform he had on the day his plane went down.

An American cargo plane bringing supplies into France agreed to take him as far as Florida. From there, George hitchhiked all the way back to Minnesota. Verna June once told me, “I don’t know how anybody would have stopped for him. He still had on that same ragged uniform from the crash.” When George finally knocked on his front door, his wife Elsie opened it — but she did not recognize him. Malnutrition had taken his teeth, much of his hair, and nearly all of his weight. He stood there gaunt and hollow-eyed, skinny as a scarecrow, a man who had somehow survived the unimaginable and walked his way home from war.

Clark’s story is one of extraordinary bravery, resilience, and quiet determination. George’s younger brother had been working on a dairy farm when the war began. When Clark turned seventeen, his draft notice arrived. The farmer he worked for urged him to stay, telling him that if he bought more cows he could likely obtain an exemption because he was “needed on the home front.” But Clark refused. His answer was simple and unwavering: “No. I have to go find my brother.”

After boot camp, Clark was shipped to England, where Allied forces were preparing for the long-awaited invasion of Europe. On June 6, 1944 —The Normandy landings — a cold, wet, fog-covered morning, Clark found himself packed into a troop carrier crossing the English Channel toward the beaches of Normandy. His landing craft was among the first waves to reach the shore. As the ramp dropped into the surf, soldiers carrying fifty-pound packs and rifles plunged into waist-deep water and fought their way toward land under relentless enemy fire.

Ahead of Clark rose the steep Normandy cliffs. Hidden above them, German soldiers waited inside reinforced concrete bunkers with machine guns trained directly on the beach below. As Clark ran forward, he suddenly heard the deafening burst of machine-gun fire. In an instant, every soldier ahead of him was cut down. Somehow, Clark reacted fast enough to dive headfirst into the pile of fallen men. He lay there motionless among the dead for hours, scarcely breathing, listening to bullets rip across the beach and the cries of wounded soldiers fade into silence as darkness finally settled over the battlefield.

When night came, Clark and one other surviving soldier from his platoon crawled out from beneath the bodies and began climbing the cliffs together. Alone, exhausted, and deep behind enemy lines, they eventually located another American platoon in desperate need of replacements. Both men immediately joined them.

Their next assignment was to retake a French village occupied by German forces. Because he was new to the platoon, Clark was handed the most dangerous role of all — scout. Under cover of darkness, he crept into the village alone to determine how many German soldiers were stationed there, where the machine guns had been positioned, and how the Americans might launch an attack. Every step carried the risk of capture or death. Yet Clark completed the mission and returned with the information his commanding officer needed. Guided by his reconnaissance, the platoon advanced on the village and successfully drove the Germans out.

It is difficult to imagine the courage required of a seventeen-year-old farm boy from America suddenly thrown into the center of one of history’s most brutal battles. Clark rarely spoke about the war afterward, like so many men of his generation. But the little that was passed down tells the story of a young man who faced terror beyond comprehension and kept moving forward anyway — driven not only by duty to his country, but by the hope of somehow finding his brother alive.

That Christmas, far from home and deep in the shattered countryside of France, Clark’s platoon finally received mail and care packages from their families. For a brief moment, the war loosened its grip. A small group of soldiers discovered an abandoned stone farmhouse whose owners had fled south to escape the fighting. In the basement, the men gathered together with their packages from home, opening tins of cookies, letters, cigarettes, and small gifts that carried the familiar scent and memory of America. Somewhere in the cellar they also found several bottles of Bordeaux wine.

For one evening, they allowed themselves to feel human again.

The soldiers shared the wine, laughed quietly, and sang Christmas carols that reminded them of home and family. In the middle of a brutal war, in a frozen foreign country, they tried to create a small pocket of warmth and normalcy. Young men who had spent months dodging bullets and watching friends die sat together imagining their mothers’ kitchens, snowy farms, and brightly lit Christmas trees thousands of miles away.

At some point during the gathering, Clark climbed the stairs to step outside and relieve himself. Moments later, another soldier followed behind him. As the man reached the stairway, his boot caught on a hidden wire.

The explosion was catastrophic.

The farmhouse had been rigged by the Germans as a booby trap. In an instant, the building erupted into fire, stone, and splintered wood. The soldiers inside never had a chance. Once again, Clark found himself one of only two survivors from an entire platoon.

It is almost impossible to comprehend the emotional toll such experiences must have taken. Time after time, Clark survived situations that should have killed him, only to watch nearly everyone around him disappear in seconds. Yet he continued forward, carrying the weight of those losses while somehow finding the strength to keep fighting.

After the war, the Tucker brothers moved to the Willamette Valley and started a small gyppo logging operation, taking whatever timber jobs they could find. The work was hard, dangerous, and seasonal, but after surviving the war, hard work in the forests of Oregon probably felt almost peaceful. It was there that Clark met my cousin Verna, and before long they were married and beginning a new life together.

When the timber began to thin out in Oregon, the families packed up and moved north to Williams Lake, where logging was still booming. But logging had never really been the dream. The Tuckers were horse people at heart, and what they truly wanted was a cattle ranch of their own. Slowly, through years of grueling labor and careful saving, they put together enough money to buy land.

Eventually, Clark and Verna settled on a beautiful property known as the Spring House Ranch. In the early days of British Columbia, the ranch had reportedly been a stopping place for stagecoaches to water their horses before continuing farther into the frontier. It seemed fitting somehow that Clark — who had crossed battlefields, survived Normandy, and endured the horrors of war — would finally find peace in a place built around endurance, travel, and survival.

When Clark passed away, their son Corky took over the ranching operation and carried on the family legacy. Verna June later carved out a quiet corner of the ranch and built herself a beautiful little house there, surrounded by the land and life they had worked so hard to create together.

I made the trip to visit Verna June around 2019 to hear these stories firsthand. I had known pieces of them growing up, fragments told here and there over the years, but never the full sequence or the depth of what the brothers had endured. Sitting with her and listening, the scattered pieces of family history finally came together into something much larger — a story of courage, survival, sacrifice, and the long journey home after war.

The men and women of this era came to be known as the Greatest Generation. They fought unimaginable battles and endured hardships few today can fully comprehend, yet most returned home carrying those memories quietly within themselves. They rarely spoke about the terror, loss, or brutality of war. Instead, they rolled up their sleeves and got back to the business of living. They built homes, raised families, started farms and businesses, and created the foundations for the future generations that followed. After witnessing so much destruction, what they wanted most was not glory or recognition, but the chance to build a peaceful life and a better future for their children.

My husband and I have always had an affinity for French cuisine—for the way a French chef cares for food. From the garden to the plate, there is an intention, a kind of quiet reverence, and yes, a bit of inventiveness that borders on magic. You know the feeling, I’m sure—that moment when a dish is not just eaten, but experienced. It’s a beautiful thing to enjoy.

So to stumble upon that same kind of magic, tucked into a small town in the Spanish countryside, felt like a gift. Unexpected, but unmistakable.

(Lake) Banyoles itself is a town shaped by tradition, though not untouched by the world beyond it. The lake, impossibly beautiful beneath the distant snow-capped Pyrenees, draws tourists throughout the year, while international rowing competitions—and even past Olympic events—have brought athletes and visitors from far beyond Spain to its shores. Yet for all its quiet worldliness, Banyoles remains deeply Catalan at heart. It is the kind of town where giant festival puppets still dance through the streets each year, where fire festivals light up the night, and where local traditions are not performances for visitors but simply part of everyday life. Most restaurants continue to serve traditional Catalan cuisine, with only the occasional Chinese, Italian, or seafood restaurant scattered among them.

We wandered the old town often—usually after market days—half-looking for a place to land for lunch, or somewhere to remember for dinner (though, truthfully, once we settled back into Can Mademon, it was hard to leave again).

One afternoon, during one of those aimless walks, I noticed them—the deep red shutters. The entire façade of a petite, bistro-like space that immediately transported me somewhere just across the border. I turned to my husband and said, “We need to come back here.” He agreed.

And yet… we didn’t.

We passed it again. And again. Each time promising ourselves we would come back.

Then Amelia, our daughter, was in town, and my Spanish husband declared, “Let’s go do a tapeo tonight.”

(A tapas crawl, for the uninitiated—which, if you know Banyoles, is slightly ambitious. This is not exactly a tapeo-crawl kind of town.)

Naturally, I pointed that out.

Naturally, we did it anyway.

We decided to begin at the place with the red shutters—Riots.

Just a vermut negra, we said. A tapa or two. Then we’d move on.

Of course… that’s not how the night unfolded.

We found the red shutters easily this time.

Inside, it was quiet—the hour early by Spanish standards. We told the chef we were on a tapeo mission, not looking for a full meal. Just a vermut, maybe a couple of small plates, and then we’d be on our way.

He smiled. Of course.

Axel—chef, owner, and as we would soon learn, storyteller—began to explain his menu. His approach was thoughtful, almost choreographed. Dishes were meant to come out in a certain rhythm. Small plates first, meant to be shared, plated with intention. He spoke about balance, about progression, about how a meal should unfold.

We listened. We nodded.

And quietly abandoned our plan to leave.

Because, of course, we wanted one of everything.

We showed some restraint—barely—and settled on a few things to start. A vermut negra. Thinly sliced salami. Bread from just down the street. And then… a bottle of Empordà red, and the shrimp, the dish that stopped us.

Shrimp from Roses, in a rancid wine sauce.

Now, as a sommelier, I didn’t recoil—but I did pause. Rancid is not exactly a word you expect, or hope, to hear describing wine.

My husband said it first:

“Rancid wine?”

Axel didn’t flinch. Instead, he explained—patiently, proudly. Wine that has turned, wine that most would discard, transformed into something else entirely. In Spain, nothing goes to waste. What might be considered past its prime becomes, in the right hands, an ingredient with depth, with edge, with story.

We looked at each other.

We had to try it.

When the dish arrived, it was deliciously complex, yet somehow simple at the same time. The famed shrimp from Roses—fresh, bright, and perfectly cooked—rested in a brothy, peppery sauce carrying something deeper beneath it.

Not sharp, not spoiled—nothing like what the word rancid prepares you for. Instead, it was layered. Rich without being too rich, slightly fermented in a way that gave the dish a kind of backbone. It lingered. It made you think. It made you ask for more bread, because this plate was not going back to the kitchen with any trace of sauce left.

It was extraordinary—familiar somehow, yet entirely new.

And just like that, our “quick stop” became something else entirely.

Axel, it turns out, had spent years in Paris, absorbing a philosophy of cooking that values precision, restraint, and beauty on the plate. But he brought it back here, to Banyoles, at the urging of his sister. Back home, to create something rooted in everything he had learned.

A little bit of France. A lot of Spain. And entirely his own.

We didn’t try much more that evening, though we wanted to. Still committed to completing a tapeo in a decidedly non-tapeo town, our next stop was La Consulta, a wine bar with tapas in the Plaça Major. We had become friendly with the sommelier who ran it before he later moved on to open a wine shop two doors down.

The night ended with me driving us home, all of us vowing to return to Riots.

We returned a few days later for lunch, the three of us, and the meal was completely over the top—inventive, deeply satisfying, and somehow still comforting. The kind of meal you keep talking about long after you’ve left the table.

A month or so later, I received a call from my friend Cristina at Mas Auró, our neighbor and olive oil producer. She had guests visiting for an olive oil tasting who were looking to buy a home in the area and wondered if she could pass along my number.

He called.

We ended up talking for quite a while—one of those naturally curious people, interested in everything. By the end of the conversation, I invited them to come see Can Mademon the following day.

“We would love to,” he said, “and maybe afterwards we can take you to lunch in Banyoles.”

Apparently, that’s where they were staying.

I suggested Riots.

He laughed.

“We just ate there today.”

I started to suggest another restaurant, but before I could finish he interrupted me.

“We would love to go back to Riots,” he said. “What a great excuse.”

Our son happened to be visiting at the time, though he is more of a patatas bravas and croquetas kind of guy. We dropped him in the plaza with instructions to meet us at Ritos for dessert, then made our way once again down the side street toward the red shutters.

The four of us had another wonderful meal.

This time, for my main course, I ordered penne with grilled octopus in a rich, smoky roasted tomato sauce that tasted as though it had simmered for hours.

In the end, the couple did not buy Can Mademon, but we spent two lovely days together eating, exploring, and talking. We hosted them one afternoon for my husband Vince’s paella. I had recently finished making my Spanish liqueur, ratafia, and after lunch we sipped it slowly alongside pieces of dark chocolate and Turrón—the traditional Spanish sweet made with almonds and honey.

The gentleman loved the ratafia so much that I sent him home with a flask shaped bottle.

It was one of those rare afternoons that quietly drifted into evening… and then somehow into another meal entirely.

(If you’d like the story behind making Catalan ratafia, you can read it here: Nine Walnuts and a Little Faith)

Not long after, I brought Axel a bottle of my homemade ratafia and asked whether he might be open to an interview.

To my delight, he agreed immediately.

“Come any day after lunch, before dinner,” he said. “We can sit and talk.”

But life intervened.

Can Mademon sold, and before long I was on a plane back to the United States—to look at houses, buy a car, and begin the strange process of building a new life again.

Months later, I returned to Spain for medical reasons, and my daughter Amelia came with me to help. She was one hundred percent on board with making the trip back to Banyoles to finally interview Axel.

We arrived for a late lunch. I apologized for the months that had slipped by, but asked if he would still be willing to pick up where we had left off.

Thankfully, he smiled and said yes.

Axel spoke mostly in English, and instead of my usual frantic scribbling of notes, I recorded our conversation so I could simply listen.

This is Axel’s story.

And before I begin, I should explain that what Axel is doing at Riots does not fit neatly into the traditional idea of a Spanish menu.

In Spain, a typical menú is often a fixed-price meal at a reasonable cost—usually three, four, sometimes even five courses, often including wine and dessert. The first course usually the largest. Structured. Predictable. Familiar.

Axel’s approach feels entirely different.

His menu begins with small plates—usually three choices—and by the time he has described them, you inevitably want all three. So he plates smaller portions, allowing the table to share and taste each one as the meal unfolds.

It feels less like ordering dinner and more like being guided through a conversation.

Axel was born in Barcelona, though he was mostly raised in the village of Centelles, north of the city. He describes his childhood as fairly ordinary.

“My parents were not especially good cooks when I was young,” he told me, laughing a little. “But as I got older, they became better cooks, and I started to notice. At the same time, I began to appreciate good food more and more.”

Like many teenagers, he wasn’t entirely certain what he wanted to do with his life.

“I was a little confused,” he admitted. “Which is normal at that age.”

Around that time, two of his closest friends left to study culinary training in Barcelona.

“One day my friends asked if I could help them at a restaurant for a special event,” he recalled. “And in that moment, I understood something important. I realized this could be very good for me.”

What struck him most was how complete the work felt. “I always thought I would work with my hands. But this… this was the complete mix– I could work with my hands,” he said, “but also with all of my senses. Smell. Taste. Touch. Everything mattered. For me, it was the most complete job I could imagine.”

Axel went on to explain that the restaurant world quickly became much bigger than cooking alone.

“The restaurant industry is a world of its own,” he said. “There is a whole system to it. It is something completely different.”

And he fell in love with it—all of it.

“At that moment, I knew it was the best thing for me,” he continued. “I liked the structure of it. So after high school, I started culinary university in Barcelona.”

He remembers those years with real affection.

“I felt very lucky because I met so many people who were also excited about cooking. We all pushed in the same direction. We pushed the teachers, we asked many questions, and everyone worked very hard.”

After two years of study, students were offered an additional six months of schooling followed by six months of staging—the culinary tradition of working, unpaid or minimally paid, in professional kitchens to learn through immersion and experience.

Axel’s first stage experience was in a one-star Michelin restaurant in Barcelona. His second took him to Poland. For the third, he requested a return to Barcelona.

“After that, I started to move around,” he said. “I decided I wanted to cook my own food someday and work for myself.”

At one point, his parents encouraged him to take over at their friend’s restaurant after the owners retired.

“It was a small restaurant in Gaeda,” he recalled. “It was small, but a very good way to learn.”

But by then, Axel had built friendships with cooks and chefs from all over the world. Like many young chefs, movement became part of the education.

He spent one summer working in Dénia, a Spanish village on the Mediterranean, where he met an Italian chef. That encounter inspired him to move to Italy, where he lived for nearly four years, cooking in Napoli, Cesenatico, and Venice.

“Italy is very nice,” he said with a smile. “Very good products to work with. But it is difficult to make money there, and opening something new can be complicated because there is so much paperwork involved.”

While Axel was working in Italy, it was also the period when El Bulli and molecular gastronomy captured the culinary world’s imagination. Young chefs everywhere were chasing foams, spheres, and liquid nitrogen.

But Axel wasn’t interested in that movement.

“I went to Italy to learn traditional cooking,” he explained. “At that time, many restaurants wanted chefs to bring them the recipes and techniques of molecular cuisine, but that was not what interested me.”

Instead, he wanted foundations. Technique. Product. Simplicity done well.

In 2015, Axel first made his way to Paris, though at the time he didn’t feel he yet had the experience necessary to work there professionally.

Instead, he spent his time differently.

“I went mostly to eat,” he said, laughing. “To enjoy. To observe.”

And he did more than observe. He met a chef who later invited him back to work in his kitchen.

A year later, in 2016, he returned to Paris—this time ready.

Over the next seven years, he cooked, observed, tasted, and gathered the experiences that would eventually give shape to his own restaurant and point of view at Riots.

After Paris, Axel spent three months in Rome with friends from school and travel, all helping another friend open a new restaurant. It was a memorable experience, allowing old friends to reconnect while working side by side as professionals.

Then, in 2023, he came home to Spain- Banyoles, to visit his sister.

That visit changed everything.

She showed him an empty restaurant space—a space that would eventually become Riots Restaurant.

“She convinced me to stay,” he said. “To open something here, near family, in my country.”

And so he brought years of experience, travel, kitchens, techniques, and influences back to this quiet corner of Catalonia.

On our very first visit, we had asked Axel about the name Riots. Given everything happening in the world, it felt like an interesting—and perhaps bold—choice.

He laughed gently and corrected our pronunciation.

“In Catalan, it is pronounced REE-otts,” he explained.

Then he clarified the meaning.

“It is not about vandalism,” he said. “It is more about revolution. A personal revolution—a riot inside yourself.”

The idea, as Axel describes it, is deeply personal.

“You are a piece of everyone behind you,” he told us. “You never see one hundred percent of the restaurant before you begin. You take inspiration from everything you have lived, from the people around you, and then you create your own way.”

For Axel, food is not about spectacle or performance. It is about experience.

“My goal,” he said, “is for people to enjoy the moment. To try something new—not with previous expectations, but openly.”

I asked Axel about his process for developing new dishes because the food at Riots truly feels unique. Not unique for the sake of being different, but thoughtful in a way that makes you pause between bites.

As he spoke about flavor, discovery, combinations, and the instinct that guides his creativity, I began to understand that Axel does not think about food the way many chefs do. He thinks in layers, contrasts, memories, and possibilities, trusting his intuition to connect ingredients and ideas in ways that feel both unexpected and natural.

What surprised me most was how much thought he gives not only to flavor, but to the experience surrounding the dish itself.

“I always do one exercise when I create a new dish,” he told me. “I think about multiple stakeholders at the same time. It is an internal exercise. How would the owner experience this? How would the guest taste this? How would the server understand it?”

For Axel, creating a dish is not only about flavor. It is about every interaction surrounding the experience.

“It is experience-based,” he said, “but also about the internal perspective of everyone who touches the concept.”

Then he explained his process in a way that made perfect sense.

“My inspiration is like a painter,” he said. “You have colors and then you mix them. For me, I have products and techniques, and I mix them together. I am not thinking first about a recipe.”

Instead, he thinks in possibilities.

“I might have celery, pear, vinegar, maybe a condiment, and I think… this could be nice together. I feel free to do what I like. Sometimes things don’t work—but most of the time they do. That is part of the process.”

I mentioned the beautiful chicken pâté we had eaten earlier that afternoon, particularly the edible flowers and fresh herbs arranged across the pâté. He explained they were not chosen simply for beauty, though beauty mattered too.

“They are for flavor also,” he said. “Sakathia for spice. Colza for color.”

And that, perhaps, is the difference with Axel.

This kind of creativity is not forced. It exists in the small decisions. The subtle contrasts. The confidence to trust instinct.

One Wednesday morning, while shopping at the Banyoles farmers market—held just steps from the restaurant—he overheard a man and woman talking about Riots without realizing he was standing nearby.

The woman asked the man if he had eaten there.

“Yes, yes,” the man replied enthusiastically. “He is so creative. So original.”

But the woman disagreed.

“No,” she said. “He makes what he wants to make. It’s not about creativity.”

Axel laughed while telling us this story because, like many Spanish conversations, it continued on for quite a while before eventually circling back around to agreement: yes, the food was creative.

But what pleased him most was not the compliment itself.

It was that people were discussing his food at the market.

At one point during our conversation, Axel said something that we needed to come back to:

“Riots, for me, is a moment in time.”

As our interview began winding down, we asked about the future. About Banyoles. About whether he imagined another project someday, another city, another restaurant.

His answer felt exactly right after spending two hours listening to him speak.

“It’s difficult,” he said with a smile. “Because if I am here, but I am thinking in the future… then I am not really here.”

It occurred to me that this may be the secret to Riots. Axel is not chasing the next thing while standing in the current one. He is wholly engaged with the restaurant, the food, and the people sitting in front of him.

“I try to think more about today,” he continued. “About how to do better now. Of course, I would love to have a little land someday to grow things. And I would like to spend more time visiting winemakers.”

Then he shrugged slightly.

“But for now, I think I want to put more into this restaurant.”

And even though we no longer live nearby, hearing that made us happy.

Getting to know our hostess

Talking to Jenn Sharp is one of the easiest conversations you can have.

She is warm in a way that immediately disarms you—welcoming, quick to laugh, and entirely unpretentious. But spend a little more time with her, and something else reveals itself: she’s not especially comfortable talking about herself. Jenn is not a self-promoter.

She’s a doer.

Raised on Rhythm and Responsibility

Jenn was born in New Orleans, Louisiana—and you can feel it in her. Not in a performative way, but in something deeper: a rhythm, a generosity, a sense that food and people are never separate.

She grew up, as many of us did, in a world rooted in routine and responsibility. A 4-H girl, her family raised Simmental cattle and thoroughbreds, and she spent her early years showing livestock and learning what it meant to care for something fully—from beginning to end.

There’s a steadiness in that kind of upbringing. Work first. Family always.

She carried that with her to LSU, where she studied agricultural business. But it wasn’t until she met her future husband that she glimpsed a different kind of life.

His family gathered.

Big weekend parties. Late night Poker parties. Barbecues that stretched late into the evening. They were lively, a little wild, joyful in a way that felt expansive—debaucherous. Fun— she laughs.

It was a contrast to the structure she had known.

And something in her took hold of it.

Jenn met Carter Sharp when he was just seventeen and she was twenty. Carter had been a good friend of her brother’s in high school—wild, charming, a little reckless in the way young men sometimes are. Jenn laughs as she describes herself back then as “the goody two-shoes.”

Carter, convinced she would never date someone younger, lied about his age.

It worked. They dated, and a few years later married when Carter was twenty-one and Jenn was twenty-three.

She Already Knew

After a small, intimate wedding, Jenn began building her own version of that life—one rooted in family, but open, evolving, and deeply creative.

Motherhood didn’t begin the story—it revealed its roots.

Long before organic became a buzzword—before it appeared in grocery stores or filtered into conversation—Jenn had already been living it.

Her grandparents understood, deeply, that food mattered. That how it was grown mattered. That it could heal. They owned a health food store, and Jenn spent time working there, absorbing more than she likely realized at the time. It wasn’t framed as philosophy—it was simply the way things were done. Food was respected. Sourced with care. Chosen with intention.

Years later, the store having been sold by her grandparents in the 80’s, Jenn tried to buy it. Unfortunately the lady that owned it had set her price. She knew the value of what she had built (even if the Banks disagreed) and she wasn’t interested in negotiating it down for anyone, not even the granddaughter of the Founder.

So when Jenn became a mother and began noticing the word organic appearing everywhere, it didn’t feel like a revelation.

It felt like a return.

Still, true to her nature, she went deeper. Research became a kind of second language. She read, questioned, and refined what she already knew—eventually making her own baby food, determined to give her children the very best she could.

That instinct–to go deeper, to learn, to do—would become a defining trait.

The Art of It

A true creative and natural entrepreneur, Jenn eventually opened a kitchen space where she ran her Special Order bakery and dress shop while her youngest, Bailey, was just one year old.

It was, by any measure, a lot.

Three children and a baby. A business built on detail and precision. Something had to give.

But the art of i, the beauty, never left her.

Even now, cake design is where Jenn’s creativity takes form. She is known for her intricate sugar flowers, delicate and impossibly lifelike. As we spoke, she reached behind her and pulled one from a shelf—a flower from her daughter Alex’s wedding.

It was still perfect. Still beautiful.

That’s what she loves best: the artistry of presentation, the way something can feel almost too beautiful to touch. To create something that surprises and delights her friends and guests, the beautiful details.

And then she laughs.

“If a cake doesn’t have the possibility of falling over,” she tells me, “I don’t want to make it.”

Sheet cakes? Absolutely not.

Of course, one did fall once, twenty-five years ago—at a dear friend’s wedding. Jenn was devastated. But her friend, the bride, didn’t miss a beat:

“It was the best cake any of my guests had ever eaten… even off the floor.”

Jenn’s laughter, when she tells this story, is contagious. And telling.

For her, perfection may be the goal but it was never really the point.

Raising Curious Humans

That same curiosity led her to Montessori philosophy, another subject she didn’t just explore, but fully immersed herself in. She studied it, became certified to teach where she applied it, and ultimately chose it for all of her children.

To this day, they credit it with shaping who they are: their independence, their curiosity, and their deep connection to family.

And that word ‘family’ is where everything begins with Jenn.

Where the Party Begins

Before there was ever a formal name for it, before Roux & Choux became what it is now, there were the parties.

They always started the same way: with family, extended family, which at its core could easily be 40 guests. Birthday parties are where it began- Roux and Choux Social Club is what it became.

And then, easily parties grew, others would be folded in—new friends, extended circles—until what began as something intimate became something expansive.

Bayou gatherings. Layered. Lively. Abundant.

Jenn doesn’t just throw parties, she builds them.

Lighting matters. Music matters. The way a night unfolds matters. She talks about how a party shifts over time, how music can guide that shift, how energy builds and softens and rises again.

But her core philosophy is simple:

Greet every guest as if they are the most loved person in the world. “Look at them as though they are your long lost child”

We talk about what that actually looks like—especially after days of planning, shopping, cooking, and preparing. Over the years she learned to shift, from preparation to enjoyment.

The parties themselves became legend within her family.

Birthday celebrations grew increasingly elaborate. At one point, she built a Jedi Temple out of PVC pipe and lights in her backyard for her son’s birthday party. As the children grew older, the parties didn’t stop—they just evolved.

More grown-up but still rooted in the same thing.

Joy.

So I ask her what makes a party successful.

She throws her head back and laughs.

“You know it’s successful when there’s laughter, joy… and empty plates!.”

It’s such a simple answer. And completely definitive.

Joy & Fragility

When I ask about the most memorable party she’s ever hosted, her answer shifts.

It was her daughter Alex’s 28th birthday, in 2019. Her son Colton had been in Asia for a year, and in the middle of the celebration, he walked in—unexpected, a complete surprise.

The atmosphere, already celebratory, lifted.

Joy, in its purest form.

What Jenn didn’t know at the time was that a phone call had come in during the party. News no one wanted to deliver—not then, not in that moment.

Her younger brother had passed.

No one told her. Not right away. She was too happy, surrounded by her children, and her family all-together again.

When the news did come, it changed the shape of the memory—but not its core.

“Death happens during celebrations,” Jenn says.

Not as a contradiction—but as a truth.

The party, and the loss, are now held together. And every year since, that gathering has taken on new meaning—a celebration of life, of family, of the fragile and fleeting nature of both.

And maybe that’s the thing about Jenn.

She understands, instinctively, that gathering isn’t about perfection.

It’s about holding space for all of it, the joy, the mess, the beauty, the unexpected.

And feeding people through it anyway…

Building a Dream & A Life

As they began having children, Carter became deeply invested in the naming process.

In particular, he campaigned hard for their first son to be named after a favorite character from a Louis Lamour novel—the book had originally been made into a movie starring Sean Connery ias Shalako and Bridgette Bardot as the countess Irina Lazarr, the glamorous female who falls for Shalako.

Jenn, however, was set on something more classic.

Carter lost that round.

Their eldest, Alexandra, is aptly named. I had the pleasure of meeting her during the Food Writers Retreat, and like her mother, she is impossible to neatly define. She is smart, funny, musical, with an extraordinary operatic voice. She is married, in a band with her husband, a librarian, a student, and one of the many genuinely interesting people I met during that weekend.

Next came Colton…. who helped so significantly during the retreat that I had to ask Jenn how she convinced him to pitch in so willingly at what was, after all, a mostly women’s food writing retreat.

Colton is simply that kind of person.

He led morning meditations for a few of us, was grounded, thoughtful, endlessly helpful, and entirely at ease among a group of women talking about food and writing and life. He belonged there as much as anyone.

I have not yet met Jenn’s two youngest adult children, but I was delighted to learn that Carter eventually got his way: the third child and second son is, in fact, named Shalako.

And the youngest, Bailey, will be getting married in just a few months—which means Jenn is currently in full planning mode and likely making sugar flowers.

One can only imagine.

By the time her children were older, Jenn found herself dreaming again—this time about something much bigger.

Many of us remember the market crash of 2007 and 2008 through the lens of real estate, business, or the way it altered our plans. Jenn remembers it through the lens of a dream.

For years, she had wanted to create something similar to her grandmother’s health food store—a place where food was respected, thoughtfully sourced, and part of a larger philosophy about living well.

She had her eye on a vacant building in town. It needed a tremendous amount of work, but Jenn could already see what it could become.

The building happened to belong to the major distributor and marketing genius that put Aveda on the map. A company built around plant-based, Ayurvedic-inspired beauty products.

You can feel why the connection made sense.

With her savings, a loan, and an investment from the building owner himself, Jenn began building Organic Planet Grocery and Café.

The renovation took a year and a half—longer than anyone expected, longer than anyone wanted.

But when opening day finally came, there was a line around the block.

People in the community had been watching, waiting, hoping for this place. They wanted it.

And for a while, Organic Planet became exactly what Jenn had imagined.

It was a family affair from the beginning. Everyone pitched in.

Bailey, 7 at the time, could often be found hosing down dishes with the old industrial restaurant sprayers. Colton, sixteen at the time, worked evenings and weekends learning about organic food, healthy living, yoga, and meditation—interests that clearly stayed with him.

Jenn laughs when she talks about it, grateful that this was what her teenage son was immersed in rather than some of the other things teenage boys can find themselves doing.

Organic Planet was an immediate success.

The problem was timing.

Its opening coincided almost exactly with the market collapse.

Like so many businesses during that period, it was not enough to be wanted, or even successful. The community rallied around it. People gathered, advocated, tried to raise money to keep it going.

But it wasn’t meant to be.

A Season in Tennessee

Jenn seems to understand that better than most.

Still, Jenn was not finished chasing ideas.

The next dream belonged to both her and Carter.

They found a beautiful property in Tennessee: a large cabin on twenty-five acres, complete with a vineyard. The beauty of the place called to them. It felt a little like stepping into a dream.

Jenn and Carter both continued working full-time jobs while also running the Airbnb, but hosting people in their home came naturally. Guests arrived, stories were shared, strangers became familiar faces. For Southerners like Jenn and Carter, opening their doors gave them an immediate social life in a brand-new place.

For a while, the whole family shifted too. Alex moved to Tennessee after graduating, and for a period it seemed possible that perhaps this next chapter would take root there.

But life has a way of changing course.

In the end, it was not Louisiana and it was not her youngest child’s wish to spend her high school years in a school with strangers.

Sometimes dreams last forever.

Sometimes they simply serve their purpose for a season.

Alex remained with her job in Tennessee for nine years, becoming Director of the University’s library. This past year she relocated home. To Louisiana. The family finally fully reunited.

Something Almost Molecular

Jenn and I both joined Substack in March of 2025. Maybe that is how we found each other.

One of the first things Jenn created on her Substack is “Sharing Kitchens Live,” where she cooks virtually alongside another cook or writer from afar. I have watched several of these, but one in particular stays with me. Jenn was cooking with Christine from and it was a cold winter evening. I was sitting alone in my upstairs office at Can Mademon, watching the two of them cook together from different parts of the world. Jenn in Louisiana, Christine in Tuscany and I in Spain.

I wanted so badly to reach through the screen with a wooden spoon and taste the sauce Christine was making.

And that is the magic of Substack.

We find people who are living their food dreams, and somehow we connect across continents on a deep, almost molecular level.

When I ask Jenn what inspired her to create the Substack Food Writers Retreat, her answer feels simple.

Hosting is her love language.

She understands, deeply, that making people feel welcome is not about what guests think of us—it is about how we make them feel. Happy. Comfortable. Seen. Fed.

I love this philosophy.

Once her children were older, Jenn began dreaming about creating retreats that could incorporate the many talents of her family—Colton teaching yoga and meditation, music, cooking, gathering, conversation.

The Food Writers Retreat felt like the natural expression of all of those things.

I do not know how many retreats Jenn imagined before this one, or how many more she will create in the future, but I do know this:

The Food Writers Retreat was a gift to each of us who attended.

All of our experiences shape us. They give us meaning. They become part of who we are. It became unanimous immediately that this was just the beginning.

Who Jenn is Now

Today, Jenn is—unsurprisingly—doing many things at once.

She’s writing on Substack. Planning Bailey’s wedding in May. Organizing upcoming Sharing Kitchens Live sessions. The last time we spoke, she was in her kitchen, baking cinnamon rolls with orange glaze, cardamom, and a dash of coconut.

I was in Spain, trying to coordinate one final call across a seven-hour time difference.

We were close to making it work when she paused, laughed, and said she had to reschedule.

She’s also a realtor in Hammond, Louisiana, and a client had just lined up eight houses to see that Tuesday.

“Sorry I have to cancel,” she told me, in that easy, self-effacing way of hers. “Really I’m normally just lolly-gagging.”

And really—I’m sorry—but you just have to love this woman.

So who is Jenn Sharp?

She is a woman who lives by her own compass.

She is Dancing Queen.
She is Gin and Juice.
She is Butterfly.

Because if Jenn Sharp’s life had a soundtrack, those songs would be playing.

We ended our conversations with a live Lightening Round of Questions- Jenn is in her home in Hammond Louisiana, and I recovering from surgery in a Hotel in Blanes, Spain.

I dedicate this story to Jenn Sharp & her family, and to all of of the beautiful humans at the inagural Food Writer Retreat.

I stopped writing when we sold the house. It had a name—Can Mademon. It became too much: too emotional, too heavy, too tangled in logistics and memory. And then, for a while, everything tipped into a kind of chaos I still don’t have language for. Maybe one day I will. But not yet.

What I can say is this: I am deeply grateful for the seven years I had in this extraordinary corner of the world.

About two weeks ago, Amelia and I returned. The trip had already been planned—an endoscopic surgery I’d been through before. I arrived braced for the worst, carrying the memory of how hard it had been. But this time was different. Easier. The doctors are approaching it in stages now, which softened the blow. I was expecting 7 to 9 days in the hospital—and I was out in two. I was booking a hotel while they were preparing my discharge papers.

And yet, the procedure isn’t what stayed with me (thankfully).

It was the return.

Spring—my favorite time of year in this part of the world—had arrived. Bright yellow mustard blanketing fields usually green, red poppies beginning to push through, the landscape quietly assembling itself into the colors of the Spanish flag.

Knowing I would soon be fasting—pre-surgery, then a strict liquid diet (and no, not the fun kind)—I moved through those first days with urgency and appetite. We ate everything we missed, we sipped on vermut negra, and drank wine into the wee hours.

We saw old friends. I walked the streets I used to know by heart—streets that once felt like mine, in that intimate way that comes from living somewhere fully.

We returned to favorite restaurants, the kind where no menu is needed because the memory of taste is already enough. I managed to squeeze in one more chef interview for a story I never finished during the move. It felt like closing a small, unfinished loop.

There were long, lingering hours by the lake. Conversations that stretched without looking at the clock. More reunions. Wandering through Girona, Barcelona, Banyoles—places that are completely familiar but no longer entirely mine.

We ate at Can Roca de Esponellà. And finally, I said goodbye to Ester and Paquita.

I cried—the kind that arrives unexpectedly and doesn’t stop on demand. Pulled from a place that understands when a chapter is truly ending.

One day, our dear friend Maise drove us from place to place. We stopped at my pharmacy—more hugs, more gratitude. I don’t imagine another pharmacist will ever come around the counter to embrace me, or ask me to come say goodbye before I leave again. Perhaps I’m wrong. But it feels like something singular.

What remains now is healing. Slow, intentional, necessary healing. Gratefully, I find myself doing that to the steady, rhythmic sound of the Mediterranean, waves crashing against the warm sandy shores in Blanes—both constant and ever-changing, like so much of life.

It’s not a complete goodbye—I have surgery, part two, in a few months. It’s more a tribute to what this life meant, and perhaps to what I took for granted.

Adéu, my beloved Spanish life. - (In Catalan it’s pronounced Ah -day- oh)

As I reflect on the incredible meals created by the small, ever-shifting teams at the inaugural 2026 Substack Food Writers Retreat, I realize something now, in the quiet after it all:

What lingers isn’t the food—not the gorgeous salads, the satisfying soups, or the surprise of a perfectly timed dessert.

It’s something far more human. It was the people.

The instant camaraderie.
The electric excitement of finally meeting in person.
That quiet, almost disorienting joy of discovering your people—creatives who don’t just love food, but live it, breathe it, build their days around it.

People who understand that a meal is never just a meal.

When I returned to the U.S. after closing the chapter on my life in Spain, I found myself… stuck.

We knew the sale of our home would be emotional. It should have been tender, even graceful. It was everything but—at times leaving us feeling taken advantage of in ways that were hard to name, but impossible to ignore. Layer onto that another health challenge, and somewhere along the way, my writing simply stopped.

Not dramatically.
Not with a declaration.

It just… went quiet.

And I didn’t know how to call it back.

Then came the retreat.

A group of mostly women (and two very brave men), gathering not just to write about food—but to cook together, to clean together, to share space in a way that felt both intimate and immediate.

There’s something revealing about cooking alongside strangers. You see how people move in a kitchen, how they solve problems, how they lead or step back, how they offer help without asking.

And what struck me most was this:

It felt like we had always known each other.

No posturing. No awkwardness. Just a rhythm that formed almost instantly—like slipping into a well-run kitchen mid-service and somehow knowing exactly where to stand.

That’s when I had the idea.

If I couldn’t yet write my story, maybe I could begin with theirs.

And there is no better place to start than with our hostess:

Jenn Sharp.

A native of Louisiana, Jenn didn’t just “organize” this retreat—she hosted it in the truest, most expansive sense of the word.

She found the venue.
She booked the speakers.
She planned—and shopped for—eight full meals for twenty-two people each.

Let that sink in for a moment.

Eight meals. Twenty-two people. Every ingredient accounted for, every detail anticipated.

And then, as if that weren’t enough, she welcomed each of us with carefully assembled baskets—warm, generous, and deeply personal—tucked inside were her famous pralines, a sweet, unmistakable taste of where she comes from.

That’s the thing about Jenn.

She doesn’t just feed people.

She gathers them. Grounds them. Makes space for them.

I’ll be sitting down with Jenn over zoom- this week- because I need to understand:

Where does that kind of energy come from?
That level of generosity?
That instinct to create not just meals, but belonging?

But I have a feeling the answer won’t be simple.

Women like Jenn rarely are.

Coming soon is the first in a series about the women who showed up, rolled up their sleeves, and reminded me—without even knowing it—why I write at all.

And maybe, just maybe, fed me back to myself.

Can Roca no es solo una leyenda local, es un testimonio de su constancia. Cinco generaciones han mantenido sus puertas abiertas, cada una trabajando con la misma disciplina silenciosa que define la vida rural en Cataluña. Al entrar, no se entra en la cocina de una abuela española cualquiera; se entra en un linaje que ha perdurado simplemente porque su gente nunca dejó de trabajar. Las paredes albergan décadas de manos —firmes y decididas— descuartizando carne, limpiando pollos, enrollando canelones, removiendo caldos, perpetuando tradiciones que prosperan no por nostalgia, sino por devoción diaria.

Al fotografiar los retratos ampliados en blanco y negro que adornan los comedores, recuerdo 2020, el año en que Ester tuvo que dar un giro, transformando un restaurante paralizado repentinamente en algo que pudiera sobrevivir a la quietud. Expandió la cocina: comida para llevar cuidadosamente empaquetada, platos recién congelados para recalentar en casa, comidas diseñadas para viajar sin perder su esencia. En Nochevieja, preparó cenas gourmet para celebrar, recogidas en la acera por familias decididas a celebrar el momento, aunque fuera discretamente. No se trataba de reinventarse por sí mismo, sino de cuidar el medio ambiente.

Las paredes de este lugar albergan más que el trabajo de generaciones: también albergan recuerdos. Risas que brotan de las historias contadas, primeros besos robados después de las noches de cine, celebraciones que marcaron el paso de las estaciones y las reuniones municipales que moldearon la vida de este pueblo. Can Roca nunca ha sido solo un restaurante; ha sido testigo.

Hace siete años, nos retiramos a esta zona del norte de España para vivir entre su gente. Llegamos varias semanas antes que el contenedor con nuestras pertenencias, así que explorar las joyas locales se convirtió en nuestro pasatiempo favorito. Can Roca estaba a solo cinco minutos en coche de nuestra casa de piedra; naturalmente, se convirtió en nuestra primera parada. Mi introducción al menú fue pollastre amb fruites (pollo estofado con frutas de hueso), uno de los platos estrella de Ester, desarrollado lentamente con el tiempo, al igual que el propio restaurante.

El plato llegó como si las estaciones se hubieran adelantado: albaricoques y ciruelas pasas conspirando para dar la bienvenida al otoño mientras el sol español aún se comportaba como verano. La carne se rindió fácilmente al tenedor. La salsa tenía un dulzor sabroso que aún no puedo identificar, y la fruta sabía a recuerdos que recuerdan los meses más fríos: ese tirón silencioso y antiguo que sentimos cuando volvemos a desear estofados. Era el tipo de plato que no solo se come; se cree.

Tomé una foto, se la envié a mi hermana Cary —que todavía trabaja en nuestra antigua empresa de catering, Parsley Sage Rosemary & Thyme— y la subtitulé: “La abuela del pollo Marbella”. Desde entonces, este plato ha sido mi favorito: el que sueño, el que pido, el que recomiendo a mis invitados, el que siempre cumple.

Y luego están los canelones de Ester, cada uno enrollado como si el tiempo se detuviera para contemplarlos. Nada sale de esa cocina sin una convicción silenciosa: la sensación de que cocinar aquí no es solo un arte, sino una promesa cumplida.

La mujer en el corazón de todo

En los siete años que llevamos viviendo en este tranquilo rincón del norte de España, he notado dos cosas en Can Roca.

Primero: nunca he ido sin ver a Ester. Siempre está ahí.

Segundo: la comida y el servicio son infaliblemente excelentes.

Cuando le pregunté cómo era posible que siempre estuviera presente, simplemente sonrió y dijo:

“Este es mi trabajo”.

Ese orgullo discreto lo dice todo.

Ester Pagès es la quinta generación propietaria y chef ejecutiva de Can Roca de Esponellà, un restaurante que ha evolucionado con el tiempo manteniendo intacta su esencia. El restaurante se encuentra junto a la única rotonda del pueblo, cuyo centro está decorado con enormes carbassas (calabazas) de cemento, un alegre guiño a las tradiciones agrícolas de la región, además del relleno vegetariano de sus deliciosos canelones.

Ester creció literalmente en Can Roca. Al más puro estilo español, la vivienda se encuentra justo encima del comedor y la cocina. Sus abuelos, padres y la propia Ester trabajaron codo con codo: tres generaciones cocinando, sirviendo y transmitiendo un legado de más de un siglo de historia.

De carnicería a restaurante entrañable

El Can Roca original nació en el casco antiguo de Esponellà, cerca de la iglesia. Fue carnicería, restaurante modesto e incluso un pequeño hostal. Hace sesenta años, se trasladó a su ubicación actual en el centro del pueblo, convirtiéndose en el orgullo de Esponellà.

En aquellos primeros tiempos, las mujeres cocinaban mientras los hombres cortaban leña, descuartizaban la carne y buscaban ingredientes. Ester pasó su infancia en las plantas de abajo y arriba, rodeada de los aromas de guisos cocinados a fuego lento y carnes asadas. Cuando le preguntan por sus primeros recuerdos, se ríe; podría hablar tres horas solo de los olores.

Durante esos primeros años en el nuevo lugar, las tías jóvenes de Ester —Dolores, Paquita y Angelina— ayudaban en la cocina durante las tardes ajetreadas. La propia Ester viajaba cada fin de semana mientras estudiaba en la UAB de Barcelona.

El abuelo de Ester fue dueño del primer coche del pueblo, lo que lo convirtió en el conductor no oficial de la ambulancia, que transportaba a las parturientas al hospital de Banyoles, a 25 minutos.

Una vida dedicada a la mesa

Los abuelos de Ester, Conxita Surribas y Josep Roca, trabajaban siete días a la semana. Cuando sus padres, Conxita Roca y Miquel Pagès, tomaron las riendas, se atrevieron a cerrar los martes, una decisión que horrorizó a la generación anterior. Hoy, el restaurante cierra dos días a la semana y se toma unas merecidas vacaciones de cinco semanas al año, al más puro estilo español.

Me costó un tiempo comprender esta costumbre de “cerrar”. Viniendo de Estados Unidos, me resultaba extraño que un querido restaurante local simplemente colocara un cartel en la puerta —Vacaciones, con las fechas— y luego cerrara durante una semana. Pero ahora lo entiendo: aquí la reputación no se trata solo de la comida. Se trata de la presencia. El nombre de la chef, su rostro, su energía: forman parte de lo que te sirven.

Ester se hizo cargo de Can Roca por completo en 1992, con la licenciatura en Economía (Universitat de Barcelona) en sus manos, tras darse cuenta de que su futuro no estaba en una oficina, sino en la cocina familiar. Y se puede sentir esa mezcla de mente y corazón en cada rincón del restaurante: la eficiencia constante fruto de sus estudios y el alma forjada por toda una vida de aprendizaje junto a sus padres y abuelos.

A Team That Feels Like Family

Her team reflects the same loyalty and constancy that define her. We are normally greeted by the warm charms of Paquita, who has worked at Can Roca for over 50 years. Paquita first joined when Ester’s grandfather invited her from a hotel job in nearby Banyoles — she has been serving guests here since that first day.

José, the poised mesero from the south of Spain, moves through the dining room with an easy grace that comes only with years of familiarity.

In the kitchen, Ester leads a small, multicultural team — cooks from Spain, Argentina, Peru, and Colombia — all united by her guiding philosophy:

“What you can do in your own house, you can do here.”

They eat what they like, share a glass of wine if they wish — maybe a beer from the tap at the end of a long day — and they work with a loyalty you can taste in the food.

Tradición, aligerada por el tiempo

Bajo la dirección de Ester, la cocina ha evolucionado: “más ligera”, dice, aunque su versión ligera sigue siendo profundamente reconfortante. A los jóvenes les encanta; los mayores bromean con ella con cariño sobre los cambios.

Sus platos estrella siguen siendo los de cocción lenta: el pollo con frutas de hueso, las mandonguilles de pollo y gambas, el confit de pato con manzana y sus legendarios canelones, tanto la versión tradicional de carne como un delicioso relleno de carbassa (calabaza). En Navidad, añade un canelón de foie y trufa que resulta muy satisfactorio.

Los canelones son un plato tradicional de las fiestas navideñas, concretamente el 26 de diciembre, conocido como el Día de Sant Esteve (San Esteban en Cataluña), y cada año prepara varios miles para recoger. Un año, la cocina elaboró ​​veinte mil canelones.

¡Veinte mil!

Un Almuerzo para Recordar

Después de entrevistar a Ester, decidimos disfrutar de un almuerzo largo y relajado mientras nuestro hijo aún estaba en la ciudad y nos acercábamos a la salida. Llegamos temprano para poder fotografiar la historia que adorna las paredes: grandes fotografías en blanco y negro que celebran la historia y te invitan a ser testigo.

Cuando le pregunté sobre algunos platos del pasado que aún se conservan, me describió las albóndigas de pollo y camarones en una rica salsa marrón, cubiertas con langostinos grandes con cáscara. Mi esposo lo llama “un auténtico plato español”, uno que el paladar estadounidense podría encontrar un poco único, y lo era, además de delicioso.

Los platos de temporada son los que más espero, sobre todo las alcachofas baby rebozadas y fritas. Sabiéndolo, Ester me trae un plato junto con las albóndigas, aunque ya había pedido más de lo habitual.

Antes de comer, recorrimos la cocina. Ester nos enseñó las diferentes etapas de su escabeche de faisán. El escabeche (en catalán significa “encurtido”) es una salsa para estofar con zanahorias, cebolla finamente cortada, aceite de oliva, hierbas frescas y mucho vinagre. Se cocina durante horas, y los faisanes, aderezados con hierbas, se estofan lentamente en ella. El olor era divino. Le pregunté si estarían en el menú de hoy; me malinterpretó y dijo que no (me dio un vuelco el corazón), pero en la mesa me enteré de que una tanda anterior sí había llegado al menú de especiales.

Ese día comí pa amb tomàquet, mandonguilles de pollastre amb gambes, alcachofas fritas y media ración de escabeche de faisán. No había espacio para el postre, así que terminamos con un café típico español: un carajillo, un espresso con un chorrito de licor. Nuestra opción habitual: Bailey’s.

Vinos, Amistad y el Futuro

Con los años, Ester y yo hemos descubierto una pasión compartida por el buen champán (su favorito es el Bollinger) y, por supuesto, por el vino. Para nuestra entrevista, abrió una botella de champán mientras mi marido me hacía preguntas y traducía cuando las historias se alargaban, o cuando simplemente no las entendía. Pasamos un par de horas juntos, páginas de notas repartidas entre nosotros, y la conversación se engarzó y profundizó, como suele ocurrir con las historias. Mientras nos preparábamos para dejar esta vida, sentí una fuerte necesidad de escribir sobre las personas que conocimos y la comida que aprendimos a apreciar y amar.

Un verano, Ester, mi marido, Albert del Restaurante La Barretina y yo organizamos una cata de vinos californianos en la terraza de Can Roca: Opus One, Hundred Acre, Daou, Silver Oak, todos de nuestra bodega. A medida que la lista de invitados crecía, incluyendo a más amigos, entre ellos Diego, el experto en la región de Perelada, los vinos españoles se unieron a la mesa. A medida que la velada llegaba a su fin, Ester sacó un par de botellas de Bollinger y terminamos la noche a la perfección: al ritmo de las estrellas, tapas españolas, historias que sólo entendí a medias y risas mezclándose con el suave murmullo de una velada catalana.

Ester cumplió sesenta años hace poco, aunque nadie lo diría. Menuda, radiante y fuerte, esquía, hace senderismo y celebró su cumpleaños yendo en moto con sus amigos y su hija Adriana al pueblo costero de Begur para disfrutar de una comida junto al mar. Vuelca su pasión en Can Roca, pero también vive una vida llena de aventura y alegría. Ella y Albert, del Restaurante La Barretina, suelen hacer juntos viajes en moto por Europa. La admiro por su éxito, su espíritu aventurero y su larga dedicación a la excelencia.

Adriana, la preciosa hija de Ester, trabaja en marketing, no en el restaurante. Y aunque el futuro de Can Roca aún no esté claro, Ester se siente en paz con esa incertidumbre. Por ahora, se entrega por completo a su trabajo, a sus clientes y a su nuevo proyecto: un olivar cerca de su casa en Espinavessa, plantado con semillas de arbequinas centenarias, propiedad de sus viejos amigos Enric y Carme en Mas Auró.

Tres hectáreas de árboles jóvenes y, como la vida se impone, el riego de las arboledas se ha suspendido. Dios tiene una forma de mostrarte su cronograma. Crecen lentamente, como un niño que da sus primeros pasos. La primera cosecha llegará cuando corresponda, y no antes.

Al igual que Ester —y al igual que Can Roca—, los olivos están arraigados en la tradición, evolucionan con el tiempo, crecen con firmeza y se nutren del amor.

Can Roca: The Heart of Esponellà

Can Roca isn’t just a local legend — it’s a testament to showing up. Five generations have kept its doors open, each one working with the same quiet discipline that defines country life in Catalonia. When you walk in, you’re not stepping into just any Spanish grandmother’s kitchen; you’re stepping into a lineage that has endured simply because its people never stopped working. The walls hold decades of hands — steady, determined — butchering meat, cleaning chickens, rolling canelons, stirring broths, carrying forward traditions that thrive not out of nostalgia, but out of daily devotion.

As I photograph the enlarged black-and-white portraits lining the dining rooms, I’m reminded of 2020 — the year Ester had to pivot, transforming a restaurant brought to a sudden standstill into something that could survive the stillness. She expanded the kitchen outward: carefully packed food to go, freshly frozen dishes meant to be reheated at home, meals designed to travel without losing their soul. On New Year’s Eve, she prepared gourmet celebratory dinners, collected curbside by families determined to mark the moment, even quietly. It wasn’t reinvention for its own sake — it was stewardship.

The walls here hold more than the work of generations — they hold their memories, too. Laughter rising from stories told, first kisses stolen after movie nights, celebrations that marked the passing seasons, and the town meetings that shaped the life of this village. Can Roca has never been just a restaurant; it has been a witness.

Seven years ago, we retired to this northern part of Spain to live among its people. We arrived several weeks before the shipping container with our belongings, so exploring local gems became our favorite pastime. Can Roca was just a five-minute drive from our stone farmhouse—naturally, it became our first stop. My introduction to the menu was pollastre amb fruites—braised chicken with stone fruits—one of Ester’s signature dishes, developed slowly over time, much like the restaurant itself.

The dish arrived as though the seasons had shifted ahead of schedule: apricots and prunes conspiring to usher in fall while the Spanish sun still behaved like summer. The meat surrendered easily to the fork. The sauce held a savory sweetness I still can’t name, and the fruit tasted like memory leaning toward the colder months—that quiet, ancient tug our bodies feel when we begin to crave braises again. It was the kind of dish you don’t just eat; you believe.

I snapped a photo, sent it to my sister Cary — still working at our former catering company, Parsley Sage Rosemary & Thyme — and captioned it, “Chicken Marbella’s grandmother.” The dish has remained my go-to ever since — the one I dream of, the one I order, the one I recommend to guests, the one that always delivers.

And then there are Ester’s canelons, each one rolled as if time itself slows down to watch. Nothing leaves that kitchen without a quiet conviction — the sense that cooking here isn’t merely a craft but a promise kept.

The Woman at the Heart of It All

In the seven years we’ve lived in this quiet corner of northern Spain, I’ve noticed two things about Can Roca.
First: I have never once visited without seeing Ester. She is always there.
Second: the food and service are unfailingly excellent.

When I asked her how it’s possible she’s always present, she simply smiled and said,

“This is my work.”

That quiet pride says everything.

Ester Pagès is the fifth-generation owner and Executive Chef of Can Roca de Esponellà — a restaurant that has evolved with time while keeping its soul intact. The restaurant sits along the town’s single roundabout — the center decorated with oversized cement carbassas (pumpkins), a cheerful nod to the region’s harvest traditions, as well as the vegetarian filling for her delicious canelons.

Ester quite literally grew up inside Can Roca. In true Spanish fashion, the living quarters sit directly above the dining room and kitchen. Her grandparents, parents, and Ester herself once worked side by side — three generations cooking, serving, and carrying forward a legacy more than a century in the making.

From Butcher Shop to Beloved Restaurant

The original Can Roca began in the old part of Esponellà, near the church. It was a butcher shop, a modest restaurant, and even a small hostel. Sixty years ago, it moved to its current location in the center of town, becoming the pride of Esponellà.

In those early days, the women cooked while the men chopped wood, butchered meat, and sourced ingredients. Ester spent her childhood downstairs and upstairs, surrounded by the aromas of slow-cooked stews and roasting meats. When asked about her earliest memories, she laughs — she could talk for three hours about the smells alone.

During those first years in the new location, Ester’s young aunts — Dolors, Paquita, and Angelina — all helped in the kitchen during busy evenings. Ester, herself, made the trip every weekend while attending UAB of Barcelona.

Ester’s grandfather owned the town’s first car, which made him the unofficial ambulance driver — ferrying women in labor to the hospital in Banyoles, 25 minutes away

.

A Life Devoted to the Table

Ester’s grandparents, Conxita Surribas and Josep Roca, worked seven days a week. When her parents, Conxita Roca and Miquel Pagès, took over, they dared to close on Tuesdays — a choice that horrified the older generation. Today, the restaurant closes two days a week and takes a well-earned five-week holiday each year, in true Spanish fashion.

This “closing” custom took me a while to understand. Coming from America, it felt strange that a beloved local restaurant would simply place a sign on the door — Vacaciones, with the dates — and then lock up for a week. But now I understand: reputation here isn’t just about food. It’s about presence. The chef’s name, her face, her energy — they are part of what you’re served.

Ester took Can Roca over fully in 1992, Economics degree (Universitat de Barcelona) in hand, after realizing her future wasn’t in an office but back in her family kitchen. And you can feel that blend of head and heart in every corner of the restaurant — the steady efficiency born of her studies, and the soul shaped by a lifetime spent learning at the elbows of her parents and grandparents.

A Team That Feels Like Family

Her team reflects the same loyalty and constancy that define her. We are normally greeted by the warm charms of Paquita, who has worked at Can Roca for over 50 years. Paquita first joined when Ester’s grandfather invited her from a hotel job in nearby Banyoles — she has been serving guests here since that first day.

José, the poised mesero from the south of Spain, moves through the dining room with an easy grace that comes only with years of familiarity.

In the kitchen, Ester leads a small, multicultural team — cooks from Spain, Argentina, Peru, and Colombia — all united by her guiding philosophy:

“What you can do in your own house, you can do here.”

They eat what they like, share a glass of wine if they wish — maybe a beer from the tap at the end of a long day — and they work with a loyalty you can taste in the food.

Tradition, Lightened by Time

Under Ester’s hand, the cuisine has evolved — “lighter,” she says, though her version of light still feels deeply comforting. The younger generation loves it; the elders tease her gently about the changes.

Her signature dishes remain the slow-cooked ones — the chicken with stone fruits, chicken-and-shrimp mandonguilles (meatballs), duck confit with apple, and her legendary canelons, both the traditional meat version and a delicious carbassa (butternut squash) filling. At Christmas, she adds a foie-and-truffle canelon that is richly satisfying.

Canelons are a traditional meal for the Navidad holidays, specifically December 26th, known as Dia de Sant Esteve (St. Stephen’s Day in Catalonia), and each year she prepares several thousand for pick-up. One year, the kitchen made twenty thousand canelons.

Twenty thousand!

A Lunch to Remember

After interviewing Ester, we decided to dine for a long, leisurely lunch while our son was still in town and we were getting closer to leaving the area. We arrived early so I could snap photos of the history that adorns the walls — large black-and-white photographs that celebrate the story and invite you to bear witness.

When I asked about certain dishes from the past that remain, she described the chicken-and-shrimp meatballs in a rich brown gravy, topped with large shell-on prawns. My husband calls it “a true Spanish dish,” one the American palate might find a bit unique, and it was unique, it was also quite delicious.

The seasonal dishes are the ones I wait for — especially the gently battered, fried baby artichokes. Knowing this, Ester brings me a plate along with the meatballs, though I’d already ordered more than usual.

Before our lunch, we toured the kitchen. Ester showed us the many stages of her pheasant escabetx. Escabetx — Catalan for “pickled” — is a braising sauce of carrots, thinly sliced onion, olive oil, fresh herbs, and lots of vinegar. It cooks for hours, and the herb-rubbed pheasants are slowly braised in it. The smells were divine. I asked if they’d be on today’s menu; she misunderstood and said no — my heart sank — but at the table I learned an earlier batch had, indeed, made it to the specials menu.

That day, I ate pa amb tomàquet, mandonguilles de pollastre amb gambes, fried baby artichokes, and a half order of pheasant escabetx. There was no room for dessert, so we ended with a typical Spanish coffee — a carajillo, espresso with a shot of liqueur. Our usual choice: Bailey’s

Wines, Friendship, and the Future

Over the years, Ester and I have discovered a shared love of good champagne (her favorite is Bollinger) and, of course, wine. For our interview, she opened a bottle of champagne while my husband asked my questions and translated when the stories grew long — or when I simply couldn’t quite follow. We spent a couple of hours together, pages of notes spread between us, the conversation looping and deepening as stories tend to do. As we prepare to leave this life, I felt a strong pull to write about the people we came to know and the food we learned to appreciate and to love.

One summer, Ester, my husband, Albert from Restaurant La Barretina, and I hosted a California wine tasting on the patio at Can Roca — Opus One, Hundred Acre, Daou, Silver Oak — all from our cellar. As the guest list grew to include more friends — including Diego, the Perelada regions expert — Spanish wines joined the table. As the evening wound down Ester brought out a couple of bottles of Bollinger, and we ended the evening perfectly: in time with the stars, Spanish tapas, stories I only half understood, and laughter mingling with the soft hum of a Catalan evening.

Ester recently turned sixty, though you’d never guess it. Petite, radiant, and strong, she skis, hikes, she celebrated her birthday by riding motorcycles with friends and her daughter Adriana to the beach town of Begur for a seaside lunch. She pours her passion into Can Roca, but she also lives a life filled with adventure and joy. She and Albert from Restaurant -La Barretina often take European motorcycle trips together. I admire her for her success, her sense of adventure, and her longstanding dedication to excellence.

Adriana, Ester’s beautiful daughter works in marketing, not the restaurant — And while the future of Can Roca may not yet be clear, Ester is at peace with that uncertainty. For now, she pours herself into her work, her guests, and her new project: an olive grove near her home in Espinavessa, planted from the seeds of ancient Arbequina trees owned by her longtime friends Enric & Carme at Mas Auró.

Three hectares of young trees — and, as life will have its way, the groves irrigation has been put on hold. God has a way of showing you His timeline. They grow slowly, like a child taking its first steps. The first harvest will come when it’s meant to, and not before.

Like Ester — and like Can Roca — the olive trees are rooted in tradition, changing with time, growing steadily, nourished by love.

My son Henry is here visiting us in Spain. He had a tough year—first, he fractured his sacrum working at Mt. Bachelor, a few weeks later he crashed his Harley-Davidson, the one he won in a raffle. The injuries required wrist surgery, a cast on one leg, and road rash I’m glad I never saw when it was raw.

He’s finally cleared to go back to work, but ski se…

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I like to pretend I don’t have a sweet tooth. I can say no to dessert with the conviction of a monk—unless it’s homemade or served from an Italian gelato stand in— Italy. But pour me a glass of something sweet—Ice Wine, Sauternes, Banyuls-sur-Mer, Muscat—and I’m all in. Port, Baileys, Tuaca, Amaretto… bring them on, in appropriately tiny glasses, of course.

When I studied to become a Certified Sommelier through the Court of Master Sommeliers, we covered wines, sweet wines, fortified wines, beers, spirits, and sake. We didn’t delve into liqueurs—so Ratafia, Catalonia’s sweet, herbaceous, anise-flavored liqueur, was never on my radar.

That changed when we moved to northern Spain. Each time we invited new friends to dinner, they arrived clutching a bottle of Ratafia. I’d smile graciously, murmur, “Sí, está muy, bien, me encanta, muchas gracias,” and hope my husband would finish the bottle eventually. The flavor—thick, dark, and almost medicinal— for me wasn’t love at first sip.

But slowly, Ratafia began to charm me. It appeared drizzled over vanilla ice cream, folded into almond cake, even enriching a duck-and-chestnut paella. Somewhere between politeness and palate expansion, I fell for it.

One evening in Lake Banyoles, our friend Joan served us a vertical tasting of his homemade Ratafia—vintages spanning several years. Each glass was like a season bottled: wild herbs, green walnuts, spice, and sunshine. By the end of the night, I was hooked. His wife promised to send the recipe, and we planned to make a batch together once I’d gathered the ingredients and the right bottles.

Then life intervened—some medical detours, postponed plans—and the green walnuts of 2024 slipped away. Timing is everything in this liqueur: you must begin with perfect green walnuts, harvested in mid-to-late summer before their shells underneath the skin harden.

Still, I was determined.

I was told that the proper way to make Ratafia is to walk for it—to gather the ingredients in the countryside, not from a shop. Most herbs were easy: rosemary, thyme, fennel from the trails behind our house, basil from my garden, and Maria Luisa (lemon verbena) from a bush near the terrace. But the walnuts…those elusive walnuts, those are the real find.

Crespia, a nearby stone village, sits on one side of the country road, while a beautiful walnut grove stretches out on the other—but that felt like cheating. So we set off to find our own. We started, naturally, with a cold beer at Fátima’s bar in Crespia, then drove into the hills. After several miles, a few u-turns, and ditches neither the car or I could manage, we found ourselves unknowingly on the back side at the Crespia grove. I jumped out of the car to get a closer look.

Rows of trees, heavy with green walnuts, shimmered in the late morning light. I picked one, turned around, and saw my husband driving straight into the grove, wide-eyed I tossed the walnut through the open car window and leaned in to see what his face would tell me.

“I don’t think anyone would notice if we grab a few walnuts from these trees?” I leaned into the car window asking –He already had one in his hand—and had taken a bite out of it, just to see what it tasted like. I took his cue, grabbed a handful more, and threw them into the car window.

Afterwards, we stood there, admiring the beauty of the grove—the rows perfectly aligned, the branches heavy with fruit. Voices startled me; cyclists were pedaling through. We waved, laughed, and hurried back to the car. The adrenaline was good for a couple of retirees stealing walnuts. We decided to keep the high going and go out to lunch.

Back home, with our contraband walnuts in hand, we decided to wing it.

Can Mademon Ratafia 2025

Made by an American in Spain

Ingredients:

1 gallon unsweetened Anise Liqueur

2 cups sugar

9 green walnuts, cut into quarters
Rosemary several sprigs
Thyme 4 sprigs

Fresh Mint a couple handfuls
Basil 8- 10 leaves
Orange peel of 2 oranges
Grapefruit peel 1/2
Lemon peel -2 lemons
Maria Luisa (verbena)- 2 sprigs

Fennel – I used cut 2 stems with flowering seeds
Vanilla 1 stick
Cinnamon sticks -1
Nutmeg - 2- 4 can be partially grated

Method: Add sugar to the liqueur, and blend with an emulsifier.

Rinse fresh herbs in cool water and let dry naturally on a clean cloth.
Place all of the additional ingredients and cover tightly.
Place outdoors where it will get both sun and shade for 40 days.
Strain using cheesecloth, several bottles, and taste!

(this is my first video- cut me some slack! )

I later learned that the remnants left behind from making Ratafia are used as the base for my favorite aperitif—drumroll… Vermut Negra. Or as we’d say in America, Sweet Vermouth.

I love an aperitif of Vermut Negra—dark vermouth on ice with a slice of orange and a few Spanish olives tossed in for good measure. It’s refreshing, semi-sweet (if you can even call it that), and beautifully complex. Perfect with a little tapa: of boquerones, or fresh anchovies, marinated in vinegar, olive oil, garlic, and parsley.

This simple preparation—boquerones en vinagre—turns the fish fillets a delicate white and gives them a bright, clean flavor that’s more refreshing than pungent. They’re usually served chilled, often with olives, crusty bread, or those impossibly crisp Spanish potato chips fried entirely in olive oil. The perfect pairing? A cold beer—or, better yet, a glass of Vermut Negra.

🍓💜 Berry Beet Smoothie

A hydrating, gut-loving, antioxidant-rich powerhouse

Ingredients

• 3/4 cup raspberries

• 1 cup strawberries

• 1 medium-large cooked beet

• 1 tbsp chia seeds- add the chia seeds to the almond milk until they have become gelatinous

• 1/2 cup plain or berry kefir

• 1 1/2 cup unsweetened almond milk

• Juice & pulp from 1/2 lemon

• 1/4 tsp lemon zest

• 1 tbsp raw honey (optional, but balances tartness)

💪 Why It Works

🍓 Berries – Rich in antioxidants, fiber, and vitamin C to fight inflammation and support skin and heart health.
💜 Beet – Boosts blood flow, supports liver detox, and enhances endurance.
🥄 Chia Seeds – Provide omega-3s, fiber, protein, and minerals for gut, heart, and bone strength.
🥛 Kefir – A probiotic superstar that supports digestion, immunity, and the gut-brain axis.
🌰 Almond Milk – A dairy-free source of vitamin D, calcium, and healthy fats.
🍋 Lemon – Enhances hydration, digestion, and nutrient absorption while adding extra antioxidants.
🍯 Honey – Adds natural sweetness and antimicrobial properties.

And look how pretty it is sitting next to these matching begonia’s.

Topped with homemade crunchy granola!

The Road to Onion Cake

After my husband and I pulled the trigger on our long-awaited dream—purchasing a home in Spain—we flew back to California still in awe of what we had just done. The house, Can Mademon, wasn’t even in the area we had originally been searching. Truth be told, we’d been “sold” by the house itself. Naturally, I went online to explore what was nearby.

The very first thing that appeared: Pastís de Ceba—an onion cake made by Albert Joaquim of La Barretina, just five minutes away in the stone village of Orfes. Down the rabbit hole I went, scrolling through Albert’s website and Instagram feed.

It was clear—we’d be eating well.

Fast forward to just last week, an Instagram reel popped up in my feed: a American diner at La Barretina raving about this creamy, quiche-like creation. The clip showed two types of caramelized onions perched elegantly beside a generous slice, it felt personal, this woman was in my seat.

La Barretina has a reputation for hearty, regional game dishes: duck with orange sauce, duck confit, quail with vinegary carrots and onions, KM0 filet mignon swimming in brandy–mushroom cream, and pork loin with anchovy sauce. Hunters can even bring in their day’s quail, and Albert will prepare them. I love that detail—it feels so rooted, so pastoral, exactly what you’d hope for in farm country.

Albert’s canelons are legendary. But it’s the Pastís de Ceba that has taken on near-mythic status, the dish that anchors the restaurant’s identity.

La Pastis de Ceba

Lessons from La Barretina

The experience begins not with the food, but with a ritual. Guests climb a staircase, ring the buzzer, and are welcomed by Albert himself. The restaurant occupies a several-hundred-year-old stone building built into the hillside, with dining rooms spread across the second floor and the family’s living quarters above. Inside, there are four intimate dining areas—each more like a room in a home than a traditional restaurant. The stair well and a few walls are layered with memory: dozens of stylish handbags once carried by Albert’s mother, the original chef, hang along the walls. Near the entrance, a signed black-and-white photograph of Salvador Dalí nods to the cultural threads woven through the house.

That magic also extends outside the restaurant itself. Before ascending the stairway, visitors can browse a small book exchange, admire the antique bread warmer, or study the old topographical map by the stairs. On the map, La Barretina is marked with a red pin, and just to the left—is our home, Can Mademon. I enjoy pointing this out to friends and family who’ve traveled far to visit us.

And perhaps it’s no accident that Albert named the restaurant La Barretina. The cap itself—a humble wool hat once worn by farmers across the Empordà—was practical, modest, and rooted in the rhythms of the land. Much like Albert’s cooking, it speaks to tradition.

After being seated, guests are handed menus to browse—but then comes the moment that transforms the evening. You’re invited into the wine cellar and choose your own wine. Dining at La Barretina feels less like going to a restaurant and more like being welcomed into a friend’s home. And that’s the magic.

Ritual, History, and the Flavor of Orfes

The drive into Orfes is an experience in itself. From the GI-554, you pass through a quarter-mile canopy of towering plane trees—what we call Napoleon trees. Their mottled bark peels in patches, their branches reach across the road like cathedral arches. Originally planted across Europe during Napoleonic campaigns, they provided shade in the heat of summer and let in light during the cold months. To this day, they remind me of the history that came before us, that rituals—whether military, cultural, or culinary—become traditions when they take root deeply enough.

My mother, a talented painter herself, once sent me a photograph clipped from an art magazine. In her email she wrote: “Debbie—this reminds me of those trees and that restaurant you took me to.” The image was a beautiful oil painting of a country road in France, lined with autumn plane trees. It was so true to life that I instantly knew she was referring to La Barretina and the road into Orfes.

Just as his cooking captures the essence of this place, so too does the artwork on the walls, framing the dining experience with a painter’s eye. In both brushstrokes and flavors, there’s a fidelity to the land, a quiet reverence for its stories.

More than Neighbors, More than Guests

La Barretina has become one of those traditions for us. It’s always on the list when we have visitors. Over the years Albert has become more than a restaurateur; he’s become a friend. We’ve gone wine tasting together, and he has shared a place at our Thanksgiving table. He’s loaned us chairs for parties. And one Christmas Eve, as I was being released from Barcelona’s Teknon Hospital and guests were due for dinner, Vince made a call. Albert provided Christmas dinner for six—on short notice, but with his characteristic grace. Just today, when we stopped by to show him a copy of the story (and to grind some coffee in his commercial-size machine), Albert insisted we take home the grinder -(he has two.) Not before, of course, raising a Chipito of his house ratafia—a Catalan digestive made by steeping Anis liqueur with young green walnuts, citrus peel, fennel, nutmeg, Maria Luisa, vanilla bean, cinnamon, and many herbs for forty days. I’ve recently started a batch myself and will share that in another story, along with a Ratafia sauce recipe Albert has promised me.

Lessons from LaBarretina

For us, La Barretina offers more than a memorable meal. It embodies the power of ritual and the way signature touches can shape identity. Choosing your own wine is not just a quirk; it is a carefully designed moment that transforms the guest’s role from passive diner to active participant. The Pastís de Ceba is not just a dish; it is a cultural anchor that keeps people returning and retelling the story.

This is the heart of hospitality: moments that create belonging, stories that define place, and rituals that become brand markers. In a town with only one restaurant, La Barretina has thrived for 45 years by remaining constant and reliable. It isn’t just a place to eat—it’s a place to return to.

Albert, who took over the family restaurant at just twenty after the tragic loss of his sister, has carried it forward for forty years. His mother—the original chef—couldn’t go on, so Albert stepped in perhaps shaken, but brave and willing. While his parents, still alive today, and often wander down from the upper floors to take their daily walk to the Fluvia river. His story is not only one of survival, but of continuity: a restaurant that endures, rooted like the Napoleon trees that line the roads.

After six years living among restaurateurs, farmers, and country folk unlike any other, we know we’ll take more than memories with us. These lessons of generosity, resilience, and ritual are gifts we’ll carry wherever we go.

Our daughter Amelia, soon launching her hospitality consulting firm, hopes to help operators design experiences born of this very philosophy: where intimacy breeds loyalty, and where a single dish, gesture, or ritual can transform a brand into legend.

A few more photos to drool over.

Every Dish Tells a Story

In a sea of Spanish wine, come on—wouldn’t you choose this guy?
I did.

The Roy Kent of wines on a shelf. Why would I bring another bottle home when those eyes—that farm-boy look—were staring right back at me? I couldn’t do it.

The wines website is rustic, simple, with fantastic photography - an entire photo gallery of the wine in different settings- I took their cue.

bodegamatsu.com

(If you’ve watched Apple TV’s Ted Lasso, you know the chant: He’s here, he’s there, he’s every fucking where—Roy Kent! That’s exactly what happened. Once I brought him home, Mr. Handsome Wine Guy went with me everywhere—in the kitchen, the dining room, side tables, getting approval from Ferdinand the Bull- a wine bottle tour of our Spanish Masia. I kept carrying the bottle around, snapping photos. Realtor-approved product placement: wine plus house-for-sale.)

Now, before you think I’ve lost it, let me remind you: I’ve been married almost 35 years to a man who first captivated me with his dark eyes and black-brown hair. When I met him, he resembled a young Omar Sharif. Think Dr. Zhivago! A young Omar, yet fluent in Spanish with a sprinkle of Russian, rolling his R’s in a black turtleneck. That was our first date. Honestly, I never stood a chance.)

So yes, I still appreciate a handsome man.

Back when we were dating, we confessed our celebrity crushes. Embarrassing now but truth is fun- His? Wonder Woman—Linda Carter. Mine? At that time was Don Johnson. (Earlier still it was the dude from The Partridge Family—David Cassidy. I think I love you- Point being: attraction is natural.

Which brings me back to this wine.
Do you see this guy?

Our day itself had been fairly productive. I worked on my cookbook agent- proposal—again. Rewrite, rethink, reshape. If you’ve ever launched something into the agent/ publishing galaxy and never heard back, you’ll understand the hesitation before hitting send. Today, though, I finally felt solid, though I have not sent, just part one of a 3 part query- check.

So when my own Dr. Zhivago suggested we head into Banyoles (our third time this week), I went along. We needed lightbulbs (essential when trying to sell a house), some banking, our daughter’s laptop pick-up, and new tennis shoes for me (my plantar fascia demands more support). We managed five errands in two hours. A miracle! Naturally, we rewarded ourselves with wine. If you're counting I am including stopping for a bottle of wine.

Back home, I made Colcannon—(recipe at the bottom) a dish I grew up on. Mashed potatoes with sautéed onion and nutmeg, a whole head of boiled cabbage folded in, topped with Irish cheddar and Kerrygold butter, then baked until golden. Pure comfort. Meanwhile, Wine-Guy hovered in the kitchen like a patient date. By then, I had fully committed to the photo shoot- he was coming everywhere with me. Laundry? Check. Butlers Pantry for wine glasses? Check. Photos in every corner of our home-for-sale? Oh, absolutely.

When the Colcannon went into the oven, we finally opened him. (The wine, not the farmer.) We poured glasses and went upstairs.

And then—my phone buzzed. Notification from Substack.

Number 56 in the International category.
Wait. What? Seriously?

I read it aloud. Vince smiled. He knows what any little win means to me.

But here’s the thing: 56 out of 100. Not exactly podium material… except in my mind. I was a slalom and GS ski racer in my youth, and merely not DQ’ing was enough to celebrate. So 56? That’s basically third place. Champagne-worthy! Or at least worth another pour of El Picaro.

So here’s to positives big and small: a cookbook query letter ready, errands ticked off, Colcannon ready for a casual “bowl” dinner, a house-for-sale with wine-bottle modeling shots, and yes—a handsome stranger on a label reminding me to keep smiling.

A little about the wine; Matsu ‘El Pícaro’

Origin: Toro, Castilla y León, Spain
Name: Matsu means “to wait” (Japanese). A nod to patience, nature, and farming with care.
Grape: 100% Tinta de Toro (Tempranillo’s bold cousin). Old vines, low yields = concentrated flavor.
Style: Juicy, bold, a little wild—but smooth, round like a Merlot- enough to win you over.
Tasting: Blackberry, raspberry, licorice, and spice with soft tannins. Dark, handsome, and hard to put down.
The Label: Part of a trilogy—El Pícaro (Youth), El Recio (Strength), El Viejo (Wisdom). The face? A real young farmer, embodying Toro’s next generation.

My Take: They call him The Rogue-El Picaro. I call him Mr. Handsome.

Colcannon

Colcannon originated in Ireland as a staple food, typically prepared during the colder months when potatoes and cabbage were readily available. The name “Colcannon” likely comes from the Gaelic phrase cal ceannann, which means “white headed cabbage” This dish is a reflection of Irish culinary traditions that center around simple, nourishing ingredients. My Dad put together a handmade cookbook as we all moved out of the house we were given one, this recipe was included because its very affordable when starting out.

Ingredients

5 M to large Yukon potatoes - peeled and cut into 3 to 4 chunks

1 small Spanish onion - diced

¾ - 1 Cup whole milk

¾ cup whole fat plain Greek yogurt (or sour cream)

salt and pepper to taste

½ teaspoon nutmeg

1 whole head cabbage, core removed and sliced into several large chunks

1 package sharp Kerrygold cheddar cheese grated (approx. 200 grams)

8 tablespoons Kerrygold Butter (half for mashed potatoes, half for dotting the top of Colcannon before baking.

Instructions

Bring a large pot of water with a big pinch of salt to a vigorous boil. Add the chunks of cabbage, it's ok if they fall apart.

In the meantime bring another pot of water to boil and add the peeled potatoes, until they can be easily pierced with a knife.

Melt 1 tablespoon butter in a small saute pan and cook the onion until soft and slighting turns a golden color. Season with salt and pepper. Reserve.

Grate 200 grams of Kerrygold cheese and reserve.

Preheat the oven to 350 F.

The potatoes should be ready to make mashed potatoes, drain the water, add the milk, 4 tablespoons of butter, (or more) yogurt, salt and pepper and nutmeg and mash with a potato masher. Taste and add more seasoning if necessary. Add the sauteed onion to the potatoes.

Remove a piece of cabbage from the boiling water, if it can but cut through with a dinner knife the cabbage is ready. Drain and if you have any very large pieces cut them in half. In a large bowl combine the cabbage and mashed potatoes, do not over stir yet blend the two together.

Place the mixture into a large casserole dish, top with the remaining butter breaking up into several small pieces scattered over the top, add the grated cheese and place into the oven for 30 minutes.

Let cool for a few minutes and enjoy!

Palak Fresco

This is my version of one of our all-time favorite Indian dishes - Palak Paneer- a beloved reminder of our years in Mountain View, California, where Indian Restaurants lined the El Camino Real, they differed by region, by vegetarian, some were ‘street food specialists’ some were casual some fancy.

Living now in the Spanish countryside, where Indian restaurants are few and far between, we knew we had to learn how to make a few of our favorite dishes ourselves. I developed this version of Palak over time. Thankfully we ate every batch, it was never bad, but I wanted it to be better, and with lots of trials it eventually became a winner. My success came from adjusting the spices, adding more! more grated fresh ginger, more coriander, cumin etc. I finally found the perfect balance.

We like it spicy, but you can easily tone down the heat. Just reduce the chili or infuse the ghee with a whole dried Italian chili, then remove it before adding the spinach.

I like to serve this alongside Chana Masala with Lemon Garlic Aqua-faba sauce and Basmati Rice with Caramelized Onions and Beluga Lentils - it is also a stand alone dinner for us.

I would love for my Substack cookbook writers, food lovers and followers to give this a try and please, please let me know YOUR OPINION! I have included a recipe for Garam Masala Spice Blend, though you can probably find it in most American specialty stores. We don’t have naan readily available either so we make do with whole wheat tortillas— fried in a little olive oil and sprinkled with cumin.

Palak Fresca

serves 4

Ingredients

3 to 4 lbs. fresh spinach/ about 8 cups chopped small (photo below)

2 Tablespoons ghee (can be found in specialty or Indian grocers) or substitute with Coconut Oil

¾ cup water

12 ounces paneer, or queso fresco cut into 1 x 1/2 inch pieces.

1 ½ cups medium chopped onion

3 Teaspoons Maldon Sea salt

5 tablespoons freshly grated peeled ginger

4 -5 cloves grated garlic or run through a masher- or approx. 2 Tablespoons

1 Serrano Chile or a spicy red or green jalapeño pepper stemmed and minced. (you can substitute with ¼- ½ teaspoon cayenne pepper.

1 whole peeled and grated turmeric bulb or 2 - teaspoons ground turmeric

½ teaspoon freshly cracked black pepper

2 ½ teaspoons ground coriander

2 teaspoons ground cumin

2 teaspoon cumin seeds

1 ½ teaspoon garam masala (you can purchase garam masala or make your own. (Recipe below)

1 can coconut cream or coconut milk/ or 1 ½ Cup whole cream.

Steamed Basmati or Brown Rice or Naan for serving

Instructions

Thoroughly wash spinach leaves and de-stem the spinach. Then shake dry in a large dish towel and place the spinach in batches on a large cutting board. Chop spinach finely and place in a large bowl. You can also use a food processor and chop in batches.

The chopped spinach should become approximately 8 cups. If you are over- its fine, use it! Next medium chop one large or 2 medium size onions.

Peel a large nob of ginger and grate it using a microplane zester -5 tablespoons of fresh ginger. (I keep mine in the freezer and grate as needed) If you end up with a very small piece, that is too hard to grate you can finely chop and throw it in.

Finely dice 4 cloves of garlic and one serrano pepper.

Measure out all of your spices and you can combine everything except the cumin seeds.

In a large skillet, place the heat to medium-high and add 2 tablespoons of Ghee or Coconut oil, once the ghee is melted add the 2 teaspoons of cumin seeds, let cook for 30 seconds alone before adding the onion, season with salt and pepper. Cook, stirring occasionally, until softened but not browned, about 6 minutes.

Add ginger, garlic and chili, and cook, stirring occasionally, until fragrant and well incorporated, about 2 minutes. Stir in coriander, ground cumin, and garam masala and Turmeric until well blended.

Add minced spinach, using a wooden spoon mix the spinach and onion/spice mixture together until well blended. Add the ¾ cup water and lower the heat to medium-low. Cover the pan so the spinach wilts quicker using the steam for about 2 minutes, uncover and continue stirring as it cooks for about 7 to 10 minutes stirring occasionally until spinach is soft and the water is absorbed. Season with salt and pepper. (you may need to add the spinach in batches, depending on the size of your pan, if you add half, then half the water, cover, wait on minute - then uncover the pan and add the rest of the spinach, stir and recover the pan.)

Once the spinach is cooked and fully incorporated with the spices and onion, stir in a full can heavy coconut mill or cream until well incorporated. Test to see if it needs more salt and pepper.

With an emulsion blender you can now cream it out a bit- I use my emulsion blender right in the pan, but if that doesn’t work for you, move the spinach mixture to a bowl and blend it lightly leaving some of the spinach unblended. I would say 90% blended. Put back into the pan and add the cubed queso fresco or paneer if it is available to you.

Serve with Basmati rice, brown rice, or garlic naan or papadum. Or if you have neither of those, serve with toasted garlic baguettes.

Garam Masala Indian Spice Blend

Ingredients

4 Tablespoons coriander leaves

4 teaspoons cumin seeds

1 teaspoons fennel seeds

1 teaspoon black peppercorns

1 teaspoon black cardamom seeds (about 10 cardamom pods)

1 stick cinnamon about 3 inches

2 star anise

8 whole cloves

½ teaspoon freshly ground nutmeg

½ teaspoon ground mace

2 dried curry leaves (can substitute one large bay leaf)

Instructions

Place the whole spices, reserving the ground nutmeg and mace in a dry skillet and toast them over medium high heat for several minutes, stirring frequently until the spices are very fragrant and the lighter spices have become deeper golden in color. Don’t over cook, the spices can scorch and become bitter. Transfer to a bowl and let them cool completely.

Break down the cinnamon stick into smaller pieces and place the cooled spices in a coffee/spice grinder along with nutmeg and mace. Grind everything until you get a fine powder. Transfer to a jar with an airtight lid and label with a post it note, tape and pen and date. It will keep for a couple of months before losing potency.

One more reason to test me!

Spinach (Baby Spinach – 1 lb / ~8 cups)

• Rich in iron: Supports red blood cell production and combats fatigue.

• High in antioxidants: Contains lutein, zeaxanthin, and beta-carotene for eye and skin health.

• Vitamin K powerhouse: Supports bone strength and healthy blood clotting.

• Anti-inflammatory: Helps reduce oxidative stress in the body.

Paneer / Queso Fresco (8 oz)

• Protein-dense: Supports muscle repair and satiety.

• Calcium-rich: Strengthens bones and teeth.

• Conjugated linoleic acid (CLA) in paneer (if made from whole milk) has been linked to improved metabolism.

Coconut Cream / Milk (or Whole Cream)

• Healthy fats: Provide sustained energy and support brain function.

• Lauric acid (from coconut): Naturally antimicrobial, supports immunity.

• If dairy cream is used: Vitamin A & D boost for immune and bone health.

Garlic (4 cloves)

• Cardiovascular support: Helps lower blood pressure and cholesterol.

• Immune booster: Natural antimicrobial and antiviral properties.

• Anti-inflammatory: Contains allicin, reducing systemic inflammation.

Ginger (5 Tbsp grated)

• Aids digestion: Stimulates enzymes and reduces bloating.

• Anti-nausea: Traditional remedy for motion sickness or upset stomach.

• Anti-inflammatory: Reduces joint pain and supports circulation.

Serrano / Jalapeño / Cayenne

• Metabolism boost: Capsaicin stimulates fat burning.

• Circulatory health: Improves blood flow and vascular elasticity.

• Immune support: Rich in vitamin C.

Turmeric (fresh root or ground)

• Curcumin compound: Potent anti-inflammatory and antioxidant.

• Joint & brain health: Linked to reduced arthritis pain and improved cognitive function.

• Best absorbed with fat (ghee/coconut oil) + black pepper (already included in the dish!).

Spices: Cumin, Coriander, Garam Masala, Black Pepper

• Cumin: Aids digestion, supports iron intake.

• Coriander: Blood sugar regulation, cooling effect on digestion.

• Black Pepper: Enhances absorption of curcumin in turmeric.

• Garam Masala blend: Warming, supports circulation and digestion.

Basmati or Brown Rice / Naan (Side)

• Basmati rice: Easily digestible, lower glycemic index than regular white rice.

• Brown rice: Higher fiber, supports blood sugar control.

• Naan: Provides satisfying carbs (best balanced with the fiber/protein-rich spinach and paneer).

Summertime in Spain is sun-drenched and endless—days spilling into nights, heat pressing against stone walls, the air thick with rosemary, cicadas, and possibility. I promised myself last winter that when the hot Spanish summer finally arrives, I wouldn’t complain about the heat. And mostly, I’ve kept that promise.

Complaining has been a much-discussed subject in our house lately. And for good reason.

But first—our news: we just had our first home viewing with our new realtor. A couple from the Netherlands, who spent more than an hour walking through. They arrived before our realtor, so we showed them around ourselves for a bit. When they were leaving, the wife— with kind but decisive eyes—looked straight at me and said, “It’s beautiful.”

And it is. And I love it too.

If we must go, I hope it is they who purchase Can Mademon, and live this life we have loved.

Of course, Can Mademon has been testing us lately. We switched propane companies back in June (I wrote about that delivery), and the tanks are still sitting on top of our lawn, one huge black tank and and 6 bright orange soldiers adorn the lawn. We politely explain this to every guest: don’t worry, they’ll be underground soon. It’s August 18th. We are still waiting.

Then, early summer, our pool heater exploded—literally. It started a fire in the oak tree and singed the bay laurels that once hid its unsightly bulk. Startled we went to investigate. Luckily my husband and I were standing in the kitchen when we heard the explosion - the smoke seeping through the oak tree lead us to the fire. The hoses were burnt and gave us no immediate answer, so my husband ran buckets from the pool to the fire, in my meek effort, I grabbed a 5 gallon glass bottle of water and took it to him. I yelled to him over the chaos- “whats the number to call fire 211? 112? which is it"?? I screamed at my loudest. Twenty minutes later the flames were out and a melted black pool heater sat amongst 7 dead bay laurel trees. We then called the fire department —after the fire was out- appropriate for my husband as he spent a year as a Cadet at the fire department in Mountain View, California. (I would have preferred calling a little sooner, before we set the forest on fire.) The police came, and then the fire department arrived to check for hot spots. Vince had done a good job.

We don’t need the pool heater in the summer- the Spanish sun keeps it just below bathwater temps. A new more powerful pool heater will be installed sometime in the fall. (or winter), one thing I know for certain it will arrive on Spanish time.

A few weeks later the washing machine quit. By this point, I began to feel like the house was talking to us. Testing us. And I realized I didn’t want to complain—or listen to complaints.

So I pulled out my post-it notes.

• “Complaining is not a strategy.” (Bezos said it. I am not a fan, but he’s right.) → I stuck on the office door.

• “To complain is always non-acceptance of what is. Leave the situation or accept it. All else is madness.” (Eckhart Tolle) → this I posted on the refrigerator.

• “Complaints are the refuge of those who have lost the will to act.” → why not post this one on the bathroom mirror.

For a while, they kept us in check. Visitors noticed, asked questions, even took photos. Who knew post-it notes could be such conversation starters?

And then, the night before the house showing, hundreds of tiny bugs appeared at our second story windows—Elm Leaf Beetles, though we have no elm trees. We sprayed, vacuumed, sprayed & prayed they’d be gone in the morning. They were back. We cleaned again. No time to complain.

Through all of this, I’ve insisted I don’t complain, I comment. But I see now my “comments” land as complaints. So I’m reposting the notes around the house for myself.

And so I’m adding one more: gratitude.

For the people who opened their arms and made us feel a part of this place. For this old stone house that stood firm through the Tramuntana’s—those wild winds tumbling down from the Pyrenees—through the blaze of summer heat and the pounding winter rains. A house that cradled us in its walls, even as it tested us with its quirks: the fires, the tanks, the broken machines, and yes, even the bugs.

We will miss this life—the rhythm of the seasons, the friendships built, the laughter around this table, the late summer light on the hills. Can Mademon has been our home, in every sense of the word.

And when I look back, I don’t think I’ll remember the frustrations at all.

Only the beauty.

Cristina is showing us the new flower which produces the olive.

Prelude to the Interview

Before diving into the health benefits of extra virgin olive oil (EVOO), we start by swapping stories about people we know who swear by it. There’s a growing trend: taking two generous spoonfuls of EVOO each day.

I mention an 84-year-old woman I know whose skin looks decades younger—she attributes her glow to her daily olive oil habit. It makes you wonder: is there really something to it?

Cristina chimes in with a story about a remarkably fit cyclist she knows. “If I don’t take my two heaping spoonfuls,” he told her, “my eyes actually hurt when I ride.” We laugh—because it is funny—but we’re also intrigued. Could a little oil each day really make that much of a difference? Would our eyes notice?

EVOO has long had a reputation as a superfood, but lately, it seems to be topping the list. Maybe those cyclists and radiant octogenarians are onto something.

The Interview

¿Debbie/Amelia - Cristina, can you tell us about the health benefits of extra virgin olive oil—and how it compares to non- extra virgin and other oils we see on the market today?

“The worst oils for me are the ones high in polyunsaturated fats. A lot of the newer seed oils are being bred or engineered to increase their oleic acid content, trying to make them seem healthier. Oleic acid is a monounsaturated fat—it's more stable, so it’s less damaging than polyunsaturated fats, especially under heat.

Polyunsaturated fats, even though they’re considered heart-healthy in moderation, have a lot of double bonds in their chemical structure, which makes them unstable. They oxidize easily. That’s one issue, but when you heat them, they can also release harmful byproducts—toxic spillovers, essentially.

Here in Spain, sunflower seed oil is everywhere, but it’s one of the worst oils to cook with. It’s high in omega-6 polyunsaturated fats and very prone to oxidation. And yet—it’s mass produced, subsidized, and widely used in both home kitchens and restaurants. Why? Because it’s cheap, and we grow a lot of it. Culturally and economically, it’s deeply embedded here. Ironically, Canola oil—which is actually more stable and healthier due to its higher oleic acid content—is nowhere to be found in Spain. It’s not sold or produced, largely because of a major public health scandal in the 1980s. People adulterated industrial colza oil—what we call rapeseed oil—to make it cheaper, and it ended up killing hundreds and harming thousands. Since then, the word ‘colza’ has been practically taboo. So even though Canola is a much better option than sunflower oil, the Spanish market won’t touch it.

In France, there’s more flexibility. You can legally blend rapeseed oil with olive oil and still sell it under certain labels. But here in Spain, olive oil is tightly protected. You’re not allowed to mix olive oil with any other oils—that would be considered fraud. The only legal blend allowed is between refined olive oil and virgin olive oil, and even that must be clearly labeled simply as 'olive oil.'

The truth is, the amount of true extra virgin olive oil produced is much smaller than the amount that’s sold on the market. That means fraud is practically built into the system. And mislabeling virgin olive oil as extra virgin is small-time fraud compared to what happens in some other countries. In Italy, for example, there have been cases where cheaper oils—like hazelnut oil—were mixed in and sold as extra virgin.

Why? Because making real extra virgin olive oil is difficult. Virgin olive oil—the slightly lower-grade cousin—doesn’t have a market. If you’re a producer and only 5% of what you harvest qualifies as extra virgin, what do you do with the other 95%? You can’t sell it as is, so it gets relabeled or blended. That’s an industry problem. It becomes a commodity, priced not for quality but for how cheaply it can be produced and sold.

Then there’s seed oils—those are a whole different issue. These are often refined, stripped of beneficial compounds, and engineered—or bred—to alter their fatty acid profiles. High-oleic versions are more stable, yes, but that doesn’t make them equivalent to oils from whole, natural sources. Your body can tell the difference—not necessarily at the molecular level, but in how these oils interact with inflammation, oxidation, and digestion. Natural, cold-pressed oils like extra virgin olive oil contain polyphenols, antioxidants, and anti-inflammatory compounds. Refined oils don’t.

EVOO is packed with polyphenols, antioxidants, anti-inflammatory compounds—it’s not just 'fat.' You’ll hear some doctors say, 'It’s just another fat,' but it’s not. It’s a functional food.

And it's incredibly stable. That’s the key. You can cook with it, use it raw—it won’t break down and release toxins the way many seed oils do under high heat. There’s a reason Mediterranean cultures have longer lifespans and lower rates of heart disease. It’s not just the olive oil—it’s how it’s woven into daily life.”

Sidebar-

* Having not heard the story of the Colza Scandal I decided to look it up and reveal more of the story. The scandal is known as the Toxic Oil Syndrome which occurred in Spain in 1981, caused by the consumption of adulterated rapeseed oil. There is no evidence in the historical record that motor oil was directly mixed with the oil in this case, but the oil was contaminated with toxic substances due to fraudulent practices. It is known as one of the worst public health disasters which affected over 20,000 people and caused hundreds of deaths. The scandal began with rapeseed oil imported from France intended for industrial use. Spanish regulations required such oil to be denatured with aniline (a toxic chemical) to prevent its use as food. However unscrupulous distributors notably the company ‘Industria Trianera de Hidrogenaction’(ITH) in Seville, illegally refined this oil to remove the aniline and mixed it with other edible oils selling it as cheap olive oil at street markets, primarily to low-income families in Madrid and surrounding areas. The contaminated oil caused a mysterious illness initially mistaken for a lunch infection, dubbed “atypical pneumonia.” Symptoms included severe muscle pain, respiratory distress, skin rashes, and organ damage. Over 330 people died and thousands were left with chronic conditions. The Spanish government implemented an oil exchange program to remove contaminated oil from circulation.

In 1987 a trial began against 50 oil importers and distributors. The Spanish Supreme Court confirmed the link between the denatured rapeseed oil and TOS, convicting 13 businessmen of public health offenses, though only two were jailed. The state was also held liable for inadequate oversight and ordered to pay compensation to victims.

Interestingly there are alternative theories and conspiracy claims. Dr. Antonio Muro argues that the oil might not have been the sole cause, he suggests that pesticides on tomatoes from Almeria could have contributed, citing geographical distribution of cases and inconsistencies in the oil theory-this theory was not widely accepted. As well, the proximity of early cases to a U.S. military base in Torrejon de Ardoz fueled more conspiracy as some victims claim they never consumed the oil. Journalist Bob Woffinden argued the government promoted the oil narrative to protect Spain’s tomato and tourism industries, which could have been devastated by a pesticide-related explanation. This theory was never investigated further.

The scandal damaged Spain’s food industry, particularly the seafood canning, as countries like Italy banned Spanish oil containing products. Domestic sales of canned seafood dropped 73% in November of 1981.

The Interview

¿Debbie/Amelia - Can you explain to our readers what qualifies an olive oil as 'extra virgin'? What standards must be met for a producer to earn that designation on the label?

Cristina- “Extra virgin olive oil is a commercial stamp of quality which is not very enforced (lots of extra virgin labeled oil is usually of inferior quality). For an olive oil to qualify as extra virgin, it must be extracted from the olive solely by mechanical means and within a range of temperatures considered low. As soon as the oil is refined or exposed to temperatures above 27°C, it can no longer be classified as extra virgin. Also, the oil should be extracted from healthy olives, i.e. not fermenting, rotting, frozen, or worm-infested olives. The process of extraction should also take place as quickly as possible from the moment the olives are harvested and the mill should be clean. If these conditions are not met, it is unlikely that an olive oil will be extra virgin. In order to certify the oil as extra virgin, producers need to get the oil tested in a lab for chemical parameters, and at an official tasting panel for organoleptic parameters. In the lab, they will test for levels of oxidation, and composition of fatty acids. You can also test for levels of polyphenols. In the tasting panel, they will test for positive and negative aromatic and flavor attributes. For an extra virgin, there must be positive attributes, such as fruitiness and secondary aromas (cut grass, tomato, artichoke…) and no negative attributes, such as rancid, musty, fusty…

¿Debbie/Amelia - What parts of the work bring you the most joy, and which challenges or tests your patience? How do you stay grounded when things inevitably go wrong?

“I do have issues like the amount of machinery that gets broken is just beyond me. But you know what you are going to do? You can get really angry, but the machinery will keep breaking anyway, and it's – in a way, it's almost better to just be zen about it and just say things are going to break. It's part of the maintenance costs. If I were to start yelling, then they don’t tell me until I find the broken whatever, so I try to stay zen.”

We comment that 3 employees isn’t a lot of staff for the size of the property, the number of trees -

“yeah I do a lot, but I love it so it doesn’t feel like it, it doesn’t feel like that much work. And the truth is we're pretty small so it's pretty manageable. The harvest - it's tiring but it's just one month. One one thing I don’t do is drive a tractor, even though I probably should learn.

I do all the bottling, labeling the bottles. The harvest is crazy and then the December bottling is crazy, some customers think- ‘oh you have finished the harvest- so can we come and buy‘? and I'm like- NO- Not Yet!- I spend about 3 weeks just bottling- all day and night, a distributor might say here's the order - 100 boxes of this and 100 boxes of that- so it takes a little time.

The thing I hate most is, for example- when we have a shipment, a client will buy something and the shipment gets lost, or a bottle gets broken, then it’s back. It takes a lot of time to fix- I tell them, keep the bottle, I’ll just send you another, or its the things like that that take a lot of time, and are miniscule- so that's the only thing I have to complain about!”

¿Debbie/Amelia - How do you see the balance between honoring olive oil traditions and embracing innovation—both in farming and in production? Are there areas where tradition should be preserved, and others where change is necessary

Cristina - “I think the cultural tradition of olive oil and olive agriculture should not be lost because there are a lot of - not just things, but all of traditional olive groves are almost like artifacts. They have the pedra seca (dry stone) which are the stone terraces that they would build just so they could even out the sloping land to cultivate the trees, helping to prevent soil erosion, retain water etc. —you see this everywhere all over the Mediterranean. They are beautiful. They're not mechanizable, which means that everything has to be done by hand. They are economically non-viable. If someone doesn’t pay extra for that olive oil, those will all go away, they will disappear, yes, but should all of them disappear? It's a little bit like the question of – should we allow certain animals to be extinct? I don’t know. It’s a good question. It's a beautiful landscape to see these old trees planted in this very traditional manner. The wild olive tree usually grows in these kinds of areas near the mediterranean because 20 kilometers outside of the sea, the wild olive tree stops growing. Cultivated olives is a different story, but wild olives, it’s really by the sea, you have these craggy growths and they have to be cultivated by hand.

New plantations for olive trees don’t look like olive trees, they’re in hedgerows. You know, economically, it makes more sense if you want to be able to enjoy olive oil and not have to pay what we- well the cost of ours, which is prohibitive for most people, then you can only go in the way of modern plantations. Modern plantations make sense because otherwise no one will consume olive oil and then olive oil would disappear as well.

So a balance, I think, is good. In terms of the milling, that I have to say, the actual mills, again artifacts to be placed in museums, they’re important because for about 2,000 years the technology of making olive oil did not really change since the Romans, it hasn’t changed until, I want to say 30- 40 years ago. The only difference was instead of a mule or instead of a person, then a mule, then steam and then electricity. That's basically it, the system itself was the same, you had a press and you would have the big stones that would crush the olives, then you would have this paste, and you would put the paste between these flat baskets (capacho mats) - you put them on top of the axle and you would press them. Then you would decant them. It's been like that, you still can find operating mills that operate like this. My God, when you go in there and smell everything– it's a lot. – So put them in a museum, but they should not be operating. Because that olive oil is not good” and she finishes the statement with “I have lots of opinions for sure”

In Spain, truly traditional olive‑oil presses using stone mill wheels, mules and capacho mats for manual or animal-powered pressing are now rare—yet still in use in a few very specific regions including Mallorca (in the villages of Caimari & Soller), Aragon & Andalusia, some producing small batches olive oil, and some as a historical experience.

¿Debbie/Amelia -Cristina, the Mas Auró brand feels very personal—less like a marketing exercise and more like something lived and shaped over time. How would you describe the values behind it, and how it came to be recognized?

“Because we’re so small, the brand kind of speaks for itself. It hasn’t really been -designed- in a strategic way—there was no big brand plan. My dad’s priority from the beginning was producing the highest quality olive oil possible, even if that meant having tiny yields.

My Dad didn’t care about volume. For him, quality always came first—even before breaking even, honestly. For example, some producers increase their yield by waiting longer to harvest or by raising the temperature during processing. When the paste from the crushed olives is cold—like in November, when the olives come in—the oil is thick and harder to extract. Imagine trying to spread rock-hard butter straight from the fridge. You need to soften it first. It’s the same with olive paste: if it’s cold, it’s solid, and less oil comes out.

Some people heat the paste using scalding water to make the oil flow better, and yes, that gets you more yield. But the oil quality goes down. My dad refused to cut corners like that. For him, even if we ended up with less oil- fine- it had to be excellent.

So no, we don’t really have a brand in the traditional sense. What we have is more like a mission statement: -make the best olive oil possible- and -be continually known for that quality-. The label design isn’t focus-group tested—it’s family-tested. Everyone has opinions, and in the end, since I’m the one running the printer, I get the final say on what goes on the label.

At one point, someone told him “Enric- you should have someone other than yourself validate this oil.” So, the Italian guy who sold us the mill came to help us set it up and stayed through the first days of our very first harvest.

The first batch? Nothing came out. But then the second batch worked, and I remember him saying, “Yes, this is very good olive oil. I smell cut grass, green pepper, and apples—this is excellent- we hadn’t smelled these attributes in olive oil before. He encouraged us to send it to professional tasters, to get proper tasting notes and submit it for awards.

And that’s how we started. For the first four or five years, we submitted to several different competitions—and we actually won a few awards right away. But after a while, we stopped. I looked around and said, -This place is becoming a mausoleum- Now, the only competition we still enter is -Flos Olei- It’s like the Parker Guide for olive oil. They give us a detailed tasting assessment, and if the oil meets their standards, we’re included in the guide. We've been listed for five or six years now.”

A Note on Flos Olei
While transcribing our interview (which I’d recorded), something funny happened. I kept replaying a part where Cristina mentioned what sounded like “Flosso Lately.” I wrote it down, closed my eyes, listened again and again—still, “Flosso Lately” was the best I could make out.

Curiosity got the best of me, so I turned to AI and typed in: “Flosso Lately” + “olive oil tasting.” Finally, the mystery unraveled—she’d been saying Flos Olei, the prestigious international guide to the world’s best olive oils.

That little detour led me down a rabbit hole of olive oil rankings, tasting notes, and global producers. It also sparked an idea: why not end the story with a guided olive oil tasting, hosted by Cristina herself?

Flos Olei: A Global Guide to the Best Extra Virgin Olive Oils—Flos Olei is the world’s most prestigious international olive oil guide, often described as the Michelin Guide of EVOO. It was founded by Marco Oreggia, an Italian food and wine journalist and professional taster.

Coming soon - Part 4— Tasting Mas Auro Olive Oil- We will learn the intricacies on what to look for and how to taste EVOO

Enric-

Mas Auro olive trees

Christina

An old stone press- which would have been operated by a mule as you can see to the right of the mill.

A bottle of Mas Auro Extra Virgin Olive Oil and the office /tasting room in the background.

Prelude to the Interview

We began by asking about the family and the history of the olive farm. Cristina’s parents, Enric Murio and Carme Salvado, purchased the property in 1994 and began planting olive trees.

1994? That’s not so long ago. If you tasted this oil, you might think olive oil production had been in the family for generations—agricultural secrets handed down like treasured recipes. Yet that’s not the case.

Enric and Carme are lifelong entrepreneurs. Though their children were both born in Barcelona (Cristina is the eldest, and Ignasi is two years younger), the family moved to the Philippines in 1979, where they started a coffee roasting and sales business (www.theculinaryexchange.ph). Shortly afterward, Enric and Carme founded a rattan furniture factory and export business, also in the Philippines, where they lived and raised their children.

The coffee business was sold in the 1990s and continues to operate under new ownership. The furniture business was partially sold, though Carme and Enric remain majority shareholders (www.emurio.com).

The family returned to Spain in the early 1990s. Before starting the farm, Enric and Carme traveled through Europe, visiting and learning from several olive oil producers.

With Mas Auró, Enric had one goal: to produce the absolute best olive oil possible. The location was important. They chose this area—Pla de l'Estany—a comarca (county or district) in the province of Girona, Catalonia, centered around Lake Banyoles (Estany de Banyoles), the largest natural lake in Catalonia. The name reflects the geography: a flat or gently rolling landscape surrounding a significant body of water.

Cristina helped on the farm when she was young but didn’t lead her life with the idea that she would one day-take over the business. She spent time at university in the U.S., then worked as a graphic designer in her early 30s. She married an American, and together they returned to Spain and opened a small boutique hotel with a restaurant outside of Figueres, where they lived and worked for nearly 20 years, all while raising two children.

Cristina describes the hotel/restaurant business as many do: “It’s a seven-day-a-week, 24-hours-a-day kind of life—while raising a family.” Needless to say, she didn’t enjoy running the hotel- nor cooking in the restaurant.

Then came COVID. The restaurant closed. She and her husband amicably divorced. At the same time, her hardworking parents were ready to slow down.

The timing couldn’t have been better.

The Interview

¿Debbie/Amelia - What's the story behind the name and label of Mas Auró? (The label of Mas Auró’s oil features a red maple leaf - Mas Auró translates to House of Maple, Mas shorter form of Masia being the Catalan word for this type of rustic agricultural home with land attached.)

Cristina- Cristina laughs and says “Pittsburg” My name “Murio” is Spanish, we are from Barcelona. I ended up in Pittsburgh in a very circuitous way. We left Barcelona in 1978 to Hong Kong. My mom had culture shock in Hong Kong and with two little kids she was overwhelmed. A year later we moved to the Philippines. They lived there until 1994. I lived there until 1991, when I finished high school I was accepted at Carnegie Mellon in Pittsburgh. There I studied Graphic Design for 4 years to get my bachelors degree. Through the four years of living in Pittsburgh my parents visited twice, once with my mom to help me settle in and then again for graduation. My mother spent most of her visits to Pittsburgh with her eyes on the trees and on the ground foraging for maple seeds. She took home these seeds and planted them here in Esponella. And that’s where Mas Auro comes from. Originally I designed the label for the house, so that is where it started. For the olive oil we kept the maple leaf. When we have Canadian visitors they get very excited and they ask if I am Canadian because of the maple leaf sign on the road and of course because I speak to them in English!

My Dad had a very particular way that he wanted the labels, he wanted a lot of information on the bottles. This is the first year that he has not put any input into the labels- so I added a little color to them- Now we have the cans (black and silver) . We introduced the cans for packaging to differentiate from the typical bottle and the plastic, and which also keeps out the light.

¿Debbie/Amelia - Can you tell us about the early years of taking over the business—what was that transition like for you?

“My parents were getting older, they were considering what to do. Do we close, Do we sell? And I said, if your game, I’ll come over and take over- I wanted to - I said if you work with me for three years so I can learn the ropes, not just agriculturally, but the mill— the mill scared me particularly because I’d been there when there were mechanical problems, and it’s, you know, you've got olives that are waiting to be milled, and you have, well if anything goes wrong and you have a problem with olive oil going all over–it's very difficult to clean. My parents planted the trees between 1995 and 1996, and I was just finishing college then. And in 2015 they put in the mill, and I remember coming every year to mill the olives. But when you're not responsible for it –it's not the same. You're just doing the fun stuff and when there's somebody else that’s dealing with the problem and you’re just there waiting and you know, talking and available to help. But I felt none of the pressure, which means I did zero learning. But once I started with the knowledge that my Dad was going to retire, even then it was not the same as when I first did it on my own. Anyway it was very helpful having the three years. The agriculture part has been a little bit easier to do because the trees are forgiving and a lot of the problems with the trees you can’t really do much about because it's related to climate. To drought, or hailstorms. I mean it's economically crippling, but that's not in my control, so if there's a problem that is my fault, I think- what can I fix”?

Though Cristina had helped on the farm before, taking over its day-to-day operations was something else entirely. Running it full-time was a leap. But five years in, she’s not only managing it with confidence—there’s a quiet satisfaction in the way she talks about the work. As I’ve come to know her, it’s clear: she genuinely enjoys what she does.

Her parents, Enric and Carme, still live on the estate in the Masia, a large stone farmhouse that’s been there for centuries. When I ask how the two of them manage such a big place, Cristina smiles and says, “They only live on the middle floor.”

Enric suffered a stroke last year, and while he’s recovering well, he still tends to a few trees and vines on the property. Carme, ever active, makes a rotating selection of jellies, jams, and marmalades (a few laced with Gin!) that are sold in the showroom. A few years ago, she brought heirloom tomato seeds back from the U.S.—now she grows several rows of them and supplies a handful of local restaurants with delicious American heirloom tomatoes. She also helps Cristina prepare for group tastings when they host visitors at the farm.

The property is dotted with citrus trees—lemons, oranges, even a Yuzu tree—and with the final harvest of the season, when the olives are at their ripest, they make small-batch flavored oils by crushing the olives and citrus together. It's the kind of detail that surprises and delights visitors during tastings, where the line between farm and table feels refreshingly thin.

¿Debbie/Amelia -Can you give me a sense of how many olive trees are planted here, and how much land they cover?

Cristina: “Mas Auró consists of 17 hectares and 3700 trees. 13 hectares are owned and 4 are leased (the old Argudells near Figueres)

¿Debbie/Amelia - Who are Mas Auró’s primary customers, and how do you typically sell your olive oil?

Cristina: “The majority of customers are direct sales, restaurants, and gourmet-boutique shops. 99% of sales to restaurants are in Spain, with two restaurants being in France. One of the larger customers is Vins & Licors Grau, in Palafrugell, a large gourmet wine and liquor store that also distributes Mas Auro olive oil to a few restaurants. We had interest from a restaurant in Madrid, but we can not produce the quantity they would need, the same with Bon Preu/Esclat, (a large grocer) they wished to carry our oil, but we can not produce the quantity needed. What we also do is bottle on demand so that the olive oil is always as fresh as possible. And then for restaurants, another thing we do is the three litre bag in the box, the price is the same, but what they have is- as they use the oil, it's in the vacuum, the air does not go into the bag, so it keeps longer, it does not become oxidized.”

¿D & A- Tell us about the tastings that you conduct, what goes into them?

“ I will do several tastings a month- from culinary schools, to universities, to cycling groups and tourists, but my favorite are the young kids, these kids I love, because they have virgin palates, because the type of olive oil that's well-known here is cooperative olive oil, which is usually much riper, it has some fermentation and is usually defective, yet that's what people like because it is what they are used to- we want to get the kids while they are young, and teach them about good olive oil. In the end it's subjective. A defective olive oil is not going to hurt you. It's not going to infect you. It's not as good as it could be, it is oxidized, it is "con-defectos” also it has fermentation. A very good olive oil is a very different experience. It will have all the anti-inflammatories, it has all the antioxidants, it will be much more aromatic, you can do much more with it –it becomes an ingredient as opposed to just a fat you use to cook or to marinate. If that's what you're looking for- flavor –then a very good olive oil is a plus. A bad olive oil is a negative- your putting in fermentations which can be anaerobic which gives a salami smell, it's a very typical cooperative smell, then you have the aerobic fermentation which can be a vinegary or winey smell, you can have a moldy taste, which comes from having olives in the mill for a long time and if there's a lot of humidity, they’ll get moldy and that goes into the olives. You can get rancidity from keeping olive oil near heat or in warm areas or in sunlight. If the olive oil is packaged in clear or plastic bottles or has been open for 6 months it becomes rancid. Using defective oil on food that you have been carefully preparing, it's like cooking it in a pan you haven’t washed in three years– you wouldn’t do that, but people don’t know, people are used to cooperatives, so were we, until we began traveling and researching olive oil”.

Spanish cooperative olive oil refers to olive oil produced and distributed by agricultural cooperatives in Spain, where local olive growers come together to pool their resources—including land, labor, and harvests—to produce, process, and market olive oil collectively. These cooperatives are especially common in Andalusia, Catalonia, and Castilla-La Mancha, major olive-growing regions of Spain. Two Key Characteristics of Cooperative olive oil is that they are Farmer-Owned: The members of the cooperative are typically small-scale olive farmers who own the enterprise collectively. Also they have a Shared Infrastructure – cooperatives often own shared mills (almazaras) and bottling facilities, allowing growers to reduce costs.

¿Debbie/Amelia - What matters most when it comes to producing truly great olive oil? Is it the region, the olive variety, the milling process—or something else?

“There is a science to olive oil, and science to agriculture, although it's not as complicated as wine where you have a lot of process and you have a lot of control with a kind of finished product - with wine you have yeast you can use, the amount of time the grape sits on the lees, there are so many things, secondary fermentation, adding sugars. (In France, not in Spain) With olive oil- there is nothing added to the oil. Olive oil is basically like orange juice. If you have good oranges you can make very good orange juice. If you have disgusting oranges you’ll have disgusting orange juice, it's the same with olives, it's mechanically removing the oil that is inside the olive, you're not doing anything else to it. Then keeping the oil safe and storing it in a way that it won’t become oxidized. Basically keeping the oil away from heat and light”.

Healthy olives is number one, the varietal, the climate, that will give you different profiles of the olives, for example if you have a drought and a lot of heat, the tree will release a lot more antioxidants and in particular olive, a pungent one, you’ll have oils that are spicy, and more pungent. If you have a mild and rainy year the olive tree does not need to give off as many polyphenols because it's not fighting anything, so you will have milder, more balanced oils. Unless you have an extremely pungent oil which is then unbalanced, outside of that the oils are good they just have different profiles. But- if the olive is fermenting, or rotting, then those are things you cannot fix. So that's number one, to have good olives, number two is to have a clean mill, so that you don’t mess up what came in as perfect. Again, it's like using a dirty pan to prepare a fresh meal.

Keeping control of the temperature, and storing them well, that's really it. In terms of healthy olives there is pest management, (for the olive fly) and there is irrigation –in a drought year you can add irrigation you can do a lot of irrigation or a little depending on the profile you want for the olive. We do restrictive irrigation because we want the polyphenols.” In the summer months we will give the tree 40 to 50% of what it wants for water, in the fall and in the spring when the shoots are growing, then it really needs the energy of the water so we will give it plenty of water. Another treatment we do that is preventative for example is adding micronutrients. In English it would be pulverizing, we have a tank where we mix the micro nutrients, like zinc and magnesium, those kinds of things, we mix it and then it gets sprayed into the trees with a fan”

¿Debbie/Amelia - What daily practices tie into growing the best olives?

“The management of the trees, we're constantly looking at the trees, there's only so many things we can do, so everything that is under our control we do, for example we're organic so the treatments that we do are preventative rather than aggressive. You have to be looking for pests, or soil erosion, erosion of the land -we leave the natural grass and plants that grow here, some of them have very deep roots, kind of like a carrot — that makes a thick and deep root, these are annuals which means it will die and that root will disappear –leaving a space that aerates the soil, which is very good, because you can get worms and other small little critters that will keep an ecosystem that is in balance, for example pests could become a problem in big groves that are tilled. Here there are enough critters that they do not get out of balance so that's better than putting pesticides. We don’t put pesticides. We try to use as much rain irrigation as possible so we do not waste water. We don’t till because if you till, its true that you don’t have competition from plants, but you also have a lot more evaporation, because the plants in the summer –eventually they will die and turn to mulch and that allows a lot of moisture in the ground and it also keeps the ground cooler, which is important for the health of the tree. So we know when we get to harvest we will have the best possible olives with the least possible pesticides and the least possibility of an infestation of a pest”.

Cristina asks if I remember the oils from the drought year—2022 or maybe 2023. I laugh, of course I remember the drought, but admit I hadn’t realized how it had shaped the oils from that harvest. We both smile, a quiet acknowledgment passing between us—she knows these oils like seasons in her bones, in a way I can only admire.

“We do have a well, but in the year of the drought we could not water, or we could water very little. And that year, the olive oils were very spicy, the Arbequina was particularly spicy.

As we are managing the trees, the workers do the manual work- for example the pruning, I’ll go in front of them and say this branch, this branch, this branch, and after about ten trees they know what branches they have to prune. And at the end of the day if they are not sure about a particular treatment, they’ll come and and get me at the end of the day and I’ll go see what they’ve done, and there's usually a branch that I wouldn't have taken out, but what can you do, you can’t be everywhere.

We harvest when the olive is green, the olive begins its process of ripening by changing color- they change from a deep green to a light green. You can start to see the change because you can’t confuse them for leaves anymore. They also soften a bit. That is when we know -it's time to start the harvest. Each variety has a different ripening date. Arebequina and Frantoio usually ripen before Koroneki and the Argudell tends to be the last to ripen.

When they are green they have more polyphenols and have the least chance of infestation by a pest. During harvest some of the olives may begin to turn purple - we use these for the lemon olive oil. Sometimes it's the end of September, sometimes it's in October that we harvest, depending on how the olives are ripening. This takes about a month. We try to make the harvest very efficient so that we don’t get to the point where we have a very late harvest. We clean the mill every time there is a new batch of oil. The mill that we have is very modern and easy to clean. The mill gets cleaned everyday as if it were a kitchen, it is cleaned with very hot water, no soap is used at all on the mill. Most cooperatives don’t clean the mill until the end of the season.” - This is also because they are usually milling 24 hours a day, continuously, so hygiene is more spotty.”

Cristina runs the company with a small team of three full-time staff, including herself. Two focus primarily on caring for the trees, while Cristina handles everything else: tastings, sales, bottling, labeling, accounting, graphic design—and managing the mill.

During harvest, she brings on three additional workers: one to assist her directly, and four in total in the olive groves.

What’s striking is how calm she remains. When I visit, there’s no frantic energy—no “chicken with its head cut off” vibe, as she jokes. “Compared to running a hotel and preparing meals, olive oil is easy,” she says.

Stay Tuned for Part 2 of The Mas Auró Interview- where we talk about the health benefits and a scandal around Canola oil that rocked Spain to its core.

The oil

The olives changing

Carme- checking the olives going into the mill.

Students tasting at Mas Auró - in the background is The Masia where Carme & Enric live.

Late harvest olives are used to make the Botanics line.

After weaving through a cornfield, we came upon a charming boutique hotel—the kind of place you stumble upon by accident but never forget. That hotel, La Palma, turned out to be just around the bend from the house we would soon call home. It’s where we spent several nights after we purchased Can Mademon a 200 year old stone Masia, and it also happened to be where I first tasted the liquid gold that is Mas Auró olive oil.

The Mas Auró bottle arrived at our table at Sa Poma, La Palma’s cozy, beautifully styled dining room, and within one dip of bread, I was hooked.

“Where did this come from?” I asked.
Anna, who ran the front of house at the family-owned hotel, smiled and said in perfect English, “Mas Auró. They’ll also be your neighbors.”

She was right. Mas Auró would become not just our neighbor—for us, Mas Auró has become a local treasure. Cristina, a friend, and the story of Mas Auró, as I would come to learn, is as rich and nuanced as the oil itself.

Back then, Mas Auró was still in the hands of its founders—Enric and his wife, Carme—whose passion and precision had built the farm into what it is today. Enric himself gave us our first tour (also in perfect English). I remember how his eyes lit up as he described the state-of-the-art Italian mill they had imported—sleek, efficient, and essential to producing oil of such clarity and balance.

Having recently moved here from California, we felt a little pride as he also spoke admiringly of UC Davis, home to one of the world’s leading agricultural programs, and how research and innovation from places like California helped inspire and elevate olive oil production here in Spain.

But it wasn’t just the equipment—it was Enric’s vision. When he and his wife first bought the property, he had one goal: to create the absolute best olive oil he could. No compromises. The farm was built on that intention, using organic and regenerative practices long before they became marketing buzzwords. And it paid off—Mas Auró quickly made a name for itself, racking up awards and accolades while staying rooted in quality and integrity.

One of the most memorable ways to experience Mas Auró was through their annual Xuca Tasting—a fall celebration of the fresh harvest. The word Xuca (a playful Catalan term with a bit of sexual connotation) hints at the sensual pleasure of olive oil tasting: warming it slightly in your palm, swirling, inhaling, and letting the oil unfold on your tongue.

Vince and I often say we lucked out landing in this particular pocket of Catalonia. Not only did we find ourselves neighbors with our now-close friends at Hotel La Palma and the renowned olive oil producers at Mas Auró, but we’re also just a few kilometers from five exceptional, family-run restaurants—each with its own personality and specialties. One of our favorites is Can Roca de Esponellà, a beloved local gem that’s been serving the community for over a century. Now in its third generation, chef-owner Ester runs the kitchen with confident grace. It’s a favorite among locals and a destination for travelers—and we find ourselves returning often.

Ester knows how much we love Mas Auró olive oil, and one year she invited us to Mas Auró’s- Xuca Tasting, where she would be cooking alongside other local chefs. Later I learned an invitation wasn’t needed—it was a word-of-mouth and sign-on-the-road kind of invite.

The event took place each fall, just after the olives were harvested and pressed and enough bottled for the tasting. Unlike wine, olive oil doesn’t age—it’s best enjoyed as fresh as possible. So this was the moment: the unveiling of the new vintage.

We arrived around 10 a.m., parked our trusty VW among the olive trees, and followed the savory smoke toward the festivities. Grills sizzled with butifarra, lamb, and rabbit. Long gold-linen tables were already lively, wine bottles half-empty, laughter echoing through the grove. Spaniards in their typical boina caps and coats stood in clusters, catching up over food and wine. At the entrance, we figured out the “program”—for about ten euros’ worth of food tickets, we could feast freely, including a bottle of wine.

As the crowd around the tasting room thinned, we slipped inside. At a large table arranged with glass bottles and cans of olive oil and platters of cubed bread, we began sampling the season’s varieties. Swirl, sniff, taste, savor. Each oil had its own personality—some buttery and soft, others green and peppery. Ending with the citrus fruit infused oils lemon, and Yuzu.

We stepped into something that felt timeless—just real life unfolding with quiet ease. The experience felt intimate, rooted in history and the land itself—anchored in generations of farmers and neighbors coming together to greet, to share, to connect. Weathered hands passed around hunks of bread, small glasses of wine, and knowing looks. These were neighbors who might not see each other often but who know the shape of each other's lives—the harvests, the losses, the gossip that doesn’t need repeating.

We didn’t try to belong. We watched, we followed their lead—just grateful to be there. The pace was slow, the conversation low and easy, with the occasional burst of laughter that said more than words could.

The Xuca Tastings aren’t annual events anymore. The rough clearing where we once left our car at the edge of the trees has since been planted with more olive groves. A quiet ending—or maybe just the next chapter. The land keeps working, keeps giving. Always in service of the oil.

I met Cristina, Enric’s daughter, after he retired. Her mother, Carme, still helps out now and then, but it’s Cristina who now fully runs the operation with a small, dedicated team of three (herself included)—six during harvest. From the beginning, it was clear she’d inherited more than the business. She carries the same deep respect for the trees, the olives and the land, the same focus on excellence, and a calm, grounded presence that made it easy to see why Mas Auró continues to thrive under her leadership.

Over the past couple of years, my quick stops at Mas Auró—often with guests in tow, eager to bring home a bottle—turned into something more. When I came alone, I found myself lingering, chatting with Cristina about the weather, business, my cookbook A Lemon a Day in the making, or life in general. Each visit became a little longer, a little warmer.

One day, I brought her a batch of biscotti I’d baked using Mas Auró oil. She was delighted—and that small exchange deepened our connection even further. We started trading stories, ideas, and eventually, something more intentional began to take shape.

While my daughter was visiting this spring, we agreed that Cristina—and Mas Auró deserved a proper story. So we asked if she’d be open to an interview. She said yes. We decided to wait until early summer, when the olive trees would be flowering and the little bitty olives would begin emerging from the blossoms. Cristina recommended mid-June.

We arrived with a lemon-blueberry olive oil cake (naturally), and spent a few unhurried hours in the tasting room and among the trees, talking about her journey, the land, and what it means to carry forward her family’s vision.

Next up — Part 2: Coming Soon — The Interview

Mas Auro Olives

Mas Auro- in the early years.

Xuca Tasting -

Masia La Palma -

Chef Ester from Can Roca de Esponella at our first Xuca Tasting

My kitchen, where Mas Auro is always present on my island & A Lemon & Blueberry Olive Oil Cake -

Founders of Mas Auro, Enric & Carme

Cristina- the early years, the young trees.

A Lemon a Day Began for Me 22 Years Ago

Imagine this: I’m balancing life as a wife, a full-time business partner, and a mom of two energetic kids. It’s Tuesday evening. Dinner’s half-prepped, bedtimes around the corner, and then—my husband drops a bombshell.

“Hey, remember my cousin from Spain? She’s flying in to be our nanny. She’ll be here Thursday.”

Wait— I check my memory files- nope not there. Its not a bad thing, I am just not prepared.

I vaguely remembered his cousin Maica. She had visited San Francisco once with Vinces aunt Carmella, and we’d met in Barcelona once —a faraway recollection of tapas bars and tiny coffees from our trip to Spain, but now I had two days to prepare for a Spanish speaking stranger joining our household. I’d liked her- and we did need a new nanny, our dear Mercedes was more than ready to retire.

Cue the late-night grocery dash. I went with a family-pleaser: Jamaican jerk chicken with basmati rice and a green salad. Safe enough, I thought.

But when Maica arrived, it didn’t quite go as planned. One bite of the chicken, and she started fanning her mouth and doing what my son Henry later dubbed the “spice dance.” As he laughed- my father-in-law offered a running commentary on another subject, and my daughter Amelia’s bedtime loomed ever closer.

It was chaotic. It was awkward. And it was the beginning of something extraordinary.

That night, as the house finally settled, I consoled myself: at least Vince and I take our coffee seriously. Tomorrow morning, I’d win her over with the perfect cortado.

Only—Maica didn’t drink coffee.

Instead, she began her day with a ritual: warm lemon water. Every. Single. Day.

And just like that, a quiet little shift began in our house. I started joining her in the morning lemon routine—though my cortado still calls my name shortly after.

Though Maica and I had met briefly before, this marked the real beginning of our friendship—one that has now lasted over two decades.

She began taking English classes while the kids were in school. She joined us on vacations, celebrated Thanksgivings and Christmases with our family, and in the summer, she and I would bring the kids to Tordera, her hometown in Catalonia. I’d stay a few weeks, then return to work while my kids enjoyed camp, beaches, cousins, and summers under the care of Maica and Maria, Maica’s mother, who became their “Spanish grandmother.”

Our families blended. Her nieces became best friends with Amelia. Her nephew was Henry’s summer companion. We built a bridge across two continents—and somehow, it never felt like effort.

It just grew, season by season.

Years later, when I was diagnosed with cancer, Maica never left my side. While Vince held down the business, she held down everything else—steadily, faithfully, lovingly.

To this day, she’s part of my family, and I’m part of hers. When we moved to Spain, we originally planned to be closer to Tordera—but fate led us to Can Mademon, a home we fell in love with, even if it is an hour’s drive away.

Summers here have become sacred. Long days are spent on the beach, and the kitchen becomes a place to escape rather than linger. Meals are light, simple—prepared outdoors when possible or not at all, as we opt for fresh market fare and cool seaside cafés. Maria taught me to cook her effortless Spanish recipes in the cool of the evenings, when the world slows and food becomes a ritual of rhythm, not rush.

Maria makes her gazpacho thin and vinegary, no bread, no fluff- drinkable. Her son Kiko—a veteran of the French Foreign Legion—and my daughter Amelia adore it. Maica, her daughter, and I prefer mine— its a little smoother, a little softer around the edges.

Over time, I’ve learned to find beauty in both. There’s no single recipe for family. No perfect blend of vinegar and oil. Like writing, you begin, you adjust, and you keep blending.

Sometimes it starts with a lemon.

Spanish Summer Gazpacho

inspired by Maria Altea Castilla of Tordera

Ingredients

¾ of a medium loaf of day-old bread - in the states I use either a Pugilese or Sourdough, here in Spain, I order a round loaf of white bread or if I can find it- I’ll purchase a Pa de Madre, similar to a sourdough. If you don’t have day-old bread- you can remove the heel of the loaf, then place in a very low heated oven until it is dried out. With the remaining bread and crusts, cut into small cubes, place in a ziplock or bowl and drizzle with EVOO and shake- then place on a baking sheet and bake at 350 F until crusty.

6 ripe summer tomatoes

1 red bell pepper (reserve a slice for garnish)

1 green bell pepper

1 medium English cucumber (reserve a couple slices for garnish)

1 garlic clove (if they are small- you can use 2)

1 tsp kosher salt

A couple of turns on a peppermill, or ¼ teaspoon black pepper

½ cup white balsamic vinegar or a Sherry vinegar

¾ cup good quality EVOO- preferably Spanish

A small handful of ice cubes

Equipment needed

- a strong blender, strainer, large bowl, cutting board and knife.

Instructions

Place a strainer over a large bowl, slice the tomatoes in half lengthwise and squeeze over the strainer removing the seeds. You will use the juice that drips into the bowl. Then roughly chop the tomatoes and put into the juice from tomatoes and discard the seeds.

Peel the cucumber, slice horizontally and with a teaspoon remove the seeds and discard. Chop and add to tomatoes.

Wash the bell peppers, remove the seeds and place in the bowl with tomatoes and cucumber.

Add the garlic clove, salt and pepper, olive oil, and vinegar. Stir with a wooden spoon to blend and marry the ingredients. (I like to let this sit together covered with a dish towel for an hour before blending- but its not absolutely necessary)

In a large bowl add a couple handfuls of ice cubes, a cup of cold water, and then add the crustless dried bread to the ice water, until it is moist, then squeeze the water out, and drop into the gazpacho mixture. Repeat until all the bread is used and stir into the gazpacho.

Blend the gazpacho on high a couple of cups at a time, until creamy and smooth. Place in the refrigerator.

Variations

Typical Garnish- you can hold back a slice of bell pepper, cucumber and onion and then dice them very petite for a garnish for your chilled gazpacho, along with the crunchy croutons. If I have an exceptional loaf of bread to use for the gazpacho I will use large torn pieces of the crust, drizzled with EVOO and baked in large stips- they make great dipping spoons.

Burrata Garnish - break up a ball of Burrata by the number of guests you are serving and drop into the gazpacho along with some basil chiffonade.

Health Benefits of Spanish Summer Gazpacho Recipe

Tomatoes (6 ripe summer tomatoes)

Rich in lycopene, a powerful antioxidant linked to heart health and reduced cancer risk.
Packed with vitamin C, potassium, and folate.
Support skin health and may help reduce UV damage.

Red & Green Bell Peppers

High in vitamins A and C—essential for immune function and skin health.
Contain antioxidants like beta-carotene and lutein, which support eye health.
Provide fiber to support digestion.

Garlic (1–2 cloves)

Known for its antimicrobial and anti-inflammatory properties.
Supports cardiovascular health and may help reduce blood pressure.
Contains allicin, which can boost the immune system.

Day-Old Bread (¾ loaf)

Provides complex carbohydrates for steady energy.
If using whole sourdough or Pugliese, you’ll get a bit of fermented goodness and gut-friendly prebiotics.
Toasted bread croutons add texture without frying—a healthier crunch!

Kosher Salt + Black Pepper

Enhances flavor naturally, helping you avoid overly processed sauces.
Black pepper contains piperine, which may help with nutrient absorption.

White Balsamic or Sherry Vinegar (½ cup)

Contains polyphenols, which are linked to blood sugar and cholesterol control.
Adds a tangy flavor with zero fat or sugar.

Extra Virgin Olive Oil (¾ cup, preferably Spanish)

A key component of the Mediterranean diet—great for heart and brain health.
Packed with monounsaturated fats and antioxidants.
Has anti-inflammatory effects and helps absorb fat-soluble vitamins.

Overall Benefit:
This gazpacho is a nutrient-dense, anti-inflammatory, heart-healthy dish that supports digestion, immunity, and hydration—all without cooking away the nutrients.