Pannacotta with dried fig salami

On Sunday we visited the ruins of a first-century Roman amphitheatre in Gubbio; as young L. studied Roman history in school this fall, the visit was a teachable moment, as well as being fascinating in its own right.

While we pretty much had the site to ourselves, midway through an Italian couple joined us. Which is how I found myself being asked to “scream”: they were up at the top of the theatre, while I was on stage, and they wanted to hear the acoustics (we later learned that she works in a speaker factory).

Lisa had a chat with them, and ended up giving them one of our This Box is for Good boxes. She also extracted from them a recommendation to visit Portonovo if we were thinking of visiting the Adriatic coast.

As it happened, we did decide to visit the Adriatic coast, renting a house 50 m from the sea for two nights here in Numata. And tonight we had supper in Portonovo, at a restaurant called Emilia.

Our restaurant opened its doors back in 1929 with our grandmother: Emilia. Emilia would come down from Poggio to the sea to organize lunches and refreshments for the first tourists in the area, locals from Poggio, Camerano, and Ancona, who loved spending time at the beach. That’s how it all started.

Today the restaurant is managed by Emilia’s granddaughter Federica, and it was Federica who enthusiastically welcomed us to return for a table when we showed up before their 7:30 opening time.

The restaurant is right on the water, and we had a lovely meal of seafood—I had spaghetti with mussels to start, followed by mixed grilled fish; both were excellent.

For dessert I had “pannacotta with dried fig salami,” which knocked my socks off it was so good. I will remember it for a long time.

As we were finishing up, Lisa had the idea that we should leave a This Box is for Good box behind, and while we debated simply leaving it on the table, we decided instead to present it to Federica on the way out.

It was clear that the gesture touched her, and so it touched us. It was also clear that she understood the “refill and pass along” conceit immediately.

A story that started with one box, ended with another.

This box really is for good.