Andrea taught me how to pick olives in Tuscany. You spread fine mesh nets under the trees in early October and shake their trunks for all you’re worth, sometimes with a machine, so the olives all drop down and you can scoop them up and take them straight to the local press where they ooze a neon green I’ve never seen in the yellow bottles of olive oil in grocery stores in the U.S. Standing in the grove after we worked, sweating beside a row of cypresses near the house, he scratched a halved clove of garlic across the face of a toasted wedge of bread, closing his eyes and snuffing the aroma, then drizzled the neon green fresh olive oil over it and all over the white cloth underneath, handed it to me and a glass of red wine, raised his own with his childish smile, and gave me the strongest buzz I have ever experienced—just from the fresh oil and garlic.
Andrea also taught me how to find truffles in the forest. We followed his little white dog, Bella, as she darted on and off the path snuffling at the roots of particular trees here and there and pawing delightedly whenever she found one. He would kneel his powerful frame beside her and delicately excavate the black knobbed truffle, give Bella a treat, and then tenderly caress her ears till she smiled. I noticed she was missing her front teeth. Altogether she found five truffles our first time out, and in the middle of a clearing, Andrea produced a table, a series of local sheep cheeses, a hotplate on which he scrambled eggs with one of the sliced truffles, charcuterie, and a bubbling bottle of Prosecco. Then he explained the missing teeth. His passion project is rescuing strays and retraining them to be not only premiere truffle-hunters but also highly sought-after cadaver dogs. He tours Italy solving crimes and giving lectures on the olfactory arts. He said that often, the men who sell truffles yank out their dogs’ teeth so they don’t eat the truffles they find. Andrea’s red face softened tearfully as he stroked Bella’s chin. “Why can’t people understand? You just have to love them.”
The stories people tell about the animals they love reveal so much—Anja, Tony, Anna.
