When I contacted Miriam, I didn’t know much about her. only that she was from Germany and studied architecture. She wrote on her profile that she preferred to talk in person if we would meet.

I was a bit hesitant because I wanted to be surrounded by Pugliese people, for this project and for my own interest. I wanted to experience the Italian way of living. But she said she would love to host me, so I thought I would give it a try. Ostuni should be a beautiful town after all.



Little did I know that Ostuni didn’t impress me that much, maybe because of the bad weather and how underdressed I was, but it was worth visiting just to get to know Miriam. Meeting her gave me such a memorable time in Ostuni.

Even though she was quite busy during my short stay, we managed to have both lunch and dinner together, and she showed me how to make orecchiette con cime di rapa, a typical dish from Puglia. Our dinner was one of her friends that night was one of the most Italian dinners I have experienced here, and it was organised by a German girl.

Maybe because Miriam, to much, had a very Italian personality.



She came here two years ago as a wwoofer, and from a planned 1 month stay, it turned into two years. From German to Italian, both friends, language and lifestyle. Now, she bought a house in Ostuni which would be turned into a guesthouse and worked as a production designer in Rome. It’s nice how we just found out once we met that we actually had quite a lot of things in common, being wwoofers and interested in organic farming, cooking and cultures. The olive oil and vegetables she had in the kitchen were given to her by her landlord who had a small farm and made his own olive oil.



We prepared the dinner table while waiting for her friend to arrive. On the table were taralli, olives and almonds for a small aperitif. Then we started the meal with friselle served using ‘sponza frise’ in a traditional way (to let the water drain down) with tomatoes and olive oil, followed by creamy orecchiette which was delicious (and approved by her Pugliese friend as well) At the end, we had some really nice colomba, the Easter bread, which was much nicer than what I expected it to be. It was even better that the one I bought from I famous bakery in Rome last year.



The lengthly dinner ended around midnight.

Miriam was a German which had very little trait of German left in her. It was a shame that we didn’t have much time to spend together. I believed that there would be so much more about Italy, Italian cultures and food I could learn from her.

I’m looking forward to share a conversation over a delicious meal with her again.