Lia is an Argentinian entrepreneur who started a farm named “Coda di Lupo” together with her husband in Sardinia, after working in the international relations field for some years in South America.
Why did you decide to start a farm in Sardinia?
Why not?! Sardinia is one of the best places in the world and once I met my husband Diego, we had to decide if we wanted to start our farm in Milan (his hometown) or in this wonderful and magic island. Neither of us is an agronomist, but we met while working for a project of agro-ecology in urban areas in Brazil. After a couple of years, we decided to move to Italy with our two kids and start this adventure.
At the beginning it was hard to find the piece of land we wanted for our farm, but most of all it was difficult to gain the trust of the land owners and make them understand that our project was to restore and respect the land, and not to build any hotel or resort.
The name “Coda di Lupo” comes from a song of Fabrizio de Andre’. We put the rhythm of that song in everything we do. We are the future of agriculture, we are the resistance!
What do you grow at “Coda di Lupo”?
We have 18 hectares, but some hectares are not cultivable, as we decided to preserve the native trees and rocks that are present in our field. We grow, following the principles of organic agriculture, Senatore Cappelli durum wheat, which is an ancient durum wheat, more digestible compared to other grains and more nutritious as well. Moreover, we grow “Tricu Cossu”, which is another ancient soft wheat, typical from the area of Gallura, which was provided to us by local producers of Gallura.
Our main products are: flour, semolino and whole wheat flour, but also pasta extruded through bronze and fregola (a traditional Sardinian kind of pasta). With the collaboration of a local mill we make “pane carasau” and “pane guttiau”, which are traditional Sardinian crunchy flatbreads.
Lastly we have a small beehive, as bees are one of my biggest passion. They are pivotal for the health of the field and for our as well, as through pollination they ensure the reproduction of many plants. Their ultimate product, honey, is a natural antibiotic, used in many traditional medicines to cure different disorders. I wish bees could talk, they have so much to teach us about nature!
How did you become a self-taught agronomist?
I definitely read a lot about how to do sustainable agriculture and about which are the best practices, however I have to admit that it is very tough to be a self-taught agronomist. I believe that one of the most important things is talking to people and learning the traditional knowledge from them, but at the same time be in contact also with those that are trying to innovate agriculture in a sustainable way (such as research centres and universities).
However, as a kid, I lived in the countryside with my family and I learned a lot by living in the farm and helping my parents milking cows, making cheese, and harvesting mais and rice. Later on, while I was studying international relations, I lost the contact I once had with nature, and I began to live in an “artificial” world. This feeling made me want to reconnect to nature, which is the key to have a successful farm and understand what the crops you’re growing need from you.
What is your view on modern agriculture?
Nowadays, many multinational companies take advantage of farmers, as they sell them the seeds and rent them machinery, chemical fertilisers and pesticides, paying the farmers back when they want to, leaving these people powerless. This is why consumers should be more informed about what they buy, where the raw material comes from and how it was cultivated. Otherwise, we will reach a point where we will be forced to eat only what multinational companies impose to us. It is essential that consumers develop a certain sensibility and change their mindset to get closer to producers and local products.
Agriculture is a long and slow process, which needs care and has much to teach us. It is definitely a difficult and exhausting business, but I believe it gives a lot of fulfilment and it is the more stable part of our economy. My husband and I believe that our agricultural project is a way of taking a political stand!
Why is cooking important?
Cooking is not a waste of time, but an essential ritual in everyone’s lives, it is an “infinite book” to learn from and ultimately a place to free your creativity. If you never even try to cook, you miss out on amazing things. It doesn’t matter how many times you fail in making a certain recipe, the important is to try and never stop experimenting with different ingredients. The kitchen is a dynamic environment and cooking is the first kind of knowledge that I conveyed to my children, together with the importance of not wasting food!
I often wonder: “How come there are so many discount supermarkets? Has food lost its meaning? When did our bodies lose their value?”. We need to re-establish a virtuous cycle, where people are actively engaged with the food they buy, and interested in knowing its history and the people behind it, to ultimately support a sustainable and fair system.
What does eating high quality food means to you?
One day my son came to me saying that he didn’t like a cookie he tried at a friend’s house. He told me it was too sweet and that it tasted like baby powder! It reassures me a lot to know that my son’s palate is able to understand and perceive the differences between an industrial product and an artisanal one. In this past few decades, we had an homogenisation of our palate, which made us forget about the “flavours of the past” as modern agriculture is going towards more and more “synthetic foods”.
When you eat artisanal products it’s a “feast of flavours” in your mouth! For example, when you open a package of our pasta, if you close your eyes, you start seeing our wheat fields and you feel the warmth of nature; it’s a multi-sensory pleasure which culminates with the act of eating itself. This is the pleasure of eating good food!
What are your projects for the future?
We have many projects and we aim at surrounding ourselves with other producers and artisanal laboratories to cooperate with, to ultimately develop new and interesting products. We are now experimenting the cultivation of the “Planet” barley, which we will use with a local artisanal brewery to develop a special recipe for a beer that we will release in 2021.
Another recipe that I’m trying to develop is a “pane carasau” made with linen seeds, to ultimately combine tradition and innovation at the same time. In fact, linen has been traditionally cultivated in Gallura and has many nutritious qualities such as minerals and it facilitates the digestion process. Lastly, our goal is to become suppliers and protectors of “Tricu cossu” seeds, which are at the basis of Gallura biodiversity.
What is the future of agriculture?
To me education is the key. Especially from a young age, children should be thought about the nutritious importance of different kinds of food. One project we started doing, before Covid-19, was about sowing “Tricu cossu” seeds with children, to ultimately show them how the plant grows and most importantly make them see withe their own eyes the entire process to get to the final product: flour.
Moreover, constant research and improvement is fundamental, especially by sharing knowledge with other producers and helping each other to produce healthy and nutritious food. Cooperation is essential and is the reason why “Coda di Lupo” won the “Sardinia Food Awards” in 2020. In fact, we collaborated with a local mill and a “pastificio” that followed the recipe we gave them and that successfully helped us produce a high quality pasta.
The land and seeds should not be in the hands of few people, they should be entitled to everyone!