the time I quit my job and moved to Italy to work on a small organic farm

on taking risks and creating your own opportunities

I’m the oldest of 3 girls

and I epitomize pretty much every oldest child (daughter) stereotype. I thrive in the structure of a classroom. I’m a rule follower… to the point where the summer before college my mom sat me down and said “Mads… I want you to have so much fun in college, I don’t want you to be in the library studying the whole time…” I wish I was joking. (I swear I had friends in high school but I was just terrified of drinking and boys and performing poorly on a test :) )

I always put myself in a certain kind of box. Or rather, I took myself out of others.

“I’m not the type of person who makes a big decision without a plan.”

“I’m not the type of person who takes major risks.”

“I’m not the type of person who would message a small agriturismo in Tuscany and pitch myself as a chef/business development consultant (with no professional experience in either), ultimately quit my job, sublet my apartment, and go to Tuscany to spend 6 weeks working on said farm”

Expect I did. It still blows my mind when I recount this experience or look back on my photos and videos from my time at Ebbio because I’m just simply not the type of person who would do something as bold, as adventurous, as experimental as this. Although I guess I am.

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let’s backtrack to 2020

The story goes I graduated college in the spring of 2020 after 4 years studying biology of global health, just as COVID was destroying everyone’s hopes and dreams. All of the jobs I was applying for (namely NYC-based healthcare consulting jobs??? idk) had frozen all hiring and I was left with no plan and nothing to do. It’s around this time that I started HandmetheFork on instagram to document my highly filtered avocado toast, lockdown espresso martinis, and everything else I was cooking to pass the time.

2021 HMF was heavy on the avo toast and cocktails

The previous summer I had interned at a global health non-profit and so I reached back out to my managers to see if I could help with any projects over the summer while I figured my shit out and the whole pandemic thing blew over. Surely it would only be a few months!

The short-term summer project turned into two years working as an associate on the emergency response team where I helped provide medical aid and disaster relief to health crises around the world. It was good work. It was also frustrating work. Ultimately, it was work that did not fulfill me.

For 6 months leading up to the summer of 2022 I tried to do everything in my power to pivot. I started applying to other jobs in the non-profit space. Maybe World Central Kitchen was the right fit? I interviewed and never heard back.

I convinced myself that management consulting would leave me rich and fulfilled. I sweat through my shirt during a 3 hour zoom interview where I was asked to calculate the weight of water in an olympic sized swimming pool to which I scribbled fake calculations on scrap paper until time ran out :)

december 2021 Kentucky tornado deployment

I swung back around to food-focused positions, applying to work in the test kitchen at Food52 and a few different coordinator positions at the James Beard Foundation. I didn’t land an interview at any of these either. I gave myself an ultimatum: figure out something by July 31 or quit. I thought quitting without my next gig lined up was potentially very stupid but would at least light a fire under my ass.

Enter Ebbio, a small organic farm and agriturismo nestled near the very small town of Monteriggioni in Tuscany

All the while I had been following this storybook-like agriturismo on instagram, a little Tuscan organic farm that hosted yoga retreats during the summer and grew all their produce for the meals that they served to guests. It was so charming and so far away and dominated my mind as I fantasized about what my summer would look like in the best case scenario.

I can still vividly remember walking on the West Side Highway, talking to one of my childhood best friends. I told her I couldn’t get this farm out of my head, how I couldn’t stop thinking about what it would be like to somehow go and work there for a few months. She said “well why don’t you? why don’t you message them and see?”

from @ebbiotuscany on instagram

It seemed quite crazy. Message them and say what? I had no real experience to offer. and even if they managed to read my message, respond to me, AND say yes– was I gonna just quit my job to go work on an Italian Farm? and do what after? what the HELL kinda plan was that? maybe something that someone bolder, braver, less rigid and structured would do…

I still don’t know what possessed me that day to draft a message and click send. But here’s what I wrote:

I had actually first reached out in 2020, but because of the pandemic I quickly realized travel would not be possible.

The message got read. And then left on read. I shamelessly followed up a week later with a second message:

I’m really cringing hard reading this lmao.

I will never forget opening my instagram and seeing I had a reply that same day. Not just a reply, a voice message. I had thought for sure I was not going to hear back at all. I ran into my bedroom with my heart pounding and played the recording:

If you listened to the above, you would have heard the charming voice of Sibilla, the daughter of Ebbio’s founder, who currently (then and now) runs Ebbio operations. When she mentioned the cookbook project, I nearly screamed. I couldn’t have dreamed up a more perfect project. It was still far-fetched that this whole thing would work out, but they were open to the idea!

Over the next few weeks I talked to Sibilla and her colleague, Jane, about the feasibility of it all. They figured out that they could convert a storage room into a bedroom for me (as long as I didn’t mind being surrounded by jars of olives and fig jam and tomato sauce) (I did not). The arrangement would be a work exchange- I would help out with the cookbook project, running yoga retreats, and create content in exchange for room and board. We landed on an early August arrival date and I booked my flight to Rome. I found a friend to sublet my bedroom in my NYC apartment. I put in my two weeks notice at work. My parents were not not supportive… but definitely concerned about my long term vision. But I was an adult! They couldn’t stop me!

I had barely even processed the decisions I had made before I found myself on the flight, on the train, in the car, and pulling up to the place I had scrolled countless times online for the past few years.

the magic of ebbio

Now there are about a million and one ways this could have been a complete disaster.

The place could have not at all looked like what I had seen on social media. I could have really not gotten along with the people I was working for. I could have been completely taken advantage of and overworked– after all I didn’t reaaaaally know these people. I could have sweat to death each night in the heat of peak Italian summer with no air-conditioning in my stuffy room (the room was quite hot but we made it work).

All that to say- my experience was damn near perfect. The farm was a dream: rustic and charming and exactly as I had imagined. I became fast friends with Sibilla and Jane, spending my days practicing yoga in the morning, setting the table for brunch before harvesting figs or tomatoes or lavender from the garden, bottling herbal sprays and essential oils, sitting with Francesca (Sibilla’s mother + Ebbio Founder) and transcribing all of Ebbio’s recipes, her recipes, as she spoke them off the top of her head– half in Italian, half english, helping out in the kitchen with dinner prep, setting the table and finally joining the guests for dinner. I couldn’t believe this was my reality. I also couldn’t believe I had created this opportunity for myself.

the time spent sitting at the kitchen table with Francesca, transcribing her recipes, were some of my favorite moments from the summer

I stayed at Ebbio for 6 weeks before tacking on an extra week to pop over to the Champagne region of France in Gyé-sur-Seine to stay with the extended family of a college friend who happen to run the most beautiful farm to table restaurant, Le Garde Champêtre. Another added week of daily produce harvesting and I even got to work in the restaurant for the day!

from Italy to France!!!!

When I got home at the end of September, culinary school was top of mind and I spent the next few weeks researching my options, my career aspirations and talking to as many people as I could about their experiences in the food industry. On October 26, 2022 I wrote in my journal:

“I enrolled in Culinary School Yesterday. Holy. Mother. Fuck. It was a slow burn of a decision to get here… but I will be starting school almost exactly two months after returning home from Italy.”

The rest is history :)

If I had to reflect on my Ebbio experience… the following comes to mind:

Social media can be a comparison trap. With everyone else’s highlight-reel-of-a-life on display, it’s too easy to fall into the comparison, jealousy, and ‘why them not me’ mindset. It’s easy to feel behind and like it’s too late to try something new, change jobs, start that social media account, and post the first video.

It’s also easy to feel that SO much is out of our control, so what’s the point. I applied to all those jobs that I (at the time thought) wanted and didn’t get any of them… didn’t even hear back from MOST of them. I had posted for years on social media with under 1,000 followers- trying my hardest to grow my platform to no avail. But all this ‘failure’ and frustrated energy forced me to have a true ‘fuck it’ mindset. A mindset that made me feel I had nothing to lose so why not send a crazy Hail Mary attempt of dm… that actually WORKED.

And that’s the cool thing- it only takes ONE yes after so many nos to start the chain of events. It only takes one client to land your first private cheffing gig and open the door. It only takes one networking call (though you will probably have to put in dozens of reps) to chat with the right connection who knows about the random job that might just be perfect for what you’re after. Showing up and putting yourself out there is more than half the battle. And that’s all in your control.

If you wanna read more about my career pivot from global health to Italian farm intern to culinary student to private chef… check out some of my other ‘stacks :)

next week I’ll be sharing some of my favorite recipes from my time at Ebbio– perfect for the start of summer too!

until then! xx,

Maddy