Getting to Apecchio was meant to be the easy bit. I'd done the research, printed the directions, even downloaded an offline map like the smug sort of traveller I am. What I hadn't accounted for was my own spectacular gift for misreading Italian road signs. Somewhere between Cagli and the turning for the village, I managed to convince myself that "Apecchio" and "Apecchio centro storico" were two entirely different places. They are not. I spent forty-five minutes circling a roundabout three times, growing increasingly convinced I was in some sort of rural purgatory, before a helpful local on a scooter took pity on me and pointed me back the way I'd come. I arrived at the stone farmhouse flushed, forty minutes late, and absolutely starving.

The owner, a lovely woman called Luisa, didn't seem remotely bothered. She simply handed me a glass of something cold and local and said something in Italian that I later learned roughly translated to "the hungry ones always find their way." I decided to take it as a compliment.

The kitchen, I discovered once I'd recovered, was the real heart of the place. Proper farmhouse proportions, with terracotta floors that stayed cool even in late afternoon sun, and a window that looked straight out over the Metauro valley. There was a proper gas hob, an oven that looked like it had seen a few decades of Sunday lunches, and most importantly, a wooden table big enough to spread out on. I had plans for that table. Grand plans.

My first morning, I set off for Apecchio's weekly market with the confidence of someone who absolutely could not speak Italian beyond "grazie" and "due birre per favore." The market itself was small and wonderfully unhurried, spilling through the narrow streets of the old town. I bought tomatoes that actually smelled of tomatoes, a length of strangozzi pasta from a woman who made it herself, and some pecorino that Luisa had specifically recommended I track down. I also bought what I thought were courgettes but turned out to be some variety of marrow that I still cannot properly identify. The vendor found my confusion hilarious. I found it less so, but carried them home with dignity.

That evening I attempted my first proper self-catered meal. The pasta was straightforward enough, though I slightly oversalted the water in my enthusiasm. The tomato sauce, made with those market tomatoes, olive oil, and a bit of garlic, was genuinely good. The mystery marrow I decided to roast with rosemary, which worked adequately until I realised I'd set the oven to what I thought was 180 but was in fact closer to 220. They emerged charred on the outside and essentially raw within. I ate them anyway, standing at that big wooden table, drinking a bottle of Bianchello del Metauro that cost less than a London coffee, and watching the light fade over the valley.

I got better, slowly. By day four I was confidently navigating the market, pointing at cheeses I couldn't name and accepting samples with what felt like local grace. I found the proper butcher's shop, where I bought sausages made with fennel that I grilled badly the first time and perfectly the second. I discovered that the little alimentari in the village centre would slice prosciutto to order, paper-thin, and that this with some of that pecorino and a bit of crusty bread made a lunch that needed absolutely nothing else.

One afternoon I attempted to make passatelli, having seen them on a menu in Cagli and decided I could surely manage at home. I could not. The mixture refused to pass through my improvised colander, forming instead a sort of dense, worm-adjacent lump that I eventually abandoned and ate as a very strange side dish. I photographed it for friends back home, who were appropriately sympathetic and amused.

The real revelation came from simplicity. Apecchio sits in truffle country, and though the proper season was weeks away, Luisa left me a small jar of black truffle paste as a welcome gift. Stirred through butter with that strangozzi pasta, it was the sort of meal that makes you slightly angry at every overpriced restaurant you've ever visited. I ate it three nights running, varying only the quantity of wine and the time I spent staring out that kitchen window.

By my final morning, the market had become routine. I knew which stall had the best ricotta, which baker opened earliest, and that the old man selling honey would always give you an extra taste if you expressed even mild enthusiasm. I packed the car with jars and packets, things I knew would never taste quite right at home but that I couldn't leave behind.

I drove away full, slightly heavier, and genuinely sad to leave that kitchen. The directions back were easier, though I still managed one wrong turn. Some things, apparently, don't change.