As September rolled through and the olives in Gozo were close to being harvested, VisitGozo met up with Maria Spiteri. Maria is a bubbly and easy-going young lady who was jolted into taking over her father’s family country farm a couple of years back when he passed. Her jovial nature is her tour de force, and there is no doubt that it helped her adjust to the role at a challenging moment for the family.
Maria explains that after finishing university, she had considered joining her father, Joe Spiteri, on his country estate. However, in those years, the business was still in its infancy, and her father was intensely working on building a quality product where agriculture and tourism sustain each other. Eventually, Maria landed a job as a brand manager in the cosmetics industry in mainland Malta and was soon engrossed in handling a world-renowned brand with sophisticated products and refined marketing campaigns. Destiny has a way of working through lives, and Maria believes this was a great learning experience for what was to come next.
Undoubtedly, slipping into her father’s shoes in steering the family farming estate in the middle of the COVID pandemic without a handover was no easy task. Probably her biggest challenge was moving back to the little island of Gozo, but once she returned to her roots, Maria felt at home. After all, this was her family farmstead, initially started by her paternal grandparents as a farm that included a fruit shop. Transforming herself from a polished brand manager into a farming estate manager happened naturally as she quickly fell in love with farm life again.
She looks back upon her first wine tours in 2021, when the Covid pandemic was still on and recollects the setting up separate platters on separate tables. Maria accepted this as a blessing in disguise as the slow pace of the business in the Covid days allowed Maria to absorb things at her own pace without the stress and frenzy of volume and crowds. Eventually, with the help of her family, who work on the estate too, she brought the operations to pre-Covid levels. Seeing that she had not had any handover from her father, she was acutely aware of the need to learn, adjust and build on her father’s labour of love. Today, her daily life includes the overall management, communicating with the farmers and working with them hands-on while collaborating with her family members, who have different roles on the estate. As her voyage in agriculture continues, Maria is always grateful for all the support she gets from her mother, who is always at hand in the shop and her aunt and uncles, who put so much passion into their work. From her end, Maria gladly handles all that comes her way. Be it financial figures, quality assurance, age-old recipes, or fieldwork, Maria assimilates, learns and adapts, and through it all, she’s never let go of her colourful attire and bright nail polish.
The first Christmas at the estate was her most significant push. She explains that it was as if she wanted to echo her past Christmas seasons in the glamorous fragrance and cosmetic industry. She worked on putting more love into the shop and created Christmas hampers, thus ensuring that the Christmas vibe was truly present for all those who visited. This motivated her to dive further into the business and started exploring other aspects of production and processes that are part of the estate’s operations.
Maria’s family farming estate produces tomatoes, olives, grapes, and fruits like citrus and peaches. Maria relies on her family when it comes to the planting of the crops and tending of the fields and orchards. She also depends on third-party farmers to supply her with other produce. This is one area of the operations that has been handed down directly from her father. Today, she continues to nurture relationships with various local dairy and fruit suppliers while assuring and relishing the quality of the products they provide her with. Maria insists that her business is seasonal; thus, she collaborates with different farmers during the year to prepare for the variety of crops to be harvested. For example, in her quest for local delicacies such as pomegranate jam, she relies upon one farmer to provide her with a good share of the pomegranates needed to make the year’s batch of pomegranate jam.
When asked about her favourite crop, Maria chuckles and mentions the busy olive season. She explains that during the season, the team works until 10 p.m. every day, and her brother would even extend his hours to three o’clock in the morning to keep up with the demand for pressing the olives. Maria is keen on team effort and praises her aunt, who many times singlehandedly handles the estate’s olive harvest! It’s a busy three-week stint but ultimately very rewarding. She speaks candidly about the vibe during the olive pressing season – the hum of the community that gathers in the yard in the early morning around coffee-making as everybody waits for their turn to bring in the crates of olives and have them pressed. There’s even a hint of nostalgia as she explains that olive oil and wine-making was her father’s line, and she had to work her way through by learning from experience, attending courses and visiting Italy to expand her knowledge. Being in the fields or at the pressing station is always satisfying, and harvest time is a time of excitement as the culmination of a year’s worth of work and dedication.
Then Maria takes a deep breath and explains that ‘kunserva’ or tomato paste was her ‘original’ domain. By this, she means that she is the person who makes it. ‘Kunserva’ making has been passed down through her mother’s family for generations. She reminisces about Nanna Tona and the aunts of her maternal side of the family, all from the village of Xagħra, specifically the area known as Tan-Nazzarenu, who were all involved in making tomato paste. ‘Kunserva’ is made by crushing tomatoes into a paste, and then one waits for the mixture to dry up under the summer’s scorching sun. Today, as Maria churns every batch of tomato paste by hand every evening during July and August, she knows that her quality tomato paste depends on sticking to the roots and preserving a long tradition.
While Maria is acutely focused on producing small batches of high-quality premium products, she also loves the visitors, tours and tasting sessions during which, she passionately explains wine making, olive pressing and the production of other artisanal foods like jams and preserves. Always eager to highlight Gozo’s rural farm life produce, she has often invited guests to join her in picking up fruit or harvesting grapes, even in some of the far-flung patches of land that are part of the family’s estate in Gozo. Currently, Maria is working hard with her aunt and uncles to renovate her family’s farming estate, and she also mentions her involvement in an educational project, ‘Let’s Talk Farming’, for students.
Suppose you’re visiting the island of Gozo and interested in a gastronomic experience. In that case, Maria advises that one should not leave the island without tasting and acquiring good wine, olive oil, salt, ‘kunserva’ and honey, as these are the creme de la creme of Gozitan produce.
Talking with Maria is like a breath of fresh air. Despite her young age, one cannot help but admire her sharp business insight, experience and deep understanding and respect for the soul of the local farming community. She’s all about preserving the fields and the orchards and helping the farmers. Maria’s biggest dream is to take the Gozo product to a level where it is appreciated with the same passion as those who produce it. It is clear from the wishful, intense look on her face that her work in favour of the Gozitan product will not relent until Gozo’s wines, olive oil, salt, ‘kunserva’, and honey are acclaimed as they should be – as original, authentic in colour and flavour as befits the traditional artisanal production methods.
VisitGozo would like to thank Ms Maria Spiteri for this interview and for sharing the photos.
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