By Patricia Platt

Two years ago, Ian Edwards studied Italian cooking at the renowned Anna Tasca Lanza Cooking School in rural Sicily. His love of Italian food led Edwards and his friend Travis Powell on meandering trips across Italy to explore the farms and estates where fine Italian ingredients are produced. Today, Edwards and Powell are the proprietors of a new, small shop in North Canaan, Tenuta Market, where they sell a remarkable range of carefully selected Italian and European gourmet food items, including dry goods, olive oil, pasta, vinegar, preserved vegetables, sweets and more.

Tenuta Market opened in September 2021 in the brick DuCillo building across from the North Canaan train depot—or as Edwards and Powell like to say, “at the intersection of the Hudson Valley, Litchfield County and Sicily.” They hope that people passing through North Canaan on Rts. 44 and 7 will meet and shop there. A recent customer from Salisbury proved the point, commenting, “I come here now so I don’t have to drive to New Haven for my special Italian ingredients.”

The store is designed to tell the stories of the products. A charming photograph is displayed near each item, along with a brief description of why the product is unique. By the time a shopper is through browsing the shelves, they’ll feel as if they’ve taken a guided trip to Italy with a peek behind the scenes of its remarkable estates—“tenutas” in Italian. Edwards summed up their approach by saying that the store was “started from an education on the craft of food making, where and how things are made and how you can taste a place where good things are grown and made.” 

One olive oil on offer is produced from five varieties of olives by 80 sisters at a Trappist monastery in the hills of Tuscany. The balsamic vinegar, available in three grades based on age, comes from a company, La Ca dal Non, that has been producing it in Modena since the early 1900s. Tenuta carries a full line of Martelli pastas, made from 100 percent Italian wheat, cut with traditional bronze dies and dried slowly for two days to perfect its texture. Their salt comes from the Sicilian salt flats of Trapani, a UNESCO world heritage site. They sell fine pistachios, truffle products, Mediterranean capers, the largest olives in the world, coffee with a cult following and many other remarkable products. Tenuta plans to add a refrigerated section next year to offer cheeses. They also carry kitchen textiles by Fabrizia Lanza, the head of the Anna Tasca Lanza Cooking School, that are painted with delightful Italian scenes.

How did they choose North Canaan? Edwards and Powell, who also live in Brooklyn, find North Canaan very charming and like that it borders Salisbury, Norfolk, Sheffield and Great Barrington. They are enthusiastic about Canaan’s growth and look forward to getting more involved in other commercial ventures and in community activities. 

Tenuta Market is located at 62 W. Main Street in North Canaan and is open Thurs. to Sun. from 11 a.m. to 5 p.m. The website is www.tenuta.market.