Labor Day was Tomato Sauce Day at the Maple Lawn Farm Market on Route 9 in Philipstown.
That’s because its owners, Maria DiLello and her younger sister, Angela Forgione, along with their husbands, were hard at work making Nonna Anna’s Sauce, named for their mother, who created the recipe in Pettorano sul Gizio in the Abruzzi region of southern Italy.
The sisters need 1,200 pounds of plum tomatoes (20 cases) to produce 400 jars, Angela explained, enough to sell in their store and feed their families for the year.
This is Maria and Angela’s 40th year at the Philipstown location, where they sell plants and the radio is always set to the hits on WHUD.
“If you give music to the plants, they grow better,” Maria said with a laugh (she laughs and smiles a lot). She added that it also helps to “pray for the plants, talk to them and water them.”
Maria does most of the watering while Angela focuses on balancing the books. When asked for the secret to their success, Angela shrugged as if the answer were obvious. “Be nice to the customers and they come back,” she said while stirring a huge pot of boiling plum tomatoes.
The sisters, both in their 70s, operated in Carmel and Poughkeepsie before moving to Route 9 in 1984. Maria and Angela’s parents were farmers in Italy with an apple orchard, a vineyard and livestock. “My father used to sell milk in the morning and make and sell cheese,” said Angela, who lives with her family in an apartment above the shop.
When asked how long they will run the business, Angela shrugged again. “We’ll shoot for another year,” she said. “Then we’ll see what happens.” Maria added: “Whatever God sends us, we take it.”
