Many Bloemfontein locals don’t just know of Nonna Lina – they’ve been welcomed by her. They’ve tasted her food, felt her warmth, and likely been greeted by her smile, signature sunglasses, and lively personality at Avanti restaurant at Woodland Hills, where she is the proud keeper of the recipes and the soul behind the kitchen.
For Michelina “Lina” Panelatti who is known to almost everyone as Nonna Lina, tradition is not nostalgia. It is a compass and way of life. “Tradition tells you where you come from,” she says, “and it will really tell you where you’re going.”
Born in Italy and rooted in Bloemfontein since April 1956, Nonna Lina has lived a life shaped by family, food, faith, and respect for doing things properly. She says living in Bloemfontein has not diluted her Italian soul but has given it a new home.
She explains that she came to South Africa as a young child with her parents. Her grandfather had already arrived earlier, having been brought to the country as a prisoner of war during the Second World War.
Bloemfontein became home, and it has remained so ever since.
She went to school here, met her husband – himself an Italian immigrant – and raised her family here. A love story where “South meets North”, she adds.
As far back as she can remember, food was everything. Not as a luxury, but as a responsibility.
“We were a big family,” she recalls. “Five children, grandparents, aunts, cousins. People just arrived over holidays, especially during Christmas and Easter times.”
Everyone helped, and everyone learned. “There was no compromising,” she exclaims.
She remembers how her mother would spend an entire day making soup. “Cheese was made at home – mozzarella, Parmesan – long before supermarkets stocked such things. Vegetables were grown, preserves were bottled, pasta was made by hand. Olive oil was a way of life long before it became popular.”
There were no written measurements, no shortcuts. You learned by watching. By listening. By being told, firmly, what not to do. That philosophy still defines her today. Ingredients matter. Technique matters. Respect matters.
“If it says Parmigiano, don’t put something else,” she says.
“If tomatoes are needed, they must be whole peeled tomatoes, or better yet, fresh ones boiled and processed at home into passata. Sauces take time. Pasta must not be rushed.”
For her, food is alive.
“Don’t kill it,” she says. “Don’t overcook your pasta, your meat, or your pizza.”
While tools have evolved with pasta machines replacing rolling pins, cutters replacing knives, she says the soul has not. Nonna Lina welcomes progress that makes life easier, but never at the expense of feel. Electric machines, she admits, take away too much of the connection. “I like to feel it in my arms,” she laughs, even if they ache afterward.
Tradition, for Nonna Lina, has always been about bringing people together.
Before Christmas and Easter, the entire family gathered at her mother’s house. Ravioli was made in enormous quantities, often up to 50 kilograms at a time. “That’s how you keep a family together. You teach responsibility. You laugh and you remember where you come from.”
Sundays were sacred. Christmas Day was non-negotiable. Her father was strict so everyone knew that there was no travelling and no excuses. Easter followed its own rhythm where they enjoyed simple meals on Good Friday, celebration after church on Sunday, always rooted in faith and food.
Today, Nonna Lina is the keeper of recipes written by hand decades ago – grease-stained, flour-marked pages filled with memories. She has taught her children and daughters-in-law, including one who is a qualified chef.
“People are busy. They buy ready-made food. They don’t know the real taste anymore.”
Still, she believes the knowledge survives when shared. Her dream is to compile a family recipe book titled Where North meets South – blending her southern Italian roots with those of her northern Italian in-laws.
Having lived in Bloemfontein since 1956, Nonna Lina has seen the city change, especially when it comes to food culture. Convenience has replaced patience, speed has replaced craft.
Yet people still come to her for authenticity. They taste the difference. They feel it.
Italian food, she reminds us, is simple – but only when done correctly. The right ingredients. The right heat. The right time. Pizza must cook from the bottom, mozzarella must melt just enough, sauce must never overpower the pasta.
At nearly 74, Nonna Lina is still working, still creating, still teaching. When she’s not cooking, she sews. She trained in fashion design, made wedding dresses for her daughters, nieces, and friends, and still creates ballet costumes for her granddaughter. Embroidery, too, runs in her blood.
She is a mother of three, a grandmother of six, and a great-grandmother to one. What keeps her young? “Being active,” she says. “And being grateful.”
She speaks often of faith, of gratitude, of blessings. Of choosing to celebrate rather than dwell on hardship.
“Don’t forget tradition. It brings back the past. It brings stories. It makes you cry, and it makes you laugh. And it keeps families together.”
In her kitchen and in her life she says tradition is not something preserved behind glass. It is lived, shared, and passed on, one meal at a time.
Text and photographs: GYPSEENIA LION
