A couple walks through a gate beside Lovera's Handcrafted Foods and sets their sandwiches on a picnic table in the courtyard. They eat and talk with each other in the courtyard with an outdoor brick oven and vines overhead behind the century-old building that houses the Italian style market that's been internationally awarded for its specialty cheeses and meats.

The scene would be familiar to Domenica Lovera, the Italian market store's owner, who said she and her late husband, Sam, would enjoy lunch every day together. “We had a wonderful life, it just wasn’t long enough,” Domenica said. “He was my best friend. The calm through the storm.”