Always as a part of the kilo of herrings I’ve bought, those are inspired by the much more famous Sarde a beccafico, a typical Sicilian dish. The problem with this recipe is that I haven’t measured the ingredients, but just followed the moment…
4 herring fillets Breadcrumbs Fine grain couscous Raisins Pinenuts Cappers Dill Extra virgin olive oil Garlic
Heat the oil and stir fry the minced garlic. Add the rest of the ingredients and cook for about 10 minutes, adding some spoonful of hot water. Lay each fillet and spread some of the breadcrumb mixture on it. Roll it and close it with a toothpick. Cook it in a pan with some oil for 10-15 minutes.
Have I already told you my childhood story about my eternal hate for minestra??? In Italy we call minestra any souplikestuff with vegetables, diced and cooked in some kind of stock or just water… In classical culinary Italian there are two different type of minestra: in brodo (in stock or water, anyway something soupy) and asciutta (dry, and we classify in this section any pasta or rice dish). What I always hated was minestra in brodo, and especially minestrone. Just thinking about it I wince… And along with my hate for minestra goes my hate for cooked celery… In fact the only thought of the smell of boiled celery make my face change in a grimace… Anyway, all this nice useless information, just to tell you that I’m now over my hate for minestra (although I’m not over the one for boiled celery) and now I can eat soupy stuff, but do not make me see a single dice or piece: I want them smooth, velvety thick, creamy… And as much as I like to play with what I have in the fridge, I do even like to transform cheap ingredients in something “chic” (I’m so hilarious thinking that something chic can come out of my kitchen!!! Especially on purpose!!!) or maybe “shabby chic” (my real aim in this life…)!
4 carrots 1 fennel 1 potato Salt Pepper Orange zest
Clean and dice carrots, fennel and potato. Place them in a saucepan, cover with water, add salt and bring to the boil. Let it cook for 20 minutes. Blend everything. Serve with freshly grind pepper and the orange zest.
P.S. This picture is part of the set "Piperita bought bargain linen napkins"...
UPDATE: Thanks to a link that dear Sam left on a comment to the post I wrote at the Food Blog S'coll, I think I was able to fix the problem... If you see something wrong, write asap!!!!
Aggiornamento: Grazie a Sam, che mi ha lasciato un link nei commenti a un post che ho scritto per la Food Blog S'coll, penso/spero di aver risolto il problema... Scrivetemi se vedete cose strane!
Ok, a friend told me that looking at my blog with explorer on a pc (not with a mac, problems are only with pc and explorer...) the header (aka the nice jpg over here with the name of the blog and a picture of a slice of cake that took me more than 45 minutes to make...) is not visible... Do you agree??? And especially, HOW DO I SOLVE THE PROBLEM???????
Ok, un amico mi ha detto che l'header del blog (quella cosa che dovrebbe apparire qui sopra con il titolo del blog e una bella fetta di torta per il quale ho perso un pomeriggio della mia preziosissima vita!) non si vede su pc usando explorer (ma solo su pc, perchè i mac, ovvio, non danno problemi)... Chi non lo vede??? E soprattutto, c'è qualcuno che mi può aiutare??????????????????????????
I do not really like chestnut and I absolutely hate marron glacé: too sweet for me, too decadent, too much, really! But once, in a French supermarket, a beautiful boite of chestnut purée draw my undivided attention and I bought it! The first time I used it I followed a recipe sent by one of this blog’s readers and made truffles. Exquisite! As I easily make the same mistakes all over again, the last time we’ve been in France I haven’t bought just one boite: I’ve bought two!!! So I’m at the same point of last spring: I have to find a good use of those heavenly goodies. Last week, reading one of my favourite blogs, I remembered how I love Nigella Lawson and how she’s always inspiring. So I took How to be a domestic goddess from the bookshelf and look chestnut in the index. Et voilà!
500 g of chestnut purée 100 g of soft butter 1 tablespoon of rum 6 eggs, separated 260 g of chocolate, melted 3 tablespoon of sugar 2 tablespoon of brown sugar
Preheat the oven at 180° C. Mix the chestnut purée with the butter. Melt the chocolate and add it to the chestnut, together with the rum and the egg yolk. Whip the egg white until foamy, then add first the sugar and then the brown sugar. Whip until peaky. Fold in three times the egg whites to the chestnut chocolate mixture and combine well. Pour in a 20 cm cake mould and bake for 45 minutes. Let it cool, dust with cocoa or icing sugar and serve.
Warning!
Do not eat this cake after this and this Too much, really!!! Our bellies were stuffed to impossible levels!!! And someone (not me, I swear!) took even two slices of the cake!!!
I do not own many of Donna Hay’s books, just two… Yeah, I know, that’s a sad story, but you can’t imagine how difficult is to find them in Italy, especially in English! And in fact the two I own are in French… That’s even sadder, isn’t it??? Yeah, I know… But I also have some good news: I just got a subscription to Donna Hay Magazine, and that’s nice! I cheered you up, didn’t I??? Anyway, this month theme, launched by Tami at Running with Tweezers, it's soufflé... In the whole two books I own I found only one soufflé recipe: Lemon Soufflés, from Modern Classics, Book 2, Gourmandises in French. As I wanted an orange scent, and not lemony, instead of lemon juice I’ve used orange juice, and I have to say that this soufflé recipe is absolutely for dummies (as it’s one of the simplest I ever did) and absolutely foolproof: they stand up in their shape for at least 20 minutes after you took them out of the oven!
For the ramekins: Soft butter Sugar
For the soufflés: 43 ml of orange juice, freshly squeezed 50 g of sugar 1/2 a tablespoon of potato starch 1 tablespoon of water 2 egg whites 35 g of sugar
Place the orange juice and sugar in a little saucepan and bring slowly to the boil. Water down the potato starch and add it to the orange juice and sugar. Continue cooking for one minute stirring constantly: you’ll end up with a thick shiny cream. Transfer it in the fridge and let it cool completely. Preheat the oven a 180° C. Whip the egg whites with a pinch of salt, until they are fluffy and softly picked, add the sugar, whipping continuously. When the white are shining, stop beating and add them to the orange cream. Butter each ramekin, cover it with sugar and fill it with the egg whites mixture. Place them on a baking sheet and bake for 12-15 minutes WITHOUT opening the oven door. Serve them hot, as soon as you take them out of the oven. Makes four individual soufflés.
Donna, in her book, advises you to make collars with greaseproof paper, but if you fill your ramekin to the edge line, you shouldn’t need any collar, like in the picture below…
P.S. This picture is part of the set "Piperita bought bargain linen napkins"...
Last time I went to my fishmonger I found fresh herring fillets at 2.50 € per kilo! Of course I’ve bought a kilo: they are good, healthy and surprisingly cheap!
3 cloves of garlic 2 tablespoons of extra virgin olive oil 3 herring fillets, skinned and diced 6-8 cherry tomatoes, diced few branches of dill 10 black olives 200 g of linguine
Bring to the boil a lot of water for the pasta. Heat 1 tablespoon of oil in a big pan and fry the garlic. Add the diced herrings, let the m cook for 2 minutes, then add the tomatoes, dill and the olives. Let it cook. In the meanwhile, salt the water and cook the pasta al dente. Drain the pasta and add it to the pan, add the last tablespoon of olive oil and turn everything together.
My ode to catalogna wasn’t a joke: I really love this greenery! Last time I went to the market I bought a huge tuft, cooked the outer leaves and ate raw the inside (puntarelle) following a great recipe. As I can’t always eat catalogna with pasta (for the good of this blog), I made this little pies (albeit I’m not sure you can call them pie, as they are something between pie and soufflé).
300 g of cooked catalogna 250 g of ricotta 100 of stracchino 3 tablespoons of parmesan 2 eggs 1 clove of garlic Salt and pepper
Mix everything in a food processor until smooth. Butter few little moulds or a big one, cover with breadcrumbs and fill them with you mixed mixture. Cook in a preheated oven for 25 minutes or until golden.
P.S. This picture is the first of a huge set that goes under the title: Piperita bought bargain linen napkins. Be ready for more!!!
For this month Sugar High Friday, hosted by chocolate master David Lebovitz, the theme is (obviously) chocolate, not in general terms, but by brand. As I grew up near the Italy-Switzerland border, my entire childhood has been surrounded by chocolate of different kind and shapes: Lindor all year long (bought by kilos…), bunnies end huge eggs for Easter, bars of any flavour (my favourite is the big bar of milk chocolate with whole hazelnut!!!), many different kind of pralines, truffles, orangettes covered with chocolate… One of my friends’ mother worked at the Lindt factory and her house was constantly filled with chocolate of any kind: we had it after lunch, for the afternoon break and often while we studied! But variety doesn’t always mean quality! Lindt chocolate is good quality chocolate, with a high percentage of cocoa and I was lucky enough to have tasted some good quality chocolates in Torino and France. But recognising quality doesn’t always lead to use it to cook a chocolate cake or cookie! I’m guilty as charged: when I want to make a chocolate dessert at home I go for the cheapest chocolate. Why? Laziness? Probably… Greed? Probably too… I realize that if you use Valrhona your cake sure tastes better, but when you cook 2 or 3 chocolate cakes a month (because your friends are so incredibly voracious) you forget about high quality and you choose the cheapest with the highest percentage of cocoa! And so it was for those cookies! The original recipe (from Nigella Lawson’s Feast, for the memory of which I have to thank THE Cream Puff: I’ve almost forgot how amazing that book is!!!) stated only white chocolate, but as white chocolate is often not even considered chocolate, I used half white and half dark. The white is Lindt (which produces the best white chocolate you can find in supermarkets) and the black is Zaini, a brand produced in Milan, with 50% minimum of cocoa. Zaini has the main advantage to sell 400 g bars, which are quite handy when you use a lot of chocolate. I wouldn’t recommend it for a chocolate tasting night, but it’s fair enough to cook with. And now, the cookies!!!
125 g of very soft butter 75 g of vergeoise brune 50 g of sugar 50 g of brown sugar 1 egg 140 g of flour 1/2 teaspoon of baking powder 1/2 teaspoon of salt 75 g of flaked or rolled oats 100 g of dried cranberries 50 g of walnuts, roughly chopped 70 g of white chocolate, roughly chopped 70 g of dark chocolate, roughly chopped
Preheat the oven at 180° C. Beat butter and sugars together, until you obtain a soft cream. Add the egg and beat until smooth. Then add the dried ingredients, beating constantly. Fold in cranberries, walnuts and chocolates. Let it rest in the fridge for 15 minutes. Cover two baking sheets with greaseproof paper. Lay spoonfuls of batter, far between, and squish them down with a fork. You should have approximately 30-32 cookies. Cook for 12-15 minutes, until golden. After cooking, let them cool on the baking sheets.
Yesterday night I opened the fridge and all I saw were some sad vegetables that screamed, “Cook me or kill me!” I cooked them…
1 red pepper 1 leek 1 fennel 1 courgette 1 little pumpkin 2 potatoes
1 teaspoon of red curry paste Salt
Tarragon to decorate
Clean and cut in chunks all the vegetables. Throw them in a saucepan, add 2 litre of water, curry paste and salt. Bring to the boil and cook it for 30 minutes, or until all the vegetables are cooked trough. Blend everything. Serve hot with some Tarragon leaves.
Maybe… As you may have understood reading my blog, I’m not a big fan of strict rules in the kitchen: I like “tradition”, but I dislike close-minded vision where only “tradition” can exist. We are lucky enough to live in a big wide world made of so many different minds that the term “tradition” can mean many many things! So pizza. My favourite pizza of all is a simple margherita: tomatoes, mozzarella and basil. I personally cannot stand the French version of pizza, as they use Gruyere, but it’s a matter of taste. I’ve never tried the American version, but, for what I can see on TV and in movies, I don’t think I would like it either, but even this is matter of taste, nothing else… And for French and Americans their way to make pizza is absolutely “traditional”. So, for a speedy version, maybe even shabby chic (in a good way!), of the traditional whole earth pizza, why not try this? Maybe even in individual serving…
Pizza Tatin
Puff pastry Tomatoes Mozzarella Salt and pepper
Roll out the puff pastry, cut a circle bigger than the mould you are going to use. In a cake mould lay the sliced tomatoes, season them, lay over them the sliced mozzarella, season, then cover with puff pastry, folding the edges between the filling and the mould. Cook in a preheated oven for 20-25 minutes. Serve upside down.
As you can imagine, this Tatin has a major problem: the mozzarella tend to stick in the bottom of the cake mould. As I did it only once I cannot give you a foolproof option, but I think that if you put in the cake mould some greaseproof paper maybe you can avoid this inconvenient. Or, you can do the pizza in the “normal” way, puff pastry under, tomatoes and mozzarella… But how sad is that?????????????????????? ;-) (You can see it on the picture below...)
I already made this cake, back in June, but as I did some adjustments and as it's one of the simplest yet most luxurious and satisfying cake in the world, I thought it was worth writing about it again! I had some kumquats (or Chinese mandarins) in the fridge since ages, waiting for a nice duck breast. But as we are on diet, and duck breast is not really allowed, I decided to do something else with them… Albeit I think this cake too it’s not allowed in our diet… Anyway… To add the kumquats in the cake I candied them and the result was even moister and gooier then the first time!!! I honestly think it’s the best chocolate cake on this book!!! If not in the world!!!
For the kumquats 15 kumquats 150 g of sugar 250 ml of water
For the cake 200 g of dark chocolate 200 g of butter 200 g of sugar 5 eggs 1 tablespoon of flour
Cocoa for dusting
Begin with the kumquats. Wash and clean them. Put them in a saucepan filled with cold water, put it on the fire and let it boil for 1 minute, than drain the kumquats and repeat this operation at least twice. Place the kumquats again in the saucepan and add sugar and water. Bring slowly to the boil and let it boil for 20 minutes. Drain the kumquats and leave them to cool on a grid.
Turn on your oven at 150° C. Melt chocolate and butter in the microwave. Let it cool slightly, and then add the sugar. Mix well and begin to add each egg, one at the time. Add the flour, and last the candied kumquats. Transfer it in a 20 cm diameter cake mould and bake for 25 minutes. Let it cool and let it rest in the fridge until the day after. Dust with cocoa before serving.
When Sigrid tagged me for this meme I thought: Oh, no… But then I began to look at the entries of last year, my first year of blogging, and I realize that I did some “amazing” things that I couldn’t dare if I had no one but my family and friends to share it with… There were low moments and “glorious” moments and I hope there will be more and more, especially for the latter!!! So, previously on The Kitchen Pantry: Zuppa bianchissima and Piperita’s love for celery root... A Lazy Sunday Focaccia for a lazy Sunday with lazy attitude… Rogan Josh and Piperita’s obsession for Indian curries... Torta multistrato di pere e cioccolato, for the sad days in need of something chocolatey... Tortini con pomodorini and the beginning of Piperita’s obsession with simple, quick and effective appertizers… Torta alle noci del Perigord, remembering Piperita travels around France… Cheesecake marmorizzata ai mirtilli and the begginnig of Piperita’s love for Donna Hay… Pasta al Rocquefort and Piperita’s addiction to fat French cheeses… Ugly cake and Piperita’s acknowledgement of her limits (it’s not that I didn’t know them before…)... Roasted fennels and Piperita’s addiction to cheap vegetables…
5 things you shouldn’t/wouldn't know about me:
1- My real name is Sara Maternini, I was born in Varese, near the Alps, I live in Milan since 2001, I have a Phd in XVII century English History, I own a catering company based in Milan, I have red hair, glasses, I’m quite messy despite my addiction to neat lists (I make them for almost everything…), and I am a pain in the arse… Really, believe me…
2- My former boyfriend married me and my French husband, not because he became a priest (god, no!), but because he was community councillor at the time we had our wedding. And this is still a common joke among shared friends…
3- I do not believe in perfection or its pursuit: I’m human, I often screw up, I make lots of mistake, in the kitchen too…
5- I’m exactly how you can see me from my blog… If you don’t like me from the blog, probably you would despise me in true life as well, so you shouldn’t bother to leave nasty comments: you can read something else instead, or maybe you may get a life… Otherwise, if you like my blog you probably would like me in real life, we could become friend and live happily ever after!
Another verrines directly inspired by this book. It’s like a verrine in kit: I did absolutely nothing if not cutting the feta cheese and assemble everything!
For 4 glasses
200 g of feta cheese 20 sundered Pachino’s cherry tomatoes in extra virgin olive oil (or 8 sun dried normal tomatoes in oil) salad Extra virgin olive oil Dry oregano
Cut the feta cheese in cubes. Assemble the glasses beginning with the salad then feta, then the tomatoes. Drizzle with oil and season with oregano. Serve.
Something more simple??????
Note: Pachino's Tomatoes are little cherry tomatoes that grow in the field around the Sicilian town of Pachino, in the far south of the island. They are sweet and tasty, very rare and expensive... We bought a kilo of dried Pachino's Tomatoes last summer, at the Siracusa market: they are worth every cents we paid them!!!
I am so excited!!! Fist of all, I did master one recipe written by him! Second, I did macarons! For the second time (we don’t want to speak about the first time, do we? Horrible horrible memories.. ), but they came quite right this time: I would like them more puffed, but I’m quite satisfied!
And now, him… There is a bloggermadly in love with him (who isn’t???): she madewonderful cakes from very difficult recipes from one of the most difficult cookbook I’ve ever opened in my life (she made macarons too!)… There is another blogger that went to visit him so many times that the serveurs cried when she left Paris… There are crowds cueing in front of his pâtisseries… He has 5 shops in Japan and 3 in Paris… He’s one of the few great chef of all time that shares all (or at least most) of his secrets (and pâtissiers have so many secrets we can’t imagine…), not in one, but in many books… Thank you, Pierre Hermé: to exist, to work, to share… Thank you so much…
The recipe I’ve followed can be found on Secrets Gourmands. Soon I will add it...
P.S. All this effort just to celebrate the first birthday of this blog...
I LOVE CATALOGNA! I just boil it, add some flaked chilli pepper from Sicily and a tablespoon of extra virgin olive oil and use it as a pasta sauce… It’s good, healthy, bitter and still wonderfully tasty. I like to leave it a bit crunchy… I could eat it forever and ever…
You should know I’m widely know as pasticciona, a really messy girl… I mess up with everything, all the time, and of course I mess up in the kitchen… Should I remind you my ugly cake attempt??? Anyway, this one is not really a pasticcio, but pumpkin cannelloni… But it looks like a pasticcio…
1 pumpkin, medium size Amaretti, to taste Salt and pepper Parmesan
Ready made lasagne sheets (yes, yes, and so???)
For the béchamel sauce: 33 g of butter 3 tablespoons of flour 800 ml of milk
Clean the pumpkin and steam it until tender. Make béchamel sauce: heat the milk. Melt the butter in a large saucepan with a heavy base, add the flour, let it toast for few minutes then add the hot milk. Turn to dissolve any lump and cook it until thick, but still liquid. Instead of turning until done I use a hand blender: it’s quicker and lumps proof!
Mix the steamed pumpkin with amaretti (I used 16, but it’s absolutely a matter of taste: add one by one and try it), salt and pepper, and 4 tablespoons of Parmesan.
On a shallow ovenproof dish spread a layer of béchamel. Lay a sheet of lasagne and spread a spoonful of the pumpkin purèe. Roll it and lay it in the dish. Continue until the end of the ingredients. Cover everything with the béchamel and bake in a preheated oven, 180° C, for 25 minutes, or until golden. Let it stand for 10 minutes outside the oven, then serve.
One of my last buy on Amazon was this amazing book that reflects the last and crazy trend that is going on on the other side of the Alps: verrines (aka, little drinking glasses filled with savoury or sweet stuff). The book is wonderful, with so many ideas I can’t stop looking at it! But remember, if you intend to buy it and try something, the ingredients stated in the book are for little glasses, lets say like the one you could use for grappa or strong liquor, not for water glasses…
For 3 200 ml glasses
For the green layer: 2 avocados Cumin 1 tomato Parsley The juice of two lemons
For the pink layer: Smocked salmon Dill The juice of half a lemon
For the white layer: 80 g of tapioca Extra virgin olive oil
Fish eggs to decorate
Halve the avocados, scoop the flesh and mix it with the lemon juice, parsley and cumin. Once you have a thick cream add the diced tomato and pulse the mixer: the tomato must remain in chunks. Make a layer in each glass.
Mix the salmon with the lemon juice and the dill. Do not over mix it, you need chunks even in this. Make a layer over the avocado cream.
Bring to the boil a pan with 3 litres of salted water. Add tapioca and cook for 15 minutes or until the tapioca is tender. Drain and cool it under cold water. Dress with a tablespoon of olive oil. Make the last layer over the salmon.
Happily participating to the event my friend Ilva proposed, here are some picks of my kitchen. When we moved in our actual flat the former owner ask us if we wanted to keep the original kitchen for a ridiculous price. As the kitchen was only 3 years old, fully equipped and practically new, we cheerfully agreed.
Dislikes: I don’t really like its colours (too bright for me) and the home appliances are not the best (all shitty-Ariston: I had to change the washing machine, I had to repair the dishwasher five times in the last three years, and the fridge is doing a strange noise since two summers ago…). I don’t like the exhaust fan like that, in the open: it’s always dirty and full of stuff!
Likes: I quite like it overall, and it’s really practical to work in it, with a lot of working space. The oven is higher than in normal kitchens, and this is one of the feature I will sure would like in our future kitchen. I like the tile walls, neat and cleanable. I like that it has direct access to the balcony, my second fridge during the winter. I like that I have a lot of space for everything: storage, dishes, pans… At the end I like most of it!
Following this good idea form my friend Ilva, at Lucullian Delights, I will provide for future reference (:-D today I’m so funny I laugh all alone for my pointless choice of words!!!) the list of the five attempts I will try this year, not in chronological order, not even in challenging order, just random: 1.Macarons: French are crazy about them, after tasting Pierre Hermè macarons I’m crazy about them, and they are one of the most difficult stuff I’ve ever tried (it can be looking like cheating, but I’ve tried them only once last year…) 2. One of the difficult recipes from PH10, the latest addition to my bookshelf. I give myself the option to choose it on the right day with the right mood… 3. A beautiful cake like this one (I know it’s not a matter of preparation (easy peasy), but just look, and that will be the real challenge for me!) 4.Blanquette de veau (there is a joke in our family : I ask my husband “What would you like to eat tonight?” and periodically, summer, winter, Easter, Xmas no matter, he will answer me “Blanquette de veau!” with a sarcastic smile on his face!) 5.Puff pastry: I’m always terribly afraid just only to think about it, but I’m collecting comforting recipes from master pastry chef… Let’s hope this is the good year!
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DISCLAIMER
I'm very sorry, but due to the little ammount of time I have to update my blog, I don't translate in Italian (or other languanges) any of the content published and I don't write recipes upon request... Don't hate me please: I still love you very much!
Good cooking does not depend on whether the dish is large or small, expensive or economical. If one has the art, then a piece of celery or salted cabbage can be made into a marvellous delicacy; whereas if one has not the art, not all the greatest delicacies and rarities of land, sea or sky are of any avail.Yuan Mei
