This is, may be, too much...

This morning I was happily going through my March issue of Olive (courtesy of my kind friend Sarah Blow), one of the prominent British food magazine, and I found an article titled "Cheap Shots. Even Michelin-starred chef need to know how to cook on a budget. Olive reveals how the professional cut down on food bills without compromising quality".
Well, well, well...
I began to read and after few lines I thought: "WTF (and not in David's exception Welcome to France! ;D)!!!"
Do they really think we are all so stupid that if Jason Atherton tells us that he uses FROZEN PEAS for Maze's pea risotto we simply think "oh, how cute, how sensitive" and we do not make the equation: "WTF, why should I pay that ridiculous amount of money for his frozen pea risotto and they do not even have the guts to write it down on the menu they are using frozen ingredients???" I do not know in Uk, but in Italy there is a law that oblige you to do so...
And it's not just by chance that the advertisement of the exact brand of frozen peas used by Jason Atherthon appears on the side page of this article... That's sad, you know? That's the lowest advertisement can get...
And Tony Singh, stating the Italian Extra-virgin Olive oil is over-priced and he prefers cheap Greek olive oil... WTF! Simply say you prefer Greek, but do not spit on one of the best products in the world (which, by the way, for its quality, it is not over-priced!)... And then he goes on saying that he uses only Normandy butter!!! Which, of course, it is not over-priced, right?
WTF! Who do you think you are making fun of???

Really, do they really think this is good publicity?
Do they really think that stating that frozen peas are used in one of Gordon Ramsay's restaurant will attract more people because they feel they are "frugal"???
Common... We are not THAT stupid...
Do it, but do not say it, please! We already know you do it, but we want to think that you are not proud of it...

As seen on tv

Or at least on Italian television...
Which I seldom watch, but just the other day I catch a glimpse of this thing pictured left... and I thought: "OMG!"
Then with my on-line grocery shopping it came as a nice little present. As fate was guiding me in such clear ways, could I ever avoid to try it???
I mean, I have to keep informed on the latest trends ALL my readers, shouldn't I?
So, for the only sake of this blog, I've tried it!
Almost two years ago, when I was still writing this blog in my mother language, I wrote a post about the fact that I am a Kinder Ferrero junky! And I really am! Not only nutella (even if know I changed producer for the simple reason that the one they sell is much better), but all the range produced by Ferrero has some kind of impact on my nervous system, such as every time I take a bite of one of their product I suddenly feel happy...
I know that they are a big corporation, that the list of the ingredient is longer than my average post and that their international web site has music (and there is not a way to stop it!!!), but I like it and I can't help it: it a fact about myself!
As much as I love my husband (AND Ewan McGregor, of course!), I love Ferrero products too...

The new credo

It can sound very snobbish, it can sound very overconfident, but I personally feel like him:

"Are you a blogger too? Give me your camera. I’ll take a really blurry, close-up picture of the grapefruit in my salad. When do you think people are going to start making fun of bloggers?"

Danny Meyer via Serious Eats

Piperita DIY

Well, this is not the DNA to create your own Piperita from one of my hair: one Piperita is enough in this world I can assure you!!! ;)
This week-end I felt handy and so I decided, after a short conversation earlier in the week with Sara, to build a light box!
And as I'm always thinking BIG, I built a huge light box, 70cmx70cm...
Anyway, let's begin from the beginning!
So, earlier last week I was chatting with Sara, and she asked me if I was using light box, I said no, that I was simply shooting in raw and adjusting white balance (and all the rest) with Aperture. But then I began to wonder: why don't I have a light box???
So I decided to build one. I search the net and I found various options, but the one that suited me most seemed this (thanks Jason for sharing!).
Saturday morning, after a very good night sleep, we woke up quite early, so I popped the dreaded question: shall we go to Castorama, my love?
A little note: Castorama and Ikea are very close in Carugate, on the outskirts of Milan AND we need to move the car to go there: a major stress!
I think his mind went directly to a blu and yellow sign, because a fear look appeared in his eyes: he knows that everytime I say Castorama I mean Ikea too...
But a saint look appeared in my eyes, and a nimbus popped out of nowhere over my head, matching my saint eyes, saying: "Me? Me I want to go to Castorama AND Ikea, spend a lot of money and be in the middle of Saturday crowd??? Noo, not me: I'm a Saint!" Saint Piperita martyr from Varese, died on a Saturday morning walked over the Ikea crowd... ;)
Anyway, there we went, and I have to say I was extremely pleased: it was a wonderful productive morning!
We went to Ikea (I'm a major candle addicted!) and Castorama, but they didn't have all I needed! And when I asked the exact material I was looking for, they looked at me as if I was the crazy housewife form Brugherio (sorry, this "joke" is only for people living in Milan...) and I was asking for a ready made kit to build a conservatory... I just wanted to build a light box!
I bought fabric in Ikea and 1 roll of carpet tape - two sided, 4 mt long in Castorama, but they didn't have the right type of foam... So, my last chance was to look for it at the Brico in Viale Monza, actually 4 underground stops from where we live...
And of course at the little brico we found everything!
Going back home we even stopped at a neighbour market and by 11.30 we were home, all packed, weekly grocery shopping too! Very productive!
And then I began with the light box... With the cat help, of course, as he likes a lot foam!!!
And I built the monster exactly as Jason instructs...
My only concern was related to the size of it: too big to keep it built all the time, so, instead of using rubber tape to stick it together, I used toothpicks, as hinges... And they worked!
My only problem now is the weather: I need nice spring days with a lot of sun! Or better bulbs...
Anyway, welcome my dear light box... And to welcome you I put on a new header, thanks to the light box, aperture and photoshop!

Boiling

What do you normally do to free overwhelming anger?
Avoiding killing someone, I mean! ;-) Ok, maybe beginning a list of people you hate, but I need something physical...
Personally, I cook difficult recipes. Very difficult recipes...
As at this very moment I'm not surrounded by my cook book collection, but I have a wider option: the world wide web.
Now the problem is that if you google "easy recipes" more then 3 million entries appears. BUT if you google "difficult recipes" less then a million.

Let's face it: our life is getting, day by day, lazier.
Nobody is willing any more to cook something that will employ your time for more then 1 hour or that will employ some skills.
I'm the first to use a stand mixer or a blender, but just beacuse they do thing better then me, not because they do them faster!
From time to time I enjoy challenging my self with something complicated, really hard, troublesome, ambitious, just to please me (Hey, I've done it!) and my hubby (Hey, she's done it!)...
And since I have the blog, the screaming crowds under my window! But I will just throw you a (store bought) croissant... :-P

So, what shall I cook tonight instead of writing an angry letter to Sandra Bullock telling her I can't stand any more her greasy hair and that will all the money she has she should get a decent hairdresser?

Incompreso

Note: first of all thank for the sympathetic comments of you all! My last post wasn't an adieu, but just a way to tell you that I want to find a different way to food blog! :-)

When I was little, in Italy they were showing on tv one of the saddest movie I ever seen (right after Remi, the saddest anime of all!!!): Incompreso. Basically it was the story of a motherless child misunderstood by his father... I'm in pain just thinking about it!!!
Anyway, back to my point!
Us, food bloggers: we are a misunderstood specie of this tech world!
How many times have you found yourself taking a picture of some juicy dish in front of you and then feeling weirdly looks all around you??? Many... Too many ;-)

The picture above was taken last september, at one of the Wagamama in London (here my "review"): I was eating alone, as often happens when I'm in London, as I'm there ALONE, working (insert Sara with sad face here), and I had to (I really felt the urge!) take a picture of the (average) food I was eating, to witness the fact that Wagamama is not so good as everybody says (better than the average fast food, but for the price I've paid, way too much, I would have preferred a REAL Japanese or Chinese or Thai alternative)...
The place was crowded and I had to share a table with a large group of English people.
Do I have to explain you the weird looks I've got???
I'm not form Mars: I am just a food blogger!!!
I even heard someone saying: "Oh my, she's taking pictures of her food" with a disbelieved tone...
I should find a line to answer to people like that: nice, funny, simple, and maybe that won't involve any strange word that will mathematically point me out as a foreign...
Ok, I ask to much: let's stick to a nice smile!!! :-)

I should have...

... so many things to say...
So many recipe to write...
But honestly, I'm pissed off writing recipe!
I write too many for work, so I don't find any more inspiration to write even more recipes on my own blog... :-(
The only idea of writing "150g of that and 100 g of the other one, mix together..." make me sleepy!
Don't you find it extremely boring??? Am I the only one???
And I realize that, right now, I find extremely boring even the food blogs, unless they have a different edge and do not relay so much on the recipes but tell you stories, fun stuff...
The picture above is a little collage of all the stuff I should have told you about, but right now they are months old, I certainly do not remember how I made them...
I remember the story behind each, that's for sure... But that too are months old...

I'm a useless food blogger...

Fell free to add sympathetic comments! ;-)

Franciacorta, Bellavista and Gualtiero Marchesi

Foreward: I paid to do what I'm going to tell you about, so I wasn't bribed. Not that you can say so for what I'm going to tell you! And I'm not a restaurant critic (and I don't aim to become one), but I have a palate, a mouth and taste... And they are all quite well developed...

My husband is a sommelier, and with the Italian Sommelier Association we went, this Saturday, to visit Franciacorta, Bellavista wine cellars, and to lunch chez the most universally acclaimed Italian chef, Gualtiero Marchesi.
It wasn't our first visit to Franciacorta, neither our first tasting of Bellavista.
The cellars are huge and very interesting. The tasting a bit less, as we tasted just one wine (the Francicorta brut, a basic product) and everybody would have loved to taste at least three different wines. If not, what's the use of a wine cellar visit with sommelier???
Then, the lunch.
I cannot say we didn't eat well, because everything was very good and really well cooked (well, not really everything). And being there in a big number (50) we hadn't à la carte menu, but a fixed menu, so I won't judge everything from that.
But... I expected more. Because, honestly, if you are a universally acclaimed chef you should ALWAYS be at your best, even if you serve the same menu to 50 chatting people. And even if this menu is average (well, you, chef, did the menu, so...)... And, honestly, being humble never killed anyone, but I already know the super mega duper ego of the chef... I do not justify it, though...
Leaving alone the whole menu, as first course we had the glorious, famous, worldly acclaimed Saffron risotto with golden sheet.
It was a good risotto, non the less, but not the most spectacular risotto I ever had (about which I won't speak, because I will ramble about another acclaimed Italian chef who's just able to make a good risotto (so he's a chef working in Milan, do you assumptions!), but uses store brought mayonnaise, and that's not the case, if not I get nasty comments, like "who the hell are you to judge?" (nobody, just a paying costumer! And I can assure you it wasn't a bargain!) and stuff like that, and that really piss me off)...
And the second course, roasted lamb, well, sorry, mine were slightly overdone...
Well, and the wine matched with the menu weren't memorable...
The bread, actually, was amazing!!! Best bread I had in a restaurant!!!
Full set of picture here...

Anyway, a good day, wonderful company on the table (we really had fun! And there were even three Chinese, who loved everything and they were very nice! And Edoardo e Mariangela whom were real fun to chat with!!!), and Franciacorta surroundings are always breath taken...

Maybe I'm too spoiled... I don't know! This job I'm doing it's spoiling me! I'm not easily amused any more! ;-)

We are all...

... different, but at the end, all the same! Everywhere in the world...
We look for the best mozzarella that can only be found in that farm, at the end of that country road, after the big tree on the left, where you see that black dog barking at you, then turn left... We look for that bottle of Gewuztraminer (yeah, I know I should had some accent to that!), bought in that little cellar, in the third village on the right after the second traffic light leaving Annecy, due south...
But at the end, if someone ask you which is, above all, your ultimate comfort food, well, the answers are more straightforward, more simple, more REAL!
Check it out!

And GET REAL!

Tell me why...

... people always feel entitled to tell me about their culinary mistakes or their (usually nasty) culinary experiments, asking for my approval???
Tell me, eh, tell me: WHY???

Because most of the time I have to force a smile, and I obviously look stupid... And mean... I'm not able to lie...

I mean, if I random meet, let's say, a cat expert, I don't begin to tell him/her that my cat is crazy, fat and too demanding and how I can solve all this!!!

Sometime something different happens!!!

There are so many different blogosferes around!
Sure one of the most powerful, or at least in Italy, is the blogosphere that speaks about technology (Yawn! Ops, sorry, I almost felt asleep)...
The Italian average technological blogger is, of course, male, geek (just to be nice and not calling him nerd!), is among the first 100 most known Italian bloggers (following the ranking of a site, which is not considered really reliable!) and its blog is quite boring (sorry to the nice guys I know among them! I really like you as persons, a bit less as bloggers!).
Most of them thinks that only "their kind" of blogospere exists (and I have proff about it, as at one geek dinner I have been lately a guy looked at me completely bewildered hearing me speaking about the food blogosphere!!! "Does it exist?" he said! Ah! What a naive!)...
And they rarely acknowledge the presence of women in the blogosphere... Unless they speak about technology in male terms!
Today la crème de la crème of female Italian blogosphere decided to act against their boring and grey male counterparts: they all published a post about THE argument that only us can understand: our period, our flow!!! Menstruation for dummies!
And that was one the funniest and lightest thing of an average day among Italian blogosphere!!!
If you speak Italian, why not go to read something different???
Here are some of the contributors (girls I know in person, but there are MANY others!!!):
Elena
Catepol
Feba
Pm10
Lalui

A long working week-end

Well, working, yes, but you know, when you work for a food company and they put you in charge of organizing their events, well, work is more like fun!
First, Friday night I welcome in Milan a fellow German blogger, Matthias, who's gonna cover the German market for San Lorenzo. Then on Saturday morning we drove to Quistello, near Mantova, to eat the astonishing Ristorante Ambasciata (a full set of picture here) for this events where we invite random people from the internet to come and eat and drink with us!
Then, from there, we drove to Imperia, where San Lorenzo head-quarters are, spent the Sunday on the sea front (well, I spent it mainly in my bedroom sleeping and waking just to fetch food! Matthias went around, or so he says!) and then Monday at the San Lorenzo offices and the at the San Lorenzo warehouse (a full set of pictures here!). Then back to Milan...
In the mean while, we hit a nice good restaurant, in Imperia (pictures here): a bit too expensive, but good...

But you know, that's working! And I'm dedicated to it!!!
Ah, so exhausting!!! ;-)

Ce n'est pas possible!

I do not know since when, but on amazon.fr, my favourite amazon, they are selling kitchen stuff!
I'm gonna die!
I want everything!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

Magic Tajine, on the table, who is the fairest one of all?

Magic Tajine: Over the seven jewelled restaurants, beyond the seventh pan, in the kitchen of the Seven Chefs, dwells Piperita, fairest of them all.
Queen [of food bloggers]: Piperita lies dead in the forest [you wish!]. The Envy Bloggers have brought me proof. Behold, her heart.
Magic Tajine: Piperita still lives, fairest in the land. 'Tis the heart of a pig you hold in your hand.
Queen [of food bloggers]: The heart of a pig! Then I've been tricked!

Oh, yeah! You've all been tricked!
I haven't post much in the last weeks, but I'm still here! Alive and kicking!
I'm just trying to recover form a very busy period, and a rather wild week-end!
But many days ago, I've cooked this quick tajine, mixing up two different recipes, so, here it is, thou magic tajine! So magic that I'm trying to remember how I did, but, nope, sorry, it's hiding any memory of it!

Lamb
Peppers
Potatoes
Onions
Olive oil

Spices: cumin, cinnamon, saffron, chilli pepper

Sesame seeds

Supposedly, I've stir-fried the minced onion in not so much oil, added the lamb, in bite size, then the spices, then the diced vegetables. Sure I added a glass or two of water, and I let everything cook...
I added some sesame seeds, just to have a "nice" picture...
Supposedly...

Maybe the Envy Bloggers have taken my brain...
;-)

Food blogger 2.0: a new specie in the world

The food blogger 2.0 is a really rare specie. It can live in every part of the world, in every environment, not only where it can find good food.
It lives mainly for the purpose of its food blog: cooking and taking picture of food. It can have many interest, but food it's the main objective of every action it does.
It has a "real off-line" life, but only on-line it feels safe. The "real off-line" life is mainly devoted to eating in good restaurants or cooking for the food blog. It finds some of its restaurants on TrustedPlaces and it buys its groceries and food mainly from few selected e-shops... And taking pictures of that.
It mainly reads food blogs and cook books.
It loves movies related to cooking and food, but it can appreciate even other kind of movies.
It's not aware of the rest of the blogosphere, as much as the rest of the blogosphere is not aware of the food blogger 2.0 (or food blogging in general).
It's difficult to spot it and it's almost impossible to take pictures of it (a rare example is published with this post, only thanks to the sympathy of a nice guy who spot it).
You can find it on facebook, probably in the group with less people of the entire social network (why don't you come and join us??? :-))
It's on Linkedin too...
On twitter it speaks about food is baking/cooking...
It's on Pownce too, but without understanding why: a geek friend says is the next step of social networking, and the food blogger 2.0 always listen to its geek friends...
It has more than one blog related to food (and it's doing it as a job!), and for sure it has a tumblr...
It tries to support and animate a food community...
It has a flickr account (and it uses Flickr uploadr) with which it participates to some groups and it creates other groups...
It's a frequent commenter on Serious Eats...
It's adding all the cookbooks to Anobii... And it created the Cookbook group (only three people at the momet: come! Come!)
It's part of some recipes communities... If it's based in Italy, is even part of Italian food social networks...
Every time it uploads a new recipe it posts it (immediately) on Taste Spotting too...
It's desperately wishing for Aperture to implement its food pictures...
It's part of the Daring Bakers Team and it's not allowed to link it to the outer world (We rock!)...
It participates to all the web food events it can...
Update: it got its business card and stickers from Moo.com

If you spot one, please contact the Food Bloggers Anonymous on FaceBook: you could save it from extinction... We need food blogger 2.0 in this world!

The best kept secret in food photography

What could make you the best food photographer in the world isn't only a good camera, good lenses or style...
No, no, my dearest! The best kept secret in food photography is a more than 300€ tool called Aperture: I'm trying the 30 days free trial and it already changed my life after one hour... And for some option you don't even need to shoot in raw: it works even on jpgs!!!

You don't believe me?
Compare this picture to the one I've published last week! It's the same picture: I swear!

I love Italy, but...

I really love my country! And my compatriots (well, not everybody, but you know...). As I had many experiences outside Italy I can really see all the pro and co of my wonderful country...
But today I'm pissed, and I decide to say it in a public display!
My dsl line is supplied by Wind Infostrada. I have since January 2006 and until today I was without a connection for at least 10 days overall... Now you think: that's not so much of a deal... Sure, it's not so much of a deal if you use your dsl to play: I use it to work, so even 1 hour is a problem.
Today I lost connection for the second time in ten days. I called the help desk and they told me: "I did some tests and you should have everything back is something like two hours". "Should"??? "Something like"??? "Two hours"????
When I told him that I needed a more specific estimate of time the men answered me "What are you complaining about? It's only half an hour that you are not connected". Now visualize my face red! And try to keep calm I told him that I already had problem one week ago, that it happened to many times and then he hanged the phone.
Now, how can I complain about this lousy, rude and impolite little piece of @#§!!! if I don't have his name, a code or something to recognize him???
I cannot.
And that's Italy: a lousy service (they say it's 4 mgb, but most of the time is not even half...), for a price much higher then in the rest of Europe, with rude people at the other end of the phone...
But as that's Italy, I continue to pay...

Do you think food bloggers use Internet at its highest potentials?

Lately I'm hanging out with a lot of "internet people" (aka people working in Internet companies, involved both in contents and logistics, software, hardware, stuff like that), and I've realized something...
They all have a blog, since ages, a flickr account, a tumblr blog, they use twitter, they know all about the latest google innovations and they are for sure part of more than one community...
And they are part of much more that for sure I do not even know it exists...

But we, one of the biggest and more bonding community on line, are we using the so called web 2.0 at its highest potentials?

In the open

I've been thinking about this post for a few months.
I was fighting with myself for the way I was going to write it, how many and which informations I was going to put in it, what "impact" it would have (as I have some kind of "impact" on anything outside my little shiny room from which I'm writing this! AH!AH!AH!), how many insults I will receive...
As few of you know, I was (and I would like to stress on the past sense) in the catering business. I'm not any more. Why?
Well, the first answer to this would spontaneously be: "mind your own business!", but as I'm writing this on my blog it would sound a bit hypocritical! (hey, I wrote the last word perfectly right all by myself!!! And that was a difficult one!)
I didn't want any more to be part of it, but the matter is not simple. As I wasn't the only person involved, and the other person is going on with the business, I don't want to get a legal charge for what I might say! So that's as far as I'm going on the catering matter!
Any way, that's not the story I wanna tell!
Two days after I went "public" with my decision I was offered with a job!
I wrote to Antonio, whom I had known through my blog, months back, and for whom I was writing recipes, to change everything and cut away the name of my former catering company, and just leave my name.
He asked me what I wanted to do from then.
Well, that was the major problem! It wasn't that I hadn't given a thought to this, but I had no real strategic plan! I was too relieved to get free of a suffocating situation, that I hadn't really thought of anything...
So I wrote him my ideas... He cut everything short and he gave me the opportunity, if I was willing to take it, to become San Lorenzo Country blogger for England.
Well, what do you think my answer was???
:-)
And next week I'm heading to London for my first """"""business trip""""""!!!

Well, why am I writing all this?
Self-promotion, primarily... :-)
To assure you that my "integrity" (:-DDDDDDD, sorry, I can't stop laughing!!! I'm so funny!!!) as a food blogger is well kept and safe: I won't do any advertising on this blog, if not related to my personal life...
Because I'm a self-centred person (but well, you know, I have my own blog, so that was established more then one year and half ago when I published the first post...)...
Because I like what I do and I wanted to share it...
Because I have few passions, one of it is good food, and I like to share it...
Because you don't want to know about tv series (possibly stupid and American) or books or movies or cross-stitching or cats, right??? ;-) (Well, about the last one I'm managing to do something too ;-D)
Because I have no recipe pending, and I'm not really into cooking lately (still with flu, but on drugs, many drugs!)...
Because I want, from now on, everything in the open (for more, check the backstage!), everything being as much spontaneous as possible, everything clear...

And I'm ready for that! Are you?

Every finger in a row is pointing at me [...]
Everyday I crucify myself
Nothing I do is good enough for you
Crucify myself
Everyday I crucify myself
And my [blog] is sick of being in chains...

P.S. Sorry for little quote that nobody will understand, but she's coming... She's just few days away... And I'm the most thrilled person in the world!!! :-)

Food photography for dummies

At the end I had to: I've decided, tempted by a good offer, to oblige my (poor) French husband to buy me, for my birthday (that is in 4 month...) a Canon Eos 350D! Yeah, I know, I'm a slaver! ;-)
As the camera is not yet in my hands (because of the offer, Milan shops run out, so my father bought it for me in Varese), I was "preparing" for the big moment (me? a control freak??? Noooo....) downloding brochure from the Canon web site. And look what I found???
A brochure for macro lenses that on page 6 explain you how a nice lady with a nice apron can take pictures that "Looks like professional cooking" in a bit, using a 500 € camera + 600 € macro lenses!!! If it could be just the camera, the world would be saved in a click!!!
I think all the Bourdain reading during flu made me bitter... ;-)