Morocco, the land where time stops...

Morocco...
That's where I've been in the last two weeks... And that's where I would love to live the rest of my life!
Morocco...
A beautiful country, made of sand, sea, ocean and imperial cities...
Morocco...
The land where time really stops! At first we thought it was our watch, but soon realized that the whole country is inside a time capsules, where hours seem days, days seem weeks, weeks seem months...
For the first week I kept asking what time it was, and then suddenly saying: "That cannot be true! It cannot be still SO early!"... Then, little by little, the watch wasn't an issue any more: our day was scanned by the prayer callings coming from the minarets and filling the cities with their melodic verses... It wasn't any more a matter of what time it was: we were living fully (and, honestly, still are) in the Moroccan way...

Our trip was fairly classic for a two week first exploration of Morocco. We toured the imperial cities and did a short escaped towards the desert.
Moroccan currency is dirham. It's better you change you foreign money at the airport: the rates are very good (at least for euro) and there is no commission. Don't do the grumpy tourist that try to pay everything in US dollars and get pissed if robbed! ;)
Credit cards are accepted only in few places and they normally add a commission of 5%. On the other hand there is plenty of cash dispensers.
We travelled in public transports, train, buses and taxis.
We stayed mainly in awesome riad, the traditional Moroccan house: a cube with no outside wall windows, but windows facing the inner court where there was a large open area, with a fountain or a garden, with lots of light. It normally comes with a huge terrace on the roof. We booked all of them before to go (and I strongly recommend it!).
We used two travel guides: an old Routard, from 2000, and a newer Guide Vert Michelin, 2007. Both weren't up to the task, honestly. Maybe we should have used the Lonely Planet instead, but we wanted to keep it French, for once...
As none of us can speak Arab (or should I say Moroccan?), we spoke French all the time. It's not that Moroccan people doesn't know any other foreign language, they do, but French is more natural for them. And French is anyway the second language of Morocco. French is essential if you want to go to Morocco by yourself.
We didn't bought a carpet but if you want to, we strongly recommend you to look up the prices for Moroccan carpets in your country, so at least you know against which price you should haggle. Because Morocco is the land of haggling too! 99% of what is sold doesn't have a price tag, and Moroccan just love to haggle! A lady on the train told us that they haggle for tomatoes and carrots too!!!

In the next weeks I will publish an accurate account of our trip, full of pictures and stories...

Do not expect too much food! Not because we didn't have it, but because after the second tajine, looking all the same, you stop taking pictures...
Moroccan food is very very good, but, unluckily, it doesn't excel in variety: tajine, tajine, grilled meat, tajine, fried fish, tajine again and then, on friday, couscous and then tajine again... And then, of course, their wonderful patisserie! But I don't want to spoil the fun of reading the next posts!

Stay tuned for:
Day 1 Marrrakesh, a first bite
Day 2 Rain going to Fès
Day 3 to 4 Up and down Fès
Day 5 to 6 Meknes and the King
Day 7 to 9 Salè and Rabat, the old and the new
Day 10 The hot train and the harassing city
Day 11 The (almost) desert
Day 12 to 14 Too much harass, too much heat and too much almond milk

Canned peaches from Monate's Lake

I was born in the Lake region of Italy: only around Varese there are 7 lakes (famous for a hard bike tour): Varese, Maggiore, Comabbio, Biandronno, Monate, Ghirla, Ganna ! Well, do not imagine lakes of the size of an American lake: no, nothing like that! They small lakes, but very very picturesque... Those lakes are very lucky with the climate, and always blessed with mild weather.
Once, many years ago, I was wandering around the Lake District, in England, and I suddenly felt like I was home: the two landscape are very similar!
The Lago Maggiore, being the biggest of the 7 (Maggiore means bigger), is well known and very beautiful... But all the other lakes are a popular destination during the summer, especially Lago di Monate, being one of the few where you can bath, and being very clean too! :)
Around Lago di Monate, there are several orchards, and the most famous are peaches, especially canned peaches.
Forget all about the normal, chewy and tasteless canned peaches you find in supermarkets: those are something else!
First of all, they are still firm! And they are not all the same: each halve is different from the other, because that's nature: nothing is exactly similar to the rest!
And then the flavour: awesome! Fresh, almost as if just picked from the tree!

For the picture above, I just drained them, blended them and then use them as a sauce for madeilenes! :)

Daring Bakers: Perfect Party Cake

[Update: the pictures were added Monday, 31 March 2008, at 8.56, Italy Time for the reasons explained below]

Oh gosh, it's today! I though it was for tomorrow!
I was freely going around the net this morning, when I hit my FaceBook page and saw a random status message from Jean Aw, Tastespotting founder, saying "... it's that time of month ~ the Daring Bakers have struck again..." (I think on the daring baker day she receives hundreds of picture of the same cake: must be real fun for her! ;) and I thought: oh my, is it TODAY?
Then I saw that Ivonne poked me (always on FaceBook), as to wake me up, and then it struck me: IT IS TODAY!!! and my pictures are on the other computer! F@#§*!!!
For pictures you should wait the early morning of tomorrow, which means that in some part of the eastern world will be still sunday, so I should be "safe"! :)
And if you do not believe me I made it, you can ask to my friend Sara: she ate it at the beginning of March, when I made it, and she loved it! Although she asked me repeatedly for the recipe and I was oblige to tell her that it was a secret! :P
This cake was honestly AMAZING!!!
As everybody else experienced, this cake was marvellous!
At the beginning I was a bit concerned about the fact that no yolk are used in cake base, but this trick turned out to be so clever! I had a wonderfully light and fluffy base!
And for once I turned off the fan in my oven and baked the cake with heat coming from below and the upper part, and it came out perfectly flat, not in a dome shape like all the other time I baked a fluffy base!
I was relieved I wasn't obliged to make the buttercream: I'm in a low sugar kind of diet, so buttercream will be so wrong for me! So I decided to go for whipped cream, with little sugar.
I used blackberries jam (without sugar) for the filling and raspberries for the final touch, that as usually with me, turned out to be fairly simple, although right now I'm carving in front of Ivonne and Tartellete pictures, just to name two! :) And you can check out all the others here!
I promise, tomorrow first thing in the morning, the pictures! Wait for them!

P.S. I forgot that a shot of the cake was already on-line, in a Nigella Lawson style, with a friend holding it! :D



[note to self: it's not the first time FaceBook saves my butt, so stop saying bad thing about it, ok?]

The Recipe Writer's Handbook

Here I am, neglecting my blog since ages and then, what do I publish? A book review! Not even a recipe and not even a picture! Bad Sara, bad!
But my book review is more useful then anything you can think of... My book review is about a book, as you can easily understand for the title, that will change your life...
Ehm, let's say it will change your way to write recipes, then your life, I dunno, it's your choice!!!
I bought it when I already decided that writing recipes was too boring for me... Don't ask me what made me push the "buy it" button on amazon. Let's simply thank I did!
The book as a simple structure: philosophy, style, testing, terminology, preferred spelling, metrics... Ok, nothing life changing there.
The life chancing experience lays in the reading of all this.
You have to know that in Italy the concept of an handbook is not very clear: we are not a self-help society, that's it. If we have to write an handbook, well, we use so many word to go to the point that most people get lost in between. Or at least I do.
In the The Recipe Writer's Handbook you cannot get lost: you simply follow the trail they lay in front of you and you are on and rocking, baby!
Soon you'll see all the wonderful flower that will blossom form my reading, and to be sure to follow them, do not forget to check out my other blog (update will soon come!).
And if you feel lonely and you miss me too much, check out my tumblr too.
and if you feel very social, well, look for me on social networks: there are many where I'm fairly active!

Kheer, Indian rice pudding

I have recently became accustomed to Bollywood movies! They rock!!! I love them!!!
So, when my friend Sara (my Bollywood movies pusher) proposed a Bollywood night, well, I jumped in with great pleasure!!! :)
And I proposed to bring an old favourite of my husband: the Indian rice pudding.
It's a really soothing dessert, fairly simple, but worthy to the best tables, as my friend Sara is! :)
I will never stop to thank her for her Thanksgiving turkey!!!
And as she always scold me that I should write recipes, because, at the end "you have a food blog and that's what you should do!" (and she's right, I know, but it's SO boring writing recipes!!!), here's the recipe! :)

1,2 l milk
75 g basmati rice, rinsed
100 g sugar
150 g raisins, golden and Corinth
1 piece of cinnamon
6 cardamom
2 teaspoon rosewater
Flaked almond and rose bud to adorn

Bring the milk to boil. Add the rinsed rice and stir with a wooden spoon for 10 minutes, then leave it to cook for at least one hour, stirring occasionally, on a very low fire.
Add sugar, raisins, cinnamon and cardamom and cook for another hour, stirring frequently.
At the end of the cooking time, it should look like a cream.
Far from the fire add rose water, stir and transfer everything in a serving bowl. Cover with the flaked almond, adorn with the rose buds and let it cool.
Enjoy it in front a nice bollywood movie!

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...

Daring Bakers: Julia Child's French Bread

I love Julia Child! Love, love, love her! Last summer I read her biography and I was just startled by her voice: clear, gentle, friendly...
So, when I saw this month challenge I thought: "GREAT! A dream comes true!!!"
I knew that when Mary and Sara chose this particular recipe they were going in the right direction toward the true spirit of the Daring Bakers!
Never, in the whole of my life, I would ever dared to make a bread that needs an entire day to be made!!!
And by an entire, I mean it: I began around 10am last Sunday and I end up with the bread ready to be cut for dinner, around 8 pm!
An overall 6 hours of rising it was a mystic experience!
Ad the rules were allowing me to use a stand mixer, I bail out, and I used my beloved one... But the time you have to wait, the fact that you have to be patient and careful while your gluten is forming to the right consistent, and the fact that you have to wait other 2 to 3 hours to let it cool before to eat... Well, it was a mystic experience!
Of course the bread didn't come out like the one you buy in France, even if I used French flour to make it!
As Julia, Mary and Sara say the problem is the home oven!
But I NEVER made a bread with that kind of breadcrumb!!! It was amazing! And I was so pleased!
Expecially beacuse, remember, I married a French! And he was very pleased to!!!
To celebrate we ate it with a nice Fois Gras aux pruneaux we bought last time we were in France! A glorious dinner!

Thanks Daring bakers to make me dare!!!!
Here the recipe by Breadchick Mary.

P.S. I know, I know: the windows in my home have horrible dirty glass! I hate to clean windows! Every time I do it, it rains the very next day! Let's just hope my mum do not see this picture!!!

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

You are my Catcher Block I’m your Barbara Novak

You are my Christian I’m your Satine.
You are my Norman Warne I’m your Beatrix Potter.
You are my Lincoln 6 Echo I’m your Jordan 2 Delta.
You are my Frank Churchill I’m your Jane Fairfax.
You are my Jerome I’m your Nagiko.
You are my Renton I’m your Diane.

I was never, and never will be, one of those beautiful women people turn to watch in the streets, but you turned for me.
I was never, and never will be, one of those girls all smiles and “yes darling”, but that’s what you love about me.
I was never, and never will be, one of those women that will celebrate Valentine’s day, but you don’t care either. And you don’t mind if I have a meeting (to organize this) for tonight.
I was never, and never will be low maintenance, but that’s why you love me.
I always was and will always be a major pain in the @#§*, but that’s WHY you love me!
And, “It doesn't take a Nazi rocket scientist to figure *that* out”!
And I will always be the girl that makes you laugh, that makes you smile and that makes you a chocolate cake!!!

And this year, a chocolate, ricotta, yoghurt and ginger spoon cake, all for you, with all my love!

P.S. This post is part of the series "Only 10 people in the word understand my quotations, one of whom is me, one my husband and the other the subject of them, but he doesn't read my blog, better, he doesn't know I exists". For the rest... Well, I won't tell you my "secret": guess it! ;)