Pandoro&Panettone Tiramisù

Tiramisù is one of those Italian desserts known all around the world. It’s simple and quick to make, adaptable in various ways and so so so good!!!
The only “rule” you have to follow is to use mascarpone cheese. You can use ricotta, but mascarpone is the only that makes sense: if you are going to eat tiramisu you must forget diet or lightness!

This version is slightly different form the original one: after Xmas day everybody in Italy has to deal with leftovers, and sure in most Italian homes there will be half panettone and half pandoro.
We are very peaky about panettone and pandoro! There are three different factions: the one that likes ONLY panettone, the one that likes ONLY pandoro, and the one that likes both. So you must provide both! And, honestly, there is a fourth faction (my favourite!) that like panettone, but only with raisins, without those annoying pieces of candy oranges…

For 8 200 ml glasses

1 kg of mascarpone
6 eggs
6 tablespoons of sugar
Coffee (but I personally prefer hot chocolate)
Whiskey or grappa or rum

1/2 pandoro
1/2 panettone
Or 1 entire pandoro or panettone

Cocoa

Divide the eggs, and mix the egg yolks with sugar. Whip up the egg whites.
Mix mascarpone with the egg yolks, slowly add the egg whites, and combine well.
In each glass or in a big shallow dish, lay a spoon of cream. Mix coffee and the liquor you are using. Tear apart panettone and pandoro and lightly deep each piece in the coffee. Lay a piece over the cream, cover it with cream and continue to layer very glass, ending with a layer of cream. Dust with cocoa and refrigerate.
It’ better do it the day before, so it can rest overnight in the fridge.

It's finnaly over!

Ok, now I can say it: this year I couldn’t care less about Xmas… I didn’t care about celebration, decoration, “sanctification” or any ation concerning Xmas…
But finally it’s over and I can say it… I wanted to be mean, but I couldn’t (at least not as much as I wanted), I wanted to be grumpy, but I couldn’t and the last thing I wanted was to be merry, but I had to…
But now it’s over, from now on I can return to my normal self: grumpy, mean and not merry!!!
2006 is almost over as well, so I can leave behind loads of stuff I didn’t like and start anew! I know it’s childish, but really from the 1st January 2007 I would like to have a different life, maybe on a Jamaican beach, but I think I anyway have to stay in the grey surroundings of my dear Milan, polluted and plenty of people I dislike…
A friend few weeks ago told me that her new year resolution would be coherence: I couldn’t agree more…
Screw you guys, I’m going home…

Seasonal greetings

Happy holidays to everybody!

P.S. The pick is from Xmas 2005...

Where have I been?

Well, absolutely nowhere, just here, only without any technological support… But, thanks to the incoming Christmas, all this was resolved with a simple credit card purchase…
Proudly writing form my new iMac, I have almost nothing to publish, expect these little white towers of petit Suisse we brought back from our last trip in France… Keeping it simple!

The worst technological period of my life…

Ok, after the problem with my dsl line, now my mac is dead: it fell form the table and at the moment is at the mac’s hospital…
I love my mac...

Maybe all this is telling me I should stop using tecnology…

Rambling

Lately I do not have lots of recipe… I’m not cooking anything interesting (unless you think that pasta with pesto is interesting…) and since we’ve been in Paris last weekend, we even have the fridge completely empty… I mean, right now there is only lots of cheese from a nice Parisian fromagerie in the 17th arrondissement that ages its own cheeses… And we all know how much French cheeses stinks! So, empty and stinky fridge…
And as I’m not really inspired in writing or rambling about food issues, here are the picture I never posted because I wasn’t really satisfied with or with the recipe itself…
Right now I’m wondering about which way I may differ from other thousands of food blog we all read out there… And it is not simple to find an answer to that question, but soon or later I will come up with some ideas about it…

So, here is the collage: have fun wondering what the hell they could be and why I didn’t publish them! Well, some of them were obviously ugly, some just came not the way I wanted them, some were tasteless…

?

This made me wonder… A lot… And I didn't yet decide if I agree or not...

What do you think?

Paris vaut bien des macarons...

... some croissants (the best of the 9th arrondissement), North African patisserie and, of course, HIM: the best, the only, le merveilleux Pierre Hermé... And foodblogger meetings, of course!!! Oh, and the discovery of yuzu...

Chinese style pork

I completely invented this marinade and I called it Chinese marinade
just because the ingredients are Chinese like (all except one…), but
I wouldn’t say you will find it served in Chinese Popular Republic…
A little memoir from my childhood… When Comrade Mao Tze Tong died I
was little, like two or three years old, and his death must have made
quite an impression on my little self. I don’t know if only for his
name, funny for a little Italian girl, as mao in Italian is very
similar to the sound of a cat mewing (miao!), or because I was
already aware of his importance on my political life… Growing older I
propend for the first solution, but for many years I was sure of the
latter…
Anyway, from the night of his death, and for the week that followed,
I went around saying to literally everybody I encountered on the
streets, at home, at the kindergarten, “Mao is dead”, with a smile
(the smile was the part I omitted when telling this story to my
comrades during my years as a young passionaria protesting against
the first Berlusconi leadership… And I would be ready to hit the
piazza again if he arouses to the power for a third time!!!)! My
mother tried to persuade me that it wasn’t very nice to announce
someone’s death with a smile, even if she told me that Mao wasn’t a
very nice person, but nothing would stop me!
What a stubborn little girl! And growing older I didn’t change a
single bit!!!

And, now, after the choirs of “who cares??!” that are arousing among
you, fellows readers, here is the recipe!


300 g of pork cut in thin stripes

2 tablespoons of soy sauce
1 tablespoon of maple syrup
1 teaspoon of grounded ginger
1/2 teaspoon of five spices mix

Steamed rice to serve


Marinate overnight, in the fridge, the pork with all the ingredients.
Stick two or three pieces of meat on metal skewers. Heat a heavy
grill and cook ithe skewers until golden and crispy.
Serve them with steamed rice.

P.S. For those whome are wondering if this meat is or isn't burn, I will assure you that it wasn't burn at all, but perfectly caramelized... and I have at least two no family related witnesses...

Amandines

Again something sweet from Donna Hay… Maybe I should buy more books
by her, so I can change trend…
Anyway, those amandines (almond tartlets) are so simple to make, and
to eat, that are worth even the effort of making the pastry base
(yes, sometime I’m so so lazy that I discard recipe that implies
pastry making…)!
For the pastry you can use half the recipe of the pastry from the Pumpkin
cake.

Serves 6

90 g of soft butter
55 g of sugar
1 egg
1 egg yolk
170 of almond flour
1 tablespoon and an 1/2 of flour
3 pinches of nutmeg
60 g of flaked almonds

Roll out the pastry very thin, 2 millimetres, and cut 6 circles and
cover 6 tartlet moulds. Let them rest in the fridge.
Preheat the oven at 150° C.
In a food processor, mix butter and sugar, add the egg, then the egg
yolk. Add almond flour, flour and nutmeg. Mix until you obtain a
smooth cream.
Fill each tartlet and sprinkle with flaked almonds.
Bake for 45 minutes.
Serve cold.