ambra

I see you your delicious Chirashi and raise you my bland looking Bibimbap. I know it's not authentic, I used what I had, but it's a favorite around here! It was "sauced" after the picture with a soy mixture and Gochujang. Here then is Tagliatelle with Sugo di Nana (Arezzo-style duck ragu). And roast beef with little red potatoes. It might look a little overcooked. But it was fine.

These are the only fava beans I can get here. When I get fresh in spring, I do all kinds of fun recipes. These I reserve for fave e cicorie. But yes, that's definitely the way I enjoy Ful! So delicious! 😊

I LOVE ful, it's one of the first things I eat when I get off the plane any place that has it! Sometimes I try to make it using Italian fava beans, but it's not the same!

And it looks AMAZING. I swear I'll get to the arroz con pollo one of these days anyway. 😁

Yea that sounds about right. 😂. If it helps, I bought all the ingredients to make arroz con pollo and made chicken teriyaki! Now I have all the ingredients for arroz con pollo and no chicken! 😁

😂😂😂 So you agree!! But that does sound like a really good recipe.

I admire you too for doing this! And everything sounds amazing. I tried to do this for a little while, but all went south pretty quickly. You've inspired me to try again! 😊

I do a big Thanksgiving every year for locals and transplants alike. Over 20 people. I usually make the basics (turkey, stuffing, mashed) along with lasagne, crudite', fennel, apple and arugula salad and an apple crisp. We also always do a "new oil" tasting (with fett'unta and black kale crostini) with 4-5 oils from different areas of Tuscany (we have a slight obsession). Then I have people bring things. Whatever they want. Including bottles. One of our friend groups is full of wine professionals/educators or certified sommeliers so we usually open a ridiculous amount of wine, usually blind. No one gets drunk, mind you, it's just a tradition and a chance to taste all together. This year we aren't doing it. My son is especially heartbroken. But I promised him we'd try a Thanksgiving in Spring party, if all goes well. We will do a small Thanksgiving, for just us, but I'm not sure what to cook yet. I don't want an 8 kg turkey for three people. I'm not a fan of the breast. Here you can only get it skinless and boneless and I'm not good at cooking it. It's usually dry.

How do you do the shrimp? They look delicious! I keep asking you about your recipes because I am so intrigued by the air fryer! Edited to say: I see now that you bought them already breaded!

I guess it's too late, and it's not a side dish, but I probably would have done tagliatelle ai funghi. What did you end up doing? I'm sure it was delicious!

I have some fresh shiitakes I might not be able to use this week.. if I were going to freeze them, would it be better to freeze raw or cook first? Thank you !

I agree 1,000% about the gluey effect in meatballs! We love Pane Verna. It's an heirloom soft wheat from around Siena and Arezzo. I can certainly buy the flour, but where we get it, they use lievito madre (and that's too much work for me to keep up). Plus, they have the right oven. I also really like macinato a pietra (Just stone ground), which doesn't seem to be very popular in Milan. These flours are always darker and have a lot more flavor and texture than the over-processed white flours we have. Especially good in panzanella. There are no extra ingredients in them. It's just flour, water and yeast. Anyway, my CSA has excellent bread for every day use.

I hope you can eat it one day! If you are vegetable dependent like we are, it's a delicious alternative to minestrone. 😀 Since we moved, I've thought about making the bread at home, but it's just been easier to bring it back, also because we buy breads made from specific flours. There are actually a lot of things we like to bring back, but I won't bore you. P.S. your chicken looks perfect!

A lot of deliciousness these days! Many compliments for all of your food! Happy belated @Shelby! This weekend I made Ribollita. The Tuscan vegetable and bread soup. It really looks terrible, in the bowl and in photos, but it's a favorite in my house. It’s basically minestrone enriched with more white beans and black kale. Stale Tuscan bread is then added. This dish is the reason I bring the bread back to Lombardy when I go to Tuscany. It’s not just about the no salt, but the consistency. You can’t use regular bread in it, it becomes gummy. After it is made, it is reboiled (hence the name) the next day. I'm still not out of my cooking funk. The most exciting thing I made (so not exciting at all) was an old-school spinach salad. In Italy, they sometimes talk about dated dishes. There are a few that come to mind, like Farfalle with Smoked Salmon or even Penne alla Vodka. Obviously, people still make what they like. And no one cares if a dish is out of style. 😀 This gets me thinking about American dishes that are old – at least dishes that I only ate back in the day, that my parents made. Today, for me, that dish was an old-school spinach salad with bacon, eggs, mushrooms and a warm dressing. I couldn’t remember how my mom did the dressing really -- (I feel like the eggs were part of the dressing?) so I just riffed off a few recipes I Googled. It was perfectly satisfying and brought me warm memories of my mother’s kitchen. It was her birthday and I always cook her dishes to remember her.

Indeed, it's hard for me to find good stoccafisso, in fact, I've never really met one I liked! 😂 My husband swears the good stuff exists, but I haven't found it. Luckily salt cod is still popular enough across Italy that you can find it easily. I hope I inspired you to make it again! 😇 Does Eataly carry either?

I'd love a portion too! 😋 Thank you so much @heidih!

Here are some random dinners from around here. This is Baccala' Mantecato. I guess it's like Brandade but without the potatoes. It is baccala that has been steeped with some flavorings (like peppercorn, onion, bay leaf and the rest) and then whipped with olive oil. We like it enough that it has its own designated bowl. 😃 It's usually served atop crispy fried polenta crostini, but we didn't have the patience for that this weekend! Then a seafood risotto made with calamari, shrimp, jumbo shrimp (sadly not pictured), clams and mussels. Then we have pork baked inside garlic bread. It's a riff off a Tuscan dish, which is just a pork filet cooked in a baguette, usually with rosemary, sage and garlic. Sometimes fennel seed. I "Americanized" it, basically making it garlic bread! First I seared the filet on all sides, then made the garlic bread, using olive oil instead of butter. Then you make a sandwich out of it, cover the whole thing in pancetta, tie it up, and bake until desired doneness. I'm not a fan of cooking pork at all, this was a special request. (I'm not good at it, it's always dry, or....wrong.)The sides were mashed red-skinned potatoes, sautéed turnip tops (with absolutely NO flavor whatsoever) and those are some mushrooms on top of the mash that I had to cook because they were about to go bad. And finally, we had a COVID scare this weekend, scarily, so the kid in the family got baked pancakes two nights in a row. The parents had lots of wine. 😁 (P.S. His results came back negative.)

Do they get dipped in egg like normal breaded chicken? Looks great!

I have seen some recipes that use rice vinegar....But I still haven't tried it yet. I will report back if I do.

This dish as always piqued my interest, yours looks great! Just one question, did you find it very, very sweet?

I make chick pea salad WITH tuna! Chick peas, chopped tomato, canned tuna, red onion. A pantry meal that is especially good in summer when it's so hot and no one wants to cook.

Thank you! And for the other!

I completely forgot about the blogs.. those were amazing! Welcome Hannah!

Thanks Shain! I would love that! I'd really love recipes for the soba salad above as I just bought soba noodles on Sunday. I may have to do without the miso though, as I didn't buy that. More locally, they sell dark miso in a giant container: do you know how long it keeps or how I can keep it by the way? I never know what to do with a giant container when I just need a couple of spoonsful. And also the green beans and mushroom stir fry. Randomly, I have fresh shitakes grown in the Sud Tirol coming in my box tomorrow. I'm very excited and was thinking of soup, but I haven't decided yet.

A frittata with leftover risotto alla Milanese and pancetta. The leftover rice was supposed to become arancini, but when I realized I had run out of bread crumbs, a frittata it was!