Franci

Unfortunately I don't have a garden, only two small balconies where I keep my herbs. Properties are very expensive, at most you see roof gardens. Thanks Marie-Ora. It started as a basic scone recipe from Epicurious but now I'm not sure how much it diverted from the original. For 400 grams flour I use 1 stick butter, 100 grams sugar, 1 TBS baking powder, a little bit baking soda, salt and one egg in a measuring cup with cream added to make 1 cup. They keep better than scones. Really Ambra? What did you have? My orecchiette are far from perfect. My mom is a northener and, while living in the South, orecchiette were so readily available that I didn't learn how to make them, only when I left, of course, the urge hit me. They are not easy. These, very likely, would not pass my aunt test. My husband complained on the sauce, too salty for him. My daughter was the one who really appreciated her lunch

Ok, let's get started! Most of you, meaning the Egulleters in the States, are still sleeping...I got up 6 am this morning. I wanted to surprise my son and bake something for breakfast. I generally prefer to eat eggs in the morning or savory foods. Not very typical Italian or French. My husband doesn't have breakfast and the children are very different. My boy likes sweets and the girl like savory foods, like my husband and I. I'm a coffe person but this week I feel a little out of shape and had a cup of Earl Grey with honey while working on breakfast I made a cross between scones and "biscotti" (in the italian way, so to say more a cookie): cocoa and chocolat chips and walnuts and currants. Here before and after baking Sunday is usually a low stress cooking for me. I decided to make the most typical Sunday lunch meal in my hometown. So orecchiette with a meat sauce. By 8 AM, I already made the dough and prep the meat for the sauce. Orecchiette traslate in little ears, it is the typical pasta from Apulia and Basilicata. It is made with a durum flour, meaning a finer semolina, in Italian know also as semola rimacinata=remilled flour. It's just flour and warm water, no eggs. The meat sauce, the way my father likes to make is made with a mix of lamb, pork and beef. Best would be pork jow (fresh pork guanciale) which I didn't order so used one chop, lamb neck and a gelatinous piece of beef. Now, children permitting, I'm going to make orecchiette.

Welcome everybody to the Principality of Monaco! Monaco is a very small Country located halfway between Nice in France and the Italian border (they are about 15-16 km from here or 10 miles if you prefer). It feels like France but the Italian influence is very strong due to the proximity to the border and the large number of Italians residing in the Principality. In fact, although I’ve been living here for almost 3 years, speaking both Italian and English, I have not managed to learn French yet. My name is Francesca but my husband and my family often call me Franci. I was born and grew up in the South of Italy, which I left for studying at age 19. Since then I lived in Milan, then moved to the States (San Francisco, Hanover NH, NYC), then back to Europe in London and for almost 3 years on the French Riviera. As some of you might have read on the dinner thread, we are an American/Chinese/Italian family. My husband was born in Shanghai and moved to the States with his family at age 10. Our origins and our travelling greatly influenced my cooking over the years. I studied business in school but I’ve always enjoyed cooking a lot. While living in NY, I enrolled in the French Culinary Institute, going to school at night and working in banking at the same time. That has been one of the best years of my life and I truly enjoyed the experience. After that I went for an internship in a good restaurant in NYC and shortly after I moved to London where I completely gave up working in banking and became a commis in a luxury hotel. The experience was short lasted and because of relatives health issues and later on my pregnancy I gave up the idea of cooking professionally, at least in a restaurant kitchen. Now I have two small children, a boy almost 5 years old and a girl, the little one you have seen in the picture, who is almost 15 months old. This equals that I had to reconsider a lot of my cooking, keep it really simple both in the preparation and in the presentation.

Dcarch, I'm impressed. You have a very keen eye for details. I didn't notice 'that' camera but Monaco is full of cameras. Even banks don't have security entrance... Looking forward to start blogging tomorrow

Ok, vegan, no vegetarian. I'd also go with Michaela suggestion: pure and simple. Another option would be to make some "rolls", or stuff some vegetables, like imam bayildi, a little summery but it is nice with a tomato sauce.

Egg polpette Eggplant polpette Ricotta polpette Marinara sauce American style doesn't have fish, right?

I have been away for a little bit and it's a nice way to start the day and see what people here have been cooking. Robirdstx, I really liked your red Chile and Garlic Shrimp in Olive Oil. Chris Taylor, beautiful Escoffier-themed dinner! RRO scallops, seared in butter and glazed in yuzu marmalade...can I have that for breakfast? Lovely! I've just spent the last 10 days in Venice. Sunday night dinner was softed shelled crabs (moeche) with polenta. In Venice they really like their white polenta with fish. I always have left over polenta with fried eggs. Love it. I'm sure I'd love your recipe for corvina, Frogprincess! For the polenta. Why you don't like how your polenta turns out? Everywhere you go they have a different preference for polenta and they like a different variety. MM84321, your blanquette doesn't look very "white" to me but so much more appealing. Love the colors. Beautiful Bruce, I live very much your asparagus, I need to try this, thanks

Hello. I'm trying to organize a trip and I'm reading and saving reviews but I'd like to save the locations (and maybe some notes) for restaurants and food shopping on a map. I've searched on internet and seen that the skitch application from Evernote might be what I need. What do you use? Thanks

That's very much true. I'd dehydrate food before deep-frying only if I'm going to puff the stuff. Here's a great text on puffing food. It took me long time but finally I tried it Not bad. I didn't get an homogeneous result. I'm not sure it's because different moisture content or temperature of the oil. I'm more for the oil, I didn't use a thermometer. Next question. How would you flavour it so the spices glue to the pasta. Toss them with a syrup before frying?

Tonight I made some experiments. I was going to fry my usual fish (anchovies and red mullets) so I decided to puff some pasta and some rice (chinese go ba). I also had some leftover spaghetti, which became a frittata di spaghetti. And a crudite platter.

Very nice looking! I have two jars of preserved lemon from last june, need to use before making a new batch. Love your scallops Soba, that's what I'm going make tonight. RRO, I'm sure I'd love those rice crackers. And I could dip almost anything in nuoc cham, it one of my favourite sauces. Yesterday, for Easter, we had a bigger meal at lunch as customary for Italians. I made Ottolenghi Artichokes, mozzarella with candied lemon, which we really enjoyed Then I roasted two lamb shoulders, one simple with garlic, rosmary and anchovies, the other stuffed, a recipe from Stephan Reynaud. The first won other the stuff by far. I served with more artichokes from Ottolenghi. This, not bad but I'm not sure I'll make it again. At night we had leftover lamb with turnips. I made a very good lamb glaze from a lamb stock I made the day before.

Good question. So, I went on the website of Candia the milk producer and noticed they have two products: Leben (fermented milk)and Raib (soured milk). I would still use leben in place of milk and lemon or vinegar. I've also seen a lot of people using Kefir instead of buttermilk.

It has happened to me a couple times that I had an old batch of chickpeas, on those rare occasions a longer cooking didn't help. Then I'm not sure how reliable are the studies out there but many claim that longer soaking is benificial in the lowering of phytic acid. In doubt and if I remember, longer soaking doesn't hurt. So, this morning I had chickpeas soaked for 48 hours, last night I added a good handful of coarse sea salt to the water. I threw the chickpeas on a sheet pan, covered with a towel and crushed a little with a rolling pin Not too bad. More effective would be a little at a time. I didn't remove the peels and decided to remove everything after cooking. Cooked in the pressure cooker for 30-40 minutes. Oh, these were surely old chickpeas...but after that they were soft enough. I poured the chickpeas on a tamis and reserved the liquid. It was pretty easy and fast to pick the peels. I didn't do a perfect job because next step was passing them through the food mill. In a bowl I whipped lemon juice, garlic and tahin. Then with an immersion hand blender I whipped the tahin mixture with the chickpeas, plus oil. I added a little bit of cooking liquid to the chickpeas...ahi! That made the hummus too runny for my liking. Otherwise the color was nice and also the texture. The specks are cumin (a little coarsely grounded). My last batch was much nicer.

What a nice meal, Scotty! Too bad I didn't know you when I lived in SF And RRO, I love pork belly. I'm looking forward to move back in a place where I can find those ingredients. Tonight we had roasted sea bream with chards and hummus>

Jmahl, happy birthday!!! Your pizza looks wonderful, I wish I could have a slice right now, breakfast time for me. But I could eat also avaserfi dish, no problem Very humble. For 2 I cooked 5-6 huge chopped shallots very slowly, with good amount of EVOO, for a good 20-30 minutes, added some smoked lardoons (maybe 70-80 grams)after the shallots were soften, at that point I should have added some tomatoes tinned or fresh but I had some nice tomatoes sauce from the day before which I used. It's not a very red sauce, more or less same weight of tomatoes and shallot. I add a spicy pepper and didn't feel adding any herb but it wouldn't hurt.

Tonight again homemade pasta. "Curzul" a specialty from Faenza, in local dialect means shoes laces. They are squared egg tagliolini usually dressed with a shallot sauce. I'll make it again, I really liked it.

Forgive me, I'm lazy, I don't want to go back and list all the beautiful dinners I've seen. Just want to say they all really look delicious! And welcome to the thread to Enrique I've not been taking pictures but we had a couple of very simple and comforting meals: guinea fowl legs with bacon and sage with polenta. Yesterday night we also had lamb chops with mint sauce and a nice salad of mograbiah and vegetales.

I've almost never had a problem of hard chickpeas and I don't use baking soda, but I soak 36 to 48 hours changing water every 12 hours and in summer I keep in the fridge. I followed also Nourishing Traditions advice and soaked with lemon (or whey) not sure it made a huge difference in texture. I should try again with the same batch of chickpeas. I also was wondering about Heston Blumenthal 10% brine for beans if works for chickpeas to get uniformity in cooking. I'll give it a try and report back. This made the best hummus I ever made! It was much lighter, fantastic. The fastest way I tried is to remove the skin before cooking, after the chickpeas have been soaked. I put them on a sheet pan and covered with a towel an rolled and crushed with a rolling pin. I tried in the past with little success but I was too gentle. Now, it's still a pain because while it was easier to remove the skin I had to go one by one anyway. Now I'm thinking of just crushing them before cooking and then cooking and see at that point in the skins float on top of the pot. Honestly, a food mill, with the smallest holes, I think does the job well enough. Well, you have a thermomix for cooking it. I hate cooking chickpeas flour because it is prone to lumps and you need to stir constantly. I guess you need to diluite quite a lot. Here they make "cakes" (panisse in french, panissa in italian) which are sliced and panfried.

I would happily eat all these breakfasts Thanks, Andie. I'll give it a try. Although I need to sub buttermilk because it's not available around here. Maybe I can use the fermented milk, north African style which is, instead, readily available.

I don't think that this is an American conspiracy, either. In The Oxford Companion to Food, under "Sausages of Italy," we find: Across the channel, in Larousse Gastronomique, we find the entry "peperone": (Oh, and to clarify above, the Ruhlman & Polcyn soppressata recipe is 80 lean/20 fat but 100% pork, no beef.) Linguistic is not my thing but like most Italians, when I first visited the US, and I heard of "pepperoni" pizza, my thought where in order: 1. why it is written with two p, 2. where is the pepper? since I was expecting a bell pepper on my pizza While the suffix "one" means big in Italian, when I say peperone, I don't think at a "big" pepper. Notice that "pepe" in Italian is pepper as in the spice: pepe in grani, grains of pepper in italian. While peperone is referred to the capsicum. If there was such a salame (another misproununced Italian word in English) in the ancient Rome, with such a name, I don't know. If there was a thin salame heavely spiced, oh well, I would not be surprised. From Wikipedia in Italian a list of the most traditional italian salami by region Here No mention of this peperone anywhere Other thing for Kent. Although I see that you are saying call the stuff with their name: "pepperoni" the American salame and other salami with their name. I can tell you that to me what is produced in the US and that I tried still doesn't taste like the stuff with the same name I have in Italy. I learned from the Charcuterie thread that the cure used in the US is different. Well, I don't know if it's that or something else again (maybe Jason Molinari could answer) but the American produced salame tastes off to me, I don't like the aftertaste. Has the law changed? Because, I was left that while you can import prosciutto, mortadella, speck, you cannot import salame. I know DiBruno well, because my husband went to University in Philly, but there is not such a thing as "pepperoni" from Abruzzo or Sicily. They might buy some sort of salame that has been spiced with spices more typical in those regions and decided to call like that.

Percyn, did I tell you already how much I love your eggs? Andie, your scones really look very good! Can you share your "lazy" way to incorporate butter? How is the process different? I generally don't eat sweets but I love scones. I had 4 small banana scones this morning for breakfast .

Frogprincess, the assistant is the boy, now almost five, although the picture is from 2 years ago. He was helping me with the cavatelli machine. The girl is only 13 months old but a good taster. I love orecchiette, like most fresh pasta from the south, is made with no egg and durum flour, which gives a very nice bite to it. I found they are very difficult to master though. Love your fish! dchard, you can transform the most simple things in a work of art! RRO, I wish I could find the cod "wing"! MMMhhhh, they look very good. I do have in the refrigerator (for months already!) some dry cod tripe or intestines, this reminds me I should soak them. Paul, thanks. Give the sweetbreads a go! I love that recipe (or better the technique). I cook sweetbreads quite often, my husband loves them.

I LOVE a fish that is called pesce pettine, pettinessa, in Italian, scientific name Xyrichthys novacula. Dusted with flour and panfried is the best for me.

me again? Tonight I felt the need to go back to tradition. Homemade orecchiette with mushrooms, used oyster mushrooms that is the same family as the "cardoncello" found in Puglia. My little girl enjoyed it a lot

Thanks for blogging, Rico! Your brisket is spectacular