Franci

Really some wonderful meals lately! Now I'm craving crabs! We have just come back from Barcelona. Just a couple pictures of what we have been eating over there. Husband master carver at work with a nice bellota leg. And we had a lot of seafood in general Some nice toro...our Japanese friends were very happy

Hi Rustem, don't know if what I'm saying is very helpful to you. I have Induction now and after years of electric hobs I can tell you I cannot go back to an electric kitchen. As for the wok, I had very little patience for my carbon steel wok, and gave up. Eventually I bought a Beka cast iron. It's kind of an heavy western style cast iron wok. I did the proper seasoning but still everything was sticking to it. so I decided to keep it as my deep frying vessel. It took me more than one year to get a patina on it! After that it become non stick. For cast iron, you do need a lot of time...you could try also a debuyer blue steel wok, too bad doesn't go on induction, I'll get one for myself otherwise.

This one has just been released

Can you please explain this flour. Google images shows no indication that this chestnut flour mention would produce any texture difference then all purpose flour. I thought about this, because I've used it in a Chinese recipe to fry duck. It's a very convoluted recipe from Barbara Tropp, it's a steamed and "pressed" duck, then dusted in chestnut flour, steamed and deep fried. Here you can see it, sorry, it's in Italian but you can look at the pictures. It was indeed very crispy, although your chicken is covered in a glaze after frying, so maybe you can tell if the restaurant's chicken retained some crunch compared to the flour one you tried at home. If you want to read a bit more on chestnut flour for frying Here on A. Nguyen. Then, in the past I also made the traditional water chestnut cake, where chestnut flour and chestnut pieces are cooked and then steamed. Now, I googled fried chicken in chestnut flour and it is common. Then my crazy mind thought: what if this people had extra water chestnut cake batter and used it up and worked for them. But I might be totally wrong.

Water chestnut flour and water chestnut pieces?

Tonight we had bulgur and freekeh salad with preserved lemons and barberries, Greek yogurt and pan fried chicken breast

Ann_T, your pizza looks awesome!!! Rotuts, usually are used blue steel pans for this (I think in the last video I linked they just use a tart pan, coated. I admittedly use also my staub cast iron pan. Heidih, this dish to me falls into the highly appreciated category of minimum effort maximum result. Slice some eggplants thickly (like 3/4 of an inch), salt and leave in a colander for an hour (more for texture I suppose than for the bitterness). Rinse, squeeze some water out pressing with the palms of you hands and pat dry. Preheat the oven at 400 F. Oil a sheet pan and dust with some breadcrumbs or panko. Salt and beat some eggs and dip each eggplant slice in the egg, shake a little, before dropping in the pan without overlapping. On each slice spread a bit of tomato sauce, add a piece of mozzarella and sprinkle some grated parmigiano or pecorino, a drizzle of evoo and bake for 20 minutes. Turn off the oven, add a leave of basil to each slice, if you wish, and let rest in the oven until lukewarm, right temperature for eating them. Next time, I'll see what happens if I do not salt the eggplants, because otherwise, 5 minutes to put them together.

Just 5 minutes, not much. Tonight, the rest of the family had spaghetti with zucchini trombetta. I had a not-a-parmigiana, super easy. I'm going to make this again and again, until the end of the summer.

Keith, maybe I used the word dough improperly, to make this pizza, or as I call it, focaccia, you do need sort of a batter. It will stick to your hand like crazy when you beat it (did you see the link of the woman beating the flour and water?) then, when you basically pour in the pan (no extra flour needed) you use oil to coat the dough which we'll help you spreading it in the pan. This maybe a more useful link on how is going to look. Also in the video they cover it with a towel as I do. Plantes Verdes, I hope it works well for you.

Plantes Vertes, pizza is generally with cheese. But...when I made it a couple days ago, I called it focaccia with tomatoes. In Puglia, where I'm from, what Americans would call a deep dish pizza, a thick pizza, is actually called focaccia col pomodoro, pizza is thin, in my area. In other parts of Italy focaccia means: no tomatoes. Generally the thin pizza has cheese. To make this tall kind of pizza, or red focaccia, if you prefer, I use the method for the typical focaccia from Puglia. It's very simple, it's a very wet dough, highly hydrated, percentage depending on the flour I use. If I use the traditional durum flour (which absorbs more liquid) or high gluten flour I can use more water. This time I used a general all purpose french flour that is not very high in gluten and the pizza was very good, better than a couple days ago. For 2 pizzas (pans diameter about 28 cm), I use 500 g flour, 1 teaspoon instant yeast, 2 teaspoons salt and water about 70-75-80% on flour. For this kind of dough I don't even like to use my mixer because I feel I do a better job by hand, it's better then going to the gym. Than I let it rise until I see it is starting bubbling nicely on top and after that I generally refrigerated for some time, like some hours or more, I bring back to room temperature and, if needed, finish rising (when it's full of bubbles is ready), then I divided it into the two pans, very well oiled and I immediately flip my blob of dough, so it gets all oiled and it's easier to stretch by hand in the pan (and doesn't stick to your hands). You season with tomatoes, salt and some oil and let in rise again (covered maybe with an inverted bowl). it goes in a hot oven (220-230C) for about 20 minutes or until the color tells you it's ready. I cover the pan with a tea towel for some minutes before sliding the pizza on a rack. A taller pizza is softer, thinner crunchier. Give it a go, not difficult at all. My son prefers so much more this kind of pizza. Ok, here a link to see how we "beat" the dough. You can skip all the chatting and go directly at the very end 4 minutes 30. I do it for about 10 minutes until I see the gluten is stronger, you'll see the dough starts forming big bubbles. HI Ashen, I wanted to do here the pissaladiera from Ventimiglia, the Italian version of the nicoise pizza. They generally add also some onion to the tomatoes but didn't have time for it. So I added only the other usual ingredients: capers, slivered garlic, and anchovies (mine, under brine, like common in this area).

Tonight I made pizza again. And no fuss asparagus and eggs

Tonight we had focaccia al pomodoro and con pomodorini and a salad nicoise

Today we had spaghetti with clams And grilled cuttlefish with zucchini scapece

I tried but didn't work for me, can't remember. 1 hour for a 10% solution? How long do you brine it for and at what %? I had a better result with "salted salmon", japanese style (3.5% salt rub on salmon weight for 2 days)

mm, sorry, meant to ask you yesterday night but not easy to write long messages on the Ipad. How do you take your claws out so neatly, any tips you want to share? What's at the base of the caviar? Yes, he likes it but, unless he is on holiday, he skips his breakfast and here are difficult to get proper fixings for it so we rarely cook it.

Mm84321, that bar! Basquecook, what a nice meal you were able to put together in so little time. Love the burrata dish. I'm a bit of a snob with that cheese because it's from where I'm from and even elsewhere in Italy doesn't taste as good as in Puglia to me. But now, of course, I'll rush and buy a burrata tomorrow... Dcarch, you, unimaginative? No possible. Beautiful, as usual. Your fault, we had white asparagus risotto. My husband complained I used too much butter and was too creamy. I wished I had a better rice...

Today's dinner was tagliatelle al ragu' And a salad of spinach, little gems, roasted beets, toasted slivered almonds, dodoni's feta, chive and a balsamic vinaigrette with a drop of blis oak barrel aged maple syrup.

To eat egg "a la coque" you pour it in a glass and add butter to it? Never thought of serving eggs this way. I should try it!

Yesterday, I was bringing home some white asparagus myself but didn't look too good. After seeing all these nice asparagus here, I need to get some on Saturday on the Italian Market. Beautiful blog Soba! I didn't realized you were blogging until yesterday. What would be a new proposition for me it's to use meat as a condiment. I love it very much but I feel I should be more moderate. I use this recipe but you can go even more minimalistic and really do with no meat. You start with a soffritto (onion, carrot and celery) plus garlic, herbs (parsley, basil, marjoram), here I added lardoons plus tomatoes (me a mix of cherry, black and peeled, what I had in the house). Cook slowly until the oil floats back on the surface. It's a tradition of the roman peasant cuisine.

Tonight we had spaghetti col sugo finto, " fake sauce" And a salad of spinach, confit tomatoes, croutons of a quick zucchini bread a made from the inside of the dolma from yesterday, olives de nyons and 21 months aged Comte. Tell me I can find at least 18 months old Comte in the US...I have a serious addiction and when I was in NY over Christmas I was able to find only the 12 months one.

I like a lot "Ris e erborin", rice and parsley in the tradition from Lombardy (with beef stock, rice cooked in the stock, potatoes and finely chopped parsley) Minestrone with rice, to serve lukewarm or cold, you can also pour in a bowl when hot and unmold in a plate. It's great in the summer. Minestra con i grattini (with are like little pasta crumbles you can make in a mixer) Pasta e patate in the Neapolitan style Meatballs soup with wild chicory Fish soups with all the Italian regional variations but I also like cataplana style or bouillabaisse

Ann_T, your pictures are so beautiful! Lovely meal. Rotuts, these ribs are very little effort and everybody found them delicious. It's a J. Mclagan's recipe. Season the ribs with salt, pepper and little 5 spices. Cook on a tray, over a roasting tin with some water, covered with foil (for 1 1/2 hours at 160 C). Meanwhile make the glaze. Soak 50 g tamarind pulp in 1/2 cup boiling water, let sit for half an hour. Add 90 g brown sugar, 2 tbsp fish sauce, juice of half a lime and some fresh grated ginger, plus some hot pepper if you like. Simmer 10 minutes. Pass through a coarse sieve and discard solids, let cool. When the ribs are cooked, turn on the broiler and bush with the glaze, let it cooked until nicely glazed.

Tonight we had tamarind glazed lamb riblets and zucchini dolma.

Dry the peel for Chinese recipes

I also tried this one! Very nice. I don't like mayo based potato salads and made it different times in last couple years.