pedie

I live in the Los Angeles area and am able to drive over to the Gioia Cheese Co. in S. El Monte. The owners, Vito and Monica, are from Puglia and I consider their burrata very authentic. It is also sold, locally at least, at Bristol Farms Markets. They also have a wonderful fresh ricotta that is wonderful for holiday cannoli.

Kevin, that dessert looks wonderful! Last night I cheated a bit and started with a Trader Joe's Spelt with red and green bell peppers...but I built on it with pancetta, sausage, beans, rosemary, swisschard and stock. The end result was a fantastic thick tuscan soup with grilled pane that hit the spot on our "chilly" Southern California evening.

They would probably say it was Tuscan to begin with since "we all know that Catherine di Medici took all the Italian recipes with her when she went to France and thus developed French cuisine!" or so the myth goes...

I am reading "The $64 Tomato" by William Alexander and he talks about growing wild arugula. Said he let one plant overwinter and go to seed and the next spring three gardening beds and the gravel path were overrun with arugula!

I am participating in a class about Santa Fe and Taos. I have chosen to research the Cuisine and Indigenous Food of the Northern New Mexico. Can anyone recommend some good sources for my research? Often, Regional Cookbooks have excellent material and so I am looking for that type of reference. We will follow up the class with a week long trip in the area in April. You can bet I will comb this forum for your restaurant suggestions! Thanks for any help you can give me regarding comprehensive cookbooks.

I can only speak for Italian-American families, but all infants in our family started out with Pastina with a little butter and milk. as their first "solid." They scoffed at "pablum" babies.

Take heart...there are nice places in Westwood that will not break your wallet. A place we enjoy is Campagnola's at 1553 Westwood Bl. http://www.campagnolatrattoria.com/ Carlo and his brother are from Sardegna. Their food is authentic and the atmosphere is warm and friendly. If you travel south to Culver City there are a number of good restaurants in the newly gentrified area near the old Helm's Bakery that are also reasonable and quite good.

I recently read a novel that I enjoyed: Recipes for a Perfect Marriage by Morag Prunty (aka Kate Kerrigan). It contains two parallel stories of an Irish woman and her Irish-American grand-daughter (a New York food writer). Their two stories are tied together with recipes. Easy read covering food, generations and relationship.

That sounds great. Thanks Thanks to everyone for all the other suggestions as well. I, too, am salivating over the figs, with goat cheese, wrapped in prosciutto and passed under the broiler. The fig jam is also tempting. I have to act quickly because they do not keep long.

A friend gifted me with a good sized container of fresh mission figs from her tree. I am looking for some interesting new ways to use them. In the past I have made fig cake, or a fig compote to serve with a pork dish, or I have stuffed chicken breasts with a mixture of fig & goat cheese. I would like to try something new. Does anyone have a unique way to use this bountiful gift??

I know how treasured a good ricotta source is...so on the chance that those of you who live in the Los Angeles area are not aware of Gioia Cheese Co. I will share their information. Their company is located in So. El Monte at 1605 Portrero Ave. Besides the creamist ricotta they are famous for their authentic Buratta (featured at Valentino Ristorante) and fresh mozzarella in balls or knots. Vito and Monica are the owners...from Puglia. Monica works the front office and if you call ahead (626-444-6015), she will hold as little as 4 pounds of ricotta for you to pick up.

The baked rice looks very good and unique. I would like to try that. I smiled when I read about your purchase of cannoli tubes. We have cannoli on special occasions and always use the old family recipe as well as the family cannoli sticks. They were made by my Sicilian Immigrant grandfather. He took a broom handle, sanded it down so it was very smooth and clean. Then he sawed the handle into six inch lengths. Next he seasoned them by oiling them down with olive oil and baking them in the oven, taking them out, cooling them, oiling them again, baking them etc. over and over until he was satisfied that they were seasoned and would release the pastry when it was fried. We have used these sticks since I was old enough to recognize them. They get hot when we make the shells but they do release the pastry with a quick rap on the end of the stick with one of the other, cooled sticks. I have already put my name on them for the family "inheritance!" Our shells are made traditionally with flour, sugar, oil, egg yolk and wine and the ends sealed together with egg white. We roll them out quite thin because we prefer the crisp thin shell to the heavy one. Our filling is unique. Some of the family make the usual vanilla or chocolate custard filling. My mother prefers to use fresh ricotta cheese whipped up, then folds in freshly whipped heavy cream, some powdered sugar, vanilla. We fill the shells just before serving so they stay crisp, dip one end in chopped nuts (walnut or pistachio) and the other end in shaved chocolate. Dust with powdered sugar. They are very light. Meravigliosi!

I'd like to offer a couple of other cookbook suggestions. One we purchased on one of our trips. It is the book Sicilian Cookery by Eufemia Azzolina Pupella, ISBN:88-8029-596-9, that is for sale at all the souvenier kiosks throughout the island. It is the English language version. The recipes are authentic and each recipe has a slick colored picture of the finished dish. It has 212 recipes and is a great resource. The second is a book that features food, wine and travel in southern Italy...south of Rome, including Sicily, entitled "Salute!" by Gail & Kevin Donovan and Simon Griffiths. It is the result of a trip taken in 1999 by two restaurateurs, a chef and a photographer and in addition to great recipes, has a day-by-day account of the trip and fantastic photography of people, places and foods. ISBN: 1-57145-685-6. Mangia bene!

Absolutely...thanks for catching that! When the sirrocco blows it is hot enough without me adding to it by misinformation!

What a fantastic goal. I suppose it is true of much of Italy, but when you get into the country and the small comuni of Sicily, you can really experience the reality of living in an agricultural community that holds fast to tradition. The meals are prepared with what is in season and much of the conversation is of the weather and its effect on the crops. These are not large farms. Each family has an "orto", a kitchen garden that grows most of the produce for their own table. It is amazing to me how they produce so abundantly in hillsides steeply terraced in rocky limestone. I receive emails talking about the crops...their recent extreme heat (as high as 110 C) is causing the little olives to dry and drop to the ground so the local harvest will be small this year, reducing the amount of oil each family will produce from their family groves. Here is a picture of an orto in Ferla, near my cousin's house.

Tomorrow is our farmer's market and I lay in wait for the fishman who drives down from Oxnard, CA with the most wonderful fresh fish. Hopefully, he will have tuna and I can try a recipe that is buried in the book "Mattanza" by Theresa Maggio. The book is her experience in Trapani, Sicily exploring the mysterious world of the "tonnara," the ritual trapping and killing of bluefin tuna in the Mediterranean (not for the faint of heart...but traditional). Recipe is on p. 78 of the paperback version. The recipe is supposed to have Arab origins. The bluefin tuna steaks (about 3/4 inch thick) are soaked in red wine for a few minutes, then dried and dusted with flour. They are placed in a buttered pan (I am assuming deep skillet) with a few fresh mint leaves on top. To this finely chopped onion and bits of parsley are added. Then it is all covered with a layer of very thinly sliced potatoes. They are sliced so thin because they are supposed to break down to be creamy in the cooking. Salt and pepper and then pour in the wine in which the tuna was soaked, add just a little water, cover and cook over a very low flame. She warns to be careful not to let it stick, shaking the pan continually. Cook for about 20-25 minutes until the potatoes are creamy. Maybe it isn't correct to share a recipe that I have not yet prepared but it sounds worth a try and I will let you know if I get the tuna and have success.

My cousins live in a little mountain comune, Ferla, in the province of Siracusa. Every April they head out to gather the wild asparagi. They are slender stalks, with a stronger flavor and a bit more chewy than what we are used to. Yes, they saute it in olive oil, garlic, salt and pepper. Wonderful flavor.

Chris, What an exciting announcement! I live in the South Bay (Playa del Rey), subscribe to the Breeze, and have enjoyed your "off the beaten path" suggestions. It is exciting to think you will take your approach to fun, affordable eating nationwide. We appreciate your suggestions when there isn't time to cook and we don't want to break the bank, but want to enjoy what we eat. Buona fortuna!

We recently completed a four month remodel of our kitchen and main bathroom. The house is small with one spare room and a small half bath, shower, no tub. We got along just fine. I set up a camp kitchen in the spare room. It has bookcases, so I emptied one bookcase and turned it into empty shelves for my electrical appliances (skillet, crockpot, grill); stacks of paper plates, glasses, cutlery and utensils. We moved the kitchen table into the room and set up the coffee maker and the microwave. I emptied some of the hallway linen closet to use as a pantry with lots of canned items. The refrigerator had to be in the livingroom...yes, a bit of a distance from the spare room, but I considered it part of my fitness program. It actually was nice. You could almost reach the door while sitting on the sofa...and grab a cold drink while watching TV! We washed whatever we couldn't throw out in the tiny bathroom sink. It was fine. But then we did not have children and we knew that it was only temporary. We had take out often and microwaved leftovers. It was actually an adventure and we are enjoying our new kitchen immensely.

First I owe this Forum big time. As a result of registering on the Forum, braising has entered my life! Yes, I have also purchased a Mario Batali cast iron Dutch oven. I drooled over the Le Cruesets and if I ever received one as a gift I would love that giver forever...but I come from a depression era family where you find ways to meet your objectives in a very cost effective manner. After looking at Target and seeing the enamel chips on all the shelf items, I felt that wasn't "good enough." Someone on the list mentioned the MB line. I got mine from Amazon for $62.99, free shipping, no tax. And the color of red-orange looks great on my stove. Put a big smile on my face. Next I got the book recommended, "All About Braising" out of the library. After one pass through I knew I had to own it...so I got it from half.com for $9.99...brand new. (I do the search first through www.addall.com where they compare prices including shipping for all booksellers.) I have prepared the Coq au vin, the zinfandel pot roast, and a whole chicken adapted from a Lidia recipe. Unbelievably delicious...all of them. The pot works wonderfully. It has the little braising spikes in the lid so I do not follow the recipe suggestion for using parchment paper as a sealer between the lid and the food. It retains the moisture just great. Also, there is no issue with clean up...I just soak it a while in warm water and it cleans like a charm. And yes, I also know what to do with the left over wine.

That was one I looked at online. cooking.com has it for $29.95. Here is the link: http://www.cooking.com/products/shprodde.asp?SKU=136856 I would like to hear from someone who has used it before I invest in it. However, Cook's Illustrated is a good recommendation since they "seem" to do extensive testing before making a recommendation. Has anyone on this list used it?

I have my wonderfully renovated kitchen with lots of counter space. Now I need a plastic cookbook holder to prop up my cookbooks while protecting them from spatter. I've "googled" and get many different styles. Have any of you found one that you would recommend? I saw one that has a wood base and an adjustable plastic faceplate, but then I read a review by a user that said it is always coming apart and doesn't hold large books. I would appreciate any personal experience posts to help in my decision. And I thank those who reply to this post, in advance! :-)

I am glad you asked. We actually had a very nice meal at Ludwig's Restaurant at 2208 Fontaine Ave. It has Bavarian food and is owned and operated by Hans Gerstl. My husband truly appreciates good Bavarian and Austrian food so he had the Schwabisher Rostbraten (he can actually prounouce it correctly!) and I had the sauerbraten. They have a very full menu with many other traditional choices. Many guests were ordering their variety of sausages. They also served a wonderful cauliflower soup.

Thanks for all the suggestions. We returned home after a great trip to the Williamsburg area. As for restaurants, we had some hits and some misses. We did manage to get to Pierce's and Cities Grill, and enjoyed both. We took Pierce's to-go since we wanted some alcohol with the BBQ and Pierce's doesn't serve it. We also had a nice authentic Italian meal at Maurizio's in the Marketplace shopping center. It is owned by a family from Carini, a small village west of Palermo. Very authentic, down to the shouting out of instructions in Italian from across the room! It was fun and it was packed every night, with many locals. Very moderately priced. What drew us was the "pasta con sarde" on the menu. In our experience, it is hard to find. In Kitty Hawk, we had a hard time. Many of the places recommended were still closed. (Like Blue Point in Duck!) Must to too early in the season. So we ended up at the Black Pelican which was maybe a "7". Nice fresh scallops and fresh fried grouper.

Thanks for all the suggestions! We leave in the am and I will report back with any exceptional finds.