A Super Simple Squash Soup like this is going to be perfect for the cold Autumn and Winter days. It’s made with just four ingredients – onion, garlic, squash or pumpkin and potatoes – and a bit of seasoning. I then pureed it to obtain what we Italians call a vellutata (smooth and “velvety” soup). If you use fresh bay leaves…
These tartlets, or tortini salati, as they’re called in Italian, are a wonderful Autumn appetizer. If you wish, you can of course make a big quiche instead of single-portion tartlets. For that, use a big sheet of puff pastry and twice the quantity of the overall ingredients. I’ve used fresh shiitake, and dried porcini mushrooms soaked in hot water. You…
This is the perfect salad for hot Summer days when you don’t feel like cooking, since the veggies – bell peppers and onion – can also be added raw instead of sautéed. I’ve used pearl couscous but you can use the plain one too for another no-cook option since it has to be soaked in hot water, whereas pearl couscous…
This recipe is an ode to Brassica (or cruciferous vegetables), a family of plants I really love. It also contains a few of Jerusalem artichokes, those cute little tubers that taste so much like real artichokes. If you can’t find them use a few boiled or steamed potatoes, always nice. So if you like these winter vegetables like me, this dish…
This salad is usually made with couscous, one of the many wonderful ingredients you can find on Sicilian menus. Couscous is part of the island’s tradition because over the course of the centuries Sicily got influenced by many different cultures and the Arabic one was one of them (see the history of the Emirate of Sicily). Couscous is typical of the…
If you’ve never eaten cime di rapa (broccoli rabe and rapini for our American friends) you might find them difficult to enjoy the first time you try them. They’re quite bitter and they perfectly embody the “acquired taste” concept. In general, Italians tend to love bitter flavours: think of artichokes, wild herbs like dandelion greens and chicory – yes, we…
Yes, another soup! I love soup and I hope you do too. This one is very easy to prepare and ready in no time: just make sure you cut the potatoes in small chunks and the cooking time will be reduced considerably. The broccoli needs just about 10 minutes to be nice and tender and while that happens you can…
This is the perfect detox soup after the heavier festive meals. It originates from Liguria, Italy, and it’s quite easy to make. It’s one of my family recipes and I love to prepare it with rainbow chard. Plain chard and wild spinach are great too!
