Cocoa and hazelnut dairy free biscuits

Autumn has certainly arrived and I am really looking forward to pumpkins, squash, chestnuts and all the typical seasonal fruit and vegetables. I love autumn colors and food. This is a very autumnal recipe perfect for celebrating the arrival of this season and another special occasion. In fact, today, 23rd of September is the autumn equinox which denotes the start of the new season and my sister birthday! Happy b-day sis!

The recipe I selected for today is a shortcrust pastry made using olive oil instead of butter. The inspiration for this recipe comes from Juls’ Kitchen, a fantastic Italian/English blog with lots of ideas and personal recipes. The first time I saw these biscuits I though that it was a fantastic idea but the thought of making a mayonnaise scared me a little. In reality, Juls’ instruction are perfect and easy and the result is impressive. In order to leave my mark and make the recipe a bit more autumnal I opted for a chocolate shortcrust biscuits topped with some fresh hazelnuts bought from a stall in our local farmers market.

If you decide to replace butter with olive oil in other recipes make sure to consider that olive oil is 99.9% fat while butter is made of 83% of fat, therefore you must take into account the percentage of water in the butter and remember that 100 g of butter are equal to 83g of olive oil plus 17g of water. 

DAIRY FREE BISCOTTI WITH COCOA AND HAZELNUT

For 4:

56 g egg yolks (about 3 medium yolks)
230 g 00 flour
75 g potato starch
65 g fine corn flour
140 g caster sugar
3 tablespoons cocoa powder
pinch of salt
175 g good quality extra virgin olive oil
35 g water
a handful of chopped hazelnuts

In the hand blender container pour the egg yolks and water and placing the hand blender to the bottom start blending. Slowly add the olive oil and keep blending until you have obtained the consistency of a mayonnaise, it should take 4-5 minutes. Sift the flours on a working surface and make a hole in the middle (i.e. the fountain). Place the sugar, salt, cocoa powder in the middle and then add the mayonnaise. Mix the mayonnaise first with the sugar and then with the flour using your fingers and knead the dough with your hands until you have obtain an homogeneous and smooth mixture. Leave to rest in the fridge for at least half an hour wrapped in a film sheet.

Heat the oven to 175°C. Take the shortcrust pastry out of the fridge and roll it on a lightly floured working surface until you have obtain a thickness of 5 mm. Cut using any cookie cutter shape you like. Place the cookies on a baking tin over a sheet of baking paper. Prick the cookies with a fork to give them a rustic appearance.

Bake the cookies for about 12 minutes. Remove from the oven and let them cool on a wire rack. Enjoy with a cup of tea or coffe.

Lo so non e’ una torta, ma questi biscottini sono molto intriganti e autunnali, perfetti per farti i miei auguri di buon compleanno! Un bacione sister!

Sweetcorn soup

Late summer is the best time for sweetcorn. When it’s fresh and straight from the field it is deliciously sweet and juicy. We picked a few sweetcorn cobs from our trusted local farm and decided to cook something a bit unconventional.

The idea for this soup came from a recipe by Debbie Major on the September edition of Delicious. The sweetcorn is contrasted by some tangy lemon juice and fragrant spices. The  bright yellow colour is a joy for the eyes. We served it accompanied with a slice of homemade soda-bread which we baked following our own recipe modified by substituting buckwheat flakes and hazelnuts to the oats.

ROASTED SWEETCORN SOUP

For 4:

3 sweetcorn cobs
30 g butter
1 onion
1 garlic clove
1 litre vegetable stock
juice of half a lemon
1 tsp smoked paprika
1/2 tsp ground cumin seeds
1 tsp tumeric

Preheat the oven to 200°C. Place the sweetcorn in a roasting dish and roast it for 30 minutes. In a large pot melt the butter. Chop the onion and the garlic clove and cook on low heat until light brown. Then add the vegetable stock and cook for another 10 minutes. when the sweetcorn is ready remove it from the oven, let it cool for 10 minutes and then separate the kernels from the cob by slicing with a sharp knife. Add the corn kernels to the pot, then blend with a food processor until smooth. Pour the soup into bowls, then drizzle with the mixed spices. Serve with a thick slice of warm bread, preferably a rustic wholewheat soda bread. Enjoy.

Elderberry juice

At this time of the year trees and bushes are heavy with berries of all colours. Everybody knows some of the most popular ones like blackberries but there are a lot of other edible berries just waiting to be picked in the English countryside. Take care when you are foraging for wild berries: there are poisonous berries that may seem quite similar to edible ones to the novice.

Elderberries are the fruits of sanbucus nigra which is found throughout Europe. The flower of the plant are also edible and are used to make syrups, drinks, cakes or in marmalades. Unfortunately, this spring when the flowers where blossoming we where away and we could not try out any Elderflower recipes, but thanks to our wet August there is now a huge amount of Elderberries everywhere so we picked a bucketful. Elderberries are abundant and  particularly easy to recognise, so there is minimal risk of poisoning yourself, but be careful, they are mildly poisonous when row and so they must always be cooked.

Elderberries have been used in traditional medicine for centuries and are believed to have many beneficial proprieties. I don’t know how much of this is superstition and how much is fact, perhaps there is a chemist among our readers that can give us more information. They make a good syrup and can be used in jams but we decided to make a thick strong juice to be added to apple juice or milk. The inspiration of this recipe comes from the River Cottage Hedgerow Handbook.

ELDERBERRY JUICE

1 kg Elderberries
1 l water
1 cup caster sugar

Wash the berries carefully then place them in a big pot with the water. Cook for 15 minutes on medium heat. Strain through a sieve, add the sugar and cook for another 10 – 15 minutes. Then bottle in sterilized glass bottles or jars. Add to apple juice or milk for a immune boosting drink.

Cherry tomato tart tatin

Summer is almost over here in England, although I’m not sure it ever started this year. Apparently this summer was one of the coldest in the last 30 years in the UK. I know that in Italy everyone is complaining for the very hot weather and probably reading these lines the only thought you have is “lucky you!”, but believe me, you would soon miss the true summer weather! Wearing socks all year round is a real failure!

Anyway, here is a delicious recipe for the last summer sunshine. A simple tart using red and colorful cherry tomatoes. As always we try to cook using seasonal and organic ingredient from our local farm. For this recipe I used a ready to use butter puff pastry, but if you have time you could make it from scratch.

CHERRY TOMATO and GOAT CHEESE TART TATIN

For 4:

300 g cherry tomatoes
a sheet of puff pastry 
50 g goat cheese
2 tbs extra-virgin olive oil
a handful of fresh basil and thyme

Preheat the oven to 200°C. Wash the tomatoes and place them in a heavy-based oven proof frying pan of about 24cm in diameter. Sprinkle with the goat cheese and some basil and thyme leaves. Drizzle with the olive oil.

Roll the pastry on a lightly floured work surface into a shape of about the same dimension as the pan . Cut it into a circular shape and then top the cherry tomatoes with the pastry, tucking in the edges well. Bake for 20 – 25 minutes. Stand for a couple of minutes and then  invert the pan onto a plate. Add extra thyme and basil leaves and serve.

Torta alla ricotta

Today is my mom’s birthday, so I decided to dedicate this post to her.  I baked a ricotta cheese cake with a raspberry coulis. It doesn’t look particularly pretty but it was very very good and received lots compliments from my colleagues. The base of this cake is made using a shortcrust pastry.

By coincidence in addition to my mom’s birthday is also the birthday of Michele’s mother.

So, HAPPY BIRTHDAY TO BOTH MOMS!!

RICOTTA CHEESECAKE

For a 18cm diametre tin:

250 g ricotta
80 g caster sugar
35 g flour
2 eggs
100 ml double cream
1/2 table spoon vanilla extract

For the raspberry coulis:
300 g raspberry (frozen or fresh)
4 tablespoon icing sugar
1 vanilla pod

For the base:
half dose of shortcrust pastry

Roll the shortcrust pastry using a rolling pin on a work surface between two sheets of baking paper until you have obtained a thickness of about 1 cm. Line a 18 cm diameter tart tin, previously buttered, with the sheet of dough. Make some small holes in the base of the cake using a fork. Cover with baking paper and ceramic baking beans to avoid bubbles forming in the tart during cooking. Cook in the preheated oven at 200°C for 20 minutes. Remove from the oven and let it cool.

In a big bowl whisk the ricotta using an electric mixer until the cheese is soft and airy. Add the sugar and flour and mix together until you have obtained a homogeneous mixture. Add the eggs, one at the time and mix well after each one. Add the double cream and vanilla extract and mix until you have obtained a smooth mixture. Place the mixture in the tin over the shortcrust base and bake for 50 minutes in the preheated oven at 180°C .

In a small saucepan add the raspberries, washed and dried, together with icing sugar and the vanilla pod cut lengthwise with a sharp knife. Cook gently, if necessary add a drop of water. Let it cook on slow heat until you have obtained a thick sauce, stirring occasionally. Strain the sauce through a strainer to get a smooth and velvety sauce.  Let it to cool and then cover the top of the cake.

Tanti aguri mamma! Ecco il mio modo per condividere con te una fetta di torta a distanza. Un bacio

Courgette blossom salad and focaccia

A new idea with courgette blossoms and an Italian classic, onion focaccia. During our weekly appointment at the local farm I couldn’t resist the temptation of asking for some more courgette flowers. The farm owner happily agreed and smiling explained to me that “English do not eat flowers, only French and Italian ask for courgette blossoms”, that’s why they do not have them in the shop. Which means extremely fresh courgette blossoms for us! This time we opted for an healthier fresh salad and I already have and idea for the next bunch, hoping to get them again. 

We served this salad with some onion focaccia, the autumn is coming and Michele is restarting his bread baking activity. He recently bought some fresh yeast from Shipton Mill, and he used some of to baking some baguettes and focaccie. We used the recipe from a very nice blog called Viva la focaccia where Vittorio, an Italian Ligurian, who is the son of a baker and now lives in California, explains step by step how to bake a perfect focaccia. We have followed his instructions diligently so there’s no need to repost the recipe here. Instead we’ll post only the salad recipe and some nice pictures.

COURGETTE BLOSSOMS SALAD

Ingredients:

6 courgette blossoms
1 small head of lettuce
1 tomato
a handful of mixed seeds (pinenuts, sunflower seeds, pumpkin seeds)
100 g small goat cheese
extra virgin olive oil and salt

Wash, drain and cut the salad and tomato and place them a large salad bowl. Gently wash and drain the courgette blossoms. Remove the stems and pistils and cut vertically in small strips. Add them to the salad bowl with the mixed seeds. Season with extra-virgin olive oil and salt, and gently mix. Serve with goat cheese flakes on top, accompanied by a slice of onion focaccia.

Courgette blossom salad and focaccia

Tagliatelle alle spugnole ready to be served

During the Easter holidays we went to Lausanne for a short break to visit friends and relatives. During the weekend the streets of the old city centre become busy with stalls of fruit and vegetables, bread, cheese and many other goodies. After a winter spent eating cabbage and potatoes we were amazed by the colour and variety of fresh produces. We refrained from falling into a buying spree, and, with more than a few difficulties we opted for a couple of smelly French cheeses and a small bag of dried Morchella (or Morel) mushrooms.

Quoting wikipedia: Morchella have a honeycomb-like cup composed of a network of ridges with pits between them. Due to their appearance in Italy they are called spugnole, from spugna which means sponge.  Morels are highly used in French cuisine and, commercial value aside, are hunted by thousands of people every year simply for their taste and the joy of the hunt. They are one of the few mushroom species that grow in spring. Genus Morchella is derived from morchel, an old German word for mushroom, while morel itself is derived from the Latin maurus meaning brown.

If you aren’t planning a trip to France in the near future, dried morel are fairly easy to find also here in England, for example at the cover market in Oxford. We decided to use half of our precious booty to make a delicious sauce for some homemade tagliatelle. The remaining we will probably use in a soup or risotto.

TAGLIATELLE ALLE SPUGNOLE

Tagliatelle (for four people):

4 eggs
400 g 00 flour
1/2 table spoon of olive oil

Sift the flour on a working surface and shape it into a mound with a hole in the middle (i.e. the fountain). Place the eggs and the oil in the hole and gradually incorporate the flour with the eggs starting by pinching them (see photo). Knead the dough with your hands for 20 minutes, until you have obtained a homogeneous and firm dough, if it is too wet add some flour, if it’s too dry add a tiny bit of warm water.  Leave to rest for at least half an hour. After this time take the dough and roll it on a wooden surface until you have obtained a thickness of about 2-3 mm. You could use a pasta machine, but the result wouldn’t be the same: the texture of the wood makes the pasta more porous which helps it absorb the sauce. Leave the dough to rest on the rolling pin (see photo) for about 20 minutes so that it dries a bit. Fold the dough making an “S shape” 5 cm wide and cut every centimetre to obtain tagliatelle. You can use the same dough to make lasagne or tortellini, but of course it needs to be cut differently.

For the sauce (for four people):

30 g dried morel
250 ml creme fraiche (low fat)
1 onion
1/2 glass of white wine
1/2 cup of milk
extra virgin olive oil
salt and black pepper

In a small container put 1/2 cup of water, 1/2 cup of milk, a pinch of salt and black pepper and soak the dried morels for at least three hours. Then drain them, keeping the soaking liquid and rinse them to remove any remaining dirt. Filter the liquid. Chop the morels and the onion.

In a large saucepan (it will have to be large enough to saute the tagliatelle with the sauce) heat some extra virgin olive oil and gently fry the onion, when it starts to brown add the morels. Cook for a few minutes, then add the white wine. When the alcohol has evaporated add the soaking liquid, cover and cook for 30 minutes adding some water if the sauce dries up.

In the meantime bring a large pot of water to the boil. Dissolve a tablespoon of salt and cook the tagliatelle for 3-4 minutes. In the saucepan add the creme freiche and stir. Drain the tagliatelle and quickly add them to the saucepan. Saute for a minute and serve.

Homemade pasta

Rolling the dough

Filed under: Pasta, Primi, Vegetarian Tagged: morel, pasta, spugnole, tagliatelle ]]> http://donotcallitbolognese.wordpress.com/2011/08/14/tagliatelle-alle-spugnole-tagliatelle-with-morels/feed/ 6 euandmi Tagliatelle alle spugnole Homemade pasta Rolling the dough http://donotcallitbolognese.wordpress.com/2011/08/11/gnocchi-de-susini-plum-gnocchi/ http://donotcallitbolognese.wordpress.com/2011/08/11/gnocchi-de-susini-plum-gnocchi/#comments Thu, 11 Aug 2011 20:39:15 +0000 donotcallitbolognese http://donotcallitbolognese.wordpress.com/?p=584 Continue reading →]]>

Gnocchi de susini

This is one of our favourite dishes, it’s a recipe typical from Trieste, but as many other traditional dishes from Trieste, it has an Austrian origin. It is perhaps a bit complicated to prepare but well worth the effort. The dough is the same as that of gnocchi di patate but this plum gnocchi are much larger and have a juicy plum at their heart.

Since plums are a summer fruit, I have always associated plum gnocchi to summer dinners in the hills of Trieste. Traditionally they can be served as a first course, with a topping of melted butter and grated cheese, or as a dessert, with sugar and cinnamon. We much prefer the latter, and that is the way my grandmother used to make them. Simply irresistible. A popular variant consist in substituting the plums with large cherries.

GNOCCHI DE SUSINI

For 4:

1 kg potatoes
12-15 plums
250 g 00 flour
30 g butter
1 tbs cinnamon
1 tbs caster sugar

Boil the potatoes until tender, but not too soft, otherwise they will absorb too much water and make the dough too sticky. Peel them and mash them with a potato ricer on a working surface and leave to cool for at least 20 min. Then add the sifted flour and mix until you obtain a homogeneous, slightly sticky mixture.

Wash the plums, cut them in half and stone them. Fill the cavity left by the stone with a teaspoon of sugar and recompose the plums.

Cut the dough into golf ball sized portions, flatten them with your hands or a rolling pin, place a plum in the middle and wrap the dough around it. Make sure the dough is sealed well, otherwise the juice will spill out during cooking.

Fill a large pot with water, bring to the boil and add a tablespoon of salt. Boil the gnocchi, not too many at the same time, otherwise they may stick to each other. Cook for 10-15 minutes depending on their size.

In the meantime heat the oven to 180°C. Melt the butter and use some to grease an oven pan (we used a cast-iron skillet which was perfect). Remove the gnocchi from the pot with a slotted spoon and place them in the oven pan. Sprinkle with sugar and abundant cinnamon, then pour the melted butter on top. Place the pan in the oven and cook the gnocchi for 15 min. Pour the sugary butter on top of the gnocchi and sprinkle with some additional sugar. Serve hot.

Courgette flowers and sage

On our last visit to our local farm shop, we spotted in the vegetable garden a lot of courgette flowers. They didn’t have them for sale in the shop so we asked if they could cut some for us. The very friendly lady agreed and asked what we wanted to do with them, adding that she had only tried them once, while in Italy.

Unsurprising. Fried courgette flowers are a classic and much sought after Italian dish, but hard to find because it is so uncommon to find courgette flowers in shops and when you do they are quite expensive.

We dipped the flowers in a wine-based batter and fried them. We served them with sage leaves prepared in the same way. The result is delicious and well worth the inevitable frying smell that will haunt the kitchen.

FRIED COURGETTE FLOWERS AND SAGE

For 8 courgette flowers and 10 sage leaves:

1 egg
100 g 00 flour
1/2 glass of dry white wine
2 tablespoon of extra virgin olive oil
salt and black pepper
1/2 glass of warm water
vegetable oil for frying

In a bowl sift the flour then add the egg yolk, olive oil, wine, salt and black pepper and mix. Then slowly add the warm water while continuing to mix until you have obtained a homogeneous mixture. If the mixture is to thick add more water. Leave to rest for an  hour. 

In the meantime wash and clean the courgette flowers, removing the stems and pistils. If the flowers are large cut them in half lengthwise. Whisk the egg white until stiff and gently stir it into the flour mixture.

In a frying pan heat the vegetable oil until very hot. Check the temperature with a small piece of bread, if it floats on the surface bubbling vigorously the temperature is just right. Dip the flowers and sage leaves in the batter, drip them briefly and then fry them a few at a time for about 30 seconds on each side or until golden. Remove them from the oil with a slotted spoon and rest them on kitchen paper. Sprinkle with salt and serve immediately.

Tomato and plum quinoa salad

It’s been a very busy week, I didn’t have the time for cooking and least of all for publishing any recipe. Due to lack of time, here is a simple simple recipe, and again gluten free! Well, this time I didn’t plan of doing a gluten free recipe, it just happened, I don’t even know why we had some quinoa in the cupboard.  We had an avocado, some cherry tomatoes and plums in the fridge and we combined them into a fresh and light tabbouleh.

TOMATO AND PLUM QUINOA SALAD

1 cup quinoa
15 cherry tomatoes
1 avocado
10 small plums
90g bean sprouts
1/2 onion, finely chopped
1 handful of thai basil
1 green chilli
1 tablespoon extra-virgin olive oil
salt

Soak the quinoa in cold water for 10 minutes, then drain it and rinse it under running water briefly. This should remove the saponin which would give the quinoa an unpleasant taste. Put the quinoa in a saucepan, cover with boiling water and cook for 15 minutes.

Finely slice the onion put it in a bowl with some cold water and set aside. Halve, stone and roughly chop the plums. Slice the avocado and seed and finely chop the green chilli and the cherry tomatoes. Chop the thai basil and put all the ingredients in a mixing bowl. Add the bean sprouts. Drain the chopped onion and add it. Season with salt and extra-virgin olive oil. 

Add the quinoa to the mixing bowl, stir in another drop of olive oil and then serve.