Tomatoes, leftover bread and a cookbook giveaway!
Except when I’ve been on duty for cooking classes, I’ve been taking it very easy in the kitchen lately. In great part, it’s due to the heat. Why cook when you can have tasty, nutritious,…
Cucina Conversations: Nonna Maria’s stuffed eggplants
My beloved Nonna Maria had a stroke almost two years ago. She never recovered. I was on holiday with TP and TT, in the Majella National Park of Abruzzo, when I got the news. My…
Cucina conversations: valerian salad with hard-boiled eggs, anchovies and spring onions
The rosettes of dark green leaves I was admiring at the Porta Palazzo farmer’s market was valerian salad. Not that I knew that at the time, during my first few months of perusing the stands…
False friends, the trouble with translating and two cicoria recipes
Beware of false friends. And no, I don’t mean the kind that are nice to your face but are mean behind your back. Though, you should probably watch out for those too. What I mean…
Cucina Conversations: Piedmontese Stuffed Onions
Leftover bread. It’s January’s topic for the Cucina Conversations roundtable and this month, Carmen, Daniela, Francesca, Flavia, Lisa, Marialuisa and I are sharing recipes from around the boot which include the staff of life. From…
Home for the holidays and two simple Christmas menu ideas
Home. Where exactly is home for me now? It certainly was a question I struggled to answer as I was ordering savoury pies, vanilla slices and coffees for myself and my family in the Tasmanian…
An ode to bitterness and radicchio
She’s sitting on her high chair, eager to join the grown-ups around her for dinner. It’s been a few weeks since I started introducing solids to her diet. I’ve opted to take a less consumerist,…
Learning to love pumpkins, what to make with them and another giveaway!
Growing up, Sunday dinner was almost always held at Nonna Sarina and Nonno Eugenio’s. And Sunday dinner almost always consisted of a roast veal or lamb, with some crisp potatoes and pumpkin to accompany the…
On preserving the taste of summer, two tomato recipes and a cookbook giveaway!
What can I say except that part of me doesn’t want summer, or rather, the fruit and vegetables that characterise it, to end? Mother nature would seem to agree with me too. There’s still plenty…