Some dishes make you travel into the past, bringing back memories forgotten at the bottom of some memory drawer. Ice cream cake is a classic example of a nostalgic trip. If you read the post, you will understand why. When I thought of sharing the recipe for this simple homemade dessert that Grandma, especially in the…
Desserts
Most of my grandma's recipes, like this robiola cake, live in our memory. Sometimes, I feel sorry thinking about the ones we lost. But, more often, I am happy for those we have recovered, patiently cooking until we have reconstructed the flavors we remembered. Nonna collected recipes as others do stamps. Her repertoire ranged from…
With nougat semifreddo, there is an almost familial connection. Semifreddo and, in general, spoon desserts make me think of the lunches that never finished when the adults stayed at the table for hours. And if the occasion was official, even we children had to remain seated until we were expressly authorized to leave the table.
Those were other…
Poached pears in alchermes, and cooked fruit in general, recall me the old-fashioned cuisine. When fruit, stored in boxes for the winter, was always present on the table.
Fresh and in season, or cooked. Today, I eat less fruit than I used to and, consequently, buy less.
And to think that until a few decades ago, when I…
What is a tradition? A habit, a repeated behavior?
Be careful not to confuse ritual and tradition. Tradition has to do with the transmission of memories, knowledges, and patterns of behavior from one generation to the next. The food, cooking it, serving it, sharing it is part of the tradition of family and social heritage that we pass…
Rice cake (Torta di riso) is typical of Bologna. Once, it was called Torta degli Addobbi (Cake of the Decorations).
Its name comes from the religious Feast of Decorations. On that occasion, people traditionally made and served it.
Feast of Decorations
During the late and early medieval period, heretical theories flourished that questioned the role…
How do you develop an original recipe?
This is the question I often hear. And I would like to answer it today telling you how the pear cake was created. The creative process never follows a single direction.
Sometimes inspiration comes from an ingredient, sometimes from a flavour. It happens that I visualize the project of a new…
Pellegrino Artusi, the gastronome who wrote the first collection of Italian recipes on a national scale, dedicates two recipes to Torta Ricciolina or Torta di Tagliatelle (although the more correct term would be Torta di Tagliatelline, since tagliolini are used instead of egg tagliatelle). There are several variations of this dessert, and more than one city…
Waiting for September to take stock of the things done, those still to be done and let some new project make its way through the pages of the agenda, I promised myself not to exaggerate. The uncertainty and peculiarity of the year, the things around me keep changing, pushed me towards a programming "at hand" and…
I look at the bowl on the table and can't wait to make the fig crostata, an appointment I look forward to every year in September. September has always been the month of new beginnings.
And while I indulge in the memory of the beautiful things of summer, with the arrival of September I change step. In…
