briciole

intervista a Marisa Churchill

interview with Marisa Churchill

oatmeal-raisin cookies from Sweet & Skinny

Prepare a cup of tea or coffee, grab a cookie (besides oatmeal and raisins, the cookies in the photo have pieces of chocolate and of walnuts), make yourself comfortable, and read on.

On March 24, I attended the Women's PowerStrategy Conference in Marin County, CA. What I have to tell about that day won't fit into one post, so I'll start by talking about meeting Marisa Churchill, pastry chef and author of the dessert cookbook Sweet & Skinny, 100 recipes for enjoying life's sweeter side without tipping the scales. Readers of this blog know that my recipes tend to be light on both sugar and fat. That's the way I like to eat. Listening to, and then conversing with a pastry chef that challenged herself to create 100 light desserts that are generous in flavor and satisfaction, was a special treat.

Before meeting Marisa in person, I read about her career as pastry chef, her Greek heritage, and her passion for swimming. And before sitting down for a one-to-one conversation with her, I listened to her lively presentation at the conference. Marisa organized her talk around the main ingredients of desserts: butter, eggs, sugar, chocolate, cream, flour, oil. For each ingredient, she discussed lighter alternatives that do the job, provide nutritional value and/or satisfy the requirements of people with special dietary needs. An example Marisa referenced in her presentation is her Chocolate-Buttermilk Cake, in which a finely shredded red beet disappears into the batter in terms of texture leaving behind its sweetness, while creamy buttermilk and yogurt enrich the cake and keep it light. Other examples I found particularly interesting are: a lighter version of whipped cream that uses gelatin, the use of crushed pineapple as sweetener (for example, in the macaroons that conference participants tasted during lunch), and browned butter.

Marisa told the story of a particular tough challenge she faced in creating a light version of kourabiethes, traditional Greek butter cookies. When Marisa's grandmother was a young woman, the king of Greece visited her town. For the occasion, she prepared a batch of kourabiethes. Upon tasting them, the king declared them the best he'd ever eaten. In thinking how she could win the challenge, Marisa had the idea of using browned butter, which is more intensely flavored and of which therefore she could use less. Pasta with browned butter and mizythra cheese is a dish her grandmother used to prepare for her and the flavorful memory put her on the right track.

solidified browned butter

As soon as I got home that day, I made a small batch of browned butter and used some to prepare scones (more details when I write a post about them). I hereby declare that I am a convert. Marisa explains how to make browned butter and other "sweet foundations" in the first chapter of "Sweet & Skinny", which then goes on to cover, among other topics, American classics, sweet treats, and Holiday favorites.

For Marisa, creating the recipes for the book was a nice challenge at a point in her career when she was looking for one. She worked in her own kitchen to develop and perfect all the recipes, some of them taking longer than expected to obtain the desired balance of lightness without sacrificing flavor and texture (for example, this PB & J cookies). Besides the ones already referenced, two more recipes are available on this page.

My conversation with Marisa flowed easily and I can see how we could have continued chatting for a long time, as you'd expect if you bring together Greek and Italian blood over the topic of food.

I know I have readers in Greece, so I want to let them know that Marisa has been featured in the press and on television there, as you can see on her website's home page. 

A few words about the cookies in the top photo. The originals are called Oatmeal-Sour Cherry Cookies (page 47) and are included in the chapter dedicated to Americal classics. The alternative use of raisins is included in the recipe, while the use of finely chopped chocolate instead of chocolate chips is my idea. The book does not show a photo of the cookies as they came out of Marisa's oven, so I don't know how my rendition fares next to them. I hope Marisa will be satisfied. During our conversation, we talked about the use of flax meal and water as egg substitute, something with which I have just started to experiment and which I used in this recipe.

Oops! I'd better bake more cookies: those are all gone.

FTC disclosure: I have purchased the copy of the book mentioned in this post. I have not and will not receive any monetary compensation for discussing the book on my blog. The views expressed in the post are my own.

cuori di barbabietola rossa ricoperti di cioccolato

chocolate-covered red beet hearts

[cliccare il link per andare alla versione in italiano]

chocolate-covered red beet hearts

In recent months, I have talked about chocolate-covered pecans and pistachios, so you may think that I am in a chocolate-covering spree, but what I am describing here actually predates my experiments with nuts. A couple of years ago, one morning, I woke up with the idea of dipping pieces of roasted red beets into melted chocolate. I dismissed such flight of fancy, but it would not go away, so I followed it and charmed many people with the result. This year, on Valentine's Day (giorno di San Valentino), I realized the idea again (slightly differently) and I am sharing it here.

Please, suspend your disbelief. The combination of red beet and chocolate is used in cakes like this one, so why not pair just those two ingredients?

red beet heart, heart-shaped cutter and red beet leftover

These hearts are easy to make and quite pleasant to eat. And as chocolates go, they are rather healthy:

• dark chocolate, in moderation, is good for us
• there is no added sugar
• the core is made of a root vegetable.

My small heart-shaped cookie cutter is perfect for this use, as it makes bite-sized hearts (it is 1.5 inch long and 1.5 inch wide).

Ingredients:

• red beet(s), unpeeled, rinsed and scrubbed well
• good quality chocolate that you know is already tempered (like bars made for eating): I use about 2/3 chocolate with 70% cocoa content and 1/3 chocolate with 60% cocoa content

Preheat the oven to 375 F. Wrap beet(s) in foil, place on a baking sheet, and bake until easily pierced with a knife. Let cool until easy to handle, then slip off the skin. Cut into 3/8-inch thick slices and carved out bite-sized hearts using a small heart-shaped cookie cutter. Set aside the leftover for salad, soup or risotto.

Note: If you are like me and prefer to buy bunches of beets with their greens still attached, cut the greens an inch above the beet, then proceed with the preparation. I usually bake a number of beets at a time, for efficiency's sake. There are many ways you can use them, besides the one described here (for example, this soup or this spread). I also set aside the greens to make a frittata or to add to kale in this dish. And I prepare the stalks in this way.

Melt the chocolate according to the instructions in this article (see also quote below). You'll need a good thermometer that gives you the required accuracy. It is very important that you chop the chocolate finely. Put the chocolate in a small non-reactive metal bowl placed over a pan with steaming (not boiling) water. Make sure the bowl does not touch the water and that no water gets into the chocolate. Melt as directed, checking the temperature regularly:

Stir constantly until about two-thirds of the chocolate is melted. Take the bowl from the heat and continue stirring until all the chocolate is melted. For dark chocolate, you want the whole mass to end up at 89 to 91 F (87 to 98 for milk and white).

Line a plate or baking sheet with wax paper. Spear a red beet heart with a toothpick (stuzzicadenti) and dip it into the melted chocolate. Lift it out and let excess chocolate drip a bit, then drop the heart onto the wax paper. Dip the tip of the toothpick into the chocolate and drop a tiny bit of it to cover the hole left by the toothpick on the surface of the heart. Repeat until you run out of red beet hearts or of chocolate.

Don't waste any of the chocolate: when you are down to just a little bit, use a piece of bread to scrape the bottom of the bowl clean (fare la scarpetta).

Let the chocolate set well, then remove the hearts from the wax paper and enjoy. As you bite, the thin layer of chocolate gives way of the soft red beet and the flavors of the two meld well in your mouth. A lovely treat.

This is my contribution to edition #321 of Weekend Herb Blogging, an event started by Kalyn of Kalyn's Kitchen, now organized by Haalo of Cook (almost) Anything at Least Once and hosted this week by Lynne of Cafe Lynnylu.

This post contains the roundup of the event.

Both images above were manipulated using Snapseed, a software Lynne told me about: thank you, Lynne!

Click on the button to hear me pronounce the Italian words mentioned in the post:

cuori di barbabietola rossa ricoperti di cioccolato

or launch the cuori di barbabietola rossa ricoperti di cioccolato audio file [mp3].

[Depending on your set-up, the audio file will be played within the browser or by your mp3 player application. Please, contact me if you encounter any problems.]

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red beet, chocolate

cuori di barbabietola rossa ricoperti di cioccolato

cuori di barbabietola rossa ricoperti di cioccolato

In questi ultimi mesi ho parlato di noci pecan e pistacchi ricoperti di cioccolato, quindi potreste pensare che sono preda di una piccola fissazione, ma in realtà quello che descrivo in questo post precede di diverso tempo i miei esperimenti con la frutta secca. Un paio d'anni fa, una mattina mi sono svegliata con l'idea di intingere nel cioccolato fuso pezzi di barbabietola rossa cotta al forno. Ho tentato di convincermi che era un'idea un po' troppo strana, ma dal momento che non mi lasciava in pace l'ho realizzata e ho incantato molte persone col risultato. Quest'anno, per San Valentino ho realizzato di nuovo l'idea (in modo solo leggermente diverso) e ora la condivido sul blog.

Per favore, non siate increduli. Il connubio barbabietola rossa e cioccolato è usato in torte come questa qui, quindi perché non unire questi due ingredienti da soli?

cuore di barbabietola rossa, stampino a forma di cuore e "negativo" del cuore

Questi piccoli cuori sono facili da preparare e un piacere da mangiare. E rispettano la salute:

• il cioccolato fondente in moderazione fa bene
• non contengono zucchero aggiunto
• il "ripeno" è fatto di una radice salutare.

Il piccolo stampino per biscotti a forma di cuore che ho è perfetto per questo uso poiché produce cuori di 3,8 cm: insomma, dei bocconcini.

Ingredienti:

• barbabietola rossa intera
• cioccolato di buona qualità in tempera (come le barrette pronte da mangiare): io uso 2/3 di cioccolato con 70% di cacao e 1/3 di cioccolato con 60% di cacao

Scaldare il forno a 190 C. Pulire bene la barbabietola (o barbabietole), avvolgere in pellicola di alluminio, porle su una lastra da forno e cuocerle in forno fino a quando è facile perforarla con una lama. Lasciar intiepidire e poi rimuovere la buccia. Tagliare a fettine di 1 cm di spessore e usare lo stampino per ricavare dei cuoricini. Mettere da parte gli avanzi per un'insalata, zuppa o risotto.

Nota: Se siete come me e preferite comprare barbabietole con ancora attaccate le foglie, tagliate i gambi 3 cm sopra alla radice e poi proseguite con la preparazione. Di solito cuocio un certo numero di barbabietole per volta, per amor di efficienza. Potete usarle in diversi modi, a parte quello descritto in questo post (per esempio, una zuppa o una crema da spalmare). Io utilizzo le foglie per fare una frittata o insieme al cavolo riccio in un gratin. E anche gli steli li preparo gratinati.

Fondere il cioccolato secondo le istruzioni in un articolo (vd. anche la citazione qui sotto, traduzione mia). Avrete bisogno di un termometro accurato. È importante che tagliate il cioccolato finemente. Mettere il cioccolato in una ciotola di metallo non reattivo posta sopra una pentola con acqua che produce vapore (ma non in stato di ebollizione). Assicurarsi che la ciotola non tocchi l'acqua calda e che nemmeno una goccia d'acqua finisca sul cioccolato. Fondere come da istruzioni, controllando spesso la temperatura:

Mescolare in continuazione fino a quando 2/3 circa del cioccolato sono sciolti. Rimuovere la ciotola dal calore e continuare a mescolare fino a quando tutto il cioccolato sia sciolto. Se usate cioccolato fondente, la massa deve avere una temperatura tra 31,7 e 32,8 C.

Foderare un piatto o una lastra da forno con della carta oleata. Infilare uno stuzzicadenti nel centro di un cuore di barbabietola rossa, sollevarlo e immergerlo nel cioccolato fuso. Farlo emergere, aspettare qualche secondo che il cioccolato in eccesso scoli e poi depositare il cuore sulla carta oleata. Intingere la punta dello stuzzicadenti nel cioccolato e poi far cadere una goccia di cioccolato sul buco lasciato dallo stuzzicadenti sulla superficie del cuore in modo da coprirlo. Ripetere fino all'esaurimento di cuori di barbabietola o di cioccolato.

Non sprecate il cioccolato che rimane in fondo alla ciotola: fate la scarpetta!

Lasciar riposare fino a quando il cioccolato si è ben solidificato, poi togliere i cuori dalla carta oleata e gustarli. Quando si dà un morso al cioccolatino, lo strato di cioccolato si spezza facilmente e lascia spazio alla morbida barbabietola rossa e i due sapori si combinano bene in bocca in una dolcezza sfiziosa.

Questo post è il mio contributo all'edizione numero 321 di Weekend Herb Blogging, un evento creato da Kalyn di Kalyn's Kitchen, organizzato ora da Haalo di Cook (almost) Anything at Least Once, la cui versione italiana è organizzata da Brii di briggishome, e ospitata questa settimana da Terry di Crumptes & co.

Questo post contiene il raccolto dell'evento.

regalo di Natale e crostata delle Feste

Christmas gift and a Holiday tart

Che cosa ti ha portato Babbo Natale? (what did Santa bring you?) is the question often asked this time of the year. In the past, I had expressed the wish to have a magic wand. This year, Santa brought me one: Babbo Natale mi ha portato una bacchetta magica.

Here it is, resting next to some of the cards (biglietti) I received as part of the North Redwoods Book Arts Guild Holiday card exchange (this photo album shows them all). They are all beautiful and they make up this year Holiday decor at our house.

On Christmas Eve (vigilia di Natale) I made a crostata with apple, rhubarb and strawberry preserves (conserva di mele, rabarbaro e fragole) and decorated the surface with Babbo Natale shapes (instead of the traditional lattice).

briciole's recipe for crostata di marmellata

Speaking of Babbo Natale, don't you think he could live in this pretty house?

I know, those are not reindeer (renne), but elk (wapiti), there is no snow (neve), and the house is actually the Little Red Schoolhouse in Stone Lagoon, CA. But still, I like to think that Santa would enjoy living here. (The Roosevelt Elk are free to roam and they do, often crossing Hwy 101, which runs nearby.)

In case you are wondering, I am still getting acquainted with my magic wand.

Click on the button to hear me pronounce the Italian words mentioned in the post:

regalo di Natale e crostata delle Feste

or launch the regalo di Natale e crostata delle Feste audio file [mp3].

[Depending on your set-up, the audio file will be played within the browser or by your mp3 player application. Please, contact me if you encounter any problems.]

tart, dessert

noci pecan ricoperte di cioccolato

chocolate-covered pecans

For the current edition of Cook the Books, we are reading Molly Wizenberg's A Homemade Life: Stories and Recipes from My Kitchen Table, an autobiography with recipes at the end of each chapter. One of the recipe pages is titled Bread and Chocolate and it starts thus:

This is a simple trick familiar to every French child. There’s something surprisingly right about chocolate and bread together, all that dark, rich sweetness against the chewy, salty crumb. It’s one of my favorite snacks.

I am Italian and grew up eating bread and chocolate (pane e cioccolato) as a snack. My home town, Perugia, is also the home of Perugina, a world-famous chocolate factory. However, I think that my upbringing is similar to that of many others in the chocolate-producing parts of Europe. In other words, I have known the pleasure of eating bread and chocolate for as long as I can remember. And I wrote about it some time ago, in an article titled Bread, Chocolate and Happiness:

The next time you look for a tasty snack or want to pamper yourself — or just because — break a piece of your favorite chocolate and cut a piece of freshly-baked, unflavored, good quality bread (maybe baked in your own oven), sit down and focus your attention on the flavors and sensations in your mouth, the contrast between the smooth chocolate and the bread textures (crunchy crust, soft crumb), the way both soften in your mouth and one melts, the meeting of the twine brought about by considerate chewing, the gingerly sojourn in your mouth that allows all taste buds to get their share of the flavors, the slow-motion swallowing that sends parting thoughts tinged with sweetness. A marriage of human bread and godly chocolate was celebrated in your mouth.

Inspired by the theme of chocolate, I decided I would try to do something I had had in mind for a while. Two events combined to direct my actions. First, an appreciation for chocolate-covered pecans, a kind of nut with which I became familiar only after moving to California. Second, in doing some research for an article on chocolate making, I ran across this piece by Shirley Corriher about chocolate tempering. Tempering chocolate is something I was apprehensive about doing at home, mostly because it uses a quantity of chocolate that goes beyond what I want to deal with in one session. In any case, the article explains how to avoid tempering chocolate if you start with tempered chocolate. (Another article from the same author is here: you want to focus on the paragraph titled A Radical Shortcut to Tempering.)

Armed with the information in the article, some good chocolate and pecans, I got down to work. I did not look at any recipe, because I knew what I wanted: simply toasted nuts covered in bittersweet chocolate.

Ingredients:

• good quality chocolate that you know is already tempered (like bars made for eating): I use about 2/3 chocolate with 70% cocoa content and 1/3 chocolate with 60% cocoa content; I suggest to start with 3-3.5 oz. (85-100 g) of chocolate
• pecan halves
• cacao nibs (granella di fave di cacao), optional

Toast pecans in a 350 F (175-180 C) oven. The amount of time it takes depends on the oven and on the size of the pecans. In my experience, there is a fine line between not toasted enough and burnt, so every time I toast a batch, I keep a close watch. I set the timer for 10 minutes, and follow the progress very closely, adding time as needed. Let the pecans cool while you prepare the chocolate.

Melt chocolate according to the instructions in the article (see also quote below). You'll need a good thermometer that gives you the required accuracy: I have such a thermometer, which I need for cheese making. It is very important that you chop the chocolate finely: this will take a bit of time. I place chocolate in a small non-reactive metal bowl placed over a pan with steaming (not boiling) water. Make sure the bowl does not touch the water and that no water gets into the chocolate. Melt as directed, checking the temperature regularly:

Stir constantly until about two-thirds of the chocolate is melted. Take the bowl from the heat and continue stirring until all the chocolate is melted. For dark chocolate, you want the whole mass to end up at 89 to 91 F (87 to 98 for milk and white). As long as you haven't exceeded 92 F, your beta crystals should be fine...

If you use this shortcut method, you should still test the chocolate on parchment or waxed paper to make sure that the chocolate sets up hard and shiny.

Verify that your chocolate is indeed in temper. Smear a thin layer onto a piece of parchment or waxed paper, then wait five minutes and try to peel the chocolate from the paper. If it peels easily and the chocolate is shiny, not blotchy, you're fine. [source]

Prepare a tray (like a baking sheet) lined with parchment paper. When ready, toss some of the pecans into the chocolate, stir to coat well and then use a fork to pick them up one at a time (if you want individual chocolate-covered pecans), or at the same time shape them into small clusters of 2-3 nuts. Deposit pecans on the parchment paper.

As you add the pecans and stir to coat them, the temperature of the chocolate decreases and the consistency is no longer nice and fluid, so you'll need to warm up the chocolate slightly before you cover the next batch of nuts. Again, make sure the temperature remains within the limit of temper.

When you are left with a small quantity of chocolate in the bowl, covering pecans becomes difficult, so you can toss into the chocolate cacao nibs: stir, shape with a spoon and deposit on the lined sheet (see the morsel on the far right in the photo).

I have already made three batches of chocolate-covered pecans and the only problem I have encountered is controlling consumption. I found the oyster half-shell while walking on the beach and I thought it would work well as a small bowl.

This is my contribution to the current edition of Cook the Books, hosted by Deb of Kahakai Kitchen. You can find the guidelines for participating in the event here, and here is the announcement.

This post contains the roundup of the event.

Click on the button to hear me pronounce the Italian words mentioned in the post:

noci pecan ricoperte di cioccolato

or launch the noci pecan ricoperte di cioccolato audio file [mp3].

[Depending on your set-up, the audio file will be played within the browser or by your mp3 player application. Please, contact me if you encounter any problems.]

pecan, chocolate

un weekend di cioccolato

a weekend of chocolate

This past weekend was all about chocolate, since I participated in two events, both having chocolate as theme.

On Saturday, I took a short class called "Build your own chocolate bar" at Coco-luxe Confections. The certificate for the class was my very first purchase on Groupon, back in January. What attracted me to the class was the chance to play with chocolate — and play I certainly did.

After the introduction, each participant was given a tray with six molds. Each working table had a selection of ingredients to be used to enrich the bars: from nuts to crumbled fortune cookies, from dried tart cherries to cayenne, smoked salt, and sage. The photos are not great, partly due to the light, partly to the need for me to concentrate on what I was doing (photographing while working with food still does not come natural to me), but they show the combination of ingredients I chose for each bar.

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This is the list of added ingredients by bar (left to right; click on a thumbnail to view photo):

1. pistachios (pistacchi), cocoa nibs and a hint of smoked salt
2. toasted coconut (noce di cocco), sage (salvia) and a hint of red salt
3. banana chips and cocoa nibs
4. tart cherries, almonds (mandorle) and cayenne
5. crumbled fortune cookies and cayenne on one side, white chocolate (cioccolato bianco) and allspice on the other
6. crystallized ginger on one side, sage and pistachios on the other.

The hazelnuts (nocciole) and peanuts (arachidi) in the last two molds are used as indicators (one side has one nut, the other side two), since one side has different ingredients from the other. Thinking about flavor and texture pairings was totally absorbing and really fun.

Once we finished preparing the molds, we lined up to fill them by ladling dark chocolate (61% cacao) from the tempering machine. Each tray was then placed on the vibrating table to let air bubbles come to the surface and escape. The trays were then cooled to let the chocolate set, and finally we unmolded our bars.

Before we got busy packaging our creations, our instructor talked about how to temper chocolate at home. The rationale behind tempering was not new to me, but the presentation was interesting as I learned useful bits of information to remember later when I try doing this at home.

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• 
• 

The first mold I filled, I went a bit overboard, as it is clear from the flaps of chocolate around the sides, but then I got better and the other bars came out nicely. The little holes on the surface indicate that the bars could have used a bit more vibration. We were given foil, boxes and labels to package the bars and personalize them (see the last photo of the set). While working on our bars, we tasted some of the truffles that are produced by Coco-luxe. The pretty decoration on the top clearly identifies the flavor of the filling.

We also played a game: we were given samples of four kinds of dark chocolate bars to taste and we had to guess the percentage of cocoa in each one of them. I did my tasting and my guessing and when the answer was revealed, it turned out that I had guessed correctly (apparently, the first one to do so since they started the game). I won't reveal the answer here, since I assume that they will continue to play the game. It was actually a very interesting exercise for our taste buds.

On Sunday, I visited the San Francisco Chocolate Salon. I had been there two years ago and enjoyed myself, so I was looking forward to my visit. Overall, I must say that this time I was disappointed. According to this list, there were 41 companies, out of 75 participants, that presented products that had to do with chocolate. Since that was public information, the responsibility is mine for not considering it carefully. Still, I am wondering what was the role of the other vendors, like wineries and vacation resorts, in the context of an event about chocolate.

I focused my tasting on solid chocolate, which is where my interest lies. Of the previosly unknown to me brands that I tried, I did not like any (and some were really unpleasant to my palate). The best part of the morning was talking to some of the vendors, all of chocolate that I already knew and liked. Here are some details:

Madécasse: If you are not familiar with this company, they are quite unique in the bean-to-bar world, because they have the whole production in Madagascar, from cacao tree growing to chocolate making and bar packaging. As you may know, cocoa beans are harvested but usually not processed where they are grown. I discovered Madécasse chocolate some time ago in a store in Berkeley (it was actually the bar packaging that first attracted me).

Other companies whose chocolate I know well are Alter Eco, Divine and Taza. In different ways, they all pay special attention to the well-being of the cacao producers and at the same time make chocolate that I like.

I also want to mention Vice Chocolates: their bars (made using chocolate from Venezuela) have interesting flavors, my favorite being the one with dried figs and anise seeds. Chocolatier I-Li Brice is usually at the Temescal farmers' market on Sunday, which is where I first met her and her products. I love chatting with her when I stop by to get some bars and truffles.

I didn't taste this truffle, but I was intrigued by the choice of filling. There was also another vendor who had goat cheese truffles.

I decided that I prefer Italian chocolate festivals, like Eurochocolate, which happens in October in my home town of Perugia, and Cioccolatò, which happens in the spring in Torino (Turin). Kathy of Food Lover's Odyssey visited this year's edition of Cioccolatò and wrote this post, which includes some nice photos. Torino is a city with a long tradition of chocolate making: It was there that gianduia and gianduiotti were created. This video shows in fast motion how the big chocolate scupture representing the 20 regions of Italy was assembled. This was part of the celebrations for Italy's sesquicentennial. Torino was the first capital of the newly born country.

Click on the button to hear me pronounce the Italian words mentioned in the post:

un weekend di cioccolato

or launch the un weekend di cioccolato audio file [mp3].

[Depending on your set-up, the audio file will be played within the browser or by your mp3 player application. Please, contact me if you encounter any problems.]

conserva di frutta

fruit preserves

[cliccare il link per andare alla versione in italiano]

Last year I wrote a post on marmellata, where I described how I was making jam, or, to be more precise, fruit spread. This past June, I purchased a book called Preserving the Taste by Edon Waycott. I also took a conserve making class from June Taylor. As a result, recently I have been following a different process to preserve fruit. I am still exploring different options and nothing is settled, but I can tell you a few things I have been experimenting with.

First of all, I am still not using pectin. Waycott's book lists fruits by pectin contents. Since I like to mix different kinds of fruit to make a jar of preserve, I choose a combination that sounds interesting and gives me a good quantity of natural pectin. I now macerate the fruit for several hours before cooking it, after adding an amount of sugar equivalent to 20% of the weight of the fruit (weighed after being prepared). I cook the fruit for a shorter time than I used to. Finally, I jar the hot preserve according to the method described in this post (see step 4).

This being blackberry season (stagione delle more) and blackberries being plentiful around me, I have been using this fruit, usually in combination with apples (mele). I purée the blackberries and run through a mesh strainer to remove the pips. It is a bit of work, but I think it is worth the effort. Plus, I love the color of the resulting preserve. The photo shows apples and blackberry purée in the saucepan.

My most recent experiment was rather accidental. I made macedonia di frutta (fruit salad) with a mix of ripe fruit (no sugar or lemon juice, just a fruit medley), and added to it palline di melone (small melon balls). I ended up making a bit too much and decided to turn the leftovers (avanzi) into the beginning of a batch of fruit preserve. I added more fruit, mostly apples, sugar, some fresh orange juice and macerated for a few hours. 

By then, there was a lot of juice in the bowl, quite a bit of it due to the melon. I filtered some of it (about a cup) into a small saucepan and boiled it gently until reduced by half to obtain sciroppo di frutta (fruit syrup). I put it in a small sterilized jar, let it cool and stored it in the fridge. I will figure out a nice way to use it. I poured the fruit and the rest of the juice in a saucepan to make preserve.

I don't peel the apples and mash them with a potato masher after 10 minutes of cooking. I then cook a bit longer, the exact amount of time depending on the state of the fruit mixture: keep in mind that it will thicken as it cools. After I turn off the heat, I jar the preserve right away, as described in the post mentioned above. Once cooled, I label the jars so I know what fruit is in it, the quantity of sugar and the date of preparation. I store my vasetti (jars) in the fridge. I am also testing a different set up for longer term conservation, but I prefer not to describe it until I have the results of my experiment.

A suggestion for using preserves: offelle di marmellata.

Thanks to Ruhama of rumahama, I learned about the Virtual Jam Swap organized by Aimée of Under the High Chair, so to this interesting event I am sending this post as my little contribution.

Hear me pronounce the words on the conserva di frutta audio file [mp3] or go to the conserva di frutta audio page for more listening options.

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Per i lettori italiani. L'anno scorso ho descritto in un post come facevo la marmellata. Lo scorso giugno ho comprato il libro Preserving the Taste di Edon Waycott e ho anche fatto un corso breve sulle conserve con June Taylor. Il risultato è che ultimamente seguo un procedimento diverso per fare le conserve di frutta. Sono ancora in fase di esplorazione, ma posso dirvi che esperimenti sto facendo.

Prima di tutto, continuo a non usare la pectina. Il libro di Waycott ha una lista dei vari tipi di frutta organizzata secondo quanta pectina contengono. Dal momento che mi piace mescolare diversi tipi di frutta per fare un vasetto di conserva, scelgo una combinazione che mi attira da un punto di vista del gusto e che contiene una buona quantità di pectina naturale. Macero la frutta per diverse ore prima di cuocerla, dopo aver aggiungo una quantità di zucchero equivalente al 20% del peso della frutta preparata. Cuocio la frutta per un periodo più breve di quanto facevo prima. Infine, invaso la conserva bollente secondo il metodo descritto in questo post (paragrafo 4).

Essendo questa la stagione delle more, ho usato spesso questo frutto, di solito insieme alle mele. Frullo le more e le passo al setaccio per rimuovere i semini. È un po' un lavoraccio, ma ne vale la pena. E poi mi piace il colore che le more danno alla marmellata. La foto mostra il passato di more e le mele a fettine nella pentola.

Il mio esperimento più recente è stato piuttosto accidentale. Ho fatto della macedonia di frutta con un misto di frutta matura (senza zucchero ne' succo di limore) e ci ho aggiunto delle palline di melone. Ne ho fatta tanta e con quella avanzata ho cominciato a farci della marmellata. Ci ho aggiunto più frutta, soprattutto mele, zucchero e un po' di succo d'arancia e ho fatto macerare per alcune ore.

A quel punto, nel contenitore con la frutta c'era molto succo, soprattutto dovuto al melone. Ne ho filtrato un po' (circa 240 ml) e l'ho fatto bollire piano in un pentolino fino a quando si è ridotto della metà. Ho messo questo sciroppo di frutta in un vasetto sterlizzato, l'ho fatto freddare e poi l'ho messo in firgorifero.  Poi penserò a come utilizzarlo. Ho versato la frutta e il resto del succo in una pentola per fare la conserva.

Non sbuccio le mele e le schiaccio con lo schiacciapatate (il link fa vedere la foto del tipo che ho io) dopo 10 minuti di cottura. Poi continuo la cottura, il numero di minuti dipendente dallo stato della frutta, tenendo conto che si rassoda quando si raffredda. Appena spengo il fornello invaso la conserva, come descritto nel post citato in precedenza. Quando i vasetti sono freddi, scrivo sul tappo che tipo di frutta contengono, la quantità di zucchero e la data di preparazione. Conservo i vasetti nel frigorifero. Sto anche provando un modo diverso per la conservazione più a lungo termine, ma preferisco non parlarne fino a quando non ho i risultati del mio esperimento.

Una cosa che mi piace preparare con le mie conserve: offelle di marmellata.

Questo è il mio piccolo contributo all'evento Raccolta delle conserve organizzato da Lacerba di Succulento e light. La mia conserva di frutta è certamente "light" per quanto riguarda la quantità di zucchero.

I contributi all'evento li trovate qui: Raccolta delle ricette per fare le conserve

cioccolato

chocolate

In a post I wrote last year, I revealed that I eat a small piece of extra dark chocolate (un pezzetto di cioccolato) every day as part of my breakfast. I should add that I eat at least another small piece later on in the day as well. My piece of chocolate comes from a chocolate bar (in Italian: tavoletta di cioccolato). (The expression fair trade chocolate in Italian is cioccolato del commercio equo e solidale.)

Chocolate has been part of my diet for as long as I remember. Being born in Perugia, a city with a renowned chocolate factory, Perugina, had definite advantages: chocolate was very much part of life. (If you are interested, in this article there are a few tidbits about Perugina and its famous Baci.) [The photo on the left shows a chocolate rendition of the griffin, one of the symbols of the city, displayed in the window of a pastry shops in downtown Perugia.]

The passion for chocolate, born early, has stayed with me: I am always eager to try a new bar of chocolate, provided it contains at least 70% cocoa (cacao) and only natural ingredients. I may go as low as 68%, if I become convinced that the reward will justify making an exception. I am usually not enthusiastic about added flavored ingredients. In any case, when I try a new brand, I go for plain chocolate.

Last March, I visited the San Francisco Chocolate Salon at Fort Mason, hoping to find hitherto unknown bars to add to my list of favorites. I was interested in the so-called bean-to-bar manufacturers, i.e., chocolate makers that buy cocoa beans (chicchi di cacao or fave di cacao) and process them to make chocolate bars, cocoa powder, cocoa nibs, etc.

At the Salon, a lot of the exhibitors offered cioccolatini (chocolates), some beautifully crafted and decorated, some that included interesting ingredients. I admired them without tasting, as they are not really what I like. Laura of Tiramisù was there as well, and she wrote a nice report on some of the products. (We didn't know each other back then, we have since met in person.)

What I look for in a morsel of chocolate is an intense, interesting and pleasant flavor that develops as the chocolate melts in my mouth and then stays with me for a little while afterward. I left the Salon with no new addition to my shortlist, a couple of Neo Cocoa truffles (tartufi) for my husband and a gorgeous antique book on cocoa, a temptation I was not able to resist. In fact, Omnivore Books on Food had a table with chocolate-related books, both new and from the past.

The chocolate bars in the photo come from my current little stash and are: Ezca bar (78% cocoa) from Escazu, a manufacturer in North Carolina that hand writes the batch number on each bar [bottom], and Tcho "Fruity" (68% cocoa, one of the exceptions I mentioned above) from Tcho, a manufacturer in San Francisco, whose factory store I am planning to visit soon. A bar of Apamate (73.5% cocoa from Venezuelan Caranero beans) from Chocolates El Rey, a manufacturer in Venezuela was nearby, but it was still unopened and I decided to leave it that way and not include it in the photo.

Hear me pronounce the words on the cioccolato audio file [mp3] or go to the cioccolato audio page for more listening option.

marmellata

jam

The Italian word marmellata and the English marmalade derive from the Portuguese marmelada, quince jam (from marmelo, quince, which in Italian is mela cotogna). Marmellata is generic, i.e., it is used for preserves made with all types of fruit.

My mother used to make marmellata di ciliegie (cherry jam) and marmellata di pesche (peach jam) for which I provided labor: cherry pitting in the first case, peach peeling in the second. Both tasks were preferable to bean shelling (recently mentioned), because I could occasionally divert pieces of fruit to my mouth. One day, I asked my mother to make a batch of peach jam with only 1 part of sugar to 10 parts of fruit. I loved the result, which here would be more appropriately called peach spread. 

This past summer, purple plums (prugne) inspired me to make my own version of fruit spread. And to add a local twist to it, I used lavender honey (miele) I bought at the farmers' market. As mentioned in another recent post, I am not a fan of pectin, so I let the marmellata di prugne simmer for a fair amount of time. For each kilogram (a bit more than 2 lbs) of fruit, I weighed 100 g (3.5 oz.) of honey (I also made one batch using 3 oz. of agave nectar for the most recent Daring Bakers' challenge).

In a saucepan, I created a well with the fruit and placed the honey in the central empty space. I brought the fruit to boiling point, then let it simmer, without stirring, until it was quite soft. I used a potato masher to reduce the fruit to pulp, added 2 tablespoons of fresh lemon juice, then put the pan back on the burner for another, shorter, period of simmering. Once jarred, I stored it in the fridge. I have used my spread to make, among other things, delicious crostata di marmellata (jam tart).

2009 update: As a result of taking a conserve making class from conserve-maker extraordinaire June Taylor, I have substantially changed the process I follow to preserve fruit. I am still refining the method. The method I currently use is described in this post. To be continued.

Hear me pronounce the words on the marmellata audio file [mp3] or go to the marmellata audio page for more listening options.

la Befana

I should start by wishing all of you Buon Anno (Happy New Year), since this is my first post in 2008. We had two intense weeks between December 23 and January 6. We spent Christmas in the Bay Area, where we still live part of the time, then we visited my father-in-law and his wife, and finally we spent a week scuba diving with friends. We did not stay up until midnight on December 31, but we celebrated Capodanno (New Year's Day) in a nice way, immersed in nature and in the company of good friends.

I was planning to talk about la Befana which is celebrated on January 6. It was a holiday when I was a kid, then it was no longer a holiday for a few years (it was decided that the Italian calendar had too many holidays, so some of them were canceled) and finally it was reinstated. The actual religious holiday is called Epifania (Epiphany). If you have never heard of la Befana, and therefore don't know what she looks like, on this page you can see a couple of photos of a modern incarnation of her on a site dedicated to la Befana and to a celebration that occurs every year in a village in central Italy. Then come back here for more.

"La Befana vien di notte con le scarpe tutte rotte" is the beginning of a rhyme about la Befana that has many different variations in terms of how it proceeds. I actually remember only as much as I wrote, which in English reads la Befana comes at night with her shoes all tattered-and-torn. Children expects la Befana to fill their stockings with candies and chocolates if they have been good during the preceding year, and with lumps of coal if they have been not so good. I always found a piece of coal in my stocking, which was black, hard, made of sugar and not particularly tasty. Every year, my father would tell me that the prized items in his stocking were mandarins and oranges, not candies and chocolates.

My father used to recite another rhyme about this day. The first part was in Italian: Pasqua Epifania tutte le feste porta via (Epiphany carries away all the holidays). In fact, the day after la Befana we would usually dismantle the Christmas tree and put away all the decorations. The second part was in the dialect spoken in his village and my writing is an approximation of his pronunciation: poi revè Sant'Antognetto e ne reporta 'n saccoccetto (then Saint Anthony arrives carrying a small pocketful of them). The feast of Saint Anthony Abbot is celebrated on January 17. What does the saint have to do with a small bagful of holidays? To get the answer you will have to wait until the right day.

Every year my favorite square in Rome, Piazza Navona, hosts the Fiera della Befana, a colorful fair that I remember visiting when I was a child and was already in love with that elegant urban space. I no longer leave my stocking out on the eve of la Befana, but I am still attached to the old lady that makes children happy (hence the stylized smiley face on the sand, an image taken recently at Point of Sand, Little Cayman island).

Hear me pronounce the words on the Befana audio file [mp3] or go to the Befana audio page for more listening options.

cartolina da Perugia: pinoccate

postcard from Perugia: pinoccate
also called pinocchiate

A pinoccata (or pinocchiata) is a lozenge-shaped sweet made with zucchero e pinoli (sugar and pine nuts). Altrimenti detto (in other words), a pinoccata is pure indulgence. As you can see from the photo, pinoccate can be either white or brown (if cocoa powder is added to the two main ingredients). They are traditional Christmas sweets.

When I was a child, my father, responsible party for the Holiday sweets' shopping, would by some for my mother, who loves them. I would take just a bite and did not need more, because pinoccate are intensely, intoxicatingly sweet. You can chew your mouthful or, like me, you can let the sugar melt in your mouth to leave behind a small cluster of tasty toasted pine nuts, whose flavor slowly emerges as the sugar wears off from your taste buds. 

 Let me introduce you to one of the most important monuments of my home town: the Fontana Maggiore, a gorgeous fountain built in 1275-78 adorned with sculptures by Nicola and Giovanni Pisano (a father and son team).

The building you can see behind the fountain is the city hall, Palazzo dei Priori, the first portion of which was built between 1293 and 1297. The entrance to the building is around the left corner, on Corso Vannucci. Perugia is actually much older than all that: the Etruscans started building massive walls around the city in the 6th century BCE.

This is a closer view of the door to the Sala dei Notari (go inside if you happen to visit: it is a beautiful, stately room) over which stand guard the two symbols of the city, il grifo e il leone (the griffin and the lion). These are reproductions: the original bronzes are kept in a museum. My higher than ground level vintage point was achieved by walking up the steps on the side of the cattedrale di San Lorenzo: in truth, this cathedral is not particularly striking from the outside, though this should not prevent you from going inside, a highly recommended move. There is much more to see in Perugia, but I will stop here for today.

From the steps of the cattedrale I will make a couple of announcements regarding special events.

• Menu for Hope 4: Chez Pim's event in support of the UN World Food Program is on, and I invite you to visit her web site and read about how you can participate in this great initiative.
• FreeRice: Novel Food co-host Lisa has posted about this entertaining way of donating grains of rice to the same program. I am scoring quite well in the game: how about you?
• Food Blog Awards 2007: It's nomination time over at the Well Fed Network site, in 14 categories. Until the end of Wednesday, you can nominate blogs in some or all of them. Then it will be time to vote on the five blogs chosen among the ones nominated in each category.
• Weekend Herb Blogging: Kalyn's brainchild has reached edition number 112 and this week I have the high honor of being the host.
• Last, but not least, Aspettando Natale/Waiting for Christmas: Francesca is hosting this bi-lingual Holiday event that is expected to collect a great selection of recipes. I am working on a special creation for the occasion.

Hear me pronounce the words on the pinoccate audio file  [mp3] or go to the pinoccate audio page for more listening options.