Mascarpone Cake and Philosophical Discussions

So, its been 7 weeks now since we arrived in Modena.

The nights are getting longer and the chill in the air is starting to bite first thing in the morning.
Italian children go to school wearing 4 to 5 layers of clothing, only to have them removed meticulously, once inside. The temperature in the classrooms can rise up to 38 degrees celsius, and thats without the heating on lol.

In my classroom, temperatures rise quite high on a Tuesday and Thursday evening. Don't get me wrong, I do love all my students, but I have a weak spot for this group because they do enjoy a heated debate.

Now, picture the scene. A group of youngish professionals, highly educated and incredibly communicative, chatting to each other about the meaning of happiness and what defines intelligence in an English level equivalent to that of a semi beginner! I am so proud of them! I am in awe of them!
I throw little hooks in to get them chatting and I sit back and enjoy it to the full, whilst correcting, practising, drilling and teaching here and there.

But it is them who make the lesson. With their enthusiam, knowledge, insights and thirst for learning that make it an incredible experience! I can honestly say that I enjoy every microsecond of it...

So this recipe comes from one of those amazing characters.
Vannalisa is sweet, genuine, incredibly keen and molto, molto carina (lovely).
Her mum is an amazing cook and Vanallisa has shared this recipe with me, which is particularly special to her because her mum has cooked this cake for her every year on her birthday!

It is very similar to Tiramisu but with slight variations! I hope you do try it.

Mascarpone Cake

Ingredients

  

. 500 gs of Mascarpone (you can find it at in the fridge counter at the supermarket. It's very common in Italy!)

 .100 gs of thinly cut toasted almonds

. 20 dried biscuits ( original recipe asks for 'Savoiardi' or ladyfingers,  but I prefer normal dried biscuits, for example 'Oro Saiwa' or 'Pavesini') 

. 15 to 20 macaroons such as 'amaretti'

. 250 gs of sugar

. 250 gs of chocolate flakes

. Coffee liquer 'Sassolino' for soaking the biscuits . As you prefer. If you don't like liquer, like me, you can soak them in some milky coffee and you will still have a very good cake!

 . 3 eggs

Method

Separate the egg yolks from the whites

Mix the egg yolks with the sugar. Whisk the whites (very well, please!) and mix the yolk and sugar mixture, including the whites with the nascarpone.

 
Add the crushed amaretti and toasted dried almonds.

Before putting the biscuits into the cake dish, soak them in the Sassolino or simply in the milky coffee (I think it's better, especially for your son, you dont want him to get drunk lol)

Be careful when you soak them as the biscuits must remain whole.

Pad the cake dish with the biscuits, creating the base and edge of the cake.

Pour over a layer of the mascarpone mixture and top with biscuits. 

Repeat as above, layer upon layer, ( your final layer should be of the mascarpone mixture).

Garnish the final layer layer with the chocolate chips and place in the fridge foor a few hours.

Buon Appetito!

I hope you like it. 

With love,

Vannalisa

 

Gnocchi with Traditional Italian Tomato Sauce

First all I am sorry, so sorry, so very sorry, for having neglected you all but, please read on and you will surely understand...she said hopefully...

So now for a huge update:
After many trials and tribulations in the UK, I was offered a teaching position in Italy, in the area I had visited whilst on holiday.
The offer was tempting-a good school and amazing food|
It took me a while to make my mind up but in the end I thought it would be a good cultural experience for my self and 'Iloveflavourme JR,' i.e my 6 year old.

So I packed my pans and he packed his toys and we both headed off to the land of Balsamic Vinegar, Modena, just outside of Bologna.

We have been here for just over a month now and it certainly has been an Experience, with its ups and downs and plenty of yummy pasta and pizza to make up for it.

My students have been the most positive aspect of it all. Very friendly, warm and so keen to put up with me!.
I am grateful for the hours of enjoyment, while they endured the hardship of trying to understand what the hell this weird British woman is teaching them, or even, saying to them!

You should be able to gather by now that I have bullied them into reading this blog and therefore need to keep them sweet as possible!
But seriously, they really are a great bunch and have managed to smooth some the harshest aspects of the cultural shock involved when moving to another country.

A few weeks back I gave them an assignement. The assignment was to write a typical recipe of the region in English. You can see how unselfish I was being in my request!!

In return, I promised that I would publish this recipe on the blog and therefore make them famous all over the internet.
Of course they did not believe a single word of that, but being the kind, hospitable souls  they are, they granted me the privilige of getting to know some of their culinary secrets and hey presto! I managed to get myself some yummy recipes!
I also promised them I would publish the recipes one at a time, as they were sent, with no ammendments! They should be proud of their English, unless they used Google translator, of course...yes, you know who you are lol

This recipe comes from a lovely lady called Maria Grazia! She has the warmest of smiles and she never, ever stops smiling either!!
She is indeed a Ray of Sunshine in the classroom, even at 8 pm on a cold Tuesday evening!

Thank you Maria Grazia!

'Gnocchi di patate

Ingredients:

1 Kg. Potatoes

200 gr.of  flour

50 gr. Parmesan cheese grated

70 gr. Butter

Salt

Boil the potatoes in their skins, drain, peel and mash dropping the mash on the floured pastry board. 

Then mix with the flour and pinch of salt.

Mix the ingredients well and knead.

Cut the mixture into small dumpliongs, and one at a time, roll on the fork by pressing with your thumb.

Place on a floured cloth until ready to use. 

Bring to boiling salted water, toss the gnocchi in and remove them with a slotted spoon when they start to float (drain well)

Arrange on warm serving dish, sprinkle with melted butter and grated Parmesan cheese and serve.

 I like this dish with tomato sauce: some onions, carrots, celery and fresh tomatoes.

In a small pot, pour in some olive oil or butter, add onion, carrot and celery cut  in small pieces and simmer on a low fire

Add the tomato cut into small pieces,and simmer

Add salt to taste. and last, before finishing, add 4 or 5 leaves of basil.

Buon appetito

Maria Grazia'

TORTELLINI and my Internet Connection

My most humble apologies!

I have had many problems with my Internet connection and it has been impossible to post or reply to anything.

Hoping to be able to get it up and running again.

In the meantime, I would like to ,while I can lol, share the recipe for tortellini.

I had this in Modena-the region where it's originally from-cooked by a real Italian Mamma!

The recipe I'm publishing here is actually from a Bologna local- a Bolognese?? - with his own wonderful website and I think his recipe is the closest to the original.

So here's Alessandro Guerani's Recipe from his Foodografia website:


TORTELLINI

The following ingredients are for about 12 persons.

The pastry
2,2 lbs flour, 8 eggs.
Pound the flour with the eggs until you'll get a homogeneous dough. Spread the dough upon a flour covered table and roll it out until you get a very thin pastry without holes in it. Cut then the pastry in squares large 1 and half inches at max.

The filling
3.5 ozs turkey breast, 3.5 ozs veal meat, 3.5 ozs pork lean meat, 3.5 ozs Parma ham, 3.5 ozs Bologna sausage, 7 ozs grinded parmesan cheese, 1 egg, butter, salt, powdered nutmeg.
Brown the turkey, pork and the veal meat in some butter. When they'll be well cooked, put them together with the ham and the bologna in a meat grinder. Add then the parmesan cheese, the egg, the salt and the nutmeg. Blend all the ingredients together until you get a homogenous mixture.

Closing the "tortellino"
It's the harder part of the recipe but after a bit of practicing and some waste you'll get some results, maybe not perfect but palatable.
Going to the practical side you have to bend the square of pastry, with some filling inside, to form a triangle. Grasp then the two corners of longest side of the triangle and push them behind, until they overlap, then you can join them together with some finger pressure.
The first ones you'll create won't be good looking for sure, but try to taste them (tortellini are good to eat even raw). If they taste good in your mouth then you succeded!

The stock
2.2 lbs beef, 1 lb spongy beef bone, 1 lb beef tongue, 2.2 lbs chicken or capon meat, 1 carrot, 1 celery rib, 1 onion, 2.5-3 galons of water, salt.
Tortellini must be cooked in some stock. There are no alternatives, don't even ask! The stock must be prepared with the above ingredients that you have to left to cook in the water for about 4 hours.
I really enjoyed it :)!