briciole

sedano rapa

celeriac (or celery root)

 

The universe is complex: consider celeriac

I have always been intrigued by celeriac's shape. I have heard people at the farmers' market puzzling over this root vegetable and how to prepare it. In this article on NPR's Kitchen Window, it is called the "ugly duckling" of the vegetable world. I think it is a very interesting vegetable, both visually and as an ingredient. I have used it mostly in soups, one of which will be featured soon. I would suggest you give celeriac a try.

This is my submission to week #13 edition of Black and White Wednesday - A Culinary Photography Event created by Susan of The Well-Seasoned Cook. Savoring the weekly gallery is highly recommended: it's a very special mid-week treat.

The photo was shot in color and then converted to light sepia.

This post contains the gallery of images submitted to the event.

una fetta di panettone

a slice of panettone

It is rather early to talk about panettone, but I have had the opportunity to taste one now and so I'll write a short Holiday preview.

I have always loved panettone: more than any other food, it means Christmas to me. As I wrote in an older post:

Panettone and pandoro have attained national status as dolci delle feste. I spent my childhood and adolescence alternating between the two as my favorite. However, for several years now, I have been solidly in the panettone camp (though I understand people who think differently). The final choice may have something to do with the fact that I lived for 10 years in Milan, panettone's birth place. In December, pasticcerie (pastry shops) in Milan show their freshly-baked panettoni and oh my! it is difficult to resist.

Both panettone and pandoro are of soft, delicate texture. Panettone is studded with uvetta (raisins) and canditi (candied orange and citron peel), while pandoro is plain inside... The names panettone and pandoro contain the word pane (bread), suggesting that they are special breads, made for particular occasions.

Bauducco Foods is a company based in Brazil that was founded in 1952 by an Italian. I totally understand Carlo Bauducco's desire to bring to his adopted country one of the best traditional products of his country of origin. I actually made panettone at home two years ago. It is a rather lengthy process and not having a stand-up mixer made it even more laborious. Bauducco's website states that their panettone "takes 52 hours to produce due to the natural fermentation and cooling process." Panettone production cannot be rushed.

The result of my efforts was good... to make French toast. However, my heart skipped a bit when at some point my kitchen smelled unmistakably of panettone, a heavenly mix of sweetness, vanilla and citrus notes. When you unwrap a panettone, the fragrance that envelops you is the prolog of a complex gustatory experience. A slice of the tall, soft-as-a-cloud cake is a perfect combination of flavors and textures.

I was pleased by the softness of Bauducco panettone. My husband and I enjoyed a slice after dinner, by itself. My father used to cut the first panettone of the season after the traditional Christmas Eve dinner, and then we had slices of it and of pandoro pretty much every day during the Holidays. Come to think about it, this year, other things have been happening earlier than usual, including the first storm (which has been dumping rain since yesterday) and the first cold spell.

Many thanks to the Foodbuzz Tastemaker Program and Bauducco for offering me the opportunity to taste the panettone.

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

una fetta di panettone

or launch the una fetta di panettone 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.]

FTC discosure: as part of the Foodbuzz Tastemaker program with Bauducco, I received a 26 oz. sample of Panettone with raisins and a 26 oz. sample of Panettone with chocolate chips at no charge. I have not and will not receive any monetary compensation for mentioning the product on my blog.

un'enciclopedia "dolce"

a "sweet" encyclopedia

Italian biscuits, recipe from "The Cookiepedia" by Stacy Adimando

With a title like The Cookiepedia this book intrigued me all'istante (instantly). Once I had it in my hands, I found a number of things to like about it:

• an appealing graphical layout, which includes nice icons and space allocated for notes after each recipe
  
• a binding that allows the book to open flat: I like it when a cookbook stays open on its own without clumsy arrangements
• variations for each recipe: variations send the message that it is acceptable to play with a recipe and so they stimulate one's creativity
• while it covers traditional cookies like peanut butter, chocolate chip oatmeal raisin, etc., it also contains innovative recipes, like Cornmeal Cookies with Rosemary and savory Salt-and-Pepper Cookies (see below)
• it is a nice book not only for adults but also for younger bakers.

A cheerful cookbook

Most important in the list of things I like about the book is that I have made five recipes from the book and they all turned out very well:

1. Crinkles: a cross between a cookie and a truffle, they are a delight for the chocolate lover (photo on the left page above)
   
2. Italian Biscuits (top photo)
3. Green Tea Cookies (photo below)
4. Dried-Fruit Cookies
5. Salt-and-Pepper Cookies (photo on the right)

In all the cases, I halved the quantities and used some whole-wheat flour instead of white flour. In making salt-and-pepper cookies, I used flax meal and water as egg substitute, something that I had been meaning to try for a while: the substitution was fine.

As I write, I have made the Italian biscuits three times and the dried-fruit cookies twice. When I mentioned homemade cookies brought with us during a recent trip, I was referring to those two kinds. And I served the salt-and-pepper cookies with a soup that will be featured soon.

To see the first 16 pages of the book, go to this page and click on the link View interior spread. I have received permission to share one of the recipes I made: Dried-Fruit Cookies [pdf]. These soft morsels can be made with various types of dried fruit or a mix. I had flame raisins from the farmers market and that is what I used. I varied the recipe a bit by loweing the amount of sugar and increasing the amount of dried fruit (the latter move was unintentional, but it worked).

The language corner. The word cookie is actually difficult to translate into Italian and the Italian word biscotto is difficult to translate into English, though the dictionary tells you that their meaning is the same. As I have explained in this post, the difficulty lies in the evolution of the word biscotto in Italian and its adherence to the original meaning in the name of the baked product sold in the US (also featured in The Cookiepedia).

It doesn't help to clarify the matter the fact that it is difficult to find Italian biscotti in US stores and that their consumption is a totally Italian thing. In one of the recipes I tried, Ms Adimando uses the word biscuit in the British English sense, more similar to the Italian biscotto.

As I said, it's complicated. If I were to translate the book into Italian, I would probably title it something like enciclopedia di biscotti e pasticcini.

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

un'enciclopedia "dolce"

or launch the un'enciclopedia "dolce" 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.]

FTC disclosure: I have requested a review copy of the book mentioned in this post from the publisher and received it free of charge. 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.