Category Archives: foto

focaccia

The italian yeast I bought turned out to be not exactly what I thought it would be… It’s supposed to be just mixed with the flour and sugar, not with warm water first. So I wasn’t sure what to do. Bakeries in Europe must have some special line on yeast and baking powder because what […]

Pollo Pollo

Bella and I each stuffed our chicken breasts: hers with fresh mozzarella, basil and garlic; mine with beets, almonds, garlic and sage. Then we breaded them with leftover whole wheat breadcrumbs, rosemary and polenta, and baked them in lemon juice and broth. We also revitalized the rice pudding from the other night with a bit […]

concerto a cerreto

We walked down to Cerreto, a slightly larger village just below Pieve di Cerreto, and listened to the first half of this concert. The soloists had amazing voices — much better than the opera we saw on Sunday, though maybe it was just a better setting for this: a smaller space, much less traffic, and […]

Lasagna con zucchini e budino di riso

Monday Dinner, made possible by a generous donation of eggs from Giuliana (after Bella took blueberry muffins over to her) Lasagna noodles 50 g farina di semola 25 g farina integrale 25 g farina 1 egg, 1 T olive oil, 1 T water Layer with: Tomato-Meat sauce (from Saturday) Ricotta-Garlic-Basil-Red Onion-Egg-Pepper Sauce Stracchino Sauce zucchini […]

opera

Tonight we saw the first act of La Boheme. The cicadas and crying babies were a bit too much, and without supertitles, Isabella wasn’t too excited about it. The voices were a bit soft anyway, but it was a nice set!

pasticcini

Or at least that’s what the dictionary says. Muffins are pretty American, about as unlikely a find in Europe as brownies. But fresh blueberries were on sale (99 euro cents for 125 grams!) and I even found Italian-made bran cereal. The recipe is based on one from epicurious: Mix together: 1 egg 1/4 c sunflower […]

Gnocchi!

The people staying here last month left a bag of potatoes, so of course we must make gnocchi! My grandmother made this for us before I ever saw gnocchi on a menu. The first time I ordered it in a restaurant, I was surprised to see it and said, just like she did, “Gnawkey” — […]

nuoatare in Borgo a Mozzano

The town country club turned two of its tennis courts into 3 pools — a 30 meter lap pool and two small wading pools, one with a fountain. 6.50 euro each for the day until 7 pm. We were thinking we’d go to Bagni di Lucca today but when we saw the sign for this, […]

pompelmo

I love grapefruit, but even this seemed a bit odd. Bella insisted I should try it. So today for lunch (last night’s left-overs), I did. Not horrible… sort of like beer mixed with fresca, without the icky saccharine aftertaste. Not something I could drink everyday, it’s a bit too sweet and soda poppy for beer. […]

Dinner in Italy

We arrived in Pieve di Cerreto Thursday evening — too late to go grocery shopping, so we had our usual first dinner at I Macelli. Excellent as always, we sat near a German couple from Erfurt who were camping all over Italy. They came to see the famous bridge and read about the excellent restaurant. […]