Homemade giardiniera is beautiful, colorful, tasty and very easy to prepare. It’s always ready for use and can be stored for several months. I serve it in combination with sliced or boiled meat, or simply use it to dress a rice salad. Giardiniera will always be appreciated by your guests because it is a genuine product made with your […]

It’s not news that I love to cook…and love to eat even more. It’s sort of like a chicken and an egg thing – do I like to cook because I like to eat or do I like to eat because I like to cook? It really doesn’t matter, but one of the things I […]

  I’m not one to eat something just because it has nutritional and health benefits – if it doesn’t taste good, I won’t eat it (unless someone comes up with a food GUARANTEED for instant weight loss or the fountain of youth, in which case all bets are off and I’ll try anything). Ancient grains […]

Just got back from a four day work trip and I had asked Dad to pick me up at the airport. It was 1:30 pm and I was tired but above all hungry.  It was rather cold on the airplane and I chose not to eat. My stomach was crying for a pizza.  German cuisine […]

When Laney arrived in Italy, I was so excited to finally meet her…and to get to know the American girl who would help me to speak English better and who gave me the opportunity to cook and join her blog! It was love at first sight! I spent three wonderful days with her, Monica and […]

Russian Salad is a very well known dish in Italy and was invented in the 1860’s by Lucien Olivier, a Moscow restaurateur of French origin.  Over time it has undergone many changes – it was known as Genovese Salad, and was considered one of the main dishes of Ligurian aristocratic gala dinners. And Italians have changed […]

Got the shopping list, dropped my son and next-door neighbours’ kids at school and heading like every Saturday morning to the farmer’s shop, north towards the hills. A plain, middle-aged woman with mud on her shoes will attend me in a 20 sq. meter barn transformed into a grocer’s shop. “Buongiorno signora come sta?”, she asks. […]

A few weeks ago, Monica wrote a terrific post explaining about all the different types of Radicchio  – and what better way to use radicchio than in an awesome pasta recipe. This is a local dish as this type of radicchio is grown in the province of Treviso, which is the area where I live. A  pretty plant, […]

Radicchio is like a religion in the province of Treviso, where I live. Called the “winter flower” because the traditional five month growing season is from November to March, it’s found absolutely everywhere.  There are always local festivals, fairs and events (this year there are 11) based around this beautiful vegetable. The red radicchio of Treviso, […]

   Cauliflower (cavolfiore in Italian) was one of those vegetables I ate but never liked. My mother cooked it only one way – steamed – which rendered it relatively tasteless and the kitchen smelling like…you know…  So I never made it for my family because they all professed to dislike it probably because the few times I […]