Too many days of holiday and you don’t know anymore how to don’t get bored??? My suggestion is … cabaret with ” La Clique“.
I went to see the show some weeks ago and i never been to a cabaret before. It was full of people (that make me think they are use to this kind of entertainment) and very funny. The 2 hours passed super quickly and it was very nice to have an alternative to the usual cinema.
The show take place in the Roundhouse in Camden, an amazing place full of musical history and very interesting just to visit, reading all the big events happened in there.Inside there is a little bar where you can have drinks and popcorns… so i was really really happy!
The characters who create the show are just incredible, funny and really good. Lots of participation from the audience of course, but lots of laughs too. If you want to leave a different and strange afternoon, don’t miss the show!
PS. Mamy Julio mi ha portato a questo spettacolo di cabaret qualche settimana fa e mi sono morta dalle risate! all’inizio pensavo ” che cosa strana”, invece sembra che gli inglesi ci siano mlto abituati perche era pieno. Comunque e’ stata un’idea simpatica, per alternare anche un po’ il cinema e i personaggi dello show erano proprio assurdi!
Recipe 111: and always to follow the tradition, in the new year’s eve dinner i served also the Cotechino with Lentils. This is very common in this date, because in Italy we say the lentils brings money in the new year, so basically everyone eat lentils also if they don’t like them so much!
And this is what happened also in my party, where the majority were french and they have never even try Cotechino before. I’m not a big fan of the this kind of pork sausage, because i find it a bit too greasy, but this one i cooked this year it was really good. My mum’s friend gave it to me saying that it was special made and she was right (grazie Marcella il cotechino era squisito!).
The ingredients i used for 10-11 people are : 400gr green lentils, 1 can of tomatoes sauce, 1 carrot, 1 celery, 1 onion, salt, 1 cotechino pre-cooked (it’s easier ) of 500 gr, but if you are thinking to serve just that or you know you guests will like it, take 1 kg at least.
So i started cooking the lentils and following the recipe i found on the green lentils Sainsbury’s bag. You don’t need to soak them and you will put them directly in a big sauce pan covered with cold water. Add half a carrot in pieces and half a celery in pieces to give flavor, wait until the water will boil and put up the fire for 10 minutes without covering the sauce pan. Then put down the fire a bit and let them cook covered this time, for other 15-20 minute.
In the meantime in another saucepan put the other half of the carrot and the celery and the onion all cut in very little pieces, add some oil, and let it cook a bit. when the onion get gold and the rest is quite cooked, add the can of tomatoes sauce and some salt. Mix and let it cook.
When the lentils are ready take them off the fire, drain them form the water and put them in the tomatoes sauce. This is going to give a better taste to everything. At this point the lentils are ready and we can start with the Cotechino!In the box you will find an aluminum bag with the precooked cotechino inside. You will need to put it in a saucepan with boiling water for 20 minute. After it you can take it out form the saucepan and you will cut one corner of the aluminium bag to drain the cotechino from the water that come out cooking it.
Then place the Cotechino on a plate and take off the skin. It’s an horrible image, but it’s very easy. Then cut it in pieces and place it with the lentils. The secret is to serve it hot, so what i did is to prepare it in the afternoon, and just hot it up with the lentils before to serve it. In this way the lentils will take the rich taste of the meat and this won’t be in direct contact with the fire, so won’t become too dry, dark or hard, but just a bit hot.
To close the New year’s eve menu’, was missing a cake and i made a stuffed Panettone… very easy, traditional and good! In reality i was looking for a pandoro to stuff, but here in London they don’t sell anymore pandoros after Christmas day!!!!!! I was shocked.
However i found for miracle this little panettone and i cut it in slaces that i filled with my home made cream. The recipe is here! I also added some pieces of chocolate torrone from Rome and the dish is done!!!
Buon appetito and Happy New year to all of you!
Ps: Mamy che te ne pare del cotechino e del Panettone! Sono troppo fiera di me! Gli ospiti si sono finiti tutto! e devo dire le lenticchie con gli odori mi sono venute spaziali ed il cotechino era veramente buonissimo! aveva proprio ragione Marcella. Pou volevo fare il pandoro farcito ma qui dopo Natale non si trova piu nulla. Assurdo! quindi ho ripiegato su un panettone piccino che ho trovato al supermercato che pero aveav le ciliegie nere dentro invece che l’uvetta. Vabbe non avevo altra scela, ma con la crema e’ venuto buonissimo. Insomma tra il torrone e le lenticchie con il cotechino che portano soldi e l’aiuto di Julio per servire il tutto, ho affascinato i francesi!
This year i decided to challenge myself with the new year’s eve menu’ for 11 guests! I decided to do the classic dishes we cook in this date and it was a real success!
Recipe 112: the lasagna is a very practical dish because you can prepare it a bit before, even the night before and just put it in the oven at the last moment. On top of that it’s a very good solution when you have a good number of guests and it also quite easy to cook and serve.
Here the ingredients for 12 people or 2 trays: 500gr of De Cecco pasta for lasagna ready for the oven, 3 mozzarelle (150 each), Parmesan, 250gr beef mince meat, 250gr pork mince meat, 2 cans of passata or chopped tomatoes sauce, salt, pepper, a glass of red wine, nutmeg, chilli, 1 carrot, 1 onion, 1 celery and for the besciamella i used 150grof butter, 1 and 1/2 liter of milk and 150gr flour.
Basically you just need to prepare the Ragu in one saucepan and some Besciamella in another one. You can find the recipe for the Ragu here and for the Besciamella here.
When they are done in my family we use to mix the ragu with the besciamella to make the lasagna more tasty.If you use the doses i wrote at the beginning of this post, you will need to add to the ragu just 2/3 of the besciamella and you will leave 1/3 for the endof the recipe.
So you will put a bit of this mix in the tray you will use for the lasagna and you will place the first layer of pasta on top. De Cecco create this pasta you don’t need to boil but you can put it directly in the oven. I really suggest you to use this because it’s quicker and the pasta will be cooked just for the right time.
Cut the mozzarella in little little pieces and place it some on the pasta then cover with another layer of sauce and pasta. Keep on putting the mozzarella in pieces, the sauce and the layers of pasta until you have at least 4-5 layers.
At the end, cover all with the rest of the besciamella and with some Parmesan. Put it in the oven at 200 degree for 24 minute ( as de Cecco says) and then you can finish the lasagna with a bit of grill to make it colorful like mine.
Serve it and enjoy!
PS. Mamy dopo essermiinpratichita con il ragu o sugo di carne e la besciamella, ed avendo trovato queste sfoglie di lasagne pronte per il forno, devo dire che prepararla e’ proprio semplice!!! non c’ho messo nulla a farla la sera prima e poi l’ho messa al forno per i minuti scritti sulla scatola ed e’ piaciuta un sacco!
This is the Christmas present for my blog, something i saw a long time ago but i was waiting the right occasion to buy it! Christmas was the perfect time and i went to Waterstones directly.
There are lots of different places where you can find recipes notebooks, but this is the nicest and more useful for me: basically i can finally put in order all my mum recipes and divide them between the ones i already cooked and the ones missing. On top of that you can also open it and use it as a support to read directly your recipe while you are cooking! Just amazing and if someone is interested it costs 15£.
Let’s hope with this present the 2010 will be more organized!
PS. Mamy ti piace questo ricettario che mi son comprata? ti fa invidia eh? ora oltre a mettere in ordine tutte le tue ricette e a dividerle tra quelle gia’ provate e quelle che mi mancano, posso anche aprirlo e usarlo come leggio mentre cucino! Inizio ad essere molto piu’ organizzata!
Recipe 113: and now it’s the time for the RAGU’, also known as Bolognese sauce. It’s a long time i wanted to cook it but i never found the right occasion. Last day i saw a friend of mine who is a master of the mince pies and i thought we could have a nice Christmas cooking exchange…. some ragu’ for the mincemeat of the classic english mince pies.
The ingredients you need for ragu’ (a quite big quantity) are: 250gr beef mince meat, 250gr pork mince meat, 1 carrot, 1 onion, 1 celery, olive oil, salt, pepper, nutmeg, tomatoes sauce 800gr (i used 2 cans of passata) and 2 glasses of red wine. Now the only thing you need to know is that it’s a very easy process but very long too. The sauce need to cook at least 2-3 hours.
First cut the carrot, the celery and the onion in the smallest pieces you can, then put them in a sauce pan with some oil and let everything fry for some minutes. When these are ready and quite cooked, put the 2 types of meat in the saucepan and cook them a bit. When the color starts to change, add 2 glasses of red wine, mix and wait until the wine is evaporated.
Let the meat coook a bit more and then add the tomatoes sauce. I used the tomatoes passata with chopped tomatoes. Add some salt and peppers and then put the pan on the smallest fire you can. At this point you just need to mix sometimes the sauce and add some hot water if you see it’s getting too thick. You will need to leave the sauce on this fire for more than 2 hours just checking the water and mixing the sauce.
After one hours or so, try a bit of the sauce and add salt, pepper or nutmeg if you think you need it. Wait for the sauce to get darker and a bit dry. After some hours on low low fire, the ragu’ will be ready!
This is my final result !
From the exchange i received a massive container with mincemeat that i used to create an italian version of the mince pies: i have in fact used the pastry that i normally make for the Italian Crostata. You can find it here.
I used a tray for the muffins ( i couldn’t find any mince pies tray), i put the butter and the flour to don’t let the pastry stick to the tray and then i put the mincemeat in the pastry, closing them on the top in the italian way, instead to cover them totally.
I put them in the oven at 160-180 degree for half an hour and i was very pleased with the result! It’s Christmas for sure now!
What do you think?
PS. Mamy ti piacciono queste tortine? sono dei dolcetti tipici inglesi che ho preparato sul modello delle crostate grazie ad un mio amico che mi ha dato gli ingredienti per il ripieno. Insomma ho dovuto solo fare la pasta e riempirla. Abbiamo fatto uno scambio culinario Natalizio: lui mi ha dato questa specie di impasto di mele, uvetta passa e noci cotte con il brandy ed io gli ho preparato un bel barattolone di ragu’! Diciamo uno scambio culturale e natalizio!
This is a classic question in Christmas: do you prefer some Panettone or Pandoro? These are the classic italian ready made dessert in Christmas (on top of the black or white torrone) and you need to have a favorite. It’s a must! Of course you can eat a piece of both but everyone has a preference. So which one you are going to choose?
I personally prefer the Panettone because less greasy and with a more interesting taste: a bit of raisins and candy fruits make the trick. However also the Pandoro is very nice and was my favorite when i was little. It’s super soft and buttery and with the sugar on the top is just good!
The best way to enjoy the Pandoro is to toast it a bit in the oven or on the toaster, but you can also serve it as a cool dessert, just cutting slices and adding nutella or homemade cream between slices. I love that! The cream is good for the Panettone too but i prefer it alone, just as it is.
And what about you?
PS. Mamy lo so che tu preferisci il Panettone come me ora! E capisco anche papa’ che continua a credere che sia il pandoro il mio preferito… con tutti i pandori che mi sono mangiata da piccola! E guai se mi davi un panettone! a Capodanno comunque non manchera’ sicuro!
Here we are… also this Christmas is passed, lots of food was served and it was very nice to stay with the family…but what about my challenge?
Good question ! I’m in holiday at the moment and i’m not going to be worried about recipes and diet. I let my mum cook, i had just enjoyed the food and i have taken some new recipes to bring with me in London. However i lost another kilo before to leave and my score will be to come back and restart with my regular food diet without any stress.
Let’s see what is going to happen, but i really think is better to have a break from every diet in Christmas and just enjoy the good food and atmosphere. Finally in just one week it can’t happen so much: the gym and new good mood will help in January! Fingers crossed!
PS. Brava mamma per i magnifici piatti di questi giorni! Tutto buonissimo! ora pero’ al mio rientro mi tocchera’ tornare alla mia dieta regolare e speriamo di riuscirci senza troppa sofferenza. Ad ogni modo e’ impossibile rinunaciare alle leccornie natalizie…non potrei per nulla al mondo…sopratutto se preparate da te!
Recipe 114: this is not a classic italian Christmas recipe but, for a reason or another, this rice is something i always cook in Christmas. Last year i did it for my parents who came to London to see me, and this year I prepared it for my friends before to come back to Italy for the Christmas break.
Just to make the dinner a bit more interesting i also prepared a little and super-easy starter that goes really well with the rice. An amazing champagne and wine completed the dinner.
For three people the ingredients are: a bunch of asparagus (8/10)- 250gr rice – around 100gr goat cheese – 1 onion – butter – 50/70gr pancetta – a glass of white wine – a vegetable stock – pepper – salt – chilli and if you also want to do the starter you will need around 300 gr of Jumbo prawns.
As usual, let’s start from the onion: cut it in little pieces and put it in a quite big sauce pan with some butter or olive oil. Wait for the color to become goldish and add the pancetta. In the mean time wash and cut the asparagus in 2 or three pieces and put them to boil in a little sauce pan, while in a another container you will put some water to boil for the vegetable stock.
When the pancetta is a bit cooked, add the rice and let it toast in the sauce pan. after few minutes you can add the white wine and mix it all until the wine is totally evaporated. add some of the vegetable stock water and let it cook always mixing a bit to don’t make the rice stick to the pan.
Waiting for the rice to cook, you can now prepare the starter: put some batter in a pan and let it melt. After a bit you can put the jumbo prawns with some salt, pepper and chilli. Wait for them to fried a bit with the butter and then add some white wine. in thsi way you will create a nice sauce that will help the prawns to be cooked and the taste will be amazing. Wait until they are a nice orange color and you can serve them in a plate with some of teh asparagus you put to boil before.
Be careful: for the rice you will use mainly the tender points of the vegetable, so i suggest you to use for the started the other part of the vegetable that for the rice would be too hard.
When the rice is almost cooked add the tender parts of teh asparagus you boiled before with their water, to maintain more flavour and mixing all wait for the rice to cook and the water to evaporate.
When the rice is ready, take it off from the fire and add the goat cheese in pieces: mix it all and the cheese will melt giving to the plate even more consistency and a great taste. Then serve it as usual with some Parmesan!
Buon appetito e Buon Natale!
PS. Mamy te lo ricordi questo riso che vi ho fatto l’anno scorso e che vi era piaciuto tanto? beh questo anno ho bissato e l’ho preparato per la nostra cena natalizia a casa prima che partissi con anche un bell’antipasto di gamberetti! Ormai questo risotto e’ diventato il mio piatto natalizio e viene sempre benissimo!
And not only… finally a burger chain that give you the possibility to choose for a dish without bread!
In England there are different burgers chains. Nothing to do with Mc Donalds and not even with real diners, but little places where you can find massive nice and tasty burger, made with good meat, bread and the most different ingredients for a quite cheap prize. Served with chips or chicken wings or onions rings, are also a quite good amount of calories by the way.
Finally a little help arrived for people like me who look for a normal social life without have to say no to any kind of dinner out: Fine Burger Co thought in something very easy and light. They take a nice burger, no bread, no cheese, no chips, but just a nice fresh salad, with tomatoes, peppers, some other simple ingredients and a light dressing, for a big and healthy dish.
Thanks to this other chain to upgrade to healty food!
PS. Mamy nella mia battaglia per poter mangiare fuori senza per forza dovermi ingrassare, ho trovato un altro alleato: e’ una di queste piccole catene di ristoranti che cucinano solo hamburgers ma buonissimi. Beh finalemente in cambio di servire solo paninoni farciti accompagnati da patatine fritte, hanno anche aggiunto l’opzione light, ovvero una bella insalata mista con hamburger. In questo modo ho la possibilita’ di mangiare una bella razione di carne con un contorno bello consistente, senza dovermi sentire ai margini della societa’ perche’ tento di resistere alle patatine fritte! E se un po’ piu’ di inglesi passassero dal Mc Donald a queste catene, gli farebbe sicuramente bene alla salute!
Everyone knows London is so multicultural that you have the possibility to try here the most different restaurants and food, so some weeks ago we went to TAS, a turkish chain of restaurants. Of course we love Houmous and Tabule, but because we didn’t really know all the rest we decided to go safe with a set menu: Sahan menu… just 8,95 each.
This menu give you four options for starters: Lentil soup, Tabule, Houmous and Ispanakli Yogurt, but we were so in love with all of them that we choose Soup, Houmous and Tabule: everything was really good and served with a special pitta bread, soft with sesame seeds and absolutely tasty.
For main course we had instead Kofte and Chicken Guvesh with a very nice couscous in both. The Kofte are pieces of minced or ground meat — usually beef or lamb — mixed with spices and/or onions. The taste is quite strong but all was grilled and it was really good. The Guvesh instead is a kind of stew or chicken casserole made with mushrooms, onion and tomato.
So finally the dinner was really interesting, different from what i normally eat, not heavy or particularly greasy at all and the flavors were really nice. If you also consider then the very cheap price and good service, i think you can have a try!
PS. Mamy qualche tempo fa ho provato un ristorante Turco: volevamo mangiare qualche cosa differente e abbiamo visto che non era molto costoso e siamo andati. Vabbe’, considerato il fatto che io e Julio andiamo matti per l’houmous e il pane pitta che usano loro, diciamo che avvicinarci alla loro cucina non e’ stato poi cosi difficile e la carne ed il couscous come lo cucinano loro e’ proprio buono. Sono sicura piacerebbe anche a voi!
Too many days of holiday and you don’t know anymore how to don’t get bored??? My suggestion is … cabaret with ” La Clique“.
and very interesting just to visit, reading all the big events happened in there.Inside there is a little bar where you can have drinks and popcorns… so i was really really happy!
PS. Mamy Julio mi ha portato a questo spettacolo di cabaret qualche settimana fa e mi sono morta dalle risate! all’inizio pensavo ” che cosa strana”, invece sembra che gli inglesi ci siano mlto abituati perche era pieno. Comunque e’ stata un’idea simpatica, per alternare anche un po’ il cinema e i personaggi dello show erano proprio assurdi!
! I’m in holiday at the moment and i’m not going to be worried about recipes and diet. 
