So, arrividerci Bologna!
We will miss your beautiful porticos...
your amazing architecture...
but most of all...
Thursday, June 5, 2008
Hail and Farewell, Bologna
Now we are headed off to the sinking city, Venice. We do not have internet in our tiny hotel so posts may not be as frequent if they happen at all. As for Bologna, I am so glad we decided to come here. It is a beautiful town with so much to offer. It's not a common tourist destination either, so if you're sick of elbowing your way through Florence and want to taste some of the true flavors of Italy, we recommend "Bologna the Fat" as they lovingly call it (and as we certainly feel after five days here).
So, arrividerci Bologna!
We will miss your beautiful porticos...
your amazing architecture...
but most of all...
So, arrividerci Bologna!
We will miss your beautiful porticos...
your amazing architecture...
but most of all...
Wednesday, June 4, 2008
Cooking Class Part 2
It was a little rainy in the morning but that didn't stop us from shopping for our next cooking class with Carmelita.
I love these markets.
Portrait of mother with prosciutto.
The vegetable man was very eager to show us his newly arrived shipment of porcini mushrooms. And at 10 Euro a piece who could resist? Carmelita grabs our precious little fellow.
She then took us to see how the professionals make the pasta. Today these ladies were making gnocchi.
She used the back of a grater to get the ridges that hold onto to all that wonderful sauce.
Then it was back to Carmelita's to get started. We had a full menu to prepare.
First course was a sfumato of asparagus. It's the same dish I had at a restaurant here and Carmelita agreed to teach us how to make it. First you need to make a bechamel sauce and then puree some cooked aspargus with cream.
After combining you add a super duper yellow egg.
Then give them a little bath in the oven.
We then stopped for a little snack that Carmelita bought for us at the bakery. First was a pastry filled with spinach and ham. Mmmmm...
Next was a traditional Bolognese rice cake. Used to be served only on a certain holiday but lucky for us, sold every day now.
Next we made meatballs out of the leftover stuffing from our stuffed zucchini yesterday.
Browned them...
Unmolded our sfumato. Perfetto!
And garnished with meatballs and tomato sauce. It was even better than the restaurant version!
Onto the next course. Rosettes which is a little like a sideways lasagna. You'll see. We lightly sauteed our gorgeous porcini.
Then we rolled out the leftover pasta from yesterday. (This was much easier than making tortellinis!)
We layered each sheet with bechamel, porcini, ham and fontina.
Then we rolled them up and arranged them in a baking dish sideways, like so.
Half hour in the oven and there you have it. Cheesy, hammy, mushroomy rosettes!
Next course (because we really need another one at this point) was a Bolognese pork chop.
It was browned,
covered with prosciutto and parmesan (what else?)
And then fried and steamed until melted. Wowee.
For dessert we made a Bolognese chocolate cake. Whip eggs,
melt chocolate,
toast almonds,
whiz almonds,
mix together,
bake,
cut in diamond shapes, as is traditional, and serve. Gourmet Magazine, eat your heart out.
We were in a food coma for a good long time after this meal. We learned so much in these classes. Highly recommend that anyone try them. Grazie mille, Carmelita!
I love these markets.
Portrait of mother with prosciutto.
The vegetable man was very eager to show us his newly arrived shipment of porcini mushrooms. And at 10 Euro a piece who could resist? Carmelita grabs our precious little fellow.
She then took us to see how the professionals make the pasta. Today these ladies were making gnocchi.
She used the back of a grater to get the ridges that hold onto to all that wonderful sauce.
Then it was back to Carmelita's to get started. We had a full menu to prepare.
First course was a sfumato of asparagus. It's the same dish I had at a restaurant here and Carmelita agreed to teach us how to make it. First you need to make a bechamel sauce and then puree some cooked aspargus with cream.
After combining you add a super duper yellow egg.
Then give them a little bath in the oven.
We then stopped for a little snack that Carmelita bought for us at the bakery. First was a pastry filled with spinach and ham. Mmmmm...
Next was a traditional Bolognese rice cake. Used to be served only on a certain holiday but lucky for us, sold every day now.
Next we made meatballs out of the leftover stuffing from our stuffed zucchini yesterday.
Browned them...
Unmolded our sfumato. Perfetto!
And garnished with meatballs and tomato sauce. It was even better than the restaurant version!
Onto the next course. Rosettes which is a little like a sideways lasagna. You'll see. We lightly sauteed our gorgeous porcini.
Then we rolled out the leftover pasta from yesterday. (This was much easier than making tortellinis!)
We layered each sheet with bechamel, porcini, ham and fontina.
Then we rolled them up and arranged them in a baking dish sideways, like so.
Half hour in the oven and there you have it. Cheesy, hammy, mushroomy rosettes!
Next course (because we really need another one at this point) was a Bolognese pork chop.
It was browned,
covered with prosciutto and parmesan (what else?)
And then fried and steamed until melted. Wowee.
For dessert we made a Bolognese chocolate cake. Whip eggs,
melt chocolate,
toast almonds,
whiz almonds,
mix together,
bake,
cut in diamond shapes, as is traditional, and serve. Gourmet Magazine, eat your heart out.
We were in a food coma for a good long time after this meal. We learned so much in these classes. Highly recommend that anyone try them. Grazie mille, Carmelita!
Tuesday, June 3, 2008
Cooking Class Part 1
We woke up bright-eyed and bushy-tailed and headed out to meet our culinary guru, Carmelita. She was very warm and friendly right from the start. We knew we'd like her when we stopped at this gorgeous looking market and she said, "This place is no good. Overpriced, and they sell poor quality Parma ham. We'll go to my deli." We knew we were in good hands. Take a look at the "bad" deli.
This'll knock your socks off. Check out how much they get for real balsamic vinegar. This is the genuine article. So read carefully because if it doesn't say what it says on this label it ain't worth the grape juice it's made of (or so says Carmelita). And don't even bother converting the price to dollars. You can't afford it. (And if you can you should be buying me a bottle.)
We strolled with our guide through the produce aisle (also known as Via Drapperie).
Wow.
Wowee. You just want to reach out and touch it...
... or not.
These are the amazing tomatoes we bought to make our tomato sauce.
Next to the zucchini blossoms are the baby zucchinis we used for one of our dishes.
Garlic. Although Carmelita informed us that most of Italy does not, and I repeat, does not use garlic. Especially Bolognese. So I don't know why they are selling it but we didn't ask questions.
Here is "her" deli. Great stuff.
We bought this runny local cheese stuff and that other brown stuff which is caramelized figs. You spread both on a piadina, which is a local flat bread.
Nice hams.
Cluck!
Oink!
These pasta are called "caramelle" (candies).
So we finished all of our shopping and headed to Carmelita's flat to begin our lessons.
Lesson 1: Zucchine Ripiene con Salsa Pomodoro (Minced pork filled zucchini in a fresh tomato sauce, but you knew that already.)
First, slice tomatoes in half, horizontally, and place in big pot with one onion.
Let it cook like this for about 10-15 minutes. Add some bay leaf, cloves and olive oil. NO BASIL. NO OREGANO. NO GARLIC. I know, shocking.
And after it is all cooked down, process it through a food mill so you get none of the skin or green bits and all of the good stuff. Return to heat and add more olive oil. That's it!
Next make neat little holes in your zucchini with a corer and stuff them with a mixture of ground pork, mortadella (a Bologna staple), some parmesan (another Bologna staple), ricotta... and other stuff.
Pan fry them in some butter and olive oil. Then throw then in the tomato sauce you made and let them finish simmering in there.
You are left with this which is absolutely fantastic.
Remember that runny white cheesy stuff and those caramelized figs? Here they are. MMMMM...
Lesson 2: Tortelloni Burro e Salvia (tortellonis with butter and sage sauce)
Ok, here's where it gets tricky. She made us make our own pasta dough. You need soft soft soft northern Italian flour. No durum wheat here, please! It looks and feels like talcum powder. You also need one of these Italian eggs with the super duper yellow yolks. They must be from super happy chickens. That's it. No water in this pasta. You mix it all very gently and you finally get something that looks like a dough. It feels like a babies butt.
Then we rolled and rolled it, thinner and thinner.
Then we cut it with this neato pasta cutter.
Carmelita showed us how to fold them (Note for you Chinese cooks out there: it is not the same way you fold a wonton. Mom tried that. She got scolded.)
Our humble attempts. She said they were "bellissima" but I think she was being generous. They don't actually look too bad...
This is a perfect one. I think I made that one.
Not.
We tossed them in a pan with melted butter and sage leaves, sprinkled a little parmesan (of course) on top and there you are. Molto bene!
For dessert we made "Panna Cotta alle Fragole" (kind of like a white flan with strawberry sauce) First we hulled the berries and sprinkled them with vanilla sugar.
Then we cooked them down. Notice how the strawberries are getting pale. This is a good thing. They are giving all their pretty color to our sauce. After they are done you simply drain the sauce into a container (do not press the berries, don't ask me why, just don't do it).
We then measured out cream, milk, sugar and gelatin sheets and cooked it until the gelatin had dissolved. Then we poured it into molds to let set in the ole frigorifero. An hour later you unmold it, pour your sauce around and...
Presto! Panna Cotta. Translation: Evilness times 10.
We bid ciao to Carmelita. More cooking to come tomorrow!
This'll knock your socks off. Check out how much they get for real balsamic vinegar. This is the genuine article. So read carefully because if it doesn't say what it says on this label it ain't worth the grape juice it's made of (or so says Carmelita). And don't even bother converting the price to dollars. You can't afford it. (And if you can you should be buying me a bottle.)
We strolled with our guide through the produce aisle (also known as Via Drapperie).
Wow.
Wowee. You just want to reach out and touch it...
... or not.
These are the amazing tomatoes we bought to make our tomato sauce.
Next to the zucchini blossoms are the baby zucchinis we used for one of our dishes.
Garlic. Although Carmelita informed us that most of Italy does not, and I repeat, does not use garlic. Especially Bolognese. So I don't know why they are selling it but we didn't ask questions.
Here is "her" deli. Great stuff.
We bought this runny local cheese stuff and that other brown stuff which is caramelized figs. You spread both on a piadina, which is a local flat bread.
Nice hams.
Cluck!
Oink!
These pasta are called "caramelle" (candies).
So we finished all of our shopping and headed to Carmelita's flat to begin our lessons.
Lesson 1: Zucchine Ripiene con Salsa Pomodoro (Minced pork filled zucchini in a fresh tomato sauce, but you knew that already.)
First, slice tomatoes in half, horizontally, and place in big pot with one onion.
Let it cook like this for about 10-15 minutes. Add some bay leaf, cloves and olive oil. NO BASIL. NO OREGANO. NO GARLIC. I know, shocking.
And after it is all cooked down, process it through a food mill so you get none of the skin or green bits and all of the good stuff. Return to heat and add more olive oil. That's it!
Next make neat little holes in your zucchini with a corer and stuff them with a mixture of ground pork, mortadella (a Bologna staple), some parmesan (another Bologna staple), ricotta... and other stuff.
Pan fry them in some butter and olive oil. Then throw then in the tomato sauce you made and let them finish simmering in there.
You are left with this which is absolutely fantastic.
Remember that runny white cheesy stuff and those caramelized figs? Here they are. MMMMM...
Lesson 2: Tortelloni Burro e Salvia (tortellonis with butter and sage sauce)
Ok, here's where it gets tricky. She made us make our own pasta dough. You need soft soft soft northern Italian flour. No durum wheat here, please! It looks and feels like talcum powder. You also need one of these Italian eggs with the super duper yellow yolks. They must be from super happy chickens. That's it. No water in this pasta. You mix it all very gently and you finally get something that looks like a dough. It feels like a babies butt.
Then we rolled and rolled it, thinner and thinner.
Then we cut it with this neato pasta cutter.
Carmelita showed us how to fold them (Note for you Chinese cooks out there: it is not the same way you fold a wonton. Mom tried that. She got scolded.)
Our humble attempts. She said they were "bellissima" but I think she was being generous. They don't actually look too bad...
This is a perfect one. I think I made that one.
Not.
We tossed them in a pan with melted butter and sage leaves, sprinkled a little parmesan (of course) on top and there you are. Molto bene!
For dessert we made "Panna Cotta alle Fragole" (kind of like a white flan with strawberry sauce) First we hulled the berries and sprinkled them with vanilla sugar.
Then we cooked them down. Notice how the strawberries are getting pale. This is a good thing. They are giving all their pretty color to our sauce. After they are done you simply drain the sauce into a container (do not press the berries, don't ask me why, just don't do it).
We then measured out cream, milk, sugar and gelatin sheets and cooked it until the gelatin had dissolved. Then we poured it into molds to let set in the ole frigorifero. An hour later you unmold it, pour your sauce around and...
Presto! Panna Cotta. Translation: Evilness times 10.
We bid ciao to Carmelita. More cooking to come tomorrow!
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