Waste not, want not

January 5, 2008 · Filed Under Italian Food · 1 Comment

Yesterday I cooked up an improvised cacuicco, which, if you do not know, is an Italian fish soup. I’d had this soup several times, so I though I’d have a go at making it, in order to use up some seafood that had been left over from our New Year’s festivities.

I did not follow any particular recipe, although I had a quick look at one such recipe on the Internet, more or less to confirm how this soup is made. All I did was to pour a bottle of tomato pulp into a pan, add a little salt and pepper, a dash of garlic, a little chilli powder and then a glass of white wine. Then I just let the mix simmer for half an hour or so. Result? Very tasty, and even my Italian other half said it was ‘excellent’. Not bad for some improvisation.

Today, again in order to use up some of the left overs, my other half, following a recipe, created some salmon stuffed with cheese. It cooked in a jiffy, looked great, but, as I realised as soon as I put a piece into my mouth, the salmon had gone off. Just as well I managed to prevent other half from feeding our little one a nice chunk of rancid salmon.

Oh well, you win some, and you lose some. At least we tried to use up this goodies, without throwing them away.

And, this evening, I ran up some vin bruleè, which is the Italian version of mulled wine. I found an ‘Alpini’ vin bruleè recipe on the Internet (great source of genuine Italian recipes - especially if you can read Italian) , and had a go. Result? Highly drinkable, if a little sweet. Less demerara sugar would have made it more tangy, as would have a little more lemon. Still, it’s going down very well, and is just the thing to sort out my annoying little cold, I can tell you. At least that is what I’m telling myself….

Tags: Cheese, drink, internet, Italia, Italian, Italian Food, Italian Wine, new year, tomato, white

Escape from Christmas

December 29, 2007 · Filed Under Life in Italy · Comment

Well, the plan was to spend Christmas with the Italian in-laws down in Genova, and we did indeed manage to endure right up until the end of the Christmas day lunch. Then we high-tailed it back to Milan. A combination of dogs not getting on with one another, lively little son causing the downstairs neighbours to shout and knock on their ceiling every five minutes etc managed to dampen that good old Christmas spirit, and we found ourselves yearning for the, relative, tranquillity of Milan.

At least the gastronomic delights of the Christmas Eve dinner over at our friend’s house managed to perk our Christmas spirit up a little. I should add that my son and I holed up at our friend’s house. This friend has a lovely appartment with a wonderful view over Genova harbour, has no barking dogs or grumpy neighbours, and the flat is more spacious and comfortable than our in-laws ‘trapped in the 1950’s’ place, and my little one was happy because he was not being constantly told not to run, not to drop toys, and not to breathe too heavily etc when in the in-laws’ place. In fact, I could not pry him away, and he actually told our friend that he wanted to buy her appartment. Precocious, he is.

Anyway, that Christmas Eve dinner was darned good. We had Oysters and lobster, amongst other things, and everything was washed down with good wine. At least some memories of Xmas ‘07 will be good.

Milan on the other hand seems to be all but deserted, and, oddly enough, much less chaotic than Genova. Everyone has probably popped off to the mountain house, leaving the city wonderfully quiet. It’s sort of like the middle of August, but cold.

By heck, it’s good to be home.

Tags: Christmas, dog, Genova, Italian, Italian Wine, Italy, Milan, My son

Milanese Grey

November 20, 2007 · Filed Under Life in Italy · 4 Comments

I think it may be true to say that winter has finally kicked in here in not-so-sunny Milan. As always here, the temperatures dropped almost overnight, well, it seems that way. In reality, the temperature had been falling gradually over the last few weeks or so, but it hit genuine winter levels towards the end of last week.

Today and yesterday the sky over the city has adopted its familiar grey winter hue. It is quite chilly too and even I am thinking about digging out my gloves - I’ve already found a scarf.

Still, looking on the bright side, Christmas is just round the corner, and all this cold weather means that gnocchi in melted Fontina cheese are back on the menu. And I can start drinking more full bodied red wine, not to mention the winter fruits grappa which is maturing in a cupboard.

Winter may be cold, but it does have its advantages.

Tags: Cheese, Christmas, city, drink, eat, grappa, Italian Wine, Milan

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