HO-HO-HOLIDAYS

I'm still alive and healthy but summer holidays are near and I've got so many things to do.

Clothes to wash, places to go, a friends' wedding, luggages to pack, things to buy and home to clean up.

This mean so little time to think about recipes to post, think about translation and photos and everything.

This year Thailand once again, I think we'll have a really good time, enjoy the place and relaxing and I'm going to attend a Thai cooking course.

I'm looking forward!!

Don't know if I'll write again before departing, anyway I wish to all the readers a beautiful and regenerating August!

See you around September!!

Pasta salad with mozzarella cheese and tomatoes ( Pasta alla crudaiola con mozzarella e pomodori)

This is probably the easier recipe of cold/warm pasta you can find.

Often here in Italy pasta salads are filled with so many ingredients that they become real calories bombs and, according to my experience, abroad is the same if not worse.

The same with rice salads and I don't really like that mix of different tastes, so many that you can't almost understand what there's inside (and sometimes, when you use canned pasta salad mixture, is probably better...).

This dish instead is plain, simple, with few but good ingredients and you don't need a lot of time to prepare it.

For 4 serves you need:

1 pound short pasta: penne, rigatoni, tortiglioni, farfalle ( 1 pound for 4 is quite a large dish, you can use less pasta)

1 big mozzarella cheese (if you can find mozzarella made from buffalo's milk is even better)

extra-virgin olive oil

3 medium red and ripe tomatoes

5-6 fresh basil leaves, washed

salt and pepper how much you like

Cook pasta at least 2 hours before serving if you want it cold, half an hour before if you want it just warm.

In a big bowl put tomatoes and mozzarella cheese chopped in tiny cubes, add basil leaves, salt and pepper and a generous pour of oil.

Mix well, add cold or warm pasta, mix again.

Store in fridge if needed, mix again before serving.

You can add a garlic clove to preparation to give a stronger flavour.

Yoghurt pudding with fruits of the forest ( Budino allo yogurt con frutti di bosco)

 Today is my sister's birthday and the recipe I'm going to post is her favourite dessert.
The photo shows my pudding, made last sunday to celebrate her birthday with the family.
You can serve it with forest fruits or chocolate or caramel or even plain: it's so beautiful so white and shiny!
In this photo I added blackberries, the mould used was a silicone mould.
For this pudding you need:

1 pound white sweet yoghurt

6 oz. milk cream

4 tablespoon sugar

1 oz. gelatine

forest fruits

Soften gelatine in a cup with a little water, drain it and melt on low fire adding yoghurt and sugar.
In a separate bowl whip cream untill it's well whipped then add slowly the yoghurt mixture.
Pour in the mould, beat lightly the mould on the table to avoid air bubbles and empty parts then store in fridge for at least 3-4 hours.
Serve with fresh forest fruits or any other topping you like: a nice idea is adding honey and nuts, as is often served greek yoghurt.

Sauteed clams ( Sautè di vongole)

And once again I post something that fits the summer season.

Here the weather is terrible: really hot but it's raining at least twice a day.

Of course it increases air humidity and the temperature seems even higher.

Me and my husband really love fish in general and in summer we try to eat it often douring the week.

Tomorrow is our wedding anniversary (two years, we're still at the beginning of a long trip :D) and almost surely we'll indulge on a romantic dinner in a nice (and a little expensive but hey...the recurrence justifies it!) fish restaurant not far from home.

Probably we'll eat something particular and classy but as starter I almost always ask for sauteed clams: it's a cheap dish but it's so tasty!

For 4 serves you need:

2 pounds and 1/4 fresh clams

1 garlic clove

white dry wine

extra-virgin olive oil

fresh washed and chopped parsley

4 bread slices, grilled as you do with bruschetta bread

Clams must rest in a big bowl filled with cold water and stored in a dark place for few hours to purge the sand: if there's a lot of sand change water once or twice.

After this time put them in a large pan under high fire: it will make them open, dump the ones that remain close, it means they were already dead and then not fresh ( it happens, even if you have the most fresh clams you can reach you always have to throw away some).

In another large pan stirfry garlic with a generous pour of oil, add a little wine, let it evaporate then add 2 spoons of chopped parsley and the juice that came out of the clams filtered with a fine strain (this juice is quite salty, so don't add too much if you have a lot and don't add salt).

Add the clams too and let it sautee for 3-4 minutes.

Put in a soup plate a grilled bread slice then cover with clams and their juice.

Serve hot or warm.

Delicious!!

P.S. : You can serve this dish as a starter or as a main dish, even as complete meal, it depends on quantity.

Baked pineapple (Ananas al forno)

The " quick and easy recipes saga" continues: with this hot weather who wants to spend hours cooking between hot ovens, boiling pots and all the rest?

Baked pineapple is the perfect conclusion for a summer dinner, tasty but light, it's even tastyer (but less light :P) if you serve it with an ice-cream scoops or two.

For 4 serves you need:

1 pineapple

rhum

raw sugar

Clean the pineapple keeping off the skin, the two ends and the centre, slice it in 1/4 inches tall slices and put them on a baking tin.

Pour on each slice a spoon of rhum then sprinkle raw sugar on.

Put in the oven with the grill function for few minutes untill the sugar is getting caramelized.

Put in dishes with the ice-cream scoops and serve.

Ps. You can prepare pineapple the same way but on skrews, the presentation will be even more beautiful.