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Asparagus Pasta Salad

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ASPARAGUS PASTA SALAD

This is a spring pasta salad with lovely green asparagus, cherry tomatoes, small fresh mozzarella balls, basil and olive oil served with penne. Asparagus Pasta Salad is a simple and fresh vegetarian dish! Everyone loves a good Caprese salad (tomatoes, fresh basil, mozzarella with olive oil), so why not change it a bit and make it a pasta salad? Also, since it is spring, why not add a few green asparagus to celebrate that? This Asparagus Pasta Salad is such a simple idea and takes no time to make. Great to bring for lunch, at a potluck or picnic, this pasta salad will highlight the day! For Any Occasion It’s a “feeling lazy today” kind of meal… Just need to cook the pasta of your choice (healthier versions too like quinoa or kamut pasta) a bunch of juicy cherry tomatoes and fresh mozzarella balls, or the big balls of mozzarella…

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Main Meals

Mega MeatBall Spaghetti

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meatball pasta

This colossal MeatBall Spaghetti is a minimalistic touch to a classic meatball sauce. This moist and filled with spices gargantuesque meatball will bring goosebumps to any carnivores guaranteed! Mega MeatBall Spaghetti is a minimalistic version of the classical meatball sauce we all love. This dish will bring goosebumps to any carnivores, a moist meatball filled with spices served in a simple onion-tomato sauce and al dente pasta. I like to cheat myself, especially with food… I would say well it’s not a totally evil dish if I just make 1 meatball instead of many, but the truth is; in the end it’s as heavy calorie wise. Anyway, if I am to sin and eat red meat, better to it right no? This meal is also kind of the story close to my heart. When I’ve met my husband, 10 years ago back in Panama, he used to eat so much pasta that I would call him a pasta…

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Main Meals

Porcini risotto

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porcini risotto italian

If there is a traditional fall risotto in Italy, it’s the beloved risotto ai funghi made with those exquisite porcini mushrooms. Porcini mushroom is such an elegant and filled with flavor mushroom, if you are lucky enough to get it, in whatever form possible (fresh, canned or dry), you’ll never go back to button mushroom. Porcini mushrooms are a relatively bigger kind of mushrooms with a large stem, it’s flavor resemble meat and is quite powerful. It’s the ultimate mushroom to make risotto. The only downside of this wild mushroom is its cost… it’s a quite expensive mushroom and not always easy to find but if you do… and aren’t on a budget, get the Italian in you shine. For this particular recipe I’ve used a pack of medium size dried porcini I bought in Italy this summer. This way, you’ll have to soak the mushroom for about 20-30 minutes before use and then we’ll…

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Main Meals

Gnocchis on a spinach sauce and crispy cured ham

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Gnocchi on a spinach sauce with crispy cured ham

Smooth gnocchis on a smooth spinach sauce topped with crunchy cured ham, a perfect balance of textures and flavors. If you are a spinach lover, this is the meal for you, also gnocchis, those italian silky potato dumplings are a great compliment to the spinach sauce. A traditional recipe made of spinach already exists; the green spinach gnocchis. I’ve simply separated the gnocchis from the spinach and made a sauce with it. The sauce under the gnocchi makes this dish look better in my option, to see the nice form of each gnocchi opposed to a mix of green balls. Gnocchis recipes in the cyber world tends to be quite traditional, meaning typical sauces that comes with; for example; the butter sage sauce, pesto, ragout, etc. which are all delicious of course. In my case, I’ve done it with a spinach sauce… mainly because I needed a way to use my leftover chicken broth in the fridge and since…

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Appetizers

Mini bruschettas with goat cheese and thyme

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Bruschetta goat cheese thyme

Mini bruschettas with goat cheese and thyme is a great way to start your next dinner party, without saying, it’s terribly easy to do. Who doesn’t like a fresh bite of tomato filled with fresh and bold flavours and a touch of creamy goat cheese? It’s a perfect match, and even those goat cheese sceptic won’t be able to resist. I believe this is how I fell for goat cheese back in the days. This recipe is clearly not an invention of mine, it’s originally from Italy. Considered an antipasto over there, and it’s pronunciation isn’t an english soft”sch” as in “shut”  but more like a “sket” like in ketchup, check this video to clear this up. I still make the error myself… Italians make all kinds of topping as bruschetta, for example, eggplant, prosciutto, mozzarella, etc. although the widely popular bruschetta pomodoro (tomato) is the one that travelled the world the…

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Main Meals

Shiitake and Spinach Risolla

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Shiitake and Spinach Risolla

A new hybrid recipe here: the “Risolla”… a mix between a risotto and a paella; Italy vs Spain. It’s a bit of both techniques, the light frying of the rice at first just like in the risotto and paella, then adding the broth and let sit with the spinach on top so they shrink down into the rice, without moving the rice until the end; that’s more typical of paella. The risotto factor is mainly in the ingredients, a good white wine and cheese to finish. So this isn’t a paella, nor a risotto; it’s a “Risolla”. The end result is less creamy than a traditional risotto because of the lack of moving the rice. But the taste is quite similar. I, often, do those hybrid meals, no disrespect to traditions, they are important and most people stick to them and it’s fine… it’s just “my tradition” is to experiment!…

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Main Meals

Asparagus pizza

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asparagus pizza

Who is tired of the same old pizza topping? It seems like no more innovation is done with them, so here is one. Since it’s spring… let’s do something with a seasonal vegetable; the asparagus.  Who doesn’t love asparagus? They are to me the pinnacle of veggies. Mother nature engineered those delicate long tasty shoots to perfection. Strangely, white asparagus, which is asparagus pick up before they reach out from the soil (no photosynthesis), motto is, “the thicker, the better” while for the green asparagus, it’s the opposite; “the thinner, the better”.  This spring veggie comes from so far back, it was pictured as an offering back in to 3000 BC by the Egyptians. Germans like their asparagus white, the French grow purple ones and for the rest of the world it’s the usual green shoots. Asparagus is a well known diuretic and is one of those studied mysterious vegetable for its … peculiar aroma when passing…

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