Category: Italian Cooking

Classic Ragù Bolognese with Beef, Veal and Pancetta

So you’ve decided to have a few friends over for a mid-week Italian supper. Great! Pick out a nice bottle of wine, some bread from your favorite bakery and toss a simple salad. All easy stuff. However; a true Ragù Bolognese takes time. Do you leave work early? Not necessarily. This Ragù Bolognese can be cooked up on a Sunday, to be served up on a Wednesday without diluting the rich flavor. If anything, a delay between cooking and eating only increases the elevation of savory goodness.

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Fresh Fruit with Whipped Cream Zabaglione

What is Zabaglione? It is a foamy, custard-like mixture of egg yolks, sugar and Marsala wine served hot or chilled as a dessert. Often Zabaglione is served over fruits or cakes. The very first time we ate this wonderful dish, it was actually prepared table-side in a private dining room by a Five-Star Chef using his grandmother’s recipe. I never was able to get the recipe from him – but this comes close. His was without the added whipped cream, staying true to its custard roots. This variation utilizes heavy cream, creating a whipped topping rather than a true custard. If it is the custard variety you seek, simply omit the heavy cream.

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Colorful Spicy Lemon-Garlic Shrimp Linguine

This recipe was inspired by a recipe I found a while at Menu Musings of a Modern American Mom (http://menumusings.blogspot.com/2011/08/spicy-garlic-shrimp.html). Don’t you just love the title of her blog?

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Chicken Breast with Savory Tomato-Herb Pan Sauce

Each morning I rise with the first golden threads of sunlight. While my guys are busy packing up lunches and heading out the door, my job is to water our garden. Flowers are forming on nearly every plant – soon we’ll have tomatoes growing. Tomatoes fresh from the garden are the best, don’t you think? As I watch my garden grow, my thoughts drift to all sorts of yummy dishes using things I have grown myself. (Now if only I can convince Hubby to let me have a few chickens . . .)

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Grilled Italian Marinated Chicken Skewers

This easy to make, yummy chicken isn’t very complicated. If you have boneless chicken breasts and Italian Dressing in the house, you are half way there. Add some cherry tomatoes (fresh picked best, but go with what’s available in the market), a bag of Boiler Onions, and maybe a jar of marinated mushrooms, and you are so there!

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Fettuccine Bolognese (That’s Inexpensive and Easy to Make)

A true, classic Bolognese is made with ingredients such as veal, pancetta and a good beef stock. When you are cooking on a shoestring budget, veal and pancetta aren’t the sort of ingredients you typically throw into the shopping cart. Not to mention the fact that some people object to veal from a purely ethical standpoint.

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Savory Sensational Chicken Scaloppine

For those of you who don’t know me, I love to collect recipes and then play around with them just a bit to put my own personal “stamp” on any given dish. More wine here, a splash more lemon juice there and maybe even a different approach to getting the breast thin. Almost always, the results are wonderful. (I will admit, I’ve had a few flops on my hands over the years – especially early on in my tinkering).

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Pesto-Alfredo Pasta Chicken Bake

This beautiful recipe is inspired by The Cooking Jar. Farah has a wonderful approach to her blog – everyday cooking for everyday cooks. While I love experimenting with recipes. Sometimes I’ll find a recipe that forces me to google some of the ingredients as I wonder “What the heck is that?” With The Cooking Jar, you will recognize every ingredient – most of those “real” ingredients are probably already in you kitchen.

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Spaghetti Bolognese with Chicken and Pancetta

Panchetta is Italian Bacon, of sorts. Both American Bacon and Italian Pancetta are pork, usually from the pork belly section. Typically both have been cured (while some bacon is sold uncured). Bacon is cured in salt, either in a brine or packed in salt. It is then aged by drying the meat, be it dried in cold air for weeks or even months, or smoked (my favorite kind of bacon). Pancetta can also be cured in simple salt, but seasonings and other aromatics are often added to the curing process to infuse Pancetta with its distinctly Italian flavors. While this recipe can be made using Bacon, depending upon the type of bacon, the flavor will vary.

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Baked Cheese Tortellini Casserole

The first time I read this recipe, I had my doubts. Alfredo sauce and Spaghetti sauce blended together – really? I like them both, although with cheese filled pastas and seafood filled pastas, I’ve always been partial to a light, creamy sauce such as an Alfredo over the robust, tomato-based Spaghetti sauce. It never occurred to me to marry the two together in one dish. Oh my stars, what a great combination!

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Fettuccine Carbonara – An American Interpretation

For those of you not familiar with Carbonara, this is a pasta dish that hails from Rome, Italy. It is traditionally made using eggs, Italian Cheeses (Romano or Parmesan or other fine Italian cheese) and Pancetta (Italian Bacon) that is tossed in a Spaghetti Pasta. The more modern renditions use Fettuccine, my preferred pasta. If you were to order this dish in Italy, cream and garlic would not be a part of the recipe, but outside Italy these ingredients have been incorporated to create a creamy, flavorful “sauce”. As a lover of all things containing creams and garlic, my Carbonara includes these non-traditional ingredients. Some people have even taken to adding peas or broccoli to their Carbonara. Personally, I don’t if for no other reason that I want to stay as close to the traditional dish of Rome while still satisfying my desire for cream and garlic. But hey, that’s just me.

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