Quick Meal - Gnocchi with Shrimp in Harissa Sauce
The thing in this dish is really the garlicky harissa sauce that gives it the warmth that otherwise is the domain of a cheese sauce. Smashed garlic and generous teaspoon of harissa slowly infuses the oil in which the shrimp is cooked and then add pasta and arugula blanched in the pasta water and you are gold!
Sicilian Mackerel Pasta via Venice
Oddly, you don't really hear a lot about food in Venice. Sure, the seafood is divine, being so freshly caught and well, it is Italy... So the bar is fairly high relatively speaking. Yet, very little is said of Venetian cuisine. By and large the general consensus is that everything is expensive and not quite the same value you get from other parts of Italy. Disregarding the economics, though, there are several lovely food experiences to be had.
Today, I want to share a dish l recreated back home from my trip to the city, where I had the best Sicilian food. A mackerel pasta with the distinctive Sicilian chilli flecked tomato sauce and with layers of flavors and surprises on the palate!
Mushroom Carbonara
If there is one thing I have learnt living in Italy for nearly a year and being in close contact with the original Italian food culture is that they are very protective of it and very very attached to the past and the old, traditional way of doing things. Which means, limited to zero tolerance to changing their beloved dishes.
The question in my mind is where is the line between innovation and tradition? When is it unnecessary to tinker with something that isn't broken and when is the need or desire?
Meanwhile, I present to you an ultimately blasphemous dish to you... Mushroom Carbonara. Which, is one, vegetarian and two has rosemary in it! Shhh! Yet, the mushrooms offer a earthy groundedness similar to what the guanciale would. If you are an orthodox Italian, I beseech you to try it before you turn your nose up at it. :)
Radicchio Spaghetti
Color me Purple.....
Bitter radicchio, slowly braised on stove top becomes a sweet sticky luxury that coats every strand of pasta like a particularly intimate kiss. Pair it with fennel and hazelnut and it is a veritable orgy. You'll even forget sex.. or, maybe this is a good substitute, for when...
A New Life That is.... Italy!
I promised you some news and I am finally ready to share. I am in Italy. Living it, breathing it, studying it, embracing it, learning to love it! No, not as as a tourist but as a resident and student.... While I am here, I am hoping to continue keeping this blog up on a relatively regular schedule. But, if I fall off the wagon, it is only because I am somewhere where there is no internet digging up the real story of Balsamic Vinegar or have in head buried in figuring how to make your kitchen connect with you and make your life easier...