recipes

by

Amaretti Almond Cake w Lemon Glaze Recipe

Amaretti Almond Cake

Amaretti Almond Cake

This cake is a spinoff from another cake that I love. I was inspired by the spiced sliced almonds that my mom gave me. She got a bag of them in Trader Joe’s and split them with me. I stared at the ziplock bag with slivered spiced almonds for a week or more. They tasted great on their own but they begged to be included in something bigger. Something more elaborate. Something to make the SHINE. So I came up with this cake, tweaking and altering that other cake that used pinoli nuts and oranges.

Italians love almonds. This cake has almond paste, too. And amaretti cookies, which have almond in them, too. AND I’ve added some almond extract to the recipe. It’s a very fragrant and moist cake. The lemon glaze gives it a fun lift.

3 cups amaretti cookies

13 tablespoons unsalted butter, divided (plus a  little more to butter pan)

1 can almond paste (8 oz)

1 cup sugar

3 large eggs

1 tablespoon vanilla extract

1/2 teaspoon almond extract

1 cup flour

1 1/2 teaspoon baking powder

pinch salt

blanched slivered almonds, toasted w a little spice

Preheat oven to 350 degrees F.

Amaretti Cookies

Amaretti Cookies

Put the amaretti cookies in the food processor and pulse until they are as fine as bread crumb. Melt 5 tablespoons of the butter. Mix melted butter and cookie crumbs together.

Butter & Amaretti Crumbs

Butter & Amaretti Crumbs

Lightly butter a 9-inch spring form pan. Spread the cookie-butter mixture evenly on the bottom and bake for about 10 minutes until poofy. Take out of oven.

In a stand mixer with paddle attachment, combine remaining 8 tablespoons of butter, sugar, and almond paste. Mix until smooth. Add the eggs one at a time until well incorporated. Add the extracts. In another bowl whisk together the flour, baking powder, and salt. Pour all into batter and mix until just combined.

Pour batter into pan on top of baked cookie bottom and smooth level. Sprinkle with slivered almonds. If you don’t have spiced almonds, plain sliced almonds works as well.

Almond Cake in Oven

Almond Cake Going into Oven

Bake for about 40 minutes until golden and a toothpick stuck in the middle comes out clean. Let cool a bit in the pan. When it’s cool enough (but still a little warm), run a knife along the sides to make sure the cake isn’t sticking, then remove the sides of the spring-form pan. Make the glaze.

For the Glaze:

Zest and juice of 3 small lemons

1/2 cup powdered sugar

In a small saucepan, heat & mix the zest, juice and sugar until the sugar melts. Spoon glaze on top of cake (spoon some along the edge so that it drips off to the sides, too). Let cool. Cut and serve.

Mmmm. That's good.

Mmmm. That’s good.

by

Mediterranean Potato Salad Recipe

 

Mediterranean Potato Salad

Mediterranean Potato Salad

Check out my cooking segment from yesterday’s Channel 4 More at Midday. A great way to perk up potatoes with the tastes of the Mediterranean!

Mediterranean Potato Salad TV cooking segment

Here’s the recipe:

Mediterranean Potato Salad

2 pounds small red potatoes, washed

2 cups grape or cherry tomatoes, sliced in half or whole

1/2 small red onion, thin sliced into half-moons

1 cup pitted green olives, sliced in half

1 cucumber, cut into half-moons

1 red bell pepper, cut into bite-sized pieces

¼ cup capers

½ cup olive oil, or to taste

a few tablespoons vinegar, or to taste

salt & pepper to taste

Boil potatoes until tender but still a bit firm. Cut into bite-sized pieces. Toss with tomatoes, onion, olives, cucumber, pepper, and capers. Drizzle with olive oil & vinegar. Season well with salt & pepper. Toss to combine.

by

Easy Peasy Pasta

Orzo pouring in...!

Orzo pouring in…!

It’s the kind of pasta you eat when you’re hungry and you want to eat something fast. You want it to be ready in the time it takes water to boil and pasta to cook…about 20 minutes.

Why not choose orzo? Get it cooking in boiling salted water. Then open the refrigerator.

What’s there?

Maybe: a few grape tomatoes. A small bunch of broccoli. A few mushrooms. On the patio is a patch of arugula growing in a pot.

impromptu sauce ingredients

impromptu sauce ingredients

There’s garlic. Or onion. Or both. Salt & Pepper. Cut up & cook up all in a saute pan with a little olive oil.

Saute

Saute

When orzo is done, drain it, and keep a bit of pasta water. Add orzo to the saute pan.

Cooking orzo

Cooking orzo

Drizzle some olive oil. Mix to combine. Add some pasta water to moisten if needed. Season. Add grated cheese (parmigiano). Kick off your shoes. Sit down. Watch TV. (Glass of wine?)  Comfy.

by

A Quick Recipe for Fresh Figs (They’re in season!)

Ripening fig in the backyard

Ripening fig in the backyard

I LOVE fresh figs. Night and day between fresh figs and dried figs. Different animals entirely. (Different taste, too.) Dried figs are tough, leathery, brown. Fresh figs, are soft, pink, luscious, Quite sensual, actually. We’ve got a fig tree in our backyard–not huge–but this is the first year more than three figs have ripened. I’m getting 5-6 spectacular figs a week.

But I remember a giant fig tree in Italy. As large as a 2-story building. It grew in the tiniest of hilltowns in Emilia Romagna. I was visiting a friend of the family, Marco, who lived in one room on the second floor of a small stone building. A single bed, nightstand, a few shelves of books, a hot plate with an espresso pot, and a heavy wooden dining table in the middle of the room were all the furniture and amenities he had. Downstairs in an adjacent building was a bathroom he shared with his parents who lived in the building across the way.

Dinner was brought up the steps on platters by his mother (remind me to tell you the mammoni story one day: about middle-aged Italian men who still live with their parents!). She brought a pile of locally made pasta in a deep delicious tomato sauce. And for dessert: a 5-inch high cake of fresh ricotta with local honey. And, of course, crusty bread.

As we sat at the table for a few hours, eating, drinking, and espresso then brewing, I was entranced by the open window. It framed the tall, full, laden-with-fruit fig tree. Next to it a bright street lamp lit the tree attracting moths. Bats zigzagged through the light, catching moths, while the fig tree stood witness to the splendid night (as did I).

Fresh Fig Recipe 1-2-3

5-6 fresh figs, cut in half or quarters if very large

1 cup mascarpone cheese

1/4 cup minced mint

1/4 cup honey

1/4 lb. thinly sliced prosciutto

salt to taste

Smear a little mascarpone on top of each cut fig piece. Sprinkle with a little salt. Sprinkle with some minced mint. Add a small dollop of honey. Wrap fig in a piece of prosciutto cut to fit the size of the fig piece. Serve.

Fig Tree

Fig Tree

by

How to Make Stovetop Espresso & Affogato

My Stovetop Espresso Pots

My Stovetop Espresso Pots

I always have a blast doing cooking segments for WSMV “More at Midday,” Nashville’s NBC affiliate. Here’s the segment I did yesterday on how to use a stovetop espresso pot and make the easy & great dessert: Affogato.

Chef Paulette on WSMV: How to Make Stovetop Espresso & Affogato

by

Ewww! You’re gonna eat that?

IMG_3277

French rolling pin, my favorite

When I was a little kid my mom steered me away from sweets. If I picked up a tootsie roll she’d scrunge her face into a frown and say: Eww. You’re gonna eat that? 

That’s the story I’m told. She’s a sweets lover (whipped cream being especially alluring). My sister, too, can happily munch cookies and candy every day. Me? Bakery displays used to appeal to me as much as the nuts & bolts bins at the hardware store. Eyes glaze over, not even seeing anything.

But that has, unfortunately, changed. I think it started in culinary school. I went to culinary school while I was still living in NYC. I was on the culinary, not pastry, track. But they interrupted our frying, braising, roasting and fabricating meat, for a quick 6-week pastry module. We whipped through puff pastry, cakes, caramel, and candies–each day bringing on a new technique.

It felt like a mini-vacation. No grease, no slimy hands, no potential salmonella, no leg joints, silverskin, or fish scales. Just butter and flour. Eggs. Everything felt lighter and happier. I feel in love with our puff pastry croissants, pain au chocolate and raisin rolls. I suddenly wanted to trail at my favorite NY cafes to learn how they made those pastries that would now pop into my eyes (and mouth) when I came in for a cappuccino or cafe au lait.

Since then I like to bake. It first felt a little foreign in my hands, but I’ve warmed up quickly. These little baked mini-pies have been haunting me since I first made them. In this recipe the filling is blueberries, strawberries, aleppo pepper & cinnamon. But I’m now dreaming of adding mascarpone. I’ll let you know how that comes out!

Mini-Pies w Fruit Filling

To make the crust, pulse in a food processor: 1 1/2 cups flour, 1 teaspoon sugar, pinch salt. Add 1 stick cold unsalted butter (that has been cut into cubes). Pulse until broken into small pieces. Add 1/4 cup of very cold white wine. Pulse until dough comes together in a ball. Remove and wrap in plastic. Refrigerate for 1 hour.

IMG_3272

unsalted butter, the baker’s friend

IMG_3274

like magic, food processor makes your pastry dough

Meanwhile make the filling. Combine 1 cup blueberries, 1 cup strawberries (cut into small pieces the size of blueberries), 1/4 cup of sugar, 1/2 teaspoon cinnamon, 1/2 teaspoon aleppo pepper.

IMG_3280

isn’t it great when food is as pretty as it tastes good?

Roll dough out and cut into 3-inch squares (or choose your shape & size). Place about a teaspoon of the mixture in the middle. Fold into a triangle and press sides together with fork tines to seal. Place on a parchment-lined sheet pan. Repeat with the rest. (You can knead lightly and roll out the scraps to make a few more.)

IMG_3284

your own personal assembly line!

Makes about a dozen. Lightly beat an egg with a little water. Brush egg on top. Make a small slit in each and sprinkle a little sugar on top.

IMG_3292

dough, pin, cutter, little pie

Bake at 400 degrees F. for about 20 minutes until golden. YUM.

IMG_3296

I can eat at least five of them

by

Tomato & Watermelon Salad? Yes, and on WSMV-TV Nashville

Watermelon Still

Catch my cooking segment on Nashville’s WSMV-TV More at Midday with Holly Thompson

Tomato-Watermelon Salad Video Link

by

You say rapini. I say broccoli rabe.

I wonder why the bitter taste is an Italian favorite. I’m Italian-American and I seem to have the gene: Campari and broccoli rabe are my two bitter favorites.

Sometimes when I open a new bunch of broccoli rabe I can smell the bitterness sailing up from the bunch without even sniffing close. I can open the refrigerator and if there’s a bunch of broccoli rabe in there and I can smell it. And even though most times I’m buying Andy Boy brand, not every bunch is so strong. It’s hard to know what makes the difference from bunch to bunch: sun, rain, soil, month?

IMG_3241

The little bud-like clusters are the best parts. I like to include some of the thick stem pieces, too. I cut it all into a little larger than bite-sized pieces, leaving out the really thick stems. (I cut those off from the entire bunch before removing the twist tie.) It’s very easy to make and I’ve adjusted my cooking style for broccoli rabe over the years.

I used to get a saucepan boiling with water and plunge it in. Let it cook until almost tender. Then drain, and saute in a skillet with olive oil, thinly sliced garlic, and red pepper flakes until cooked through and tender/al dente to the bite.

IMG_3245

Now I just use a large skillet with a little water in it (about a 1/4-1/2 inch). Get that boiling. Then add the broccolie rabe and cook to tenderish. By then most of the water has evaporated. Then I add some olive oil and the garlic and pepper flakes and season. It skips a step and comes out more delicious!

IMG_3244

Eat it straight. Or add it to pasta. Stays nice leftover, too.

IMG_3247

by

When Spaghetti Hangs Around With Eggs. In Rome.

 

window

I lived in Rome for a year while completing my third year in college. Actually, school was just an excuse to live there. My parents visited Rome for the first time a couple of years before. They were bowled over and came back booking the next trip to bring my sister and I. On my very first night in Rome I felt the world closing in around my heart and head. It was too much. I wanted out. I felt that crush of culture shock while that tug of “I know this very well” rushed underneath me.

By morning. I was in love. With Rome. I finagled a year there under the guise of going to school. My Roman roommate, Grazia (later to be called Enrica), was a free-spirited Roman, much to the chagrin of her parents. She moved out of her family home at 17 to live on her own. No one moved out of their family home unless they were getting married. Her dad disowned her for a few years but softened later.

Many adventures for me ensued under the wings of Grazia, but also within my college circle. But here I’d like to show you a recipe that made my jaw drop when I first saw Grazia make it. Spaghetti Frittata. Yes, spaghetti fried with eggs. A spaghetti omelet if you will. I loved it at first bite but was supremely skeptical till then.

This works best with leftover spaghetti in its leftover sauce — whatever it is! My favorite has turned out to be leftover spaghetti in a tomato shrimp sauce (yes, including the shrimp).

about 2-3 cups leftover spaghetti in sauce

5 large eggs

1/4 cup grated parmigiano or pecorino

salt & pepper to taste

olive oil for frying

In a mixing bowl, mix together the spaghetti, eggs, and cheese until well combined. Season with salt & pepper (remember, the spaghetti might be already seasoned, but the eggs need some). Heat about 3 tablespoons of olive oil in a medium oven-proof skillet…enough so the frittata won’t stick, or use a non-stick pan.  Heat until hot. Pour the egg-spaghetti mixture in and gently spread so it covers the width of the pan. Let cook a few minutes until the bottom is set, and then put under a broiler. Broil till top is set and golden. (Be carfeul taking out skillet from oven. When placing it out of the oven be sure to leave a pot holder on the handle so you don’t forget it’s hot!) With a spatula loosen frittata and slide onto a plate. Cut into wedges with a pizza cutter. Serve warm or at room temp.

DSCN1847

by

Grilled Eggplant Parmigiano

All you need is a grill and a food processor. No need to turn on stove or oven.

Slice your eggplant into medium thin slices. Brush with olive oil, season with salt & pepper. Grill until softened, imprinted with grill lines, and even charred a bit. Also grill two big tomatoes sliced in half, 1 large onion, peeled and sliced in half, and 2-3 cloves of garlic (keep them together so they don’t fall through the grill or hold together with skewer). Pulse the grilled tomatoes, onion, and peeled grilled garlic cloves in the food processor until you have a smooth sauce (or chunky if you like). Season with salt & pepper. Spoon some sauce in the bottom of a casserole dish (I use an alimunum one since it’s going back on the grill). Place a layer of eggplant slices on top, spoon some sauce, sprinkle grated parmigiano, scatter cubes or slices of mozzarella. Repeat in one or two more layers. Place back on a very low grill (or use top grate away from direct heat if you have one). Close cover and cook until cheese melts and is bubbling.

Now pour a glass of cool Italian white wine (Frascati? Pinot Grigio? Soave?) and enjoy…preferably outoors in a garden fragrant with basil and ripening figs. 🙂