Octopus salad with clementines citronette dressing

Ingredients for 4 people:

1 octopus (800 g)

3 potatoes

a sprig of fresh sweet fennel

extra virgin olive oil

salt and pepper

3 clementines

Preparation:

I wash and clean the octopus under running water.

Then I stew it in a pan with a deep-boiling water, lightly salted, 

covered by a lid  and I cook it over a low flame for about 30 minutes.

I let it cool down in its water, so I skin and cut it up.

Meanwhile I wash and stew the potatoes.

I drain and peel and cut them up.

Apart I mix the clementine juice with sprigs of fresh sweet fennel, extra virgin olive oil, salt and pepper.

I put the octopus in a bowl adding the potatoes and the clementines citronette dressing.

I serve the octopus salad with clementine slices.

It can be a starter for New Year's Eve dinner.

Christmas brownies

Ingredients:

200 g unsweetened cocoa powder

175 g margarine

150 g sugar fruit

3 eggs

80 g corn starch

a vanilla stick

lactose and sugar free,hazelnut cream

coconut flakes

 

Preparation:

I power on the oven at 180 ° (low temperature).

I melt the unsweetened cocoa powder and the margarine in a double saucepan.

Apart I whip the eggs with sugar fruit, then I add,mixing from down to up, 

little by little,cocoa and margarine cream, starch and vanilla.

I pour in a square baking pan and I bake for 25-30 minutes.

After cooling it down, I use a cookie cutter to cut the Christmas trees, 

I spread the hazelnut cream above a tree, I put another tree above and I spread the hazelnut cream also above it.

I finish sprinkling some coconut flakes on.

During Christmas season tables are full of cakes, desserts...and for food intolerance people like us

it 's hard...seeing the others eating such so tasty delicacies.

So we do with what we hav've got and find the way to gratify the taste.

With this recipe...the others will envy us!

Christmas bread

Ingredients:

100 g rice starch

100 g corn starch

200 g rice flour

350 g unsweetened yogurt

50 g unsweetened cocoa powder

200 g homemade pears jam

100 g sugar fruit

2 eggs

Preparation:

I whip two eggs, then I add the sugar fruit, yogurt, pears jam and then flour, starches and the cocoa powder. 

I pour the dough in a pan covered by greaseproof paper and I garnish above with almonds thin layers.

I bake for 30-40 minutes at 180° (low temperatures for cakes).

A sweet awakening...for Christmas morning.

Sea bream fillet with saffron gravy

Great binges come closer...and peep out from traditional dishes new recipes.
They could take part of your family recipes.


Ingredients :

4 sea breams fillets (200 g each)
1 stick of celery
1 little carrot
1 small leek
1 small packet of saffron
400 g tomato pulp
parsley, basil
4 tablespoons extra virgin olive oil
salt
pepper

Preparation:

In a large pan I put the fish fillets in only one layer, the celery, the carrot and the green part of leek.

A sprig of rosemary and a pinch of salt also.
I let it cook for ten minutes.
Meanwhile I chop the white part of the leek and I sweat it in the oil.
I add the tomato pulp, chopped parsley and basil. Then salt and pepper.
It cook for  about 15 minutes.
I take away the vegetables from the pan , I water down the saffron in the gravy and I put there the fillets.
I cook the fish over a low flame for ten minutes.
I serve the fillets on a bed of tomato sauce and with mashed potatoes (with lactose-free milk, margarine and saffron melted in the warm milk).

A simple recipe but yummy  for the Christmas Eve dinner .

Happy Christmas

TO EVERYBODY!

Ginger cookies

There is a british and american tradition to trim the Christmas tree with typical ginger cookies named gingerbread man...because are man-shaped.
I make them with other Christmas cookies cutters.
Ingredients:
115 g margarine
200 g superfine corn flour (fumetto type in Italy)
150 g rice starch
100 g potato starch
2 teaspoons grated fresh ginger
2 teaspoons ground cinnamon
100 g maple syrup
115 g sugar fruit
1 beaten egg

Preparation:
I preheat the oven at 160° (very low temperature). In a bowl I sift the flour, the starches and the spices.
In a large pan I melt over low flame the margarine and I add the maple syrup and the sugar fruit, mixing well.
I pour the dough in the bowl with the other ingredients and I add the beaten egg.
It's a gummy dough at the beginning but after some minutes becomes solid.
On a flat covered by flour; I roll the dough tick 3 mm and with cookies cutters I shape stars and jingle bells.
I put them on baking pans , kneading and cutting up to finish all the dough.
I bake the cookies for 15- 20  minutes, as long as are golden.
I take them out of the oven and I let them stand in the pans for some minutes. Then I move to other flat for cooling them down.
I mix the sugar fruit with the water on the stove so to make a caramel to pour hot on the cookies. Very carefully.
Once cooled down, the cookies are shinies and good-looking.

I hang them up to the tree with red ribbon.

Codfish with Sicilian crumbs

Summer is far away and the sea too.

The smell of this recipe comes to mind such memories, such starry night skies in Filicudi (Eolian Islands, Sicily) and the colour of the sea so sky blue -green that show between full bloom caper bushes.

Ingredients:

1 yeast-free khorasan wheat piadina (typical Italian flat unleavened bread)

3-4 slices of codfish

4-5 sliced potatoes 

2 tablespoons Filicudi's capers

2 tablespoons pine nuts

50 g small Italian dry tomatoes named Datterino

2 tablespoons Sultana (a variety of raisin)

a sprig of fresh sweet fennel

Preparation:

I blend the piadina without toasting it, with capers, the dry small tomatoes, the sultana,the pine nuts and the fresh sweet fennel.

I put these  mixed crumbs on the slices of codfish in a pan covered by a greaseproof paper and I drizzle some drops of extra virgin olive oil.

I put the sliced potatoes in the same pan, a pinch of salt and the remaining mixed crumbs.

I bake it in the oven for 30 min. at 220 ° max. temperature, the last five minutes only cooking them au gratin.

While outside it's snowing...a bite and I come back to Mediterranean sea...I come back home.

Conchiglioni pasta with vegetables sauce

Good things that now start dealing with new types of pasta for food intolerance people.

So sometimes  we can treat ourselves and prepare an unusual but remarkable baked pasta!

Ingredients:

300 g corn flour pasta (big shells-shaped, available at supermarket)

1 yellow pepper

1 medium carrot

1 thin slice of uncooked pumpkin

1/2 white onion

a sprig of fresh sweet fennel

10 small Italian tomatoes named "pachino"salt

extra virgin olive oil

100 g grated parmesan

100 g Emmenthal cheese

vegetables yeast-free stock cube

Preparation:

In a pan I sauté the finely chopped onion in extra virgin olive oil and I add the other chopped vegetables.

I let them sauté and flavour with sweet fennel and the stock cube. I add the water, 400 ml about, a pinch of salt and let it cook up to  the sauce is ready (20 minutes, without reducing it so much).

I cook the pasta apart in a large pan with deep-boiling salted water for 10 minutes.

I drain and cool it down under running cold water for a couple of minutes and then I put the conchiglioni in a baking pan where I poured already three tablespoons of sauce.

With a tablespoon I pour inside every shell-shaped pasta a bit of sauce, chopped Emmenthal cheese and a sprinkle of parmesan.

I bake the pasta for 15 minutes at 200° (medium temperature) and the last five minutes only cooking it au gratin.

A light and fast baked pasta...for a Sunday lunch with your family.

Crêpes with chickpea flour

Ingredients for 4-6 (depends on thickness) crêpes:
100 g chickpea flour
100 g corn flour
20 g corn starch
1 pinch of salt
2 eggs
15 g margarine
300 g water
100 g lactose-free milk
pepper

Preparation:
I put in a bowl the flours and the starch, in the centre the salt and the beaten eggs and I whisk well the batter.
Then I add, mixing, the milk and last the melted margarine.
When the batter is uniform I let it stand for 40 minutes.
Then I oil slightly the pan with sunflower oil, I heat it and I pour in the centre half-ladle of batter.
I tilt the pan so to spin around and have round crepes.
I let cook one side for about 2 minutes and then carefully I turn it upside down to make golden also this side.
Once we prepared the crepes, I spread lactose-free stracchino (soft cheese), stewed and pan-fried (with garlic and extra virgin olive oil) spinaches and some toasted pine nuts.
My husband who willy-nilly is my guinea pig...first time he proved them , he watched puzzled, like what is it inside? He tried and then he globbed them up.
Just at the end he knew that they were chickpea flour made.

Hazelnuts square-shaped cookies

 

This recipe is special for me as the main ingredient are hazelnuts.
My father picked them up around Nebrodi hills, in the province of Messina (my hometown) and that he sent to me.
They arrived to me already shelled one by one...at the least I had to prepare a recipe in his honor.
I love simple dishes...so it had to be easy and without any effort.

Ingredients:

100 g cut up margarine
100 g fine corn flour (fioretto type in Italy)
50 g corn starch
a pinch of salt
100 g vanilla- flavoured sugar fruit (it's enough to put a vanilla bean already used inside the sugar fruit jar . In this way you will have it always and problem solved!)
1 egg
4 tablespoons lactose-free milk
100 g half-cut hazelnuts

Preparation:
I preheat the oven at 180°(low temperature)
I prepare a square baking pan and I cover with greaseproof paper.
I sift the flour, the starch in a bowl, adding salt and mixing by hand  the margarine.
The dough now is nubby.
Then I add the sugar fruit and I mix well.
Last the beaten egg, the milk and the hazelnuts. Mixing well up to the dough is soft.
I pour it in a baking pan covered by greaseproof paper and I flatten the surface with a cake-slice.
I bake for 25 minutes.
I let it cool down out of the oven for 10 minutes and I lift the edges up by the cake-slice.
I turn it upside down a cutting board and I cut the square-shaped cookies.

Thank you Dad! Your hazelnuts are delicious!