Pasta carbonara is a very fascinating thing, let’s start with the ingredients for 4 people:

• 320g spaghetti (this is the typical type of pasta for the carbonara)
• 100g bacon, diced
• Salt and pepper
• 3 eggs
• extra-virgin olive oil
• 50g of grated Parmesan cheese. The ideal cheese should be Pecorino, which is made from sheep’s milk and has a sharper taste than Parmesan.

Heat the olive oil in a frying pan, then add the bacon and gently stir fry until the bits are golden and crispy. Set aside and let them cool down.

Lightly beat the eggs in a small bowl, and add the salt and pepper.When the bacon is at room temperature add it to the eggs.

While you’re cooking the spaghetti according to the packet instructions, take a few minutes to remember the one and only truth about “carbonara sauce”, and repeat it as a mantra: carbonara sauce doesn’t exist. At least if, by “sauce” we mean a separate entity, which we mix into the pasta.

The reason why there is no such thing as sauce for carbonara, is that, what you pour on the spaghetti are just lightly beaten eggs, which will immediately start to coagulate with the heat of spaghetti.This is why the secret of the Italian pasta carbonara is all in a good timing, so follow me.

Pour the spaghetti in the colander, let gravity do its job, but just when all water has been drained, put the colander on top of the saucepan, for five seconds, then pour the spaghetti back in. You will need a little bit if the cooking water or the pasta will be too dry, but not too much. This is why the timing is so important.

Add the eggs, and stir until they are completely curdled. Add the Parmesan and serve. If you’re not sure of what you’re doing, collect part of the cooking water in a separate bowl, drain the spaghetti completely, then add the water one tablespoon at the time until it’s not too dry.

There are four different parties when it comes to the spaghetti carbonara recipe. First, there is the smoked vs the unsmoked bacon. In the latter case you would use guanciale,which is made from the pig’s cheek. Then there is the cream vs cooking water party.

Whereas I’m fairly neutral when it comes to bacon (being in Ireland I would definitely go for the smoked one), I have no quibble about saying that I’m a proud member of the cooking-water-party.

Vegetarian Frittata

Cheese and Pears is back after a long time with a vegetable frittata recipe. I have to confess one thing: I have hardly cooked recently, and my sweet-half (I’m not sure if this is proper English, I’m translating from Italian dolce-metà) has taken over the duties in the kitchen, and I think that for while from now, I’ll be bathing in her own light, until this lazy spell goes away.
Frittata is the Italian equivalent of French Omelette or the Spanish tortilla, but with differences, the main one being that unlike the French or the Spanish, we don’t make it a matter of national pride.
Typically, it’s all in one piece, but you may also find who would call frittata what actually are scrambled eggs. Also, the typical recipe for frittata includes vegetables and/or salami.
In Veneto, the region where I’m from, frittata is the traditional dish of a trip to the countryside you would do with family or friends on the 25th of April, the day of St Mark’s, who is also Venice’s patron saint. Incidentally, the same day we also celebrate Italy’s liberation from nazi-fascism (in 1945).

Anyway, enough Italian history for dummies and back to the Italian frittata recipe. The one we (she) made was baked in the oven, here are the ingredients:

• 6 whole eggs
• 6 asparagus
• 1 zucchini, chopped
• 1 red pepper, sliced
• 1 onion, chopped
• Zest of half lemon
• Salt and pepper
• 2 tbsp extra virgin olive oil

Boil the asparagus for 15 minutes in salted water then drain, let them cool, and chop them.
Heat the olive oil in a frying pan and add the zucchini and the onion. Sauté at low-medium heat for 10-15 minutes. Take the frying pan off the heat, and set aside too cool down.
Preheat the oven at 180° C, 350° F.
In a bowl, break 6 eggs, add salt and pepper, and the lemon zest, and lightly beat them.
Add the asparagus, zucchini and onions, and peppers to the eggs in the bowl, and stir. Place a piece of ovenproof paper on a baking pan or tin and pour the egg mix . Ideally, for a baked frittata recipe like this, you should end up with a thickness of at least one cm.
Bake it for about 20 minutes, or until all the egg has coagulated. If this frittata with vegetables is not too thick, if it’s cooked on the surface, it means it’s also cooked inside. If you’re not too hungry you can wait a little more until it’s golden brown on top.

It’s also great for the day after lunch box, between two slices of toasted brown bread.

Italian Savory Pie

After surviving Christmas with the family and Year End at the Company, Cheese and Pears is back, trying to cope with a fall in the number of visits to the site, that is only second to the fall of employment rate over here in Ireland (bad joke, I know). Ice has taken possession of the Country and this afternoon it will snow again, hopefully for the last time. Luckily enough I can work from home and save myself a 7 km journey at 5 km per hour.

Let’s go back in the kitchen with this great savory pie, “torta salata” in Italian, where salata means salted (as opposed to sweet of course). Now, don’t ask me the difference between a torta salata and a quiche lorraine, maybe there is some real foodie reading this (as opposed to a fake one like me) able to explain that to me. Actually I’m not going to pass this off as authentic Italian but hey, my mom makes it, my sister makes it, and I make it, and that’s enough to make it Italian food.

The pastry for the quiche is a shortcrust pastry but without sugar. For 4 people you will need:

• 200g (7oz) plain flour
• a pinch of salt
• 100g (3½oz) chilled butter, diced
• 1 medium egg, beaten
• a pinch of salt
• a tbsp of cold milk just in case

(Confession, in case I haven’t said that before: I don’t know if someone out there enjoys making shortcrust pastry, but I don’t)

Put the flour in a bowl, add a pinch of salt, make a hole in the middle and put the butter cubes in it. Using your fingertips, rub flour and butter together until they are like breadcrumbs. Add the beaten egg and work the dough just enough to put the ingredients together. If the dough is too dry, add just ½ tbsp of cold milk at the time. As soon as you have a ball that can hold together, cover it with clingfilm and stick it in the fridge, but before doing that, flatten it with the palm of your hand, as it will be easier to roll it afterwards. Leave it in the fridge for 30 minutes or one hour until firm.

In the meantime start preparing the filling. You will need:

• 1 tbsp olive oil
• 2 cloves of garlic
• 1 broccoli, chopped in small pieces
• 3-4 medium potatoes, finely diced
• 1 zucchini, finely diced
• 1 medium egg
• 50g (1½oz) grated parmesan
• a handful of breadcrumbs
• salt and pepper

Heat the olive oil and the garlic in a frying pan, add the diced vegetables and cook them for about 15 minutes until they start to soften. Pour them in a bowl and let them cool, then add the egg, Parmesan, salt and pepper.

Preheat the oven at 180°C (356°F). Grease a 22cm (9inch) cake tin with butter and dust with flour. Take the dough out of the fridge and roll the shortcrust pastry with a rolling pin. This is the most delicate part (for me, at least), because the pastry crumbles very easily, so be gentle. I usually roll the pastry on a sheet of baking paper, keeping the shape as round as possible, until it is a little larger then the tin, then transfer it, and press it down gently with the fingertips to make it stick to the bottom and the side of the baking tin.

Add the vegetable mix, sprinkle the breadcurmbs and bake it in the oven for about 40 minutes, until the top is golden.

Shrimp Risotto Recipe

Cheeseandpears is back, with a huge recipes backlog. The reason for staying away for so long is simple: I’m currently working on my plan to become rich, and as Bill Cullen would say, it takes time and commitment.

Anyway, it’s time for risotto. Seriously, do you know how to make risotto yet? I hear sometimes people declaring their love for Italian food claiming they do an excellent risotto. Even if I don’t claim I do, I’m always more interested in the making rather than the final result, which can be good or bad regardless of how good you follow the process. So, if you’re reading and you do an “excellent risotto” how do you do it? Do you follow the steps below? Or do you do it your own way? By the way, I recently found out (with horror) that, when she makes risotto, my sister adds all the stock at once. So there you go, another blow to the myth that you have to be Italian to cook Italian…
I already explained the steps in my very first post about mushroom risotto but if you’re too lazy to click on it I’ll sum them up here (click it anyway, it’s a delicious risotto recipe). I’m not sure if I’ll repeat exactly the same steps in the same way, as I AM too lazy to click on my own recipe.

For two people:

• 160-200g (6-7oz) risotto rice (buy the good one, don’t be stingy!)
• 1 liter (2 pints) vegetable stock
• half onion
• 2 tablespoons olive oil or 25g (1oz) butter
• half a glass of white wine
• more butter and parmesan
• the food you want to flavor the risotto with

1. Put the chopped onion in a saucepan with the olive oil, let it sweat at medium -low heat for 7-10 minutes. Don’t burn it.
2. Pour the rice and turn up the heat, let it toast for 1-2 minutes, keep on stirring. Set a timer to 17 minutes from when you pour the rice
3. Pour the wine, turn down the heat to medium and let it evaporate.
4. Pour a ladle of stock, let it absorb before you add another one. Then pour another one and so on. Keep on stirring to prevent the rice from sticking
5. When the rice is cooked, you may need to let it go one or two minutes more to absorb any excess of stock. Take it off the heat add a knob of butter and Parmesan, cover with a lid and let it rest for 3-4 minutes. Give a good stir and serve

What about the flavor of the rice? Well there’s no fixed rule. Depending on the recipe, it can be added from the very start, half-way or towards the end. It can be cooked separately or added raw to the saucepan. And of course it can be all these things combined together. This is what you do in this particular risotto recipe, so follow me if you want to kick it up a notch.

Now, this shrimp risotto with peas goes like this.
You’ll need the ingredients above (parmesan is optional) plus 100-150g (3,5-5oz) of precooked shrimps and the same quantity of frozen peas. The quantity here is variable, firstly because I tend to forget to write them down when I cook, secondly because it depends on taste. My advice is: train your eye and go for balance: your risotto shouldn’t be swamped in peas and shrimps, but you shouldn’t struggle to find them either.

Shrimps: before starting the risotto, heat a tbsp of olive oil with a clove of garlic, stir-fry gently the shrimps and 2/3 of the defrosted peas for about 15 minutes, then add them to the risotto almost at the very end of cooking time.
The other 1/3 of the peas should be added at around the 8th minute of cooking.

In this way the peas will have two different textures and colors, one part more brownish and cooked, the other mire green and raw.
The picture of this shrimp risotto recipe is miraculously good enough to show that.

brown bread bruschetta

My huge fan base has been complaining that I haven’t been posting for a while. The truth is I haven’t been cooking a lot recently, but this is only temporary, you’ll see. In the meantime, check this super quick bruschetta recipe: brown bread bruschetta.

I’m stretching the concept of bruschetta a lot here, as I didn’t use the classic Tuscan bruschetta bread, but Irish brown soda bread. The topping is 1 ball of mozzarella cheese, and zucchini with bacon bits.

This is actually three recipes in one. But first things first. For the Irish soda bread:

• 500g (1lb) whole flour
• 1 tsp baking soda
• 1 tsp of salt
• between 350 and 500 ml (12-17 fl oz) buttermilk

Preheat the oven at 180°C ( 350° F). Combine all the dry ingredients, then add the buttermilk. I don’t have a specific quantity, but whole flour tends to make a hard bread, so I like a very very sticky dough, I won’t say liquid, but almost.

Stir just enough to mix all together, pour the dough in a cake tin and bake in the oven for 40-45 minutes. For the best result you want to make the bread the day before, as it’s more taste after a day.

For the zucchini topping:

• 2 finely chopped zucchini
• a clove of garlic
• a tsp of olive oil
• ½ pint of stock, heated
• ½ a glass white wine
• 2 tbsp of bacon bits

Heat the olive oil in a pan and suteé with the garlic and the bacon bits. Add the zucchini and stir until they’re all coated with oil. Turn on the heat and pour the wine. When it has evaporated turn down the heat again and add the stock, a little at the time. Let it absorb before adding it again (like you would do in a risotto recipe). When the zucchini are tender set aside.

Preheat the oven at 100° C (210° F) , cut 4 slices of brown bread and leave them for 30 seconds in the toaster. Slice the ball of mozzarella cheese and cover each slice of bread, put some zucchini on top and stick the bread in the oven until the cheese is melted. The remaining zucchini will be your side dish.

As I said, this is not the real recipe for bruschetta, but if you have non-Italian guests at your table, you can show off a little bit and say that this is how they do it in that secluded Tuscan village, it’s just a pity you can’t remember its name right now…

Risotto with Walnuts and Spinach

The magic of risotto recipes has happened again: taking two flavors that you know they’ll match (and walnuts, as it turns out, match with pretty much everything) and making a risotto out of them, even if you’ve never done it before.

It’s quarter end, and we’re all pretty crazy down at The Company, so this time I won’t go over the risotto routine again (sauté, toast rice, add wine etcetera), you can find it at the the post that started it all, the mushroom risotto recipe.

Risotto recipe for people:

• 3 tbsp olive oil
• ½ onion, chopped
• between 250 and 320g (9-11oz) risotto rice
• ½ glass white wine
• ½ litre (1 pint )of stock
• 200g (7oz) frozen spinach
• 100g (3 ½oz) walnuts, half roughly chopped, half finely chopped
• 30g (1oz) butter
• a handful of grated Parmesan

Thaw the spinach in boiling water, drain, squeeze and set aside.

Heat the stock.

Following the routine, add the finely chopped walnuts at stage 1 with the sauté, and the spinach at stage 3½.

When you’re finished, just before serving, stir in the rest of the walnuts.

More risotto recipes

Pasta Alla Campidanese

Of all the pasta recipes, this is probably my favorite. My aunt Elia would be proud of me: this gnocchetti alla campidanese turned out really good. This one is a typical Sardinian dish (Campidano is a vast plain in the south part of the island), whose basic ingredients are sausage and saffron. If you add some grated Pecorino cheese (less optional than in other pasta recipes) the resulting taste is fairly strong. Be ready for it.

Which sausage? Well, I wouldn’t know a proper word for it. In some recipes you sometimes find Italian sausage, but I’m not sure what it means. In this case it would be a Sardinian sausage, but it doesn’t help either. Let’s say it’s pork sausage, with a fair amount of fat. It’s not spicy, and it’s not a salami, which means it’s raw and you’re supposed to cook it. I’ve pasted a picture below. Whichever closest you can find to that, the better.

Which pasta? Sardinian gnocchetti (I found them in a Deli shop) is a ribbed pasta with a shape similar to small gnocchi, but that’s the only thing they have in common. An alternative is another type of pasta called malloreddus.

This pasta recipe is for four people:

• 320-350g (11-12oz) of gnocchetti or malloreddus
• a few strands of saffron
• 150g (5 oz) sausage
• 1 tin of chopped tomatoes
• ½ onion, chopped
• salt and pepper, olive oil
• a handful of Pecorino cheese

Remove the skin of the sausage and the fat in excess, and reduce it to small pieces. Heat the olive oil in a frying pan and sauté the onion at low heat for about 10 minutes.

Add the sausage and let it go for another 10 minutes. Add the chopped tomatoes and the saffron. Let if go at medium heat for about 30-40 minutes until the meat is cooked and the sauce has thickened.

Cook the pasta, drain, and add to the pan with the sauce. Stir for 2 minutes at high heat and serve.

More pasta recipes.

Baked Mashed Potato Cake

How do you get rid of 1.5 kg of spuds that have started to sprout in your kitchen? Bake a mashed potato cake. This mashed potatoes recipe is taken from Gennaro’s Italian Year (for amazon.co.uk click here). The word gatò is of course the italianized version of the French gâteau. The original recipe uses a kind of Italian cheese called Provolone, but I used the ubiquitous mozzarella instead.

• 1.5kg (3 1/3 pounds) potatoes
• 100g (4 ½ oz) + 25g (1 oz)  butter
• 1 glass of milk
• 2 + 2 eggs
• 150g (5 oz) grated Parmesan
• 200g (7 0z) mozzarella
• 100g (3 ½ oz) provolone (or 100g of more mozzarella)
• 200g (7 oz salami (or 200g bacon bits)
• 2 tbsp finely chopped parsley
• large handful of dried breadcrumbs

Boil the potatoes in their skin until they’re soft, let them cool a little (making sure they’re still warm), peel them and mash them in bowl.

Preheat the oven at 200°C (400°F), grease a loose-bottomed cake tin with some of the extra butter and dust with breadcrumbs.

Stir the milk in the mashed potatoes and add 2 whole eggs plus 2 yolks, Parmesan. Provolone and/or mozzarella, salami or bacon, and parsley.

If you used mozzarella instead of Provolone (as it happened with the lasagnas), the taste will be less strong, and less salty, so add a pinch of salt to correct this. The bacon or the salami will take care of the rest.

Pour the mix in the cake tin and press with a spatula, sprinkle the surface with breadcrumbs and little knobs of butter.

Bake in the oven for 35-40 minutes until golden.

If you can’t eat it all in one go, let it cool completely, slice it and freeze it, mashed potato recipe makes an excellent lunchbox.