Millefeuille, seeing the light at the end of the tunnel? / La Millefoglie e la luce in fondo al tunnel

A tunnel? Yes indeed, a dark tunnel, from which I will emerge only with the perfect recipe, victorious. Or else I will be condemned to wander in obscurity, maddened by the thought that somewhere out there someone is baking the perfect millefeuille.

Spelt, wholemeal and wheat bran bread / Pane al farro-spelta, farina integrale e crusca di frumento

Few days ago I was discussing with Barbara, on a bread baker’s group on facebook , about dough hydration. Highly hydrated doughs scare the wits out of me, and I have disastrous memories of my first attempts at highly hydrated ciabatta. Barbara encouraged me to try and hey, there is nothing as a good challenge to get me going. Since I had been doing very little baking and feeling a bit down in the previous days I decided I needed a proper kick in my backside.

My tomato sauce / La mia salsa di pomodoro

This year has brought many changes into my life. I decided to quit my job, came back where I grew up and many other things. One of those many other things is my urge for more earthly, concrete things. So came the decision to help Dad plant and sow his vegetable garden.

Knock Knock here comes Le Creuset’s Knob / Il pomello del desiderio

A year ago, after a lot of internet browsing and actual drooling over pictures of magnificient breads, I decided to get my own Le Creuset pot. I longed for one for far too much time. Blame it on childhood memories of my mum’s orange set of pots, my natural attraction to all things nice and often too expensive, or the new colors that were issued in 2012. Who knows. I knew I needed one.

Mille feuille part III: abandon all hope ye who use too much butter! / Millefoglie parte III: lasciate ogni speranza voi che abbondate di burro!

With such a title to introduce my post you can imagine my third attempt at mille feuille has been quite tragic. Did I actually say, in my Cake is… post, that the third shot at something results in victory? How wrong was I! Or maybe mille feuille is just the exception to the rule.

Pain de beaucaire, truth or dare? / Pain de beaucaire e le verità nascoste

I know I owe you all an apology and an explanation. My last post’s title was misleading, as pointed out to me by Barbara. Probably some of you, like her, expected some dark revelation about my personal life and got none. I talked about some secrets and shared none… My mind was travelling back in years, living those moments I would share solely with my mother and my mind went through what we considered our little secrets.

A celestial wreath and some secrets / Una angelica ghirlanda e qualche segreto

Not long ago, as you all know my blog is fairly young, la Greg commented on some of my first pics on Instagram. She was so fascinated by the wreath she asked me if I was to bake one sooner or later and making a post out of it.

Stale bread? French toast! / Pane secco? Colazione gustosa!

I must admit it, sometimes I get carried away. Last weekend some friends came over for breakfast and I overbaked. Not only they had a go at my latest millefeuille experiment, I also baked some brioches, an experimental bread (regretfully chucked away…a failure!) and four baguettes.

Cake is… all good things come in threes! / Cake é…non c’è due senza tre!

Yet another Cake is… Tuesday. Why did I choose Tuesdays to test my Cake is… recipes? Simple as one two three, Wednesdays are Ada (my niece) days. Usually me and my father go and take care of her whilst my sister works and I bring my baked goods, knowing they will be judged with no mercy by both family members.

Mille feuille Tale, part two / Storia di una Millefoglie, parte seconda

Back to my mille feuille quest, as promised I devote myself to this cause and will do a test recipe once a week until the 28th of September. Last Friday was no exception. But I admit my second row has been part success part fail. Well not fail, I’d rather say bail…out. My excuse? I had many other things on my mind, especially baking fresh goods for guests that came over for the weekend.