ZZAFF!: Cavollatt montato

 

For the last episode of this season of ZZAFF! I chose a simple but very scrumptious recipe. The base consists in cavollatt, an egg cream that was once consumed as an energy drink because of the amount of sugar and fat contained in it. The cream, alternated with ladyfinger biscuits, results in an excellent dessert that is perfect for the summer season. Cavollatt montato has to rest in the refrigerator and is to be eaten cold.

Tigelle

Street food is now everywhere on the streets of our cities and at every special event around Ticino. A few years ago when I attended Food Immersion Festival I was impressed by Tigella Bella‘s stand but there was so much to say and eat that I realized I had completely forgot to mention them! The thought of these soft flat breads didn’t leave me but only now I had the idea to reinterpret the original recipe. The result? Spectacular! Try them as soon as baked. Warm, soft and fragrant they lend themselves beautifully for a brunch in your backyard!

Maroggia’s Mill Cookbook: Rye Flour Tigelle / Il Ricettario del Mulino di Maroggia: Tigelle con farina di segale

 

Street food is now everywhere on the streets of our cities and at every special event around Ticino. A few years ago when I attended Food Immersion Festival I was impressed by Tigella Bella‘s stand but there was so much to say and eat that I realized I had completely forgot to mention them! The thought of these soft flat breads didn’t leave me but only now I had the idea to reinterpret the original recipe for Maroggia’s Mill Cookbook. The result? Spectacular! Try them as soon as baked. Warm, soft and fragrant they lend themselves beautifully for a brunch in your backyard!

Maroggia’s Mill Cookbook: Roscòn de Reyes / Il Ricettario del Mulino di Maroggia: Roscòn de Reyes

Today for Maroggia’s Mill Cookbook a festive recipe. For once not a Christmas one but one dedicated to Epiphany instead, so you still have plenty of time to study it and find the time to bake it. For once I decided to cross cultural boundaries, flying to Spain. Roscón de Reyes is a doughnut shaped bread, made with a dough similar to panettone, which is decorated with candied fruit. This bread is prepared on the occasion of the coming of the Three Kings, on January 6th. In short, the Iberian version of the Swiss Three King Cake Bread! The dough I created is not the simplest to handle. For those who are not familiar with very rich and soft doughs I would recommend using a dough mixer. For reasons balance in the photographs but also to redistribute the Roscon to my various guinea pigs I decided to make mini portions, I think that for a larger donut 20 minutes of further baking lowering to 160 ° C will be surely necessary to bake the bread thoroughly. Try it…I bet you won’t find a softer dough!

Maroggia’s Mill Cookbook: Soft Milk Flatbreads / Il Ricettario del Mulino di Maroggia: Focaccine soffici al latte

Yet another Friday with Maroggia’s Mill Cookbook and yet another bread: a flat bread. Nothing more handy. Flatbread can be stuffed, lends itself perfectly as an accompaniment to a main dish or serves beautiful as a simple snack. A soft and versatile bread that doesn’t need to be sliced and can be easily portioned by tearing it into smaller pieces. Ideal to have for breakfast as for lunch and dinner. This time around I wanted to try and enrich the dough with eggs and milk to make the bread as soft as I could. The result is great but I would recommend you to consume this bread when still hot or to warm it briefly in the oven or toaster after brushing it with a little water, to fully taste its softness and fragrance. You can flavour the dough with seeds, spices or chocolate chips for a tasty snack.

Maroggia’s Mill Cookbook: Hazelnut and Liquorice cake / Ricettario del Mulino di Maroggia: Torta di nocciole e liquirizia

Some time has passed since the last cake recipe for Maroggia’s Mill Cookbook. One of those simple cakes, easy and quick to bake and offer to friends who come over for a tea or a coffee, or as the perfect finishing touch to a casual dinner. This recipe lends itself well to be customized using other nut-based flours such as almond flour, pistachio flour, or walnut flour. This cake (which I baked in a 15×8 cm mould with 1/3 of the amount of ingredients shown in the recipe written for this post, which requires the use of a ring mould of approximately 23 cm diameter) marries the warm and enveloping taste of hazelnut with the slightly bitter sweetness of licorice. What a perfect match!

Soft Milk Rolls / Panini al latte

I don’t know about you, but these rolls to me are all about childhood. The inevitable snack in the lunch box my mum would pack for school trips, an evergreen of impromptu snacks…the milk roll is the emblem of sharing made carbohydrate. Split it in two and enjoy it with the ones you love the most, stuff it with slices of ham or chocolate bars, wrap one in wax paper and place it safely in a little corner of your bag. The soft milk roll will never disappoint you!

MTChallenge: Rolls! / MTChallenge: Paracul Rock’n’Rolls!

As I write it is my birthday. I woke up at 6.30 to prepare everything, both the rolls for the challenge and a sweet dessert to celebrate. So forgive me for cutting short, time is short and I even have to pack for tomorrow since I’m going to fly to the UK for a family reunion.

MTChallenge keeps lifting the stalk and I admit, I am struggling. It’s a lot to deal with, the degree of complexity, not to mention the degree of sophistication required…imagine what happened in my mind when I saw these beautiful rolls with which Giovanna challenged us. I quite not fit in. I’m rough and tough. Im not good with sophisticated things, at least not in the kitchen. These kind of challenges always make me quite anxious. On top of it the UK trip and a fridge to empty rather than to fill. So no coup de theatre, just two little recipe in order to participate. I hope Ale and Giovanna will forgive me but after all, the most important thing is to participate, isn’t it?

Maroggia’s Mill Cookbook: Gin Bisbino Babà / Il Ricettario del Mulino di Maroggia: Babà al Gin Bisbino

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Today for Maroggia’s Mill Cookbook I propose you my own interpretation of a great classic of Neapolitan pastry. The babà! Three years ago I baked babà for the first time thanks to the MTChallenge and I then promised to myself to try out other combinations sooner or later. I just had to wait until Alessandro wrote to me one day asking me if I had some original ideas to promote a new brand of gin, 100% local, produced by friends of his. I had already heard about Gin Bisbino and already had the opportunity to taste it but in fact I had never thought of using it in a recipe. Gin Bisbino really impressed me for its delicate flavour. A real pleasure to taste Gin Bisbino goes perfectly well with the fresh flavours of rosemary and grapefruit I chose to flavour the pastries with. To balance the bitter note of the grapefruit I added a little rose water that comes very delicately as an aftertaste, especially when the cream is eaten on its own. I decided to brush the babàs with rhubarb jelly which is slightly sweeter albeit maintaining the sourness of the other ingredients. And if you do not want to get your hands dirty, you can always try the recipe of Gin Bisbino to make an excellent Gin Tonic!

Rice flour, Matcha and Lemon Cookies / Biscotti di farina di riso, matcha e limone

Tea time with a friend. Rice flour which has been sitting in the pantry for too long, as well as a jar of matcha powder which might as well be a find from an archaeological site. Consider lemons are never missing in my fridge. Put all of that above together and what you are left with is a batch of sensational cookies. And here’s the recipe!