Part mousse, part custard, all romance. This is the Valentine’s dessert your date will actually remember. Valentine’s Day is just around the corner, and I wanted to make a special dessert so I decided on a twist on an Italian classic, Zabaglione. Zabaglione is a traditional Italian custard made by whipping Marsala wine with sugar…
Every year for Christmas I get pastries and biscotti from Del Prete pastry shop in Bridgeport. Everything there is great, but they make the best cannoli in Connecticut. So you can imagine my disappointment to find out they had a fire and are temporarily closed, so I need to get my cannoli for the holidays…
How do you make Zeppole, the classic fried dough treat served at Italian Festivals even better? Add Ricotta Cheese of course! Growing up I was always used to seeing the plain flour based zeppole at festivals, your traditional fried dough, which I still love. But I find myself making ricotta zeppole more often lately. I…
Summer is flying by and I am feeling a little self-imposed pressure to get in all of the great Summer recipes I had planned on. I may not get them all in but it really would have been a shame if I didn’t make this espresso granita with whipped cream. This is a really great…
Some of my fondest memories of my (too few) visits to Sicily are of sitting in the café in the morning and having a Granita di Limone (Italian Lemon Ice) and brioche for breakfast. That’s right, I said for breakfast. In the summer in Sicily, granita and gelato are breakfast foods. That’s what I call…
What is gelato? Some might say gelato is just the Italian word for Ice Cream. While close, that wouldn’t be exactly accurate. There are two big differences between Italian gelato and American ice cream. The first is that gelato contains less butterfat; it is typically made with whole milk rather than cream (in some rare cases…
You don’t have to wait for the next Italian festival or carnival to enjoy some fried dough. With this recipe you can make delicious Zeppole right at at home. Sprinkle with powdered sugar, and let the memories of eating them out of the bag while enjoying the sites and sounds of the feast come right…
We had a bit of a heat wave here in Connecticut last week. I figured what better way to fight the heat than to try out a new flavor of gelato. Since I was sticking with Sicilian style gelato, I decided to go with a very popular flavor in Sicily, pistachio. Serves 6 to 8…
From The Perfect Scoop: Ice Creams, Sorbets, Granitas, and Sweet Accompaniments (Ten Speed Press, 2007) On my first visit to Torino, I arrived in rabid pursuit of qianduja, a confection made from local hazelnuts ground with milk chocolate that is a specialty of the Piedmont region. I’d also never had gianduja gelato at the source. I did…
From Gelato!: Italian Ice Creams, Sorbetti, and Granite by Pamela Sheldon Johns (Ten Speed Press, 2008)One of the most popular flavors in gelaterie in Italy is crema, a simple frozen custard unenhanced by any flavoring. It has a rich yellow color due to the brightness of the yolks of Italian corn-fed chickens. Makes 1-1/2 quarts; serves…
