Italian food, travel & lifestyle
I don’t remember exactly how I came across the recipe for these Pistachio Cookies, but so glad that I did. Pistachio Cookies are the type of little morsels that with one bite let you know that everything is right with the world, if only for that special moment. A delicate bite of ground pistachio flavored with lemon and vanilla, what could be wrong with that?
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Bomboloni, the fried Italian style donuts found throughout Italy but especially popular in Tuscany, are certain to bring a smile to just about anyone. These ethereal lemon infused bites, a specialty of the seaside town of Livorno, were introduced to me by my teacher and friend Giuliano Bugialli so many years ago. A special treat enjoyed by the Italian Jewish community for the coming holiday of Hanukkah when fried food commemorates the story of the oil in the temple.
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Summer days have slipped away and although I always look forward to the season change and all that it brings, thoughts of long sun filled afternoons make me a tad melancholy. The flavors and smells of freshly grown summer herbs are difficult to capture once the time has passed. The perfume of the lavender fields are an iconic symbol of summer and what better way recapture that image than with Lavender & Chocolate Biscotti….
Keeping with the Thanksgiving theme, here is another of our family favorites adapted from the gifted Gina DePalma of Babbo in Greenwich Village. If you are not familiar with this recipe, you are missing something extraordinary. In it’s simplicity, Pumpkin Cake with Rosemary or Torta di Zucca delivers the essence of a fall evening in the Italian countryside – comforting, straightforward, and satisfying. The ingredients couldn’t be more Italian – olive oil, rosemary, raisins, Grappa, pine nuts; pleasantly evoking something typically prepared by a loving Nonna using only what she had on hand….
