Fresh vegetables and pasta call for spring recipes!

It’s almost the weekend! Are you ready to go shopping and to pack your fridge with the best of the products London can offer?

Will you go to a market, to your usual shops or to your favourite delis?

If you didn’t knew it yet or if it’s a long time you don’t pass by Chelsea, maybe it’s time to comeback there and have a look to the new fruit and vegetables Chelsea’s provider: Andreas.

“We established our family-run greengrocers in Chiswick in 1994.  Eighteen years later we opened our second store, in Chelsea.  Both our stores are complemented by having other excellent food retailers nearby giving our customers an unrivalled opportunity to buy top quality, delicious food.”

This is his mission: “Our mission is to provide the finest flavours’ to our customers. Our philosophy is to provide the best or nothing at all. Our goal is to provide the quality that discerning cooks at home require to excel.”

And it’s not all: with his great ingredients and knowledge and passion for his fresh and genuine products, he sell also our pasta Pastificio dei Campi in the most famous shapes: Spaghetti, Linguine, Paccheri e Orecchiette!

So are you keen to cook this weekend? Andreas just told me Mr and Mrs Jolly's finest Asparagus are now in shops courtesy of the Hill Boys, so here is an easy quick and gorgeous recipe to cheers to the new shop and the new products now available for you:

Linguine with Asparagi, Pecorino cheese and pine nuts

- 600 gr Linguine Pastificio dei Campi
- 300 g asparagus
- 600 gr shrimps
- ½ cup of white wine
- olive oil, a pinch of salt, pepper and a garlic clove

       
Wash and cut the asparagus into small pieces and place in a pan some olive oil with the garlic clove. When hot, place in there the asparagus and let them cook adding some water if needed. In the meantime cook the pasta in boiling water.
After ten minutes, add the peeled shrimp to the pan and cook for some minutes on high flame. Then finish the cook with some pepper and the white wine.
When the linguine are ready, drain them and toss it in the pan with all the rest of the ingredients.

Serve them with some grated pecorino cheese and some pine nuts on top.

Enjoy your dish and your weekend.

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Why not try them with some cuttlefish?

During one of my little holidays back home, I get inspired by my roman market, so the next one will be a colorful and tasty dish to change a bit your pasta habit.

Last Monday my mum told me she was going to the market, so I thought could have been nice to post here some pictures of the market that I always tell you about.

All these colors, all the vibe of the people at the stands and all the beautiful products... They blew my mind and I couldn't resist from buying the ingredients for my next recipe: zucchini blossoms and little squids.

I decide to cook them with some Spaghetti Pastificio dei Campi and here are all the ingredients I used for 2 people:

6-8 zucchini blossoms

150 gr. of Spaghetti or Vermicelli Pastificio dei Campi

6-8 little cuttlefish

Some white wine

Oil, salt, pepper, chili

and a bit of grated pecorino cheese.

Clean the cuttlefish or buy them already cleaned. Cut them in half and put them in a pan with some hot oil and a garlic clove. Let them cook and color a bit. Add the white wine and let evaporate.

Then add the flowers cleaned from the inside and cut in half.

Put the water for the pasta to boil with some salt and when boiling, add the spaghetti. Let the spaghetti cook al dente, while adding salt, pepper and chili to the pan.

When the spaghetti are ready, drain them and toss them in the pan with the rest. Serve in a plate with some grated pecorino cheese and a sparkle of chili! Enjoy the color and the taste of the hot roman spring!

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End of the summer recipe with Pastificio dei Campi

Last week speaking with Niccolo from *food in the city, he told me about one of his favorite recipes during the summer: Spaghetti with anchovies fillets and fresh courgette flowers...and my mouth started watering!

I love courgette flowers and here in London they are so hard to find... but some days ago magically on twitter @Andreasveg  tweeted a pic about his beautiful courgette flowers and the dinner was decided.

I took the flowers, the anchovies from *food in the city, Nick recipe and just a little bit of ricotta! It was gorgeous...an explosion of taste that i was really missing. A bit like my so loved fried courgette flowers, filled with mozzarella and anchovies.

However here is the recipes for you to try. For 2 people you will need:

- 200gr Spaghetti o Linguine Pastificio dei Campi

-80 gr Fresh ricotta

- 60gr Anchovy  fillets in Olive Oil

- 6/8 Courgette flowers

- 1 onion

- olive oil and salt for the water

Put on the fire a big pan with the water for the pasta. In the meantime cut the onion and place some olive oil on a pan. Add the onion in little pieces and let it cook a bit.
Cut the flower from the courgette. Take of the pistils and slice them. Place them in the pan and let it cook.

While the pasta is cooking add to the pan the anchovies cut in little pieces and a bit of water from the pasta. When the pasta is "al dente", drain it and toss it in the pan with the rest.
Add the ricotta and mix it all. Serve on a plate with just a bit of grated fresh pepper. Enjoy!

Do you want to find all the ingredients at once... write down this date on your diary 10th of September. More news to come soon.

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From the basic vegetables in your market to an healthy recipe for the winter.

We are almost at the end of January and the good resolutions need a bit of a push to stay with us: eating less, healthier, eating more vegetable and fruit or simply cooking everything at home. Whatever was your resolution or whatever is your need, just check out this recipe of the classic italian minestrone because is something you can cook anywhere and at any time, giving you the energy and all the vitamins you need.

It's good for kids, especially if you can blend it and serve it with Parmesan, like italian mums use to do. It's great alone as any other fresh homemade soup, and finally it's a complete and delicious meal with the addition of  pasta and some grated Parmesan. 

I have to admit i have tried once the minestrone soup they sell in boxes, but i can tell you the taste of this it's totally different. I don't even know which ingredients they choose to made that.

However here is the recipe for 4 people:

1 celery stick

1 onion

2 garlic cloves

2 carrots

2 courgettes

1 big potatoes

1 little cabbage or half if too big

some parsley salt, pepper

150gr of chopped tomatoes sauce

200gr Borlotti beans (soaked the night before)

and 300-350gr of  Tubetti Rigati from Pastificio dei Campi

Place some olive oil in a pan and hot it up. Then add the finely chopped onion, garlic cloves and parsley. When the onion starts to become goldish, add the peeled tomatoes sauce and the beans already drained by the water.

Mix it all and let it cook. In the meantime cut the cabbage in thin slices and then in half again. Add it to the pan and pour a good quantity of water. Mix all the ingredients every now and then to avoid them to stick to the bottom of the pan.

Wash and cut in cubes the courgettes, the carrots and the potato, and then add them too to the pan. let it cook for around 20-30 minutes and then have a try to know if it's missing some salt, pepper or anything else.

When the Borlotti are cooked, add the pasta, Tubetti rigati, the right pasta shape for this dish. These are little tubs but quite thick and with the little stripes they are perfect to enjoy all the different textures of the ingredients.

Let the pasta cook in the same pan with the soup so the starch released will give taste and thickness to the minestrone. When ready, serve it hot with some grated Parmesan, parsley or simply olive oil if you like it.

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From the Christmas eve dinner party, pasta and traditions

As i told you in the previous post, this year i was ready to prepare the Christmas dinner in a very traditional way, cooking just fish but also trying to present to my guests a dish that could be a bit original. I thought could have been nice to put together products from Italy and UK, so i choose to use the Wild Smoked Scottish Salmon from Forman & Son.

This is in fact a 100 year old family business supplying smoked salmon, caviar and other smoked and fresh fish to the world's leading hotels and finest restaurants in UK and from 2002 is also online on Forman & Field, fine food mail order company specializing in fresh, traditional British produce from small, independent producers. 

This was just a part of my special treat for my guest on Christmas. They still didn't know Pastificio dei Campi, the pasta that was going to be used to create the main protagonist of the Christmas eve dinner: Spaghetti with Wild Smoked Salmon and cream of courgettes.

Here the ingredients for 6 people:

600 gr Spaghetti Pastificio Dei Campi

200 gr of Smoked salmon

4 courgettes of a medium size

1 fennel

4 spoons of  pine nuts

4 spoons of Mascarpone or single cream

some garlic cloves,

salt, pepper, some fennel seeds

a glass of white wine

Cut the courgettes and the fennel in little cubes, then place them in a pan with some olive oil and chopped garlic cloves. Let it cook for around 10 minutes adding some salt and pepper and then pour the glass of white wine. When evaporated, turn a bit down the fire and cover the pan.

Now in a big sauce pan prepare the water for the pasta, add some salt and when it starts to boil, add the spaghetti. Let them cook and in the meantime blend the vegetable with the pine nuts until creamy. Now put everything again in the pan you used before with also the mascarpone or single cream and the smoked salmon in strips.

When the pasta it's "al dente" drain it and toss it in the pan with the salmon and the cream. I added here some whole pine nuts too and I serve it hot with a sprinkle of fennel seeds. If too dry, you can even add a bit of olive oil but not Parmesan. We don't normally use it with the fish and you could risk to cover some flavors.

This dish it's perfect for Christmas, but it's also a quick and easy recipe to cook any day of the week, being a very complete main course. I hope you will try it!

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From Brazil to UK everyone cooking pasta and enjoying it!

Yesterday was the World Pasta Day and after New York, the place chosen this year for the big celebration was Brazil, third world producer of pasta. From the first congress in Rome in 1995, delegations from various countries once a year discuss together the theme of the collective promotion in favour of pasta consumption, exchanging their ideas and experiences.

The first event was successfully carried through, thanks to the efforts of the Steering Committee, consisting of representatives of the National Pasta Association (United States), of UN.A.F.P.A. and of the Associations of Venezuela and of Turkey.

The objective of World Pasta Day is "to draw the attention of the media and consumers to pasta. Communication should underline the fact that pasta is a global food, consumed in all five continents, having unquestionable merits, appropriate for a dynamic and healthy life style capable of meeting both primary food requirements and those of high-level gastronomy".

I wanted to participate as well in this celebration and i decided to cook a nice and easy spaghetti dish with courgettes and Taleggio cheese.

Last weekend in fact in Southbank in London, was organized a nice Cheese and Wine Festival, that i couldn't miss. Lots of different producers from France, England and Italy came to sell their products and the atmosphere was really great.

I had a little tour between the stands and the activities organized there: there were short wine taste courses, champagne stands, but also products from bakeries were been sold... and of course lots of cheese. I bought some french "Bleu d'Auvergne" to eat on some fresh bread as a starter and some italian Taleggio to cook a new pasta recipe.

I know that a very good combination is Taleggio with "Radicchio rosso" a kind of red chicory, very typical of the north east of Italy, but quite difficult to find here. So i decide to use another vegetable, easier to find and cook: the courgettes were the right choice because with their delicate taste, they can create a  good mix with the italian cheese without covering it or disappearing.

Wash and cut the courgettes in thin slices or even in little pieces and stripes. Put some oil in a pan with the shallot chopped finely. Let it cook a bit and when tender add the courgettes, salt and pepper. Wait for them to absorb some of the oil and when they start to fry, add a glass of white wine.

When evaporated, cover the pan and wait for the courgettes to cook and get mild and colored. In the meantime boil some water, then add salt and the spaghetti. If the courgette are getting too dry, add some milk or water from the pasta to let them cook and become tastier.

When the pasta is ready, add to the courgettes the Taleggio cut in little cubes and then the drained pasta. Toss it all a bit until the Taleggio is melted and mixed with the courgettes.

Serve it hot with some Parmesan, pepper or chili on top.

Enjoy the World Pasta Day!

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