my apple & walnut cake

i was looking for a way to use my spelt flour and i found a recipe of muffins with it. i made some changes and that’s my apple & walnut cake. we love it! i made it twice in a week!!

ingredients:

• 80 gr of spelt flour
• 80 gr of rice flour
• 60 gr of walnuts
• 1 apple and a half
• 1 tablespoon of baking powder
• a pinch of bicarbonate
• a pinch of salt
• 1 egg
• half glass of oil
• 80 gr of brown sugar
• 3 tablespoons of ricotta cheese or half glass of milk

whip the egg with the sugar, then add the oil. in another bowl mix the flours, the baking powder and the bicarbonate (sifted). add the salt and the walnuts coarsely chopped. cut in small pieces the apples and mix them with the flours. add the liquids to the solids. add the milk (or the ricotta cheese).

bake for 30 min at 170°

Vegan, vegetarian or...

 
Lately I'm thinking about our way to eat. I live in a place where dairy and meat are very diffuse. Among my friends there are just two vegetarians, no one single vegan, but many around me experiencing a situation of doubt and indecision. I want to be honest: I think it's impossible for me to become vegan... I love milk, cheese, eggs... But avoiding meat is something I really want to try! I already mentioned the book I'm reading – the china study (between one about child care and one about montessori's activities!). Yesterday I was at a meeting about homeopathy and a woman said that changing her eating habits changed her life. She suffered of rheumatoid arthritis and switching to a vegan diet made her feeling better without medicines. I don't know if it was because I know closely that disease or because she read that book too, but I keep thinking about it...
One of my resolution for these last two months was cooking more vegetarian dishes and I'm really understanding how hard is for me avoid meat, especially ready-sliced salami. And even harder is cooking legumes and cereals that I didn't even know that existed! Luckily as I've said, I'm not alone and I'm always asking recipes to my friends.
It's time for thinking about a lot of things in my life: what kind of mommy I want to be  how to raise my child, how eat better, if vaccinating or not, if it's time for homeopathy for my little girl with bronchospasm... Even if it's hard I think it's a good thing questioning from time to time: it gives you the chance to learn from others and from your errors!
That's some of my favorite vegetarian/vegan blogs:
Ohdeardrea: not need to say anything about this blog! She writes about her life and her cooking.
Una vegetariana in cucina: (in Italian) a new discovered and I love it!
La frittata è fatta: a new new entry, but I've already seen a couple of recipes I really want to try!
I love browsing about food blogs... Some of them have very beautiful pictures ... The best are:
Cannelle et Vanille
What Katie Ate
il cavoletto di bruxelles
anemone's corner

Spelt and oat biscuits

Breastfeeding makes me very very hungry and even if I try to eat as much fruits as possible,the only thing I really crave for are sweets! I'm lucky enough to share this passion with a friend and new mama so when she finds recipes with low sugar and no butter she email me.
These biscuits are healthy and delicious! The recipe comes from ribes e cannella (Italian food blog) but I changed something: I used regular milk instead of oat milk, almonds instead of hazelnuts and half of the dose of sugar (but I added more honey).
No need to say that I love them and so do my husband!

 
The recipe is (my version):
50 gr of brown sugar
70 gr of honey
50 gr of corn oil
100 ml of milk
50gr of almonds (coarsely chopped)
100 gr of chocolate (chopped)
100 gr oatmeal
250 gr of spelt flour
1 spoon of baking powder

Bake 20 mins at 180° C

stuffed peppers

According to one of my last post, I want to learn more vegetarian dishes. I'm not going to quit eating meat, let's be realistic, but eat it just once or twice per week will be a success.
On Saturday we had some friends for dinner and we prepared a risotto with pumpkin and radicchio. The combination was very tasty! Like always I made too much risotto and I thought of a new way to use it: stuffed peppers.
It's very easy even if not so quick (preparing the rice - if you don't have it already - requires 18 mins and then you have to cook the peppers).

I put the peppers with the rice in the oven at 180°C for one hour.

enjoy!

small tart with ricotta cheese and fig

that’s a super easy recipe!

you need:

figs (depends on how many tart you want to cook)

300 gr of ricotta cheese

1 egg

75gr of powdered sugar

a roll of puff pastry 

mix sugar, egg and ricotta until you have a cream.

using something circular cut the puff pastry to wad some small cake pans. fill with the cream and half fig each.

put in the oven at 180° for 20 min

you can try them with nuts instead of figs!

enjoy!

ricotta & choco cake

 

i made this cake a couple of weeks ago and it was love at first sight! it’s very easy to do ( i made it while being with both my two daughters so…) and super delicious!

and half a glass of milk,

a packet of baking powder

choco drops.

 

whip the egg whites in a bowl. get another one and mix yolks, sugar and butter. add the ricotta cheese and mix gently. then add the flour, baking powder, milk and choco drops. in the end incorporate the egg whites.

bake at 180° C for 40 mins.

 

in order to lose weight i’m trying to bake my own sweets (i can’t quit them!) and i’m trying to choose cakes and biscuits with less butter or fats in them.

Enjoy!

carrot & chocolate plumcake

i saw this recipe on a tv program and i made it several times since then… but this time i had a special helper: zoeti! this was actually our first four-hands-recipe and we enjoyed it so much!! it’s easy to do with a kid, healthy and… delicious!
i have added choco drops to the original recipe.

Ingredients:
400 gr of carrots
3 eggs
300 gr of flour
300 gr of sugar
chocolate drops
baking powder
salt
1 glass of seed oil


first of all whisk all the carrots. then break the eggs in a bowl.

then add the flour with the baking powder, the sugar a little bit of salt and the seed oil and mix all together.

the last touch is the chocolate and…

voilà! after 20-25 minutes at 180°. (we made this three muffins as special trick for dinner)

coffee cookies

first mix the butter, the egg, coffee and sugar until you have a kind of cream.

then add the flour with a little bit of bicarbonate.

create a shape for your biscuits and put them in the oven at 170° for 15 minutes

enjoy!

strawberry tiramisù

 

the tiramisù is a cake typical of Veneto (the region where i live) and i love it! unfortunately during the pregnancy you cannot eat it because there are raw eggs in it but i found some recipes to make it without eggs!generally tiramisù is made with coffee (picture on the right) but i used strawberry instead since it’s more fresh and the theme was red & white.

what you need:

• savoiardi (a kind of biscuit)
• strawberries (500 gr)
• 250 gr of mascarpone
• 250 gr of fresh cream (to whipped)
• 70 gr of sugar
• 3-4 spoons of milk

first of all wash almost every strawberry (keep 5-6 for decoration) and whisk them with the milk.
























use a strainer to remove all the seeds from the strawberry smoothie
















mix well the mascarpone and the sugar.

then add the whipped cream (mixing gently from down to up to not “sag” the cream)














Start with a thin layer of cream, then put the savoiardi and wet them with the strawberries pureed (or drench them into the pureed before). Add cream and keep in this way (wet savoiardi and cream). end with cream and garnish with fresh strawberries.







keep it in the fridge for at least 4 hours.




i don’t have a proper picture of the result… but i think this one is better! zoeti loved it!!

asparagus & potatoes cream

 

i boiled potatoes and asparagus for a while before to speed up the procedure. then i add the vegetables, cut into small pieces, to a pan with oil and onion. add the vegetable broth to cover everything. let it cooking until potatoes and asparagus are tender. whisk everything. you can add some fresh cream if you want.

i made these bowls during my ceramic course! eating in something you made makes everything delicious!!

keep 3-4 asparagus tops for garnish ;)

pregnancy menu ideas

i've already talked about toxoplasmosis here but i'm so obsessed with food lately that i want to share some other menu ideas (toxo-free).

as you can see i'm obsessed with salad and tomatoes! actually... from all that it's red: tomatoes, strawberries... i'm waiting for watermelon and peaches! another reason for eating healthy salad is that i already gained 8 kg (!!!) and i want to stay under control as much as possible (also because i really can't say no to chocolate). I bought a fitball and i'm using my cyclette (yes guys... here it's always raining!!) to start moving my muscles... i'd prefer a long walk into the nature but since it rains...
i hope to be persevering in my exercise program (i always start with enthusiasm but i quit very soon)

what to eat when you are pregnant

i know that in many countries there's no something called "toxoplasmosis" or pregnant women are not routinely screened for it as happens here in italy for example. the fact is that if you're negative (which means that you are receptive) you have to be careful with raw vegetables and fruits, not well cooked meat, fresh eggs and not pastorized milk (and with gardening and cats). i'm one of those unlucky woman who is receptive so i have to take precautions with food. it's strange how much you can miss a type of food when you can't eat it for 8 months!
that's something healthy and toxo free for those of you who need food inspiration:

Breakfast

that's what i usually have for breakfast. beginning a new day with an orange juice prevent from many seasonal deseases and last winter i had no one single cold or cough (even if zoeti brought home a lot of virus!). carbs are important to let you start with some energy and that's why my breakfast has always a carb portion. i add some decaf or barley coffee to the milk.

Some ideas for lunch or dinner

eggs + fresh tomatoes + mushrooms + broccoli with cheese

stracchino (a soft cheese) + fresh tomatoes + steamed vegetables + some bread

a mix of sauteed vegetables (zucchini, tomatoes, red & yellow peppers, onion, an eggplant), that you can use as side for a main dish or for a special pasta!

i'll post some other toxo free recipe as soon as i can!

Enjoy!!

father's day recipes

INGREDIENTS for STRAWBERRIES MUFFINS:

á          230 gr of flour

á          100 gr of sugar (i use just brown sugar)

á          130 gr of butter

á          3 eggs

á          150 ml of milk

á          Grated rind of an organic lemon

á          2 teaspoons of baking powder

á          Vanilla

á          A pinch of salt

á          400 gr of strawberries

á          100 gr of chocolate (I used the dark one)

mix dry (sugar, flour, salt, rind, baking powder and salt) and liquid ingredients separately and then add the liquid ones to the dry ones and mix well. in the end add strawberries and chocolate. put the mixture into the molds and bake for 25-30 minutes at 180°C

i used whipped cream for garnish! 

Aubergine millefeuille:

á          A round eggplant

á          2 big tomatoes

á          A scamorza (an italian very tasty cheese)

á          Oil + salt + pepper + chilli

put the eggplant in a mixture of olive oil, salt, pepper, parsley and chilli for 10 minutes in the fridge. then put a slice of eggplant, one of tomatoes, one of cheese and close everything in a pack made with baking paper.
bake it for 15 minutes at 200° C.
to see the result see here

pear cake

i'm trying to catch up with my challenge "a new dish every two weeks" so... that's my second new cooking experiment of the year: pear cake! it's super easy and delicious!
that's what you need:

2 eggs
125 gr of yogurt
3 pears
80 gr of sugar
200 gr of flour (and half a bag of baking powder)

just peel the pears and cut them in smal pieces. mix all the ingredients. cook in the oven for 30-35 mins at 180°C. and.... eat it warm!!

my special breakfast...