Posted on
January 01, 2010 by
Stile Mediterraneo
There is one dish that cannot miss on Italian tables at midnight on
December 31st.
This is the Lentil soup! Because they resembled coins, in the past they were thought to bring financial prosperity in the year to come. Nowadays, we associate them to general good luck, in any field. I and Marika had lentils for three days in a raw….just to be sure!
Usually lentils are prepared with cotechino (pork).
Instead, I and Marika prepared a much healthier recipe with lentils, orzo and extra virgin olive oil.
Really easy and really delicious!
INGREDIENTS
1 lb lentils (the very small)
1 lb orzo
2 carrots
parsley
extra virgin olive oil
sea salt
chilly pepper
RECIPE
Soak the lentils overnight and then rinse them. Put in a pan with the orzo and cover with water. Add the sliced carrots and cook at low flame for 1 hour and half while stirring and adding water if necessary. Add sea salt and chilly pepper.
When ready switch them off and add parsley and extra virgin olive oil.
What are your New Year’s culinary traditions?
WE WISH A WONDERFUL 2010 AND NEW DECADE TO ALL OUR READERS!
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Tags: cooking schools PugliaItaly Cooking classeslegumesmediterranean cuisinePuglia cooking classesPuglia cuisine
Category
Favorites, Italy Cooking classes, Mediterranean Healthy food, Pasta & Rice, Puglia Extra virgin olive oil, Recipes, Vegetables & Legumes, cuisine
Posted on
December 26, 2009 by
Stile Mediterraneo
I and Marika don’t eat lots of sweets (apart from tons of the famous hazelnut ice cream from Lecce we already wrote about!).
However, we love the traditional Christmas sweets, just because they are really specific to this festivity and so we make them in Puglia only once per year. And this has been the same since always.
Our favorite Christmas sweet is a fish made of almond. In many families and countries it is a tradition to eat fish at Christmas time. In Puglia we also have fish as a dessert!
This sweet is very simple to prepare. We make the dough with sugar, almond and chocolate. Then we stuff the fish with Marika’s pear jam, biscuits and liquor. We decorate the fish eye with a coffee bean.
However, as for many other almond sweets we prepare during our cooking classes in Puglia, the almonds we use are what make the difference.
The fish we made for our family’s Christmas lunch weighed 1 kg. We understood that everybody liked it since there was none left.
And you, what are your favorite Christmas culinary traditions?
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Tags: cooking schools Italycooking schools PugliaItalian cuisineItalian recipesPuglia cooking classesPuglia cuisinePuglia traditions
Category
Cakes & Desserts, Favorites, cuisine, traditions
Posted on
December 19, 2009 by
Stile Mediterraneo
One of the most typical fish from the Mediterranean sea is the Dorade.
If you come to Puglia, this is something you should not miss. Our favorite place where to eat is in Otranto, just by the Adriatic sea.
A dorade can be prepared in so many different ways.
I and Marika love the dorade baked in sea salt crust: this recipe allows us to appreciate the freshness of this fish and its particular taste.
We don’t add any flavor, herbs, lemon or olive oil.
The only ingredients we use are: dorade and coarse sea salt.
As always the most important thing is the quality of the ingredients we are using.
It is extremely important that the dorade is freshly caught and most of all that it is coming from the sea (and not farmed).
INGREDIENTS
2 servings
1 lb 3 oz dorade
coarse rock salt (as necessary)
PREPARATION
Preheat the oven at 200 °C.
Clean the fish.
Place a layer of sea salt on the bottom of a large baking pan.
Lay the fish on top of the salt and cover it with sea salt.
Cook for about 25 minutes.
Tags: cooking schools PugliaItalian cuisineItalian recipesmediterranean cuisinePuglia cooking classesPuglia cuisinePuglia recipes
Category
Cooking tip, Favorites, Fish & Meat, Mediterranean Healthy food, cuisine
Posted on
December 05, 2009 by
Stile Mediterraneo
It’s unbelievable! We are in December and we are still enjoying a fantastic mild weather in Puglia. Even at the market we can still find summer vegetables, which are not imported but produced by the local farmers.
Today I and Marika decided to take advantage of this fantastic weather and prepared one of our favorite summer dishes: the sweet and sour peppers (peperoni in agrodolce).
This recipe testifies the Arabic influence in the Pugliese cuisine.
INGREDIENTS:
4 servings
4 bell peppers (a combination of red, yellow and green) seeded and cut into strips
1 tbsp (15 ml) extra virgin olive oil
1 tbsp (15 ml) sugar
1 tbsp (15 ml) wine vinegar
1 tbsp (15 ml) capers
1 tbsp (15 ml) black olives, pitted
1 tbsp (15 ml) bread crumbs
parsley
salt, to taste
PREPARATION:
Place the olive oil and sugar in a pan over medium-low heat and cook gently for one or two minutes.
Add the pepper strips, cover the pan and simmer until the peppers are softened, but still firm, about 20 minutes.
Add vinegar, capers, olives and keep cooking another 10 minutes over low heat. Remove from heat and add bread crumbs and parsley.
Allow to cool before serving.
For more information about our Mediterranean cooking classes in Puglia please contact us at info.stile@gmail.com or subscribe to the Cooking School newsletter
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Category
Recipes, Vegetables & Legumes, cuisine
Posted on
November 22, 2009 by
Stile Mediterraneo
Puglia is certainly a region of extra virgin olive oil, which replaces butter almost everywhere: we put it on top of bread and salads; we use it for cooking and baking.
One of the most common questions our guests ask us during our cooking classes and olive oil tastings is whether it is better to fry in extra virgin olive oil vs other oils.
I and Marika think that one of the major takeways from our cooking classes is that our dishes can be delicious and very tasty even if we don’t deep fry ingredients, as the most traditional local cuisine would require.
I and Marika were lucky enough to be brought up by our GrandMother who taught us almost everything about the traditional home made recipes of Puglia. However, the traditional cuisine sometimes requires ingredients to be deep fried.
I and Marika have moved on and re-intepreted those traditional recipes in a healthier way. Because Marika is a Cardiologist and I am an extra virgin olive oil taster, we have a more Mediterranean approach. We love to smell and taste the flavors of raw extra virgin olive oil. We don’t want to destroy its healthy benefits and flavors by frying it.
Also, we don’t want to destroy the benefits of the ingredients we use by frying them.
Therefore our guests are always impressed when we can make very tasty stuffed eggplants, eggplant parmigiana or zucchini parmigiana, meatballs etc, without frying them!
Tags: cooking schools Pugliahealthy cookingmediterranean cuisinePuglia cooking classesPuglia cuisinestile mediterraneo
Category
Mediterranean Healthy food, Puglia Extra virgin olive oil, cuisine
Posted on
November 28, 2008 by
Stile Mediterraneo
To learn to cook just like Mama, put yourself in the hands of Cinzia and Marika Rascazzo. The sisters run Stile Mediterraneo, which offers day/week-long (€300/1445, not including flights or accommodation) cookery courses for small groups (up to six people). These include hands-on classes, visits to the best local artisans and markets, and wine tours (encompassing the grape and olive harvest in season). They started cooking when they were five years old, taught by their grandmother, and the cooking school is in a small village, famous for its olive oil and DOC wines, 10 minutes drive from the golden Baroque town of Lecce.
You can contact Stile Mediterraneo at: info.stile@gmail.com andinfo@stilemediterraneo.it
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Category
Favorites, Puglia, Reviews, cuisine
Posted on
June 29, 2007 by
Stile Mediterraneo
Stile Mediterraneo is a project born out of love and passion. Passion for a region Puglia, its people, the beauty of its landscape, its food and wine, its history and culture.
One of Italy’s best-kept secrets, Puglia is a region in the South East side of Italy – the “heel of the boot”. Many people have called Puglia the “next Tuscany”. Stile Mediterraneo provides an authentic and tailor-made experience of Puglia’s many beauties and secrets.
There will be cooking classes with local cooks, visits to markets and artisans shops, winery tours as well as arts (opera, exhibition, fashion tours) and outdoor (spa, golf, sailing, cycling, horseriding) activities.
People will discover the many secrets of this beautiful region where the sun shines all over the year and where people enjoy the art of living!
Tags: cooking schools Italycooking schools PugliaItaly Cooking classesLeccePuglia cooking classesstile mediterraneo
Category
things to do in Puglia
