Forking Tasty

Drinkable Chocolato

On day two in Rome I visited Trastevere, a cool but still touristy neighborhood across the Tiber. To my surprise our visit coincided with the Chocolate Fair. Lines of tents filled the piazza with chocolate in all forms. From bars, bon bon and bites to crafted shapes like stiletto heels, wrenches and proscuitto there seemed to be every chocolate form you could imagine. Additionally there were chocolate cannolis, chocolate donuts and, what you see here, sipping chocolate. What we think of as hot chocolate seemed a bit more high test here in Italy. It is as thick as it looks. The Canadian and I had a tough time finishing this off with out major sugar shock. Three sips and you are done unless you get a fresh brioche or baguette and do the ‘ol chocolate dip. Smart right? Well, we unfortunately couldn’t find fresh bread but we did use our sugar high to propel us on foot all the way to the Trevi Fountain.

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Porchetta Please

Kind of a Roman thing I came to realize. What’s different than most you’ve seen in the states is they use the whole damn pig. That’s why they are so damn big. I think these are closest to a Shwarma joint in that they start the day with a giant piece of meat and slowly slice it back into a tiny nub of swine. A good show can go through 1 plus of these debones and re wrapped porkers a day. This one was spotted in Piazza Navona. Probably not the best Rome has to offer since Navona is one of the most touristed places in Rome. If you follow Bourdain, he’ll tell you to go to I Porchettoni far away from the tourists.

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Italian Cookie

I realized that the stories from Italy can take months to properly explain. In the crunch of the Holidays and my burning need to share all the Italian goodies before the Italian-American goodies hit the holiday table, I am going to post my highlights in short order this week allowing you all a quick Italian food vacation before the Holidays take over.

First up is this perfect pignoli cookie. The reigning champion of this cookie is my Aunt Joy but as far as an “in Italy” version this takes the cake, or cookie as it were. The key to the pignoli is to get that crunchy outside with a moist and soft inside. This succeed on both fronts. Washing it down with a quick Italian espresso made it that much better. Where did I get it? Just a tiny, non-pretentious, BAR(read coffee shop) on via you-name-it. My favorite type of food discoveries are always the unexpected and nondescript places. Truth be told, there was a name and you should remember it. Pasticceria Dagnino. Get there.

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Allora. I’ve been in Italy.

Hence the seven days of silence, tight pants and cured meat withdrawals. There is plenty to discuss and review so expect tons of Italian posts in the next few weeks as we slide right into our Italian-American Christmas. For now be satiated by this bowl of spaghetti carbonara I had just a few steps off Campo di Fiori in Rome at Salumeria Roscioli. Thanks to Mario Batali’s real time tweeting he hooked us up with this recommendation of a little nondescript salumeria. Along with this tasty dish the table was filled up by a burata with sun dried tomatoes, a plate of meatballs, a huge samulmi plate, proscuitto carpaccio and of course a bottle of vino.

As they say, when in Rome. As I say, visit here.

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Thanksgiving in Canada

I bet yesterday was a rough day back. I hope you all had as amazing and as restful a Thanksgiving weekend as I did. I clocked in with an average of 8.5 hours of sleep per night. That’s unheard of in this family. Well rested and well fed I share with you a few of the delicious, authentic, fresh and traditional goodie’s my amazing mother-in-law whipped up for our London, Ontario Thanksgiving weekend starting with the above channa masala.

To set the tone here’s a little video of…

Thanksbringing 2011

This past Sunday was our third annual Thanksbringing meal. Those not familiar with the ritual can brush up here. As the name implies, Thanksbringing is the yearly potluck in which I open my kitchen up to my wonderful friends who take turns cooking and heating up their contribution to the feast.

This year we played things a bit different in the meat department. In past years we…

Red Velvet Mishap

A baker I am not. I will be the first to admit that I prefer to cook without measurements and recipes. A “little” of this or a “sprinkle” of that, along with a good gut sense, is truly all you need when cooking. An uncanny olfactory system and more taste buds per capital than the population of some horrible new Williamsburg restaurants (another post) helps a lot too.

Baking on the other hand is a completely different story. Hence this failed Red Velvet cake. Longs tory short, I am attempting a tres leche cake for Thanksbringing today. As a back up I bought a box of cake mix. It so happened that it was buy one get one free. I went for the red velvet thinking, “How hard can it be?” Obviously, for me, kinda hard. I’ll tell ya how the tres leche comes out. Stay tuned.

Bullet to Bratwurst

Last week I had the unique opportunity to partake in an ancient ritual that in modern days has come under quite a lot of scrutiny. I’ll let the video speak for itself, mostly. I will say, I love meat. I think our industrial food chain is a disturbing mess but at the root, eating meat is a pleasure that I will not willingly give up. The recent advent of smaller farms providing better living conditions, feed and slaughter practices have thankfully given me an alternative to funding these disastrous factory farms and “processing” plants through my meat habit. I am conscious of where I by my meat from. How they were raised and how they were killed are just as important as what they taste like. In fact the two go hand in hand. That said it is very difficult to buy meat from these sources all the time. Not to mention expensive. I hope, over time, these smaller farms become the norm and the availability and usage increase to become the norm. The video above chronicles my very personal experience on the road to this goal. Enjoy.

If you are looking for more, my friend Liza does a great job telling a bovine story.

French Food vs Snowtober

Are you kidding me?

For those of you not in NYC, it snowed today. It’s not January. Not even December. Barely November. It’s just not right. Rather than harp on the disastrous outdoor weather, I combated it with a little hibernation vaccination. Nothing cures the abnormally bitter, cold, slush filled street chaos better than a big pot of beef bubbling on the stove all day. That’s right, the french classic beef bourguignon. It warmed my house all day and then warmed my soul all night. Talk about turning a negative into a positive. Stay warm and dry NYC tomorrow is bound to be better.

RECAP-REEL TASTY: The Three Amigos

photo credit: Kun Kim

Ariba! Ole! and Amigos!

The season 3 finally of REEL TASTY went off better than we could have ever expected. Again we bit off a little more than we could chew. In the end the Mexican fiesta, with our favorite three amigos, was a pinata smash hit.  Although we didn’t have an actual pinata we did have everything else very well represented form pork to beans to tequila.

For those who are unfamiliar with our dinners, Reel Tasty is Forking Tasty’s summer supper club where Aimee, my co-chef/host, and I screen a movie on a 2 story building while our guests sample some of our latest and tastiest gourmet creations. As many of you who follow know, we had a few run in’s with the weather this season. For our final dinner on the deck, mother nature gave us…