Italian Food Recipes

I like to call this Italian recipe Red Risotto: it is a simple risotto prepared with fresh tomatoes cut in cubes and seasoned with some dry or fresh basil. When you want to cook something with rice easy but delicious this is the ideal Italian recipe. The best result is obtain if you prepare this risotto using: a vegetables broth obtained boiling the vegetables in salted water, sweet cherry tomatoes or san marzano tomatoes typically used to prepare tomato sauce and the type of rice called Arborio that is ideal for excellent risotto.

INGREDIENTS (for 4 people):
320 g of Rice Arborio
1 Onion
1 Carrot
1 Celery
1 Potato
150 g of Tomatoes in cubes
Some basil
3 Tablespoons of extra virgin olive oil
Salt
Some Parmesan

PREPARATION TIME: 20 minutes

COOKING TIME: 20 minutes

WINE: Barbera Doc (Red Wine)

PREPARATION
Start with preparing the broth: place in a pan the water, the big pieces of half onion, the celery, the carrot, the potato, salt and let the water boils for about 10 minutes.

Now prepare the risotto: cut in slices the other half of onion, place them in a pan with the extra virgin olive oil and let them golden for 5 minutes

then add the tomato and cook for other 5 minutes.

Place in the pan the rice and let it roast for 3 – 4 minutes,

add the white wine and when it is evaporated begin to add one ladle of hot broth stirring until it is absorbed;

continue in this way, adding ladles of hot broth, for about 15 - 18 minutes. During the preparation of risotto continue to let boil the broth. When the rice result slightly firm to the teeth means that it is ready, serve hot sprinkled with some Parmesan.
This is the result:

BUON APPETITO!

The main ingredients used to prepare this delicious Italian appetizer are carrots, cream and speck that are ingredients with opposite taste: the sweet taste of carrots and the spicy taste of speck join by the cream. The best way to cook carrots with cream is on a low flame so the different flavours mix each other, this Italian appetizer can be accompanied with a dry white wine like Grechetto dell’Umbria that is ideal with the sweet taste of this appetizer.

INGREDIENTS (for 4 people):
500 g of Carrots
125 ml of Cream
40 g of Speck in cubes
40 g of Butter
Salt
Black pepper

PREPARATION TIME: 10 minutes

COOKING TIME: 25 – 30 minutes

WINE: Grechetto dell’ Umbria (White Wine)

PREPARATION
Clean, peel and cut the carrots in slices. Let the butter melt in a pan, add the carrots and let them brown on a low flame for about 10 minutes

then add the speck, sprinkle with salt and black pepper,

add the cream

and continue to cook for other 10 – 15 minutes until the carrots become tender.

Serve hot. This is the result:


BUON APPETITO!

Today I open my fridge and I see ricotta cheese so thinking about what to do with it I decide to prepare a delicious Italian tart with a mixture of ricotta cheese and custard. The preparation of this Italian recipe is simple you should pay attention only when you cook custard in order to not make lumps and the ingredients that you need are only flour, eggs, butter, sugar and lemon.

INGREDIENTS (for 8 – 10 people):
250 g of Flour
8 g of Yeast for sweet
120 g of Sugar
80 g of Butter
2 eggs
250 g of Ricotta (Italian cheese)
INGREDIENT FOR CUSTARD:
500 ml of Milk
1 Lemon peel
40 g of Flour
120 g of Sugar
5 Yolks
9 g of Vanillina

PREPARATION TIME: 45 minutes

COOKING TIME: 1 hour

WINE: Moscato di Siracusa Doc (White Wine)

PREPARATION
Place in a bowl the flour, the sugar, the butter in pieces, the eggs, the yeast

and mix all together in order to obtain homogeneous dough that should stand for about 30 minutes in fridge covered with film.

Preheat the oven to 150 – 180°C, in the meantime prepare the custard: place in a pan the yellow part of the lemon peel, the milk and let it boil,

mix in another pan the sugar with the yolks,

add little by little the flour mixed with the vanillina in order to obtain a homogeneous batter


then place the pan on a low flame and add little by little to it the boiled milk without the lemon peel stirring to not make lumps.


Let the mixture boiled and continue to cook for about 5 minutes stirring from time to time until you obtain a sort of cream.



Now let the cream cold and then add the ricotta cheese mix all together.


When the dough is ready dampen a sheet of baking paper and place it on the bottom of a baking pan of 24 cm diameter, roll out the dough 1 cm thick on it


and pour the mixture of custard and ricotta cheese on it.

Now bake for about 1 hour or until the surface of the ricotta mixture become golden.

Let it cool, sprinkle with icing sugar and serve.
This is the result:

BUON APPETITO!

In this Italian recipe the name Braciola is not referred to thin slices of veal pan-fried but describes a kind of roast of veal cooked in the tomato sauce stuffed with parlsey, garlic and Parmesan. This is a traditional Italian recipe of my grandmother cuisine’s who gives me some suggestions to obtain the best result: the piece of veal necessary to prepare this Italian main course is the muscle or brawn of veal, in addition the parsley and the garlic with which stuff the meat should be fresh and the meat shoul cook completely covered with tomato sauce. The meat shoul be served cut in slices and accompained with some peas sprinkle with balck pepper.

INGREDIENTS (for 4 – 6 people):
900g of meat of veal in an only piece (the best one is the muscle or brawn)
60g of Parsley
1 or 2 Cloves of garlic
30g of Parmesan
1 / 2 Onion
4 Tablespoons of extra virgin olive oil
1 Kg and 400g of Tomato sauce
Some leafs of basil
Salt
Black Pepper

PREPARATION TIME: 20 minutes

COOKING TIME: 1 hour and 30 minutes

WINE: Colli d'Imola – Sangiovese (Red Wine)

PREPARATION
Start with the preparation of meat: place the meat on a cutting board

This is another traditional Italian recipe that is typical prepared in occasion of Carnival: it is easy to realize and as main ingredients you need only flour, sugar, eggs and the type of apples called Renetta or Stark that are sweet and floury. This fritters are delicious and prepared in all region of Italy in particular in Venezia where there are two different recipes of fritters of apple: one is this presented below, another one is that in which apples is cut as washers, covered with a liquid batter and fry. They are both delicious!

INGREDIENTS (for 4 – 6 people):
400 g of Flour
5 Tablespoons of Sugar
Spout
1 Grated lemon peel
16 g of Yeast for sweet
2 Eggs
300 ml of Water
5 Apples
Icing sugar
Extra virgin olive oil for fry

PREPARATION TIME: 1hour and 15 minutes

COOKING TIME: 20 minutes

WINE: Malvasia

PREPARATION
Mix in a bowl the flour, the sugar, the grated lemon peel, some spout and the yeast

then add the eggs and the water

and knead with a tablespoon in order to obtain a batter not much liquid now let the batter stand for 1 hour.

After this time clean, peel and cut in cubes the apples, add them to the batter and mix.

Preheat the extra virgin olive oil in a frying pan, place in it with a tablespoon some batter and fry it.

When the fritters become golden remove them from the oil

and place them over a sheet of kitchen paper to remove the excess of oil. Sprinkle the fritters with some icing sugar and serve them.
This is the result:

BUON APPETITO!

INGREDIENTS (for 4 people):
320g of Trofie (a particular type of pasta)
1 Brunch of rocket salad
350g of Shrimps pre-cooked
4 Tablespoons of Extra virgin olive oil
20 Cherry tomatoes
Salt
Pepper
1 Clove of
1 Glasses of rum

PREPARATION TIME: 15 minutes

COOKING TIME: 20 minutes

WINE: Vermentino di Gallura Doc (White Wine)

PREPARATION
Preheat a pan with extra virgin olive oil, brown in it the clove of garlic and remove it when it is brown. Add shrimps,


before cleaned, cook for 10 minutes, add rum and let it evaporated, then add the cherry tomatoes, before cleaned and cut in half.

Now sprinkle with salt and pepper and 1 glass of water and continue to cook for about 10 minutes.

When cooking is completed, add rocket salad, before cleaned and cut, and continue for other some minutes the cooking.

In the meanwhile cook Trofie in salt-boiling water.

When Trofie are ready drain them and add them to the pan with sauce. Serve hot.
This is the result:

BUON APPETITO!