are two of my favourite things

Pedro and I got married on a beautiful warm July afternoon, surrounded by all our loved ones: friends and family. It was even more beautiful than we had anticipated and we were filled with joy to see everyone so happy, during the day.

We started planning the wedding in January and from the start we knew we wanted to keep things simple and personal. So, Pedro designed the invitations and the thank you cards. Since we got married in a botanical garden, that was the major source of our inspiration.

Above you can see some of the things we did:  two days before the wedding I baked a few batches of cookies, that were placed in jars, for all our sweet-toothed guests.

As both our families take cooking and food in general pretty serious, we decided our wedding favor should be something sweet and something savory and should represent both sides of the family. So, what’s best than homemade tomato jam made by my mother and olive oil that comes from Pedro’s parents hometown? We thaught it was pretty perfect and our friends and family agreed.

For the party, we wanted something fun and that really set the mood for the night. So, we took on the task of making different shapes of moustaches on a stick, that were quickly coveted by everyone – and we have hilarious photos to prove it.

It was a long day, but it was rewarding to see everyting we dreamt really come together – it was a special day that we’ll keep in our hearts for a very long time.

My mind has been elsewhere and so the blog has been (really) neglected. It’s only four days till the big day and I can’t seem to find the time to blog..

As the blog, the kitchen has been quiet – no big and fancy meals, no new recipes, just a few reliable, easy and quick recipes. The picture above tells it all – I can whip this pizza in about 15 minutes and not feel that guilty about not cooking a proper meal in weeks.

In other news, I’m beyond excited about this next few days. A bit nervous too, but I guess that’s normal.

In a week, we’ll be leaving for New York, where we’ll stay for 3 weeks, including a small road trip to the Hudson Valley.

In New York, we’ll be joining Karen Mordechai and a small group of other food-loving people, on a Sunday Suppers class with chef Vincent Rotolo, all about grilled pizzas and cheeses. Can’t wait!

Recipes from an Italian Summer

I Know How to Cook

Ready for Dessert: My Best Recipes

Dough

This was my Sunday lazy lunch – and is currently one of my favourite meals: bruschetta!  

Whether with goat cheese and honey or with slow roasted tomatoes, they make a pretty quick and tasty meal. Tomatoes are rapidly becoming one of my favourite vegetables and their roasted version is pretty damn good.

I usually toast the bread in the oven for up to 15 minutes, and then brush them wil olive oil and garlic.

For the slow roasted tomatoes, i did as follows:

Wash the tomatoes, cut off the stem end, and halve them lengthwise. Pour a bit of olive oil into a small bowl, dip a pastry brush into it, and brush the tomato halves lightly with oil. Place them, skin side down, on a large baking sheet. Sprinkle them with sea salt and ground coriander—about a pinch of each for every four to six tomato halves.

Bake the tomatoes until they shrink to about 1/3 of their original size but are still soft and juicy, 4 to 6 hours.  Remove the baking sheet from the oven, and allow the tomatoes to cool to room temperature.

They go great with salads, meat, pasta or by themselves.

these pantry loving images are from a post from designismine.

So, we’re spending the weekend at my parent’s house, and it is raining so much we barely left the house.

And after my last post, where I talk about is food, it seems pretty apropriate that late last night my brother e-mailed me these photos of his dinner.

Yup, it reaaally runs in the family!

Everyone who knows me a bit, knows I love to cook. I love to prepare a meal, to think of different recipes to try, I love how it calms me and how happy I feel. And, of course, I love to eat.

But I tend to always do the same recipes. I buy cookbooks, I read them, enjoy seeing different approaches to a common dish, but I always get stuck on my confort zone.

Well, I’m done with that! I decided I will start trying different recipes – and not always doing desserts…

So, last weekend I grab the huge portuguese traditional cookcook Pantagruel, and looked for something totally different.

So I looked for fish dishes as it is something I rarely do – and found it! Pataniscas de Bacalhau-  something similar to crab cakes but done with codfish. On the contrary of what I had thought, they are not hard to make and they turned out great!

Pedro was really pleased and so was I. They were light, tasty and go beautifully with rice.