Casatiello Napoletana (Stuffed Easter Bread)

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There are many Easter Breads in Italy and each region has its own version, but most include whole, sometimes coloured, eggs. This specific recipe is from Napoli and is made in a pan with a hole in the middle, called a ruoto. The recipe is enough for two breads in 270 mm pans.

800 g Bread Flour (Tipo 0)
300 g Water – luke warm
5 g Honey or Molasses
23 g Yeast – fresh
500 g 1:1 Biga (Mother plant of yeast)
100 ml Extra Virgin Olive Oil – plus extra to smear the pans
20 g Salt
50 g Salami – about 5 mm cubed
50 g Pancetta – about 5 mm cubed
50 g Cheese – any melting mild cheese of your choice – about 5 mm cubed
50 g Parmigiano or Grana Padana Cheese – about 5 mm cubed
12 Quail eggs – fresh – Plus two to glaze the bread

Mix the honey, water and yeast and let it stand for 5 minutes. Now mix in the flour, biga, oil and salt and knead well. Let it proof until at least double in size, then knead briefly again. Divide the dough in two, but keep about 50 g to make strips to secure the eggs, and roll each into a square of about 300 mm. Spread all the cheeses and meat on the squares and roll up. Place each roll in a well smeared pan in such a way that it fills the entire base of the pan. Now place the whole eggs evenly on the breads and secure each with two thin strips of dough. Proof until at least double in size. Glaze the top of the breads with beaten egg and bake at 220 C for 13 minutes. Turn the pans around and bake for another 20 minutes at 190 C.

Enjoy hot or cold, or the next day on the Easter Picnic.

12 Bits and Pieces Vegetable Lunch

Today we needed a quick light lunch. I have come to the conclusion that the more vegetables I bring in from the garden, the more innovative Mrs BYF becomes. I decided to post this recipe that can never be repeated because it was delicious and used up all the bits and pieces I have produced and harvested.

1/2 cup thinly sliced swede

4 handfuls radish tops, washed and picked. Discard the bigger stems and eat the radishes

8 small tomatoes some not fully ripe, some over ripe

2 handfuls of very tiny potatoes

4 very small zucchini and whatever flowers are left, diced

1 small but evil chilli

1 thumb nail sized bit of fresh ginger

1/2 medium onion

1 tablespoon or much more chopped garlic

4 tablespoons of olive oil

salt and pepper

1 sprig of rosemary just because I got it for free from the museum foyer on Anzac Day

3 fried quail eggs (runny yolk) on top of each serve. The egg is optional but makes all the difference according to Mrs BYF who can eat eggs for every meal, every day of the week

Method

Put the washed radish tops in a pot , cover and fry until the leaves have wilted. In the mean time, fry the onion until translucent in the olive oil along with the garlic, chilli, ginger and rosemary. When the onion is ready add the potatoes (boil them first if they are bigger than your pinky nail) and the swede. Fry quickly until all is soft and integrated. Add a spoonful of water if necessary. Lastly, add the tomatoes and fry for a minute. Serve when everything is soft and just before the tomatoes burst. Add salt and pepper to taste.

Add a ladle of Extra Virgin Olive Oil and cracked Black Pepper and enjoy while washing it all down with a glass, or two, of home made Cherry and Black Current Wine. Scoop up the sauce with home made bread.

Lepre al Limone di Domenico

We decided to take a few hares before the newly released virus gets to them. After cleaning them well and ageing in the fridge for some days, it was time to taste.

Lepre al Limone ( Rabbit with Lemon )

1 Hare
Half a cup of flour
Pinch of salt and pepper
Three tablespoons of good Extra Virgin Olive Oil
Two table spoons of butter
One handful of garlic
One fresh hot chili
2 Small fresh lemons
Good stock
Heat the oven to 200 C.

Cut the rabbit into portions and dry very well with paper napkins. Mix the flour, salt and pepper and dust the rabbit very well. Heat a cast iron or heavy based pan that can fit all the rabbit pieces, add two table spoons of good olive oil, shake off the flour and fry the rabbit until well browned. When the rabbit is golden, transfer the the pieces to a roasting pan. Add one tablespoon of butter and place in the centre the oven. Discard the contents of the frying pan and wipe clean. While the rabbit is roasting in the oven, add one table spoon of butter and one tablespoon of olive oil to the cleaned pan. Add a handful of fresh garlic and as much chili as you can take, some whole fresh lemons cut into pieces (I was fortunate to have harvested some small sweet lemons from my tree the day before) and cook on low heat until the garlic is translucent before adding the contents of the pan to the hare in the roasting pan. Baste and turn the hare often and keep moist with good stock – about a spoon full at a time, adding stock when the hare appears too dry. Don’t add too much stock at a time, you never want to poach the hare (again I had very good stock on hand from pigeons I cooked the day before). Depending on the age of the hares it may take up to an hour before they are tender, but remember to keep it moist and toss frequently.

Enjoy with your favorite starch (we had potatoes and spinach from the garden)

Never forget the good home made wine. I tried the new cherry wine for the first time and Mrs BYF the new Rhubarb wine.

ENJOY!!!!

Puffball

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One can benefit greatly by living in close proximity to a keen forager with an eye for mushrooms. The mushroom season in Dunedin has been exceptionally good and boletus are plentiful should one know where to look for them. Mushroomers may share their haul, but will never, ever tell where their mushrooms are found! Our generous benefactors have shared their bounty with us and some of the most thrilling mushrooms, the puffballs, grow right here in their garden!

Recipe for fried puffball mushroom

1 Good sized puffball, firm and pure white right through when sliced. The inside has a marshmallow like texture

2 to 3 Eggs, lightly beaten

1 cup dried breadcrumbs with a pinch of salt and pepper added and mixed in

Use a cast iron or heavy based pan big enough to fry the mushroom slices in 2 ot 3 batches

Enough pork fat or vegetable oil to come up to about 2.5 ml up the side of the pan. Apart from the great taste, pork fat can be heated to a very high temperature, ideal for frying

I have written about puffballs before, and this one was prepared by again slicing it into ‘steaks’ about 15 mm thick, dipped in egg wash and coated in dried breadcrumbs. This time the slices were fried until golden in pork fat, processed in our kitchen from a delicious home grown porker. I highly recommend frying in pork fat but those that fear animal fat can use vegetable oil. We ate the mushroom, dressed with a few drop of fresh lemon juice and ground black pepper, for dinner along with fresh tomatoes that ripened in Dunedin’s first hot summer since we moved here. The tiny lemons are from the tiny tree planted in our front garden 2 seasons ago.

Only flour for making the bread to produce crumbs and salt and pepper were purchased to produce this lovely meal.

NAVIGLI DI LEONARDO DA VINCI A MILANO

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After spending a whole day combing through Archives of Mezzano Martello in Milano, I was thrown out at 15H00, because they wanted to close for the day.

On recommendation of my wife, I made my way to the Navigli in Milano for a memorable lunch / dinner.

The Navigli of Milan are the artificial canals constructed between 1179 (Naviglio Grande) and the 16th century (Naviglio Martesana) with the purpose of making Milan accessible from the Ticino and Adda rivers.

I enjoyed the home made Gnocchi as a Primi and Polenta with Eggs and Truffle as a Secondi with fried Artichokes as a Contorni. Even though the place was still very quiet and empty as it only comes to live at night, it was a memorable and enjoyable experience.