It looks  amazing whether you use a single fruit (in my case Mango) or a cocktail of fruits (Berries, Kiwifruit, Bananas, Plums, Pineapple, Melon…)

What I like about this recipe is that you can prepare the crust and the pastry a couple of days ahead, and assemble the whole thing when ready to serve.  And this is what i did,  just make sure to take the crust and the cream out of the refrigerator to give them enough time to cool to room temperature, and give the cream a quick whisk to get rid of any lumps.

I read a tip about brushing the pre baked crust with apricot glaze (heated jam and water) to prevent the filling from softening it. (I skipped this step, and the crust was still firm and crumbly the next day)

Sweet Pastry Crust:

-  1 1/2 cups (195 grams) all purpose

-  1/8 teaspoon salt

-  1/2 cup (113 grams) unsalted butter, at room temperature

-  1/4 cup (50 grams) granulated white

-  1 large egg, lightly beaten

Pastry Cream:

-  1 1/4 cups (300 ml) milk (whole or 2%)

-  1/2 vanilla bean, split lengthwise or 1 teaspoon pure vanilla extract

-  3 large egg yolks

-  1/4 cup granulated white sugar

-  2 tablespoons all-purpose flour

-  2 tablespoons cornstarch (corn flour)

-  1/2 tablespoon orange liqueur (optional, but adds a great taste)

Tip: vanilla beans can be washed, dried and placed in a sugar bowl. I use this vanilla sugar in all my desserts. If you use vanilla sugar, don’t add any vanilla extracts to this recipe.

Topping:

- 2 medium sized Mangoes (cut into wedges)

Tip: With the skin still on, slice the wider, flat sides off the mango as close to the pit as possible, then cut the flesh into wedges, just short of the skin, being careful not to pierce through. Using a spoon, scoop out the mango slices.

Let’s start cooking!

Sweet Pastry Crust:

Whisk the flour with the salt, and set aside. Using your electric or hand mixer, beat the butter until softened in another bowl. Add sugar and beat until light and fluffy. Gradually add the beaten egg, beating just until incorporated. Add the flour mixture all at once and mix just until it forms a ball. Flatten the pastry and cover it with plastic wrap, and refrigerate for 30 minutes or freeze for 15 minutes.

Lightly butter and flour, or spray with a non-stick cooking spray, an 9 inch tart pan with a removable bottom. Pat the chilled pastry onto the bottom and up the sides of the pan. Cover again with plastic wrap and place in the freezer for about 15 minutes.

Preheat oven to 205 degrees C . Lightly prick bottom of pastry crust with the tines of a fork (to prevent it from puffing up). Place the pan on a larger baking sheet and bake and in center rack of for 5 minutes. Reduce the temperature to 180 degrees C and continue to bake for about 15 minutes or lightly golden brown. Remove from oven and allow the crust to cool completely.

Pastry Cream:

In a heatproof bowl, mix the sugar and egg yolks together. Sift the flour and cornstarch together and then add to the egg mixture and mix until you get a smooth paste.

Bring the milk and vanilla bean (if using) just to boiling, remove from heat and add slowly to egg mixture, whisking constantly to prevent curdling (you can always strain the mixture). Remove vanilla bean, scrape out seeds, and add the seeds to the egg mixture. Then pour the egg mixture into a medium saucepan and cook over medium heat until boiling, whisking constantly. When it boils, whisk mixture constantly for another 30 – 60 seconds until it becomes thick. Remove from heat and immediately whisk in the liqueur (if using). (Stir in vanilla extract is using instead of a vanilla bean.) Pour into a clean bowl and immediately cover the surface with plastic wrap to prevent a crust from forming. Cool to room temperature.

Assembling The Tart:

To remove the tart from the fluted sides of the pan, place your hand under the pan, touching only the removable bottom. Gently push the tart straight up, away from the sides. Run a rubber spatula between the crust and metal bottom, then slide the tart onto your pie dish or platter.

Spread the pastry cream onto the tart shell. Place your mango slices in concentric overlapping circles on top of the cream.

Tip: After arranging the fruit, you can brush it with an apricot glaze to give the fruit a beautiful shine (Heat 1/4 cup of apricot jam and 2 teaspoons of water in a saucepan or in the microwave until melted)

Serves about 6-8 people.

[SAH-blay]
Sablé is a classic French cookie. The word Sablé means “sand”, and the cookies are so named because of their delicate, crumbly texture.

If you are a chocolate lover, then you should definitely try this recipe.

Few tips:

1- This recipe is about chocolate, buy the best Unsweetened Cocoa powder you can find and the best semi-sweet chocolate for the glaze. You will not regret the outcome!

2- Butter is also a main ingredient in this recipe, after all it’s a shortbread. Use unsalted butter if available

3- Use “pure” vanilla extract if it’s possible.

Ingredients:

1 cup all-purpose flour
1/4 cup  unsweetened cocoa powder
1/4 teaspoon salt
1/2 cup (1 stick)  unsalted butter
1/2 cup granulated white sugar
1/2 tsp pure vanilla
1 egg yolk

Chocolate Glaze:

90 grams of semisweet chocolate
2 tbsp unsalted butter cut into pieces
1/3 cup roasted hazelnuts coarsly chopped (you can substitute with pistachios, walnuts, pecans or almonds)

These chocolate chip muffins are simply delicious,  moist,  buttery and full of chocolate!

This recipe Makes 12 regular sized muffins.

Ingredients:

- 1/2 cup (113 grams)  butter, melted and cooled
- 2 eggs
- 1 cup  milk or cream
- 1 1/2 teaspoons vanilla extract
- 2 cups all-purpose flour
- 2/3 cups  granulated white sugar
- 1 tablespoon baking powder
- 1/2 teaspoon salt
- 1 cup  milk chocolate chips

Preparation:

Preheat oven to 190 degrees C and  position rack in center of oven.
Butter, or line with paper liners your muffin tins.

Whisk  the eggs, milk, and vanilla extract in a large bowl.

In another bowl, whisk together the flour, sugar, baking powder, salt and the chocolate chips.
Then using a rubber spatula, or wooden spoon,  fold the wet ingredients and the melted butter, into the dry ingredients. It is very Important to stir only until the ingredients are combined.

Fill the muffin cups with the batter, using two spoons. Place in the oven and bake until a toothpick inserted in the center of a muffin comes out clean, about 20 minutes.

Let the muffins cool for a while before removing them from pan.

Optional: You can sprinkle each muffin with a mixture of granulated sugar and cinnamon before baking.

So here’s Pia’s recipe for the mjaddara (mdardara):

Ingredients: 2 cups of lentils 3/4 cup of rice 1 large onion Some olive oil, salt and pepper + Plenty of onions for the caramelized onion topping! Preparation: Cook the lentils in plenty of water until soft. Wash the rice and add it to the cooking pot. Cover the lid after the water boils again. Let it simmer for about 20 minutes. In the mean time, dice the onion and cook it in just a bit of olive oil until translucent. Add the cooked onion, salt and pepper (to taste) to the other ingredients. Then add 2 large table spoons of extra virgin olive oil to the pot. Mix well, then turn off the heat. Pour in a serving dish and top it with caramelized onions.

The mjaddara is a dish best served cold (like vengeance!). It gets even better tasting after a couple of days in the fridge. The sandwich I made was just some (old) bread, mjaddara, rocca (ruccola), sliced tomatoes and a drizzle of balsamic vinegar to top it off. Simply yummy!

Here’s a compilation of some awesome pictures we shot at Cinque Terre, Genova.

Riomaggiore

Manarola

Corniglia

Vernazza

Monterosso

Le Cinque Terre are five beautiful towns situated on the Italian Riviera,  in the Ligurian region of Italy. The five villages are: Monterosso al Mare, Vernazza, Corniglia, Manarola, and Riomaggiore.

These fives towns are famous for their beautiful landscapes that overlook the sea, their panoramic terraces and lack of visible modern development!

Cinque Terre products:

• Pesto (Sauce made from basil leaves, garlic, salt, olive oil, pine nuts and pecorino cheese)
• Anchovies of Monterosso
• Focaccia (Bread topped with herbs)
• Farinata (Bread made with chick-pea flour)
• Sciachetrà (Sweet wine)
• Grappa (Brandy made with the pomace left from winemaking)
• Limoncello
• Grapes
• Olives

Here are some photos of the coast of the Italian Riviera as seen from the towns
The posts that will follow will be displaying photos for each of the towns.

This weekend was very special. We went on Friday afternoon to Cinque Terre in the Italian region of Liguria. The Cinque (five) Terre (lands) are indeed five beautiful towns (Riomaggiore, Manarola, Corniglia, Vernazza & Monterosso) right on the Ligurian coast, all connected by multiple pedestrian paths through the mountains. The towns are also accessible by , train, buses and ferries.
The towns’ economy basically depend on fishing and tourism. Le Cinque Terre are also considered an important national park and a protected marine and land reserve.

Well, right after we arrived to Riomaggiore, the first of the five towns we learned first-hand how friendly everyone is around here… including the Ligurian cats!

You can see beautiful chubby cats everywhere, and they are not afraid of people. All seem to be well fed, well treated and they don’t mind the tourists. We’ve been away from our cat “The Boss” for a while now, and feeling home-sick just a little bit. My husband went to pet one of the cats sitting on side of the street minding its business, and the cat went all cuddly and nice, leaning to rub its chubby head on the back of his hand. It stayed there, and allowed me to pet it myself. Later that night we found another cat (in the next town) that did the same. And another one… well it was raining and the cat was sitting under a bench trying to hide from the sparse drops of rain. Still it welcomed our petting hands on its head, for a little while before it looked away (probably saying to itself: “tourists!”).

Well I decided to write this blog and post some of the pics we got for the Cinque Terre cats!

We did much more than pet cats here. Maybe that should go in another post!

I’ve been eating Spaghetti ala Bolognese for as long as I remember. Well, I thought I have anyway. After I got married though, I truly tasted the Bolognese sauce for the first time (as it should be) and it was even greater.
Well, today we wanted to go to Bologna to taste the real thing. We took a train from Rifredi train station (in Florence) at about 11:30am and got there shortly before 1PM. An easy ride, and we had some time to study what parts of the meetings we missed this week.
Arriving at the train station we did what we customary do as soon as we get to a new city: get the bus tickets. The lady at the tourist information office almost laughed at us, saying we should simply walk over to the center of the city. We got a free map from the information office and waited about 10 minutes for the bus that goes to the center anyway.
We spent a few minutes in the center near the Neptune fountain then quickly decided to go get some food!
We found a nice cozy place (Pietro’s Trattoria) we read (on some blog) it had good food. Pia had the Tagliatelle with Bolognese sauce, and I asked for some Large Raviolli. Well, the tagliatelle was good (as one would imagine), and the raviolli were indeed large, all three pieces! And the wine was simply great. I’ve been drinking Chianti and other Tuscan wines for a while, but this was truly wonderful. It’s a shame we didn’t get any with us, but I forgot to ask for it when we had to leave (some Dutch guy who was behind us struck a conversation with me right after after lunch).
After lunch we strolled around the center, saw the hordes of university students with weird dresses and gothic look filling the streets. It was truly disturbing!
Finally we went back to the center and waited for an hour or so for our train. We tried to find a bus back to the train station, but an old lady looked at us funny and explained (in Italian) that it’s about 500m away, only one bus stop anyway. Well, we walked over and took the train back.
A nice day all in all, I should have ordered the Spaghetti ala Bolognese myself. Maybe next time!

Menu di oggi (today’s menu):

- Primo: Cannelloni con ricotta e spinaci (Spinach & ricotta cannelloni)
- Secondo: Bistecca e ruccola (Steak on a bed of arugula)

We didn’t actually have a salad, but it was too much to eat already.

The recipes are truly simple.

For the primo: We got a box of cannelloni from the supermarket (250gr). We also found a plastic box of spinach all cleaned, cut and ready. Now that’s convenient
On top of that, a 200gr pack of ricotta cheese actually costs less than Labneh. So put that with the spinach and mix, then stuff it all in the canneloni (do not pre-bake those) Pia: season with salt and pepper to taste, also some extra virgin olive oil here to bring the mix together.

Now for the “hard part”, make some “roux”, mix with milk a bit of mascarpone (we had this laying around) and season with salt and pepper.
All in the oven for about 20-30 minutes. Wow! We had half at lunch and I finished off the rest earlier in the evening.

Pia adds: Abdallah missed the fact that I added some grated Parmigiano Reggiano to both the sauce, and on top of the dish before sending it to the oven. It gives a nice color and a wonderful extra taste.

As for the secondo: well, it’s a piece of steak. Season it with some salt and pepper. Put some extra virgin olive oil in the pan (no idea why!) and put the steak there for a couple of minutes. Done!

Of course, just doing the above may give you the worse meal ever. But with my wife, it tastes and looks great. She makes it sound so easy. Heh!

Check out the pics below. And let me know how lucky I am.

“When it rains, it’s definitely time for soups and stews!” says Abdallah.

Today it rained in the morning,  so I decided to cook something special for my dear husband.
It’s been three weeks now that I am cooking almost everyday. The COOP is near, and I ‘m managing with the ingredients here.
So far we’ve had: Tawouk, Mjaddara, Riz w Fasouliah, Balila, Fasouliah Bzeit and Tabbouleh (without mint & bulgur). But we were still craving for stews with rice, and Abdallah had mentioned earlier craving for ‘Aleb Khodra’ (Lebanese vegetables stew).  I had found earlier in the frozen section of the COOP, a bag of frozen mixed vegetables for Minestrone*, and I thought  I could give this traditional italian dish a Lebanese twist

Meat, onion, tomato sauce and paste, pepper and oregano… and cooked rice.

Minestrone: Thick Italian soup made with vegetables, often with the addition of pasta or rice. Common ingredients include beans, onions, celery, carrots, stock, and tomatoes.