ITALIAN FOODIES

I’ve nothing much to report on the new business front except that the contracts to be signed are in the post as we speak, the accountant is getting the business plan together, I’ve warned my bank manager that we are coming to get lots of money, he thinks I’m joking, he’s in for some shock,  Alessandro is in Italy sourcing equipment so it’s busy, busy!!!! Just to give you a little info on it, we are opening an Italian bar and grill, it is a restaurant but it will be casual dining focusing on pizza, pasta and a large grill serving all different types of steaks, home-made burgers, fish like tuna steaks, swordfish steaks etc. The focus will be on simple, home-cooked food that’s affordable!! I think eating out has changed a lot in Ireland over the last couple of years and people are moving towards casual dining, somewhere you can eat any night of the week and not just a Saturday night or for special occasions. I know myself that I would eat out a lot more if there were more casual dining options but it is an area that is really lacking in Limerick so we are hoping to fill that gap!!

Everybody I tell says what a great idea it is and how badly Limerick needs something like this and how exciting it is for us!! Yes it is exciting but I won’t really be excited until  2 or 3 years time when it is established and “maybe” beginning to make a profit!! Until then it’s lots of stress, lots of phone calls with the bank looking for more money and no sleep but hey I’m tough so don’t go worrying about me now:)

With the new house and full freezer  - oooh the excitement, I plan to start cooking lots of dishes like cannelloni, lasagne, pasta al forno etc that I can make up in big batches and freeze and then just pop into the oven on the busy days when I have no time to cook. Lasagne seems to be a lot more popular in Ireland than cannelloni and seems to be the one that most people would make themselves at home but I actually prefer cannelloni. Everyone thinks of spinach or meat cannelloni so I’m going to post about different flavours and fillings from the norm.  This recipe is based on one I saw a while back in a pasta book I picked up in SQ by Ann and Franco Taruschio which has 100 different pasta recipes and really is a great addition to the cookbook collection. This recipe is really easy and was really fast to make, I cooked the pasta sheets in the morning, left them in the cold water and went off and did the shopping and then put it altogether when I came back, it was really delicious and the princess loved it too so it will be a regular in the Italian foodie house!!

what you need:

 - 500g ricotta cheese

 - 2 eggs

 - 100g grated parmesan cheese plus extra for topping

 -  tbsp chopped flat leaf parsley

 - 1 tbsp chopped basil

 - sea salt and black pepper

 - 10 - 15 slices of parma ham

 - fresh tomato sauce or passata ( we have tubs of fresh sauce or bottles of De Cecco passata in La Cucina)

 - pasta sheets or cannelloni tubes - we have really good fresh pasta sheets in LC at the moment which are perfect for lasagne or canneloni. If you can’t get fresh use dried pasta sheets or dried tubes.

 - butter or margarine

 - nutmeg

 - olive oil

what to do:

 - bring a pot of water to the boil, add salt and some olive oil and cook your pasta sheets until al dente. Don’t over cook as they have to into the oven to be cooked again. Scoop out with a slotted spoon or sieve and drop into container of cold water with a little olive oil and leave to cool down. Lay out a tea towel, place pasta sheets on it and dry off with some kitchen paper. 

 - in a bowl mix your ricotta, eggs, herbs, parmesan, season with salt and pepper and a pinch of nutmeg.

 - put a slice of parma ham on each pasta square and divide the mixture between the pasta sheets and roll up into tubes.

 - grease your oven dish and arrange the cannelloni in a single layer. Cover with your passata and srinkle over lots of parmesan.

 - bake in the oven for 20-30 mins and serve with extra parmesan.

buon appetito!!!

Now, before any Piccola customers get too excited this is NOT the recipe for the stuffed mushrooms in the family restaurant La Piccola Italia. The stuffed mushrooms on the restaurant menu are famous, there was even an article about them in one of the Irish newspapers a while back. They also do them in the family restaurant in Atina “Il Viccolo” and Italians come from far and wide for them as they are a family recipe developed by The Mil and Bru’s Zia Theresa so you won’t see them on any other menu in Italy!! They are basically mushrooms stuffed with a meat mixture and served in a creamy red wine sauce, so many people have asked for the recipe over the years but only the family know it and we have all been sworn to secrecy. 

This stuffed mushroom recipe from Ursula Ferrigno is a great accompaniment to a piece of grilled fillet or lamb, it features under the antipasti section but I wouldn’t like them on their own, a piece ot meat compliments them perfectly. I’ve noticed I haven’t featured any meat recipes for a while, my next of couple of posts will be vegetarian but meat will be back on the menu, lamb shanks perhaps???

WHAT YOU NEED:

 - 50g porcini mushrooms

 - 4 large field mushrooms - I used the large breakfast mushrooms from Superquinn.

 - 2 anchovy fillets in oil, drained.

 - 1 garlic clove chopped finely.

 - 100g fresh white breadcrumbs.

 - pinch of freshly grated nutmeg

 - 2 tbsp olive oil

 - handful of chopped flat leaf parsley.

 - sea salt and black pepper.

WHAT TO DO:

 - soak the porcini in warm water for 10 - 15 mins. Drain and pat dry with kitchen paper.

 - pre-heat the oven to 200 degrees.

 - remove the stems from the mushrooms.

 - chop the porcini, mushroom stems, anchovies and garlic together. Put in a bowl and add the breadcrumbs, nutmeg and salt and pepper to taste. Don’t add too much salt as the anchovies are quite salty.

 - heat the olive oil in a frying pan and add the mushroom and breadcrumb mix and saute for 5 mins.

 - lay the mushroom caps on an oiled baking sheet, hollow side up. Fill with the breadcrumb mixture, sprinkle your parsley on top of each mushroom and drizzle with olive oil.

 - bake for 10-15 mins until soft and serve at room temperature.

We’ve decided that this is the year we open La Cucina no. 2 but it is proving rather difficult!! We want to open in the city centre and would love to have a unit on Thomas St or Bedford Row as it seems to be the new “cafe quarter” and it looks so well since the redevelopment. The only problem is the RENT, it is astronomically high and I know we would have better “foot traffic” in this area but I don’t think you could ever sell enough food to cover all the other costs too. Food business owners always complain about the overheads and I think most people just think we are moaning over nothing. People take the price of food at face value and often question why something is so expensive when the cost of the raw materials are so low and this is true, the cost of making a simple pasta dish is so cheap but it’s everything else that costs so much!!! The profit margins in the food business are soooo low, they average between 3 and 8% and staff costs are huge making up roughly 38% of a business’s turnover!!

BUON APPETITO!!

Our new chef Alessandro is working out really well and is making really authentic Italian dishes that even Paulo would be proud of:). He made soup yesterday with eggs, potatoes and tomato and although a few people did turn their nose up including one rather “nice” lady who made her thoughts on it very clear by telling us that it couldn’t be soup with eggs in it and that there was no way she was having it but if we had chicken and mushroom soup she would have it???we just smile and continue on but everyone else has been really positive so fingers crossed it continues. I have a good feeling about trying the more authentic Italian dishes as there seems to be such great interest and buzz around food in Ireland at the moment especially in relation to local producers, Farmer’s Markets, home-made food etc.

 - fill the base of a frying pan with olive oil and heat over a low heat, add the garlic and onion for a few minutes until soft but not coloured. Add the tomatoes and basil, season and leave to simmer for 20-25 mins until you have a thick sauce. Remove and pass through a sieve and discard the pulp. You could just make extra tomato sauce and use it for this recipe too!

BUON APPETITO!!

So that new girl started last Wednesday and she was fantastic, I couldn’t believe it!! At long last everything seemed like it was falling into place but alas on Thursday she called in to say she was after getting another job so it was back to the drawing board!! The worst part was that I had put an ad in the paper that day and had gotten so many phonecalls in relation to it I just said that the job was gone!! We were just going to have to cover it ourselves until we found the right person but alas that wasn’t going to happen either because Bru went and sprained his ankle really bad on Thursday night and is now on crutches for a week so he can’t work or mind the princess - but don’t you be feeling sorry for him as he had a great weekend in front of the T.V watching sport and sipping on a few Peroni!!! So as usual nothing goes to plan but all is not lost!!

This is another “pasta al forno” dish that we have started doing in La Cucina. They are going ok but we won’t be retiring early from them by any means, lots of people ask about them as they are in the display counter but when I tell them they have to heat them at home in the oven they change their minds and order a take-away pasta instead but we will continue on with them for a while, as they say “Rome wasn’t built in a day”!!

 - besciamella sauce

p.s. - there are many variations of this recipe so feel free to leave your version in the comments!!