ITALIAN FOODIES

I have been tagged for my first meme by the lovely Marie over at Proud Italian Cook, for those of you who aren’t familiar with the concept, it is basically a way of learning more about the blogger and their lives!! Here it goes:

WHAT 4 JOBS I HAVE HAD:

4 PLACES I’VE LIVED:

 - Shannon: It’s where I’m from, god help me:)

4 PLACES I’VE BEEN ON HOLIDAY:

 - Boston and Chicago

4 FAVOURITE FOODS:

 - PIZZA - margherita with buffalo mozzarella and cherry tomatoes.

4 PLACES I’D RATHER BE:

 - I have to say life is pretty good and once I’m with Bru and the princess I’m a contented little camper, a little trip to Italy and the beach help every now and again:) but if I had to choose it would be here and here.

Laura, Val, Maz, Deborah

Ciao!!!!

There seems to be a problem with uploading photos at the moment so no recipe again today. I decided to show you our little cucina for 2 reasons:

1. we will be moving in a couple of months and I’m really going to miss it, we’ve been here for 5 years and we have definitely got good use out of it. It came from Italy of course!

2. When I’m reading other food blogs, I’m always so curious to know what the writer looks like, what kind of person they are and what their kitchen looks like?? Maybe I’m just too nosy for my own good!! That is probably the mystery of blogging and now I’ve blown mine by showing you my kitchen. Oh Well!!

That’s the princess in her royal elevated throne, she always sits there while I’m cooking and I have to entertain her with my melodious singing voice. One can never have too much “twinkle twinkle”:)

On another note I was delighted to find a website promoting the restaurants of Atina. Bru’s cousins restaurant Il Viccolo is on it so you can see some pictures of the restaurant, his family and the menu and a couple of pictures of Atina. The site is in Italian but it’s easy enough to follow

 - click on Storia di Atina to see some pictures of Atina, there is a little arrow at the bottom to skip to the next one.

 - click on Il Viccolo to see the restaurant, use the link “visita il locale” at the bottom to see pictures of the restaurant and then click on the links on the top to see the family and the menu. If you click on each photo it tells you who everyone is. It’s really cool actually for such a small town.

If any of you are going to Italy this year and are driving from Rome to Naples, I would definitely recommend stopping off in Atina, it’s easy to find and not that far off the motorway. The village is tiny but is so authentic and the views are stunning and pop into the restaurant for a bite to eat. Most of them speak english which is rare in a small village but they have so many ex-pats returning every summer from England. Ireland and Scotland with their families. Tell them Lorraine and Bruno sent you!!!

 - Pasquale’s girlfriend Francessca has a really funky bar in Atina and that is listed on the site aswell, it’s called La Buka so have a look if you like. We’ve had many a late night there!!

Enjoy!!

 Ok all you foodie lovers out there, a beautiful relationship has blossomed from the blog world. Laura from www.eatdrinklive.typepad.com has kindly agreed to sell her lovely home-made goodies in La Cucina starting from today. We’re always interested in supporting local baking producers if we can as we just don’t have time to do it ourselves. In La Cucina we stock Sallymills, Cocoa Beans and Wildes Chocolates.

When it comes to home-made foods there are very few producers as it is so expensive to start up. I think there are some grants available for production but not for retail. It’s quite sad really as the franchises are taking over the food world in Ireland where everything is frozen and mass produced and us dedicated souls slogging our hearts out to make good quality, fresh home-made produce get no government support or grants etc. 

In Italy in order to protect local produce they have the “agriturissmo” which is a restaurant that produces everything they sell. They have their own pigs, cows, make their own wine etc. Everything they sell has to be produced on site even the bread, cheese etc. There is no menu, you are just offered whatever there is available that day. We ate in one in Atina, we had every part of the animal, e.g kidney and liver stew to start etc. It was one of the best meals I ‘ve had. It was so nice to know that everything had been made by that family in their home. They get government grants to cover everything and then have to abide by a set of rules. Where are there any farm shops, farm restaurants etc in Ireland??? i would love to head out to the country and eat some locally produced food that’s in season.

I know there is a bit of change happening at the moment with the promotion of farmer’s markets etc but I still think a lot more could be done. I’ve read a lot in the papers recently that they now realise that small businesses actually contribute more to the economy than the big multinationals who get loads of tax breaks and incentives. It’s difficult opening your own business, myself and Bru did the work of 4-5 people, doing about 70-80 hours a week for the first couple of years but you have no choice and don’t get me wrong it has been worth it but a little help to get us on our feet would have been great.

Anyway my message is support your local businesses if you can that are family owned whether it be your local butcher, deli, cake shop because in today’s competitive environment they need it.