Semla

February has come and this time of the year reminds me of the first (and unfortunatelly only one) time that I visited Stockholm.

Back in 2007, Laura, Gaspare and me traveled together from Lubeck to Skavsta airport. The vision of the frosty city and the thousands of islands in the lake was marvellous.
Too bad for us, we only spent the time there from a friday night and departured on Sunday to fly back to Bremen, Germany, the city of our Erasmus student exchange program.
Beyond Gamla Stan, the historical center too much crowded in Italian population for my taste and the regret not to have seen the reindeers in Djurgården, a very common Seven Eleven store offered me a great memory of course related to food.

I am refering to semla or its plural semlor a sweet bun cut into two halves made by cardamom wheat with milk, almonds and whipped cream. On top everything is even sweeter

thanks to powdered sugar. I always thought its flavour was given by poppy seeds but I was mistaken!

The tradition finds its reason to eat these sweets on Mardi Gras and the autenthic receipe is a field of battle to make win every year during Carnival one bakery against another to reach the perfect semla. Even a Semla academy is born.

Here below a short clip from a Swedish tv commercial: poor guys these semlor testers' huh?

Pastificio De Filippis

With this post I would like to start a good habit to suggest you places worthy to visit under a culinary stand point.
A good foodie needs to know where to go, anywhere.
My anywhere is unfortunately limited to Europe, at least so far. It wouldn’t be honest to recommend places friends suggested me while I have not tried on my skin.
I’ve been in Tunisia once so extra European borders, though the resort I visited was in the middle of nowhere and I couldn’ t visit too much.

Today’s location is PASTIFICIO DE FILIPPIS. In a central pedestrian area in Turin, this shop for homemade pasta is now flourished into a cosy place to eat.
The menu is changing every now and then. They serve plin (small tortellini tipical from Piedmont)with melted butter and cheese, risotto c’est a dire rice with fresh artichokes and lil squids both priced 12 € each, flan with bagna cauda and anchovis, tagliatelle with sausage from Bra, selection of cheeses and so on.
Of course their specialty- as the name suggests- it’s the handmade pasta.
Here some pictures of yesterday’s dinner with my best friend Carina. Plin (on the left) and the above mentioned risotto (on the right)




Pastificio De Filippis

Via Giuseppe Luigi Lagrange, 39 10123 Torino
Turin - ITALY
011 542137

La gula del Norte

"Do you want something from Spain?" asked my best friend Carina.
My answer was pretty clear.
Anguriñas:commercially known as "La gula del Norte". A canned good that looks like worms (I know it's not pleasant), whose name in Spanish sounds like little eels but is indeed made by a different mixture of fishes. You could say they're fish pasta, sold natural taste or added in garlic.
Quick to cook when warmed in a pan: a matter of 2-3 minutes time.
I have to admit the dobubtful origin made first me, then my family hesitate a while. It is indeed artificial food, still everyone should try it to see if they agree to say how gula is wonderfully tasty.

FOR EVERY 100 GRAMS:
· Calories: 156,7 Kcal (654,1 KJ)
· Protein: 10,5 g
· Carbohydrates: 7,3 g
· Fat: 9,5 g

We love panelle

If you can tell you're in Montecarlo because you see lots of banks, you can easily say you're in Sicily on the number of ice cream sellers.

Beyond that, you can really be 100% sure you're walking on Sicilian territory if the street food you have in your hands is panelle.
They were a great surprise for me the first time I tried them. They're often in triangle or squared shape, obtained with gram flour, coming from ground chickpeas and at last deep fried.

They're perfect with a dust of pepper and some lemon drops squeezed. I can assure you the flavour is unique!

Ascot loves food

Ascot is the famous british horse racing taking place over 300 years and mostly known for the exagerated, funny, sometimes pieces of sculptures artistic hats on the ladies.
The catwalk of these skinny beautiful preppies this year was, strange to say, all around food.

Caption could be: how to have an icecream and not gaining pounds of your body or how to meet friends with Celebrations' stock on your head!

Madrid profundo!

When I first told Sergio, a colleague of mine, about my culinary experience with zapatilla, the comment was "Madrid profundo!" The fact is that it’s not so common for a turist nevertheless a foreign one, to know this sandwich. Calling it these way reduces the power of the imagination of this tasty and mouth-watering bread, warmed on a grill and filled with a kind of smoky ham called lacon and a type of melting cheese from Galitia named tetilla- as it resembles the breast of a woman. Zapatilla literary means small shoe but I assure you that nothing is small in size nor in flavor. The owner of Bar Melo’s, located in Calle Ave María 44, in the neighbourhoood of Lavapies warns every single customer that you have to be hungry enough to have it and, as a menace, finish it. I remember the time I was there with my boyfriend: we considered a better option to share a half zapatilla. First thing I’ll do next time I visit again Madrid (the last time I could only spend an afternoon after my flight back) we’ll be for sure to eat a zapatilla.

Stroopwafels, my love

I can predict when my boss has travelled to an back from the US with a connection flight to Amsterdam when he brings back the fantastic Gouda’s Stroopwafels.
Gotta admit it’s the only food with cinnamon I can bare.Even if I lived in the Netherlands I never had the chance to try them in bigger version, sold on the streets.I’ve always bought them in a tin either in Hema, Kruidvat or other drugstores. If I should be even more honest, stroopwafels, these wonderful waffles with caramel syrup were my regret behind my back when I left the Country of the clogs, windmills, canals, lot of rainy days and cheeses.
With my surprise, I found a pack of six stroopwafels sold in Tiger, the Danish silly and cute store that recently opened in Milan and Turin.