Recipes - LA BELLA VITA

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Recipes

magic lemon pudding on blue plate

PROOF IN THE PUDDING
MAGIC LEMON PUDDING {GLUTEN AND DAIRY FREE RECIPE}

savory-easter-tart

SAVORY EASTER TART
TORTA SALATA PASQUALE

bittersweet love salad

BITTERSWEET LOVE {SALAD}
Blood Orange, Arugula & Red Onion Salad

ribollita with spoon

Ribollita
Tuscan Bread & Vegetable Soup

Beet Pasta Ravioli with Ricotta and Radicchio Filling

Valentine’s Day Dinner:
Beet Pasta Ravioli with Ricotta and Radicchio Filling

Persimmon and Pecan Bread - Hachiya persimmon pulp is the star ingredient in this irresistibly fragrant fruit and nut bread.

Patience and persimmons
Persimmon and Pecan Bread

Panettone filled with cream, chocolate and nuts

Sweet Italian Christmas:
Panettone Filled with Whipped Cream, Chocolate and Hazelnuts

Grape Focaccia - Schiacciata con l'uva: A sweet wine harvest flatbread from Tuscany made with layers of bread dough filled and topped with wine harvest grapes and sugar. When baked, the grapes and sugar meld together to create a jammy center with crunchy seeds. Simply deliziosa!

Tuscany in California: Schiacciata con l’uva
Tuscan Grape Focaccia

An Ode to Pasta - Handmade egg and spinach pasta ribbons simply dressed with butter sauce and adorned with fragrant truffle shavings is the ultimate delicacy and ode to pasta.

An Ode to Pasta:
Straw and Hay Pasta with Truffles

Lagostina Martellata Hammered Copper Pastaiola

Lagostina Giveaway:
Martellata Hammered Copper Pastaiola

pork-tenderloin-figs-balsamic

Sweet September:
Pork Tenderloin with Figs and Balsamic Sauce

Baked Sunset Peaches with Amaretti Filling - Yellow peach halves are filled with fragrant ground almonds, sugar and fruit pulp then baked until luscious and gloriously golden with ruby red rims.

Savoring Summer
Baked Sunset Peaches with Amaretti Filling

Spaghetti all'Amatriciana - This world reknowned dish hails from the town of Amatrice and was adopted by Rome as one of its signature dishes. It's made with cured pork jowl bacon, tomatoes, garlic and - of course - spaghetti or bucatini. Simply deliziosa!

Love & Pasta
Spaghetti all’Amatriciana

Peperonata Crostini – Colorful, sweet and tangy Peperonata makes a vibrant and tasty topping for toasted bread as an irresistible appetizer.

The Sweet Taste of Summer
Peperonata Crostini

Baked Rice Stuffed Tomatoes - Pomodori al Riso is a beloved Roman summer dish featuring intensely flavored tomatoes filled with garlic and herb scented rice then baked until wrinkly on a sea of golden potatoes. Simply deliziosi!

You say tomato, I say “Pomodori al Riso”
Baked Rice Stuffed Tomatoes

Chef Deborah Dal Fovo at her kitchen door in Tuscany

A Warm Welcome Home – My Return to Tuscany
Tuscan Farro and Bean Soup

DON’T MISS A RECIPE!

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Teatime with my Easy Italian Chocolate Cake is nur

Teatime with my Easy Italian Chocolate Cake is nurturing food for the soul as well as the body. This rich, moist cake stays fresh through the week and a little slice goes a long way to satisfy a craving. A tutorial video and recipe for this cake are in my latest posts. It’s so easy to make that you will have no excuse ; )
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Now is a good time to get back to basics. Breakfast in bed with a good book, morning meditation, leisurely lunches, civilized tea at 4PM, gardening in the afternoon (even if it’s only on a terrace), online dance classes, and planning a strategic (supplies are limited) yet delicious dinner then music or movie before bed. It’s all in a day’s life now with my work of making cooking videos and posts fitting into the living (instead of the other way around).
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This quiet time is an opportunity to plant the seeds of things you’ve always wanted to accomplish but didn’t have the time or attention span to start. Learn new things, master something, try something unexpected, discover an unknown talent, work on yourself. Then watch those seeds grow 🌱and marvel at what happens when we turn our focus inward...we truly come alive. Use this time to go inside as well as stay inside.
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Stay home, be well, and stay safe. Oh, and keep cooking. You’re doing great 😉
xx,
Deborah

. Easy Italian Chocolate Cake {Vegan} (Adapted fro

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Easy Italian Chocolate Cake {Vegan}
(Adapted from Ada Boni’s Torta Bil Bol Bul, 1929)
~Watch my video tutorial on IGTV!~
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I don’t know about you, but staying home has given me a craving for chocolate cake. But what happens when you are out of butter and eggs? During our stay at home time, it’s likely to happen and that’s when I reach for legendary Italian cookbook writer Ada Boni’s easy, everyday cake recipe that was created during the Great Depression without the luxury of highly rationed butter and eggs. It’s fitting for our global quarantine when we are running out of ingredients and will satisfy a craving with its dense, moist crumb and sweet chocolatey flavor. The secret ingredient in my vegan version is coconut milk for a moist, rich yet dairy-free cake, but almond milk can also be substituted (or whole milk for a non-vegan version). You can even make it with gluten-free flour for GF version.
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Ingredients:
1 2/3 cup/200g 00 or all-purpose Flour
1¼ cups/250g granulated Sugar
1 cup/90g unsweetened cocoa powder
2 teaspoons/12g baking powder
1½ cups/360ml coconut milk, warmed to liquefy solids
Grated zest of 1 orange or ½ teaspoon cinnamon

Preparation:
Preheat the oven to 350°F/180°C. Grease an 8-inch/20cm round cake pan with butter then line with parchment paper or dust lightly with cocoa powder.

Sift the dry ingredients together through a sieve into a large mixing bowl. The cocoa and baking powders tend to clump and sifting insures a lump free cake.
Add the coconut milk and orange zest then mix well until batter is smooth. If you don’t have an orange, you can substitute the zest with a pinch of cinnamon, like in the original recipe.

Spread batter into the prepared cake pan and smooth surface. Bake cake in the center of hot oven for 35 to 40 minutes or until the surface of the cake springs back when touched with a fingertip.

Cool cake for 10 minutes then remove from pan and cool completely. Dust with powdered sugar and serve as is for a simple treat or dress up with whipped coconut cream for a more elegant dessert.
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*Watch my IGTV video tutorial and tag me on photos of your cakes. Enjoy!

After a long, lonely, and worry-filled day, I fou

After a long, lonely, and worry-filled day,
I found comfort in a simple plate of pasta. I’m grateful for following my own suggestion and doing advance cooking for the stay-at-home order, so all I had to do was pull a portion of ragu’ out of my freezer and boil the spaghetti. While it won’t solve the coronavirus problem, pasta is - without fail - a welcome antidote to the blues.
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I hope all of you are staying home, staying healthy, and enjoying some home cooked meals to sooth your souls.
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I’ll be doing more cooking videos of easy Italian recipes to help you in the best way I know how...showing you how to nurture yourselves and your families during this trying time. ❤️
Love to all and a big virtual embrace,
Deborah
xx
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What’s better than a creamy, comforting risotto

What’s better than a creamy, comforting risotto for a quarantine cheer me up? You can learn how I made this Fennel and Orange Risotto in my step-by-step video recipe on my IG stories/highlight. Hope you make it to cheer yourself up. We can do this!
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#stayhome #covid19 #quarantine #quarantinekitchen #italianchef #cookingclass #risotto #recipevideo

Here’s my recipe for hearty, nutritious Tuscan C

Here’s my recipe for hearty, nutritious Tuscan Chickpea and Pasta Soup that can be made in little time using few pantry ingredients (although time is one luxury we now have plenty of). It’s so delicious that you’ll forget it’s a classic peasant cooking dish made from inexpensive staples you always have on hand. This version uses canned chickpeas, but dried chickpeas soaked overnight then simmered slowly until tender and creamy are even better.

PASTA E CECI
Tuscan Chickpea and Pasta Soup

Serves 4
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- 3 tablespoons extra virgin olive oil, plus more to garnish
- 2 garlic cloves, peeled
- Sprig of fresh rosemary leaves, minced
- 2/3 cup/170ml canned tomatoes or peeled fresh plum tomatoes, chopped
- Pinch hot chili pepper flakes or minced peperoncino
- 30 ounces/890 canned chickpeas or 3/4 cup dried chickpeas soaked overnight and cooked
- 6 cups/1.4 liters homemade chicken broth or 4 cups canned broth plus 2 cups water, hot
- 4 ounces/113g dried egg pasta like tagliatelle, broken into pieces, or other small pasta
- 4 tablespoons freshly grated Grana Padano or Parmigiano Reggiano, plus more to garnish
- Kosher or sea salt
- Freshly grated pepper to taste
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Heat the olive oil and garlic in a large, heavy bottomed saucepan over medium heat. When the garlic begins to sizzle, add the chopped rosemary and cook for a few seconds then remove from heat and carefully pour in tomatoes (they will splatter). Season with salt and pinch of chili pepper (if using), return to heat and cook until tomatoes separate from oil, about 5 minutes.

Add the chickpeas and toss in tomatoes to coat then pour in the hot broth. Cook at a gentle simmer until chickpeas are tender. Remove from heat and puree the soup with a stick blender to a coarse texture leaving some chickpeas whole.

Taste and adjust seasoning keeping in mind that the cheese you add later will slightly increase saltiness. Bring soup to a boil, add pasta and cook until very al dente, 3-4 minutes less than package directions.

Remove from heat and stir in grated cheese. Ladle soup into bowls then let rest and thicken for 10 minutes before serving. Serve with swirl of evoo and freshly ground black pepper.

Stay healthy!

We can’t afford to waste, especially during thes

We can’t afford to waste, especially during these times. Please be mindful to repurpose and make proverbial silk from a sow’s ear. This idea for you was my isolation dinner last night. After I trimmed a pork tenderloin to roast, slice, and freeze it for future meals, I used the meat trimmings (literally scraped them off the sinew) to make a quick “ragu’ in bianco”, or white ragu’ for pasta.
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Here’s my off-the-cuff recipe without specific quantities. Use your instinct and taste buds for that : ).
- meat trimmings from any piece of pork, cut into tiny pieces (few ounces per person)
- swirl of evoo
- bit of butter
- finely minced onion (I used white)
- grated carrot - minced celery
- bay leaf (optional but gives touch of luxury)
- milk (I used oat milk)
- pasta (I chose quinoa fusilli)
Put a pot of water on to boil for pasta. Season boiling water generously with salt and, when water returns to a boil, add pasta. Cook until al dente.
Meanwhile in a skillet, heat olive oil, butter, onion, pinch of salt, and 1 tablespoon water over medium flame. Cook, stirring occasionally, until onions are soft and translucent then add grated carrot, celery, and bay leaf and cook for a couple minutes until vegetables are tender. Add the pork and cook, tossing in the cooking oils, until seared on all sides and no longer pink. Add some milk (just enough to deglaze pan and cover pork halfway. Cover skillet partially with lid and cook sauce until milk reduces and thickens to a medium consistency.
When pasta is cooked, lift it out of pan with water clinging and place directly in skillet. Toss pasta in the sauce of the heat, adding more pasta cooking water as needed to create a loose and juicy pasta. Remove from heat and serve as is or with a grating of Parmigiano Reggiano (I skipped cheese) and a drizzle of evoo.
Buon appetito!

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