Italian Food Recipes

If you want to eat Italian gnocchi but not the classical one, just made with potatoes, but something a little bit different with the taste of chestnut this is the perfect recipe.
These types of gnocchi called tocchetti are made with chestnut’s flour, potatoes and pumpkin and the seasoning is made with the Italian cheese Asiago. The Italian cheese Asiago is produced in the town of Asiago and there are two types according to its aging: the fresh one that is smooth and the crumbly one for the aged cheese of which the flavour is reminiscent of Parmesan. In this recipe I used the fresh one for its sweet taste and its smooth consistency.

INGREDIENTS:
1 kg of Potatoes
300 g of Flour
200 g of Chestnut’s Flour
200 of Pumpkin in pieces
1 Egg
Breadcrumbs
150 g of Asiago Cheese cut in pieces
40g of Butter
Leaf of Sage

PREPARATION TIME: 20 minutes

COOKING TIME: 15-18 minutes

WINE: Novello (Red Wine)

PREPARATION
Boiled the potatoes with peel

and cook the pieces of pumpkin in a pan with two spoons of extra virgin olive oil.

When the potatoes are cooked, peel and mash them in a bowl together with the pieces of pumpkin.

Put on the table the mixture of potatoes and pumpkin together with the flour, the chestnut’s flour and the egg

and begin to knead until you obtain homogeneous and soft dough, this take about 8 – 10 minutes, if the dough is too soft you can add a little bit of breadcrumbs.



Divide the dough in parts and roll each one in order to obtain a sort of longs sausages thick as a finger. Pay attention to have always enough flour on the worktable in order to not attach the dough to it.

Cut each long sausage in small pieces of 1 cm length that we can call “tocchetti”.

Sprinkle tocchetti with flour and place them on a tray.
Let salted water boiled, put on it tocchetti and cooked them until they come on the surface. In the meantime prepare the seasoning, put in a pan the butter with the leaf of sage,

when tocchetti are cooked drain them and put them in the pan with butter and sage, add the Asiago cheese and let it melted.

Serve hot.

BUON APPETITO!

Castagnaccio is a traditional Italian dessert particularly in Tuscany where it is also called baldino or pattona, it is a strange Italian dish but it is simple and fast to prepare. The main ingredients that you need to prepare it are: flour of chestnuts, water, pine kernels, sugar and extra virgin olive oil. In some case you can find also recipes enrich with walnuts, raisins and rosemary. Castagnaccio traditionally should be cooked in a baking pan of copper tinned and might be prepared with sweet flour of chestnuts that is produced as from November, if you want you can also change the water with milk in order to obtain a sweeter tart. According to the tradition the use of rosemary is linked to a love legend: the rosemary use to flavour castagnaccio was a sort of love elixir so that who eats castagnaccio falls in love with the girl that offers him castagnaccio.

INGREDIENTS (for 8 people):
400 g of Flour of Chestnuts
50 g of Sugar
400 ml of Water
4 tablespoons of extra virgin olive oil
50 g of Pine kernel
20 g of Butter

PREPARATION TIME: 10 minutes

COOKING TIME: 30 minutes

WINE: Aleatico dell’Alba

PREPARATION
Place the flour of chestnuts and the sugar in a bowl add the extra virgin olive oil

and mix, then add the water little by little and in the same time stir the mixture in order to not make lumps.

Now add the pine kernel, butter and flour a baking pan of 22 cm of diameter, pour in it the mixture

and bake at 180°C for 30 minutes or until the surface present crack and the pine kernels become golden.
This is the result:

BUON APPETITO!

The chestnuts are typical fruit of the autumnal and winter period in Italy. You can eat them boiled or roasted but you can also use them to prepare delicious appetizer, first course, second course or dessert. In particular the chestnuts flour is ideal for dessert and first course. In the following recipe chestnut flour is used to prepare tagliatelle (noodles). In this recipe chestnuts tagliatelle are seasoned with a sauce of walnuts, chestnuts, pine kernels and cream. It’s very good!








INGREDIENTS (for 4 people):
150 g or Flour
200 g of Chestnuts flour
2 Eggs
10 Walnuts
8-10 Chestnuts
20 g of Pine kernels
200 ml of Cream
3 Tablespoons of extra virgin olive oil
Salt
Pepper
Marjoram


PREPARATION TIME: 45 minutes

COOKING TIME: 15 minutes

WINE: Brachetto d'Acqui Docg

PREPARATION
Let salted water boil for tagliatelle (noodles). Place the flour and the chestnuts flour on a floured worktop, mix them and arrange them as a fountain, add in the middle the eggs

and the salt and mix in order to obtain a solid and elastic dough.Let the dough stand for about 20 minutes.

After this time with the help of the pasta machine cut the dough into noodles. Pay attention that the dough must be always floured in order to not sticks it to the pasta machine.

Then start to prepare the sauce. Crack the walnuts and peel the chestnuts. Preheat in a pan 3 tablespoons of extra virgin olive oil, add the walnuts, the chestnuts, the pine kernels, salt, pepper and some marjoram and let them brown.

Then add the cream and let it reduce for about 5 – 8 minutes.

When water boil, add the tagliatelle, cook for about 4 – 5. Drain them and pour over them the sauce. Serve hot.
This is the result:

BUON APPETITO

This is a typical Italian recipe that is prepared in autumn. This recipe explain the preparation of fritters made of chestnuts flour, but you can also use fresh chestnuts. In this case you must boil and sieve the chestnuts to obtain a puree. You can make variations adding to this simple Italian recipe some raisins, some chopped almonds or some chopped walnuts. You can serve them simply with icing sugar for a delicious dessert or as a snack, or with thin slices of lard for an unusual appetizer.









INGREDIENTS (for 4 - 6 people)
250 g of Flour of Chestnuts
1 Tablespoon of Sugar
1 Egg
100 ml of Milk
Extra virgin olive oil
Icing sugar
A pinch of salt

PREPARATION TIME: 10 minutes

COOKING TIME: 15 minutes

WINE: Dolcetto D'alba (Red wine)

PREPARATION
In a bowl put the flour of chestnuts, the sugar, the salt and the egg

and start to mix. Then add the milk

and continue to stir until until you obtain an homogeneous soft dough.

Preheat abundant extra virgin olive oil in a large pan. When the oil is hot make spoonfuls of the dough and put them into the oil

and cook until the surface of the fritters become golden. Then dry them with a napkin, let them cool and place them on a platter. Sprinkle with icing sugar as you like. This is the result:

BUON APPETITO!

Chestnuts are autumnal fruits that can be used to prepare a great number of Italian recipes, from first courses to second courses, and are a good ingredient for many Italian desserts. In Italy the most famous chestnuts are that of Mugello or that of Marradi. There are many way to cook them: chestnuts roasted on a flame or on oven, chestnuts boiled with a bay leaf, glased chestnuts. Flour of chestnuts is ideal to prepare many Italian recipes such as special kinds of pasta, polenta, fritters, cakes like Castagnaccio or Montebianco, Necci a sort of piadina that you can serve with cheese, bacon or lard and many other delicous recipes. A particular kind of chestnuts are named Marroni: a bigger kind of chestnuts with a sweet taste ideal for jam, cream or cakes. Chestnuts cooked in the way presented in this recipes are good after a meal or as a snack.










INGREDIENTS (for 4 people)
300 g of Chestnuts

PREPARATION TIME: 10 minutes

COOKING TIME: 30 minutes

WINE: Recioto della Valpolicella (Red Wine)

PREPARATION
Clean the chestnuts with a towel.

Make a cut over the belly of them. Place the chestnuts in a large pan and start to cook on a high flame for 5 minutes then continue to cook on a low flame until the surface of the chestnuts become dark.

Peel them paying attention because they are hot. Serve warm with a good glass of red wine.
This is the result:

BUON APPETITO!