Summer wrapped in ravioli

Triumph
Mint, peas and marscapone; the gorgeous taste of summer wrapped up in ravioli
Summer wrapped in ravioli

I've been subscribing to delicious. - probably Australia's best foodie magazine - for a few years now. I've kept the subscription up while I've been living in Switzerland and get it delivered here. I still love ripping open the plastic it comes wrapped in and spending a lazy morning, usually on a Sunday over a cup of tea, idly flicking through the colourful, glossy pages, and turning down the corners of the pages with the recipes I want to save for later. 
 
There's just one problem with getting an Australian magazine delivered in Switzerland; the recipes in them are 6 months out of sync with the season I'm living in. Being summer at home and winter here in Switzerland, it means that, at the moment, issues are arriving bursting with recipes for ice cream, salads and desserts full of summer berries. Meanwhile, I'm still stuck in hearty comfort food mode.

Gorgeous pea and mascarpone ravioli

But there was one summer recipe which - despite the weather outside - I couldn't resist giving a try. Pea and mascarpone ravioliwith sage burnt butter allowed me to give Betty a whirl with the pasta machine attachments I had bought a year or so ago and had only used once or twice. I was given extra incentive with the pasta making accessories my mum had given me for Christmas, including ravioli cutters.
Pasta is easy enough to make, but ravioli is all about the filling.

In this case, creamy mascarpone combined with fresh peas and vibrant mint made for light, refreshing ravioli which screamed summer. The sage-infused burnt butter provided the perfect, yet delicate savoury counter balance to the sweet pea filling.

I’ve always had this thing with seasonal food – don’t eat winter food in summer and vice versa.  But sometimes, when something is this good, it would be criminal to wait six months to try it.

The best brownie in the world?

Transcendent 
Sin - that would be gluttony - never tasted so good

The best brownie in the world? 

Sometime earlier this year - I don't remember when, it's been a busy year - I needed to make something for a dinner party or a birthday, and came across a recipe in my recipe volumes I hadn't made before: twice cooked chocolate brownies.

Fudgy brownie goodness

The recipe came from an old issue of delicious. - November 2009, to be exact - from chef Ben O'Donoghue (you can also find the recipe here). It looked relatively easy, so thought I'd give it a try.

They're pretty easy to make - melt chocolate and butter; beat eggs, sugar and vanilla in Betty; pour in chocolate mixture; gently fold in flour and nuts; pour batter in to tin; bake until nearly cooked.

My goodness, they were good. Everyone else thought so, too. Ever since, these brownies have become legendary. I've made them a few times now - either for dinner parties or work colleagues - and the reactions I get each time range from ecstasy-inducing mumbles, to exclamations of how good they are. I like making people happy.

I made them for my friend Katy's dinner party recently and realised I had never blogged about them, but didn't want to until I had good photos. Then, last week, Katy had a busy week at work and I was cajoled (not that I needed much convincing) into making them again to cheer her up.

The result of taking them to work

I took them into work and this time I brought the camera with me. I should've taken photos of my colleagues' reactions when they realised what I'd brought in - some grinned and did little claps, others squealed with delight. But I stuck to photos of the brownies.

And, I seriously have to admit, they must be some of the best brownies I've ever made. They're rich, fudgy, with a hint of saltiness from a pinch of salt, and crunchy from the macadamias. Oh, and chocolatey. Very chocolatey. Lots of butter, lots of sugar and lots of chocolate. No-one ever said that something this sinfully good was good for you.

They're called twice cooked for a reason. While they're perfect as they are, you can take it to the next level by steaming them for dessert. I did this for the first time last night. I probably didn't steam them long enough to make them truly warm and fudgy, but no matter - with some vanilla icecream, it goes down really well as dessert.

Steamed up with icecream for dessert

Back to sharing them at work, and most people took seconds. I made the mistake of having two, one straight after the other. They're delicious, but spacing them out is recommended. While polishing off the first one, it prompted me to ask my colleague Alex - an American, and therefore perhaps considered an authority on the subject of brownies - whether she thought these were the best brownies in the world. She considered for a moment, before replying that she's had lots of different types of brownies, so it was hard to judge, but that these were pretty damn good.

From an American, that's good enough for me.

Just four hours until Italian stew heaven

Transcendent  

Melt-in-your-mouth tender beef, with rich flavours and perhaps the easiest recipe I’ve ever made, makes this a must-do during winter

Just four hours until Italian stew heaven

I’ve found, since moving from Australia at the beginning of the year, that’s there’s very little I’ve missed. I miss the usual things of course – family, friends, familiarity – but there’s something to be said for unfamiliar thrills. However, it’s food that I’ve found my biggest challenge in adjusting to life in Switzerland, strange as that may seem. I’ve complained about platinum-plated meat prices and the utter lack of some ingredients that I consider staples – liquid stock the foremost one – but otherwise I make do and carry on. But I’m glad of the small chances I get to experience food familiarity every now and again – like the May issue of delicious.

Peposo, mash and rocket

I’ve been buying delicious on and off for a couple of years, but the annual Italian issue in May is a must-buy. So, with the approach of May this year, I asked my mum to buy and send over the May issue. Once it arrived, I had a quick flick through and pretty much left it forgotten on my coffee table for the next six months. With the approach of winter, I recently started to look for wintery, comfort-food ideas.

Picking up May’s delicious, I came across contributor Jill Dupleix’s peposo, or Tuscan beef stew. It looked ridiculously simple and hearty, so one cool, cloudy Saturday I decided to give it a go, impulsively inviting some friends over to share. First, the ingredients; they’re pretty simple. It’s just stewing beef, red wine, tomato paste, rosemary, garlic and anchovies for seasoning. That’s it. As Jill mentioned in her introduction to this recipe in the magazine (I’ve only included the link to the delicious web page here), anything more would ruin it.

While the price of the beef for it made my eyes water (paying CHF45 – A$48 – for 1.8kg of the cheapest cut of beef I could find), it was so worth it. It’s perhaps one of the easiest recipes I’ve ever made; just a matter of placing all the ingredients into a casserole dish (my beloved blue Le Creuset I had brought over recently) and placing into a moderately slow oven for four hours. Simplest dinner party recipe I’ve done.

Rich flavours and melt-in-the-mouth tenderness

While Jill suggests serving this with some polenta, I decided make some mashed potato instead, as I’m still warming to the taste of polenta. But it didn’t matter – the hero of the night was the peposo. What an amazing dish. After four hours of quietly cooking away, I lifted the lid of the dish and the aroma of red wine, garlic and rosemary immediately assaulted us. It tasted as good as it smelt. The rich flavours of the wine and garlic perfectly complemented the rosemary and beef, which was so tender it easily pulled apart with just a fork and melted in the mouth.

It’s a shame that, being here, I’m now six months out with the recipes in delicious. They’re now publishing summer ones. But, there’s always next year’s May issue, and its Italian winter delights, to look forward to within its pages.

Custard tart and tiramisu make dessert heaven

Transcendent

The custard tart was easily the hit of the evening. The rating explains why.

Triumph

A relatively easy to make and tasty tiramisu deserves this rating.

Custard tart and tiramisu make dessert heaven

I feel that with this week’s post I’ve come back full circle. It was partly because of a great dessert I made for a dinner party at friends’ place that I started this blog – read my second post on the dulce de leche cheesecake and you’ll know what I mean.

Vanilla custard tart
Photo: Renee H

This time, with the same group of friends, a different dessert was needed. There were eight of us this time around; almost enough to make two different desserts, so I did! I thought about what I would make for a week or so before finally settling on vanilla custard tart from the September 2010 issue of delicious; and tiramisu, from Twelve: A Tuscan cookbook by Tessa Kiros.

Twelve was given to me a couple of years ago by my friend Nat – either for Christmas or my birthday, I forget which – when she couldn’t find Jamie’s Italy (which I now have). It’s a book I really like – full of the rustic, Italian flavours I love – but I rarely use it, so I was delighted to have this recipe to cook from, especially given there are at least another five tiramisu recipes in my collection. Oddly enough, this was actually the first time I’d ever made tiramisu.

Popular dessert, and for good reason!
Photo: Renee H

First, a round of applause goes to Renee and her husband Al for hosting the dinner party, and to Renee in particular for the great photos. Stylish! By the way, I mentioned a couple of posts back that I was on the hunt for a new camera. Thanks to Dan’s recommendation (it’s Academy Awards night for Jo’s friends!), I bought a Panasonic Lumix G2. It’s like a small DSLR. I’ve taken photos of dinner during the week, but that will be next week’s post. Now I just need to learn how to use it. Anyway, I had hoped to have my new camera to take these photos, but Emperor D missed the delivery guy by just 15 minutes and I had to wait until Monday to get it.

I’ve seriously digressed, so back to dessert. I made the custard tart first, the night before and, in another first for me, I made sweet shortcrust pastry from scratch. It turned out okay. The custard was easy to make, especially with Betty lending a hand. Put it all together, bake, and… oh! Amazing. Just gorgeous. The custard was just set and had a lovely smooth texture, which contrasted nicely with the crumbliness of the shortcrust base. The taste though – I just can’t describe it. It was divine. There were oohs and aahs all around the table and I think nearly everyone had seconds.

Tiramisu and the layers
of biscuits and cream
Photo: Renee H

Despite making two desserts for this party, I feel like I didn’t raise much of a sweat at all. Tessa Kiros’ tiramisu was quite easy; simply mixing in egg yolks and marscapone, and then folding in egg whites. Then I dipped savoiardi biscuits in strong coffee and, in this case, Marsala wine, before I layered it all and grated dark chocolate over the top. Next time I’d like to try this with Frangelico, which I’m quite partial to, instead of Marsala. It was quite nice, with a great mix of flavours, but really, it was completely outshone by the tart.

There was enough dessert though to feed a small army; Emperor D and I polished off the tart the next day, and there was a third of the tiramisu left. However, that army, and my friends and I, found ourselves in dessert heaven. The next dinner party will be a tough task for me to try and top that effort.