We have been asked to publish more info about the Giada de Laurentiis and Academia Barilla event in New York City, so we managed to get more pictures and the dinner menu, designed by celebrity Chef Giada De Laurentiis.

The evening, organized in conjunction with Fancy Food NY, officially launched the new celebrity gourmet food line Giada de Laurentiis Selected by Academia Barilla, a series of authentic Italian food specialties you don’t want to miss in your Everyday Italian cuisine.

The guests at the Astra Lounge, the exclusive NYC penthouse, had the pleasure to taste a number of dishes prepared using the new Giada De Laurentiis product line. Giada’s NY menu was definitely tempting, with innovative recipes such as:

Artichoke Pesto on Ciabatta
Parmesan Popovers (you can find the recipe here)
Whole-Wheat Penne with Green Beans, Ricotta and Lemon
Balsamic Chicken Skewers
Grilled Swordfish with Lemon, Mint and Basil
Balsamic Marinated Beef Tenderloin Skewers
Roasted Baby Potatoes with Tuscan Herbs
Anytime Vegetable Salad

The newly-launched gourmet product line designed by Giada De Laurentiis and selected and produced by Academia Barilla, is composed by:

100% Italian Extra Virgin Olive Oil - artisan production from the sunny Southern Italy, this extra virgin olive oil has a subtle and smooth taste, with hints of arugula, artichoke and grass.

Balsamic Vinegar of Modena - a gourmet selection from Modena’s artisan producers, this balsamic vinegar presents a tart fruity taste with hints of raisin and red apple.

Natural Sea Salt with Fresh Lemon Zest - hand harvested from famous salt pans in Sicily’s seaside town of Trapani, this natural sea salt is enhanced with zest of fresh local Sicilian lemons.

Giada’s Tuscan Herb Mix - an aromatic mix of wild rosemary, sage, bay leaf, basil, marjoram, thyme, wild fennel and chili pepper. Hand harvested and dried in small batches on a Tuscan estate.

The entire product line is available at the best gourmet food store in the United States, and also online at the Academia Barilla online store, just follow the links above to get to each product!

Let’s welcome again Chef Tony Mantuano, Chef/Partner at Spiaggia restaurant in Chicago, and Guest Chef at the Italian Food Lovers Chef Network.

Chef Mantuano today proposes a great recipe from The Spiaggia Cookbook: Eleganza Italiana in Cucina, a cookbook co-written by Tony Mantuano and wife and wine expert Cathy Mantuano.

Today’s recipe is Ravioletti di Crescenza con Salsa di Parmigiano Reggiano e Burro al Tartufo (Crescenza Ravioli with Parmigiano Reggiano and Truffle Butter Sauce). Elegant and rich, this pasta dish is all about top-quality ingredients. Crescenza cheese (also know as Stracchino) is a soft, fresh creamy cheese from the North of Italy, and is ideal for these pasta pillows.

Are you ready? Let’s go to the kitchen.

CRESCENZA RAVIOLI WITH PARMIGIANO REGGIANO AND TRUFFLE BUTTER CHEESE
(Ravioletti di Crescenza con Salsa di Parmigiano Regiano e Burro al Tartufo)
A recipe by Chef Tony Mantuano
(serves 12)

INGREDIENTS (FOR PASTA DOUGH)

- 2 cups type 00 flour
- 1 teaspoon salt
- 8 egg yolks, lightly beaten
- 1/3 cup water

FURTHER INGREDIENTS 

- 1 pound Crescenza cheese
- 1/2 stick cold butter, plus 1 1/2 cups unsalted butter
- 1/3 cup truffle oil
- 1 1/2 cups grated Parmigiano-Reggiano or Parmesan cheese
- 12 cloves garlic, thinly sliced, crisped in olive oil
- 12 small sprigs fresh rosemary
- 1 cup edible flower petals (optional)

PREPARATION

Mound the flour on a pastry board or other wood or marble work surface. Make a well in the center and add the salt and the egg yolks. Using a fork, gradually fold the flour into the eggs, adding the water little by little until you have a soft dough. Knead a few times until smooth, then form the dough into a ball, wrap in plastic and refrigerate for 1 hour.

Preheat the oven to 375 degrees F

Roll out the pasta dough into thin sheets. Using a chef’s knife or pastry wheel, cut the pasta sheets into twenty-four 5-by-5-inch squares.

Place the squares on a lightly floured board or cloth until ready to cook. Cut out 24 rectangles of parchment paper, each 7- by 7 1/2 -inches. Grease each piece using the cold stick of butter, leaving a 1 1/2-inch border unbuttered.

Have ready a bowl of ice water. Bring a large pot of lightly salted water to a boil. Add the pasta squares to the boiling water and cook until al dente (tender but firm to the bite), 1 to 2 minutes.

Remove the pasta squares with a slotted spoon, shaking to remove excess moisture, and transfer carefully to the ice water to stop the cooking. Working quickly, remove the pasta squares from the ice water one at a time, and lay flat on a cloth to dry. Do not overlap or the squares will stick together.

Cut the Crescenza cheese into 24 pieces, each about 2 inches wide, 2 inches long, and 1/4 inch thick. Place a piece of the cheese in the middle of each pasta square and fold the bottom and top flap of pasta over the middle, wrapping it around the cheese. Then fold the sides into the middle, burrito style.

Place the ravioletto, seam side down, in the middle of a buttered parchment piece and fold the parchment around the pasta, repeating the technique used to wrap the pasta around the cheese. Place the parchment packet, seam side down, on a baking sheet. Repeat with the remaining pasta, cheese, and parchment.

Bake until the edges of the parchment paper are barely golden brown, 10 to 12 minutes.

Meanwhile, in a saucepan over medium heat, melt the 1 1/2 cups butter. Cook to a nutty brown color, 4 to 6 minutes. Stir in the truffle oil.

To serve, place 1 tablespoon of the Parmigiano Reggiano in the center of each of 12 warmed plates. Carefully remove the parchment around a ravioletto and place it on the grated cheese.

Arrange a second ravioletto next to the first. Spoon 2 tablespoons of the truffle butter over the ravioletti. Sprinkle with another 1 tablespoon Parmigiano Reggiano.

Garnish with the garlic crisps, rosemary, and flower petals, if using. Repeat to make the remaining 11 servings. Serve immediately.

CHEF MANTUANO’S TIPS

Wrapped in the parchment and placed in an airtight container, the ravioletti freeze well for up to 1 month. Bake right from the freezer for 25 minutes, and continue as directed.

Thank you Chef Mantuano for this gourmet pasta recipe!

If you want to get more recipes from Chef Mantuano, you can buy the Spiaggia cookbook, or the previous cookbook Wine Bar Food. You can purchase them online at Barnes and Noble and Amazon.com. Wine Bar Food is also available at CrateandBarrel.com.

Or, you can subscribe to Academia Barilla’s newsletter, that delivers monthly exclusive content and latest news and culinary insight on the art of Italian gastronomy, including of course gourmet recipes. This month’s featured recipe is from Chef Tony Mantuano, a yummy Prosciutto with Parmigiano Reggiano, Shaved Artichokes, and Hearts of Palm Salad.

Chef Mantuano’s recipe is paired with a cocktail recipe by wine expert Cathy Mantuano: Negroni Sbagliato, a classic Italian cocktail. As Cathy Mantuano explains, Sbagliato means “mistake” in Italian. The mistake in this drink is that the bartender at Bar Basso in Milan grabbed a bottle of sparkling wine instead of a bottle of gin to make a Negroni. The customer loved it. The rest of course is history.

Do you want to get to this content and to receive it on regular basis? Easy, just register to Academia Barilla’s monthly newsletter! It’s free!

Academia Barilla Italian Culinary Specialist and Iron Chef Judge Mario Rizzotti is back on TV for another educational session on how to recognize authentic traditional Italian cheeses from fakes.

TV Host Vince Gerasole invited Mario Rizzotti for a special extra insight on CBS2 Chicago’s popular food show Table for Two. You can watch the entire video segment from the TV show at this link - we couldn’t embed it, but we got some screenshots for you, and we can summarize the Italian food insight and tips shared by Mario Rizzotti at the show.

Mario started presenting Parmigiano Reggiano, the king of cheeses, as something totally different from what you get “in the green can”, as asked by Vince Gerasole. Parmigiano Reggiano, tells Rizzotti, has more than 900 years of history, as recorded by historic menus and publications. Parmigiano Reggiano is entirely made of specially-fed cows in the area of Parma, and shouldn’t be confused with “Parmesan cheese“, a sort of mass production product for the export markets.

To recognize the authentic Parmigiano Reggiano, as Mario Rizzotti reminds, it is enough to check the external part of the wheel, that must feature the “Parmigiano Reggiano” original print all around.

But the major revelation about the authenticity of the product comes with the tasting. Parmigiano Reggiano must be cut into blocks (chunks) to fully appreciate its crunchiness and sandiness, the latter created by the amino-acids released by the proteins of the high-quality milk used for its production.

The quality of the ingredients and its rich flavor make Parmigiano Reggiano a great choice for many applications: grated or shaved on pasta, as an aperitivo with a glass of wine and, as told by Mario Rizzotti, also as a “munchie” for young babies aged 6 months, because of the good milk, that carries great calcium and protein for kids.

Academia Barilla Italian Culinary Specialist Mario Rizzotti also introduced other Italian regional cheeses, focusing on all the varieties of Pecorino (Romano, Toscano, Sardinian, Sweet), the popular cheese made of sheep’s milk cheese.

To counterbalance the tasting of Parmigiano Reggiano, Mario Rizzotti invited TV Host Vince Gerasole to taste Academia Barilla’s Pecorino Gran Cru, which is the first sheep’s milk cheese produced with the same production technique and aging process used for Parmigiano Reggiano, making it… the king of sheep’s milk cheeses!

You can find Academia Barilla’s Parmigiano Reggiano (both in wedges or as a whole wheel) and Pecorino Gran Cru at the Academia Barilla online store, and at the best gourmet food and specialty stores in the United States.

If you want to catch up with Mario Rizzotti, you have two choices: check your local listing to see him in action as a Judge for Iron Chef America, or meet him in person for an Italian food demo at the Barilla Italian Cooking Weekend at the Chicago Botanic Garden this weekend!

This is definitely the best time of the year to visit the Chicago Botanic Garden. The mild climate, the summer light and the awesome settings of the garden’s landscapes surely invite for a day of nature exploration and discovery, long walks, bike rides, or to enjoy one of the many learning workshops and events offered by the Chicago Botanic Garden.

This is also the time of the year when, among the other events and attractions, the Botanic Garden also presents the Garden Chef Series, a lineup of top Chefs with a full calendar of cooking demos every Saturday and Sunday starting the last week of may, and closing the first week of October.

Barilla America, the presenting sponsor for the 2008 Garden Chef Series, will showcase the Barilla Italian Cooking Weekend, a weekend of Italian cooking programs and special giveaways at the Regenstein Fruit & Vegetable Garden this Saturday, July 26 and Sunday, July 27. Barilla USA and Academia Barilla sponsored also last year’s edition of the Garden Chef Series - you might remember our blog posts from last year’s edition.

This year, Barilla USA Executive Chef Lorenzo Boni, Academia Barilla Italian Culinary Specialist Mario Rizzotti, the participating Chicago top Chefs and their respective teams, will give demonstrations using fresh Italian ingredients such as those found in the Fruit & Vegetable Garden.

Among the participating Chefs is Chef Doug D’Avico, who is already participating in our Italian Food Lovers Chef Network.

In addition to plant and recipe giveaways, the Barilla Italian Cooking Weekend will offer family activities and tastings of gourmet olive oil, balsamic vinegar, pasta, traditional Italian cheeses and other Italian gastronomy delights.

The event is free but seating is limited, so please make sure to arrive early.

The Chicago Botanic Garden is easy to find, located approximately 20 miles north of Chicago at 1000 Lake Cook Road in Glencoe, Illinois. Google Map below for driving directions.

We have already received a number of gourmet recipes from the Chefs of the Barilla Italian Cooking Weekend that we will be sure to share with you after the event.

So be ready for yummy dishes and top Chef tips for the preparation of Farfalle Piccolini Salad, Sautéed Wild Mushroom Bruschetta, Crescenza Ravioli with Parmigiano Reggiano and Truffle butter sauce, Lobster Bread Salad, Chicken Parmesan with Campanelle Pasta and more - all on our Italian Food Lovers blog, stay tuned!

This month we published a good share of recipes, among those from Giada De Laurentiis, others from our Chef Network, and a couple more from the Chef team at the Academia Barilla Culinary School, but we didn’t forget about also browsing the Academia Barilla Gastronomic Library (BIGAB) for recipes, where we generally get great inspirations.

Summertime brought to our minds fresh, sunny, Southern Italian seafood dishes, and we stumbled upon a great cookbook, Chef Giuliano Bugialli’s “Foods of Sicily, Sardinia and the smaller islands” (1996, Rizzoli International Publications). We often talk about Chef Bugialli’s “Parma” cookbook, edited by Academia Barilla and available at the Academia Barilla online store, but we like also Chef Bugialli’s exploration of further Italian regional traditional cuisines.

Today’s recipe comes from Trapani, Sicily: Couscous alla Trapanese (Couscous Old Trapani Style). Couscous is a typical Arab dish, imported into the food culture of Southern Mediterranean countries more than a 1,000 years ago. Traditionally, Arab couscous is made with meat and vegetables, but the unique Tunisian version of couscous is made entirely with fish and seafood.

The proximity of Trapani, Sicily, and Tunis, Tunisia, and the commercial and social exchanges that intertwined the two cities over the centuries, allowed a fusion of some cultural topics from architecture to fishing style and, obviously, to food. Trapani is less than 300 miles away from Tunis, and some of the Sicilian minor islands, such as Pantelleria and Lampedusa are even closer, as you can see in the Google Map below.

Trapani absorbed the Tunisian couscous culture (and vice-versa), adding its own Sicilian touch to a typical Arab dish. The Sicilian Couscous alla trapanese is a main course, and its unusual feature is that fish and chicken are combined in the same dish, a duo sometimes found in Spain (Valencian Paella) but not in Italy. It has become very difficult to find authentic preparations of this dish because today Italians often omit the chicken.

Nowadays people rebel as much at the amount of work and time required to make real couscous as they do to make real polenta. Certainly precooked versions of these grains save time but it is important to understand that in using these precooked versions, the real flavor and texture of the dish are sacrificed.

Ready for the Couscous Old Trapani Style? This recipe requires a long preparation time.

COUSCOUS ALLA TRAPANESE
(Couscous Old Trapani Style)
A recipe by Chef Giuliano Bugialli
(Dish picture by John Dominis)

INGREDIENTS FOR THE SAUCE

- 1 large red onion, cleaned and coarsely chopped
- 1/2 cup extra virgin olive oil
- 1 1/2 pounds blanched and seeded tomatoes, cut into large pieces
- about 2 pounds fish heads and tails, wrapped in cheesecloth
- salt and freshly ground black pepper
- a large pinch of hot red pepper flakes
- 20 sprigs Italian parsley, leaves only
- 6 large cloves garlic, peeled
- 10 very large fresh basil leaves, left whole
- 4 tablespoons tomato paste
- 3 cups completely defatted chicken broth, preferably homemade

INGREDIENTS FOR THE FISH AND CHICKEN

- 6 medium-sized calamari (about 1/2 pounds), cleaned and cut into 1/2 inch rings
- 2 pounds of different types of non-oily fish, cut into large pieces, with bone (Langoustine, the small lobsters, are optional)
- 1 large lemon
- coarse-grained salt
- 1 chicken (about 3 pounds), cut into 10 pieces, with all the extra fat removed

INGREDIENTS FOR THE COUSCOUS (NOT PRECOOKED)

- 1 pound couscous
- salt to taste
- 1/2 cup lukewarm water
- a large pinch of ground saffron
- 2 tablespoons extra virgin olive oil
- 5 large bay leaves

INGREDIENTS FOR PRECOOKED COUSCOUS

Follow the procedure printed on the box, adding oil, not butter, as well the bay leaves and ground saffron listed above.

INGREDIENTS FOR THE BROTH 

- 4 quarts very light chicken broth, preferably homemade
- 4 bay leaves
- a large pinch of ground saffron
- 4 medium-sized carrots, scraped and cut into large pieces

INGREDIENTS TO SERVE

- 3 or 4 langoustine for decoration (optional)
- 15 sprigs Italian parsley, leaves only, coarsely chopped

PREPARATION

Soak the chopped onion pieces in a bowl of cold water for 1/2 hour. Soak the calamari and fish pieces in a large bowl of cold water with the lemon, cut in half and squeezed, and a little coarse salt for 1/2 hour.

If you are making your own couscous, place the (not precooked) grain in a large bowl. Add salt to the water along with the saffron and start adding the water by tablespoonfuls while constantly rubbing the grains between the palms of your hands. Do not add extra water until the previous tablespoonful has been completely absorbed by the grain and uniformly distributed. When all the water is used up, oil your palms and again rub the grains. Keep repeating until all the oil is used up.

Place the 4 quarts of broth along with the bay leaves, saffron and carrots in a stockpot and bring to a boil over medium heat. Line a colander with a thick cheesecloth then mix the prepared couscous with the bay leaves and put it in the prepared colander.

Fold the cheesecloth over the top and insert the colander in the stockpot containing the boiling broth. Tightly cover the colander with a lid or with aluminium foil. If you have a lot of space between the stockpot and the colander, you can seal it by wrapping a kitchen towel dampened in cold water all around or you can make a dough with flour and water, and attach it all around the opening in order to keep the steam from coming out (the dough method is Sicilian and probably older than the cloth method). Let simmer for 1 hour.

Meanwhile, heat the oil in a large casserole over medium heat. When the oil is warm, drain the onions and add them to the casserole; sauté for 5 minutes, stirring constantly. Add the tomatoes and cook for 15 minutes, stirring every so often with a wooden spoon. Add the fish heads and tails with their cheesecloth wrapping and cook for 15 minutes, turning the “bags” over 2 or 3 times. Season with salt, pepper and the hot pepper flakes.

Finely chop parsley and garlic together on a board. Add the chopped ingredients along with the whole basil leaves to the casserole, mix very well and cook for 5 minutes more. Dissolve the tomato paste in the broth and pour it into casserole. Lower heat and simmer for 1 hour. The liquid should be reduced by half. Remove and discard the cheesecloth with all its fish bones.

Taste the sauce for seasoning. Start adding the fish that require at least 35 minutes of cooking time, such as calamari, to the broth. Add the other fish and chicken pieces that take less time as appropriate. The chicken will not take more than 20 minutes to cook.

Open the cheesecloth, mix the couscous very well to be sure no lumps have formed, then close it again and cook for 1 hour more.

When the sauce is ready and the fish and chicken are cooked, transfer the couscous to a large serving platter. Pour all the sauce over the couscous, arrange all the fish and chicken, with or without langoustine, on top and sprinkle with parsley. Serve hot.

CHEF TIPS FROM ACADEMIA BARILLA

To obtain a full Sicilian flavor, the Academia Barilla Chef Team suggests to use Academia Barilla’s Monti Iblei Sicilian extra virgin olive oil and Natural Sicilian Sea Salt with Black Olive Oils - they are both available at the Academia Barilla online store.

Buon Appetito!