Eating by the sea

From sunrise to sunset, the informal hospitality of people living by the sea...

Ristorante Emilia a Portonovo - Monte Conero, not far away from Casa Olivi Villa in Italy

Cooking in Casa Olivi

Take a look what you can eat in Casa Olivi:

Menu 1

Antipasto

crostini with truffle and mozarella

crostini with spring vegetable

typical prociutto from Trentino (speck, salami)

scoperino cheese with grape marmelade 

small tomatoes filled with ricotta 

small artichokes in olive oil

Primo

gnocchi with duck sauce 

Secondo

veal and green peas

fritata of vegetable 

crema fritta (speciality of Le Marches)

Dolce

apple tart

Menu 2

Antipasto

Melon and prosciutto

Primo

Ravioli of ricotta or lasagna Vincisgrassi

Secondo

roasted chicken

beef 

Porchetta

tomatoes and melanzane (aubergines) roasted

salad

Dolce

crostata with blackberry marmelade

chocolate sausage

Menu 3

Antipasto

melon and prosciutto

ricotta in the oven

pecorino cheese, grape marmelade and small peperoncini

salami

artichoke in olive oil

home made olives

primo

lasagna Vincisgrassi

Secondo

milk pork roasted

potatoes and tomatoes roasted

green beans

Dolce
fruit tart

Fish cous cous

This cous cous has been cooked in Casa Natoli in Sciacca, Italy! It was super!

Nonna Giusy’s Fish with Couscous

From the book Jamie’s Italy by Jamie Oliver

Serves

4

Introduction

When I was on the island of Marettimo, I found out that it’s famous for its African-influenced couscous dishes. I walked around the town one day asking the locals who made the best couscous and, of course, every answer was “Mia mamma!” That is, until one lad took me along to meet his grandmother — Norma Giusy.
She was the most incredible woman, who made her own couscous by hand using coarse semolina flour and rubbing it in a bowl with a bit of water until it stuck together in little chunky bits. It was so delicious, and incredibly easy to make, but I think the type of flour she was using will be hard to find outside Italy, so I would suggest using quality bought couscous instead.
This is how the women on the island prepare whatever fish their husbands catch at sea each day. When they see the boats coming in, they put the couscous on to steam and get ready to start poaching the fish. It’s a really interesting method and damn tasty. I was at Norma Giusy’s house for three hours learning how to make it, so thanks, Norma! (And she makes a mean limoncello, too.)

Ingredients

Couscous

	1	small onion, peeled
	½	bulb garlic, peeled
	~	Large handful fresh flat-leaf parsley, leaves picked
	14	oz. couscous

Fish

	~	Olive oil
	1	large white onion, peeled and sliced
	4	cloves garlic, peeled and sliced
	½	dried red chile, crumbled
	2	red mullet or bream (11 to 14 ounces each), gutted and scaled
	2	jars (16 ounces each) stewed tomatoes
	~	Sea salt and freshly ground black pepper
	~	Large handful fresh flat-leaf parsley, chopped

Steps

1. Put the onion, garlic, and parsley into a food processor and whiz up until fine. Mix with the couscous, then put into a steamer or use a colander over a pan of boiling water and let it steam very slowly for half an hour. Transfer to a serving bowl.
2. Meanwhile, put a pan on low heat and add a good glug of olive oil. Add the sliced onion and garlic and the chile and cook gently for about 5 minutes. Add the fish to the pan, then pour in the stewed tomatoes and the same amount of water so that the fish is covered. Season with a little salt and pepper and simmer gently for 20 minutes. Remove from the heat and carefully transfer the fish to a plate, then pour half the sauce into the bowl of couscous and mix together.
3. At this point Norma Giusy placed a couple of towels over the bowl so the couscous remained warm while it absorbed the sauce. You can do this, or cover the bowl with aluminum foil and place it in a very low oven (160 degrees) for 30 minutes. Flake the meat from the fish and put into a second serving bowl. Be careful to remove all the bones. Pour the rest of the poaching sauce over the top, sprinkle with chopped parsley, and serve with the bowl of couscous in the middle of the table for people to help themselves.

Notes

Editor’s notes: If you don’t have a good setup for steaming couscous (such as a couscoussière), you can make an all-in-one version by pulverizing the onion, garlic, parsley, and 2 cups water in a blender, then pouring the liquid over 1 1/2 cups couscous in a saucepan. Cook on low for about 20 minutes (depending on the size of the couscous pearls) until the couscous has absorbed all the water. Fluff with a fork before serving.
Vary the flavors in the fish-poaching stew by adding fennel seeds, Aleppo pepper, chopped kale, and the like. Canned whole tomatoes work perfectly well as a substitute for the stewed tomatoes. And a few fillets of firm-fleshed fish, such as halibut or black cod, will do just fine in the place of the bream or mullet.

This content is from the book Jamie’s Italy by Jamie Oliver.

Casa Olivi in ELLE Decoration Germany

Casa Olivi has been published in
ELLE DECORATION Germany

http://casaolivi.blogspot.de/2012/08/elle-decoration-germany-june-2012.html

You can book Casa Olivi here: www.casainitalia.ch

Casa In Italia on facebook

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http://www.facebook.com/pages/Casa-In-Italia/131079690359895

You LIKE it?

There's more to Italian Cuisine than pasta

There's more to Italian cuisine than pasta, as you'll discover in the Marche. With delicious cheeses, cured meats, truffles and speciality dishes this is gourmet heaven.

http://casaolivi.blogspot.de/2012/08/theres-more-to-italian-cuisine-than.html

"Few people seem to go on vacation to the Marche, the region of Italy that lies between Umbria and the Adriatic. Yet it is a delightful area, with rolling hills, great beaches, long stretches of undeveloped coastline and cultured hilltowns such as Urbino. If you take a cheap flight to the Marche – you can fly to Acona from London - you’ll not only escape the tourists who flock to Tuscany and Rome, you’ll be able to try the region’s delicious cuisine. As Fred Plotkin says in his fascinating book Italy for the Gourmet Traveller (Kyle Cathie £14.99), ‘the combination of sea, hills, and mountains’ in the Marche means that ‘there is superb seafood as well as excellent truffles, mushrooms, meats, olives, grapes, and especially cheeses. Dishes to look out for on your vacation include vincisgrassi, a rich lasagne made with cream, veal ragu and black truffles; brodetto, a fish stew made with garlic and herbs and served over slices of bread; lumache a nove erbe, which is snails cooked with nine herbs – a speciality of the northern Marche; and sarde alla Marchigiana, a dish of sardines which are baked with breadcrumbs, rosemary, parsley and lemon. As you explore the Marche, you will also find speciality cheeses such as Casciotta, a cheese made from a mix of sheep’s milk and cow’s milk, that Fred Plotkin says was Michelangelo’s favourite cheese. Apparently the great Renaissance artist used to eat keep supplies of casciotta handy so he could eat it while he sculpted. Michelangelo liked it so much he eventually bought land near Urbino and grazed sheep on it, so that he would always have casciotta to eat. Other traditional cheeses from the Marche are Formaggio di Fossa, a pecorino cheese stored in caves, and Pecorino Sotto le Foglie di Noci, a pecorino cheese wrapped in walnut leaves. In Italy for the Gourmet Traveller, Fred Plotkin suggests restaurants where you might like to eat when you visit the Marche. He also provides some recipes for classic dishes of the region. This recipe for Shrimps Wrapped in Prosciutto, which appears here with permission, is a speciality of Ristorante delle Rose in Marina di Montemarciano. It uses prosciutto from the town of Carpenga, but if that is unavailable you may substitute it with prosciutto from Parma or San Daniele. Prosciutto from Carpegna is saltier than the others." www.amazon.co.uk/Italy-Gourmet-Traveller-Fred-Plotkin

Vini...

If you have the chance to be near Bolgheri in Tuscany, don't miss to visit the Winery:

Le Macchiole

http://www.lemacchiole.it/index.php?lingua=en

Le Macchiole is a story of men and human endeavor. And of one man in particular.

Eugenio was strongly convinced of his passion for wine that, when it entered his life, took it over and proceeded to profoundly transform it. Always one for experimenting, he decided to become a winegrower; following his instinct and wholeheartedly committing himself to hard work, he became a very successful one. Cinzia, his partner for years, was his accomplice in this new and challenging adventure.