Hot chocolate spoons, and recycling Christmas Cards

 For the hot chocolate spoons I used little wooden spoons, the idea is simple, just dip the spoon in a cup of hot milk and stir! They are perfect for little present, inside a little bag with a Christmas card for backing. Now this idea may not suit everybody, but I like to recycle everything I can, even old Christmas cards, I cut out the front (as long as there isn't any writing on the back, and make labels, collages, or even little cards like in this example, to be hand delivered with a chocolate spoon inside.

 On the back of the cards we wrote our Xmas messages and the chocolate spoon flavors: chocolate and cinnamon, double chocolate and cocoa, white chocolate and cardamom, white and dark chocolate, and dark chocolate with sugar granules. Melt the chocolate, pour on the spoons and add your spices or topping! Easy as!

 Do you ever recycle your Christmas cards?

Photos and Recipes by Alessandra Zecchini ©

White and sugar Christmas tree

Merry Christmas! This is my big tree, with white decorations, some collected, other handmade.

Some are porcelain, some wooden, some cotton or felt, and there are some real starfish too.


I made several with fondant, instructions here

Others were made with paper doilies and meringue,
instructions here

And here is the tree at night!

Photos and Recipes by Alessandra Zecchini ©

Kakiage, perfect when I don't know what to do (and I want to cook carrot leaves)

I have a lot of carrots in the garden, but because the soil is 'pottery quality' clay, they rarely grow long, and I have to start using them now before they get too knotted! I picked a few, including the tender leaves (yes you can eat carrot leaves) and a couple of thin celery sticks, plus two leeks that never managed to grow beyond spring onion size. I washed, peeled and chopped the lot and then I made a batter with some tempura flour and water. Kakiage is a kind of tempura where more vegetables are mixed together, a bit like a fritter, but lighter, and if you use tempura flour also easier (no need to whisk eggs).

Add the chopped veggies to the batter (in a proper Japanese kakiage the vegetables should be cut into strips, here they were just roughly chopped) and spoon into hot oil to fry on both sides. Sprinkle with salt and serve. Very very simple and perfect for those kids who don't eat vegetables: they will probably eat any kind of veggie if it is hidden in a delicious kakiage fritter!!

Leftover kakiage can be added to a bowl of hot noodle soup, it tastes even better!

Photos and Recipes by Alessandra Zecchini ©

Meringue snow flakes and doilies for the Christmas tree

More ideas for more white Christmas tree decorations. Meringues are classic, in the past I used the meringue wreaths from my book Party Food for Girls, and this year I was very happy to see that Franci and Vale from La Signora dei Biscotti blog made them too, so if you would like this meringue recipe in Italian click here, and if you like the recipe in English you can find it in Party Food for Girls, available from Amazon, The Book Depository and many other online bookshops. If you live in New Zealand you can find it in good bookshops and, of course, in the library.  

Meringue wreaths, from left: page 54 and page 65 of Party Food for Girls

This year I decided to make snowflakes, it is a little harder as they can break more easily (also I didn't want to make them too big!) but they are beautiful!!! Same recipe as the wreaths and they will last for years (if you decide not to eat them, that is!).

Another idea is too use paper doilies, like the ones that you find under small cakes or cake slices in fancy cafes. I found two different sizes, the smallest that I could, and not only they look really nice and classy, but they are inexpensive and fill the tree nicely. To tie them up I used white embroidery cotton.

The tree is nearly ready, I will post a photo in the next few days!

Photos and Recipes by Alessandra Zecchini ©

Hand painted biscuits for Christmas, Scandinavian/Dolomites/South Tirol style

These days there are a lot of Christmas Parties and events around, and on Sunday I had a double booking. I went to the Dante Society Xmas party (also because my kids were preforming), and sadly I missed this Slow Food Waitakere Terra Madre celebrations, which I was told was a great evening!

Feeling guilty and wanting to take part in spirit I made some biscuits for the event, covered them with fondant (brush with jam first, I used raspberry) and then together with Arantxa we painted them all using red food colour gel and jam. I have a couple of thin paint brushes that I use only for cooking.

I really like white and red for Xmas, and I love patterns that make me think of the Dolomites, South Tirol, and Scandinavian Christmas. The biscuits looked truly beautiful, it took us three afternoons to paint them (many other chores to be done too), but mostly because we had to think about what to paint... next time it will be quicker, and I know that reindeers and mountain goats, rosters and birds, flowers and hearts etc. always look great. 

The biscuits were much appreciated at the event, and I hope that you will like the idea too!

Photos and Recipes by Alessandra Zecchini ©

Focaccia made with the water from mozzarella and no yeast

I saw it done several times in Italian blogs, and since the other day I had some mozzarella from Massimiliano I wanted to try it too. I think that I will need to work on it but as a first attempt it was brilliant and I will never throw away the water from mozzarella again!! Please read carefully because I think that some of you may be really interested in this one!

I had 200 ml of mozzarella water (you know that whitish water that you get in the bag when you buy mozzarella? Yes, that one!), I put it in a 900ml yogurt container, then I added 1 tbsp of extra virgin olive oil, one pinch of salt, 1/3 tsp of brown sugar and 200 g of high grade flour. I though that it was wise to start with an equal water to flour ratio. I stirred the lot with a fork and covered it. I didn't expect it to rise so much, after 24 hours it was doubled! Maybe it is because I covered it with a good top? I decided to put it in the fridge overnight to slow the process, but the morning after the dough had gone down :-(. Still, half a morning in the sun and it was already bubbly again!

Just look at it! I thought that it could have handled a bit more flour, but I didn't really have time to experiment, so I poured it directly on a baking tin, without touching it! 

Then I placed it inside the cold oven for a couple of hours to see if it was going to rise some more, but it was too soft, it just spread out instead!! So I turned the oven on and baked it. When I thought that it was nearly done I brushed it with olive oil and added some rock salt and cumin seeds on top and then baked it for other 5 minutes.

I think that it is too early for me to give you a proper recipe for this, I am not quite sure how long it is best to bake it for, but one thing is sure: Please do try and experiment!! Don't through the water from the mozzarella away, it is an amazing starter for a sour dough type of bread and focaccia, especially if you are like me and don't fancy keeping a sour dough starter going for months and months (sorry sour dough, I travel too much for this!). Look at the cut focaccia! It was so soft and tasty... I will make it again and again and if you try I am sure that you will be pleased too!

Photos and Recipes by Alessandra Zecchini ©

Chocolate and cardamom pudding with berries, and over 3,000 views

Yesterday Google recorded 3,228 page views, a new record for me, and interestingly over 2,000 views were from the UK (which is usually 4th or 5th in the audience statistics). Once again most viewed post was this one, but the Turkish delights also did well, as did all the recent Xmas posts. Of course it could simply be a robot that checks every single page and steals recipes, but never mind, it is lovely to top the 3,000 mark, and by more that 200 too!

And now to the recipe, nothing to it really, but I like chocolate with cardamom and berries, and the kids loved the glasses!!! These are quite cute grappa glasses that sit on the side and can roll around like a spinning top, in fact I don't use them much because they are quite wobbly, but they do give that 'ship-in-a-bottle' feel to food, and are perfect for verrines and fancy dinners.

I made a chocolate cream with one egg, 1/2 tbsp flour, 2 tbsp sugar, 50 g dark chocolate and 250 ml milk. In the end I added a few seeds of cardamom. I poured the chocolate pudding into the glasses and when it was cold I added raspberries, strawberries and other berries... but I have to say that this part wasn't that easy, I should get myself some long and skinny tongs!

Photos and Recipes by Alessandra Zecchini ©

Christmas recipes and ideas

Here are some recipes and ideas for Christmas, please click on the captions for the links.

Classic Christmas

From top left clockwise: 

Mont Blanc Mille-fuille, 

Panforte, 

Vegan Panforte,

Strawberry and Balsamic non-alcoholic aperitif

Small Treats

From top left clockwise: 

Homemade Marzipan,

Marzipan Fruit,

Calissons,

Turkish Delights

Christmas 'Shapes'

From top left clockwise:

Star Biscuits,

Christmas Origami Decorations,

Christmas Biscuits,

More Biscuits

Photos and Recipes by Alessandra Zecchini ©

Roast potatoes with red onion and thyme

Busy month this one! I wonder if I will manage to post every day like I did last December! Anyway, I have a lot of Xmas decoration ideas to publish and recipes too, this is a good one for the roast potato side dish (to accompany a Xmas roast, nut or other!). 

Cut the potatoes in small cubes. Chop one or two red onions, and some good olive oil and mix.

Place on an oven try lined with baking paper and sprinkle with salt. Bake on high for about 30-40 minutes, shaking the potatoes from time to time (I do this by lifting the baking paper). When the potatoes are ready add a few thyme sprigs and mix well (I like to add the thyme at the end, it will smell lovely!). I also like to use thyme with red onion, but sage could be a good alternative.

The kids have been busy with end of the year's performances, both had piano concerts at school, and then Arantxa had two dance shows (with lots of rehearsals!) and Max an ukelele festival. This Sunday they will perform in a play (Pinocchio) at the Dante Alighieri Italian society's Xmas party, you are welcome to come along!

Have a great weekend!

Photos and Recipes by Alessandra Zecchini ©

White Christmas tree decorations made with fondant: this is easy sugar craft for Sweet New Zealand!

This year my main Xmas tree (I mean the big one, I have other trees too, like these ones here) is going to be all white. I have a few white decorations, mostly in cotton and felt, plus a few in ceramic, wood and glass. I also added ribbons and some white starfish, and the rest I decided to make. I started with some fondant decorations, and these are so easy that even children can do them. Just roll some fondant and cut it with cookie cutters. cut a little hole too. Let the fondant figurines dry for a couple of days and then hang with a ribbon or a string. I hope that you like this idea, and fondant is not expensive, from a pack you can get out tons of decorations!!! I am going to show you the whole tree once it is finished, for now this is just a little peep :-).

And because these decorations are sweet and even edible (I mean, I will not eat them, but technically you could, if you are into icing!), and because this is an original idea of mine (oh yes! at least, as far as I know... probably some Martha Stewart's elf have done them already) and because it is well suited for December....

I am entering this post in this month edition of Sweet New Zealand, the sweet blogging event for Kiwis, this month hosted by Lydia Bakes.

Photos and Recipes by Alessandra Zecchini ©

More Xmas ideas: coffee and recyclable Xmas boxes for presents

This morning I popped by Sue and Dan for a coffee. While Dan was making it Sue showed me a photo in today's paper of a flat white (or was it a cappuccino?) with snow man and Xmas tree. I immediately moaned to Dan that I wanted it too, and guess what? He made it!! Of course all the girls at Sudan went ooohhh!! and we took photos! Are you good at decorating your coffee too?

And now another idea for an eco-Christmas. My friend Daniela gave me this set of Xmas boxes 2 years ago, they are made of cardboard and are very sturdy, plus they are beautiful, you don't need wrapping paper (just put a ribbon to secure them so that nobody peeps inside before Xmas), and all your presents under the tree will look stylish and professional!

The boxes come in different sizes so you can use them for a number of presents year after year after year... and to store them away, they all fit one inside the other like a Russian doll! Well, I think that this is a great idea, if you are keen on recycling!

Photos by Alessandra Zecchini ©

Christmas decorations ideas: branches instead of pine trees

These small 'trees' are just dried brunches that I got from the garden: one is decorated with china birds  (from an art gallery in Alice Spring, Australia), and the other is decorated with wooden figurines and clay cookies.

Photos by Alessandra Zecchini ©

Strawberries for Kiwis

I know that it will sound strange to the readers in the Northern Hemisphere, but now for me it is strawberries everyday! Mostly I have them just fresh or marinated with lemon and sugar, and I found that since I am very lazy at eating green kiwis, I have more if I add them to my strawberry salads.

If you live out west or drive by on your way to the West Coast beaches, stop at Lucy's (in front of Nola's) for a real fresh strawberry ice cream. Just be prepared to wait: it takes a while to make them! 

Last news for the day: check out the latest edition of Little Treasures Magazine for my refreshing and healthy fruit and vegetables recipes and ideas for the little ones, and also an article about Kiwi blogger Frances (The Bake Club) and her baby Tui. 

Photos and Recipes by Alessandra Zecchini ©

Fresh As raspberries, lychees and feijoas dipped in dark chocolate

Usually every Christmas I make dried apricots, nuts and other dried fruit dipped in dark chocolate, but this year I am using Fresh As freeze dried fruit. The flavour is really intense, and the texture completely different, crispy and fresh! I used dried raspberries, dried lychees and dried feijoas. I had friends around and everything disappeared in no time. Most people preferred the raspberries, but I preferred the lychees and Max the feijoas. I did the mandarins already here, and I am pondering about the next fruit to try!

Photos and Recipes by Alessandra Zecchini ©