Sweet bread "tutti frutti"

What a long pause. Incredible how time flies when there is so much to be done. Since last time, my son Matteo has grown and claimed lot of our time. We have also move to another house and another city (Mechelen) ... still in Belgium. A very nice historical place with lot of good food shops as well and, especially, an amazing cheese shop where I can find almost everything even form Italy.

Work got busier both during day and during free time. But things are getting a bit more relaxed ... finally, since I miss cooking. Only issue is that now in the new house we have a smaller combo oven (bad bad) and induction (better better)> We will manage.

Now, the first recipe I want to post from Mechelen is something of a typical Italian flavor ... so typical that I love it and Elke does not !! Again it is based on the paste of pistachios, but this time I have used another amazing ingredient given to us by our friend Minouche. Artisanal candied fruit directly form Sicily. Ohhhhhhh! I could eat them on their own even so full of flavor they are. Not like those crappy industrial plastic-looking things you see around.

(Leggi la ricetta --- Read the recipe)

Chocolate cake with strawberry custard

A busy week ... not that it will get better as we are at three weeks from the birth of the third family member. So, I am all excited ... Elke is all worried ... we are both all waiting. Definitively the best things that has happened to me, and more than balancing my less exciting half of life ... the weekly one.

So, we experiment with cakes ... even if I am well conscious that kids need growing a bit before they can start biting something like this one ... basically a mix between a nice strawberry custard I stole from here and a brownies base. Super delicious and full of the flavors I would expect kids to like (chocolate, sour, sweet, strong colors, etc. etc). Well, what  .... not of their liking. Well papa is there anyway to make it and eat it ;-)

(Leggi la ricetta --- Read the recipe)

Fondant frozen-strawberries mattonella

What is the issue with a busy week? Oh, you ask what is a busy week? Well .... work, pregnancy (5 weeks to go) and looking for a new house in a city not near-by .... enough??? So what is the effect of a busy week? A busy week-end cooking. And this is the case for us now ... we have been are are still cooking a lot for an overall of two new desserts and two new pasta dishes which will appear soon on these pages.

But the first one needs to be this dessert Elke made yesterday and we tried today, since it is strawberry season and this mattonella (italian name for something in between a semifreddo and an ice-cream) is simply perfect as is mixes chocolate with frozen strawberries (frozen fruit is something typical of Amalfi and, thus, a simbol of our wedding). It is easy ... it requires really dark chocolate and it needs being served in thin slices, since the fruit gets frozen.

Should I add more? Is the photo not enough to attract your taste-buds? Well, in this case join me now in eating a bit of it .... if you manage to get here in time ;-)

(Leggi la ricetta --- Read the recipe)

Banana muffin bread

Since the weather is getting better and a few long week-ends are coming (like next week thursday and friday are national holidays), we start our season of spending sometime on the belgian coast. It is not like being at the beach in Italy, but it is still relaxing and far from the everyday things.

Therefore, here I am . Posting quickly a new recipe while I wait for the program "My Restaurant" Belgian edition .... which is fun!! Gosh, it makes me feel like too many people try to open a restaurant without having a clue!!

The bread you see posted here is based on a cake I have already shared. Here the low sugar quantity is balanced by the banana and the chocolate mix. The result is something which is not only ice to taste ... but it fills the house with a wonderful banana aroma. As the one before ... also this one did not last much

;-)

(Leggi la ricetta --- Read the recipe)

Pears and Chocolate cheesecake

Now that the snow is gone and rain has replaced it, I kind of miss all that white around. Bah! Such is life sometimes. I guess we appreciate things more once their are gone. Jut like for this cheesecake ... I wish we still has a bit left to eat in these gray days.

I believe it was about two weeks ago, when I saw Sciopina posting about her wanting to do a Pastiera (traditional Easter cheesecake from Napoli) but ending up making a pear and chocolate tart. I really wanted to do it ... but I am no so great fun of cakes with pastry on top. 

And so this cheesecake came to be. It is a fairly lighter cheesecake in the sense that it has less calories, much less eggs and  it tastes less fatty. We enjoyed a lot the way the bitter chocolate (with caramelized bean chips in it) goes with the light ricotta cheesecake, the (still) crunchy pear pieces and the spicy cookies. Much better than the other recipe I posted sometime ago. Sure that one is different, but we both preferred this one (despite I still used a very dark chocolate Elke does not fancy too much).

For the italians (or who else can find it), consider using the 85% chocolate Venchi here since it is dry and has a bit the taste cocoa beans (I did not use it since I had little left and wanted no to use it up).

(Leggi la ricetta --- Read the recipe)

Pear and chocolate tart

Am I on a kitchen-blog-roll (gosh this sounds like a weird sentence)? No, simply so many recipe I wanted to share ... but it was so painfully slow with the old mac. Or better sort of boring, now I can enjoy listening to music (Midnight by Joe Satriani right now) while downloading something and writing my blog. A luxury ... but a nice one.

(now music moves to Patience by George Michael ... reminiscence of my youth)

I wanted to share this recipe for a while now. I found it in an old number of Cucina Moderna, an Italian magazine we used to be subscribed to. I liked more than Elke ... but I honestly love the pear and bitter chocolate combination. Elke prefers less bitter chocolate. Next time I will use a sweeter 55% chocolate instead of the 80% one ... and she will love this tart too.

Do not be fooled by its appearance .... it is, like all other desserts, rather caloric and not very filling!

(Me. & Mrs. Jones by Ami Winehouse playing .. gosh like a step back in time)

PS: I think I forgot to follow up on some meme ... if so, please remind me and my apologies.

(Leggi la ricetta --- Read the recipe)

Chocochips and yogurt muffin cake

One day (last saturday), a couple (we) paid a visit to some friends.

"Hi, welcome. How are you" - smack smack smack (in the Netherlands it is always three kisses)
"Fine fine .... cold tonight, eh?" - smack smack smack
"Come in come in" - smack smack smack
"Francesco ... ehm ... yes" - giving me the coat - "thanks. Ah, ciao ciao. what a nice smell int he house!".
"Go on, Elke".

He (better me) takes the hanger and put the two coats on. Approaches the coat wall rack ... raises his arm towards it. Let it go .....
"Aaaaaaaaaaaaahhhhhhh!!!!! *&#*$&#*#&$*#&$" - lot of noise (kind of boooom) and here it goes the rack with all coats and the monkey on top of it. Down on the floor, or actually on his (mine) left knee.

We Italians call this "a Fantozzi moment" ... maybe in the states would go as "a Funniest Video show" moment. Sure, everbody might have laughed except me (thanks to a stif and sore knee ... the thing was heavy, the monkey on it not amusing, the coats many) and my friend who has to mount back the rack on the wall! But all other guests ... I am sure they must have been laughing inside. I am now!!

Now, back to the cake. I wanted to do a cake like this since I saw this beautiful blueberry muffin cake from Jen. Thus, I set up for it this week-end, but no blueberries .... so I browsed, read Jen's recipe again, got myself injured ... and I ended up with this version. It is a perfect cake for breakfast since it is light, not very sweet (but sweeter than bread) and very "chocolaty". It was so difficult to wait for it to cool down that we placed it outside (see photo) at 5C .... well, in the end we tasted it warm!

I liked it so much, I dream to have breakfast tomorrow with the last piece! Diet prevents me from simply eat it now!

(Leggi la ricetta --- Read the recipe)

Clementine mousse

Well, for once I made a recipe from a fellow food blogger .... but again I decided to change it in order to make it simpler for me to make it!!!Plus I really want to play more with my foaming canister! So here it is a clementine mousse which original recipe (in italian) can be found here blogged by Lenny and that I proposed in a version for the canister. I suspect with the canister the result is much much lighter (as usual)

In any case, thanks Lenny! Nice Christmas recipe.

PS: the italian version is almost a copy & paste of the original with the canister changes only.

(Leggi la ricetta --- Read the recipe)

Pears tart

Our mac is going crazy. The monitor died and now it works again. Must be some weird contacting. Well, as I do not like not posting I quickly post something before it dies again. Gosh, how much mac-dependent I am now !! Anyway, this is a simple modification of an earlier recipe, where we use pears instead of apples and the baking/serving is slightly different. I hope you will enjoy it!

Serves: 8
FlexiPoints: 5

Suggested wine: none.
Special equipment: none

Ingredients:
1 kg pears
100g butter
100g flour
100g sugar
5g baking powder
8g vanilla sugar
1 egg
100ml milk
1 pinch of salt
8 tbsp low-fat (8%) cream
Flour and margarine as needed

Ingredient replacement:

Ingredient note: none

How-to:
1. Quarter, peel and slice the pears.
2. Melt the butter in the milk and set aside.
3. Work together the egg and sugar with a pinch of salt. Add the vanilla sugar and the baking powder. Whisk in the buttermilk. Once homogeneous, add also the flour one spoon at a time through a sieve. Work until a bubbly batter is formed.
4. Mix the batter with the sliced pears. Grease a deep baking tin and dust it with flour. Pour the batter in and bake at 170C for about 60’. Let cool down.
5. Serve a generous spoon from the cake in a deep dish with one tbsp of light cream on top.

Apples & Pears Flan

I have been asked to blog a recipe for a Belgian cake ... well, it was a coincidence that this recipe was in the pipeline. I am not sure it is typical, but surely it is Belgian. To give you an idea of how crazy Belgians are for apple tarts, few weeks ago we went to a BBQ of Elke's family ... and everybody except one family brought an apple cake!!! Incredible. We got this version from one of Elke's aunts (Tante Corine) ... it is super delicious! It is actually more a flan then a tart. Lekker!!!

Serves: 8
FlexiPoints: 6
Suggested wine: none
Special equipment: baking paper, 24cm baking (quiche) form

Ingredients:
220g pate sucre (crumble pastry)
100g sugar
18g vanilla sugar
20cl low-fat single cream
3 eggs
3 tbso flour
1 tbsp creme anglais
2 apples
2 pears

Ingredient replacement:
pate sucre -> use any sweet crumble pastry you prefer

Ingredient note: none

How-to:
1. Cover the quiche form with some baking paper and roll the pastry on it. Be sure that there is little pastry hanging at the borders.
2. Slice the apples and pears thinly, mix and distribute them on the base.
3. Work the flour, eggs, sugar, cream and creme anglais together until an homogeneous batter is obtained. Pour on the fruit.
4. Bake in a pre-heated oven at 180C for 50’ to 60’ or until the top has browned. Cut off the pastry which hangs out at the border. Serve at room temperature.

Little savoiardi cakes with apple

(Photo@TheFoodTraveller.com - Nikon D200)

Oh well, let's bake some little cakes. Not that we have kids yet, but we love to bake something on sunday for our breakfast during the week. This time I just wanted to try something simple and low in fat. The normal cakes Elke bakes calls for lot of butter, while the savoiardi base not. So, here we are ... making little muffin-shapes cakes using a the savoiardi base with some apple to make it wetter. I have to say the end result is nice with the sugary and light texture of the savoiardi and the moisture of the apple. Nice ... and not a killing calories bomb!

Serves: 12 cakes
FlexiPoints: 2.5

Suggested wine: none
Special equipment: none or maybe a kitchen robot

Ingredients:
5 separated eggs
2 little apples
150g fine sugar
120g flour
3g baking powder
1 pinch of salt
Margarine as needed

Ingredient note: Well, not a recipe note ... but for people wondering what a savoiaro is, well they are also called lady finger cookies in English (wikipedia link).

How-to:
1. Whip the egg whites until stiff. Peel and finely chop the apples.
2. Work the yolks with the sugar until a uniform pale yellow cream is obtained. Add the baking powder and keep whipping.
3. Pass the flour though a sieve. Work the flour in the egg yolks one spoon of the time so as to obtain a homogeneous batter. You might need to use a metallic (hard) whip now as the batter will be somewhat hard.
4. Fold the egg whites. Add the chopped apple and mix well still with a folding movement to avoid the batter to loose its foaminess.
5. Grease a muffin tray with some margarine. Distribute the batter and bake in an hot oven at 180C for 20’-30’.

Semifreddo Vlaanderen

(Photo@TheFoodTraveller.com - Nikon D200)

I have done it again. This semifreddo recipe is now stuck in my head and as mentioned in a comment on the previous post ... here I am with a new version. I call this one Semifreddo Vlaanderen (Flanders), because this is a typical Flemish taste with chocolate and the spicy speculoos (or speculaas) cookies. Elke really adores this version more ... I really like both! Now, what will we do with so much of it left when friday we are gone to Italy for a couple of days??? Should we eat it all tonight ?!?!

Serves: 10
FlexiPoints: 3.5

Suggested wine: absolutely nothing. Get a coffee!
Special equipment: none.

Ingredients:
2 (separated) eggs
30g sugar
220g single cream (35%)
100g Callebaut dark chocolate (70%)
100g Speculoos cookies
1 vanilla pod
2 tbsp Rum


Ingredient note: As the name says, this recipe has been done purely with Belgian ingredients (well, I call them flemish). So use real Speculoos (check Wikipedia) and Callebaut chocolate. If you can’t ... use your favorite chocolate and try to get some dry brown cookies that have been seasoned with cardamom, pepper, cinnamon, cloves and ginger. Or at least cinnamon!

How-to:
1. Split the vanilla pod. Scrape the seeds out and mix them with the cream. Add the pods to it, stir and let it rest for at least 30’ in the fridge.
2. Make a meringue batter with the sugar and the eggs white by whipping the whites to soft peaks and adding the sugar when they start foaming up. Discard the vanilla pod halves and whip the cream until a light and airy (yogurt-like) consistency is obtained. Whip the egg yolks until light and foamy.
3. Chop the chocolate in medium pieces and crumble the cookies. Gently mix the cream with the yolks and the rum. Fold in, then, the meringue batter. Add gently the chocolate and cookies.
4. Fill a baking tin with the mix and put in a freezer for at least 10 hours.
5. When serving, remove from the tin and slice it quickly. Serve immediately to avoid it to melt.

Torrone semifreddo

(Photo@TheFoodTraveller.com - Nikon D200)

Everybody seems to love ice cream. But to make it, a machine is needed in order to work and refrigerate at the same time. Yes, they are cheap ... but they take space and are not often used! So, here is a fantastic and really tasty alternative: the semifreddo! This is nothing else that what would happen to ice cream ... without continuing stirring ... more or less. This version we got from a local favorite restaurant of ours. Lovely the combination of the melting chocolate and the chewy nougat. And really really easy!

Serves: 10
FlexiPoints: 3.5

Suggested wine: if you really insist ... a nice Tokaij 5-puttonyos would be perfect or at least was for us!
Special equipment: a standard food processor

Ingredients:
2 eggs
50g sugar
200g single cream
100g dark chocolate (70%)
100g nougat
10ml Rum

Ingredient note: This recipe works better with the traditional italian nougat (or Torrone).

How-to:
1. Whip the egg whites with the sugar to soft peaks. Whip the cream until a light and airy (yogurt-like) consistency is obtained. Whip the egg yolks until light and foamy.
2. Chop the chocolate and the nougat. Whiz them shortly in a food processor. they will come out chopped by kind of sticked to each other.
3. Gently mix the cream with the yolks and the rum. Fold in, then, the whipped egg whites. Add gently the chocolate and nougat mix.
4. Fill a baking tin with the mix and put in a freezer for at least 10 hours.
5. When serving, remove from the tin and slice it quickly. Serve immediately to avoid it to melt.

Crescia with apples

(Photo@TheFoodTraveller.com - Nikon D200)

Sometimes I am amazed by how many varieties of apple cakes are around. This one is something of a sweet bread ('crescia') stuffed with apples. Light and tasty. Shaping the crescia in the tin can be annoying, but the result is quite nice: a tasty and light alternative to the brise'. Funny is ... I have recently discovered my mum has been doing pastry like this for years. Should have paid more attention.

Serves: 10
FlexiPoints: 8

Suggested wine: none
Special equipment: a 24cm baking tin

Ingredients:
500g flour
500g apples
100g butter
180g sugar
10g instant yeast
2 eggs
1 lemon
50ml calvados
Honey as needed

Ingredient note: none

How-to:
1. Peel and slice the apples. Put them in casserole with 80g of sugar. Distribute 1 glass of water on top and cook on medium-low heat with the lid on until the apples are soft (about 10’).
2. Work together the flour, yeast, butter, the rest of the sugar, the grated lemon zest, the eggs, the calvados and 1 tbsp of the cooking juice of the apple until a uniform pastry is obtained.
3. Roll the pastry in a 24cm disc and one of 30cm. Grease the baking tin with some butter and dust it with flour. Cover the tin with the larger disc. Distribute the apple and cover with the second disc trying to seal the border. Remove the hanging trims.
4. Bake it in an hot oven at 200C for 30’. Brush the top with some honey and serve at room temperature.

Chocolate shortbread cookies

(Photo@TheFoodTraveller.com - Nikon D200)

I wanted to bake this ones since I saw a post on the traditional version on the blog "cavoletto di brussel". I used basically the same recipe, but added chocolate and reduced the baking time since it felt a bit too long ... these cookies last a while. I made them almost two weeks ago and they taste still fresh now out of my cookies' tin. I love the chocolate flavor in it!!! Pity they are so fatty!!!

Serves: up to 50 cookies
FlexiPoints: 2 per cookie

Suggested wine: forget wine ... coffee!
Special equipment: none

Ingredients:
350g flour
200g french lightly salted butter
50ml milk
100g dark chocolate (50% or more)

Ingredient note: the darker the chocolate the bitterer the final taste. Milk chocolate is not an option as there would be very little flavor after baking.

How-to:
1. Cube the butter and let is soften at room temperature. Break the chocolate in small pieces.
2. Work it with the flour, milk, chocolate and the sugar until a solid dough is obtained. Refrigerate for at least 60’ in cling foil.
3. Roll the dough to a sheet not thicker than 1 cm and cut out the shortbread cookies using a knife or a shape. You might need to knead and roll the dough a few times until it is all used-up.
4. Bake in the middle of an over at 150C for 30’-35’.

Brussel waffles ... so light, you can't stop!

(Photo@TheFoodTraveller.com - Nikon D200)

One day my parents came over to Belgium and wanted a waffle. And we Italians got baffled by the fact that, apparently, there are two types of waffles in Belgium: Liege and Brussels waffles. The former are soft, sugary and sticky. The latter are crunchy and very light. I love both, but this time I will share the one my fiancee Elke does more often. Brussel waffles. Eat them for breakfast, with powder sugar, icecream, whipped cream, almost anything ... even nutella!!

Serves: 16
FlexiPoints: 2.5

Suggested wine: none !!
Necessary equipment: waffle maker or similar

Ingredients:
- 300g flour
- 500ml UHT milk
- 75g caster sugar
- 100g butter
- 2 eggs
- 10g instant yeast
- salt as needed

How-to:
1. Melt the butter avoiding to get it burned.
2. Mix the flour, yeast, sugar and butter. Add the eggs and whick well.
3. Warm up the milk to room temperature and add it to the flour a bit at the time working it until a smooth batter is obtained.
4. Let it rest for 1 hour. Bake in a hot waffle machine in 16 batches following the machine instruction.
5. Best when just made, they will stay tasty for a couple of days!

Belgian bread pudding

(Photo@TheFoodTraveller.com - Nikon D200)

We had quite some bread left and, since I could not stop eating it, Elke decided to make a pudding out of it. Of course, we did not have one ingredient and we ended up driving around to find it .... or better driving to the local hypermarket and queueing for just one little thing! The belgian recipe reminds a lot of the Christmas Pudding I have eaten a few times in England. Chewy, tasty and heavy! Served with some power sugar on top ... perfect breakfast!!

Serves: 15
FlexiPoints: 4.5

Suggested wine: none!

Ingredients:
- 300g old bread
- 500ml UHT milk
- 75g caster sugar
- 75g brown sugar
- 5 free-range eggs
- 50g raisins
- 1/3 tsp cinnamon
- 8g vanilla sugar
- 1 tbsp honey
- 3 slices of honey-cake with pearl sugar (belgian ‘honig peperkoek’)

How-to:
1. Warm up the milk to room temperature and stir in the honey and sugar.
2. Put the bread and the cake slices in pieces in a bowl. Add the milk and let it rest for 30’ until soft. In the meantime, slightly whisk the eggs together.
3. Use a fork or a wooden spoon to mix well the softened bread until a liquid batter is obtained. Do not use a kitchen robot, since it is nice to have some bigger pieces of bread left. Stir in the raisins, the cinnamon, the vanilla sugar and eggs.
4. Grease a baking tin or cover it with baking paper. Pour in the bread mixture and bake in an hot oven for 20’ at 200C on the lowest part of your oven and for 15’ more at 180C in the middle position of the oven.
5. Serve at room temperature and with some power sugar on top.

Klaaskoeken or Belgian Christmas Cookies

(Photo@TheFoodTraveller.com - Nikon D200)
I know that Christmas has passed, but these ones are lovely and Elke makes them so often in December that I can enjoy them for breakfast or dinner or as a snack almost everyday. Unfortunately, I did not manage to post the recipe before ... as I do not make them, I did not know where it was. Just make them despite Christmas has passed ... have them with some chocolate or cheese or as they are.

Serves: up to 24
FlexiPoints: 5.5 (each)

Suggested wine: well .... coffee or tea!

Ingredients:
- 1 Kg flour
- 33g instant yeast
- 2 large eggs (separated)
- 450 ml UHT milk (at room temperature)
- 160g sugar
- 8g vanilla sugar
- 200g butter
- 2 tsp grated cinnamon
- Egg yolks and salt as needed.

How-to:
1. Melt the butter. Remove from the heat; add the milk and the two egg yolks. Mix well. Stir in the yeast, the sugar and the cinnamon.
2. Beat the two egg whites with a pinch of salt until stiffen. Add it to the mixture.
3. Work in the flour one spoon at a time until a solid dough is made. Knead the dough for 10’. Wrap the dough in plastic foil and let it rest covered for 30’. Keep the dough warm at around 25C.
4. Roll the dough in sheets 1.5cm thick and use a form to make little human (or different shapes). You will need to knead the dough a few times to use as much as possible out of it. Let them rise for 30’.
5. Whisk some egg yolks and use it to grease the top of the shaped dough.
6. Bake in batches in a pre-heated oven at 220C for 6’.
7. Serve warm.

A simple apple tart

(Photo@TheFoodTraveller.com - Canon PowerShot G2)

I love apple cakes and tarts. The world is full of recipes and I would like to share the simplest recipe I ever came across ... extremely tasty and compatible with a diet! Most of the work goes in peeling and slicing the apples. If you can, use renette apples. Otherwise, use any other variety which has a sour and dry bite (when not cooked).

Serves: 8
FlexiPoints: 5

Ingredients:
- 1 kg renette apples
- 100g butter
- 100g flour
- 100g sugar
- 5g baking powder
- 8g vanilla sugar
- 1 egg
- 100ml milk
- Salt, flour and margarine as needed

How-to:
1. Quarter, peel and slice the apples.
2. Melt the butter in the milk and set aside.
3. Work together the egg and sugar with a pinch of salt. Add the vanilla sugar and the baking powder. Whisk in the buttermilk. Once homogeneous, add also the flour one spoon at a time through a sieve. Work until a bubbly batter is formed.
4. Mix the batter with the sliced apples.
5. Grease a round baking tin for quiches and dust it with flour. Pour the cake batter in and bake at 170C for about 60’.

Bitter chocolate cakes

(Photo@TheFoodTraveller.com - Canon PowerShot G2)

I used to bake these very often for breakfast. Alas, no longer due to lack of time. I love the taste of a simple chocolate cake loaded with a bitter chocolate flavour. I personally use very bitter chocolate (85%) and sometimes I add some extra chocolate in little pieces with slightly less bitterness (70%). Fabulous and rich; a real treat! I wish I had time for baking them more often.

Serves: 12
FlexiPoints: 5

Suggested wines: none

Ingredients:
- 180g dark chocolate (>70%)
- 120g fine sugar
- 100g self-rising flour
- 150ml single cream
- 80ml half-fat UHT milk
- 4 separated eggs
- 1 entire egg
- Margarine and salt as needed

How-to:
1. Whisk the 4 egg whites to soft peak and set aside.
2. Melt the chocolate in either a pot with a thick base or in a bowl on simmering water. Stir in the cream and the milk so as to obtain a uniform cream.
3. Work together the 4 yolks and the sugar. Add the chocolate and the flour (through a sieve). One uniform stir in the entire egg till it is fully absorbed.
4. Fold the egg whites in with a spatula and bottom-up movement.
5. Grease a 12-muffin tray with abundant margarine. Distribute the batter among the muffin cavities.
6. Bake at 190C on the second lowest slot of the oven for about 35’. Let cool down outside of the oven before eating.

Chocolate fondant

(Photo@TheFoodTraveller.com - Nikon D200)
Chocolate fondant ... one of the tastier and simpler cake to make for a dinner. When I say simple, I mean extremely simple. Just do not get worried when you see it rising and falling, or getting strange cracks and shapes ... simple accept the shape it gets and enjoy it. It is lovely alone or with some orange jam (with orange peel in it).

Serves: 8
FlexiPoints: 8

Ingredients:
- 250g 70% bitter chocolate
- 200g butter
- 4 eggs
- ½ tbsp oil
- ½ tbsp rum
- 100g extra fine sugar

How-to:
1. Break the chocolate in pieces and melt it a baign-marie (in a metallic bowl over boiling/simmering water). While still a baigne-marie stir in the oil, cubed butter and, one spoon at a time, the sugar. Work the mix until homogeneous.
2. Let cool down. Work in the eggs one at a time. Add the rum.
3. Greasy a baking tray with some margarine and pour in the chocolate mix.
4. Bake in an hot oven for 30' at 180. Let cool down for 15' int he oven and serve at room temperature.

Little pannacotta with raspberries

It was a long time I wanted to try this recipe from the book of Fabio Marangon from the restaurant Cucina Marangon. One of the few times I actually use my dutch in trying to understand a recipe. This said, I have to admit that the recipe is actually a fairly standard one. There is not twist or changes. Yet, we loved it so ... I post it. And I just had the last one few minutes ago!!! Ops, I was forgetting ... do not eat the spaghetti as well, it is only decoration!

Serves: 8
FlexiPoints: 4.5

Suggested wine: ... nothing !!!

Ingredients:
- 450g double cream (40%)
- 1 vanilla pod
- 70g sugar
- 54 rasperries
- 2 gelatin sheets
- 4 dried spaghetti

How-to:
1. Mix the cream with 50g sugar. Split the vanilla pod in two and remove the seeds with the help of a little knife. Add the seeds and the pod itself to the cream.
2.In the meantime, rinse the gelatin sheets in cold water.
3. Cook the cream on gentle heat for 15’ stirring frequently with a whip. Add the gelatin sheets and whisk well.
4. Distribute the cream among 4 small ramekins and refrigerate for 8 to 12 hours.
5. Just before serving, make the raspberry coulis by mixing together 30 raspberries and 20g of sugar. Pass it through a sieve. Distribute it among the ramekins to make a red layer on top.
6. Break the spaghetti in two and make little kebabs of three raspberries each.
7. Serve with the kebab on top.