With COVID-19 being an ongoing issue, we haven’t been able to get out and do much of anything during our time here in Italy. But we have been blessed to meet some truly wonderful people who have taught us a thing or two in the kitchen.

Laura came over one day to teach us how to make a proper Italian pizza. She and Silvio always make their own dough but because it takes 2-3 hours she did that ahead of time and brought it over. She said the bakeries here also premake it for you to purchase to save time.

Eva took everyone’s orders – she and Laura were making cheese pizza and olive pizza with capers – then started rolling out the dough. We always try to keep Livvy as involved as we can so I helped her roll some dough too.

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Next steps were spreading the sauce, putting on the mozzarella and drizzling some olive oil.

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After adding any toppings, the pizzas went in the oven and ta da! The perfect Italian pizzas were made! And they were delizioso!

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Our next lesson came from Luciano, who taught us to make a great pesto sauce for any pasta.

Take some tomatoes (supplemented with some tomato sauce if they are not as ripe or in season), basil leaves, olive oil, cheese (we used parmigiano I believe along with a goat cheese), pine nuts and blend it all up in a food processor or with a hand mixer. And you’re done!

Luciano also gave Dave a great recipe for pasta with broccoli and another homemade sauce. It was so easy to make that Dave no longer wants to buy pasta sauce at the store. Super easy and even our toughest critic (aka pickiest eater) Eva liked it! 👌🏻

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Last but certainly not least, tiramisu! When Roberto heard we really enjoyed that he surprised us by bringing over the ingredients one day so we could make it while Eva and his daughter Chiara played. Here’s the recipe from Dave’s notes:

Tiramisu

Espresso 200ml-ish
Put into bowl to cool

1/2 kg marscapone
Sugar
6 eggs
Savoiardi biscuits

Separate yolk and whites
Whip/froth whites
Put marscapone into mixing bowl
Fold in whites
Fold in yolks
Fold in sugar
Then whip again

Dust pan with Cacao zuccherato
Dunk biscuits (quickly) into coffee and layer pan.

Layer chocolate chips

Then layer marscapone whip

Then dust more cacao zuccherato

Switch biscuit direction for next layer and repeat.

Then let it chill in the fridge overnight. We can guarantee it is so good! And much easier to make than we would have thought. Hope you enjoy it as much as we did!

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