Barbabietole... Beets

Ever seen a raw beet? As with other vegetables, my first time upclose and personal with an unprocessed beet was in Italy. Even though it's beet season and I could have found fresh ones in the market, I cheated this month and bought precooked veggies from the store. I had two recipes to try, both involving hand-rolled pasta (until I buy a much needed electronic machine), and lots of trips to fit in in between.

Probably you're familiar with beets now that they've been popping up in salads more often in restaurants. Hopefully this chunky little root will continue to grace menus even more frequently and in a greater variety of dishes because it is true vitamin dynamite. According to World's Healthiest Foods (WHF), the red pigment in beets betalain is responsible for some of their anti-inflammatory and anti-oxidant properties. The WHF website does a very complete nutrient description, and also tells you how to best cool beets in order to maximize their health benefits.

In March, I attended a fresh pasta class in Genova (pictures of my yummy creations found here). A few days later while looking for recipes to try at home, I was captivated by the beautiful colors I found in the pictures of beet recipes. Thus the theme for this month.

Source: http://www.bonappetit.com/recipes/2005/05/beet_ravioli_with_poppy_seed_butter

Source: http://it.paperblog.com/pasta-colorata-alla-ricotta-e-barbabietola-113388/

Be forewarned! Getting picture perfect results with the beet takes a few practice runs! Here's some advice to get flamboyant instead of cute results:

• The recipes that call for normal pasta and beets in the sauce (versus beets mixed directly into the pasta dough) produce flashier colors. As cooking breaks down the betalain pigment, the boiling process turns deep purple pasta into a Easter bunny violet.
• Hand rolled ravioli are hard to make thin enough to get the peak-a-boo effect of fuchsia through the pasta. Even if you use an electric pasta machine or pre-rolled sheets, to get the best color results, you'll need to use rice pasta or wonton wrappers as the Bon Appetite recipe suggests in its opening comments. (Suspicion confirmed by this blog).

Below are the results of my experiments. I've noted in both cases the original recipe source but recompiled here the recipes because I made some slight adjustments and added my own personal touches. Enjoy!

Mezzacuori di barbabietola con papavero e prosciutto

Half-Heart Shaped Beet Ravioli with Poppy Seed Butter and Prosciutto

(original Bon Appetite recipe here)

Ingredients:

For the pasta
- 1 3/4 cup soft grain white flour
- 1 cup whole grain wheat flour
- 4 large eggs
- pinch of salt

For the filling
- 2 large red beets (precooked, for cooking instructions click here or here)
- 1/3 cup fresh ricotta cheese
- 1/3 cup fresh goat cheese
- 2 tablespoons of breadcrumbs

For the "sauce"
- 1/2 cup butter
- 1 1/2 tablespoons poppy seeds
- 4 thin slices of fresh cut uncooked Prosciutto
- freshly grated Parmesan cheese
- salt and pepper to taste

Instructions:

Make the pasta

1. Wash your hands and have a bag of extra flour and a spatula ready nearby.
2. Pour the flour on a clean flat surface into a hollowed put volcano shape. Crack the eggs open and put them in the middle of the flour. Stop any loose streams of eggs by brushing the flour around and back towards the volcano walls. Sprinkle the salt over it all.
3. With the fingers of one hand (and one hand only! it's handy to keep the other hand clean) break the eggs yolks gently and begin to circle the eggs around, slowly mixing in the flour. Of egg runs off bring it back to the volcano with flour with your hand. As you mix more and more flour into the eggs, you will find it useful to scrape the work surface with the spatula so that all the flour egg mixture is integrated into the dough. Likewise, scrape the fingers of your working hand with the spatula to integrate these crumbs as well. Your goal is to work the mixture into a ball. I had to add a bit of flour to get there using the ingredient proportions Bon Appetite suggested. Just don't add too much otherwise your dough will be tough and impossible to roll out.
4. Knead the dough 4-5 minutes. I learned a neat trick in Genova to determine if the pasta dough is ready or not: rip off a bit of the dough and roll it between your palms to get a short fat cylinder shape. Trying ripping this tear of pasta straight down the middle. Of you make it, dough's ready. If not, keep kneading a bit.
5. Wrap the dough in plastic wrap until ready to roll and fill.

Make the filling
6. In a food processor, purée the beets. If you don't have one of these useful contraptions like me, you can use the finest side of a cheese grater to make a fine beet pulp.
7. Mix the beet purée in a large bowl with the ricotta and goat cheeses and the breadcrumbs.

Construct the raviolis

8. Press your kneaded ball of dough into a flat rectangular shape. Run it through the largest setting on your pasta machine. Fold and run again. Repeat with the next thinnest setting and them for every next setting until that of 1/16 th of an inch run the rectangle of dough as is. If you are hand rolling the dough like I did, make sure your work surface was cleaned and dried and generously floured before beginning. As for the thicknesses and shape, do your best to eyeball it! The shape isn't as important unless you're making square shaped ravioli.
9. Cut out your ravioli. I was taught not to re-clump the bits of dough between the cut pasta but instead to cut what's left into small pieces, mix with lots of flour (so they don't stick together) and freeze for later use in a minestrone or simple plate of pasta.
10. Prepare a small bowl mostly of water and a spoonful of olive oil and wash your hands again.
11. Put a spoonful of filling on one ravioli, and with one finger run the water/oil mixture along one half of the ravioli seem. Fold and pinch together the seem to close.... Easier said than done! I found it useful to hold the ravioli dough in one hand and use the other hand to push the filling into the partly closed ravioli, keeping one hand at all times clean of the beet mixture. I closed the top of the heart first and finished by closing the tail.

Cook ravioli and sauce 

12. Put a pot of salted water on the stove to boil.
13. In the meantime, rip prosciutto into 1 cm by 1 cm -ish size pieces and put in skillet with a drop of olive oil.
14. When the prosciutto is getting crispy, add the butter to the pan and when that's melted add the poppy seeds. Turn off the heat until the ravioli are cooked.
15. Carefully deposit the ravioli into the boiling water. Depending on how thick your pasta is, it could take anywhere from 2 to 10 minutes to cool them. Wait till they float mostly to the top of the pot, taste one and then judge accordingly.
16. Relight the skillet with sauce and carefully transfer the cooked ravioli to this skillet. With a slotted spoon or spatula turn the ravioli around under they are covered with the butter, seeds, and prosciutto. Sprinkle a pinch of pepper in there if you feel like it.
17. Transfer the ravioli to serving plates and sprinkle generously with freshly grated Parmesan. Viola! Enjoy your creations!

Tagliatelle di barbabietola con pesto siciliano

Beet Tagliatelle with Sicilian Pesto

(original pasta recipe in Italian here)

(original pesto recipe in Italian here)

Ingredients:

For the pasta
- 2 small beets (precooked, for cooking instructions click here or here)
- 2 3/4 cups soft grain white flour
- 2 eggs
- pinch of salt

For the sauce
- 1 lb cherry tomatoes
- 1 cup fresh fresh ricotta cheese
- 1 cup + 1 TBSP of parmesean cheese
- 2/3 cup pine nuts
- 1/3 cup almonds
- 1 cup + 1 TBSP of parmesean cheese
- 1-2 garlic cloves (up to you)
- 1 fistful of fresh basil
- 2/3 cup olive oil
- salt and pepper, and peperoncino (red pepper flakes) to taste


Instructions:

Make the pasta

1. Pureé the beets either with a food processor or with a cheese grater.
2. Follow the steps above, only this time add the pureed beets into the middle of the "volcano" with the eggs.

Make the pesto
1. Wash and cut up the tomatoes. Wash and then dry well the basil.
2. In a large mortar put together the basil, tomatoes, pine nuts, garlic, red pepper flakes, and salt (don't really need to add salt, especially if your ricotta cheese is the hard salted kind). Add in the oil and get to work grinding with your pistel.... if you don't have a mortar and pistel, use a food processor... or use a normal bowl and a hand-held blender.
3. Add in the cheeses and blend until you have a nice smooth sauce.
Enjoy!

Senape... Mustard

I'm ready to return to my blog! I'm back in Italia, and to help me stress less about the late trains I need to go back to celebrating the best thing this country has to offer: its food!

However... my first "welcome back" post is inspired by a product I bought in Paris last week: fresh mustard! As this amazingly detailed article on Nibble explains, one of the main types of mustard bought and sold today has its origins in the Mediterranean and the pre-Italians (ancient Romans) used to grind up mustard seeds right at the table to dress their dishes. The Romans brought mustard seeds north to present-day France where it was then cultivated by monks. Around the turn of the thirteenth century, thanks to some "divine intervention" Dijon then became forever synonymous with mustard when the present Catholic pope privately commissed mustard sauce from a relative's garden in the region.

Every variety and brand of mustard as we know it today, as a prepared saucey condiment, is a mix of different ingredients from lemon juice to vinegar to mayonnaise depending on the preferences of each geography's population. The Romans started by mixing their crushed mustard seeds with il mosto, the first freshly squeezed juice from the fall wine grape harvest. Today, Italian mustard production and consumption is limited. You can find, as I call it, the bright yellow "hotdog variety" in most supermarkets. Traditionally made Italian mustard can now only be found in mom and pop bread or gourmet food shops at premium prices. Well-known varieties include Mostarda Montovana and Mostarda di Cremona. With a translator, you could try to make them at home with the linked recipes. But it's worth the splurge as the mustard is often mixed with lovely little treats like carmelized miniature red onions. One fun way I've consumed mustard in Italy is as part of a dish/event called the Fondue Bourguignonne. As the name suggests, the dish originates elsewhere, this recipe says from Switzerland. It's essentially a fondue of oil in which you fry different meats and then dip them in a variety of sauces, one being mustard usually prepared fresh from powder (Coleman's) with vinegar, oil, and water.

So back to my trip to Paris. Every trip I take, no matter how short, includes one gastronomic stop. This time I wanted to visit first-hand the Maille boutique I had seen Andrew Zimmer visit on The Travel Channel. This place has been around since 1747, and in addition to its famous mustards, it also produces a wide variety of vinegars. Much to my surprise, the mustard here wasn't even marked up for tourists, it was cheaper than in the grocery store! I bought one funky flavor and one traditional on tap. The 200g of "fresh white wine mustard" I bought on tap at Maille has been going fast. It's satisfyingly spicy yet is neutral enough in flavor to be a great compliment in salads, meat dishes, and sandwhiches.

Here's one Italian recipe that calls for mustard in which I tried using my French ingredient together with another ingredient that just came into season, the artichoke!: 

Carciofi fritti alla senape

(Mustard Fried Artichokes)

 (picture borrowed from original recipe website GialloZafferano)

Ingredients:
- 8 artichokes
- 1/2 cup flour
- 1 tsp yeast
- 1 TBSP fresh chopped parsley
- 1-2 TBSP mustard
- 2 eggs
- 1 TBSP olive oil
- vegetable oil for frying
- salt

Instructions:
1.  Cook, cut and clean the artichokes. For basic steaming instructions see my previous post on artichokes. To cut: cut off the tops (the pointy part), and peel out the harder, outer leaves. Then slice the artichokes into chunks (about 8 per heart).
2. In a large bowl, mix together the eggs, flour, mustard, and salt. Then mix in the oil and yeast. Add warm water or more flour if needed to achieve a good consistency for coating the artichokes.
3. Mix the artichokes into the batter and let them sit a few minutes.
4. Mix in the parsley.
5. Heat the oil for frying and once hot add the "marinated" artichokes to the pan one by one to insure they don't stick together. Fry each artichoke section for 5-7 minutes.
6. Let artichokes cool on paper towels to absord some of the oil but serve hot and add salt to taste!
Original recipe in Italian

blog on hold

This blog is officially on hold until I finish my MBA! Happy eating to everyone until then! Sorry about promises to write about Spanish food, but I just can't budget the time. It's for the best - when I finish, maybe I'll figure out how to turn this hobby blog into a money blog! i.e. my passion is my work!

my summer hiatus in the States

So I've taken a rather long break from this blog and the Glocal Eating website while at home in the U.S. for the summer.  Instead of writing about Italian food, I was busy trying to reproduce it for my family and friends in Nebraska.  Here's the pesto I made with fresh basil from my mother's garden and some pasta carbonara. The other picture is of a Parmesan and breadcrumb stuffed artichoke. I'll put some more photos of that up on the Glocal Eating food fotography page once I get the chance. I also returned to a part-time job in the food industry. In high school, I worked in a Mexican restaurant, in college a global crêperie, and this summer to put away some of that credit card debt, a great little Italian-American place called in Zurlo's in west Omaha where everything might have been a little tweaked for the American palette, it was all made from scratch and delicious!

For now, here are some pictures of the local farmers' markets I managed to visit:

First stop, Washington D.C.'s Eastern Market - May

 

Famous Pike Place Market in Seattle, WA - July

 

 

And last but not least (although I didn't take very good pictures here), the new Aksarben Farmers' Market in Omaha, NE - August

 

Sign-up today for online cooking class of "real foods"!!!

The class is called "How to Cook Real Food: An Online Cooking Class" and it looks like a great and non-expensive way to learn how to cook natural foods without having to leave your home. Learn right from your computer.
REGISTRATION ENDS MAY 31, SO HURRY UP!!!!

CLICK HERE

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Here is some content from the website:

Jamie Oliver’s “Food Revolution” is spreading the word about just why we need to eat “real food” for our health. Michael Pollan tells us to cook from scratch — he says, “Eat real food. Not edible food-like substances. Eat things your great-grandmother would have recognized as food.” Sign up today!

It seems simple enough. Eat real food. Cook from scratch. Shop locally. But how do you make it happen in your own kitchen? Especially those of us who never learned how to cook — we were raised on microwave suppers, boxed cereals and toaster pastries. We all face the challenges of a modern life – balancing work and parenthood, all the while trying to feed our families healthier meals.

Our food supply has changed drastically in the past few decades. These days, you have to be a chemist to make sense of it all. Artificial growth hormones. Hydrogenated soybean oil. High-fructose corn syrup. And isn’t organic food more expensive? Sure, eating healthier is great, but not if you go broke in the process. How do you feed your family healthy, nourishing meals without spending all day in the kitchen and blowing your food budget?

You value real food, your local economy and your family’s health. But just how do you get started?

Learn to make fresh, seasonal vegetables your family will love.
Learn to Cook Real Food – Fast!

http://www.nourishedkitchen.com/ecourse?AFFID=35564

Carciofi...Artichokes

carThis entry is dedicated to probably my favorite vegetable. I love artichokes! I just really enjoy their tangy, distinct taste. But I would say this is a relatively new infatuation. Like with many foods, I grew a new-found appreciation for artichokes when I moved to Turin, Italy because while shopping in the local markets year-round, I actually saw what a bunch of vegetables actually look like in their natural state... before being canned and put on the shelves - they way we find a lot of things, like artichokes, in the majority of the United States. For all of you who grew up like me, even with parents who cooked mostly healthy meals, and still only saw artichokes come out of cans, here's what they look like!

I took the second picture this afternoon. The carciofi I used in all my creations below, I bought last weekend, and they cost significantly more, as you can see from the first picture. As the season matures, the prices fall with an increased supply.  In Italy, the carciofi are in high season in March and April.  They are a good diuretic (good for the urinary system) and good for cleaning out your liver, like after a night of debauchery. It’s also apparently a good source of iron and helpful in lowering cholesterol.[i]

I first endeavored to extract from these things what I knew as "artichoke hearts" a year ago. I evaluated various cooking methods online... All involve first cleaning away dirt, the outer leaves, and most of the stalk. Between boiling and steaming, I went with steaming because you loose less nutrients to the water.[ii] If you don’t have a fancy steaming pot or steamer, you can make a makeshift one like I did by punching holes in an aluminum pie tin, and then covering that during the steaming process with aluminum foil. For smaller artichokes, I steam them about 30 minutes, and for larger ones 40-45 minutes.

I tried out a bunch of new, and very simple recipes this year. First:

Insalata di Arance e Carciofi

(Orange and Artichoke Salad)

 

Ingredients:

-        One lemon

-        fresh spinach leaves

-        fresh, cleaned, raw artichokes

-        one orange (I used the “blood-orange” variety)

-        almond slices

-        olive oil

-        balsalmic vinegar

-        salt

Instructions:

1.     Prepare a bowl of cold water, fresh squeezed lemon juice (half of a lemon’s worth should suffice), and a pinch or two of flour (not sure what the flour does, but it was a suggestion from my friend’s Italian nonna (grandma) so I followed it). Let the artichokes soak for about an hour.

[PHOTO]

2.     Clean the spinach leaves by separating them from their stalks, rinsing them in cold water and shaking them dry. Then arrange them on a plate.

3.     Peel the orange and cut in slices (cutting from one side to the other, not splitting into the pieces naturally formed by the inner orange “skin”).  Arrange the orange pieces over the spinach.

4.     Take the artichokes out the water, cut off the tops (the pointy part), and peel out the harder, outer leaves. Cut the artichokes into thin strips and arrange on the salad.

5.     Toast the almond slices in a pan over medium heat on the stove and then sprinkle them over the salad.

6.     In a small bowl whisk together the olive oil, balsamic vinegar and salt.  Drizzle over the salad, and if you want spritz over everything a bit a lemon and enjoy!

For more recipes from where this one came from, click here and then use Google Translate to figure out what to do!

Next, a recipe I found on a Piedmont recipe website:

Carciofi Gratinati

(Artichoke Au Gratin)

Ingredients:

-        12 artichokes (fresh and raw)

-        1 lemon

-        olive oil

-        butter

-        half a clove of garlic

-        a handful of parsley (optional)

-        2 egg yolks

-        a large spoonful of breadcrumbs

-        a large spoonful of grated parmesan cheese

Instructions:

1.     Toast the breadcrumbs in a pan on the stove with a spoon of olive oil. Remove from the stove and set aside.

2.     Prepare a bowl of cold water, fresh squeezed lemon juice (half of a lemon’s worth should suffice), and a pinch or two of flour (not sure what the flour does, but it was a suggestion from my friend’s Italian nonna (grandma) so I followed it). Let the artichokes soak for about an hour.

[PHOTO]

3.     Take the artichokes out the water, cut off the tops (the pointy part), and peel out the harder, outer leaves. Cut the artichokes into thin strips.

4.     Then put the artichoke slices in a pan over medium heat on the stove with enough butter, and a bit of oil, a bit of parsley and the garlic. Let everything simmer and brown slowly.

5.     As the artichokes cook, add some water to help them take on a tender texture.

6.     In a bowl on the side, whisk together the two egg yolks, the breadcrumbs, the grated cheese, and the lemon juice.

7.     Pour this “cream” into the pan when the artichokes are soft and mix together fastly.

8.     Season with additional parslet, salt and pepper to taste. Serve hot!

These are two recipes using non-steamed artichokes. You can use steamed artichokes in a million ways… This week I made my favorite spinach and artichoke dip, and substituted toasted pita bread (not really available in Italy) with my favorite breadsticks from the local bakery (they’re covered with sesame seeds, soo good!).

I saved a few steamed artichokes in the fridge and made a simple salad for dinner post-Easter lunch feasting. I didn’t have any fresh basil, so I used dried basil, mozzarella, salt, and some fresh lemon juice to accompany these artichokes.

Have any artichoke recipes? I am always looking for new ways to eat them!

BACI!

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[i] http://www.bioexpress.it/0000009d1d07d8701/0000009d1d0d07211.html

[ii] http://www.oceanmist.com/products/how-to-prepare/how-to-steam-an-artichoke.aspx

Cavolini di Bruxelles...Brussels Sprouts

It's been awhile since my last blog post, many apologies. I was away from Italy visiting my family in the United States and eating all the, as one would say in Italian schifezze americane, that is "American rubbish," i.e. bacon cheese burgers, chili cheese fries, cheesecake (lots of cheese, huh!). The United States of course also has its share of fresh and seasonal produce, but we'll get to that when I'm there over this summer for a longer period of time. 

Right now in Italy we're near the end of the Brussels sprouts season. I know a lot of people like to wrinkle their nose in disgust at the sound of the words Brussels sprouts, but have you ever tried these things doused in butter? And did you know they are full of helpful anti-oxidants and mineral salts like phosphorus and iron? And, back in the day, because of their detoxifying properties, they were used as a hangover remedy![i] For a good website in English on all the healthy benefits of Brussels sprouts, click here. 

According to the Italian "Alimentipedia" (food encyclopedia), Brussels sprouts actually originate from Italy and were brought to Belgium by the Romans.[ii] Other websites in English explain that while the oldest ancestors of Brussels sprouts did indeed come from Italy, the variety we grow and eat today was cultivated and spread to other territories from the area around Brussels in the 11th century.[iii]

All the cute cartoons I found in English making fun of how everyone hates Brussels sprouts were copy righted, and I couldn’t find anything in Italian – I guess it’s an English or American thing to hate and despise this poor little vegetable. In the last two months there have been three gastronomical events in the Turin area of Italy where I live celebrating the Brussels sprout and its other cabbage cousins![iv] I found an amusing little forum with lots a answers to that question from “they make my husband have stinky farts” to “most people are kids, and kids are picky eaters.”[v]

I encourage you to try at least one of the recipes below – for your health and for the good of exploration!

Brussels sprouts with hazelnut brown butter – for recipe click here

Brussels sprouts, cheese, chestnuts, pancetta, and pine nuts

 

This recipe is by Chez Babs – an Italian food lover whose blog has some amazing photography. This post was in honor of the release of a cookbook by another blogger whose pen name is “Cavoletto di Bruxelles,” or “Little Brussels Sprout.” For the original recipe in Italian, click here.

Ingredients:

-        “sweet” pancetta

-        butter

-        fresh sage

-        cooked/boiled and peeled chestnuts (see blog post on chestnuts for how to prepare chestnuts)

-        Brussels sprouts

-        Nutmeg

-        Mascarpone cheese

-        Roasted pine nuts

Instructions:

1.     Boil the Brussels sprouts in salted water until they are “al dente,” don’t over cook!

2.     Let the pancetta sizzle and simmer in the butter and sage (you judge quantities here).

3.     Add in the chestnuts and mix everything together so that all that good buttery goodness covers all the ingredients.

4.     Add in a pinch of nutmeg and salt and pepper to taste.

5.     Serve with a spoonful of mascarpone cheese and roasted pine nuts.

Brussels sprout and fennel salad with orange and almond dressing

This one has some fancy gourmet ingredients that I’m not sure I translated right, but I’m sure that if you explore a bit online you can figure out what will work! For the original recipe in Italian, click here.

Ingredients: (for two servings)

-        7/8 Brussels sprouts

-        1 large fennel

-        large salt

-        sliced almonds

-        1 orange

-        vanilla extract

-        5 grains of whole black pepper

-        1 spoon of “smoked Viking salt”

-        cold-pressed, “spray-able” olive oil

Instructions:

1.     Toast the almond slices in a pan.

2.     Cut the orange in half and squeeze the juice out of one half. Carve out the pulp from the other orange half.  With a carrot slicer or any other appropriate kitchen tools you have, slice off some pretty ribbons of orange peel like you see in the picture. Set everything aside for the moment.

3.     Remove the outer leaves of the Brussels sprouts, cut off the base of the sprouts and let them sit then for a few minutes in water mixed with a bit of lemon juice (preserves color).

4.     Rinse and then dry the Brussels sprouts before cutting each in half.

5.     Bring salted water to a boil and cook the Brussels sprouts for around 10 minutes.

6.     In the meantime, remove the outer layers of the fennel, remove and set aside the fern-like “beard” of the plant to use later as decoration, and cut the fennel into slices.

7.     Drain the Brussels sprouts and run them under cold water to stop the cooking.

8.     Mix the Brussels sprouts, fennel, and orange pulp together.

9.     In a separate bowl, we’ll make the dressing. First, grind and then toast the pepper grains in a pan.

10.   In a blender, put the fresh-squeezed orange, a spoon-full of the smoked salt (I would try less first and then add more if you feel it needs it), a drop of vanilla extract and the oil and blend so that the dressing takes on some body, a bit like mayonnaise.

11.   Pour the dressing over the salad, adding to garnish the toasted almonds, and for a final touch the fennel piece previously set aside.

Last, but not least, the simplest recipe and the only I actually tried (because I went to the grocery store before I looked up ingredients this time): 

Brussels sprouts with butter and Parmesan

Ingredients:

-        little less than a pound of Brussels sprouts

-        4 Tbsp of butter

-        4 spoonfuls of shredded Parmesan cheese

-        salt

-        one lemon

Instructions:

1.     Prepare a bowl of cold water and squeeze in the juice of one lemon.

2.     Remove the outer leaves of the Brussels sprouts, cut off the base of the sprouts and let them sit then for a few minutes in water mixed with a bit of lemon juice (preserves color).

3.     Boil a pot of salted water and dump in all the Brussels sprouts. Let them cook in the boiling water for around 10 minutes.

4.     In the meantime, shred your Parmesan cheese if you didn’t buy it shredded.

5.     Put the butter in a frying pan and put it on low heat to melt.

6.     Drain the Brussels sprouts, in another bowl mix them with the cheese, and then dump them into the pan with butter. Mix around a bit, salt to taste and serve!

PS – I reheated these the next day with a bit of nutmeg and pepper and they were great!

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[i] http://www.alimentipedia.it/verdura/Verdura_cavolini_bruxelles.html

[ii] http://www.alimentipedia.it/verdura/Verdura_cavolini_bruxelles.html

[iii] http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Brussels_sprout

[iv] http://www.cavolettodibruxelles.it/2009/11/appuntamenti

[v] http://uk.answers.yahoo.com/question/index?qid=20060809004718AAkhFKg