Only Recipes, by Alessandra Zecchini ©

  I found a Vegan frozen sweet short pastry in the supermarket, and I wanted to try it. Actually, I like making short pastry, but making Vegan short pastry is not that easy (for me) so I was really curious. Because the pastry is already rolled it was easy to cut it with a cookie cutter, and I opted for hearts. Up to here everything was fine, but then the pastry shrunk in the oven! My pretty fat hearts became long quirky hearts! Did this ever happen to you? My solution: transform the hearts into pretty-quirky-modern-art hearts with some glossy icing. I did the borders white first, and then I coloured some icing with saffron powder for yellow (this also gave the biscuits a lovely saffron aroma and flavour), cocoa for chocolate, and then I added a drop of red food colouring to the yellow saffron icing for a geranium orange/red. The colour reminded me of lipstick and nail polish, but I liked it! The kids took the biscuits to the Surf Life Saving Club and they were a...

This is the last of 4 courses I made for a Twilight menu (inspired by Stephenie Meyer's books) . It was fun to create Twilight recipes, especially with just the few ingredients I had at home at the time. Enjoy! Breaking Dawn Dessert Black Sesame Seed Pudding with Rose Syrup and Red Rose Petals Photos by Alessandra Zecchini © I unashamedly admit that I am very happy with the dessert. In the pantry I found some surigoma, crushed black sesame seeds, and I remember that in Japan I enjoyed many sesame seeds desserts. And in the garden I had some beautiful red roses, not sprayed and therefore edible! Breaking Dawn is all about love..... Ingredients 50 g crushed black sesame seeds (available in Asian shops) 100 ml water 1 tbsp sugar 1/3 (one third) tsp agar agar (available in Asian shops) For the Syrup 100 ml water 2 tbsp sugar 1 tbsp rose water essence Finish with red rose petals Place the first 4 ingredients in a small pot and bring to boil. Simmer for 2 minutes, stirring well, and then...

Yes, I have 'Twilight fever', or 'Twilight addiction'? Whatever the term, it gets to me at any given time of the day, and I have to open the closest of the Twilight saga's books I can find, and read a bit of it! So this is the first of 4 courses I made for a Twilight menu (inspired by Stephenie Meyer's books) : Twilight Starter Plum Tomatoes with Aceto Balsamico Tradizionale di Modena Photos by Alessandra Zecchini © Well, this is easy! Red tomato from my garden and Modena's black gold: Traditional Balsamic Vinegar (ABTM) , possibly one of the most sensual ingredients ever! Ingredients Fresh plum tomatoes Extra virgin olive oil Salt to taste (I used Maldon) A few drops of Aceto Balsamico Tradizionale di Modena Assemble as shown in the photo.