Let me tell you about this great, no-fuss, restaurant in Rome that we absolutely fell in love with that we had to go back again!
I’ve used my sometimes trusty Rome Wallpaper guide (iPhone edition) to pick our restaurants and this is the one time it did not fail us.
I’ll just show you what we had during our two visits…
Now wasn’t that mouth-watering?
Posts coming up: regional italian dishes and the best meal we have ever had!
This is my first post on my trip to Italy and naturally it’s on gelato!
I consumed so much gelato during my trip that sometimes they constituted as meals. They slab the gelato, and not scoop, on your cone until it forms a mountain!
I don’t think I will write much in these posts because these images speak for themselves…
In Milan, we accidentally stumbled on a gelato/chocolate store (in the most unexpected area)
and with the quirkiest logo…
They had mostly chocolate flavored gelatos with exciting additions!
I had chocolate gelato with candied orange peel and my friend N. had chocolate gelato with chili.
I’m hopefully going back to Milan in October and this is one shop I can’t wait to go back to!
More posts coming soon..
My afternoon tea time. Flower blossom tea with an oats and dates cookie
Doesn’t this remind you of the scene in the film Marie Antoinette when she gets excited about the flower blossoming, which was a gift from China? Or the Chinese Ambassador?
Well it is quite exciting to watch as the flower blooms in the hot water. It is just lovely!
So you know how I am obsessed with my new cookbook and how I have different kinds of flour stacked in my fridge? Well about two weeks ago I saw a chocolate chip cookie recipe in the whole wheat flour section of the book. I still had plenty of whole wheat flour but I had no chocolate.
I went down to the kitchen determined to make a plain cookie but then I saw a bowl of dates leftover from lunch earlier and remembered that I still have a large container of oats. And this is when I decided to make oats and dates whole wheat cookies. I didn’t change much in the recipe except for reducing the amounts of sugars (brown and white) as the dates are sweet enough.
I made my first batch, just added a handful of oats and chopped whatever dates I saw in front of me. I made them thick and when they baked, they were almost cake-like and the baking powder after-taste was overpowering.
For the second batch, I measured everything correctly, reduced the amount of baking powder and made them smaller and thinner.
Remember my new prized possession? Good to the Grain? A book on baking with whole wheat flours.
Well so far, I baked three different items: whole wheat cookies (with my additions of oats and dates and omitting chocolate chips), banana cereal muffins using rye flour and lastly my proudest accomplishment so far…
Whole wheat and oats sandwich bread Continue reading
Lovely readers,
I would like to introduce you to The Oven Experiments’ new contributing blogger, my sister Besma, who is going by the name (for the time being as I am still trying to figure out how come her name does not come out as Besma) busymomskitchen (her up and coming food blog for busy moms).
Here is a list of her blogposts on The Oven Experiments:
And one coming right away.
Enjoy!
I recently impulse-bought a new cookbook on baking with whole grain flours, Good to the Grain, and so I decided to go to Al Raha Stone Mill in Qadsiya Co-Op to stock my cupboard with some oats and different kinds of flours.
I am big fan of this shop and I love how knowledgeable their staff are. It’s very rare in Kuwait to go into a shop and find the shopkeeper actually know what they’re talking about. I mentioned them here and here.
Of course I couldn’t stop after getting what I went for. I saw a selection of different kinds of goat cheese, which are made locally at their goat farm, and saw ricotta goat cheese. I had to get it!
I also grabbed a bag of 4 grains flat bread and went back home.
In a bowl, I spooned some of the ricotta cheese, added barbeer, mint, cucumber slices, walnuts, green olives, a drizzle of olive oil and a few flakes of sea salt.
And what I had was one of the most satisfying simple meals ever! The bread was on the sour side which I love and the cheese was so smooth and creamy.
*picture taken from my iPhone using the ShakeItPhoto, an application that gives a Polaroid effect.
Marron glacé. This is a treat I had to accustom my palate to. All my life up until 3 years ago I assumed I did not like marron glacé! Why? Because as a child I tried it and hated it and so I grew up thinking I didn’t like it.
My mother, on the other hand, loves it and always has. Three mother’s days ago, I decided to change the routine and make her marrons glacés instead.
When I had my BDesserts business I got some of my supplies from a local company that imports French products called FAMECO and they sent out recipes on a monthly basis and one of them was how to make marrons glacés. It seemed fairly easy and it was. This is when I had my first bite as an adult and fell in love with it.
I made it again yesterday and this what you need: Continue reading
Yes you read it right, camel milk chocolate! Never did I think that anyone would think of making chocolate using camel milk! So you can imagine my surprise and my hesitation when my friend and colleague handed me a bag of camel milk chocolate bars after her return from a trip to Dubai. Each bar has a different flavor as you can see from the image below.
I took the 70% chocolate bar and broke a small piece and placed it on my tongue. As it melted, the chocolate had an unfamiliar taste. It was strong. I’m not sure if it was the camel milk or because I was thinking too much. But I liked it.
So if you happen to be in Dubai and feel a bit adventurous, then why don’t you try some camel milk chocolate and while you’re at it, how about a camel burger?
The Oven Experiments 