Sicilian Girl

Tweet When I was  living in the San Francisco Bay Area, I could easily find fresh fish and seafood just about any time of the year. The fish counter in my neighborhood market carried a good supply, but the place to go was Race Street Fish and Poultry, a little local market that had the [...]

Tweet Okra, also known as “gumbo” or “lady fingers,” is a highly nutritious edible green pod vegetable. It’s available fresh just about year-round in the South and from May-October in other areas. Fresh is best for breaded and fried but you can usually find it frozen in the market, which works fine in soups, gumbos [...]

Tweet Lasagna has been a part of my family’s Christmas dinner for as long as I can remember and it’s the only time I really ever make it anymore. This past year I didn’t even make it, my son did (molto squisito). My mother used to make enough for all of us to enjoy on [...]

Tweet For many folks, soup is the original comfort food, whether it’s a soothing light stracciatella or a hearty pasta e fagioli. This full bodied fennel soup falls somewhere in between. An easy to prepare recipe with only a few ingredients, this soup is so thick and creamy that you’d never guess it has no [...]

Tweet Onion soups have been popular since Roman times, so it seems to me that French onion soup might not be so French after all! As you may recall from your history class, Henry II, future king of France, married a lovely Italian girl from Florence named Catherine de Medici. What you might not remember [...]

Tweet The majority of the soups I make are of a hearty variety, like Minestrone and Lentil. You know the kind that warm you up on a cold winter’s day. But as the days begin to heat up the simplicity of a summer meal becomes appealing for a couple of reasons. First, the garden (yours [...]

Tweet   They would tell you that they’ve been in the family for some time now and that they will be passed down to the next generation. They would also tell you they have welcomed a newcomer to the neighborhood, helped a friend through a difficult time, eased a busy mom’s day, consoled someone in [...]

Tweet The quintessential Italian vegetable soup! I have never made a casual  pot of  my Minestrone. What do I mean by that? It’s simple really, each time I prepare this signature recipe, I do so with intention and purpose. This particular pot simmering on the stove today is more than mere vegetables and broth. It [...]

Tweet Fagioli, also known as pasta fazool, is a typical dish of the Italian table. In nearly every region, province and village you will find a version of this pasta and bean soup. There are countless unique recipes that change from place to place, which is as good a reason as any … to try [...]

Tweet       Soup for breakfast might sound a bit strange to you, but this is really very good. In the Lombardy region of Italy, there is a very old city called Pavia. It is here that Zuppa Pavese was created by the monks of Certose di Pavia. I call it breakfast soup because, [...]