We all have cooking tips and techniques learnt through personal experience or because someone else was kind enough to tell us.
Gala Placidia's activity
Questions Asked
 A fairly comprehensive list of words related to food and wine has been prepared by a few of us. It still needs revision, corrections, additions and you may be able to help as it is a Wiki.
Tue, 06/30/2009 - 04:31
 It is official, the old Casino in Bagni di Lucca is reopening its doors after many years; however, it is going to be a modern version, more "little Las Vegas" style than its elegant and exclusive predecessor.
Mon, 06/29/2009 - 09:04
A few weeks ago I started a thread in the old forum about this topic. I still think that it would be great if we could all share our favourite recipes which our families and friends enjoy.
Fri, 06/19/2009 - 05:29
 I think that there are quite a few members who have married overseas an ½ûÂþÌìÌà citizen; however, I am not quite certain whether they have registered their certificate of marriage before the nearest ½ûÂþÌìÌà Consulate.It is advisable to do this an
Tue, 06/16/2009 - 03:43
 It is most important, if you own a property, to have a clear description for it. That is possible through the "visura catastale" which gives you and confirms many facts regarding your title.
Sun, 06/14/2009 - 05:21
 Polenta is one of those ½ûÂþÌìÌà dishes that you either love or hate. Considered in the past as the poor people's staple diet it is nowadays served in the best restaurants.Â
Sat, 06/13/2009 - 17:53
I have just seen on TV some images regarding the Treviso tornado. I sincerely hope that any members in the area have not suffered from this disaster. Â
Sun, 06/07/2009 - 16:44
 The base for many ½ûÂþÌìÌà sauces and dishes is the "soffritto" (sofrit in French, sofrito in Spanish), a mixture of some diced vegetables which are cooked in a heavy pan with three tablespoons of olive oil (although some other kinds of oil and fa
Sat, 06/06/2009 - 05:37
 Hi everyone, this is a warm invitation to joint this group and discuss ½ûÂþÌìÌà food, wine, regional cooking, recipes, tips, cooking utensils, history of cooking and any related subject you may wish to talk about.And welcome, Mimosa, glad to see t
Fri, 06/05/2009 - 08:28
Comments posted
I agree, Sprostoni. But then... whose interest are they serving? On the other hand, I will not put the blame on Wall Street alone, SirTK. We nicely got ourselves into this mess we are in. We could say that it all started with the American "toxic" mortgages, but then, the European banks copied the system, gave away big mortgages to people who would not normally qualify and over properties which were worth only a fraction of the money they were lending and also bought those toxic American "investment packages"... Ambitious young brokers were allowed to play "roulette" with little or no supervision (at least this is what the banks say). It's absolute madness!!!! Well, according to an old Mayan prophecy, the world is coming to an end on the 21st of December 2012, so perhaps we do not have to worry that much. It will sort itself out then...
I do not think that changing governments, and this applies not only to Italy, will bring any benefits to anyone. At the same time, this is a crisis that stems from a profoundly wrong economic system and we cannot blame specific people in government for this collapse. It is incredible to see how the stock exchange, throughout the world, reacts to any speculation, which convinces me that all what they are doing is gambling as if they were in a big, global casino. The problem is that the number of players is very small, but we, the ordinary people, pay for the damage they cause. We all need substantial reforms as the current system is not working.Â
Berlusconi is in deep trouble now. We shall see what happens on Tuesday:
Extreme weather conditions all over the world and a few earthquakes... Not very reassuring.
Some time ago, I saw on French TV a program on "wwoofers" coming to help farmers who cannot afford to hire outside help. I tried to find a link, but for those who can speak French there is this article from "La Dépêche Marseillaise" which covers what was said in the program. I think that it is a great idea.
I totally agree with Raggio and this brings us back to the discussion we had in another thread: Copper was particularly dangerous as it can leak. Same thing with aluminium, which is nowadays linked to Alzheimer's disease. The acidic content in tomatoes could cause unwanted reactions. Even nowadays, some people do not tolerate very well their acidic content and it is sometimes recommended to remove skins and seeds and evento add some baking soda. There are some experiments being made to create tomatoes with a lesser acidic content and some people with digestive problems do not tolerate them very well. Basically, cooking and food science is chemistry in action. For this reason, cast iron and ceramic cookware are excellent, but copper is nowadays treated to avoid the problems that existed in the past.
Enter the keywords "olive yield" in the search engine and you will get lots of information.
It is true that chutney improves over time and it also looses the vinegar flavour. It also keeps very well for several months.... if you can resist from eating it.... I would say that this chutney will be great to accompany a frittata (perhaps a zucchini one).
I think that this link gives very useful information about health cover entitlements throughout the EU:
I agree with Alma, those villages have been there for years, centuries, you cannot forecast something like what happened. Unfortunately, it looks as if the weather is not improving and they say that as from tomorrow there could be more problems: