When I throw parties, it’s usually Italian food, because pasta is the best! And so is pizza. And caprese salad. And minestrone. Did I mention you can serve caprese on a stick? It’s very easy once you make the mozzarella I yammered on and on about in a previous post. It is one of the easiest but also tastiest vegan cheese recipes. I went to Rome once, in my pre-vegan days, but I did eat a lot of soya-gelato, because it’s everywhere there, and it was the first time I tasted a non-dairy gelato that was good. Not “tasting like bean” good, but actually properly good. Rome is also the place where I saw the most inspiring or spiritual place I have ever seen in my life, so I guess I owe the city a little something. Or maybe the Italians are just my kind of people, both in looks and temperament (we have a lot in common). I may have had the cliché, let’s generously call it “polyamorously inclined” Italian fling way back when, but I can’t find too much fault with him, because he’s one of the two people who ever properly cooked for me with love and affection and without me having to lift a finger (or get out of bed and into clothes). In my defense, I cooked for at least ten people without expecting anything in return, so don’t accuse me of being high maintenance, sometimes it’s just nice to share the maintenance and romance in turns, ok! And then we haven’t even started on Italian movies that involve food (and Tilda Swinton and men with unscrupulously depicted, beautiful bodies), just WOW!
Another recent international discovery is spanakopita. I got to know it because in my teens (think age 13/14) I had a shameful love of the sisterhood of the traveling pants, and in it spanakopita is mentioned (because one of the main characters is Greek-American). So I guess the book taught me that awkward underage teenage sex is only interesting when you are yourself an awkward pre-teen, but that pastry lasts forever. Just like the thing I took away from Veronica Mars is that I will gladly take Leo D’Amato off her hands if she is not interested. Ok, rambling. Spanakopita! This one is approved by Terry Hope Romero’s Greek husband, has been since updated by her in an episode of Vegan Mashup, but the classic tofu one is still ridiculously delicious! I could not stop eating it even though they are quite heavy and about 80% olive oil. Which is precicely what makes them so good. I would definitely recommend this recipe to people unfamiliar with filo pastry, because it as a nice way to get acquainted. Before you go #GBBO crazy and make it yourself. I am not quite there yet but planning to.
Last but not least I will give you what happens when I see Nigella Lawson do something with whipped cream and decide to combine my meringue recipe with store bought rice whip. Freeze it and use it the next day, otherwise it will develop ice crystals. This should work with home-made coconut whipped cream but I can never get that to work. I gave you a meringue recipe way back when, make sure to really dry them out for this one though. I always add some lemon zest to the sauce, which is basically blitzed raspberries with vanilla and agave strained to remove all of the seeds. Really, nothing could be easier. I love it with chocolate chips and vanilla, but if you are a coffee fan it would certainly work with some instant espresso powder, some chocolate meringues or some completely different kind of sugary-cinnanon-cookie (and even more chocolate chips). The possibilities are endless, and all you need is a reliable (can be store-bought) vegan whipped cream and whatever you’d like to add to that. This recipe’s an oldie but a goodie. You can make it as simple or as fancy as you want.
