CHEF AMANDA
Food has always been a part of who I am. I am a quarter Italian so it's in my blood. What might surprise you though, is that I actually didn't start to love cooking until this last year or so.
Ever since I was little I loved to bake and would watch Food Network. My favorite show to watch was Ree Drummond's "The Pioneer Woman." I would always skip to the parts where she would bake.
Fast forward seven years and I'm in college. One thing I had always wanted to do was go to Italy ever since I was in seventh grade. I decided my sophomore year to study abroad. I found the perfect program. It was through Loyola's John Felice Rome Center. It would be a three week fusion experience that would let me travel to Abruzzo. The main reason I choose this fusion experience was because I found out that same summer that my great-grandma (on my dad's side) was from Alfedena, Abruzzo. This trip would allow me to see where my family is from.
Growing up, I never got to meet my Mimi. My dad would always share stories of how she would make homemade gnocchi. I would hear about ravioli eating contests (my uncle ate about 30 raviolis and won!). My great-aunt Marie has taken me under her wings and taught me family recipes. On Thursdays when I'm in town I got to cook with my great-aunt and my cousin Melanie. That was truly when my love for cooking began.
I am proud of the title "Chef Amanda" that I was given to by Giovanni (pictured above) . My love for cooking has only gotten stronger these days and I can't wait to show you what new things I have discovered along the way!
MANGIA! MANGIA!
BASTA PASTA
Pasta is one of the loves of my life! I'm not trying to be too overly dramatic there, but I really mean it! Pasta is the base of so many wonderful dishes. Don't get me started on how many different types of pasta there are.
I have made pasta about four times that I can think of. The first time was when I was in Italy. Viola, our cooking instructor, helped explain how we had to measure out the semolina flour, add in an egg with salt and use a fork to mix it all together. It seemed so much easier when I was there.
Image: Viola and I
Three months after my return home from Italy, I decided to attempt to make gnocchi. I had bought all the ingredients and had my special semolina flour and recipe notebook nearby. I was ready to start! I sprinkled the cup or so of semolina flour on my counter and added in 2 eggs and some salt. The mixture had a yellow tone to it because of the semolina flour. The fun part was getting to roll the dough into long snakes and then cutting them into small pieces.
After I got my tray full of gnocchi, I boiled the water and put my gnocchi pieces into the water. I tried to wait as patiently as I could, but lets be honest I kept checking every 5 seconds waiting to see the gnocchi float to the top. After all my gnocchi was cooked, I made sure to get many pictures of my beautiful creations! Once I popped the first gnocchi into my mouth, I was so surprised! It actually tasted good! I had no idea how it would turn out, but I'm glad everything worked out. In general, gnocchi is one of the easier pastas to make I have learned. It only took me a little over an hour to make the dough and then cook the gnocchi. Now comes the fun part: cleaning up!
When making gnocchi, I recommend using semolina flour. I use the Caputo brand, not sure that there is really much of a difference between the other kinds out there. This brand of semolina flour comes from Naples. You can find it at any Italian grocery store.
Ingredients
4 large golden potatoes
Pinch of salt
2 eggs
Semolina flour
Supplies
Pot
Ricer or grater
Dough cutter or pizza cutter
1.
Boil your potatoes in water until they are cooked through. Use a fork to pierce one of them and if it goes through all the way then you're good.
Tip: Peel the potatoes beforehand to save some time later on.
2.
Once the potatoes are cooked through, let them cool off completely. Peel the potatoes. Once they are peeled, use a ricer if you have one to rice the potatoes into a bowl.
Tip: If you don't have a ricer, you can grate the potatoes, it just takes a very long time to do so.
3.
Pour the flour onto your clean surface. Create a mound with a well in the middle. Add the eggs with a sprinkle of salt on top.
4.
Use a fork to mix the eggs in the middle. Slowly grab some flour from the sides. Eventually use your hands to mix everything else together.
5.
Split the dough into roughly four smaller sections. With one section start rolling to form a snake.
Tip: Roll from the middle part of the snake to the outside, to make it longer.
6.
Using a dough cutter, cut small pieces from the snake.
Tip: As you are cutting, try to cut with an edge to the dough.
7.
Boil water. Add gnocchi pieces to the water. Wait for them to float to the top (it takes a few minutes).
Enjoy!
Tip: Sprinkling some flour on top of the gnocchi can help it not stick to other gnocchi as it is cooking.
GNOCHHI
It's a Pizza Party
No I do not know how to toss up and spin pizza dough! Maybe one day I will attempt to do that, but for now I will keep to my way of stretching out the dough.
Pizza, pizza, pizza! Pasta still has the #1 spot in my heart, but pizza is pretty close second.
One of my many dreams is to one day own a wood-iron pizza oven. Wood-iron pizzas are amazing! There is something about having your pizza have that charred look and flavor that takes it to another level. Sadly, I will have to accept that my oven in my apartment can not magically make wood-iron pizzas. Imagine if one day it could! The other day I thought to myself about if I could replicate a wood-oven pizza by burning the pizza and leaving it in the oven slightly longer than it needed to be.
Since I was in high school my family has made a vegetable pizza (shoutout to my old babysitter Ashley for the recipe!). We would buy the pizza dough from Whole Foods.
For the last few years I have used Ashley's recipe and made it my own. I try to find the same kinds of vegetables I would normally use, but oftentimes I just use what I can get my hands on.
One thing about me is that I am lactose intolerant. Quick backstory. When I was in Italy about 10 days into my trip my stomach started hurting me a lot. I didn't feel hungry and so I thought I had caught a virus. That became a whole adventure in itself because I was on the farm in Abruzzo. I had to hike one mile down into town with my photography teacher Tom and we went to the only pharmacy in town. They only spoke Italian, so my teacher translated everything. I got some probiotics (I still have one of them at home I think) and went back up to the farm. Wow didn't realize how long this story got. Once I returned home I still thought I had a virus while I was there. It magically felt better to enjoy the rest of the trip. Fast forward five months to December when I found out I was lactose intolerant. It kind of makes sense because growing up I hated milk, so I never drank it. When I did I would put a timer on our oven for a minute and have a banana nearby to get rid of the taste. So yeah, mystery solved.
The marvelous Tom
I still have dairy here and there, but when it comes to cheese I go vegan. I've noticed that vegan cheese doesn't melt the same as regular cheese. Since I have used vegan mozzarella on pizzas, I have to get used to not having melted cheese on top. That is the frustrating thing about using vegan cheese. One thing I have learned along the way is that for leftover pizza, microwaving it can help melt the rest of the cheese (you'll thank me later).
My sister is gluten intolerant and so I used a gluten free flour when I made her own mini-pizza. It was my first time using gluten-free flour. That pizza for sure did not turn out the best compared to the ones with regular flour. I recommend researching how to make gluten free pizza, because I'm pretty sure I did something wrong. It might have needed to be cooked longer than the other pizzas.
Moving on to actually making pizza. Last year when I made pizza dough it was always thin crust. I never planned to have a certain type of crust. What I did was just search up pizza dough recipes and make whatever I found and liked. This year weirdly enough I have been only able to make thick crust pizza. So the recipe I am including for pizza dough is for thick crust.
Making pizza is very fun, but also tiresome depending on what you choose to include on your pizza. It's always more fun when someone else is helping you. At home, my mom or sister usually helps cut up the vegetables while someone else works on flattening the dough. When it comes to making pizza in my apartment I am on my own. I have accepted this fate.
Go off into the world and create your own masterpieces~~~
Pizza with vegan cheese
Thin crust pizza
Thick crust pizza
Melissa (my sister) and I with our homemade pizza.
PIZZA
Pizza dough (Thick crust)
2 cups of flour (plus flour to sprinkle)
pinch of salt
1 packet of yeast (1 tablespoon)
2 tablespoons of olive oil
Toppings
Tomato sauce
4 cloves of garlic minced
Italian seasoning
Oregano seasoning
2-3 bell peppers cut up into pieces
Mushrooms
Onions
Spinach
Basil
Mozzarella cheese (vegan or non-vegan)
1. Preheat oven to 425 degrees Fahrenheit.
2. Add sugar to a large bowl with warm water. Sprinkle yeast on top and stir everything together. Let it sit for 5 minutes
3. Add olive oil and salt and stir again.
4. Add the flour in gradually and stir it all together until it forms a dough ball.
5. Add more flour to the dough so that it doesn't stick to your hands. You can roll the dough out on a floured surface or start stretching it out with your hands.
6. Once the dough is stretched out, put olive oil to coat your pan. Place your dough on the pan and use your fingers to even and spread the dough out.
7. Add olive oil on top of the dough and then your tomato sauce. Add Italian spices and oregano on top of sauce, along with minced garlic.
8. Add any vegetables you like on top. Spread them evenly on the dough. Top with cheese.
9. Put the pizza in the oven for 30 minutes. Check once the timer goes off. If the dough is still soft keep it in for another 7 minutes.
Voila!
Margherita Pizza
Use the same recipe above for pizza dough.
Toppings
Tomato sauce (1 8 oz. can)
Italian seasoning
Oregano seasoning
Mozzarella slices (1 container)
Basil (1 cup) *pictured is 1/2 cup*
