October 27, 2006 Vol. I Issue 10

Ciao, Amici!



This month has been very exciting! Early in the month, I spent a weekend in Atlantic City, N.J. for the Atlantic City Gourmet Food and Wine Festival where I was featured as one of the celebrity chefs! Held at the A.C. Convention Center, there were exhibitors from all over the country offering delicious specialty and gourmet foods, fine wines, technologically advanced kitchenwares, confections, and lots more. I tasted bold and robust wines from vineyards right in New Jersey. I also found this incredible ergonomically designed knife that is perfect for cutting my hard, crusty Italian bread. Cutting the bread has never been more effortless. I am so excited about this product. Soon it will be up on the website for purchase so keep checking back to MariaLiberati.com! Also to be featured for sale on the website is my new line spices which I had a chance to introduce and use at the AC Festival. They’re called Sapori D’Italia. The Tuscan blend goes especially well with my bruschetta. Many of the other celebrity chefs asked if they could use my spices in their recipes on stage! Speaking of celebrity chefs, I had the amazing opportunity to meet and work with some truly inspirational people, including Christina Pirello of the television show Christina Cooks Naturally, and Cat Cora of Food Network’s Iron Chef America!



On October 14, I participated in the 5k run and benefit for Alex's Lemonade Stand. In 2000, four-year-old cancer patient Alexandra "Alex" Scott decided to operate a lemonade stand to help raise money for doctors to find a cure for kids with cancer. With the help of her older brother Patrick, the two set up their first stand on their front lawn in July 2000. Over the next four years, Alex and thousands of volunteers throughout the country held annual lemonade stands and fundraisers to continue raising money to benefit the Alex’s Lemonade Stand Foundation for childhood cancer. Though Alex passed away at the tender age of eight, she is remembered through her altruistic work and enthusiasm. Click here to donate to this worthy cause.



This past Sunday, I made an appearance at the Marlton, N.J. Barnes & Noble, and look for me this Saturday at the Barnes & Noble in Montgomeryville, Penn. where I’ll be signing copies of my book The Basic Art of Italian Cooking!
Upcoming Appearances

Saturday, October 28, 2006
Barnes & Noble – Montgomeryville, PA
1271 Knapp Road
North Wales, PA 19454
215-699-3099


Wednesday, November 15, 2006
Barnes & Noble – Rittenhouse Square
1805 Walnut Street
Philadelphia, PA 19103
215-665-0716


Saturday & Sunday, November 18-19, 2006
Pennsylvania Food & Beverage Show
York, PA


Saturday, December 2, 2006
Barnes & Noble -- Valley Forge/Devon, PA
Valley Fair
150 West Swedesford Road
Devon, PA 19333
610-695-6600


Friday, December 8, 2006
Williams-Sonoma at the King of Prussia Mall
Suite #1932
160 North Gulph Road
King Of Prussia, PA 19406
610-265-5970

Wednesday & Thursday, December 20-21, 2006
Barnes & Noble Concord Pike
4801 Concord Pike
Wilmington, DE 19803
302-478-9677

Did you know?

Did you know the Italians don’t recognize Halloween as a national holiday? However trick-or-treating is becoming more and more common for Italy’s children on All Hallow’s Eve! Italians do, however, celebrate All Saints’ Day on November 1. On this day, Catholics attend church services honoring the saints, martyrs and those who have died for the Catholic faith. The very next day, on All Souls’ Day, families prepare a special feast for the souls of the departed. They then attend church to pray for those souls. It is said these families leave their homes open for their departed friends and family who would enter and enjoy this special feast cooked just for them. But, if the family came home to find that their offerings hadn't been consumed, it meant that the spirits disapproved of their home and would work evil against them during the coming year!

Try some of these recipes for your own All Souls’ Day:

Ossa dei Morti cookies (Bones of the Dead cookies)

2 1/2 cups flour 
4 oz hazelnuts 
4 oz almonds 
2 cups sugar 
2 egg whites 
Juice of a one lemon
Butter for greasing the cookie sheet 
Flour for the cookie sheet

Begin with a large bowl: combine the flour, egg whites, sugar, and lemon juice. Work in the nuts, leaving them whole, and continue kneading until you have a fairly firm dough. 

Roll the ball of dough out with your hands on your work surface so as to obtain a snake; cut the snake into half-inch thick slices and shape the bit into bones with your hands. 

Preheat your oven to 360°. Butter your cookie sheet, dust it with flour, lay the bones on it, and bake them for about 20 minutes. Let them cool before serving them.


Fave e Aiete (Fava bean and Collard Green Soup)

14 ounces dried fava beans 
18 ounces collard greens 
2 cloves garlic, crushed 
Olive oil 
Salt to taste

Begin by rinsing the beans, removing any stones that may be mixed in with them, then put them in a pot with ample water to cover and leave them over night. Cook them the next day until tender and blend them; check seasoning. 

Pick over the collard greens, discarding any really tough ribs, wash them very well, and heat them until the wilt completely in a large pot (the water left over from the rinsing will be sufficient). Squeeze out the excess moisture and chop them coarsely. 

Reheat the bean puree. Heat about a quarter cup of olive oil in a skillet; sauté the crushed garlic until it begins to darken (don't let it brown), and then stir in the greens. Cook briskly for a few minutes, stirring to keep them from sticking, and as soon as the greens are done combine them with bean puree. Check seasoning and serve hot.


Here is this month’s mouth-watering recipe as featured in The Basic Art of Italian Cooking. This is the Italian bruschetta I made in Atlantic City and Italy this past summer:

Bruschetta Di Sapori

4 thick slices of crusty Italian bread
1 fresh, red ripe tomato
2 Tbsp extra virgin, cold-pressed olive oil
2 oz fresh mozzarella cheese
Sapori D’Italia Tuscan blend spice

Preheat oven to broil. Drizzle 1 Tbsp EVOO on a cookie sheet and place the bread slices on top. Drizzle ˝ Tbsp of EVOO on top of the bread slices.

Dice the tomato and crumble or shred the mozzarella. Spread the tomato and mozzarella pieces evenly over the four slices of Italian bread. Sprinkle on 1 tsp of Sapori D’Italia Tuscan Blend spice over the bread.

Place the bruschetta under broil until golden brown.


Keep in touch with me through my blog, which is updated weekly. Click here to view my most recent post.

Thanks for reading this month’s newsletter. If you would like to pass this along, feel free to do so!

L'appetito vien mangiando! (The more you eat, the more you want to eat!)

Amore,

Maria Liberati

About my book, The Basic Art of Italian Cooking :

This book is more than just a cookbook. It is my passion for food and cooking interweaved with stories from my past that make me who I am today. With my easy to follow recipes from a personal tour of Italy, you can experience every fresh fruit macedonia from my family's vineyard. Taste the minted pears and parmigiano antipasto. Italian cooking is never just a recipe, it is the basic art of creating something special from something simple and fresh.

Also, proceeds from the sale of each and every book go to Gilda’s Club. Gilda's Club is a special place where the focus is on living with cancer. And where men, women and children with any kind of cancer and their family members and friends can plan and build life-changing emotional and social support. Gilda's Club is named in honor of Gilda Radner, who, when describing the emotional and social support she received when she had cancer, called for such places to be made available for people with cancer and their families and friends everywhere. Although the Saturday Night Live comedian died in 1989, Gilda's spirit lives on at every Gilda's Club, where members join with other "experts" at living with cancer to both give and receive the benefits of love and laughter through the unique Gilda's Club program. Click here if you’d like to donate directly to the website.

“A fine primer for budding Italian chefs. The entertaining, informative stories that are woven into the cookbook provide a wonderful backdrop to the well-explained basic recipes of Italian cuisine.” 
—MICHAEL DEGEORGIO, executive chef at Il Cortile Restaurant, New York City,
and specialty food consultant 

“A memoir about living in Italy and the pleasures of Italian food that makes a perfect
gift. But the recipes are so delicious, you’ll want to try it first yourself.” 
—CHEF ERHARDT TELL, four-time Cordon Bleu Award winner, television chef and cookbook author

“If you want to get a sense of true authentic Italian food and the flavor of living in the mountains of the untouched regions of Italy, like Abruzzo, not only do I recommend you take the trip, but also that you make Maria Liberati’s The Basic Art of Italian Cooking part of your library.” 
—JIM COLEMAN, host of the PBS television series, Flavors of America, and executive chef at Coleman Restaurant at Normandy Farms

To buy the book everyone is talking about go to http://www.marialiberati.com/book.php.

To unsubscribe to this newsletter, http://www.marialiberati.com/unsubscribe.php.