Author: dolcevitaspinelli

Cooking contest for mussel lovers

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If you like mussels, are a creative mastermind in the kitchen and want to be called the Best Belgian Mussel Chef of 2012 participating to this contest is a must!

You will be able to show your skills in front of a professional jury who will choose the best chefs. During the pre-selections you will be judged on how well you know your product and with how much respect and care you handle it. Another reason for participating you get to cook in the Miele Culinary institute  (so you’ll be using top material), get a goody bag and I didn’t even speak about what the winner gets 🙂

The competition is only for hobby chefs, so this way you get to compete against people from the same level as you…

You can subscribe and find more info for the contest via the following link and who knows; maybe you’ll be Belgium’s next Hobby Chef. Subscriptions need to be done before September 10th

For my readers from the Netherlands there is also a competition, they can check the following link for more info

Good luck!

Ristorante del grano, a lunch in paradise

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Saturday I was lucky enough to have lunch at ‘ristorante del grano’ in the middle of the wheat fields or ‘paradise’ as I would prefer calling it. My reason for being here was to try a few new creations of fresh foods producer ‘Come a Casa’ (you know, I’m sure you’ve seen them in the supermarket).

When arrived at the fields, I have to admit that I somehow indeed felt like ‘come a casa’ because the first thing I saw was a ‘Piaggio Ape’ just like my Italian grandfather used to have  (without the logo that is 🙂 )

But I came here to try some new dishes…  So let’s follow the arrow and find our way home

Somehow following the arrow seemed really like going to paradise (but this time I reaaaaally wanted to follow that light)

I have to be honest that when I got asked to try packaged lasagnas, I wasn’t too enthusiastic

I mean, being an Italian and eating lasagna that is not freshly made just doesn’t work (or so I thought)… I have never in my life eaten pre-packed lasagna’s or even other dishes. But I did want to give come a casa the benefit of the doubt, because you can’t judge a book by its cover….

So with an open mind I was ready to try the new products lasagnas ‘Come a Casa’ wanted to introduce, the ‘Lasagna Verdure’ and ‘Lasagna Bolognaise’. For both lasagnas ‘Come a Casa’ used whole wheat flour instead of regular flour to make the pasta.

Why whole wheat? It is said this is more healthy for us, so reason enough 🙂 (FYI, I personally also make my pizza dough with whole wheat flour instead of regular… for me it just gives an extra punch of flavor to your dish).

To my opinion there was no better place for the big introduction than in ‘Ristorante del Grano’

But check out the pictures and you be the judge ….

I shouldn’t forget to show you guys our little place in paradise

So setting perfect-> Check

To open our taste buds, we received some antipasti and some caprese as starter dish (For the wine lovers amongst you, we first got served a Prosecco gran Riserva with the antipasti and a 2010 Pinot Grigio  from Veneto with our starter)

But of course we were here to try the news lasagnas… (I love having more than 1 main course) a bonus was that it got served in style

First we received the Lasagna Verdure served with a 2011 organic southern Italian rosé wine:  Era Terre di Chieti

After that we tried the Lasagna bolognaise served with a 2010 Montepulciano d’Abruzzo Col di Sotto by casa vinicola Botter

I did indeed like both lasagna’s, first of all because you can taste that they used fresh ingredients and not only tomato (for the vegetable one), although I personally preferred the bolognaise, I think it is because I need meat 🙂 but I’ sure my veggie friends will enjoy the Lasagna verdure as much…

The only thing I do find strange is that the lasagna got served with salad… but as it looked so good I ate it after my lasagna’s (it would have been a crime throwing this away)

And as if this was not enough, they spoiled us with a trio of desserts lined up for us 🙂

Mascarpone with fresh strawberries and a meringue crumble, panna cotta with red fruit coulis and a classic Tiramisu.

The perfect end of a perfect lunch. If paradise would exist I sure hope it would be like the Ristorante del Grano!

Even though I would prefer making my own lasagna, BUT if I ever won’t be able to make it (or be too lazy, I admit) the Come a casa whole wheat lasagna would definitely be my first choice as a replacement… I’m sure you also won’t regret it

Thanks to the come a casa team and the wonderful hosts for all their care!

The big apple – part 1

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‘The city that never sleeps’, this is soooo true. New York is one busy city, no matter at what time you go outside there is always something to see or to do. Last month my fiancée and I decided to set sail to New York City to discover as much as possible during our 7 days in the Big Apple.

The hardest part of this trip to NYC was actually finding a hotel in a list of over 800 hotels that had a good price/ quality value. During this quest I was really surprised how expensive the hotels are in NYC (maybe another reason why this city never sleeps 🙂 ). For me it is important that the hotel (when doing a city trip) is in a good location so I can walk everywhere or at least have some good public transport connection. The room must be clean and last but not least I must be able to have breakfast. I know NYC has lots of great breakfast places, but when I wake up I need an instant breakfast fill up 🙂 otherwise I just can’t function correctly (I am one hungry man).  After a long search I did find a hotel that even topped my criteria, it was the one and only Yotel.

  • 10-15 minute walk from Time Square (where you have all subway trains at your disposal, all sightseeing busses, etc…)
  • They serve complementary muffins (10 different types) accompanied by coffee, tea, … at breakfast time

  • Has a rooftop cocktail bar (mmm, I loved their Margarita’s)

  • You can sleep up to the 27th floor (we were on the 24th floor),

  •  Very modern

  • Normal NYC price
  • Friendly staff
  • Walking distance from Broadway (I love musicals, don’t care what you think 🙂 🙂 )
  • …

Something that might initially scare you is the size of the room, but you shouldn’t be scared. I can say for a fact that the architect who has designed the rooms made sure every millimeter of the room got used in a good way and that you have all the comfort you need. If I go back to NYC, I wouldn’t doubt of staying there again.

A little tip if you go to NYC (or North America in general), no matter which kind of hotel you stay in (5 star or a B&B), you must always check the room (before putting your bags down) for Bed Bugs.  This seems to be a big problem in North America. (FYI, the Yotel didn’t have any).

Hotel -> Check

For me the best way to start your visit in NYC (or any other city of this size) is by using the sightseeing bus lines on the first day! Yes, I know it seems very touristy and usually I’m also not too keen on it. But for a city of this size taking these busses is just common sense. It helps me to get a good overview of the city, plus, during this ride I can write down the things I definitely want to see. (And as there is a tour guide on the bus you also learn some stuff). We took the Grayline on our first day and are proud of it :-).

After the first day the best en fasted way to get around is the subway or at least, that’s what we did. The NYC subway is very easy to use and it is best if you buy a pass for your whole stay (this might be most convenient)

To be continued with some great eateries and must see’s in NYC….

Walrus and me

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If you are expecting a heroic story about me and a walrus, I’ll have to disappoint you…

What I do have for you guys, is another great spot to do some nice eating, called Walrus 🙂

I actually got to know this eatery thanks to my mom, she ate at Walrus with a couple of friends and liked it. I, trusting my mom’s taste, of course wanted to try this… (just to change and not go to the same restaurants again). I can say for a fact that I officially like it :-). Summarizing my impressions: Good honest food, good portions, a pleasant environment, cute waitresses and last but not least, normal and correct prices for both the food and drinks.

I’m a quit big eater and usually feel like eating a starter, but the problem is that sometimes I’m the only one at the table to feels like eating 2 whole dishes… Lucky for me Walrus had a great solution for this, a Tapamix (with some very nasty meatballs). So the tapamix made my evening even better 🙂

Our choice of dishes tonight went to the Vol-au-vent (I really love this dish) and for my company Salmon with baby spinach and mashed potatoes. A feast for both the taste buds as the eye…

To make a long story short (or shorter, because I always like to give you guys the whole picture 🙂 )

If you don’t feel like cooking and want to have some good food in a nice environment, Walrus is the place for you…

Hope you’ll like it!

Walrus eatery

Website: http://www.eetcafewalrus.com/

Address:

Jan van Beersstraat 2

2018 Antwerp, Belgium

Phone n°: +32 (0) 3 238 39 93

 

Gnocchetti Frasca

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This recipe is actually a piece of nostalgia! Gnocchetti frasca was  one of the most requested pasta’s at my dad’s restaurant. It is simple to make, with few ingredients and very quickly made. Ideal for an evening, after a busy day. I know the spicy salami might scare you, but it won’t be too spicy at all 🙂

In case you wouldn’t find gnocchetti sardi, you can always use other dried gnocchi (not the gnocchi di patate!!!)

  • 10 slices of spicy salami (like Chorizo, or Salame piccante calabrese, …)
  • A cup of peas
  •  1 portion of saffron (you know, one of those little plastic thingies)
  • 150g of mushrooms
  •  2 tomatoes
  •  Salt & pepper
  •  ½ cube of chicken stock (, but veggie stock of beef stock)
  • Cup of cream
  • 40cl white wine
  • Olive oil
  • Gnocchetti sardi (but you could also use regular dried Gnocchi (NOT the same as gnocchi di patate!)

  • Slice the mushrooms, cut the tomatoes and salami in cubes
  • Put some olive oil in a pan and start heating your pan. Put all the vegetables and salami in the pan and let it simmer for a few minutes until most water from the tomatoes is gone

  • Add the white wine to deglaze

  • Add the cream, ½ chicken stock , salt, pepper and the saffron

  • Let it cook on lower heat for 10-15 minutes until your  sauce is thickened a bit and yellow

  • Cook your pasta ‘al dente’ and add the cooked pasta to you sauce
  • Mix it and let leave it on the low heat for a few minutes (2-3)

Only 2 things left to do and that is serve it and enjoy some good food 🙂

TheTricolere a piece of Belgian pride

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For the Belgian National celebration  the 21st of July, the fast-food chain Quick has create an exclusive burger to make the national celebration even bigger. They created the Tricolore, a hamburger in the colors of the Belgian flag. A black bun, some red tomatoes and yellow golden cheddar cheese and this for only 2,50 EUR. The best of all, it will be available from July 20th untill the 22nd in every Quick restaurant in Belgium.

FYI, Quick is also organizing a Drache contest , via the following facebook page you have to guess (before Friday) what temperature it will be on Saturday at 5 p.m. at the Royal Palace in Brussels.  The price is a  Free Quick menu for you and 20 of your friends.

Good luck and if you don’t win I hope you’ll at least be trying the Tricolore.

Tomorrowland with a Gastonomical touch

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Who knew a Festival could get a Gastronomical touch? When I think of a festival, I usually think of hot dogs, hamburgers, French fries… but certainly not of gastronomy

This year Tomorrowland decided to combine dance music with good food. During the 3 days of the festival from 27 to 29 July you’ll be able to enjoy all kinds of gastronomical food, going from a healthy or gluten free snack to a three to Michelin star meal.

Please find below a list of the gastronomical delicacies you’ll be able to enjoy during these 3 days:

Vegetarian and gluten free:

One of THE Belgium’s healthy food ambassadors Alain from the Antwerp veggie Walhalla Lombardia. FYI for the 2009 edition of tomorrowland he made a special ‘Tomorrowland Magic Mushroom’ per request of Moby. For people wanting their gluten free meal, they can already reserve it or request more info via lombardia@tomorrowland.be

Refined dining

Tommorowland also thought of the people wanting something more refined. These people will  REALLY get spoiled.

At the main stage you’ll be finding nobody less than Wout Bru with his team from the Michelin star awarded restaurant Chez Bru (located in South of France). Here you will be able to try a top dish with a nice glass of wine. For Wout, this is not the first visit to the festival, last year he served more than 1000 meals in 3days.

For our friends with a sweet tooth Tomorrowland has asked Master pastry chef Roger van Damme from restaurant ‘Het Gebaar’ (FYI, he has the only Michelin star restaurant in the world that is only open for lunch). He will be in his ‘peperkoekhuisje’ aka the house of cake from the fairy tale Hansel and Grettel , where he’ll be serving a dessert specially created for Tomorrowland

For those who want the TOP OF THE BILL, they can go for the 3 Michelin star 7 course meal at a for the moment still secret location and chef at the festival (my personal guess would be Sergio Herman)  Unfortunately only 8 lucky people will be able to enjoy this meal. What makes it even more special is that you cannot buy the seats for this meal, you can only win them. On top of the gastronomical dinner, you’ll also be getting some FULL MADNESS COMBI (VIP) tickets for the festival. More info on this later.

And as if this was not yet enough, they Tomorrowland has also forsee a Cocktail bar, where Manuel & Olivier Wouters from cocktail bar Sips will be showing the art of making cocktails (and letting everybody drink them aswell of course).

Hope this will make your Tomorrowland experience even more unforgettable! This even makes me want to go 😉

WHAT DOES THIS ALL COST?

A ticket for both restaurants (Wout Bru and Roger van Damme) can be booked via http://www.tomorrowland.be/. Wout Bru will be serving 3 dishes  for 27,5 EUR (includes a glass of wine), Roger Vandamme will be serving his dessert for 17,5 EUR including a glass of dessert wine or a cup of coffee. I’d advise you to be quick, as there limited seats available

Enjoy

My Loire valley adventure by bike: final part

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After already having had a wonderful time in the Loire, it got even better! Not only did I get to visit some of the most well-known vineyards in the Loire valley, I also got to go around the Vitiloire wine fair together with the one and only Miss Vicky Wine. For you who don’t know her, she’s the coolest wine chick in France that knows a loooooooot about wine. So lucky me :-). My preferred wine houses I got to try were Lionel Gosseaume (loved his white wines aka Les Sauterelles) and Domaine des  Ouches (for the red wines). So if you ever get the chance to try them, please do so 🙂

The next day we were all ready again to ride our bikes through more or the beautiful landscapes of the Loire Valley or better around Saumur. The architectural character of the town owes much to the fact that it is constructed almost exclusively of the beautiful, but also fragile Tuffeau stone and indeed gives a very unique touch to this region.

Not only is it known for its architectural sites, it is also well  known for its sparkeling wines. Did you know that most Champagne brands like Bollinger, Taittinger ,… own lots of vineyards in this region. They have done this as the soil caves around Saumur is perfect  are perfect to make some of the best sparkeling wines around. One of the best examples would be Langlois-Chateau (fyi, chateau is a family name, not indication of a castle), is owned by Bollinger. It is already long before it got taken over by Bollinger, that this vineyard had a big tradition in making sparkeling (since 1885) and it is indeed one of the best you’ll try and the best part is that Cremant de Loire as this wine is called is much cheaper than champagne 🙂 (I like) (FYI, their other wines are also very good)

2 Vineyards you should also try to visit are ‘Clos du Cristal’ and ‘Chateau de Targé’, there are 2 reasons for this, first of all for the wines and second of all to hear them  talk with all their passion about their life work  … oh and also because the vineyards are beautiful… I’ll let the pictures speak for me 🙂

 

In case you would feel hungry, I would suggest going to restaurant L’Hélianthe and here again, the pictures will do the talking.

I really hope that all of this has convinced you to travel to the Loire! I enjoyed it very much, even with all the effort of cycling :-). For more info on the Loire you can always look on the website of Vins de Loire

My Loire adventure by bike: part 2

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Lucky for us we could start our first day of cycling in sunny weather. For me it was a little bit to warm (or I was just dressed to warm), because it sure wasn’t because of my bad shape ;-). The first day took us from Tours to Rochecorbon

To get to our first vineyard ‘Maison Brédif’ located in Rochecorbon, we cycled through the beautiful vineyards or Vouvray. This thanks to Christophe Marzais (from Détours de Loire) our guide. What seemed for a walk in the park for Christophe, was a little tougher for the rest of us 🙂 (not the downhill part)

But the ‘paysages’ were really nice!

Where are my manners, I’ m always talking about us, but I didn’t even introduce my cycle buddies… Please find my cycle buddies on the picture below (They made the trip even better!). FYI, we just came of our bikes when this picture was taken, so nooooo judgment please 🙂

As said, our first stop was at vineyard ‘Maison Brédif’ located in Rochecorbon.  Founded in 1893!

What I liked about all the vineyards  we’ve visited (also at Maison Brédif)  is that you can really see and feel the history they’ve all been through and they have the most beautiful cellar you could possibly imagine (If I think of wine cellars, these are the ones I think about). So I would really recommend if you would come to the Loire valley, to stop at some vineyards.

Ok, now it might get a little bit technical, but what do we need to know from the region around Rochecorbon/ Vouvray? Maybe the diversity of the soil here, that changes from parcel to parcel. It goes from very sandy clay to chalky clay… which results to a big difference in the flavor the grapes will be having (even if they are the same kind of grapes). If you don’t believe me, just pick a grape on every different type of soil and compare 🙂

Even though you can also find red wines in the Vouvray region, it are mostly the white wines that are well known (and best, if you ask me). FYI, all grapes get picked by hand!

Of course we also tried wines 🙂 , that was the reason of all the effort of cycling, right? If I would and could generalize the Vourvray wines (but maybe I shouldn’t, but I will 🙂 ) I would say that most Vourvray wines are actually sweeter wines with touches of exotic fruit like pineapple or Quince .

The most special wine we were fortunate enough to taste was the Vouvray Collection from 1959, which got a cognac color during the aging process. FYI, did you know that normally white wines are better for aging for years instead of red wines?! (Neither did I, so never too old to learn). You would think it would get sweeter, but it doesn’t 🙂

After this last tasty wine at Brédif, we jumped (more or less) on our bikes to head towards the Vitiloire wine fair. But more about that in the next blogpost…

My Loire valley adventure by bike

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What does one think about when thinking of the Loire Valley? Most people (including me) would b say that the first thing they think about is castles, which is indeed something we cannot ignore. Chateau Chambord would be one of the famous ones, but there are many more beauties across the valley.

What surprises me though is that not so many people would be think of wine when they think of the Loire, unlike for example Bordeaux where people would instantly think of wine. I can say for a fact that the Loire valley is one of the regions with some of the best French wines just think of Sancerre or  Pouilly Fume as most welknown, but there are also wines like Chenin Blanc, Chinon, Cremant de Loire, Malbac,….

When they first asked me if I wanted to join to do a wine tour through the Loire valley, I didn’t hesitate long. First of all because I had never been there and secondly I was sure that I would actually see that the Loire Valley is more than ‘Chateaus ‘. What I didn’t really didn’t take into account, was that it was a tour through the Valley by bike :-).

I honestly have to admit that I have underestimated the bike ride, not that I’m so out of shape, but some of those climbing’s were pretty tough! BUT, I’m really glad that I did it by bike as I got to see things that you just would see when taking a tour bus or car. The next best thing would be doing it by Vespa 🙂

We obviously couldn’t cycle through the whole Loire valley in 2 days. For the first day the choice fell on Tours which would be seen as the capital of the Loire Valley and the second day we would be visiting the region around Saumur.

Stay tuned if you want to read more about my adventure in the Loire valley….