Tag: italian dessert

Stroopwafel Cannoli

Cannoli!! I always manage to spell it wrong (that’s 2 n’s,  not l’s, and the plural form is also cannoli!), even though I’ve made them before, in the form of these adorable Torah cannoli!

Of course my love for this fabulous dessert was reignited on my recent trip to Italy, where I saw cannoli in many forms in bakeries and pizza shops alike. Many were topped with crushed pistachios, or folded with Luxardo cherries, mmm mmmm….

I was especially excited to try these with the latest snack to hit the kosher market, stroopwafels! Stroopwafels have nothing to do with cannoli, in fact they come from The Netherlands, where they place the caramel-stuffed wafers on their coffee to warm them up in the morning. A stroopwafel, literally “syrup waffle”, is a wafer waffle made from two thin layers of baked dough joined by a caramel filling. First made in the Dutch city of Gouda, stroopwafels are popular throughout the Netherlands and is a well-known Dutch snack.

When I first tried stroopwafels, I realized that they would make the perfect cannoli wrapper if I soften them in the microwave to make them pliable, and boy was I right! So you get the best of cannoli, with a sweetened ricotta filling, and the best of stroopwafel, with a crispy wafer reminiscent of Lotus cookies, stuffed with a gooey caramel. I mean what’s not to love?!

And to top it all off, as an homage to my Italy trip, I even made my own homemade ricotta! I’ve been dreaming about it ever since eating the herbed baked ricotta at the kosher winery in Tuscany, Cantina Giuliano, and I had so much extra milk so I just went for it. Making homemade ricotta is super easy! So enjoy the bonus recipe below.

Some other fun things to do with stroopwafels while we’re at it… make smores! or ice cream sandwiches (chipwiches, anyone?!). They come in single portion-control packages of two, or family packs of 8, so look for them in your local supermarket!

As for these adorable plates, it’s Walmart for the win! I love when I find great prop finds at the most unexpected places and these are just everything. Freeform. Fun patterns. Black and white. Just. My. Jam.

Speaking of jam, feel free to swirl in some good quality jam, or make some Stroopwafel PB&J’s! Omg, how good would that be? Yes please!!

buon appetito!

This post is sponsored by Smackin’ Good. All opinions are my own.

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Fourth of July Tartufo

If you’re looking at the screen quizzically wondering what tartufo is, don’t worry. I didn’t know what it was until recently either! A few weeks ago, a few kosher bloggers and I went out to celebrate the anniversary of the Kosher Connection group. It’s a team of kosher food bloggers that joined together to help each other navigate the blogging world. If you follow my blog, you may have noticed our monthly link-up challenges.

We met at Siena’s restaurant in Brooklyn, to celebrate the partnerships and friends we have made over the past year. Siena served us a variety of dishes, sampling their Italian and Mediterranean cuisine. Some of the highlight dishes included their fried zucchini chips with homemade marinara, a medley of fresh salads, ravioli cooked to perfection and a standout tuna steak over white beans and spinach.

For dessert, we were served a tasting of their finest sweets including cheesecake, tiramisu and tartufo. I had to ask the waiter to repeat himself, as I’d never heard of it before. It was a layered ice cream dessert with marachino cherries and vanilla ice cream at the base and pistachio ice cream on top. It was served as a rectangular slice and drizzled with chocolate. The ice cream was delicious, but I couldn’t get over the pretty presentation. After a few hours milling over the tartufo concept (and browsing the internet for every tartufo recipe I could find) – I had a stroke of genius. Why not find blue maraschino cherries, and layer red and white frozen desserts in celebration of Independence day?

I was so excited about my idea that I went straight for the grocery in search of blue maraschino cherries. Little did I know that kosher ones are not that easy to find. So, I did what any idea-obsessed blogger would do…research. I found a kosher company that makes maraschino cherries in a variety of colors and I called them up. I asked where I might find the blue ones in Brooklyn, and they gave me two different locations. I was on it. The next day, I drove out to a shady little store on Coney Island and picked up my loot. I drove straight home, my ice cream already thawing on the counter.

When I uncovered my tartufo the next day, I never imagined it would turn out so pretty. Sure, it wasn’t perfect. The ice cream layers had sunken into each other, and the maraschino cherries peeked out a tad too little. But still. My experiment had worked. Wonderfully. Happy 4th of July!

1 year ago: snap pea, corn & red currant salad
2 years ago: grilled chickpea burgers

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