Hello dear,
I have two very exciting stories to tell you! Or actually, I have much more. But, because we have eight followers now, I will stick to the essentials and save the rest for one of our whisky drinking evenings. So, food related news!
Every tuesday, me and my lovely Italian friend Laura try to discover unknown Paris ground. We pick a metrostation, wander around a bit and try to find a nice coffee place. It sometimes leads us to find the most beautiful places! One fine day, for example, we were exploring Belleville and stumbled upon Rue St Marthe. The cutest little street when you least expect it! One shop on this street caught my eye: 'la tete dans les olives'. It looked just to good to be true on the outside, but just my luck, it was closed. I decided to take a picture and come back another day. Just as I was getting my camera to focus, the most charming man arrived, WITH the key to olive oil heaven! Pablo was the name. He let us in, and told us all about what was going on in there. A lot!
Walk in to this shop andyou feel like you just left Paris and arrived on Sicily. It is small, a little dark and messy in the most pleasant way. Like Pablo's great grandmother (I picture a small lady in a blue dress with no teeth left) could just walk in and start making you a pasta. One wall is covered in vats of olive oil. The oil comes from local sicilian farmers and is imported by the shop owner himself. The label on the vat will tell you who made your oil. I am always such a sucker for products with a story! And on my way out Pablo fed me some reallytasty fig and almond pastries. Good man as he is...
All this olive oil got me in a cooking mood! Reason enough to pull out my latest purchase; 'mon premier diner végétarien' by Alice Hart. 'What would be good with olive oil?', I asked my
self. Parsnip rosemary buns was the answer. Tasty, healthy and very pretty. They just need a dip in some fresh sicilian olive oil and they are good to go.
Here is how to make them:
- olive oil
- 220 g grated parsnip
- 275 g flower
- 1 TBS rosemary
- 1 tsp salt
- 2 eggs, beat
- 2 TBS milk
Preheat the oven to 190 Celsius and prepare a baking sheet. Mix the parsnip, flower, rosemary and salt in a big bowl. Make a hole in the middle. Putt the eggs and milk in the hole and mix quickly with a knife. Make sure not to over-mix. Divide the dough into 6 balls on the baking sheet. Drizzle some olive oil on them and finish them of with a sprig of rosemary.
They will need about 25-30 minutes in the oven. Until they are nicely golden. They are very tasty when slightly warm!
