Beautiful summer mornings

Good morning! I have been admiring the leaves in my garden. There's something about nature that is just hard to understand. It is so lovely in its simplicity. Enjoy these photos.

Can you see the Little water droplets waiting to drop from this beautiful leaf on this dewey morning?

Have a great day!

Seaside redux

Well. This is a new culinary adventure. CC and I are making zucchini spaghetti? Yes, that's right. Zucchini spaghetti. For you gluten-free fans or vegetarians this is your dish.

I got CC this nifty little tool which makes spaghetti out of a half of zucchini; she was skeptical at first but then saw how well it worked. I was the sous chef with the knife to trim the ends and separate onto the paper towels to be roasted.

Then it goes in the oven to be roasted on 200° for 30 minutes so that you dry it out. The zucchini has a lot of water in it!  It might even take longer to get it to dried out. This is so it's not wet when you add the sauce.

So we decided to make an old Italian favorite. We learned this in 2001 a cooking school in Florence. Sharon Oddsson was our chef teacher. She created this recipe for her husband Juliano Garga's restaurant Garga.  It is called Mmagnifico with a cream sauce with citrus. Quite delightful on top of the zucchini spaghetti. The side was grilled fish. Delicious! 

More soon...

Thoughts Of Italy

I have missed Italy like never before. The wonderful mornings, the coffee, the food, the people. It seems everything I try, I keep comparing it to our experience as in  "when we were in Italy".
The first days we were home, we were in New York. During that very first morning I wandered around  looking for a perfect cappuccino, window shopping, thinking of morning walks in Rome.
These photos try to capture that most lovely New York morning. I found many Big City comparisons. Here are a few photos that capture it:

NYC Buildings covered with greens ...

or in  ROME...just like around the corner from our spot near the Pantheon...

Lovely  NYC door  pulls   ....Note that is Cardinal's RED 

Or in ROME...

In NYC Musicians playing right on the street...

 the Flat iron building and it's regular Art display. Just like in Rome... Art in place...

 an explanation of the beautiful exhibit

Florence...

or ROME...

NYC Fashion models on the street...

 Look at those legs...

or in ROME...

NYC Italian wine stores trying to tempt us to try more Italian Wines...

or in Rome
at Roscioli...

In NYC ...Beautiful gardens... aren't those Alliums stunning at Gramercy Park?

or in ROME... at the Vatican gardens...

 as seen on just a morning stroll...

Eataly offering to fly me back to Italy while waiting for the market to open...

waiting for American opening  times... in Italy they open the market at 6am ...I wanted pasta and mushrooms...

or in FLORENCE and ROME:

Firenze Mercato...

mushrooms...like fresh procini...

 a different idea of picking up pasta...

 That is Claudio and his wife Alma making my caffe...

multiple markets around Rome... Campo di Fiore

 near the  Spanish Steps...

Trying to find a perfect morning coffee at Friend of the Farmer ( our meal was wonderful...)
in Gramercy. The cappuccino at TazzA D'Oro in Rome was um ...a bit better...

or in Rome and Florence...

OK , well lots to good things can be found in New York also...I suppose.
Ciao...