Sicily

Pasta Three Ways:

Housemade Tomato & Sausage

Caponata Style

Alfredo Style

Ciambotta Con Carciofi (Spring Artichoke Stew)

Torte Di Ricotta with Strawberries & Pickled Rhubarb Garnish

This could have been the last week we travel across the world with food, because of the many end of school year activities already looming.  Sicily has a pretty amazing food history and, set on a latitude very close to our own,  it has a lot of recognizable ingredients that grow both there and here.  Spring was just peeking out between rainstorms, so we grabbed the opportunity to also feature spring ingredients such as baby artichokes, spring peas and rhubarb.

The most enthralling day was Thursday. We had already made our tomato sauce and caponata base, now was the time to make the sausage and pasta.  To hand crank dense dough through a pasta machine into fettucine and grind "lesser" cuts of meat into familiar looking fresh sausage (we used chicken meat, herbs, apple & liver) was spellbinding.  And very tasty on Friday.  No leftovers!