Very soon, I will be boarding a plane for a flight to Rome.

I will be spending my very first Christmas outside Canada. I will be spending my holidays, along with my mother and brother, in the loving company of my father’s family in Ascoli Piceno.

We’ve been planning this trip for months and even though the time to depart is here, it still seems a bit unbelievable to me.

Then again, it’s hard for me to believe that it’s been ten years since my beloved papa’ left us.

Most often, at this time of year, I find myself trying to focus on the year that was and the year ahead. Through it all, though, is the one constant: my wish for all the people that I love and care about.

This holiday season, I wish them all joy, light and warmth.

I won’t be around for the next three weeks or so and this little spot will be fairly quiet.

But my wish for you is that you are surrounded by the ones that you love with much good food and much laughter.

Happy Holidays and all the best to all of you!

Ciao!

Chocolate Meringue Cookies
Recipe from Biscotti: Recipes from the Kitchen of The American Academy in Rome, The Rome Sustainable Food Project.

2.5 cups sugar
4 tbsp. unsweetened cocoa (not Dutch-processed)
1/4 tsp. cinnamon
8 egg whites, room temperature
1/2 tsp. salt
6 oz. semi-sweet or bittersweet chocolate, melted

Preheat oven to 225 degrees F; line two baking sheets with parchment paper.

Combine sugar, cocoa and cinnamon in a bowl; set aside.

In the bowl of a stand mixer, with the whisk attachment, whisk the egg whites until frothy. Add the salt and whisk at high speed until soft peaks form.

Slowly add the sugar/cocoa/cinnamon mixture, in a steady stream, with the mixer at medium speed. Increase speed to high and continue whipping until stiff peaks form and the meringue is glossy. With a rubber spatula clean the sides of the bowl to ensure that everything is fully incorporated.

Using a pastry bag fitted with a tip of your choice (I used a star-shaped tip), place the meringue mixture in the pastry bag and pipe out cookies in whatever design you like. Be sure to leave a few inches between each meringue cookie.

Bake the cookies for approximately an hour and 10 minutes and then turn the oven off. Let the cookies cool in the oven for one hour. Remove from the oven and transfer the meringue cookies to a wire rack to continue cooling. Leave overnight so that the cookies will dry out completely.

If you wish, you can dip the bottom of the cookies in melted chocolate or drizzle melted chocolate on top for some extra dazzle.

Cookies should be stored in an airtight container and will keep for a week or so.

Enjoy!

Wowza!

What exactly happened to 2011?

I feel like it was just yesterday that I was making all sorts of plans for 2011, imagining what the year ahead would hold.

Well … here we are. Once again I find myself staring out at the horizon as a new year slowly starts to make itself known.

Like every year, 2011 was unique. It had its good moments and bad, it had its ups and downs, it had its highlights and its moments that I’d rather forget. My family is with me and everyone is safe and moving forward so that, in of itself, is a blessing.

I once had a boss who gave me a very helpful bit of advice. She told me that every day, no matter how good or bad, I should always try to make note of something new. She wasn’t referring to anything work-related. What she meant was that each day, as I go about my business, to take the time to acknowledge something new.

I try, very hard, to take time each day to acknowledge new things and to also be aware of what I’m grateful for. We spend so much time rushing through life that it often feels like we’re not actually living. We’re just rushing through.

As I prepare for Christmas in Italy, I’m trying to really focus on the here and now and to be gateful for my family, my friends and my life.

As for my blog, this hasn’t been the greatest of years for Cream Puffs in Venice. It’s not that anything bad has happened it’s just that work priorities and other life priorities have meant that I’ve had less time than ever to blog.

And that’s okay.

I’m still so grateful for this space and for those of you that make it a pleasant place to inhabit.

This will be the last edition of Magazine Mondays for 2011 - I’m hoping that the “little non-event that could” will come back bigger and stronger in 2012.

I’m happy to say that the last MM of 2011 is a great one, with this delicious Maple-Walnut Cake with Brown-Sugar Frosting from the November 2011 issue of Everyday Food.

I’m a maple syrup fiend, and yet I rarely bake with it. Generally, I use maple syrup to lather pancakes and waffles but this time around I used a generous amount to flavour a cake and the end result was so delicious.

I hope that your holiday season is filled with many delicious sweet things!

Here’s the final round-up of MM participants for 2011:

Valerie of Sex, Food, and Rock & Roll made Basic Marinara from a January 2005 issue of Gourmet.

Susan of Wish Upon a Dish made a Raspberry Buttermilk Cake from a June 2009 issue of Gourmet.

Poppy of Poppy’s Patisserie made the Dense and Dark Chocolate Loaf Cake from a February 2009 issue of BBC Good Food Magazine.

Di from Di’s Kitchen Notebook made Triple Chocolate Cookies from Cook’s Country.

Bridget of Meals on Winthrop made Divine Dressing from the December 2010 issue of Bon Appétit.

I wish you all an amazing week!

Ciao!

December 1st is probably one of my favourite days of the year. Not only does it mark the end of November (always a tough month for my family), but it marks the beginning of the holiday season.

I always give people fair warning. If you’re in my presence from December 1st onward you are more than likely to be exposed to 24-hour Christmas music stations, non-stop discussion of cookie baking, musings about what the best options are for Christmas Eve dessert and incessant calendar-watching as I strategize about what days are best to make the various holiday treats that my family makes every year at this time.

Well … this December is going to be just a little bit different. Oh, there will be non-stop Christmas carols and cookie-baking to be sure, but it’s all going to be taking place on another continent.

For the first time in my life, I will be spending Christmas in Italy with my father’s family.

My mother, my brother and I will all be flying over in a few short weeks where we’ll have the opportunity to enjoy a truly Italian Christmas.

Part of me still can’t believe that this is truly going to happen. I keep looking at our plane tickets and asking myself, “Am I really getting on an airpline in a few weeks to travel to Italy for Christmas?”

While I have had the priviledge of the most beautiful Christmas celebrations with my mother’s family, there has always been a little voice inside that has urged me to spend at least one Christmas in Le Marche. Having lost my father ten years ago this past November, it seems that much more important that I finally make this dream come true.

Last weekend, I called my aunts and uncles in Italy and could barely contain my excitement. While I look forward to seeing what Ascoli Piceno will look like all dressed up for Christmas, and while I can’t wait to see my family again, truly what I am most looking forward to is the chance to be in the kitchen with my aunts and my mother.

As I get older and as I watch my aunts get older, I come to cherish more and more the time that I can spend with them. My favourite moments with them are always in the kitchen, where they are most relaxed and comfortable. It’s there that they feed both my tummy and my soul with their beautiful ways and their incredible stories.

I cannot wait.

But even though I won’t be here for Christmas, that does not mean that I won’t be doing at least a litle baking before I go.

In the spirit of my upcoming Italian Christmas adventure, I got the baking season off to a start with a traditional Italian cookie that I have actually never baked before: Mustazzoli.

I followed the recipe in Francine Segan’s tremendous Dolci: Italy’s Sweets.

Made with buckwheat honey and flour, this was a most interesting cooking to make. While I have tasted Mustazzoli before, this was my first time making them. The dough was certainly a bit challenging as it was a bit sticky. I shaped it into a log and scored it to make slicing easier once baked.

The cookie had a spongy, chewy texture and a deep honey flavour. It’s certainly unusual but I’m so glad that I tried the recipe.

While I was preparing to make the Mustazzoli, I decided to look through some of my other Italian cookbooks and happened upon a recipe for Mostaccioli in Gina DePalma’s Dolce Italiano: Desserts from the Babbo Kitchen. Interestingly, in the head note to her recipe, DePalma mentions that the number of variations that she found for this particular cookie was staggering. Her own variation includes spices, nuts and chocolate!

Whether you know them as Mustazzoli or Mostaccioli, I hope you’ll find a recipe that intrigues you and give it a try.

In the meantime, let the Christmas baking begin. After all, it is the most wonderful time of the year!

Ciao!

Here are some Mustazzoli/Mostaccioli recipes that you might be interested in:

Mustazzoli - Honey Bread

Mustazzoli

Mustazzoli - Quanto Basta

Mostaccioli - Canadian Living