Starters and not only Archivi • Cooking Classes and Private Chef In Tuscany

Bruschetta Bliss: A Taste of Tuscany through Cooking Classes

Erika Elia — Thu, 26 Oct 2023 18:28:08 +0000

Bruschetta bliss!

Under the Tuscan sun, where the air is heavy with the sweet scent of ripe tomatoes and the sound of laughter fills the rustic kitchens, there’s a dish that captures the essence of this enchanting region like no other – Bruschetta Bliss with Fresh Tomatoes and Garlic.

This is a must-try experience during your cooking classes in Tuscany, whether we’re coming to your villa or preparing it in our cooking school in Tuscany near Lucca.

The story

of this dish is one of simplicity and tradition. It’s a tale that’s been told for generations, passed down from one cook to another, each adding its own chapter to this culinary narrative.

In the heart of Tuscany, life moves at its own pace. It’s a place where the sun-ripened tomatoes are plucked from the vine, and the garlic is gathered from the garden. It’s a land where the art of cooking is about letting the ingredients shine, and the preparation is as much a part of the meal as the tasting.

The first time

I experienced Tuscan Bruschetta at my granny’s table when I was probably 1 year old. Tourists coming to Tuscany probably taste it at a quaint family-owned trattoria nestled in the rolling hills. I imagine a table set with rustic charm, and the aroma of freshly baked bread and tomatoes drifts from the kitchen.

The secret of this dish, so simple in its tasteful complexity, is profound, a celebration of the region’s bounty.

Bruschetta Bliss Recipe:

Ingredients:

4 ripe tomatoes, preferably San Marzano
1 clove of garlic, peeled
A handful of fresh basil leaves
Extra virgin olive oil
Salt and pepper to taste
1 baguette of rustic Italian bread, sliced

Instructions:

1. Prepare the Tomatoes:

Begin with the ripe tomatoes. Rinse them and remove the stems. Then, chop them into small, delectable cubes (or thin slices)

2. Create the Tomato Mixture:

In a bowl, mix the diced tomatoes with a generous drizzle of extra virgin olive oil, and add a pinch of salt and pepper to taste. Stir gently, allowing the flavors to meld together in a dance of bruschetta bliss. Cover with a film and let it rest for at least 30 minutes.

3. Toast the Bread:

Slice the baguette or rustic Italian bread into thick, inviting pieces. Toast them lightly – whether on the grill, under the broiler, or in a pan with a hint of olive oil – until they are beautifully golden and crisp.

4. Rub with Garlic:

While the bread is still warm, take the peeled garlic clove and gently rub it over one side of each slice. This step imparts a subtle, delightful hint of garlic and sets the stage for your bruschetta bliss.

5. Assemble the Bruschetta:

Arrange the toasted bread on a platter, garlic-rubbed side up.
Now, lovingly spoon the tomato mixture generously over each slice, allowing the juicy tomatoes to marry with the crisp bread in a symphony of bruschetta.
For the finishing touch, tear fresh basil leaves and scatter them over the top, adding a burst of color and a touch of freshness to your bruschetta bliss.

6. Drizzle with Olive Oil:

Conclude by drizzling a bit more extra virgin olive oil over the top, creating a lustrous sheen and enhancing your bruschetta bliss with that distinct Tuscan flavor.

7. Serve and Savor:

Serve your Tuscan Bruschetta immediately, while the bread is still warm and the tomatoes are at their most vibrant. Let each bite carry you into a world of bruschetta bliss.

Tuscan Bruschetta with Fresh Tomatoes and Garlic is more than just an appetizer; it’s a sensory journey through the sun-drenched landscapes of Tuscany. It’s a reminder that the most beautiful dishes are often the simplest and that food is a way to connect with a place, its people, and its timeless traditions. With every bite, you can taste the rich history and warm hospitality of this remarkable region. In Tuscany, every bite of this dish is a bite of bruschetta bliss, a taste of the artistry that is Tuscan cuisine.

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Italian Aperitivo: Gougeres (french cheese puffs) cooking class in Tuscany

Erika Elia — Thu, 18 Nov 2021 15:00:26 +0000

Italian Aperitivo: Gougeres (French cheese puffs)

Running Cooking Classes in Tuscany often means toasting with an aperitif in your hands, together with your students.

Sometimes we toast throughout Tuscany due to my work as a traveling chef, other times we toast directly in the kitchen of the “Cuoche in Vacanza” Cooking School and B&B near Lucca.

Well, for sure we had a great Italian Aperitivo last week. It was the starter for a buffet of about 30 people. The closing of a master’s degree at the University of Genoa was celebrated.

So, the Italian Aperitivo: Gougeres is very fashionable in recent times. I have learned these french cheese puffs directly from my stepmother who is from Dijon in Burgundy where they originate. For the buffet that I prepared, I decided to accompany them with an excellent smoked salmon.

Well, in Italy, we put the Gougeres over a charcuterie board with delicious cold cuts and also precisely with the smoked salmon.

Follow the steps one by one and you will have one of the most delicious things in the world.

Buon Appetito!

GOUGERES (french cheese puffs)

INGREDIENTS

5 oz (150 gr) flour

5 oz (150 gr) groviera or emmenthal or maasdam cheese

2 oz (60 gr) butter

1 cup (250 ml) water

1 pinch nutmeg

to taste salt, pepper

4 whole eggs

1 yolk for brushing

METHOD

Boil water + butter

Add the flour in one stroke and whisk well

Pour 1 egg till incorporated … proceed with one egg at a time till they’re finished.

Add 3⁄4 of the groviera and the nutmeg and mix again

Switch on the oven 392°F (200°C)

Grease a baking tray with butter (you can also use baking paper)

Spoon the pasta on the tray (help yourself with a teaspoon to expel the dough from the spoon in one move)

Spread the remaining cheese on the top

Brush (if you like) the yolk on the top before baking

Bake at 392 °F (200 °C) for 30 minutes (fan)

Important Recommendations

Before switching off the oven, check the gougeres are well baked on the bottom and touch the top that should be hard (not elastic).

Turn off the oven and let them dry and cool inside the oven, with the oven door slightly open

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Italian Flag Appetizer in a glass

Erika Elia — Fri, 01 Oct 2021 18:13:39 +0000

Some time ago I prepared this Italian flag appetizer in a glass.

As an itinerant Chef, I was in the countryside near Viareggio. They called me as a Private Chef at their villa in Tuscany and I posted this photo on my Facebook Page .

Simple is not easy

Many keep asking me for the recipe. I am very happy to share it with you. Allow me to remind you that everything I prepare is simple, but the ingredients must be of the highest quality.

This appetizer is so nice to see and recalls the colors of the Italian flag: that’s why the name.

Maybe I’ll do soon a Facebook Streaming and we’ll prepare this together. Let me know if you like the idea. You know last year I did a lot of free Facebook Streamings from my Dolce Vita in Tuscany B&B and Cooking School; I’ll restart them soon guys.

Always Simple and Healthy dishes from Italy!

Well, while I am here I also dust off my grandmother’s sentence: SIMPLE DOES NOT MEAN EASY.

Enjoy your meal guys! English for: BUON APPETITO RAGAZZI!

Click to view slideshow.

Italian flag appetizer in a glass

INGREDIENTS (about 15 PEOPLE)

1 pound fresh mozzarella fiordilatte
1 cup heavy cream
30-35 cherry tomatoes
small basil leaves to decorate
4 tbsp brown sugar
to taste salt and pepper
to taste extra virgin oil
9 oz salted Taralli

METHOD

cut the tomatoes in half. Place them with the moist side up on a sheet of parchment paper. Sprinkle a little salt, then the sugar, and a drizzle of oil.
Bake them at 180 °C, 356 °F for about 20 minutes, fan. Anyway, until they are slightly browned at the base and a little dried out.
Whip the cream
Blend the mozzarella in a robot until you get a cream. Season with salt and pepper.
Incorporate the whipped cream into the mozzarella cream to obtain a mousse
Coarsely chop the taralli until crumbs
Season the crumbs of taralli with extra virgin olive oil

TO ASSEMBLE

On each small glass for appetizer place:
a layer of taralli crumbs
the mousse (if desired with the sac a poche), which fills the glass,
sprinkle with a few crumbs of taralli
add 2 or 3 pieces of confit cherry tomatoes
decorate with basil leaves
season with a drizzle of extra virgin olive oil
Enjoy your meal!

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Focaccia Pugliese online cooking Class, cooking school in Tuscany

Erika Elia — Fri, 25 Sep 2020 08:31:58 +0000

Focaccia Pugliese online cooking class is my last live stream. In fact, I’m making many Italian and Tuscan recipes directly from the kitchen of my Cooking School and B&B in Tuscany.

Someone prefers Watching a Video

Well, as a chef, I can say that many people prefer watching a video, then stop each step and follow the procedure. Furthermore, in this way, you can easily understand the “right way” to handle an ingredient. So, watching a video means that you can notice many suggestions and tricks that you are not able to understand just reading a recipe. At which level of the oven to bake, for example, and how long. Well, often this is not written in a recipe, but watching a video you can’t forget it. So you know how much is important, right?

Some others prefer reading and print the recipe

On the other hand, some others prefer to read and print the recipes. They want to bring a paper with them, maybe near the stove, without thinking of watching too far from where they’re cooking.

Focaccia Pugliese online cooking Class: “Dolce Vita in Tuscany” Cooking School

Recipe Type: Appetizer

Cuisine: Italian

Author: Erika Elia (Cuoche in Vacanza)

Prep time: 15 mins

Cook time: 25 mins

Total time: 40 mins

Serves: 6

Ingredients

3¾ cups durum flour or all-purpose flour (1 pound + 3 tbsp); 500 grams flour type 0
1½ cups + 2 Tablespoons; 400 mL warm water
4 oz; 100 gr potatoes (1 potato)
1 tsp; 4 grams active dry yeast
1 tsp honey
1 tsp salt
50 gr; 2 oz EVOO (and some more to grease the tray)
1 pound, 500gr cherry tomatoes
Oregano (fresh or dried)
8-10 Olives (no bone)
to taste capers

Instructions

Boil and mash the potatoes
Pour the flour on the pastry board, make a well and add the mashed potatoes. Start kneading pouring 1 tbsp of water. Dissolve the yeast in the other tbsp of water and continue to knead adding the honey, the evo oil, and the salt.
As you’ll obtain a soft and wet leaf, grease a baking tray with some evo oil and spread your dough with your hands. Flip the spread dough, and put some oil again, so there’s oil on both sides.
Add the cherry tomatoes cut in half, the olives, the capers, and the oregano if you like it.
In the video, I put these ingredients as decoration.
Wait that it raises for about 2 or 3 hours (depending on the room temperature).
Anyway, it has to duplicate to achieve the right texture.
Bake in the oven at 392 °F (200 °C), 482 °F (250 °C) for about 25 minutes.

This Focaccia Pugliese online cooking class had great success and many views on Facebook streaming. By following the steps, you will learn how to make soft and tasty focaccia. The ingredients are the original ones and here in Italy, they are among the best you can find.
Enjoy your meal!

You can be interested also in:

Pizza,

Pizza tricks and tips

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Hot Seafood Starter from Italy

Erika Elia — Thu, 15 Mar 2018 17:00:00 +0000

Hot seafood starter was invented by Nonna Rossi (my mother-in-law); she is one of the best cooks I ever met.

She’s one of us: Cuoche in Vacanza (Chefs and cooking classes in Tuscany). We can come to your home vacation in Tuscany OR you come to our Cooking School and B&B near Lucca: Dolce Vita Cooking School in Tuscany.

Well, this starter is so easy and so amazing, let me recommend you to definitely buy fresh seafood. The taste is magic, like having a gorgeous dinner at a restaurant. Here in Italy, for example, the hot seafood starter is a must in the menu of a fish restaurant. Even if you don’t love to cook, I’m sure you’ll obtain something to remember and to offer to your family and friends.

Buon Appetito!

Hot Seafood Starter

Recipe by Erika Elia (CuocheinVacanza.com)

Prep time: 20 minutes
Cook time: 15 minutes
Total time: 35 minutes
Serves:

Ingredients

Mussels 1 Kg
King Prawns 500 gr
Squids 500 gr
Cuttlefish 500 gr
Octopus 600 gr
Sea bass 500 gr
Cherry Tomatoes 500 gr
Parsley

Instructions

Fillet and cook the sea bass steamed for 15 minutes. Cut in small pieces and let it warm.

Chop the squid and the cuttlefish, blanch them for about 10 minutes.

Drain it and set it apart with the sea bass. Season with salt, extra virgin olive oil, and a little pepper.
Meanwhile, in a large pan, let the mussels open, with a clove of chopped garlic and 1/2 glass of white wine; cover the pan. It’ll take around 5 minutes.
Once opened, let the mussels in the pan, out of the heat.

In another small pan pour oil extra virgin olive oil and a clove of crushed garlic; when it’s hot, pour in the king prawns. It takes about 3 minutes of cooking.
Drain the mussels.
Put everything in a large tray and season with the oil of the prawns, some more extra virgin olive oil, salt, and pepper.

Cherry tomatoes on the top!
Don’t forget to sprinkle with chopped parsley.

Hot seafood starter is ready!

L’antipasto di mare caldo è pronto!

Hot Seafood Starter!

Did you know Hot Seafood Starter?

How is your fav way to taste sea fruit or seafood starters?

Please leave a comment below, I’ll answer you asap!

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Calci (Pisa) discovering and cooking wild Herbs in Tuscany

Erika Elia — Thu, 21 Nov 2013 10:12:00 +0000

It is a splendid new course/cooking class that I was able to create Thanks to the help of an expert herbalist: Maurizio.

Cooking wild herbs is the end of a marvelous walking in Nature here in Tuscany hills.

What we’re going to do during this “wild herbs” Cooking Class

Course duration: 3 hours about

recognize and distinguish the herbs we meet along the way
collect herbs and create a Menu with herbs and flowers collected
arrive at an old country house among the olive trees where we’ll cook herbs and enjoy the meal together

Contact me to learn more
Last Sunday I lived a really amazing experience. I’m not exaggerating, I sincerely can say that I couldn’t imagine feeling so good with some people, inside nature, knowing and learning all the species of wild herbs that you can find here in Tuscany, during this period, the Autumn.

Finally an authentic experience

I was lucky to meet Maurizio, a farmer who lives in daily contact with the seasons and with the natural wonders.

You can learn so much from people like him. And it’s really prepared on the subject of wild plants and has the ability to teach you recognizing a plant, almost as if it were the easiest thing in the world.
I must say that it is open to me a marvelous view, made of colors, odors, but especially the fact of “this hidden nature” (wild herbs), that yesterday I just lazily watched distractedly. The world of wild plants is truly extraordinary. And the thing that excited me most is the fact that many plants that we have seen can be eaten and are delicious!

After we picked them, in fact, we continued our walk toward Maurizio’s home, which lives in an old stone farmhouse surrounded by olive groves.

Cooking wild herbs

Once there, we cleaned herbs and cooked them in various ways:– With the milk thistle and wild carrot we prepared a beat, and then we fried them in a pan. Afterwhile we seasoned with this sauce some bread slices (homemade and cooked in a wood oven bread!) and Maurizio has dusted over this marvel some calendula petals. Rating: 10 cum laude– We prepared a mixture with raw herbs, those most tender (sorrel, lamb’s lettuce, wild leek, catnip, dandelion…) and then we seasoned them with olive oil, salt, and pepper. At this point, we put on the bread (cut into slices) some milky mozzarella and we seasoned it with fresh herbs.
Rating: 10
The undisputed star was, however, basmati rice, which we cooked with a little water. In the meantime, we put on the fire, in a large pan, a little ‘oil and half a cup of water and then the herbs to cook, cut. Once cooked (about 15 minutes), we flip into the pan with the rice (cooked and drained of its water)

Rating: 10 cum laude

We also tasted my Focaccia (natural yeast) with fresh tomatoes and extra virgin oil, after warmed it a bit in a large pan.

This course on the herbs with a walk in the fields, and the beautiful house where we enjoyed some real delicacies were a really fantastic experience and they enriched me so much. I think Maurizio lives giving importance to what really has, I believe he discovered the meaning of life, unlike many of us.

That’s why I brought this authentic experience to my “students” in cooking classes in Tuscany.

I’m at your disposal for any further information. Anyway, do not hesitate to read HERE. I really recommend this experience as is possible.

Erika Elia

info@cuocheinvacanza.it

www.cuocheinvacanza.it

Salva

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Artusi Cibreo Sauce – Classic Recipe from Tuscany

Erika Elia — Thu, 21 Feb 2013 16:26:00 +0000

Artusi Cibreo sauce is one of Tuscany’s most treasured culinary traditions.

Simple yet elegant, it captures the essence of Italian home cooking while showcasing the richness of classic flavors. Every bite brings a taste of Tuscany straight to your table. And this is probably the reason for its success in our private dinners around Tuscany.

A Classic Tuscan Delight

The sauce takes its name from Pellegrino Artusi, the father of modern Italian cuisine, who carefully documented it in his timeless cookbook. Prepared with chicken liver, combs, and sometimes yolks, the Artusi Cibreo sauce is delicate, rich, and surprisingly versatile. It was historically served to those in need of gentle, nourishing food, including convalescents. Today, it remains a highlight of Tuscan gastronomy and a favorite among both locals and visitors.

Cibreo Sauce

Ingredients and Preparation

One famous modern example is Chef Fabio Picchi, whose Florence restaurant, Cibreo, is a testament to the enduring appeal of this recipe. Following the traditional steps, I prepare the sauce with precision, letting the natural flavors shine. Start by blanching the combs, chopping the livers, and cooking them gently with butter. Season with salt, pepper, and broth to keep everything moist. Finish with egg yolks, flour, and lemon juice whisked into a smooth sauce, poured over the giblets. The result is creamy, flavorful, and unmistakably Tuscan.

If you want to experience authentic Tuscan cooking at home, learning the Artusi Cibreo sauce is a perfect place to start. This recipe connects you to centuries of culinary tradition, letting you bring Italy’s history and taste to your own table.

For anyone exploring Tuscan cuisine, mastering the Artusi Cibreo sauce is more than just learning a recipe—it’s about understanding the rhythms of the kitchen, the care for each ingredient, and the respect for tradition. Every step teaches patience, balance, and attention to detail, values that define the heart of Tuscan cooking.

Once prepared, the Artusi Cibreo sauce can be served over simple toasted bread, fresh pasta, or alongside roasted vegetables, highlighting its versatility. It’s a dish that invites sharing, conversation, and connection around the table. For those cooking at home, this sauce offers a small yet profound window into Italian culinary heritage, combining simplicity, flavor, and history in every bite.

Salva

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