Cari amici!

Hello, dear friends and readers! This month of February we have been busy cooking up pasta dishes for simple dinners, such a comfort during the cold temperatures we've experienced this winter. In keeping with the 2025 Jubilee Year and the call to visit Rome, we have revisited the Fab Four of Roma. The 'Fab Four' aren't the Beatles here, but the four classic Roman pasta dishes: Cacio e Pepe, Gricia, Carbonara, and Amatriciana. All four are classic Italian sauces: 3 or 4 ingredients, put together in the simplest of ways.

Gricia is probably the least well-known of these dishes but one of our favorites. Chunks of guanciale (cured pork cheek) are sauteed in olive oil to render the fat, the spaghetti is added with some pasta water and cooked to form an emulsion. Amatriciana is made by the simple addition of tomato sauce. Carbonara adds an egg yolk instead of the tomato. All three are finished with a healthy grating of Pecorino Romano cheese. Cacio e Pepe is just Pecorino Romano and black pepper, tossed with pasta water til the cheese coats the spaghetti. We have received many requests for a recipe for cacio e pepe, so here it is along with some helpful tips!

Another comfort food we've had a turn with this month - chocolate! It's always a good idea and truthfully, it makes you feel better, right?! We can't wait until our spring Piedmont tours where we'll visit an artisan chocolate factory and enjoy the local chocolate dessert, bunette. We've resurrected this molten chocolate cake recipe (from chef Jean-Georges Vongerichten, grazie!) during the holidays and have continued making it. Below is the recipe for Molten Chocolate cakes, incredibly easy to prepare and always impressive. It's a perfect finish to a winter meal. Serve with a dessert wine like Bracchetto d'Acqui from Piedmont and you've got an elegant finish!

You've probably heard about the 2025 Jubilee year and how hordes of people will be descending on Rome. Visitors will most likely be spread throughout the year and so far, indications are that crowds won't be any more crazy than normal in Rome!

There's so much to see in Italy that are off the main tourist track of Rome - Florence - Venice (and now Cinque Terre and Amalfi) and visiting Italy off a cruise ship isn’t a real Italian experience. Join us on one of our small-group tours to see other regions and gain a deeper understanding of the uniqueness of the each region, its culture and its foods and wines.

Our 2026 dates are out and the Emilia Romagna spring tour is back by request!  We also have an optional 3 day tour of the Alto Adige and Dolomites! Check out below and on our website!

Buon appetito!

Gina and Mary

Cacio e pepe

Cacio e Pepe, the creamy pasta dish from central Italy, continues to take America by storm. Made with just 4 ingredients, it is notoriously difficult to execute. The right pecorino cheese, freshly grated black pepper, good quality spaghetti, tossed with the pasta cooking water will render a creamy and rich dish that you’ll be craving again and again. 

The best pasta to use is a thick spaghetti, preferably one that is bronze-cut and slow dried. This production method originated in southern Italy and produces a pasta that holds onto the sauce and has a nice chewiness. Pasta that would not be good with this sauce are large tubes (rigatoni, pacceri or ziti) or fine angel hair or capellini.

Cacio is the central Italian word for local pecorino, or sheep’s milk cheese. Pecorino Romano and aged Tuscan pecorino both works well for this dish, but Romano is the easiest to find in the US. Grate it with a microplane or on the fine grate of a box grater. Do not use pre-grated cheese as it is coated with an anti-caking agent, usually cellulose (fine wood pulp).

Spaghetti Cacio e Pepe

½ lb thick spaghetti

1 ½ cups pecorino Romano, grated fine

1½ teas fresh cracked pepper

2 tbsp extra virgin olive oil

sea salt

   Cook the spaghetti in salted water until not quite done, about 2 minutes less than the package directions. Warm the olive oil and pepper in a sauté pan large enough to hold and toss the spaghetti; remove from heat. Put the grated cheese in a bowl and stir in 1 cup of the pasta water. When the pasta is ready, use tongs to move it from the pot to the sauté pan and add the cheesey water. Toss toss toss while the cheese melts and coats the spaghetti and the spaghetti absorbs the water. Add additional cheese and another grating of black pepper and serve immediately.

A tip from experience: don’t cook the spaghetti in the sauté pan over heat as this may cause the cheese to clump and stick to the bottom of the pan. 

Molten Chocolate Cakes

1/2 cup (4 ounces) unsalted butter, cubed

2 tablespoons all-purpose flour, sifted

6 ounces bittersweet chocolate, preferably 66% cacao Valrhona, chopped

2 large eggs, room temperature

2 large egg yolks, room temperature

1/4 cup granulated sugar

1/4 teaspoon salt

Preheat oven to 450°F and prepare six individual ramekins by lightly buttering and dusting with flour. Set the ramekins on a baking sheet.

Combine the chocolate and butter in a bowl set over, but not in, simmering water. Stir occasionally  until chocolate mixture is melted and smooth.

Beat eggs, egg yolks, sugar, and salt in a medium bowl with an electric beater until very thick and pale, at least 3 minutes. 

Fold chocolate mixture and flour into egg mixture until well combined and no streaks remain. Spoon batter into prepared ramekins. Bake until tops of cakes are just set and edges spring back when touched but centers still feel soft, about 9 to 11 minutes.

Remove cakes from oven, cover ramekin with an inverted dessert plate. Carefully turn over and remove the ramekin to unmold cake. Repeat the unmolding procedure with remaining cakes. Serve immediately with crème anglaise or vanilla ice cream.