Daring Bakers... Passport to Italy

Step aside Stouffers... this isn't convenience food. This is my GRANDMOTHER's lasagna. Or something damn close.

This month's Daring Baker adventure -- brought to us by Mary of Beans and Caviar, Melinda of Melbourne Larder and Enza of Io Da Grande -- takes us to Italy as it might have been in my great grandmother's era and proves that the simplest of recipes stand the test of time.

Paper thin ribbons of spinach-speckled egg pasta, bathed in alternating layers of a beautiful butter-nutty bechamel, a beefy bolognese courtesy of Tyler Florence and a sprinkling of piquant parmesan cheese.

Real food. Simple ingredients. And a moderate amount of elbow grease. With the exception of the tomatoes in the sauce and the spinach in the pasta, nothing out of a can, a jar, a plastic bag or a cardboard container.

Lynne Rossetto Kasper's Lasagne of Emilia Romagna warms the heart and soothes the soul -- and thanks to the ladies hosting the March challenge it's my new go-to recipe when I've got an afternoon to kill and I'm looking for old world comfort food.

Bookmark this on Delicious

Under the wire...almost

We're still in the process of assembling this month's Daring Baker Challenge, but I didn't want to let the posting window go by yet again without documenting our progress. The bolognese turned out beautifully, and we're optimistic about the other components as well. With this month's time commitments, we may well be enjoying the fruits of our labor on Wednesday, so be sure to check out everyone else's lasagna while we wrap things up here.

The March 2009 challenge was hosted by Mary of Beans and Caviar, Melinda of Melbourne Larder and Enza of Io Da Grande. They have chosen Lasagne of Emilia-Romagna from The Splendid Table by Lynne Rossetto Kasper as the challenge.

Bookmark this on Delicious

I'm Ba-aaa-ck!

Another one of those parental prophesies is coming true. Time DOES go faster with every passing year. Didn't we just celebrate the new year...how the heck did it get to be SPRING?!?!

I haven't slept through the last twelve weeks, really. While my diet continues to shift as I try to strike a balance between what's good for me, what's good for the community, what's good for the planet and what *tastes* good, I've still got a healthy dose of the culinary curiosity that prompted me to start this journey three years ago. I've eaten well, and I've got a large stash of archived photographs to prove it. And I'm rearranging my recreational time over the next couple of days to share some of it with you.

Coming soon to a your favorite feed reader:

- The Daring Bakers haven't excommunicated me! I've got tuilles! I've got a chocolate valentino! along with a handful of January Tuesdays with Dorie...

- A couple of fantastic Tyler Florence recipes...

- Several selections sourced from this winter's CSA bounty...

Hang in there; I'll wrap up the rewind as quickly as possible so we can move on and enjoy the spring bounty before summer is upon us.

Bookmark this on Delicious