American Food Friday-Mac and Cheese

The Diva ( center) with other writers on the Naples Trip

But it is American Food Friday!

Here is Bleeding Expresso’s Friday Mac and Cheese
no matter where you live I think this is comfort food.

I like mine baked in the oven after to get a crunchy top,
with some breadcrumbs
and usually use rigatoni pasta.
Living in Italy we can certainly pump it up
with all the great pasta and cheeses we get here.
Think about creamy gorgonzola, mozzarella with cherry tomatoes, 4 cheese!

Here is a new version I just had outside of Sorrento
A very elegant ricotta stuffed Rigatoni ( called mezze-candele here)
lightly breaded and toasted or fried
laying in a light tomato sauce!
This is the next recipe I am going to work on for you!
let me know if you are interested!

A long way from the 4/$1 boxes with yellow powdered questionable cheese which was a comfort food even back then, adding peas and a can of tuna to dress it up!

Here in Italy, the softest melting cheese ( questionable too) are the sottilette, which Michele of Bleeding Expresso uses, BUT once again, they are a vital part of comfort food for Italians too.

We use them on our twice-cooked fennel and the beef braciole with garlic and capers
that both come from my hubbies mom’s recipes.
Nothing like making Mom food here in Italy!

Grazie Michele!

I have just returned from my Naples tour!
WOW… what a whirlwind trip.

Was fabulous to be on the recieving end of a tour for a change
I was part of a press trip with a group of British writers
and we saw Naples, Positano, Amalfi and my new love Sorrento!

the Giardini Di Cataldo production center in Sorrento

I had visited Amalfi when I first moved here,
and it may have been having a truck almost run me off the road
( we were run into a guardrail and it crushed the bumper into the tire
and gave us a flat tire and we were stuck on the curve!)
or perhaps just feeling carsick, that trip,
but even this trip,
Amalfi is the most touristy of the towns we visited.

I did find fabulous candied lemon zest, dipped in Chocolate at the Andrea Panza chocolate shop
in Amalfi,
along with the delicate limoncello filled crystalized candies which were too delicate to travel.

I also adored my Cremosa di Caffe, which is replacing Granita in many shops.
Think of a cappucino granita,
coffee with cream and ice.
Rich but refreshing.

Thanks to Ulysse for insisting!

I am still digesting most of what I saw,
but
had to give you a taste!

I had so much fun and learnt so many more new things,
I am sure I will be taking my Divina Cucina friends on a Southern Italy
tour next June!