Chocolate Cheesecake

Well, sure you know that Cheesecake is not a very typical italian cake, but I made it for my girl's birthday and wanna share with you all. It's a variation of the classic New York cheesecake: i'll add chocolate and use chocolate biscuits for the basis. Let's see how to make it!

Ingredients (Metric and Imperial) for a 24cm (9 inches) cake tin

For the basis:

• 300g of chocolate biscuits
• 100g of melted butter.

Finely crumble the biscuits and mix them with the melted butter: put this mixture on the bottom of the cake tin and press it. Put the cake tin in the freezer for half an hour.

During this time, prepare your cheese cream:

Ingredients:

• 450g (16 oz) of Ricotta cheese
• 250g (9 oz) of cream cheese
• 150g (5.5 oz)  of powdered sugar
• 200g (7oz)  of plain melted chocolate
•  40gr (1.5 oz)of cocoa powder
•  2 eggs

Put in your mixer the ricotta, che cream cheese and the powdered sugar and mix them for 2-3 minutes, then add one by one the other ingredients untile you have your black yummy cream.

Now get your cake tinn off from the freezer and  fill it with the cream.

Put in the pre-heated oven at 350°F (180°C) for at least 45-50 minutes

Once cooked and cooled, put it in the fridge for at least 3 hours, then serve it with some vanilla ice cream or some sour cream.

Carrot VELLUTATA

Let's talk about another type of VELLUTATA (you can see CABBAGE one here). I can't translate this word, but I want to explain you the meaning: VELLUTO in Italian is like VELVET in english: So this dish is like Velvet in your mouth, delicate, soft and creamy just like Velvet! You can make it with every vegetable you like: Carrots, Cabbage, Potatoes and so on and you can change quantities of spices to have a more spicy or more delicate dish. Let's see how to prepare a cabbage (and potatoes) VELLUTATA.

Ingredients - Party of 4

• 1kg (2.2 Lbs) of carrots, sliced
• 1 big potato, chopped in little cubes
• 1 onion
• 2 pinches of salt
• 1 pinch of pepper
• 1 tablespoon of extravirgin olive oil
• Chili (optional)

Method:
 

• Put in a big pot the oil and the onion, turn on a low flame
• after 1 minute add the cubed potato and the sliced carrots, half-cover with warm water and cook it for 30minutes
• Mix everything with your blender, add the salt, the pepper and the optional chili
• serve it into your little bowls, with some roasted bread or croutons

Risotto with Broccoli, Curcuma and sundried tomatoes

Risotto is a typical Italian dish: we make it in millions of ways, with every ingredient existing in nautre. This is  a simple and vegan one, made with broccoli, Curcuma (a typical indian spice that is sometimes used also in our recipes) and sundried tomatoes!! Let's see how to make it

Ingredients (metric and imperial) - party of 4

• 350g (12oz) of Risotto Rice
• 2 medium broccoli
• 10 sundried tomatoes
• 2  tablespoons  of curcuma
• 2 pinches of salt
• 1 tablespoon of extravirgin olive oil
• half onion, finely chopped

Method

• Wash the broccoli and cut their spikes (we will use only them)
• put in a big pot the spikes, the  curcuma, 1 pinch of salt and half-fill the pot with water
• Boil  it for 10 minutes and get of the spikes 
• Now we have the soup with which we will cook the risotto
• Put the extravirgin olive oil and the onion in a large pan, turn on a low flame and cook it for 1-2 minutes
• Add the rice and start mixing with a  big wooden spoon (in Italian CUCCHIARELLA). The most important thing is NEVER STOP MIXING, slowly but steadily. This will toast the rice, and it’s very important for a perfect result
• After 2 minutes start adding the broth and remember DON’T STOP MIXING. You mustn’t drown your rice, but it must always be half-covered by the soup. When it starts to become dry, add the broth spoon by spoon until the end of cooking time
• 3 minutes before the end of cooking time, add your broccoli's spikes (saving some of them for decoration) and the sundried tomatos, sliced in little pieces,and continue mixing and adding some soup
• When cooking time is over, turn off the flame, and, if necessary, add a pinch of salt and some curcuma more.

Serve it, decorating with some brococoli's spikes