For the love of food and travel

Well, I finally did it.  They have been on my list of things I have always wanted to make for way too long. Croissants are not something you make if you do not have the time. They do take a lot of time and labour. But I like to call it the labour of love. Now, will I ever make these again? Probably yes, but only because I love croissants and I live in a family of bread lovers. Technically, making croissants are not hard at all....they are actually pretty straight forward. If you can make bread then you can make these, but you do need time .  A croissant is a delicious French pastry, known by its crescent shape. (Croissant means crescent in French). Puff pastry is used to make this delicacy - the dough is layered with butter, rolled and folded a few times, then rolled into its shape. It is then glazed with butter and baked. The original croissant was called Kipfel and originated in Austria in 1683. It was created in honor of the Austrian victory over the Turks and mod

When you are living in a city like Bangalore, you could always expect showers in the evenings. It brings the down the temperatures and it gets cold outside. Though not very cold like the winters in December or January. But it's during these chillier days....or rather nights, you feel like eating a warm & comfy homemade food. I just love easy cooking one-pot meals, and a lasagna is perfect for such conditions. This is one recipe that I've been wanting to post for quite some time. I make this so often and couldn't decide which one should I choose first, the classic with beef, a vegetarian or this one with chicken. I finally decided on this chicken lasagna as it is lighter, and at my home kids love it.  I was really excited about how this chicken lasagna turned out. A classic is always a classic; but actually this chicken lasagna turned out just perfect.....it had the perfect texture and tasted incredibly good. I didn't use cheese between layers as I didn't wa

We love pasta. We do make it a point to visit an Italian restaurant at least once a month to have pasta. Also I make it at home. So, pasta is always in stock in my pantry. Spaghetti, fettuccine, macaroni, fusilli, lasagna, ravioli, cannelloni and farfelle are all our favourites. And the sauces that go along with it, whether it is Alfredo, Carbonara, Pesto, Marinara or Arrabbiata....makes the pasta a wonderful meal in itself.  According to the International Pasta Organization, there are more than 600 different shapes of pasta produced throughout the world. Pasta is a staple food of traditional Italian cuisine, with the first reference dating to 1154 in Sicily. It is typically a noodle made from an unleavened dough of a durum wheat flour mixed with water or eggs and formed into sheets or various shapes, then cooked by boiling or baking.  Pastas may be divided into two broad categories, dried and fresh. Most dried pasta is commercially produced via an extrusion process although

The first time I saw and ate a slice of focaccia was at an Italian restaurant. Ooh la la!!! in an instant, I fell in love with the aroma, the texture and the taste of this wonderful bread. And definitely....also the way it is pronounced. So, the next thing I need to know...... is how to make this at home. And that leads me to go online and check for recipes and follow other food bloggers to see how focaccia can be made in one's kitchen......and just as I thought, it comes under my category of easy cooking. But, first of all what is focaccia? Focaccia is a flat oven baked Italian bread. It is usually seasoned either with olive oil, cheese, herbs, meat and onions. It can also be flavoured with a number of vegetables.  Most historians believe Focaccia originated with either the Etruscans of North Central Italy prior to the Roman Empire forming, or in Ancient Greece at the beginning of the first millennium BC, though flat unleavened bread has been made throughout the Middl