foodie sites for all tastes

I am so happy the weekend is here.  I am looking forward to staying home, finishing a couple of art projects I have delayed and cleaning up before hitting the road again next week to Amsterdam.  For some weekend inspiration, I just discovered three great food blogs that I wanted to share with you: Food 52, They Draw and Cook and A Dash of Compassion.

Food 52 is a community food blog that started as a cookbook with lots of great articles, recipes, photographs and a shop.  They Draw and Cook are illustrated recipes sent in by people all over the world.  The illustrated recipes reminds me of the recipes that I used to see published in newspapers in the late 80s and early 90s and A Dash of Compassion is by a friend of mine in Toronto who is an amazing vegan baker.  I can’t wait to try out a recipe from each.  More about Florence (two shots below) next week, as well as ,what’s delicious and modern in Amsterdam.

Places to Eat: Milan

I just returned from a trip to Italy with stops in Milan and Florence.  I was there with my fiance checking out potential wedding venues with an excellent wedding planner who specializes in Tuscany weddings.  As a destination to get married, we learned from our mini Tuscany tour that this part of the world was definitely NOT for us (rustic is not charming or ideal for our backdrop).  However, that did not stop us from putting on our “urban-city searching foodie hats” and taking in the best of culinary, design and shopping in five days.

Milan is the second largest city in Italy and is known for its fashion, aperitivo, excellent food and design.  This large,  cosmopolitan, shopping mecca has an excellent transportation system both above ground and below, and for a 4.50 Euro day pass, it is both easy and cheap to visit all your favourite hot spots around the city.  There were several places we intended to visit like Peck, Gogol & Company, California Bakery, 10 Corso Como and Da Claudio Pescheria  but the combination of torrential rain and getting soaking wet, the fact that we only really had 36 hours in Milan spread over two days, plus exhaustion cut our Milan conquest a bit short.

Some of our favourite spots in Milan include Bianco Latte, a beautiful, light cream accented with wood, natural looking space that is part stellar gelatteira,  part cafe, part bakery, part retailer and part restaurant.  While it sounds like Bianco Latte has several different service offerings going on, I assure you the company does all of them exceedingly well.  We returned twice to Bianco Latte to sample different gelato flavours (ie. biscotti, dolce de leche, orange chocolate, and pistachio (of course)), browse their adorable retail section of colourful For Life teapots and tea cups, and cool, plastic, Baci Milano cake plates and serving pieces, and sip some much-needed tea.  As an aside, it is nearly impossible to find good tea in Milan and Florence.  I get the Italian coffee thing and how you won’t have a bad cup in Italy, but for the tea drinkers out there, a week of Twinings is hell.  To my good fortune, Bianco Latte carries and brews Lov Organic tea, a brand I have blogged about before and like.

via Bianco Latte

Luini, is a tiny store, tucked behind the Duomo and is a famous panzerotti house in the city.  Luini also made our list of top spots in Milan to visit.  Luini makes both sweet and savoury panzerotti, where the sweet taste like a cookie stuffed with delicious things such as nutella, pear, figs, or walnuts and lightly dusted with icing sugar. The savoury Luini’s taste like what a pizza pocket, panzerotti should taste like.  They also have some impressive baked goods available at the counter. They have a no picture policy, so the images I have for you are off the web.

photos via: vacanta-italia, virgbee, amoitaly, tourism milan, miguelvecin

Another spot that truly impressed us was Cioccolati Italiani, a design-forward, sleek-looking space that specializes in all things chocolate from eating to drinking.  Behind the counter, they have three taps that pour white chocolate, dark chocolate and milk chocolate tempting you to order something sweet.  Cioccolati Italiani has three stores in Milan and we visited the one opposite to Luini.  My fiance tried the chocolate espresso, a shot of espresso in a clear espresso cup with thick, dark chocolate on the bottom.   A spoon accompanies the drink and as he downed the espresso, he was left speechless as he scooped up the remaining melted chocolate below the coffee.

photos via: Where Milan, Linda Bezze, Con i Piedi Per Terra, Tamabea

Finally, La Rinascente food hall, on the seventh floor of La Rinascente department store was a magical place to see.  Rows upon rows of the best of Italian products including oils, pasta sauces, pasta, tea, chocolate, spices, wine, you name it, it was there.  We look forward to returning to Milan for a full weekend (and good weather hopefully) where we can take in more sights, areas and continue to explore the culinary delights of the city.

Book: Nomad by Sibella Court

This looks like an interesting book to pick up for the holidays.  Sibella Court is an Australian interior stylist and owner of shop, The Society Inc in NSW.  Nomad is a collection of photographs of travel shots and styled spaces to show how to bring your travels home with you and incorporate your finds into your decor.  I love Sibella’s work.  To me, her rooms look contemporary, care-free, and “well-lived” as she expertly combines pieces from around the globe and employs her skill and creativity in layering, clustering and styling spaces.  A very “Anthropologie-esque” aesthetic meets, antique market/flea market chic. The book, Nomad, will be available on Amazon November 23 and can be pre-ordered here.  To read more about Sibella and her experience, there is a really good interview on website The Design Files.

Examples of Sibella’s work:

via the design files

via house to home

via fabric of my life

via international visual

Penguin Books Great Food Series

I am loving the Penguin Books Great Food Series, a collection of cookbooks with writing and recipes from the past 400 years.  Can you imagine trying a recipe that was created 200 years ago?

These books are more like artwork thanks to the stunning cover designs by Coralie Bickford Smith.  I think Penguin is on to something by trying to engage and connect with its design oriented consumers who would appreciate this type of product from a design perspective, different than your typical reader.  Why not make reading more fun, by jazzing up the covers and turning them into mini works of art that any cook, cookbook collector, or design enthusiast would proudly display (and read) in their homes?  There is even a blog that shows what the food looks like from some of the recipes in this collection of old cookbooks here.

via dustry burrito

via sue du jour

cake from emil gaigher

Bakeries in Prague rarely disappoint.  On every street, the most marvellous aromas waft out of doors into the noses of pedestrians, luring them in for a treat.  I am all about exploration and trying new things. I had walked by Emil Gaigher,a bakery located in Prague 5,  several times en route to my fiance’s office and had high hopes for this coconut covered, vanilla cake from Emil Gaigher, but to my dismay, it looked better than it tasted (my fellow cake taste testers agreed).  However the cute marzipan mouse on top of the cake photographed well!  I am off to Milan and Florence tomorrow and will report back on any delicious bakeries or fabulous design shops that I find in my travels next week.