Cooking with Marietta in Italy

That time we rode the train to Pompeii like lost puppies and got picked up by the most beautiful Italian woman with a cigarette in her hand who drove us to her home and welcomed us with cappuccinos and croissants. She taught us how to make pasta from scratch and fill raviolis with ricotta and how to correctly make pesto and a lasagne with bechamel. The language barrier was no more, we communicated with smiles and laughs and devoured our delicious meal together with wine and finished off the afternoon with homemade limoncello. This was the most beautiful and authentic Italian experience and I will treasure it forever.

Easter 2021

Here’s a little of our Easter celebration with family. I made and Italian lunch, lemon risotto, chicken parmigiana and caprese. Molto Bene.

Strawberry Picking & Berry Crumble Recipe

This is from May 2019! Strawberry picking at Pecan Creek Strawberry Farm is currently closed due to Covid-19 but is open for drive-thru pick up!

A few weeks ago some friends invited us to go strawberry picking at a local farm. Yes, a local farm! only 20 minutes north of us, and here this California girl thought strawberry fields only existed in California… Wrong! Noah my very Texas boy insisted on wearing his denim farmer overalls and we headed to the farm!

Pecan Creek Strawberry Farm in Pilot Point is a gem! They open their farm to the public Saturdays and Wednesdays. You pay $3 for a red bucket to put your picked strawberries in and then they charge you per pound you pick! You can pick as many or as little as you’d like! Best part is you get to keep your bucket and the next time you go don’t have to pay for one just your strawberries!

There's something special about picking your own fruit, searching for the perfect red berry and plucking it from the ground. While I love gardening, it was nice going to a farm where someone else has already done all the work and you get to eat the fruit of their labor, see what I did there?

Our fresh strawberries turned into the yummiest Berry Crumble we devoured for dessert! I’ve included the recipe for you! Its super simple and delicious!

Mixed Berry Crumble

Prep time: 10 minutes

Ingredients:

• 1lb of Strawberries, 1 cup of Blueberries, 1 cup of blackberries
• Half a cup of melted butter.
• 1 cup of oats
• 1/2 all purpose flour
• 1/4 sugar
• 1/4 chopped walnuts
• 1/2 teaspoon of vanilla extract
• 1/2 teaspoon of almond extract

Instructions:

1. Wash and dry berries, place them in a baking dish.
2. Melt butter and mix in flour, oats, sugar, chopped nuts, vanilla and almond extract.
3. Crumble over mixed berries.
4. Bake for 30 minutes at 350 or until crumble is golden and your home smells delicious.
5. Serve warm with ice cream! Store leftovers in the fridge, it also taste great cold!

Throwing an Epic Pizza Party with Ooni

In our home you can say pizza is a big part of our life, or, pizza is life. Either way you’d be right.

Ooni has become the tool we use for many successful and delicious pizza parties! We love entertaining with Ooni because you can crank out pizzas in 60 seconds! Plus over the years Fred has perfected his craft and has come up with some amazing pizza recipes!

So today we’d like to share with you some of those recipes and some tips on how you can throw an epic pizza party yourself!

5 Tips on How to Throw an Epic Pizza Party

1. Set a date, and invite your friends for an awesome pizza night.

2. Figure out your menu. Take into consideration any allergies or major dislikes. This might not be the best night to experiment with anchovies if your friends don’t like fish! Make a shopping list and buy your ingredients the day before so that your produce is fresh! We like to buy our meats in the deli department as opposed to pre-packaged, that way it’s fresh and sliced to our liking!

3. Prep ahead of time. Make your dough according to your recipe. Set up a prep station and put your ingredients in individual bowls so you have easy access to them while you are making pizza! Decorate your table, make it fun, use fresh herbs as centerpieces, light some candles, prepare a relaxed atmosphere. You set the vibe! Don’t stress too much about this, the real highlight of your party will be the pizza anyways!

4. Serve your pizza “Family Style” One of the best features of the Ooni oven is that it cooks pizza in just 60 seconds which allows you keep the pizzas coming and keep your guests eating! We serve our pizzas in metal trays so they are easy to pass around the table to share. Family Style allows you to create a casual setting, keeping it simple and letting you serve a varied menu that everyone can try.

5. Always end the night with dessert! With Ooni you can make a so many delicious desserts that will keep your guests talking about your epic pizza party and wanting to come back for more!

Pancetta, Egg & Basil Pizza

S’mores Pizza

Bread Adventures

Hey, how was your weekend?

Saturday, Fred spent all day baking, made us waffles, he made sourdough bread, french rolls, he’s amazing, he even sold a few breads to some friends. I’m loving this new bread hobby he’s into because I freakin love bread!

So after eating bread all day Saturday what did we do Sunday after church? Went to a bake sale!

Yea, the bread obsession is real.

Patina Green our favorite sandwich spot in McKinney was having a pop up bake sale and we had to go. Pamela and Brock, the bakers selling their bread could not have been sweeter despite our wiggly and chatty children, also their array of breads was fab.

After picking out our baked goods we grabbed some sandwiches and sat down for lunch, sliced right into the freshly baked bread and my heart soaked it all in, family and good food are some of my favorite joys.

Totally recommend Patina Green if you have not been there and check out Pamela and Brock their bread was everything you would want bread to be!

Hope you have a great week! Eat something delicious.

Go, eat your bread in joy, and drink your wine with a merry heart… Ecc 9:7

Valentine's Date in Deep Ellum

On Saturday Fred treated me to an early Valentine’s Day Date. He knows me too well and planned it just right.

Dallas, Food, Duh.

While a girl can eat a big meal, trust me… I’m more of the tapas philosophy, small bites so I can try a little of everything and take my time. So Fred decided to take me out to eat small bites at a few different spots.

We started our date at Jimmy’s Food Store, the best Italian market in Dallas. Italian cuisine and culture is so near and dear to us and being in Jimmy’s Food Store makes me feel like I’m there though I've never been but I like to pretend while i’m there! You can buy a glass of wine to sip on while you shop. You’re completely surrounded by every imported Italian ingredient you might ever need along with local goods. I found the perfect pasta noodles for my Galentine’s Party coming up and we bought our meats we needed for pizza night from the deli, the deli!!! At the deli you can buy sandwiches, the most amazing sandwiches in town, Fred and I split a prosciutto caprese sandwich, soo tasty!

We then headed to Deep Ellum, one of my favorite spots in Dallas. We walked around the outdoor market, hit up a few shops like Jade & Clover and Archer Paper Goods, seriously adorable shops!

Then came our second food stop, Revolver Taco. We had authentic street tacos with wagyu beef carne asada, cilantro and onions! The best part? There’s an abuelita in the kitchen making your tortillas, (insert tears of joy here) and you can actually see her throwing it down in a cute Mexican apron. You won’t find your typical Texas “fajita meat” tacos here, just the real good carne asada.

We ended our date with dessert at Emporium Pies. It was my first time checking out the Deep Ellum location so I was really excited to check out their floral mural, insta worthy. They have their seasonal “Valenpies” I had to go with the Dr. Love pie, a gooey brownie with red velvet cream cheese, need I say more?

Though it was a chilly 30 some degree date, my super hot Valentine kept me warm, like literally, my thoughtful Fred even bought me hand warmers to put inside the pockets of my coat. Thank you Fred for always loving me, caring for me, spoiling me. I love you my dearest Valentine.

Easy Pie Crust

Fall is definitely here and I’m so glad it decided to bring its weather with it because that means I get to bake! Lets be real even if it was 90 degrees I would still be baking…

I’m excited to share with you one of my most cherished recipes and staple to many of my favorite meals, chicken pot pie, quiche, apple pie, pumpkin pie, pie, pie pie! Yes, pie counts as a meal btw.

I get asked for my pie crust recipe all the time so I thought it’d be perfect for this to be my first recipe featured.

True story. I've been using this recipe for years, even way back before I had a standing mixer. I used to use my hands to combine the flour and dough, and pinch it all together, it was a pain, it would take forever but it was always worth it. So if you don’t have a mixer and you don’t mind getting your hands a little buttery I totally recommend you try.

But if you do have a mixer… You’re in trouble. You’re going to want to make this recipe over and over because its really easy! I always double it and store my crust in the freezer, so whenever I’m craving pie, which is almost always, I pull it out, unfreeze and voila, fill it with yummy goodness.

So enjoy! Let me know if you try this recipe! Tag me or message me!

Easy Pie Crust

Makes: 2 Pie Crust

Prep time: 15 minutes

Ingredients:

• 2 1/2 Cups (315 Grams) of All Purpose Flour
• 1 Tbs Sugar
• 1 Tsp Salt
• 1 Cup of Unsalted Butter
• 1/2-1 Cup of Cold Water

Instructions:

1. Cut butter into cubes and place in the freezer
2. Whisk together flour, sugar and salt in mixing bowl.
3. Turn on mixer to lowest setting and begin to add butter cubes a couple at a time.
4. Slowly begin to pour cold water a few tablespoons at a time until dough comes together and no longer sticks to the mixing bowl, you might not need all of the water
5. Divide dough into 2 balls and roll together. Refrigerate for an hour before you bake or freeze by wrapping pie crust with plastic wrap and storing in a zip-loc bag.