Spring Vegetable Risotto

Blogging Marathon# 64: Week 2/ Day 1
Theme: Cook from 1 European Cuisine -- Italian

Dish: Spring Vegetable Risotto

We are on to our second week of blogging marathon today and my theme for this week is to 'Cook from 1 European Country' and I picked Italian cuisine. When I think of Italian food, pizza and pasta are the first to come to mind. But there is so much more to the world of Italian cooking. The many regions in Italy have distinctive cuisines based on the local ingredients available, cooking styles and eating habits.

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For the first day, I have this Spring Vegetable risotto. Risotto is a north Italian rice dish that is cooked in broth to a creamy consistency. Arborio, Carnaroli etc are the principal varieties of rice used to risotto. These are high in starch, round medium or short grained white rice -- they have the ability to absorb liquids and release starch, so they are stickier than the long grain varieties.

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Colomba Pasquale for #BreadBakers (Easter Dove Bread--Eggless Recipe)

BM# 51 -- Baking Marathon: Day 12

Bake of the Day: Colomba Pasquale (Easter Dove Bread)

I'm taking a short break from breakfast bakes today and instead have a delicious Easter bread. I recently joined the Bread Bakers group. #BreadBakers is a group of bread loving bakers who get together once a month to bake bread with a common ingredient or theme. More information about the group and how to join in the baking fun is at the end of the post.

This month's theme is Easter, Passover and Springtime breads from around the world. I made these cute little spring breads last week and wanted to try a more traditional Easter bread for the Bread Bakers group. Found this Colomba Pasquale or Easter Dove bread recipe on King Arthur website. The dove shaped bread looked lovely, so I decided to give it a try.

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Sweet Spring Bread

Happy Easter Sunday Everyone!!
Since I am doing the month long baking marathon, I thought why not extend the baking theme to the weekends too and post some of the bakes that I made from my cookbooks. This way I can link them to Valli's 'Cooking from Cookbook Challenge' and clear some of my baking recipes too.

I was planning to bake this Sweet Spring Cake on the first day of Spring, i.e., March 20, but we had a snow storm that day and it didn't really feel like Spring, so I pushed it until this past week when finally we got a little glimpse of Spring. It went back to being chilly and cold again, but at least there's hope that it will get better soon.

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