Tuesday, January 29, 2013

Friuli: Lifestyle – A Couscous Lunch


photograph and copyright by manfredi bellati

Friuli: Lifestyle – A Couscous Lunch. At the palazzo L’Agricola, a former agricultural building, in a charming hamlet in a little town of the Fiuli region of northern Italy, a couscous lunch was elegantly prepared.

 

A Couscous lunch. Our host, the gentleman, designer and aesthetic Carlo Piccolomini with his Cavalier King Charles, Titania are photographed by the upstairs fireplace over which hangs a portrait by Manfredi Bellati of the adorable Spaniel.

 

The elegance and simplicity of the table settings in the dinning room welcomes guests with two tables in front of the fireplace.  


The cheese soufflés.



On the kitchen table the meal is ready to be served

Cheese Soufles
Couscous
Vegetables cooked in broth
Ratatouille
Harissa
Cooked Fennel and poppy seed salad
Pumpkin and Spinach Quiches
Assortment of cheeses from the Natisone Valley and Gorgonzola
Mostarda Veneta



Cousous with ratatouille and vegetables cooked in broth.




The cheeseboard. On the cheeseboard two local cheeses, from the Matayur region in the Valley of Natisone, they are made with unpasteurized milk, together with a classic Gorgonzola dolce, are all delicious eaten with Mostarda Veneta, boiled fruit in a spicy syrup.



The desserts: A chestnut semifreddo together with traditional deep fried carnival pastries were a delicious  ending to the meal.


 
Carlo Piccolomini and his sister Benedetta Piccolomini who is a garden designer and who together with landscape architect, Paolo Sgaravatti and neurologist, Francesca Meneghello are the driving force behind The Healing Garden, Un Giardino Per Rivivere, at the San Camillo Hospital on the Lido in Venice.   It’s a healing garden for the senses, a natural place, where sound, touch, color and smell contribute a therapeutic relief to suffering for the patients. Please contact the website if you would like to donate time or money for this worthwhile project, which hopefully will be ready this summer.


The guests are happy.


 
And... Titania hopes there are leftovers.







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