Al Castello Italian Restaurant
April 17, 2009 23:09
In South San Jose there are a few authentic Italian restaurants thanks to the number of first generation Italians who live in the area: among those my favorite is Al Castello Italian Restaurant because the owner, Giovanni Rossi, and his staff have become good friends of mine.
So, of course, I'm only going to say good things about my friend's restaurant... but I still have to pay the bill when it's all said and done! Actually, I just realized that I've never tried his pizza and that is truly silly since Giovanni is from Naples! My problem is that I like eggplants and I cannot resist Al Castello's penne alle melanzane (they're actually called something else, but I have started calling it "the usual" today so I am going to have to open the menu next time and correct myself).
For directions, menu, and more go to
Al Castello's web site.
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italian restaurants
Riso al Nero di Seppia
March 30, 2009 23:45
Riso al nero di seppia is an exotic sounding and looking dish that is far simpler to prepare than expected. My first attempt at this recipe can be classified as a successful failure: the end result was apetizing, but preparation took a couple of wrong turns. First, I got no nero (black ink) from my seppia (squid), so the dramatic color contrast between white squid and black rice did not happen at all. Second, I ended up cutting up the squid thus bypassing the instruction to place an entire squid in each plate. That's because I only had one enormous squidone: next time I'll study the recipe before going shopping.
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Riso al Nero di Seppia
Penne alle Melanzane e Prosciutto
March 21, 2009 22:59
I had been wanting to try this recipe for a while as I am a huge fan of eggplants and prosciutto.
Since we moved to San Jose,
A.G. Ferrari's is a bit further away, and today we got to go and
stock up on Italian cold cuts and cheeses since we were in the area.
The recipe also calls for cream, diced cheese (which melts), some grated parmesan cheese, and an onion. The recipe calls
for scamorza but I used
Puzzone di Moena,
which was slightly more flavorful than expected,
if you know what I mean...
The end result was very good and I will try to master this dish as it could become one of my top 20 favorite dishes.
Permalink:
Penne alle Melanzane e Prosciutto
