The Perfect Panini

I never thought that I’d find the perfect paninis while I was living in Paris, but I did. My favorite place for paninis was MIA the last time I visited, but I found a way to recreate them at home. Solving the panini puzzle means enjoying delicious sandwiches any time I want. And once pesto came into the picture, I wanted.

Tomato-mozzarella paninis are my absolute favorite, but you can use whatever fillings you like. Chicken is great too! Just make sure you’re using some kind of cheese so the sandwich holds together.

The first ultimate secret to making the perfect panini is finding the right bread. You want the kind of bread that is partially baked but has to be cooked at home to bring on its crisp crust. The bread looks white and doughy before it’s baked. Trader Joe’s sells ficelles (thin baguettes) and ciabatta rolls this way. Slice your unbaked bread, and add in your panini ingredients. Make sure some of the cheese is touching each roll so the sandwich will stick together. The second ultimate secret is to spray the outside of the bread with vegetable oil before grilling it. This step helps the bread get nice and crusty brown.

Then, turn your panini press or grill pan on high and grill the paninis until they have nice lines and the cheese is melted. If you’re using a grill pan, press down on the sandwiches with a spatula or the bottom of another pan to flatten them. Enjoy these babies!

Shopping list:

  • The kind of bread that is partially baked, looks white, and needs to finish baking at home
  • Tomatoes
  • Mozzarella
  • Pesto
  • Cooking spray or vegetable oil
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Presto Pesto!

Without pesto, I might never have started a love affair with my food processor. You see, my first food processor was very tiny. I think my aunt and uncle got it for free from a casino(?). It was cute, but it was just too small to make pesto. I had to make it in batches, and I could never figure out how to divide the ingredients. So I got a bigger food processor, and now I’m in love and use it all the time. Thank you, pesto. Pesto is also wonderful because it smells like summer, and it adds boundless flavor to everything it touches. And in French, it’s called pistou. I love saying pistou.

To make pesto, drop 3 whole garlic cloves into a food processor while the blades are running. Let it get chopped up. It will smell wonderful.

Then, add 1 pinch of salt, 3 tablespoons of toasted pine nuts, and 2 cups of loosely packed basil leaves into the food processor.

Run the food processor until the basil is minced. Then, with the food processor still running, drizzle 1/2 cup of olive oil in and let it get mixed. It’s starting to look a lot like pesto!

Remove the pesto from the food processor, and stir in 1/4 cup of finely grated parmesan cheese. Presto pesto! You can spread your pesto on sandwiches, pizza, mix it into soups, or toss it with salads. To store your pesto, transfer it to a container, pour in enough olive oil to cover the top of the pesto so it doesn’t brown, put on the lid, and stick it in the fridge.

This recipe was adapted from Mario Batali.

Shopping list:

  • Basil- 2 loosely packed cups of leaves
  • Pine nuts- 3 tablespoons
  • Garlic- 3 cloves
  • Olive oil- 1/2 cup
  • Parmesan cheese- 1/4 cup, grated
  • Salt
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Another Visit to the Funny Farm

I went home recently to visit my family and check out their summer garden. Nothing was ready to pick yet, but it looks very professional. There are rows of tomatoes, peppers, and eggplant, and I can’t wait until things are full and ripe. It’s like a farm!

I also got a chance to catch up with the kitties, including Contortionist Greasey. David looked at this picture for five minutes, cocking his head, asking me a hundred times if he was looking at Greasey’s left or right ear, her left or right eye, where is her nose, where is her other ear, and on and on. Granted, it’s a crazy way to sleep.

Muffin was a lovely, cuddly princess. Mango was recently diagnosed with  diabetes. My mom gives him shots of insulin while he eats, and he doesn’t even notice that it’s happening.

The pond looks great, but two of the new fish babies are missing. The bird must have come and eaten them.

But there are plenty of dragonflies.

And even a yellow ladybug. It was friskier than any red ladybug I’ve ever seen.

Cat tails. Any relation to a pussy willow?

My mom bought these flowers at Costco. Not bad!

These are from Costco too. As you can probably tell, I had a very exciting trip. Just the way I like it!

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