Cooking World

Such snacks as this with crushed pineapple, cream cheese, and sliced ham always are always very popular at parties.

You need:
8 ounce package whipped pineapple cream cheese
1.5 cups crushed pineapple in juice, well drained
8 inch flour tortillas
6 ounces sliced ham

How to prepare
Slightly blend the cream cheese and pineapple in a bowl. Take the tortillas and put them on a clean tray. Spread half of each tortilla with the cream cheese mixture. Put a slice of ham over the cream cheese. Roll up each tortilla and if needed, seal the edge with a cream cheese. Place each tortilla roll in plastic wrap and tray tightly. Put the snack in a refrigerate for at least 2 hours, then unwrap and cut into medium-wide pieces.

This is simple and delicious dish for the admirers of the Spanish cuisine.
Ingredients:
1 (340 g) can solid white tuna
3 teaspoons mayonnaise
2-4 green onions, thinly sliced, and one more for garnish
1/2 red bell pepper, chopped
A little vinegar
black pepper to taste
garlic salt to taste
2 ripe avocados, cut into halves and pitted

How to make
Mix together in a bowl tuna, mayonnaise, green onions, red pepper, and vinegar. Season the substance with pepper and garlic salt, and then stuff the avocado halves with the mixture from tuna and vegetables. Garnish with rest green onions and add black pepper before eating.

According to the historical records, at the end of the 16th only Istanbul there were at least 500 cafes. In Europe the first cafes were opened by immigrants from Asia around 1650.
It is interesting that a coffee tree has a lifespan of about 50 up to 70 years.
The coffee berries turn bright red from yellow in 6 - 8 months after flowering.
Mature coffee tree in bloom is covered with 30,000 white flowers which begin to develop into fruit within 24 - 36 hours.
In nature coffee tree can flower eight times in one year, all depends on rainfall.
Arabica has 900 different flavours.
During roasting coffee increases in volume by 18.60%.

There a few versions about coffee’s origin

The province in Ethiopia where it was first discovered is called Kaffa.
The holy building in Mecca is called Kaaba.
In Turkish “roasted� is “kahwe�.
Cahouah and Cohuet are Arabic words.

Going to buy perfumes, some people take some coffee in their handbag to have a sniff in between smelling each perfume to refresh the nose.
Spent coffee grounds around the garden plants will prevent it from snails and slugs.
A mixture of coffee grounds and sugar can be used as a fertilizer to help pot plants recover, if their leaves that have turned yellow in winter.
In December 2001 Brazil produced a scented postage stamp to promote its coffee - the smell should last for 3 to 5 years.

May be you know that coffee is the second most often used product in the world after oil;
For the producing countries it annually makes a profit in €30 billion.
It gives work for more than 100 million people.
About 1400 million cups are consumed each day.
Coffee is the second most popular drink after water in the world.

For most people all Italian cuisine is like pizza and spaghetti. Those who have only skin-deep knowledge about Italian cooking frequently think that it is all pretty much alike. But, those who travel through Italy can notice differences in dishes and their ingredients even if the cities are just some miles apart.

Every Italian town has its own style of making sausage, special kinds of cheese and wine, and its local type of bread. It is funny, but if to ask people how to make the most common for all Italians pasta, you will not hear identical answers. Varieties of the Italian cuisine can bee seen just on one example with pasta recipes: made in every possible variations in size and shape soft egg noodles in the North, hard-boiled spaghetti in the South.

Italy is a country of great varieties, and cuisine is simple one more aspect of the diversity of its culture. This diversity has historical and geographical roots. Land of plenty with countless environments and their variations: fertile valleys, mountains covered with forests, Mediterranean coastlines.

But if the diversity of ingredients can be explained by the climate opportunities, great number of food styles in Italy result from its history. Many populations in the past have occupied Italian territory, and most of them have influenced the culture and traditions.

Traditionally Italy has been divided into Southern and Northern regions with their specific climate peculiarities and consequently, farming, which has left an imprint on its cuisine. Think only about Tuscan, or Friulano, or Piemontese cooking, the variations are actually local.

Celebrating Christmas, the residents of the Tuscan city of Siena cook Panforte, a nutty fruitcake sweetened with honey, and Ricciarelli. With the approach of the holiday, every pastry shop makes these dishes and puts them on display. In Florence, which is very close to Siena, you will not find either.

Friuli Venzia Giulia has many ties with central Europe, and so the cuisine contains ingredients which can not be found in the rest of Italy. Some widely-spread dishes in one regions can be considered to be foreign in others, as has happened with Sauerkraut, Jota (pronounced Yota), an unusual but tasty bean soup.

Though now extra-virgin olive oil is popular throughout Italy, this has not always been like that. With the exception of a few areas near lakes, Northern Italy is too cold for growing of olive trees, and as a result many people got used butter for cooking. In the wormer Central and Southern Italy, and the Islands, on the other hand, people cooked with olive oil.

Well known Italian dry pasta is made from durum wheat, water, and a pinch of salt: it is very easy to make, so very popular, especially in the South regions, where warmer climate and sufficient sunlight create nice opportunities for drying of the pasta. And now in spite of dry pasta factories everywhere, Italians generally beleive that southerners still make the best dry pasta.
Central and Northern parts of Italy (especially Emilia Romagna and Piemonte) are on the contrary known for fresh pasta, which is made with eggs, flour, and salt, for example tagliatelle, tajarin, or pappardelle, all of which are made in flat forms. The center and north are also world-wide known for their stuffed pasta, for instance, ravioli or tortellini: these kinds of pasta can be found in areas where people have not used to eat much flat or dry pasta until, for example in Lombardia.

The South of Italy has much warmer climate and consequently, much longer growing season than then in the North. It is obvious, that vegetables that thrive under hot sun, especially tomatoes, are more popular in these warm regions, which also has more dishes with tomato sauces than in the North. In the North, depending on the climate there are plants better adapted to cooler temperatures and less sunlight, for example head cabbages, black leaf kale, cardoons, and radicchio.

Italy is located in the middle of the Mediterranean, thus being historically a crossroads, which has led to a significant influence from outside, so here you may see various foreign signs. Quite obvious and expected in this region is French influence (regional French, but not haute cuisine) in the close to the French border areas of Liguria, Piemonte, and the Valle D’Aosta, and Austro-Hungarian influences in the Veneto, Trentino Alto Adige, and Friuli Venezia Giulia. Spanish influence is also present, and especially in Milano, which was under the Spaniards for some time; Spanish influence is evident in the South, which historically was ruled by the Bourbons until the unification of Italy in 1850s, and in Sardinia, which was under the Spaniards for a time. Signs of the English cuisine can be seen in Tuscany with the classic bistecca alla Fiorentina and zuppa Inglese, English steak and English trifle, respectively, which were cooked for the representatives of the English colony that settled Tuscany in the 1800s. Jewish influences can be found in Rome that also has historical explanation. Finally, in Sicily you can enjoy a tasty mixture of Roman and Arab dishes, which came from that time when it was an Arab province.
In brief, Italian cuisine is many-sided and diverse, and this means that there are a lot of surprises to experience.

People, who like sedate aristocratic tea drinking, should visit La Galerie des Gobelins.

And at last, the last restaurant of Plaza Athenee - a bar. This place is aimed more likely at the youth, who likes parties. Queer search of the designer, who has combined technological attributes of modern design and wooden panels of the XVIII century, have transformed the bar into a fashionable night club. The room is divided into two zones. The space of the first is arranged around the bar itself, made from an architectural glass with built-in luminescent lamps. The second zone has a chamber atmosphere. Leather sofas, freakish carpets and huge canvas will be an excellent frame for a cocktail party.

By the way, local cocktails are something like the card of the whole hotel. Their concept is created not only by barmen, but also by the management of the hotel led by the director, who is responsible for legendary firm service in Plaza Athenee. Cocktails are his hobby. Those, who like champagne and raspberry may enjoy with one of the most popular drinks of today’s night Paris - Rose Royale. And his most tremendous invention is substance called Flower Power. The recipe of this nonalcoholic cocktail enriched with oxygen is kept in secret. It is known only, that it contains an elixir from several flower species gathered in mountains of the Western Europe.

The prices are frightening, but the meal is worthy. One may also choose one of so-called “collection” menus, though, this pleasure will cost from 250 up to 400 € not taking into account cost of drinks.
This manuscript contains about hundred pages. It has wines from Italy, Australia, Spain, Portugal, Greece, Hungary and, certainly, the France - 1001 titles from the best wineries of the countries. None has managed to leave the restaurant quickly: the choice turns to lasting many hours procedure which, by the way, will satisfy even the most whimsical judges. To their services - rare and collection wines, as, for example, Dom Perignon - Moet and Chandon 1959 (2080 €), Chateau Cheval Blanc 1982 (5400 €), Chateau Latour 1955 (3000 €), Chateau Lafite Rothschild 1949 (1677 €) or Petrus 1966 (1982 €).

The next restaurant of the hotel is Le Relais Plaza. Phillip Mark also is responsible for a gastronomic component here. And though on the cuisine this restaurant is more simple in comparison with Alain Ducasse au Plaza Athenee, it without ceremony becomes the holder of a title of the most refined Parisian establishment. After all its decor has been inspired by interiors of the legendary liner Le Normandie.

The third restaurant - La Cour Jardin. It is located in a courtyard of a hotel directly open-air, it will best suit for a late lunch or an early supper. The best place to spend hot July evening in Paris.