Some of the best food in the world is often the simplest. It’s good to have an array of flavors in each bite, it’s great to have different textures and levels of sweetness and bitterness, in one dish. But when we get too used to complex flavors, we forget to appreciate that the simplest food is often the most satisfying. The Italian cuisine has this very ethos etched into its culinary traditions. Ask any top chef in Milan, Tuscany or Rome and he or she will say ‘minimum ingredients, maximum flavor’. The ingredients can’t be masked, hidden or supplemented, they stand up on their own two feet in simple recipes. Let’s see a few snacks that fit this order.
Chocolate and pretzels
It’s so simple but it’s so good. Chocolate covered pretzels, or pretzels dipped in chocolate, is a great snack. If you want something that is a bit more gourmet, then the types of pretzels that specialists esprovisions.com sell are right up your ally. These are made with softy, chewy dough, covered in a crispy crust with fine salts sprinkled on top. You can have these pretzels on their own or you can have them with homemade chocolate sauce. It’s very easy to make the former, as all you really need is 70% chocolate bars, a little bit of butter, a glass bowl and a saucepan full of boiling water. The butter will keep the chocolate from hardening and thus, able to be picked up with a piece of the pretzels or just drizzled on top.
Grilled cheese
Why don’t we consume more of this cheesy, gooey goodness!? Grilled cheese is awesome, in every single way. But let’s look at how we can make it better and simpler. Rather than get your typical thick white bloomer loaf, get a crusty sourdough bloomer instead. It’s got less water content and thus, able to trap heat inside the sandwich, a little more efficiently. Next, get some gruyere, provolone and American processed cheese. The gruyere is naturally duller in flavor but the texture is very smooth. The provolone is strong but not too strong and it’s very chewy. American cheese is well, American cheese. It’s got a very focussed pungent taste and it’s simply a classic ingredient all grilled cheese sandwiches need. Next, get some unsalted butter and use it to cook within a cast iron griddle pan. This is a simple, classic grilled cheese which needs no explanation.
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A Med snack
Go down to the port or riviera of any Mefityerranian city and you will find one snack, loved above all others. Flatbread and hummus. Yes, it’s really that simple. But wait, there’s more. The type of flatbread you find the most popular is olive flatbread, with all three kinds cut up in little bits and olive oil drizzled over the top. Hummus can be made of many things but the most popular is plain with olive oil, black pepper and or with capers in Italy mostly.
The best things in life are simple and familiar. These are some of the snacks you should never forget about and always have them in your fridge, ready to hug your stomach.