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Mixed Grilled Meats On Skewers | Valentina Cirasola | Author and Designer

17 Jan 2011 Leave a comment

by Valentina in Books Blog Tags: #ComeMiaNonnaReturnToSimplicity, #ItalianFood, #ItalianLifeStyle, #ItalianTableCustom, #MeatSkewers, #SouthernItalianCuisine, #ValentinaCirasolaAuthor

Drawing ©Valentina Cirasola

I need to tell you about this Italian custom of each Saturday night in country towns of Puglia, in Italy. It is an excerpt from my book: ©Come Mia Nonna – A Return To Simplicity. The book contains many cultural notes intended to let the readers discover the region of Puglia in an original way, from me, the writer, and local native of those parts.

“Many people would turn their nose up at this dish, because it is made with animal interiors, but read it first, you will know why I am raving. “Gnumeridd” is the title of this specialty, which is the dialect version of the Italian mixed grilled meats on skewers.

At the end of the week, butchers might have some leftover meats and animal interiors. They don’t throw them away but get creative on Saturday nights. They pull out their grill, place it right outside of their shops and cook the various cuts of meat on skewers: home-made sausages, small pieces of veal or lamb with bones, and the “Gnumeridd”.

While people are strolling around, enjoying the Italian “Dolce Far Niente” (sweet to do nothing), and the butcher’s grill. The air is filled with the enchanting and phenomenal aroma coming from the butcher’s shop and permeating the entire street. People are attracted by the flavors, their mouth waters, the only sensible thing to do is to stop by the grill and choose the pieces of grilled meat right off the grill which will be served in a cone of yellow butcher paper, wrapped in newspaper sheets. Among those pieces of grilled meats, they will find the surprise, which is the “Gnumeridd”.

Customers will eat standing up leaning against the wall of the butcher’s store, or sitting along the sidewalk. They will eat using their hands, no forks are allowed, and will enjoy every bite while thinking that perhaps even God must have stopped there for a taste as these bite-size grilled meats are divine!

I define the “Gnumeridd” dish as a hypnotic type of food because it is tasty, juicy, and aromatic. The reason for the superb taste is the good Puglia olive oil, good clay soil, and no hormones in animal nutrition. All of these combined make simple food fit for a King. Once you try the first one, you will want more and more, like cherries. It is a social dish. If you are eating by the butcher’s store every one you know will stop by and with one excuse or another will want to eat with you. This is a specialty of a town in Puglia called Altamura (Tall Walls).

How do you find the interiors of animals in American supermarkets, since everything is sold in packages? For this recipe, you need liver, hearts, and kidneys. Go to the back of the store and ask your butcher to reserve for you the parts of your choice and the type of meat of your choices. The original Puglia’s recipe requires lamb, goat, sheep, beef, and porc. In America will be challenging to find some of these meats, thus make it with the available meats. Ask the butcher to take the fat off and chop them in bite sizes.

Finely chop any spices of your liking, except the laurel leaves, and reserve.
Coarsely chop the raw liver, hearts, and kidneys. Wrap them up into single slices of bacon to obtain rolls of about 4″ long. Tie these rolls with a 100% cotton thread.
Stick them on a skewer, alternating a laurel leaf between each piece of cubed meat and the Gnumeridd.
Baste them with a rosemary sprig in a marinade of olive oil, lemon juice, salt, and black pepper and grill them until done inside thoroughly and they are golden brown and crispy on the outside.”

Barnes & Nobles

This recipe can also be done with good cuts of stew meat and without the animal interior parts altogether. Try it and love to hear your comments. Ciao,
Valentina
www.valentinadesigns.com

Author of two Italian regional cookbooks available in this site at the Books Page:
Come Mia Nonna – A Return To Simplicity http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Lnq8baaAq0M
Sins Of A Queen – Italian Appetizers and Desserts

Sea-Urchins or First Newly Wed Night? | Valentina Cirasola |Author and Designer

12 Jan 2011 Leave a comment

by Valentina in The Good Life Tags: #BariPuglia, #ComeMiaNonnaReturnToSimplicity, #ItalianLifeStyle, #ItalianTableCustom, #Octopi, #SeaUrchins, #SouthernItalianFood

Sea Urchin

Fish in Puglia is a sacred saint subject! It is a very serious matter. People eat it at least four times a week and every time is a ritual.
“Il fritto misto”, or mixed fried fish is always eaten with the hands when brought to the mouth is almost like playing the harmonica with the flesh and the bones.

Many fish sauces or broths are always used as condiments to pasta or rice and the fish cooked with those sauces becomes the second course, this way the preparation time is well spent and we have two substantial dishes at once. It is also a good way to save money on food. Pugliese cooking is today, as it was in the antiquity, a frugal cuisine.
One characteristic aspect of the fish in Puglia is the ritual of eating it raw on the bank of the Adriatic Sea.

In Bari, there is a place called: “N-Derr’a La Lanze”, a centre of the mariners’ life of the old city, where fishermen leave their boats to rock on the calm waters of the port and where they sew their nets and curl octopi for hours. Curling octopi it is a spectacle to see! It is an ancient practice that goes back to the late 1500’s and is only done in Bari.

The City Council governing Bari in the 1500′s established that the curled octopi had to be sold in a roll of one Kilogram at the price of 3-1/2 grain, which was the money value at that time. The curling serves the purpose of tenderizing the octopi, which then will be eaten raw with only a glass of white wine and a piece of fresh country Pugliese bread.

Much seafood, or as we call them “frutti di mare” are eaten raw, such as sea truffles, mussels, clams, razor clams, oysters, sea-urchins, smelt fish and others found in the Mediterranean Sea. Sunday meals especially are not complete without seafood.
We have an old Barese saying that goes: “It is better to eat sea-urchins and seafood than to consummate a first newlywed night”. In other words, sea-urchins are only good when they are freshly caught, retaining briefly their color and taste of the sea, but marriage, when built on solid foundations, is always there.

Please forward this article to anyone you think might be interested in reading it and let me know what you think by leaving a comment below. Thank you. Ciao.
Valentina
Visit the designer: www.valentinadesigns.com

Come Mia Nonna–A Return to Simplicity http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Lnq8baaAq0M
Sins Of A Queen – Italian Appetizers and Desserts
Available in this site at the Books Page and also in various locations:
outskirtspress.com/ComeMiaNonna
http://outskirtspress.com/SinsOfAQueen
http://www.amazon.com/Valentina-Cirasola/e/B0031A02H2/ref=ntt_dp_epwbk_0

Robert Taitano, a friend and business associate of www.wine-fi.com says:
“Valentina – an International Professional Interior Designer is now giving you an opportunity to redesign your palate”.

I Prescribe Bohemian Style | Valentina Cirasola | Interior Designer

10 Jan 2011 9 Comments

by Valentina in Home Designs Master Tags: #BohemianColors, #BohemianHomeFashion, #BohemianStyle, #DecoratingBohemianStyle, #HomeTrends

In my second book, Sins Of A Queen, I wrote that “Salt is the spice of food, attitude is the spice of life”, but in my designing business colors and fabrics are the spices of a home.
We have entered a new decade of a young millennium with a new gentle attitude when approaching style. We are freer than ever to decorate or even to dress as it is most pleasurable to our eyes and without following made-up rules any more. Yet every 40-50 years we take inspirations from past time décor or fashion, turn it around and make it new again. That is because looking back in the past is nostalgic for those who have lived it and refreshing for those who have not yet. Who would have imagined that the hippies ‘70s era would have brought inspiration to copy today!? Well, not really copy it, but remake it into a new sophistication.

Today looking at the ’70s means to take the psychedelic patterns, the bold colors, the vivid floral fabrics of that era and mix them with the contemporary style or even with traditional furniture. The objective is to incorporate without falling into the matchy-matchy syndrome.
I say, feel free to mix paisley with geometric lines, fringes with appliquéd designs or rich velvet, quilted pieces with leather pieces, masculine with feminine, but do it with a conscious style and taste.

The Bohemian style of this decade has a well researched look, sophisticated, soft, gentle and vintage versus the jumble of colors and patterns of the ‘70s that went hand in hand with scruffy, casual and untidy fashion look. The Bohemian style is totally different from Shabby Chic style, you might find vintage items and vintage colors and fabrics, but you will not find distressed and worn out items, only suggestions to the past.

Furniture of the Bohemian style are well-preserved even if they are from the ’70s, no chipping in the wood and in the varnishes, leucite, bakelite materials and flowers in every colors and shapes for accessories. In homes a striking Bohemian color palette allows the browns, grey/silver and Prussian blues to live together in a combination of velvets, tapestries and 16th century French prints. Opposite to this autumnal colors, the new Bohemian style allows to decorate interiors in a more young dynamic way with pinks, oranges and dark blues or purples in an attempt to revive the hippies fashion’s vibrancy and rebellious colors.

natalie_quilt_company_store (Photo: Natalie Quilt – The Company Store)

In a bedroom, bring a patchwork floral quilt with mixed floral prints pillows and set it against a heavy textured wall for a new chic. We will see beautiful and interesting stones on the walls again, such as bricks. I absolutely adore any natural stones! In the living room, add a bundle of colorful flowers pillows to that beige tired sofa and watch life come back to the room!

(Photo: the Company Store)

I prescribe Bohemian style in your home, because it is comfortable, unpretentious, yet chic and refined. Walking down the street in a Bohemian fashion is a head turning. Whatever ideas you have, I can help you put it all together, I am only an email away. From there is easy to develop a project through various communication channels that will not break your bank. Ciao,
Valentina
http://www.valentinadesigns.com

Valentina Cirasola has been in business as a designer since 1990. She has helped a variegated group of fun people realizing their dreams with homes, offices, interiors and exteriors. She is a designer well-known to bring originality to people’s homes. As an Italian designer and true to her origins, she provides only the best workmanship and design solutions.
Check out her books on
Amazon: http://goo.gl/xUZfk0
Barnes&Nobles: http://goo.gl/q7dQ3w

I Survived A 13 Courses Dinner | Valentina Cirasola | Interior Designer

02 Jan 2011 2 Comments

by Valentina in The Good Life Tags: #italianCooking, #ItalianCulture, #ItalianEndOfYearDinner, #ItalianFood, #ItalianKitchen, #ItalianTableCustom

New Year’s Eve in almost every Italian homes is like history repeating itself. A 13 courses Lucullian dinner awaits to be consumed. Soon after Christmas people start planning their New Year’s Eve, whether it will be in a club, restaurant, or at home with family and friends, the end of the year is an important day of the entire year. It is a common believe that whatever one does on that evening and the first of year, one will do it for the rest of the year, therefore no crying, no paying bills, no arguing, only cooking, eating, laughing and spending a pleasant passage into the new year.

(Click on each photo to view it larger).

The street markets and stores stay open at least until 5:00 pm for those who need the last few ingredients, or to find the last-minute outfit for the evening.
The people who stay at home to celebrate with their loved ones, end up cooking all day long. It sounds like an awful stressful activity to do right at the end of the year, but in reality Italian people love to cook in company of other people and even with their guests. Lot of laughter and camaraderie goes on during the cooking and that is one of the many reasons food in Italy taste so good, we make them with love and pleasure.

It is customary at lunch to have a small snack of vegetables and a fruit, but at night the New Year’s Eve dinner is an act of culinary cleverness and serious professionalism. The dinner table is well set, but not overly decorated with useless stuff, the food will take a center stage on the table of this evening.

Orange Appetizer

The dinner for this special night consist of 13 courses by tradition, one for each month of the year and one more in honor of the new coming year. It seems a whole lot of food to brush off in one night, but starting at 6:00 pm when everybody sits down at the table, until midnight when the champagne bottles pop, there are six hours of nothing but food paced with intervals and slow enjoyment.
It starts with many antipasti of different kind, but a mixture of raw and shell-fish is the king for this night, as it is for all the eves before an important holiday.

The evening continues on the note of fish. Any type of pasta with any fish sauce is served as a first course and grilled, fried or baked fish as a second course.

Olives and savory munchies fill the table to help passing time between those courses which need to be cooked fresh on the spot, to encourage conversation and wine drinking. In some families between the first, the second and third course, it is customary to pass a small portion of lemon or orange sorbet as a palate cleanser. What a delightful and fine dinner practice!

After the most important part of the dinner is served, all the minor plates will be parading such as, fried vegetables, fried puffy dough, food preserved under oil or vinegar, dried fruits and nuts, fresh fruit, typical regional home-made sweets and cookies, along with the store-bought sweets.

One specialty must never be forgotten before midnight strikes and that is cooked lentils with a swirl of olive oil and basil leaves. The popular belief is that each lentil represents money, more lentil a person can eat, more money that person will make. Needless to say we consume a large pot of lentils every end of the year just to wish ourselves a good financial stability.

At midnight the champagne is popped, kisses, hugs and laughter fill the air, accompanied with panettone, a typical Italian sponge cake sometimes filled with chocolate, sometimes with champagne cream, or tiramisu’ as I like, or candied fruit.

The 13 courses dinner is over after midnight, but the night is young and it is the first day of the new year. Outside, people shoot fireworks from their balconies and windows. It is important to welcome the new year and celebrate it any way people can. If people celebrate this first day, they will be celebrating many more times during the year, so the old folks saying goes. Then at 5:00 am in the streets is time to taste freshly made croissants, hot from the baker’s oven with a warm frothy cappuccino to fight the cold temperature of this winter night spent in boisterous festivity.
Buon Anno, Happy New Year to all and peace in the world.

I would love to design your kitchen and show you the way to comfort and good cooking through a functional space. Contact me, I am at your service. Ciao,
Valentina
http://www.Valentinadesigns.com

Valentina Cirasola is an Italian Interior Designer in business since 1990 with a special passion for kitchens and cooking. She operates in the USA and Europe. She loves to remodel homes and loves to turn ugly spaces into castles, but especially loves to design kitchens and wine grottos. She also the author of two Italian regional cookbooks available on
Amazon: http://goo.gl/xUZfk0
Barnes&Nobles: http://goo.gl/q7dQ3w

A Fabulous Space For Bacchus | Valentina Cirasola | Interior Designer

29 Dec 2010 Leave a comment

by Valentina in Home Designs Master Tags: #FurnitureDesigns, #HomeRemodeling, #ItalianKitchenStyle, #kitchenDesign, #KitchenRemodeling, #WineCellar, Avaliving

Wine Tasting Area & Chef Pantry ©Valentina-Interiors & Designs

Brazilian Cherry and Pecan wood inlay. This is the kitchen among many of my designs that Avaliving selected to feature this week. The area where the refrigerator used to be became a space for wines and an area where to taste cheeses, slicing prosciutto, basically an area where to prepare aperitif. The tall floor to ceiling cabinet hosts sixty bottles of red wines on roll-out shelves. Clients did not really require a temperature controlled room for the red wines, as they use them every day with friends and family visiting often. A small refrigerator for white wines under the granite counter top was necessary to free the space in the family refrigerator, already bursting with food serving two growing boys and the family entertainments.

Full Kitchen View ©Valentina-Interiors & Designs

I strategically placed this wine area between the new door to the dining room and the chef pantry. The supplies such as crackers, toothpicks, dried nuts, fruits and stuff for aperitif are now kept close by the wines and the wines have easy access to the dining area with a new passageway, saving the owner a trip around the wall.
Planning a well-functioning kitchen is not just about designing cabinetry to stuff the walls, but it’s about letting all the spaces communicating with each others and their function.

The “anticato” tile floor I added really suited the clients who are Italians and like me, they don’t care that the floor or counters show a little ring of wines here and there, the signs of a good time and the sign of a lived home. Natural stones will leave with us and will become beautiful when they start showing the sign of life, just like our stones in Europe are living through centuries and everyone admires their beauty.

Full Kitchen View ©Valentina-Interiors & Designs

This wine area was part of the entire kitchen remodeling with family and dining rooms included.
There you have it, another example of how I can change a kitchen from an unattractive 1970 cooking area into a contemporary dining, cooking and entertainment showcase. Thanks to Avaliving featuring it this week, more people will have the chance to admire it.

I am available to consult with the wine lovers out there and to design a fabulous space fit for Bacchus. Ciao,
Valentina
http://www.valentinadesigns.com

(All photos belong to ©Valentina Interiors & Designs)

Valentina Cirasola is an Italian Interior Designer with a passion for kitchens and cooking. She has been operating in the USA and Europe since 1990. She loves to remodel homes and loves to turn unattractive spaces into castles, but especially loves to design kitchens and wine grottos. She is also the author of two Italian regional cookbooks:

©Come Mia Nonnna – A Return To Simplicity http://outskirtspress.com/ComeMiaNonna
©Sins Of A Queen http://outskirtspress.com/SinsOfAQueen

Amazon: http://goo.gl/xUZfk0

Barnes&Nobles: http://goo.gl/q7dQ3w

I am ready to add colors to your life | Valentina Cirasola | Interior Designer

23 Dec 2010 Leave a comment

by Valentina in Home Designs Master Tags: #2011Colors, #2011FashionColors, #2011HomeColors, #HomeTrends, #HoneysuckleColor

New year, new life, new style! At the end of each year those of us concerned with style and colors are always curious to know about new directions to take for the coming year, whether it would be for a remaking of a space, a remodeling of a house, or presenting a personal image. It is a genuine need we have to feel and look good first and to please others second.

The first decade of this millennium has been characterized by bluish colors, from indigo to plum, in all the tints and tones. We are leaving the blues to dive into the pinkish, in fact Pantone has declared Honeysuckle the color of the coming 2011. Honeysuckle is a hot and vibrant color, but many, I am one of them, might not feel too hot in this color. This color is considered an “escape from reality” and a boost to our self-esteem in facing everyday problems and life challenges. This is all good, if a simple slap of honeysuckle color on the walls really helps people keeping their sanity!!!!

We all know that in time of stress every little cheerful thing helps. During the depression the colorful glasses were invented and the pink glass was the color most in demand then. The Federal glass today are highly collectible and valuable.
(Find this champagne Federal glass on http://www.replacements.com/webquote/fegnorp.htm)

As you can see from the palette up above by On Idée Fixe Production – London – info@rogerlaborde.com, honeysuckle can be combined with many hot colors to emphasize the energy, or with dark colors to calm it down. The best way is to use it sparingly, as an accent. This graphic gives the idea of how many combinations are possible.

In decorating a room, honeysuckle will help the decor come alive without overpowering the rest of the décor, but only if it is used on one wall or when used in a bunch of pillows and nothing else, or even when used on draperies alone.

Honeysuckle emanates a great energy around food areas, such as kitchen, dining and family rooms. It has been said it is a powerful color to increase appetite and feed conversation, just like the red and orange colors. To add a rhythm to a white kitchen, it is a good idea to paint and accentuate some cabinets in honeysuckle. In the same color, paint wood door knobs/handles and attach them to the white cabinets, then attach Federal pink glass knobs to the honeysuckle cabinets. Now that’s rhythm! I just gave you a solution for an innovative make-over kitchen without spending a boat load of money.

Colorful pillows create a fresh young atmosphere in a house, a few here and there in honeysuckle color can be the base for the dominating field which communicates with some pillows in light green, beige/brown, white and even red. Use my palette of circles (above) as a guide for home and fashion.

There is a little something for everybody in honeysuckle color, even men. Hermès ties in honeysuckle with muted orange and brown stripes are a delightful sophistication, or a geometric pinkish design makes an interesting tie when worn with pearl grey pants and shirt with a plum jacket.

I am ready to fit this new 2011 color in my life. Are you ready to have a striking vibration and a new level of energy this coming year in your home or guard robe?
Ask for my help, you shall receive it. Ciao,
Valentina

http://www.valentinadesigns.com

Valentina Cirasola is an Italian Interior Designer and former Fashion Designer, working in the USA and Europe. She blends well fashion and interior in any of her design work. She loves to remodel homes and loves to turn unattractive spaces into castles. Valentina is knows as a colorist and her own life is a continuous evolvement of colorful events. Check out her books on
Amazon: http://goo.gl/xUZfk0
Barnes&Nobles: http://goo.gl/q7dQ3w

Can You Be Bold? | Valentina Cirasola | Interior Designer

11 Dec 2010 2 Comments

by Valentina in Home Designs Master Tags: #DecoratingTips, #FurnitureLayOut, #HomeDecorating, #HomeStyle, #HomeTrends, #InteriorColors, #UrbanStyle, Furniture

November and December are two fabulous months for me to get inspirations from stores and their displays. Being the curious person that I am and always with a camera in my hands, I shoot at anything that attracts my eyes. The other night, after I had taken a few pictures, I started to notice a pattern in my photos. Everything in my camera view was big, bold, large, oversize and not for any particular reason. Ok, nothing wrong with that, I guess my eyes needed to sweep in wide spaces, but how do we fit oversize items in small spaces, you might ask? Let’s start by saying that one does not need to have tall ceilings and ballroom type of space to host large objects.

Two bulky bookshelves (as in the photo) will look massive in a small room, but adding a large picture, print, or canvas in between will break the bulkiness, the monotony and will fill the wall nicely. The horizontal lines must be kept on the same level for the eyes to rest peacefully and send a message of harmony to the brain. The same two bulky bookshelves placed side by side in the middle of the wall in a large room will not look so massive any more and it will allow floor space perhaps for a pair of chairs, or a pair of floor lamps on each side of the bookshelves.

I love clocks on the walls, whether they are antiques, contemporaries or reproductions, they are timeless objects of décor. A Grand Central Station wall clock, a Parisian country clock, or a Grand Father’s clock, they all need to be surrounded with the right accessories. An oversize clock hanging on the wall needs a large base, a console, or a credenza under its own weight to eliminate the feeling of “hanging” in space, then the wall feels balanced. Of course to match the right kind of style of chandelier and lighting to the style of the clock would be ideal, but today’s décor permits to go outside the rules and allows personal expression to make a statement and to define the character of the home.

Mirrors: consider them as another kind of windows opened in the walls. They reflect the light and they reflect the beauty, so place them where you can see the beauty elevated to higher power. Mirrors must not be all the same style and look, nobody said that, as matter of fact, more they are different in sizes, shapes and style, higher the interest they will bring to the décor of a room. And if one of the mirror is so large that would be even too heavy to hung, lay it casually against the wall, it will actually give a perception of height and everything reflected in it will look slightly taller. A mirror combination will fill a large wall graciously and a large mirror in a small room will change the status of the room from contained to grand.

(All photos taken in the store by ©Valentina Cirasola with permission)

Lighting finishes the room like jewelry on a woman’s dress. This is one item of furnishing where we can all go to town due to a wide variety of choices, but remember that the eyes find repose when they meet shadows. It is very nice to have bright light and light beams when we need to see clear, but in some special moments a light glow coming from various planes is so much more refined.

Large items have one advantage: they fill any space magically, clutter is eliminated instantly and so is the desire to accumulate more items.

As seen on Affluent Living:

Go out there and find the boldest, largest items for your decor and then set them in the most unusual way. Ask yourself what this item makes you feel, what is the emotion that it exudes in the room and how it dictates its presence. If you like to send me pictures, I shall be here to help with any challenges. Ciao,
Valentina

http://www.valentinadesigns.com

Valentina Cirasola is a trained Italian Interior Designer in business since 1990. Being Italian born and raised, Valentina’s design work has been influenced by Classicism and stylish, timeless designs. She will create your everyday living with a certain luxury without taking away your comfort. She loves to restore old homes, historic dwellings and she focuses on remodeling.
Check out her books on
Amazon: http://goo.gl/xUZfk0
Barnes&Nobles: http://goo.gl/q7dQ3w

Hot Fireplace | Valentina Cirasola | Interior Designer

07 Dec 2010 Leave a comment

by Valentina in Home Designs Master Tags: #Fireplace, #FireplaceDesign, #HomeInteriors, #HomeRemodeling, #LivingRoomColors, Avaliving, Decorating

I am so happy to start my Monday with the news that one of my project is featured on Ava until next Monday, a site where designers can interact and connect with potential clients anywhere in the world without having to travel. Ava’s site is a place where anyone looking for home solutions can find it there and learn from the experts. Every week AvaLiving has a theme and based on that it features the best submitted designs.
This week theme is: Hot Fireplaces.

I presented my project in Foster City, California of an interested fireplace in the living room with attached built-in unit.
This room was part of the entire home remodeling. Clients had no preconceived idea of any style, or decor. They were open to any suggestions. The only request was that the T.V. would not be on top of the mantel, as it is usually seen in most homes. A fireplace is for enjoying fire, while reading a good book, or sipping wines in company of friends. A crackling fire should be a cozy background for watching T.V.

In designing this fireplace I had a few challenges: two windows on both sides of the fireplace and not enough clean walls to place a larger plasma T.V. as the client requested.
The result of my studies of the room was to design a built-in unit attached to the mantel to make it visually looking as one continuous wall. The built-in unit would include a short bookcase, a smaller plasma T.V., storage for DVD/CDs and the fireplace itself.
The fireplace’s stones came from the work done in other areas of the house. Being budget conscious I make sure no material goes to waste, as usual in all my projects. The iron stone was very expensive, it was a good thinking to use the left over for the hearth application. As the professional who is always ready, I shall be prompt and ready to help you with any of your design needs, whether it will be decorating, designing, or remodeling.

I am honored to be featured on AvaLiving, thank you Ava for your support. Life is good at Valentina Interiors & Designs. Ciao,
Valentina
http://www.valentinadesigns.com

Valentina Cirasola has been in business as a designer since 1990. She has helped a variegated group of fun people realizing their dreams with homes, offices, interiors and exteriors. She is a designer well-known to bring originality to people’s homes. As an Italian designer and true to her origins, she provides only the best workmanship and design solutions. Check out her books on
Amazon: http://goo.gl/xUZfk0
Barnes&Nobles: http://goo.gl/q7dQ3w

Custom and Traditions Of An Italian Christmas Dinner | Valentina Cirasola | Interior Designer

06 Dec 2010 2 Comments

by Valentina in Books Blog Tags: #FoodHistory, #ItalainStyleEating, #ItalianChristmaDinner, #ItalianCulture, #ItalianFood, #SinsOfAQueen, Avaliving

In Italy, in the province of Pavia, Christmas Eve dinner starts with a soup of lasagna mixed with mushrooms sauté in oil and garlic. In old times in Italy newborn babies were wrapped in bands of white cloth to keep their tender legs very straight and prevent them from growing bowed. In the fantasy of the local people this dish represents those bands, it is made in honor of baby Jesus being born on Christmas Eve.

Many specialties follow this first dish: marinated eel salted stockfish and escargot. The small horns of the escargot allude to discord and disagreement between people, therefore they need to be hidden in the stomach of the guests to properly prepare themselves for a peaceful Christmas, as the legend says.
Other fundamental specialties are risotto cooked in any style, roasted turkey, boiled capon dressed with mustard. In the same province of Pavia, going more toward the inland towns and villages, included in the typical menu of the holidays, after a risotto plate, one finds stuffed onions with meat and focaccia bread.

A must-have dessert for the end of the dinner is the Sbrisolona Torte, a typical dessert of that area. It is a crisp and friable torte, which accompanies Torrone, Panettone and Pâte Brisee’ all hand-made specialties found in each home. The Sbrisolona Torte doesn’t really mark the end of the dinner, there are still all the fruits of the season parading on the table: citrus, grapes, and dry nuts. Apples, even though are fruits of the Christmas season, are not eaten because they represent the fruit with which Adam and Eve committed the original sin.

Women bake hand-made bread for the Christmas holidays. The portion to use for every meal is cut and reserved, then all Christmas types of breads are placed on the center of the table and everyone, in turn, must take a piece every day from Christmas Eve until the 31st of December. It is a belief that Christmas types of breads do not go bad, do not grow mold and therefore they are good to cure bellyache.

Every region in Italy has different customs and traditions. In the South, the main item on everybody’s table is fish, cooked in any way possible, in addition to the delicacy of raw fish and shell-fish and it doesn’t matter how much its price sky-rockets in this time of the year, it is a must-have! Christmas dinners last many hours, they could go on for 5 or 6 hours. Italians people spend a lot of money for a Christmas dinner and cook for days to make it ready, but the only important thing is the togetherness of the family, the love for one another, and that in itself is priceless. Ciao.
Valentina
http://www.valentinadesigns.com

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Valentina Cirasola has been in business as an interior designer since 1990. Her life is a continuous evolvement of colorful events. She will not only design your home, build it, and decorate it, but she will also design your palate with her new productions of Italian regional cookbooks. She is the author of
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Caressing The Past | Valentina Cirasola | Interior Designer

26 Nov 2010 4 Comments

by Valentina in Home Designs Master Tags: #1920Architecture, #1920Style, #ChristmasDecorating, #ChristmasThemes, #HistoricAinsleyHouse, 1920Fashion, Avaliving

This year I feel very honored to have been one of the designers selected to decorate Christmas at the Historic Ainsley House in Campbell, CA.

The owner, John Colpitts, a British native, built the House in the 1920s as a retirement home. John came to California in the late 1800s and made his fortune canning food, which he exported to England to his brother.

This year Christmas theme was “Christmas Around The World”. Being Italian born I thought of bringing a bit of the Amalfi’s flavors into my decorations, with citrus fruit, grapes, roses, camellias, and the typical poinsettia. My color scheme has been platinum, green, white, with a touch of purple and gold as accents throughout the guest bedroom, boudoir, closet, and cosmetic parlor.

Cosmetic Parlor

The guest quarter is a very delicate room, with powdery pastel colors fit for an elegant woman. Original 1920’s dresses are kept beautifully on mannequins and inside of the closet, while originals accessories peek through an original traveling trunk resting in the boudoir. I was so surprised to see a cosmetic parlor in the boudoir. It is a simple pedestal sink with a lighted mirror above and monogrammed face towels hanging on the bar, all concealed beyond a door when not in use. What a nice feature! Small features and details such a cosmetic parlor have ceded the way to large bath spaces, which, at times, I feel they are totally sterile and without a soul.

While I was in the attic of the House selecting the items for my Christmas decorations, I felt so much part of that era. The director was telling me that J.C. the owner, kept his liqueurs in the basements beyond some wood panels. The Prohibition Law marked the era, but we all know that when something is forbidden, we want exactly the object of sins. The story goes that the highlight of the Ainsleys’ parties was to turn all the lights off and make the guests find the door to the basement where the liqueurs were kept.

Going up and down the stairs from the attic, I could not help admiring the hardwood floor beautifully concerted almost as inlay work, the type of setting that would require the artistry and clinical eye of an ebonist. Custom flooring is another area of designing that has ceded the step to a less expensive and faster application.

The House was designed with 15 rooms in a style of Tudor Revival architecture with the influence of Arts and Crafts movement of the 1920s. The most striking feature is the English style thatched roof, remade in 2007 as a faux thatched, but one can also admire the half-timbering façade, the interior wood paneling, the multi-paneled windows and the bay windows, especially the corner one at the breakfast room.
During my conversation with the curator/director, I learned that in 1990 the House was lifted up in its entirety and moved about 1.5 miles to the present location in Campbell, CA. One would think tiles would come apart, the floor would open up and walls would create cracks during the house moving, but nothing came undone. The workmanship was really a mastery, I can adduce.

Boudoir

The modernity of the guest bathroom style really struck me, the entire bath is quite spacious. The tub is enclosed in a Tudor style alcove surrounded by Nile green tiles, the shower is separated from the tubs, enclosed with a glass door and finished with the same color tiles with three water jets, a very avant-garde detail to find in bathrooms of that era. A deep linen closet and an enclosed W.C. make this a desirable spa, just as we intend it today.

Christmas_in_Amalfi

Alcinda was in love with John Colpitts, who was a workaholic with a strong character and played hard to get. The only way to get him to pay attention to her was to accept a job in his firm as his bookkeeper. Alcinda was 17 years younger than John, but she became his wife at last. A medium, while visiting the house a few years ago, felt a massive male energy, so I was told. I felt the same while I was decorating the upstairs guest bedroom, an enveloping warm male presence, perhaps he was a woman’s charmer. He had many visitors from Europe sojourning in his house. I can see the care that was given to the guest bedroom, made delicately elegant and comfortable for a woman. For the same reason, I wanted to give the room the same gentleness using soft Christmas colors and a certain daintiness with the flavors of romantic Amalfi.

The Ainsley House will be open every day from Nov. 20th to Dec. 19th. Calendar of events will include Holiday Teas and Tours, Holiday Boutique, Photo with Santa and Holiday Open House.
I have enjoyed the experience of caressing the past in a prestigious historic home and especially have enjoyed the comments on my upside-down tree.

Perhaps next year, I can be called to decorate your Christmas with a special theme at your home. Ciao,
Valentina

http://www.valentinadesigns.com

Valentina Cirasola is a trained Italian Interior Designer in business since 1990. Being Italian born and raised, Valentina’s design work has been influenced by Classicism and stylish, timeless designs. She will create your everyday living with a certain luxury without taking away your comfort. She loves to restore old homes, historic dwellings and she focuses on remodeling. Check out her books on
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