Prep a Full Meal with a Single Skillet!

After receiving feedback from fans of the original 5-section MasterPan, its creators are launching the smaller, convenient and versatile 2- and 3-section MasterPan through a Kickstarter campaign. These skillets allow users to prepare full meals with the use of a single pan, like a full breakfast of eggs, pancakes and sausage, burgers with bacon for lunch, and grilled chicken and veggies for dinner. Cooking with the MasterPan can also help users with preparing the right amounts of food, helping to control portion sizes and minimize food waste. This is a great product for use in smalls dorms and apartments, camping with the family, or at home.

 Key features for the new products from MasterPan include:

•   Detachable handle for use in oven (up to 360 degrees)

•   Safe non-stick coating for easy cleanup

•   Induction steel plate for evenly distributed heat and for use on any stove top

My Thoughts:

MasterPan is paving the way for innovative cooking supplies. Whether you are a master chef or new to the game, MasterPan will have you enjoying your cooking experience. No matter if you are whipping up a single meal or one for family, there is something for everyone.

For more information on the latest grill and griddle addition to the MasterPan family, check out the Kickstarter campaign:

KickStarter

Attached are two pictures as I made pancakes in the morning from the Kickstarter model. I absolutely loved it! It cut my normal cooking time in half since I could cook multiple pancakes, as well as eggs and breakfast meats together. I also adored that it allowed for proper portion control. The pancakes were the perfect size, yet still thick and fluffy!

My family loves to have breakfast at all times of the day, and these pans were ideal. MasterPan was kind enough to send me multiple products, and they all were incredible. The non-stick texture, the shape of the pans, as well as the ability to cook so many different things at once was a true blessing. They were ideal for grilled chicken, steaks, and vegetables. I'd recommend MasterPan to anyone!

Connect with MasterPan:

Website  Facebook  Twitter  Youtube Instagram 

Review: Solavore TR-86 High Performance Reflector

Solavore TR-86 High Performance Reflector
 

NEW!

Bring on the heat with Solavore’s powerful new TR-86 Reflector. Its mirror-like surface – 86% Total Reflectance - means faster preheat, higher oven temperatures, and increased range for partial-sun days.

• Great for baking. Cook year-round - even up north, far from the sunbelt
• Weather and tarnish resistant surface, a finish that will stay looking new for years, thanks to anodizing that hardens and coats the aluminum
• Detachable, folds flat. Includes carry case for safe storage when not in use
• Made in the USA
• Save $17 and get free shipping when purchased with your Solavore Sport

Visit Solavore:
www.solavore.com
Facebook
Twitter
Instagram
YouTube

Shop:
www.solavore.com/shop

Our Thoughts
I reviewed the Solavore Sport Solar Oven a few months ago (read my original review here) and I have to say, I still love it and continue to use it - it will definitely see the most use in the summer so I don't have to use my traditional oven and heat up the house! 

It has been frustrating though, to not be able to use it in the winter months - for about a month before, and a month after, the winter solstice.  Not the fault of the solar oven by any means, just a sad combination of our specific location in town with surrounding buildings, trees, and the low position of the sun in the sky.  Our backyard gets plenty of ambient light during the day, but not enough direct sun so there's not enough time to cook foods for the longer periods the solar oven requires.  So as you can imagine, when Solavore offered me the chance to try out the new TR-86 high performance reflectors I jumped at it because the new reflectors capture more of the sun's rays for winter performance.

So this beautiful shiny thing arrives . . . and I kid you not, we then had like 2 weeks of overcast days, snow, and fog.  The news said at one point 51 straight hours of FOG.  That wasn't even the end of the fog though. Ridiculous. And certainly not conducive to solar cooking!

For a comparison, this is the "old" reflector that came with my Solavore Sport - definitely reflective and helpful for solar cooking.

Now compare the new TR-86 Reflector - much shinier; a higher reflective surface:





Finally the weather cooperated and we had a day of SUN! Awesome.  Great, now what to cook?  Hmm.  Let's try some muffins. This recipe is straight out of my own paleo cookbook which I believe you can read about in my profile on Blogger (if you wish!). It's a nut flour based recipe since we are grain-free, and the base recipe is very versatile and has served me well over the years - one I know to work well with a variety of different added ingredients.  For this one, I made a cinnamon spice muffin with dried fruits.  I started pre-heating the oven at about 9:30am, when the first sliver of morning sun came up over the house and hit the far west side of our backyard.  The outside temp was 9F.  The muffins went in the oven about 10:30am.  I did have to move the oven a couple of times to keep it in direct sunlight but it's not heavy, and the smooth bottom slides nicely over the snow.

The oven temp with the TR-86 Reflector was about the normal temp I'd expect during the warmer months without using a reflector, about 225F. 

The recommended baking time is 90 minutes, and the temp inside the oven was steady. You can see the condensation building up in this photo.

I did open the oven to check the done-ness of the muffins and decided they weren't quite done yet.  Just be aware that opening the solar oven during a frigid day (remember the outside temp was 9F!), it will lose some heat and need more time for the sun to bring it back up to the required temp.

Overall, the muffins took about 2 hours to bake until they got as done as I like them.  Much longer than the 20 minutes in my (gas) oven, so you know, have patience!  Their consistency/texture was a little different than traditional cooking - wetter, chewier. I will try this again during the warmer months when I can get the oven temp up a little higher.  (Don't let the solar oven get over 300F or warping may occur.)

Next up - with the success of the muffins, I thought I'd try a cake.  Well, it didn't start out as a cake.  Really I just wanted to make a sauce.  But then I kept adding stuff to it and it ended up as a cake. (That's rather how I cook anyway, adding stuff here and there and the end result doesn't always resemble what my first intent was!)

This one failed for three reasons:

1. I think it's because I used my own cooking pot, which has a blue lid, rather than the black lids that come with the pots that come with the solar oven.  I think a black lid would have absorbed more light.

2. While I can throw together a muffin recipe without actually using a recipe - just been doing it long enough I'm used to it - I don't think I got the ratio of ingredients quite right since solar baking involves more moisture during the baking process. Something to work on.

3. Weather.  Granted it was mostly sunny out (there were some clouds), but we also had high winds - in the 20-30mph range.  The solar oven, even with the TR-86 Reflector, had trouble keeping the temps up enough for baking.  It was at about 180F, which will cook your roasts fine if you cook them all day, but trying to bake in the winter, well, not so much.  I ended up scooping out the batter into a muffin tin and finishing it in my gas oven.

I tried to put in some halved acorn squash in the black pots after I gave up on the cake but again, with the high winds, there was not enough warmth and certainly not enough direct sunlight time to get the squash more than lukewarm. 

Seeing what the temps and weather conditions needed to be for successful winter solar cooking, and the time frame we actually have direct sunlight in the backyard - I decided not to try a roast - there just wouldn't be enough time of direct sunlight - not yet.  Soon though . . . another few weeks or so and the sun will be much higher in the sky and I can get back to it.  (As a side note, we are moving to the country this year (building a house) and out at our new property - I won't have to worry about having enough direct sunlight because we aren't surrounded by buildings - plenty of open space to soak up all the sun's rays, all day long.)

The last test I did with the TR-86 Reflector, was chocolate chip cookies (almond flour based).  I knew with the moisture content inside the solar oven the cookies would turn out chewy and soft.  Not crispy, like my husband likes them.  Haha, more for me!

I didn't have a cookie sheet small enough to fit inside the solar oven so I just used the pots (uncovered) it came with. I was able to fit 14 cookies inside the two 10" pots.

Now, our crazy weather had changed enough in the last couple of weeks - we went from frigid temps to, well, nice out. But this gives me an idea on how well the new reflectors perform in warmer temps.

You can see the snow's already melted, that's how nice it was out - in the 40-50F range. 

The cookies really didn't take too long to bake, about 90 minutes. With the combination of the outside weather and the new reflectors, the solar oven temp reached about 275F.  The cookies turned out awesome. Chewy, delicious, perfect, and best of all, I didn't have to share!

Holiday Gift Guide - Review: Viking Pressure Cooker with Steamer

 

The Viking Pressure Cooker uses a simple non-slip lock knob to easily and securely clamp the lid down on the vessel. Set the lid on in any direction you wish, then just turn the knob to create a pressure safe seal and you are ready to cook.

• Open & Close the Lid with the Turn of a Knob
• Can Be Used on any Cooking Surface, Including Induction
• Energy Saving – Reduces Cooking Time by Half or More
• Pressure Release Dial Allows You to Easily Adjust the Pressure
• Durable Stainless Steel Construction
• Pressure Indicator Identifies when the Cooker has Reached Full Pressure
• Stay Cool Handles

The commercial cooking technology and innovation once reserved for only restaurant kitchens is available for your home; only from Viking. To make it even better, Viking is now infused with a new culture from Middleby under which are continuously striving to ensure that their products, quality and service are the best available.

Shop:
Amazon
Overstock
Wayfair
Cutlery and More

Stay In Touch
Facebook
Twitter
Youtube
Instagram
Pinterest
Tumbler

Our Thoughts
I love to cook. And it's a good thing, given my son's special dietary needs.  I plan my days around what I want to make for supper and the time it takes to make it.

Did you know a pressure cooker can cook 3 - 4 times faster than conventional methods? That does tend to make life a little easier . . .

Viking sent me their fabulous 8 Quart Stainless Steel Pressure Cooker for review and I have made quite a few meals in it already - veggies, roasts, dessert.  I detest cheap cookware and the Viking Pressure Cooker is very nicely heavy duty - no cheap thin walls, no hot spots. It even has measurements on the inside of the pot.

Really, a pressure cooker is pretty easy to use.  Put your food mix in, put the lid on, set the pressure to whichever setting the dish needs, and turn the top knob to close the lid tight.  Turn the heat to high until the little red pressure indicator pops up (indicating the pot is now sealed), then turn the heat as low as you can without the pressure indicator falling back down (if it does, just turn the heat back up again for a bit until it re-pressurizes). You need to make sure you have enough liquid in there, and the heat (once pressurized) needs to be set to the minimum in order to retain the pressure.  Upon mentioning I had a new pressure cooker to try out, one of the first things someone said to me was to be careful because someone they knew blew two of them up! 

First up was turkey thighs with an assortment of veggies - onion, celery, and parsnips. First I fried the (skin covered) turkey thighs in oil and salt & pepper, then removed the thighs and cooked the veggies a little bit in the oil.  Then add the thighs back in, cover, and pressurize for a quick fully cooked meal. For this dish I used the recommended amount of water based on the manual that comes with the cooker, and by the time the food was done, it looked more like turkey thighs resting in veggie soup.  But, I just pulled out the thighs, set them aside, and strained the veggies, which had melted down into a nice textured dish. Now, I figured the veggies would rather be turned to mush if I cooked them the entire time with the meat, and they were. The interesting thing was that I had spiralized the parsnips and the time in the pressure cooker actually riced them for me.  The (fried) turkey skin was understandably soggy. I think doing skinless meats would be better in the pressure cooker - either that, or you'll need to oven roast the meat to crisp up the skin once it's finished in the pressure cooker. Time in pressure cooker - about 30 minutes, but I think I could have done a little less.  Oven roasting takes about 1 hour and 15 minutes.

Hinging on that outcome, next up I decided to make riced parsnip pudding.  I have always loved rice pudding, but as we are grain & dairy free now, I needed to come up with a new dish.  Parsnips are delicious with coconut milk, cinnamon, and sugar - have done that mashed quite a few times, sometimes adding pears and/or apples.  Since using the pressure cooker on spiralized parsnips turned them to a riced consistency in the first dish, I figured I'd try spiralizing them again and let the pressure cooker do the work that my little food processer is really too small to do.

I added as much water to the mix as I thought I'd need, because parsnips absorb A LOT of water, especially by the next day in the fridge. I wasn't sure how long to cook them to get the right consistency, so after about 10 minutes in, I de-pressurized the pot and checked on them.  They were still very watery (although delicious!!) so I added in some arrowroot to thicken and re-pressurized, cooking for another 5 - 7 minutes or so.  In actuality I should have just riced the parsnips first to get the texture just right (but again, I need a bigger food processor), but the whole dish was unbelievably delicious with a thicker, creamy-smooth sauce, just like one would expect with rice pudding.

Next up was a fresh venison roast.  Venison can be tricky to cook, and if you don't do it right it dries out and is pretty much like eating shoe leather. I have found that cooking a venison roast slathered in coconut oil with some salt & pepper for 4 hours on low in a crock pot makes for a nice tender roast.

First I braised the venison roast in coconut oil and salt & pepper.  Then I threw in a little onion, garlic, rosemary, with more salt & pepper, and added some water.  This roast . . . was OMG tender.  I mean OMG OMG OMG DROOL DELICIOUS tender!!  Now, I know from years of experience that sometimes it's more the cut of meat and less the cooking method, so I need to try another venison roast to see if I get the same results but I have high hopes. The packages are just stamped "Venison Roast" so I don't know which roast packages are which cut.  But this has me soooooo encouraged to try it again, and if all my venison roasts turn out this tender and moist, this pressure cooker will be my #1 go-to method for venison roast. Time in pressure cooker: 25 - 30 minutes since it was a small roast. Did I mention the crock pot takes 4 hours??

Next up was a cow tongue - one of my absolute, hands-down favorite cuts. My husband hates the texture of tongue - it is a bit spongy - but he loves the texture of brisket and I can't stand it. LOL.  Anyway, more tongue for me!

Cooking tongue in the crockpot has always been my best way to get the tongue skin to peel off, but it invariably always has some dried out spots that are tough to peel, so I end up fileting it off.  In the Viking pressure cooker, the tongue came out as delicious and tender as I expected and as a bonus, the steam made the whole thing incredibly easy to very quickly peel it. Time in pressure cooker: 25 minutes.  Crock pot - 6 - 8 hours.

Last dish for this review is lamb shanks.  I was SO excited to find lamb at our local big box store - I raw feed my dog and so I'm always browsing the meat aisle for cheap cuts of meat for her and they're one of the few places that sell a good selection of offal.  And right next to where the cow offal was, I found the lamb shanks.  Two $10 packages later, I had supper all planned.

Normally I oven roast this dish with lamb steaks or chops, but shanks are much thicker and have the large bone inside of them.  I usually use the crock pot for lamb shanks, but here again, I wanted to try using the pressure cooker because it saves so much cooking time.

I did manage to set off the smoke alarm while braising them (oops!) but they braised up beautifully.  I pulled them out, set them aside, and then added in my veggies (zucchini, mushrooms, garlic, & rosemary) and a little sweet cherry wine & balsamic vinegar.  Stirred them to coat, and added the shanks back to the pot.  Added a little more balsamic vinegar, salt & pepper to the meat, put in some water - not too much, knowing zucchini are very watery, and pressurized the pot. I still ended up with quite a bit of liquid from the zucchini and the meat but the whole dish was so delicious.  I love lamb.  I hate sharing lamb.  LOL.  Time in pressure cooker: 45 minutes.  Crock pot takes 6 - 8 hours.

Now the funniest part of this whole pressure cooker experience was the dog.  Bella is an 11 month old Rottweiler and she just did not know what to do about the noise the pressure cooker makes as it releases little bits of steam while cooking.

First she had to inspect this new noise-maker:

Then she laid down in front of the stove and quietly woo-wooed at it until the food was done.

Overall, the Viking Pressure Cooker is incredibly easy to use.  There are tons of recipes online, and you'll also find a couple in the manual. It comes with a steamer basket too. I am a big fan of high-quality cookware, and most of my cookware is vintage because it's better quality than the cheap stuff you can buy at big-box stores.

The only thing I wish was a little different about this pressure cooker is that it's tall and narrow, and I have an easier time with the more squatty pots.  Just something for me to adjust to.  5 stars!!

Holiday Gift Guide: Solavore Sport Solar Oven

The Solavore Sport Solar Oven may look like a plain black box, but looks can be deceiving. Years of engineering experience and testing went into designing the Sport’s base, boosting its functionality on multiple levels.

The Solavore™ Sport was purpose-built by solar-cooking experts for maximum efficiency, durability, and ease of use. Weighing 9 pounds and measuring 12 ¼” high by 27 ¼” long by 17” wide, the Sport is lightweight and portable. Oven temperatures typically range from 210º – 260º F, maxing out at 300º F. In other words, hot enough for slow-cooked goodness (food cooks starting at 180º F) but not hot enough to burn dinner. It simmers like a crock pot and bakes like an oven.

The Sport solar oven is very popular among campers, preppers, outdoor enthusiasts, bikers, sailors, and those in the LOHAS demographic, etc. They are used to cook a broad range of delicious food including meat, poultry, vegetables, fish, slow cooked meals and baked goods, without using cooking fuel of any kind other than sunlight. The Solavore Sport oven also pasteurizes water and dehydrates food. 

You can literally "set it and forget it" and go about your busy day. The food will be perfectly cooked when you return. Kids when using it get a science lesson on solar energy while enjoying the many fun children's recipes. They also won't get burnt or get their fingers pinched in the aparatus of this kid friendly solar oven. 

Designed by engineers from 3M, the Solavore Sport is a virtually indestructible, retained-heat box-type solar oven made of rugged, durable, lightweight injection-molded nylon resin. Surround insulation and two-pot capacity enable unattended, family-size year-round cooking. The Sport solar oven is an industry leader in price, performance, family-size capacity and rugged durability.

Every Solavore solar oven purchased in the developed world helps to fund a Solavore Sport somewhere in the developing world where an open fire is still the main kitchen appliance. Over 20,000 Solavore Sport ovens have been deployed in 60 countries. The benefits that Solavore Works, Solavore's corporate social responsibility program, brings to communities in the developing world include:

• Respiratory health: freedom from common diseases such as pneumonia, which kills more than 3 million people a year around the world due to indoor cooking fires
• Water pasteurization and food dehydration
• The removal of one of the main causes of deforestation in the developing world, the continuous chopping of firewood
• Savings in energy expenditures, which can range up to 25-50% of a family's budget
• The ability for girls to attend school rather than spend their days collecting firewood and venturing further and further away from home to do this
• Increased income generation, enabling a woman to sell the excess food that she bakes or dehydrates in her solar oven 

Mission
Solavore is a women-owned business promoting clean-cooking technology around the world.

The preparation of food using heat is the most elemental of human endeavors. Cooking sustains our bodies, nourishes our souls, unites us around a common hearth. In a world of infinite richness and variety, cooking is a common thread stretching across time and cultures.

At Solavore™, we believe that cooking fuel should be healthy and as abundant as sunlight.

We build ovens that make clean-cooking fun, easy and liberating.

We build ovens that will be game-changers for women who risk their lives every day gathering wood or burning it, simply to feed their families.

Every oven purchased gets us one step closer to putting out a wood-fuel fire somewhere in the world.

Let's get outside and cook.

Visit Solavore:
www.solavore.com
Facebook
Twitter
Instagram
YouTube

Shop:
www.solavore.com/shop

Our Thoughts
I have been wanting a solar oven for a long time, so as you can imagine I was (and still am!) ridiculously excited to receive the Solavore Sport Solar Oven (with reflectors) for review.  Our cabin is off grid, and for the house we are planning to build next year we hope to have as much energy savings as we can. 

Summer/early fall has been a perfect time to try out the solar oven - we don't have central air in our current home by choice but during the heat of the summer, cooking indoors just serves to heat up the house further (as well as adding to our energy bill). And of course there are days where I do A LOT of cooking and often wished I had more than one oven.

Here's the setup:

You get the oven + lid, two Granite Ware 10" pots, an oven thermometer, and reflectors. 

  

Easy to assemble - because there really isn't any assembly required: just put the oven in an area that receives full sun during the day, fill a pot or two with yumminess and place inside the oven, place the oven lid on top and use the 6 clips to hold it in place. Add the reflectors if the weather conditions and what you're cooking requires it.  Start your meals in the oven by 9am (I did mine by 10am and it was all good) and then walk away . . . come back hours later and your food is cooked to perfection! Not even kidding about the perfection part . . . no, seriously.  It's PERFECTLY cooked!

Okay, so the first thing I cooked was a fresh ham roast.  It was a fairly good sized chunk of meat, so I cut it in half.  This not only allowed the Solavore Sport Solar Oven to cook it better (small pots cook better than densely filled large pots) but I then also got to cook it two different ways.  The first pot I just did salt and pepper, because sometimes I just want a plain pork roast.  The second pot I added mango-infused cranberries, onion, and some seasonings.

before cooking

fresh out of the solar oven - look at all those meat juices!

sliced and ready to eat

Plated with rutabaga hashbrowns and fresh fruit.  YUM!

The cleanup is incredibly easy, too.  Food DOES NOT burn in the solar oven - the oven temperature when cooking the pork roast topped out at 225F in the heat of the day.

Then cooking agony . . . I had soooo many food plans the first week of having the solar oven but the weather most certainly did not cooperate.  In fact, we got 7" of rain one night (can you say flash flood??  Our streets are STILL flooded 2 weeks later)! The weather remained mostly cloudy for a good week after that and the one sunny day we did have had 40mph winds, gusting up to a recorded 67mph. Not good for solar cooking!  It was SO. HARD. to wait for a good sunny or even mostly-sunny day so I could get back outside with the Solavore Sport Solar Oven!

When the sun finally showed its beautiful warm face again, next up were chicken quarters. I was going to try my medium-sized Granite Ware roaster in the solar oven but it was just a wee bit too tall - touching the oven's lid, so back to the two smaller 10" pots it was. I added apples, freshly foraged chanterelle mushrooms, thyme, rosemary, and some other seasonings.

before

perfectly done!

I'm well used to using a crock pot, and one of the things I really wanted to try in the solar oven was a venison roast.  Venison is a very lean meat and if not cooked correctly, will result in the driest roast you've ever attempted to eat. We eat a lot of venison - it's actually our main meat - so having a new method to try that promises perfectly cooked meat had me itching to try it.

Now, the directions say not to add any water or other oils to your roasts, but knowing that venison cooks better in the crock pot when slathered with unrefined coconut oil, I did the same for the solar oven.  I mixed seasonings in with the coconut oil and coated the entire roast with it, also adding bay leaves and orange slices.  The result? 

Fantastic doesn't even begin to cover it . . . the roast was so tender it just fell apart, which can be hard to achieve for venison.  Using the crock pot, venison is much more tender than using conventional oven roasting, but even the crock pot couldn't compare to the Solavore Sport Solar Oven.

unbelievably tender venison roast. *drool*

Tonight's supper is basically the filling for my own paleo recipe of chicken pot pie, minus the pie crust. Chicken, vegetables, herbs.  With the juices from the chicken quarters, (yes, quarters again! Hey, they were on sale for $3.99/10lb bag!) the added veggies will make for a fabulous thick stew to serve with the meat.

No "after" picture since what's pictured below is currently in the oven roasting away. But trust me, it will be soooooo delicious. :)

I have to say, the solar oven has become my new favorite way to roast meats. I am going to thoroughly enjoy experimenting with many different kinds of dishes!

More recipes can be found at Solavore:
Savory
Sweet
Blog

Some cool things about the Solavore Sport Solar Oven:

• use the reflectors to help heat the solar oven in less-than-ideal solar conditions - best to use them in the early morning and later afternoon, removing them during the heat of the day. 
• pasteurize water using the Solavore Sport Solar Oven! Simply fill your pots with water, place the WAPI (water pasteurization indicator) in the center of the pot and let the sun heat up the water to 149F for 10 minutes or longer. When the wax in the WAPI melts, the water is pasteurized.

The company history is quite interesting too - and a big THANK YOU shoutout to Anne Patterson for keeping this solar oven alive and going!

I am a HUGE fan of this thing - if you're looking for a holiday gift for the cook or eco-conscious person in your family, get them a Solavore Sport Solar Oven!  Or just get one for yourself - it's well worth it!

Review: Dolcedi

Natural Low-Glycemic Sweetener From Organic Apples

Dolcedì’ is a new, all-natural liquid sweetener that’s made from 100% organic apples and is a low-glycemic* alternative to sugar and other sweeteners.

Dolcedì’ can be used any way you would use traditional table sugar or honey. Its neutral flavor enhances the taste of food and drinks without altering them. Dolcedì’ is also highly soluble in both cold and hot drinks and can be enjoyed with pancakes, on yogurt, in fruit salad, and in baking. With 25% fewer calories than table sugar and higher sweetening power (you just need ½ tsp vs. 1 tsp granulated sugar) Rigoni di Asiago Dolcedì’ is made from the concentrated and filtered sugar extracted from organic apples. It is certified USDA organic, non-GMO, gluten-free, vegan, and STAR-KOSHER.

*Dolcedì’, with a GI value of 22.5**, is suitable for those who want to eat well, following a balanced diet for a healthy lifestyle.**GI = 22.5 +/- 5, determined as set out by the standardized method (ISO 26642:2010(E); FAO/ WHO Expert Consultation 1998; Wolever et al 2008.

About
Rigoni di Asiago® is a family-owned and operated business based in the Altopiano di Asiago, a mountain plateau in Northern Italy (90 miles north of Venice). Committed to sourcing the finest ingredients, their certified organic products include Fiordifrutta fruit preserves (the leading jam in Italy), Nocciolate hazelnut and chocolate spread, Dolcedì’ natural sweetener and Meilbio, honey from the best production areas of Italy.  The company was one of the first in Europe to turn to organic farming in the early 1990s and merit the Certified Organic label.

Find Rigoni di Asiago® products on Amazon or through the "Find a Store" search on their website. 

You can also find Rigoni di Asiago® on:

Facebook
Twitter
Instagram

Our Thoughts
Being into whole fresh foods and the nutrient-dense paleo way of eating, as you can imagine, I've tried a variety of natural sweeteners - including some that are fruit-based. Dolcedì’ is made from apples - that's it, nothing else added. Organic apples, at that! (Actually their whole company focuses on organic farming - one of the first in Italy to "go organic" - and sustainable, eco-friendly manufacturing processes.)

The first thing I did was taste Dolcedì’ all by itself.  It's a clear, thick syrup. The taste is pretty neutral, as promised. 

So let's see how it worked for me: it's suggested use is for teas, baking, and any other place you'd use sugar.  I don't drink much tea in the hot summers, and I've never been a fan of iced tea, so I skipped that option. 

The first recipe I made with Dolcedì’ was one I recently created and have been enjoying this summer, an avocado and ginger coleslaw dressing. 

This is a fully raw recipe, no cooking involved. My recipe calls for maple syrup, and the substitution ratio calls for the same amount.  Maple syrup of course has its own flavor; substituting it with Dolcedì’ didn't go quite as I expected.  The dressing was missing the full, round flavor maple syrup provides and actually left the dressing with a somewhat bitter aftertaste (I find stevia to have the same effect).

Ok, next up, baking! I wanted to see if the aftertaste disappeared with the heat of baking.  We have a Harrelson apple tree and recent storms had knocked down several small apples.  Now, Harrelson's are TART and the young apples are even more so.  Storms knock some early apples down every year and I use them in a easy stovetop dessert that consists simply of apple slices, cinnamon, maple syrup, and cherry wine, cooked until the apples are soft and the sauce reduced.  And really, apple sweetener used on apples?  Should be a perfect combination!

Again, I was surprised that Dolcedì’ didn't perform as expected. While I didn't get a bitter aftertaste, I used way more than I would have of maple syrup as the Dolcedì’ did not overpower the tartness of the apples no matter how much I used.  I ended up adding maple syrup, which immediately reduced the tartness.

For me, I'll stick with my trusty maple syrup.  I do think that used raw, Dolcedì’ would perform fine in teas, and I'll try that when the cold weather hits in a few months.

I do want to note that Rigoni di Asiago® has a variety of other products that look right up my alley - a chocolate hazelnut spread that looks beyond delicious, as well as several honeys.  I wish I could try them all!  I can't even pick a favorite to try but right now it's a toss up between the Organic Italian Forest Raw Honey, Organic Italian Orange Blossom Raw & Creamy Honey, and the Organic Italian Wildflower Raw & Creamy Honey.