For casual winter evenings with friends, my favorite family style dinner starts with a big platter of antipasto passed around the table.  I follow this with two pastas—a rich baked one and a light tagliatelli, usually with chopped arugula, cream and crumbled pancetta.  For  dessert, what’s cozier than a rustic pear or apple tart, with a dollop of mascarpone mixed with a little whipping cream.

The menu below is an all-out feast, perfect for a celebration.  These recipes are from Every Day in Tuscany.  At the end of a winter meal in Tuscany, bowls of clementines and walnuts always appear at the table.  When you’re peeling the pungent orange fruit, cracking walnuts, and sipping a little vin santo, you naturally want to linger in the candlelight.

 Try this menu for an all-out Tuscan feast!

Antipasto Platter
Download Frances Mayes’s Antipasto Platter recipe.

Kale, White Bean and Sausage Soup
Download Frances Mayes’s Kale, White Bean and Sausage Soup recipe.

Chicken under a Brick
Download Frances Mayes’s Chicken under a Brick recipe.

Roasted Vegetables
Download Frances Mayes’s Roasted Vegetables recipe.

Il Falconiere Steamed Chocolate Cake
Download Frances Mayes’s Il Falconiere Steamed Chocolate Cake recipe.

Also be sure to visit www.thetuscansun.com/index.html to learn about Frances Mayes’s Olive Oil, homemade at Villa Bramasole. Join the Bramasole Convivium to receive the Tuscan oil at your home! A good idea: Soak some toasted bread in the oil and salt it a little – an ancient Tuscan pleasure, as old as the wind. Savor, while reading Every Day in Tuscany.