Wednesday, May 29, 2013
Beef filled pierogi with creamed tomato sauce
You can call the dish a fusion of Polish and Italian cooking. Nothing new of course, I had a very similar dish once in an Italian restaurant in Windhoek, they obviously served instead of pierogi ravioli.
Close enough, I thought and that's how I've got the idea.
Would I have known, how much work it would be, I guess I would have ordered some takeaways from the mentioned restaurant. And don't think, I don't like complicated, time consuming dishes. I do. Well, not at the moment. Not with a toddler and baby to look after. But I did it and it was delicious, even if the tomato sauce was a bit too sour. Will I cook it again? Most definitely - when I have enough time and patience.
I grew up with pierogi, for me it's THE Polish dish. I love them, no matter if filled with cheese and potatoes (russian), sauerkraut and mushrooms, just mushrooms or meat. They are also very tasteful with fruits or with chunky cottage cheese for dessert. They are also called dumplings or polish ravioli.
I remember my whole family standing in the kitchen sticking the pierogi together. And last week I also remembered, why all of us helped - it takes for ever to get them done. Beside the meat being cooked three ways, cutting out the dough and sticking the pierogi is so time consuming. I'm sure every Polish housewife and cook laughs at me now and does them on their head, but since I'm doing them maybe twice a year, it's a never ending story. But said that, it's worth it!
Tuesday, May 28, 2013
It's time for chicken again
I was just waiting for the ridiculous price for snow peas to drop, so I can do that delicious dish, that I just love, not only because it's so easy and quickly done. The combination of flavours and textures is so beautiful.
To be honest, I was sure, I wrote already about that dish and was surprised not to find it here. On the other hand, I also wasn't cooking it for quite a while, because of the already mentioned crazy price for snow peas.
I'm trying to grow snow peas in our garden for years already, but that's what you can call an epic fail. This year the plants grew indeed and were even carrying some fruits, but despite our new sprinkler system, the plants dried out eventually after having only one set of fruits. I won't give up thou and gladly take any advise that could help to finally cultivate them in our garden.
But we're not talking about my garden... The idea for the following dish came from here (in German language), but I've made the recipe only once with pork and substituted with chicken instead. You will see, that I changed some other things too, but all in all left the recipe as is.
And here comes one of our all time favourites:
Chicken stew with snow peas and almonds.
Thursday, May 23, 2013
Swiss twisted bread with sun dried tomatoes
I already announced on my FB-page, that my next post will be about that fantastic bread. I had saved the recipe for quite a long time and was just waiting for the right moment to bake it. I found it here (in German language) and it was advertised as the perfect bread for braais (BBQ). Last Saturday we were invited for a braai and I thought, it's the ideal time to give it a try. That way I also had a small present.
I halved the ingredients as I thought it would be too much. Well, stupid me, I didn't expect the bread to be that good and I ended up baking the next day again.
I knew, I took a risk baking a bread I never did before, especially because it took me longer then I thought and the bread was just ready as we had to drive. But the recipe was described as easy to make, so I thought I will take my chance.
Luckily I had sour dough in my fridge. I wasn't sure if I can still use it, as I've made it month ago. But all went well and the bread turned out "divine" as my friends remarked. And it has been proven, that my sour dough turned out nice and potent, so I "fed" it with 100 g flour and 100 g lukewarm water immediately in order to make sure, I can use it again. I read in bread baking forums, that people use their sour doughs or mother doughs for 20! years by only feeding them on a regular base. That's so spectacular.
Beside that, I think the fact, that all the herbs and the tomatoes were home grown, made the bread even more special.
Saturday, May 18, 2013
It's getting cold, but we're still having salad
The following salad is absolute my favourite, for many years already. The idea or let's better say the original, as I'm making it exactly as I ate it for the first time, came from a restaurant in Berlin, Steglitz. The salad was named after the restaurant itself and is until today their biggest seller.
As I made it a few days ago, after a really long time, I had the feeling, I forgot something. When I looked up, if the restaurant still exists, it hit me right away: I forgot the potato croutons. So even if they are not on the picture, the recipe is not complete without the potato croutons.
The salad is for me of course connected to a lot of memories, but even so the combination of the flavours and textures is amazing. What I like most, to my surprise, is the combination of cucumber, orange and avocado. I'm always placing these ingredients together on the plate, so they are enjoyed together.
The only thing I'm missing, is the fantastic herbed feta they used, it was very soft and not as salty in taste as the one I'm getting here. Still, the salad is in my opinion one of the best.
So, there is not much to say, just try it out and I hope you'll love that salad as much as I do.
Leafy salad with herbed Feta, avocado and oranges
Wednesday, May 15, 2013
My quick and delicious spelt-curd-bread revamped
Maybe you remember the quick and delicious spelt-curd-bread I presented in February, possibly one or the other even tried it out. As for me, it became my favourite bread and I'm baking it almost every week, alternating the seeds I'm putting in.
So why revamping it? Well, I had the problem, that with the given quantity of ingredients, my bread either overflowed the baking dish
or if I separated it in two baking tins, the breads turned out to flat, because there wasn't enough dough. At least with backing two loaf, I've been able to find out, that the bread is staying fresh and fluffy for a really long time. Even after 5 days in my cupboard, wrapped in a kitchen towel, the inside was almost as good as on the second day. Not that its very important to us, because normally we eat that bread within two days, but still good to know.
So last time I was baking with my original recipe, I've put the dough in only one baking tin again and my bread rose so much, that the thin crust broke and the still fluid dough flowed out all over the oven. I almost started to cry.
So that week I decided to reduce the amount of flour and adjust the other ingredients. But I didn't adjust consequently, because I wanted to experiment a bit. The idea of baking a smaller bread was initially grounded in getting hold of smaller packages of instant yeast; instead of 10 g they are only 7 g now. I wasn't sure, how the bread will come out, but as you can already guess, it turned up just better than the previous. Even my husband asked, if I changed something.
So here comes my revamped and improved Spelt-curd-bread with sunflower seeds
So why revamping it? Well, I had the problem, that with the given quantity of ingredients, my bread either overflowed the baking dish
So last time I was baking with my original recipe, I've put the dough in only one baking tin again and my bread rose so much, that the thin crust broke and the still fluid dough flowed out all over the oven. I almost started to cry.
So that week I decided to reduce the amount of flour and adjust the other ingredients. But I didn't adjust consequently, because I wanted to experiment a bit. The idea of baking a smaller bread was initially grounded in getting hold of smaller packages of instant yeast; instead of 10 g they are only 7 g now. I wasn't sure, how the bread will come out, but as you can already guess, it turned up just better than the previous. Even my husband asked, if I changed something.
So here comes my revamped and improved Spelt-curd-bread with sunflower seeds
Monday, May 13, 2013
Sunday is pancake day - Blueberry kefir pancakes
We haven't had pancake Sunday for a long time now and somehow Mother's day seemed to be a perfect day to revive our tradition. First I wanted to make my favourite apple-kefir-pancakes, but I remembered I had blueberries in the freezer. I was always wondering, what was the fuss about blueberry pancakes, but since I've tried them for the first time, I fully understand the excitement. What a combination, but I guess, you already knew.
What makes my pancakes special? Maybe one of my favorite ingredients: kefir. If you can get hold of it, and I'm sure you can, try it out and let me know what you think.
I must confess, that I've made these fantastic pancakes for the first time already a few weeks ago, but by the time I thought of taking pictures, they were all gone. So this Sunday I had to hold back for a moment, to take a few snapshots, before I made a dive for them.
And here they are...
Tuesday, May 7, 2013
Cooking with okra part 2
We managed to go to our organic market on Saturday morning. It's a really nice, small market, mostly extremely packed with people, but I kinda like the atmosphere. That's one of these moments, when I miss the beautiful, huge markets of Berlin, I loved to saunter around on my days off. I like getting my groceries from the markets, it's like the small corner shops from the earlier days. You get the chance to talk to the farmers, see where your food is coming from, ask questions and being social.
Be that as it may, we bought okra again and I was eager for preparing another, for me exotic, dish with that wonderful vegetable.
As you maybe remember the article I read about okra and the writers dislike for okra getting slimy. Well, the following dish is one of those, but it didn't bother us at all, as it was in perfect harmony with all the other ingredients. I guess, if I have more time for preparing lunch (at the moment both kids are at home due to the kindergarten being closed for two weeks) I will give it a try to prepare the okra as in the article described, in order to get rid of the sliminess and check if I prefer the dish that way. But as I said, I wasn't bothered and just noticed, what the author meant.
The dish is inspired by that recipe, but as you will see, I changed quite a bit, especially because I was running out of time and the given recipe was very time consuming. Nevertheless we were more than pleased, so was our guest, we had that day for lunch. There is only one thing left to say, you must find out for yourself which recipe you prefer. Anyway, here is my take on
West African chicken stew with okra
Be that as it may, we bought okra again and I was eager for preparing another, for me exotic, dish with that wonderful vegetable.
As you maybe remember the article I read about okra and the writers dislike for okra getting slimy. Well, the following dish is one of those, but it didn't bother us at all, as it was in perfect harmony with all the other ingredients. I guess, if I have more time for preparing lunch (at the moment both kids are at home due to the kindergarten being closed for two weeks) I will give it a try to prepare the okra as in the article described, in order to get rid of the sliminess and check if I prefer the dish that way. But as I said, I wasn't bothered and just noticed, what the author meant.
The dish is inspired by that recipe, but as you will see, I changed quite a bit, especially because I was running out of time and the given recipe was very time consuming. Nevertheless we were more than pleased, so was our guest, we had that day for lunch. There is only one thing left to say, you must find out for yourself which recipe you prefer. Anyway, here is my take on
West African chicken stew with okra
Friday, May 3, 2013
Vive la France - and Coq au vin
or braised chicken in wine.
We love our comfort food, that good home cooking, especially now in winter. The evenings are getting quite chilly nowadays - yes, also in Namibia, so we prefer rather something substantial. Coq au vin is one of the classics I really like to prepare, because it somehow cooks itself. Last year Christmas we got a pressure cooker from my parents in law, since then I do my coq au vin in there and after only 1 hour of cooking, the flesh is falling off the bone and melting in your mouth.
I honestly don't remember where I got the initial recipe from, it's so long ago and with years I stumbled upon many recipes with similar ingredients structure and I just added and abandoned here and there ingredients. The recipe I cook with stayed unchanged for the last few years, so I guess I found for me my perfect coq au vin.
First of all, I don't use the whole chicken, as in the original french recipes described, instead I'm just using drumsticks and thighs. For us two ( and a half) I mostly buy a package of 8 each and it's more than enough for one dinner. The amount of the sauce is as much as for a whole chicken, because we love a lot of sauce, so if you prefer using a whole chicken, you don't really need to increase the ingredients.
Aside from that, if you are lucky to get a Burgundy wine, you must promise to use that. If you're not, as myself, you must use a decent wine, preferable a Pinot Noir and not the cheap "papsak" wine (wine in a box), you normally would take for cooking. I know, one should always take a good wine for cooking, but let's be honest, who really does it. So make an exception and you will be rewarded with a delicious dish.
Subscribe to:
Posts
(Atom)
Connect
/>
Bloglovin
