RECIPE: Delicious Egg-Fried Rice with Roasted Brokkoli and Honey-Glazed Leeks

Hi. How’s everyone doing?
I made this dish last night, and I definitely didn’t expect it to be that nice, so I didn’t bother taking a photo. It looked like, you know, egg fried rice. But then I did really like it, so here we go.

Delicious Egg-Fried Rice with Roasted Brokkoli and Honey Glazed Leek

1. Cook 1 bag of rice in vegetable stock.
2. Once it’s cooked, spread out on a flat plate for it to cool quickly.
3. Put the florets of half a brokkoli on one side of a (in silverfoil covered) baking tray and mix with olive oil, oregano, thyme and salt.
4. On the other side you put 1 (cut into slices) leek. Mix with a little bit of olive oil, salt and honey.
5. Put the baking tray under the (hot) grill until everything has crisped up a little bit. (Keep an eye on it though, leek tends to burn easily)
6. Fry 2 handfuls of thinly sliced mushrooms in a bit of olive oil.
7. Add the cooled rice, the brokkoli and the leek.
8. Scramble up two eggs in a cup, before you pour them over the rice (+the other things).
9. Push the rice-egg-brokkoli-leek mixture around the pan, until the egg is cooked.
10. If you want to, you can also add some little marinated cubes of feta cheese. Trust me, it’s good!

VOILA

Deutsch

1. In Gemüsebrühe 1 Tütchen Reis abkochen
2. Anschließend auf einem flachen Teller ausbreiten, um ihn abkühlen zu lassen
3. Auf der einen Hälfte von einem (mit Alufolie ausgelegten) Backblech, Brokkoli- Röschen mit Olivenöl, Thymian, Oregano und Salz mischen.
4. Auf der anderen Seite (in Scheibchen geschnittenen) Lauch mit Olivenöl, Salz und Honig vermischen (Vorsicht, Lauch verbrennt gerne)
5. Das Backblech unter den (heißen) Grill stellen bis alles leicht knusprig ist.
6. In etwas Olivenöl, 2 handvoll in dünne Scheiben geschnittene Champignons anbraten
7. Den (abgekühlten) Reis, Brokkoli und Lauch hinzugeben
8. In einer Tasse 2 Eier verquirlen
9. Die Eier über die Reismischung geben, und die Mischung durch die Pfanne schieben bis das Ei gekocht ist.
10. Wer das Ganze noch leckerer machen möchte, bestreut den Reis jetzt noch mit marinierten Fetawürfeln! Vertraut mir, schmeckt lecker

Guten Appetit!

RECIPE: Grilled Sweet Potato Soup

This is the best soup I have ever made (maybe even that I’ve ever tasted). I saw the recipe on the hungry birdie and I knew straight away, that I was going to have to try it! I love love love sweet potatoes especially when they’re grilled. I also just got a blender stick thing, so I’m trying to make more soups to make up for the soup-less time, when I didn’t have this magic thing.

The result was so so good, I can’t even describe it, I’m afraid you’ll just have to try it yourself. I did some things slightly differently, so I’ll post my version of the recipe here. But you should definitely all go follow this blog. It’s the first recipe I made from it, but it was so good, that it’ll end in a lifetime subscription for me.

My soup wasn’t vegan anymore in the end, because I made it a tad less thick with regular milk and I used some actual mayo in the dip, but you could easily keep it vegan, by just using more stock to make the soup less thick and by using the recipe on the hungry birdie to make the dip. Oh and one more thing, I’ve decided to post the recipes in German underneath the recipe in English now, because there might be some people who don’t like reading English as much as I do

Grilled Sweet Potato Soup with a Lemon and Garlic Dip
1. Peel and cut into cubes (1cm^2 roughly) 3 Sweet Potatoes (aim for the biggest ones you can find).
2. Put them in a bowl and mix with salt, cayenne pepper, herbs de provence, some curry powder and olive oil. I find it hard to put measurements on this one, because it’s up to your taste. If you don’t like it spicy obviously go light on the cayenne pepper. Generally I’d say don’t be shy about the spices though!
3. Spread the marinated sweet potatoes on an oven tray covered in silver foil and put under the (hot) grill for about 25 minutes. They’re done, when they’re really soft inside, but slightly burny on the outside (that’s how I like them anyway).
4. Whilst they’re in the oven, you tidy the incredible mess you made, you get on with the dip. Mix 1 tablespoon of Mayo, 2-3 tablespoons of natural yoghurt (or if you’re feeling fancy greek yoghurt), garlic powder (or fresh garlic, I just get fed up with garlic some days), lemon juice, salt, pepper, a tiny tiny tiny bit of mustard (if you’re not using french mayo that is) and sugar.
5. Put the dip in the fridge, whilst you finish the soup
6. Chop 1 leek (obviously) and let it caramelize in some olive oil whilst you chop 2 carrots, which you add once the leek is nicely caramelized. (Sugar helps, but I don’t want to get you on the unhealthy track)
7. Add in some garlic (fresh or powdered, either will do the job)
8. And now quickly, before the garlic gets bitter, add some vegetable stock and let it simmer until the liquid’s mostly gone. Now (optional) if you’ve got other stuff to do like tidying the mess you made in the process  you can keep going with the adding stock until you want to finish the soup. The longer it cooks, the better it will taste (although there’s probably some sort of asymptotes line concerning how good it can get, just by adding the same ingredient again and again)
9. Add the soft inside, crispy outside sweet potatoes to the pan.
10. Add 200ml of coconut milk
11. Purée the soup
12. Adjust the consistency with either milk or more vegetable stock
13. Serve with some nice baguette and the dip which is waiting for you in the fridge

And now I just have to wait for it to turn lunchtime so I can eat the rest of the soup NOM NOM NOM. Thank you hungrybirdie, I think this will be one of my favourite recipes of all times!

Things to Try Thursday: Leeks

As my fridge is still pretty packed with leeks, I’ve decided to do a Things to Try Thursday just for leeks. Because I’m cool and that.
There won’t be any sweet recipes, so instead of organising them by sweet or savoury, I organised them by which food blog I found the recipes on”

Serious Eats
- Sweet Potato Leek Soup
- Polenta with a Leek and Mushroom Ragu
- Leek Fritters (because we love fritters!)

Closet Cooking
- Mushroom and Leek Wild Rice Salad
- Wild Leek Pesto Pasta
- Fiddlehead and Leek Tart covered in melted Gruyere (mmmh)

Our Kitchen
- Leeks Vinaigrette and Roasted Potatoes with Herb Oil

Dana Treat
- Pizza with Silky Leeks, Smoked Mozzarella and Eggs

Delicious Days
- Risotto with Leeks and Winter Squash

Smitten Kitchen
- Leek and Mushroom Quiche
- Leek Bread Pudding

Food 52
- Leek, Lemon and Feta Quiche 
- Leek Tart with Ricotta and Pea Purree 
- Layered Mushroom and Leek Paté

LEEKS Leeks LEEKS Leeks LEEKS

 

You might have guessed it from the heading and the photo: this post will be about leeks. In fact the whole week probably will be, because I just did the glorious thing and bought 3 KILOS of Leeks!

You’re probably wondering why I would do such a thing, it’s not exactly something that you’d buy in bulk because neither is it something that is in everything anyway nor does it keep well.

But, there is a reason. I’m in France. They love leeks. They put it on offer in the supermarket. So when I saw it today, I figured, why not take the Leek Challenge: Buy the full 3kg and use all of it in an as many different ways as possible. I’m not sure how it’ll work out, because it’s so much leek, I can’t even fit it into the fridge, and I’m yet to figure out how to store it.

So far I’ve had four ideas, which I’ll make and see if they’re actually nice, if they are, I’ll post the recipes during the next week, if they’re not, I’ll probably tell you about my sad, disappointing dinners anyway, just without any depressing photos.

Do you have any nice recipes for leeks?

Things to Try Thursday, 19th January 2012

SWEET
Nothing sweet that caught my eye this week, I’m afraid.

SAVOURY

1. I’ve recently discovered my unconditional love for sweet potatos, so: Sweet Potato Gratin

2. I’m also a big fan of butternut squash: Butternut Squash Stew (should probably make the most of winter vegetables)

3. Peas. Of course we can’t not talk peas, when we’re talking about vegetables that I like. Here’s an amazing sounding recipe for Green Pea Pesto Ravioli (they’re sooo pretty too!)

4. This one reminds me a tiny bit of these Huevos Rancheros of closetcooking. The only thing in common being salsa and egg, but surely kidney beans and avocado could only make these waffles even better? Savoury Cornmeal and Chives Waffles with Salsa and Eggs 

RECIPE: Chocolate-Chip and Baileys Pancakes with Raspberry Creaminess

Yo. It’s monday (have you noticed?). So I thought you might feel like something indulgent (I’m still working on posting healthier things, promise). This won’t come as much of a surprise, but something Joy(theBaker) made, made me think of this. It’s quite similar, but still a little bit different, so here it is:

RECIPE: Chocolate-Chip and Baileys Pancakes with Raspberry Creaminess

1) To make the pancake batter, mix 1 cup of flour, 2 tablespoons of brown sugar, 1 teaspoon of baking powder and a tiny bit of salt
2) In a separate bowl, whisk together 1/2 a cup of buttermilk (or milk, whatever’s in your fridge, yoghurt would probably work too), 1/2 a cup of Baileys and 1 egg. Also add some vanilla extract, if you fancy it.
3) Combine dry and wet ingredients
4) Mix in some milk chocolate chips/chopped milk chocolate
5) I’m guessing you know how to make pancakes, so get your frying pan out, melt some butter and start making pancakes.
6) For the dip: Mix chopped frozen raspberries, some yoghurt (or “curd cheese creme”), sugar and some honey
EAT

As for upcoming posts, you might not believe me (I don’t blame you) but there are some that are not just recreating/making something fairly similar to whatever Joy makes, it’s just hard not to, because everything she posts looks so delicious, and then they actually taste too good to not share them. But just so you believe me: There’ll be a nice recipe for a vegetable thai green curry soon. Promise. 

Things to Try Thursday, 12th of January 2012

SWEET

1. This one looks like a little delight for breakfast, or second breakfast, or mid-afternoon snacking: Cherry Chocolate Coconut Granola

2. I believe this is a German kind of cake, it’s absolutely delicious and you should all try it: Baumkuchen

SAVOURY

1. These Quinoa Cakes look a lot crispier, than the ones, I made a while ago: Quinoa Cakes with Roasted Red Pepper

2. This definitely looks interesting: Wild Mushroom Vodka Soup 

3. This looks so delightful, and elegant, and mysterious and mmmmmh: Black Sesame Tart with Mushrooms and Feta 

4. As we established last week, I LOVE a fritter, so this is definitely a recipe to be tried: Aubergine, Buffalo Mozzarella and Mint Fritters 

5. And last but not least: because Haloumi can be so delicious: Haloumi, Rocket and Pomegranate Salad

Joy’s Caramelized Mushrooms and Dumplings

Yesterday I made lunch for the family, and I chose to make the Caramelized Mushrooms and Dumplings dish that Joy the Baker posted a while ago (again). It turned out delicious, and because it was perfect just the way the recipe was, I didn’t change anything. I did exchange the chives in the dumplings for chili, but that was for my chives not looking too pretty reasons rather than because I thought, it’d be better with something else. So here’s just some photos, and a link to the recipe, so you can all have a read and look at the pretty photos

RECIPE: Blueberry-Stracciatella Cheesecake with Cashew Nuts

I’m planning to post some healthier recipes soon, but in the meantime, let’s concentrate on indulgent food (not saying that healthy food can’t taste indulgent, but you know indulgent in a classic sense, with lots of cream and butter and the like). I made this for christmas eve and I think it’s safe to say that it turned out a success, so I thought I’d share it here

Blueberry-Stracciatella Cheesecake with Cashew Nuts

1) Use a food processor or pestle and mortar to grind a generous handful of cashew nuts and about 1 package of chocolate covered digestives
2) Mix this with a couple of tablespoons of melted butter
3) Grease a springform tin and then use your fingers to push the mixture onto the bottom of the tin. Put the tin in the freezer, whilst you get on with the rest.
4) Mix together 3 packages of Philadelphia Cream Cheese, some sugar (depending on how sweet you like it), some melted dark chocolate,  a handful of crushed up blueberries and vanilla extract.
5) Fold in about 250-300ml of whipped cream
6) Pour over the cooled base, decorate with some grated chocolate and/or berries and let it set in the fridge. 

RECIPE: Sweetcorn Fritters

1) Separate two eggs and whisk both the egg whites and yolks.

2) Mix in 1 tin of sweetcorn into the egg yolks along with some salt, approximately 3 tablespoons of flour,  a sip of milk, chopped coriander, chopped chili and some pepper.

3) Fold in the frothy egg whites

4) Heat up some vegetable/sunflower oil and when hot, fry spoonfuls of the sweetcorn mix.