Stuffed aubergine rolls.

Last Saturday we were invited to Leszek and Ewelina’s. There was a lot of good food on their table, 2 types of curry, steamed rice, some chicken for meat lovers, naan bread that made me squeak, as mine is never that good and there were also those beauties. They were already on the table when we arrived, the toothpicks made it easy to pick up and enjoy. They were my favourite thing we have eaten that evening, I asked for a recipe and then also found it on the internet. Just like Leszek said, it is a Georgian dish, veggie, healthy, good for you. Pretty and tasty. I made it last night and ended up scoffing most of it by myself, as husband claimed the texture of aubergines made them ….challenging. Ma che cazzata!! 🙂

Thinly sliced aubergines were first salted and left to sweat for half an hour before being dried off and fried. The stuffing I’ve made a tiny bit differently. The original recipe and the one at Leszek’s used raw walnuts, I simply can’t stop myself from toasting them, there is so much more flavour after 10 minutes of gentle heat! They were then blitzed with a shallot, some garlic ( maybe a bit too much, I decided afterwards), fresh coriander, a pinch of chili and paprika, salt and all this creamed with a good splash of water to make it into a paste. Spread on the aubergine slices, rolled up, stitched with a toothpick and finished off with fresh pomegranate seeds and more fresh coriander. 10 out of 10 for me and I will be making them in a couple of weeks for a planned dinner party. Might play around with a completely different filling.

Pistachio cake.

A delivery came from Bronte yesterday, from Tipici e Food, the place we visited in June. We ran out of everything we bought there long time ago, but signor Antonio ships his quality pistachios all over Europe ( apart from the UK, he said, too expensive after Brexit). So we now have a lovely stash of the most fantastic pistachio products and also 2 bottles of this delicious liquor, quite evil, when one tries to have alcohol free weekdays!

I’ve been looking for a nice recipe for a good pistachio cake, where I could use some of the ground pistachios I just received. So many food blogs out there, not all for me. When I’m after a recipe I don’t want to spend 5 minutes scrolling down somebody’s bloody life story. I don’t want to keep reading if the recipe is written for mentally challenged and explains in details, that they want me to use 2 whole eggs, which means 2 yolks and 2 whites. Next!!! The recipe for pistachio cake which recommends using a green food colourant – no. Why?!

I finally settled this morning on a recipe that called for no butter, no artiticial colouring, tweaked it just a touch and I’ve just finished my first piece.

I’ve had a packet of ground, raw pistachios, which I’ve gently toasted on the frying pan, I used 60g. 150g of plain flour, 1 1/2 tsp of baking powder, 1/2 tsp of baking soda, a pinch of salt. 2 whole eggs I whipped with 120g of sugar, less that in the recipe, some of it was vanilla sugar. Some grated lemon zest went in and a tiny bit of cinnamon. The toasted pistachios. 150g of greek yoghurt and 150 ml of olive oil, all nicely combined, onto the lined baking tray. 175 degrees, 30 minutes, done.

Once cooled I tipped a small jar of pistachio cream from Bronte, which was perfectly sweet and had great consistency to spread, so I didn’t have to mess about with the original recipe’s ideas of dilluting it with water and adding sugar. A final sprinkling of ground pistachio completed the picture. Might share some with Lara. 🙂