I love eating. Even more than I love cooking. My Mum got this thing into me, being a working woman with two kids and still managing to put a two course dinner on the table for us every day. My meals are a lot simpler, I cook for two, with Florian being my most devoted fan and audience. There is nothing more rewarding than a nicely turned out meal. There is nothing more enjoyable that a great plate of food in a decent restaurant with a glass of great red in a nice company. Hence this blog, to share ideas and joy of good food.
Bon Appetit.
Great British summer is in full swing, 2 days of rain and gusty winds, what can one do if not bake. Butter cookies always go down well with us, so I baked the first one of 2 recipes today, the second one, with hazelnuts maybe tomorrow. Very simple recipe-200 g of softened salted butter beaten in kitchen aid with 100 g of icing sugar, 1 tsp of vanilla paste added, then 250 g of plain flour slowly in, 2 tbsps of milk. When ready, to the piping bag with a wide nozzle. Squeezing the dough onto the baking paper was quite an effort, but I managed, then baked them in 160 degrees for about 15 minutes. When cooled, they were dipped in melted white and milky chocolate.
I find them a touch too sweet, but might try to do something similar to what I bought in Italian Conad last month, butter cookies stuffed with a nice, thick frutti di bosco marmalade. Those were great. I’d just have to find a jam good enough to use for this.
First ever, how I managed to avoid ever making one of these, I don’t know. We get through 18-24 fresh farm eggs in a week in our house and yet it took “Remarkable places to eat” on the BBC to make me want to cook one. Excellent mini series, I must say, there was an episode in Venice ( “Venetians are thieves”, said our Tuscan host Marco last month), in Edinburgh- loved it, as it featured The Kitchin, one in Paris and one in San Sebastian, which is where the tortillas were made.
I used a simple recipe from BBC Good Food, with half a white onion chopped and slowly fried in quite a lot of oil, till softened but not coloured. 2 medium sized potatoes chopped quite small, cooked until soft. Then most of that oil had to be drained before 4 beaten and generously seasoned eggs were added. I also chucked in a few cherry tomatoes from the green house and some green peas leftover from Izzie’s supper. It cooked under the lid for a few minutes then with a help of a plate I turned it upside down to finish the cooking. I served it with crusty baguette, a green salad and some parma ham. We both liked it, but I would put some more flavour in it, chorizo maybe, garlic, something strong.
Got back home the day before yesterday after 10 days in Toscana ( and a cheeky one day in Liguria!). According to the invoice from Europcar we’ve done over 1700 miles in our rented Fiat 500, we’ve seen a chunk of that stunning land and we have eaten very well indeed. Again. 🙂
One place that knocked me off my feet was San Giminiano. I always wanted to go and visit it and it was well worth it. Super hot, very crowded, but stunning. We’ve had lunch; Izzie became a huge fan of prosciutto e melone and that’s what she asked for there. What arrived was a very generous plate of possibly the best Parma ham I’ve ever tasted, surely freshly sliced, plus melon as sweet as candy.
Florek went for a beef carpaccio with truffles, while I was starving enough for a plate of gnocchi.
Two bottles of wine were purchased, one of the local ones will be kept on the rack until some cold autumn day we will fancy a vino from San Giminiano, while this lovely Brunello was enjoyed that same day on Marco’s terrace.
Then, one evening we set out for Lucca with our eyes set on Bistecca Fiorentina. And bistecca we had alright, a T-bone, served to us on a hot plate, so we could finish the cooking of it the way we liked, some salad with that and a caraffe of red wine. An excellent piece of beef it was, followed by a less impressive bill of over 150 euro- it turned out they charge by weight of the meat, which also had a massive bone. :-/
When we hopped across the fence to Liguria to see some of Italian Riviera and Cinque Terre, we’ve eaten well again. For me it had to be some seafood, so I started with octopus salad and managed to convince Izzie to try a piece.
Salad came with a chilled glass of Pinot Grigio, simple and fantastic.
And then spaghetti with seafood, the langoustines were actually sweet! Loved it.
On the last evening we went back to Lucca and I ordered spinach gnocchi with walnut sauce, waitress said it was amazing, it looked the part, but I thought lacked a bit in terms of oomph. Google photos made it look like that;
In terms of stocking up the pantry I’m currently very much ok for truffles and porcini, 4 chunks of great parmesan in the fridge too.
And, pleasantly surprised, no shock while checking my body weight, I managed not to go too stupid while on holidays! 🙂
The kind of bake I love to bake! Quick, easy, tastes great, seasonal. From mojewypieki.com. I intended to bake those yesterday, but as a certain Siemens engineer ruined our whole day ( failed to turn up for a SECOND appointment to install smart meters, clearly got mega bollocked by his boss after our phonecall, kindly turned up at 4pm and stayed for 1,5 hour having turned off the electricity- no oven), it all got postponed till today. Had to get more raspberries too as the child demanded some for her porridge this morning.
300 g of plain flour, 2 tsps of baking powder, 0,5 tsp of baking soda, 130 g of sugar. A zest of 1 whole lemon. 2 beaten eggs, 250 ml of natural yoghurt- that’s the only thing natural yoghurt is good for, baking, otherwise vile! :-). Half a tall glass of veg oil. All the ingredients gently and briefly mixed together, only to combine, overmixing results in muffins that are all but light. And at the end about 320 g of fresh raspberries in. Into the muffin cases, into the oven, 175 degrees, 25 minutes. Finished with a simple lemon icing- mental amount of icing sugar + lemon juice added until the texture is thick, but still runny.
5 of the muffins went to the Dewicks, as little Ruby has chicken pox.
I was rudely awaken early this morning by the cat being sick under our bed. Sleeping was done, so having checked the news and stuff I looked at mojewypieki.com for some strawberry inspiration. My small strawberry patch in the garden is currently giving us a bowl of berries every day, the net helps to keep the birds away. I found the tart called “Truskawkowy Las” (Strawberry Forest), loved the look of it and made it for tomorrow evening, Keava and Simon will jump the fence to join us for a few glasses of wine and extras. Long overdue!
Short, chocolate pastry, quick and easy to make with kitchen aid. 160 g of plain flour, 30 g of cocoa, 60 g of icing sugar, 100 g of cold, unsalted butter and a pinch of salt. 1 whole egg brought it all together nicely. It rested in the fridge for 30 minutes, then got blind baked in 190 degrees for 10 minutes, followed by 20 minutes with no beans.
Chocolate creme pat was a first for me today, nice little number, not too chocolatey, just right. 3 egg yolks beaten well with 70 g of sugar. 20 g of both plain and potato starch added, while 300 ml of milk was getting nice and hot. Milk slowly added to the mixture, returned to the heat, stirred constantly till thickened, off the heat. 90 g of dark chocolate added, it melted quickly, needed some help of electric whisk as lumps appeared. While still warm it went onto the tart case, smoothed out, what was left in the pan was enjoyed by a certain chocolate enthusiast. 🙂
The strawberries on top are ours, as mentioned, raspberries from Co Op, mint from the garden.
Last Saturday we braved the rain ( summer’s been cancelled this year, by the look of it) and went to check out Daylesford Farm near Kingham, a place recommended by Christina. I knew nothing would be cheap there, but we still went and blew 60 quid. First thing I noticed on the car park was a Tesla charging station, that said it all about the clientelle…. 🙂
It’s all organic in there, apparently, nothing wrong with that, there’s a lovely selection of bread, there’s butcher’s, some fish, cured meats- at eye watering prices- as well some lovely stuff for home. My favourite place was a little cold cheese room. We got some of their own organic cheddar, some blue cheese and a small piece of a phenomenal truffle number imported from Italy, called Moliterno.
We had most of those cheeses on Saturday evening, laughing out loud in the face of the diet!!! But last night I grated the remaining piece of the truffle cheese onto the pizza, alongside mozzarella di buffala and parmesan. And finally, almost exactly a year after purchasing it, I used up one of my whole truffles from La Bottega di Tartuffo in Lucca. Time to do that was high, as I’ll be there next month again. Beautiful pizza, earthy with mushrooms, simple, cheesy. Top marks!
The cake I’ve made for Ewa and Sophie had nothing to do with diet, everything to do with indulgence, calories and the general feeling of happy tummy. Which is what I’ve been struggling with recently. But life is tough, one needs to shut up and get on with the diet, whinging will not knock the kilograms down.
On mojewypieki.com this cake is called “Fried Egg Cake”, mine on the photo does not look as great as Dorota’s due to the jelly on top (pear flavoured) being distinctly green. It sits on a quick and easy genoese sponge; 2 eggs, separated, whites beaten with 1/3 glass of sugar, 100 g of flour added, yolks, 50 ml of sunflower oil, 1/2 tsp of baking powder. Baked in 160 degrees for about 20 minutes. Following the comments under the recipe I’ve moistened the sponge with some lemon juice before adding the cheese layer. It took about 280 g of white curd cheese from Polish deli, worked a bit by kitchen aid to add some air to it. A tub of mascarpone. A tub of Philadelphia. About 4 tbsps of icing sugar. 3 tbsps of lemon juice. A grape jelly, for which 200 ml of water was used as opposed to the usual 500 ml. 200 ml of double cream. All this gently whipped together. My one complaint would be the jelly which tasted a touch artificial, I’d never have guessed the cake was to taste of grapes. Calorific value I reckon about 3 million. 🙂
Canned apricots were arranged on top to look like fried eggs and finally a pear jelly, before the whole thing went to the fridge to set. Chopped pistacchios sprinkled on top before serving.
Both girls liked it, so did I, though I only allowed myself a small piece. Accompanied by lovely sunshine and some prosecco.
Hands down the best curry I’ve ever made. While flipping the pages of the latest Good Food I saw this recipe and wanted to make it straight away. Today I did and we both loved it, Izzie ate some too, but only because she was promised a dessert. Florek had seconds, I didn’t, I’m being good. Over 500 kcal according to the magazine, so I wasn’t pushing my luck. Worked out at 4pm though, needed to earn my curry!
2 garlic cloves, a chunk of ginger, 2 large shallots blitzed into a nice creamy paste. 3 chicken thighs chopped roughly and quickly browned off, then out of the pan, the onion paste in for a few minutes. This followed by dry spices- 1tsp each of cumin, ground coriander, turmeric and paprika. 2 tbsps of tomato puree. 2 tsps of sugar, 1 of salt ( could be skipped, 300 ml chicken stock was salty enough). 0,5 tsp of chili flakes. Once all this was happily combined in the pan and smelling phenomenal, chicken went back in, chicken stock too and slowly it cooked for about 30 minutes before chopped potato and a sweet potato went in. They were not in the recipe, but I love spuds in my curry. And some cauliflower too. And peas, added towards the end. 150 ml of double cream was recommended to be added by the end, but I used coconut cream half way through.
Toasted, flaked almonds, fresh coriander and naan breads from Sainsbury’s completed the picture. Very, very good indeed.
I have a new cookbook, Tim Anderson’s “Tokyo Stories”. The first recipe that screamed “MAKE MEEEEEE!!!!” at me was the hanetsuki gyoza. Made it accordingly, but skipped the crispy”wings” made with soaked cornstarch. I was starving, so was Florek, I left it out. Gyoza itself was super tasty, Florek, who’s not crazy on any pork dish had all all of his plus 3 of mine- I was pushing it already in terms of my diet…. :-/
Anyway, 250 g of fatty minced pork from Toby’s, 80 g of very finely chopped Chinese cabbage, 4 garlic cloves and a 2cm piece of ginger, grated. A handful of chopped chives- replacement for nira, I had no idea what nira was, but google did have an idea. Seasoned with salt and white pepper. All this nicely combined and wrapped in gyoza wrappers, gently panfried, then covered and steamed for 3 minutes to make sure the pork inside was nicely cooked. Served with a simple dipping sauce made with 4 tbsps of soy sauce, 2 tbsps of rice vinegar, a splash sesame oil and – not in the recipe, but I thought ponzu would work here nicely- good splash of lemon juice.
Excellent, not too complicated and will be made again.
Florek took his girls for lunch today, to Cote, Gloucester one, not the one in Cheltenham, where they don’t care if the steak is medium or well done. I had small breakfast 4 hours before in anticipation for lunch, so by the time we got to the restaurant my stomach was yelling. Diet went aside today, I had some deep fried calamari and then a bowl of delicious mussels in a creamy sauce, packed with garlic, parsley, shallots- somebody took time to sweat them nicely. Loved every single one of them, so did Izzie, who had a plate of her own mussels.
I’m bursting with pride, when my lovely, smiling 5 year old indulges in moules mariniere and lemon sorbet. Table for Three coming up!
