Bacon Spinach and Egg Puff Pastry

The eggs are scrambled and there is cheese scattered on top of the eggs.

This is more a brunch pastry or light lunch version. But who does not like a good amount of fluffy eggs?

Cleaning out my freezer and fridge slowly shows me a lot of half empty packages. One was frozen spinach. The bulky cardboard box needed a lot of space. I took it out in the morning and tossed it a microwavable container to start to defrost on its own. It just needed 3 minutes later to be ready to squeeze the water out.

The scrambled eggs needed to be soft and not too much cooked. I used some potato starch and milk and beat the eggs in with seasoning. In a pan with foaming butter and swiftly scrambled to a soft consistency. Out of the pan on to a plate to cool down.

Chop a green onion and open a package of thin bacon strips. Put that in a little oil in the cleaned pan where you made the eggs in. They need a couple of minutes, season and add the spinach. Pull it apart and cook for 5 min. Do not forget the nutmeg. Set aside to cool down completely. 

Unroll the puff pastry on the baking sheet and cut the sides in wide strips. Layer spinach mix first, then eggs on top. Next Parmesan strips and last fresh parsley.

Ground pepper on top all over and fold the strips of the puff pastry over to close it. Brush with creme fraiche and sprinkle sesame seeds on top.

Bake at 200 C fan for 25 min.

Ingredients:

1 rectangular puff pastry

300 g defrosted spinach

1 green onion

75 g bacon strips

1 tbsp oil

4 eggs

1/2 tsp potato starch

30 ml milk

Dried chives

2 tbsp butter

Parmesan slithers

Salt, pepper, nutmeg

2 tbsp creme fraiche

Sesame seeds

Thuringa Sausages with short Pasta

I am a fan of the Thuringa Bratwurst. A raw sausage that gets its brown color from a good pan or grill.

The sausage meat has a seasoning that makes it special. It works well as part of a sauce or stew when you take the casing away and rip the meat in pieces. Better than ground pork from a package.

I wanted an easy meatsauce with short Rigatoni pasta. Something that clings to the pasta, not runs over your plate.

I had a head of chicory and some cherry tomatoes to get rid off, so they went in together with onion and garlic. A bit of cream needed to go and some veg stock. A good dish to prevent food waste.

Ingredients:

250 g short Rigatoni pasta

2 Thuringa sausages

2 tbsp oil

1 red onion

4 garlic cloves

1 chicory

100 g cherry tomatoes

1 tbsp tomato paste

Pasta water

100 ml double cream

Salt, pepper, Italian herbs, smoked paprika

Start the Rigatoni.

Brown the ripped sausages and add onion and garlic. Season and add tomato paste.

Next add some pasta water and the chopped tomatoes. Cook for 3 min and add the chicory.  Next the double cream and more pasta water.

Add the drained pasta and serve with some cheese.

 

Bulalo Beef Shank Soup Filipino style

A Winter comfort soup from South East Asia? Winter? Well, the Philippines have some Mountains and rainy season. Comfort is what people need to feel good.

This is a nose to tail recipe. It uses mostly marrow bones and beef shank. But only marrow bones would do the trick too. 

I bought 2 beef shanks this week and wanted a slow braised sauce heavy dish. But then I stumbled over this dish on Pinterest. I went out today to get me some marrow bones from the butcher as well as fresh corn on the cobb (in Winter?) and Bok Choy.

For a very clear broth I put bones and beef in enough water to cover it and let it come up to a boil. After 5 minutes I had a thick protein foam on top. Usually I use a slotted spoon to take some foam off. But that much, no way. I poured everything in a colander and washed the bones and meat and cleaned the pot from all the scum. In the end that made a super clear stock.

The clean stuff went back in the pot and I used 1 carrot, 1 piece of celeriac and 10 cm of leek, some fish sauce, lots of black pepper and 4 bay leaves. Enough water to cover everything. My pot was a pressure cooker and I closed the lid thight and let it come up to boil until the marker came up. Then reduced the heat and cooked the soup for 45 minutes. 

Steamed off and I took out the meat from the beef shanks. It fell off the bone and was easy to shred. The veggies were discarded. Checking for seasoning with more fishsauce and black pepper.

Pieces of corn, sliced bok choy and spring onions went in and cooked open for 15 min. During this time I prepared the Basmati and a fried egg. Rice and egg are eaten with the soup. I scraped some bone marrow out of the bone on my plate.

Recipe for 4:

2 large beef shanks

4 marrow bones

1/4 cup fishsauce

Lots of fresh ground black pepper

4 bay leaves

1 carrot, piece of celeriac, bit of leek

4 spring onions

1 large bok choy

1 corn on the cobb

Basmati rice 

4 Fried eggs

Gingerbread Muffins

My BFF baked them for me.

The traditional Christmas flavours are not so dominant in these muffins. They are more nutty than christmassy.

They are easy to bake and are a nice gift in the cold January. But if you like the flavour more intense, add a third more  of the spices.

Recipe for 12:

80 g walnuts

2 eggs medium size

80 ml neutral oil

150 g brown sugar

200 g yogurt 3,5 %

150 g AP flour

100 g ground hazelnuts

2 1/2 tsp gingerbread seasoning

2 tsp baking powder

Topping:

12 chocolate covered almonds

Preheat the oven 180 C.

Chop the walnuts roughly. Mix eggs, oil, sugar and yogurt. In a second bowl mix the other dry ingredients, except the walnuts.

Pour the egg mix over and stir well. Add half of the walnuts and fill the paper cups. Put the other half of the walnuts on top.

Bake for 25 min and when the muffins have cooled down, stick the almonds in.

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Chicken Thighs and Spring Onions Korean style

This is a recipe from Aaron&Claire on YT. A 15 minute meal.

But only as long as you can get boneless and skinless chicken thigh meat. Otherwise the preptime is a bit longer. But on the upper side, you get enough cast offs to cook a great chicken stock for a future dish.

Don't throw away the raw bones and skin and fat pieces. Just grab some veggie and pour in water and cook for 1 hour. Pour it through a sieve and put in a Mason jar and stick that in the fridge.

Marinate the chicken chunks:

1 tbsp soy sauce

1 tsp oyster sauce

1 tbsp Mirin

1 tbsp olive oil

1 tsp sesame oil

1 tsp cornstarch

Fresh ground pepper.

Just stir it well with the chicken and set aside for 30 minutes. 

Now start the rice first. Everything else will be done fast.

Ingredients:

4 spring onions

400 g chicken thighs

1 tbsp olive oil

Pickled ginger

Lemon juice

Sesame seeds

Cut the spring onions in 2 inch pieces. Heat up the oil in a wok and cook the onions until they have a brown touch. Get them out.

Add a little more oil and place the chicken in. Color on both sides until the meat is cooked theough. Add the onions back and toss through.

Serve on rice with ginger and lemon wedges and sesame seeds.

 

Borlotti Beans in Tomato Sauce with Pasta

Poor peoples food from Italy.

But I cheated and added some smoked sausages to the sauce.

These beans are creamy and nutty tasting and go very well with tomato sauce. Serving it as a Primo with Medio Rigatoni al bronzo.

But a tomato sauce based dish without a couple of veggies in is not the Italian way. You have a garden or a market somewhere in town, veggies are easy to bulk out any meal.

Recipe for 3:

1 can Borlotti beans

1 can crushed tomatoes

1 tsp vegetable stock paste

175 g smoked sausages

2 tbsp olive oil

50 g leek

50 g celery

2 green onions

3 garlic cloves

6 tiny red chili

2 stalks of majoram

Salt and pepper and smoked paprika

Grated Parmesan so much as you like

Chop all the veggies and drain the can of Borlotti beans.

Heat up the oil and sautee the veggies for 10 minutes. Season with salt and pepper. Add the sausage chunks and cook them for 3 more minutes. Chilis and majoram in.

Then in with the crushed tomatoes. Pour some water in the can to clean it and add it to the pot as well.

Veggie stock paste helps with the taste, as does the smoked paprika. Let that cook for 10 minutes or until the veggies are soft. The Borlotti beans only need to heat through in the sauce.

Finish the dish with a good helping of Parmesan and eat it with short pasta or Italian bread.

Beef Pares Filipino style

Served with garlic rice and beef broth.

I love a good beef goulash. Then I saw this recipe online and thought: that is a lot of work but worth to try it.

The pudding on the right was for my neighbor.

Preparing it in 2 days makes the work a lot better to handle. And the beef has time to rest over night before it gets its final touch. It will fall apart very easy then.

The garlic rice needs day old cold rice anyway. I used the rice to cook it.

Ingredients for the first day:

500 g beef goulash

2 tbsp oil

2 yellow onions

5 cloves of garlic

1 knob ginger

3 bay leaves

Lots of fresh ground black pepper

Salt

2 1/4 cup water

2 tbsp veg stock paste (optional)

2 rice cooker cups longgrain rice

Chop onions, garlic and ginger. Season the beef with salt and pepper. Brown it in oil on all sides, add the veggies and the bay leaves and pour water over. Add veg stock.

Bring to a boil, cover and reduce the heat and simmer for 95 min. Cool down.

Cook the rice and cool it down.

Ingredients for the second day:

4 tbsp dark soy sauce

1 tbsp oyster sauce

2 tbsp tomatopaste

1 tsp fresh ground 5 Spice powder (fennel, anis, cinnamon, clove, szechuan pepper)

2 tbsp brown sugar (liquid)

ground pepper

Rice:

6 cloves of garlic

2 tbsp oil

1 tbsp butter

3 tbsp light soy sauce

spring onion greens

Reheat the pot and add all upper the ingredients and cook for an other 40 minutes. During this time prepare the garlic rice. 

Many people serve this dish with a beef broth. I used a beef stock cube and chopped some leek and used the white of the spring onion and some pieces from the cooked beef.