Chicory with Bacon and Parmesan

A recipe from one of the supermarket advertising newsletters. This on is from EDEKA. This time of the year chicory is sold everywhere. We have farmers around here that sell it locally. Getting really fresh produce is no hassle.

Other then as a salad, chicory can be prepared as a cooked vegetable. It keeps its structure while cooking. The slight bitterness gives a distintive flavour.

The combination with bacon is a winner. There are many recipes available for it.

Recipe for 2:

2 big chicorys, 5 medium potatoes, 30 g Parmesan, 1 stalk rosemary

60 g bacon, 2 tbsp oil, salt and pepper

200 ml veg stock, juice of 1/2 lemon, 60 ml double cream, 1 tsp potato starch with 1 tbsp water

I used my air fryer for the potato cubes. But you can deep fry or pan fry them. Season them well afterwards. They were just watered, dried, tossed in oil and herbs and air fried for 20 min at 180C.

When the potatoes cook, chop the bacon and start it in oil for 5 min. Take off the outer leaves of the chicory and cut the thing in the middle in two parts. Set them down in the bacon pan. Add lemon juice. Brown for 2 min, turn and brown the other side. Pour in stock and cream, toss in the rosemary and season with salt and pepper. Cook covered on medium for 5-8 min, depending on the size of the chicory. Uncover and sprinkle with Parmesan.

Bind the sauce with the starch slurry.

Serve with the potato cubes.

Oyster Mushrooms and Mortadella Sauce with Pasta

This is a recipe from 3 star Chef Witzigmann. I had a seasonal problem to get all the ingredients, but nearly made it. A great dish for lunch or dinner.

He cooked the tiny pasta he used like a risotto in the chicken stock. My method was different, but still very delicious.

Recipe for 2:

120 g small pasta, 600 ml chicken stock

1 shallot, 1 clove of garlic, 1/2 tdp dried thyme, salt and pepper, some lemon juice

1/2 red bell pepper, 200 g oyster mushrooms, 50 g Italian mortadella, Parmesan, 2 hands full of baby spinach

50 g Edamame beans (broad beans were nowhere to be found), parsley, olive oil, 2 tsp creme fraiche, 40 ml white wine

Cook the pasta in the chicken stock and save some of the liquid for the sauce. 

Chop shallot and garlic and fry it in olive oil. Add the mushrooms and give them a couple of minutes. Season.

Now add the chopped mortadella and the beans. Now in with the wine, the creme fraiche and some pasta water.

Next are the diced bell pepper and spinach. Let it wilt. You may need to add more stock.

Check the seasoning and stir in the pasta.

Finish with some parsley and Parmesan.

Pasta with Hungarian Hot Paprika Sauce

This red Hungarian paprika paste is HOT. There is a mild version of it, but I like the spicy one more. Our city had two partnerships with Cities in Hungary. On many big city festivals or at the Christmas market in town, there are emmisiaries from Szeged or Gyönk in the city and take part in the festivals. A booth with local products draws lots of people.

But you can get this pastes here as well in the supermarkets. I usually use them to spice up some meat sauces. This is the first time I used it as the main component of a pasta sauce. I needed some other ingredients to tone it down a bit, but it was still hot and spicy.

Recipe for 1:

110 g Buccatini pasta, 2 shallots, 2 cloves of garlic, 

3 tbsp Hungarian hot paprika paste Piros Arany, salt and pepper

1 tbsp olive oil, 125 ml veg stock, 2 tsp honey

60 g goat cream cheese, 3 tbsp pasta water, chives,  

shredded Gouda, basil

Cook the pasta. Chop onion and garlic and saute it in oil. Add the paste and stir it for 1 min. Add veg stock and cook it through. Add the rest of the ingredients except the Gouda and basil.

Mix with the pasta and check the heat. 

Maybe 2 tbsp paprika paste are enough :-) 

Flank Steak in Rendang Sauce

At the end of the week I check what is left in the fridge. Sometimes the meal plan for the whole week changes and ingredients are left in the fridge. 

I bought a flank steak and asked the butcher to seal it in a bag. That way it keeps a lot longer. Up to 30 days.  But the recipe I planned for it did not work out. I stood in front of my spice rack and waited for an inspiration. From the Dutch supermarket I found a spice package Rendang. Coconut milk is a staple in my household.

The next stop was the veggie drawer of my fridge. More on the empty side. But still usable stuff.

Ingredients for 1:

175 g flank steak, 2 spring onions, 2 cloves if garlic, 2 tbsp rapeseed oil, 1 red bell pepper, 2 celery stalks, parsley

1 package Rendang paste, 200 ml coconut milk, 100 ml water

Salt and pepper, 1 tbsp rice syrup 1/2 lime

1/2 cup rice

Pat dry the steak after it rested outside the fridge for 45 min. Season with salt and pepper and cut into thin slices.

Chop all the veggies. Start the rice.

Heat up the oil high and put the meat in to sear it on both sides for 3 min. Use a small bowl and scoop the meat in and cover with a plate. That way it rests and stays soft.

Put the seasoning paste in the pan, reduce the heat a bit and add coconut milk and water to loosen it up. Get all the veggies in and cook them until done.  Now in with the steak and the juice to reheat it. Sweeten with syrup and put lime juice in for balance.

Chop the parsley and stir it in. Serve with rice.

Sweet Potatoes oven roasted Cajun style

I was looking for a recipe booklet from Florida. My friend wanted the recipe for orange and onion salad. It was from this booklet. But over the years my collection of cookbooks went through the roof. Finding a special one in between 450 others was a challenge. It did not take long for me to get side tracked. I found the Cajun one and stopped looking for the other one. I remembered that I had posted the recipe online a couple of years ago on the SortedFood website. Problem solved. Recipe found. Link sended.

Cajun or Louisiana style cooking is one of my new favourites besides Korean dishes. Today were my new ordered enamel baking dishes in the mail. The smaller one got cleaned and loaded and is doing its first round in the oven already.

Recipe:

450 g sweet potato, zest and juice 1/2 lemon, 100 ml orange juice

1- 2 tbsp dark muscovado sugar, 40 g butter melted, 1 cinnamon stick

Lemon salt and ground pepper

Heat up the oven 180C.

Peel the sweet potato and cut it into 2 cm discs. Single layer in an oven proof dish.

Pour the butter on top and sprinkle the sugar over. Get lemon and orange juice in. Cover the baking dish with aluminum foil and bake 25 min. 

Take the foil off, stir well, take out the cinnamon stick and sprinkle with salt, pepper and lemon zest. Stick into the oven uncovered for 25 min.

Salmon and King Prawns

I needed a quick fix and salmon and prawns sounded like the best solution. There is nothing worse then fish that has died twice. Saving on the cooking time is good. Food on the table in less then 30 minutes.

Just seasoning the salmon and marinating the prawns in some curry based Jamaican seasoning.  I used my rice cooker and put some 5 spice powder together with salt and water in. A fragrant rice to go with the seafood.

Serving the whole dish with rice and a mixed romana salad salad cherry tomatoes, cucumber and fresh herbs in a mustard cream dressing.

Beef Lollipops with Horseradish and Beef Tea

This is a Chef Stefan Marquard recipe. 

I need a good beef stock this week for an other recipe. The best is the homemade variety. Two huge beef shank slices and all the veggies from my fridge are the base. A selection of spices are for the depth of the broth. The long cooking time made the beef very tender and the broth intense.

These lollipops have been served at catering events. They are great to serve a large group of people. I have enough beef for 2 more dishes and 1,5 l of stock.

The fun of this dish is the finishing at the table. The beef gets skewert and stays in the warm stock. Then is taken out and slathered with horseradish cream and dipped in raw veggies. That not only looks good, it gives a lot of freshness to the beef.

4 l water

1.2 kg beef shank slices

Carrots, parsnips, celery, celeriac, leek, parsley

Bay leaf, allspice, juiniper berries, cloves, birdeye chili, star anise, pepper, salt, asant

Red bell pepper, bunch of chives, 2 shallots, 3 tbsp sour cream, 2 tbsp horseradish

Season the beef with salt and a little sugar and let it rest for 15 min. Put it in the large pot with cold water and bring to a boil. After a couple of min you will get lots of brown foam on top. Use a spoon and a bowl of water and skim it off until no more is coming. That helps to get a clear stock.

Cut up all veggies, not too fine! Add them and all the spices and bring the pot back to a boil. Reduce the heat, cover with a lid and on very low cook for 3,5 to 4 hours.

Take the beef out to cool down a bit. Cut it into long strips and skewer them. Filter some of the hot stock into a small pot or bowl and stick the skewers in to keep warm.

Peel a red bell pepper with a speed peeler and chop it very fine. Chop shallots and chives too. You can either mix it on a plate or make 3 different lines to dip the meat in.

For more beefy taste, serve some hot broth in Espresso cups.

 

 

 

 

Jajangmyeon or Black Bean Noodles

The color of this sauce is on the less appealing side for Europeans. But the taste with the rich bacon or pork belly aroma is awesome. I am happy that I bought a large jar of Korean black bean paste. And it has to be the Korean kind, because the Chinese one tastes totally different.

I saw that recipe on Aaron & Claire. I used the restaurant version with the fried off black bean paste. This could be my new favourite pasta sauce.

Recipe:

50 g Korean black bean paste, 25 ml veg oil

125 g pork belly or bacon bits, 1 tsp grated ginger

4 spring onions, 1 large red onion

1 tbsp oyster sauce, 3 tbsp soy sauce, 2 tbsp sugar

3 tbsp fried bean paste, 150 ml water

2 tsp potato starch, 2 tbsp water

Wheat or Ramen noodles, cucumber

In a pan fry the bean paste in oil. Stir constantly. When it is bubbling, pour it in a bowl an set aside.

In a bit of the frying fat start the pork and let it brown. Grate in some ginger. Add most of the spring onion, but keep some green for later. After 2 min, add the roughly sliced onion. Cook for a bit.

Add oyster and soy sauce, sugar and bean paste and stir well. Now add the water and let the sauce cook for 10 min. Add the greens.

Make the starch slurry and bind the sauce. Cook the noodles and julienne the cucumber.

Serve with some kimchi.

The rest of the sauce will taste even better the next day on some more noodles.

Toad in the Hole

This is an old Britain's classic. A family dinner for more than 100 years. 

Yorkshire Pudding is unknown here in Germany. When people hear the word pudding in Germany they think of a sweet dessert. Very famous mass product for pudding is Dr.Oetker.

I have no idea why a pancake batter that is cooked in the oven is called a pudding. But it is a tasty cushion for the sausages.

Ingredients:

3 free range eggs, 105 g all purpose flour, 150 ml milk, 1/4 tsp mustard powder

Salt, pepper, 3 tbsp rapeseed oil

6 chicken sausages, 1 large onion, tonkotsu sauce (use any kind of sausage like pork)

Prepare the batter with the 4 upper ingredients and let it rest in the fridge for 1 hour. Then season with salt and pepper.

Heat up the oven to 220C and put the sausages and the onion quarters in a baking dish. Pour over the oil and bake in the oven for 10 min, turning them half way. It depends on the thickness of the sausages. 

Take the batter out of the fridge and season with salt and pepper then pour carefully around the sausages. Beware of hot oil.

Close the oven and bake for 25-30 min. DO NOT OPEN THE OVEN DOOR.

I served it with some tasty sauce from a bottle.

Beetroot Pistachios and Horseradish Soup

The title of this soup sounds a bit weird. But the idea for it was an ALDI recipe. I just pimped it a bit. I was a little too onedimensional for me. A bit more veggies, spice and herbs and I loved the soup.

Beetroot is very earthy in taste. That is the reason not everybody loves it. But the combination with other veggies mellows out the earthiness. Just make sure to were kitchen gloves to prevent your fingers from getting purple. A good veg stock and some decent seasoning helps too. 

Recipe for 4:

500 g cooked beetroot, 1 large carrot, 2 medium potatoes, 1 celery stalk

1 large onion, 2 cloves of garlic, 50 g butter, salt, pepper, piment d'Espelette

700 ml veg stock, 60 ml double cream, 4 tbsp horseradish, 60 g roasted pistachios, 1/ 2 bunch fresh dill

Start with melting the butter and building the flavour with onion, garlic and celery. After a couple of minutes add carrot snd potatoes. Now season.

The veg stock comes next and finally the beets. Cook on medium low heat covered for 15 min. Check if the veggies are done.

Use a blender for the soup. Chop the pistachios and the dill and serve the soup with a bit of cream, horseradish, pistachios and dill.

Dakgalbi or Korean spicy Chicken

This was on my to do list for Korean dishes for a while. Due to lockdown I was not able to go to the Asian market in downtown. Last Saturday I finally found the food items I was looking for.

It is the first time I used rice cakes. The thick straw shaped pieces that look like the foam chunks in packages. I was curious to try them. 

The recipe I tried was from Aaron&Claire YT. But I toned down a bit on the spicy side. For my first try it was hot but not too much. The bad thing is, heating up leftovers the next day increases the spicyiness. But I can upscale the heat level next time.

Sauce:

1 tbsp minced garlic, 1 tsp minced ginger, 3 tbsp soy sauce, 1 tbsp veg stock (chicken)

2 1/2 tbsp sugar, 1 tbsp rice or corn syrup, 1 tbsp oyster sauce, 1 tbsp sesame oil

2-3 tbsp gochoujang chili paste, 2-3 tbsp gochugaro hot pepper flakes

1 tsp curry powder, ground pepper, 100 ml apple juice

500 g chicken either breast or thigh meat  (I used breast) in bite size pieces

Marinate time minimum 20 min. I kept it for 2 hours on the cold balcony.

10 rice cakes, 1 large yellow onion, 2 green onions, 1 purple carrot or sweet potato, 2 hands full of shredded cabbage, 1 celery stalk, 2 tbsp rapeseed oil, 50 ml water Usually Shiso leaves are used in this dish. They are not available here in Germany.

Use premade Udon noodles to add and grated cheese.

Use a wide pan and get the oil in. Layer the veggies and rice cake in. Put some of the cabbage in the middle. Pour the chicken with the sauce on top. Put the lid on and cook for 3 min. Now stir everything around and let it cook until the chicken is done. Add some water to prevent the sauce from burning. Cook the noodles in the sauce.

Since Koreans love cheese. Draw a line in the middle of the pan and pour in the cheese. Put the lid on and let it melt.