Potato Salad with Beef Broth

That may sound crazy, but it tastes great. 

Using a good broth to let the potato slices soak in is essential. And the broth needs to be hot when it is added to the potatoes.

But that is easy. The onions need to soften in some oil in the pan. They need to be seasoned with lots of freshly ground pepper, but not too much salt. The raw ham is salty and the broth has salt too.

When they are done, add the vinegar, the mustard and the hot broth to the pan. Now pour it over the potatoes and add a bit more oil to them.

Gherkins  and chives are a good company for potatoes in a salad. Get some in.

At first it will look as if the potatoes are drowning in liquid. But stir and let it sit at least 30 to 45 min.

The broth will be soaked up.

Ingredients:

1 kg potatoes, the salad kind

1 onion, 2 green onions

60 g raw Black Forest Ham

5- 7 gherkins

2 tbsp chives

1 tbsp mustard

225 ml beef stock

3 tbsp grapeseed oil

3 tbsp white balsamic vinegar

Salt and pepper.

 

 

 

Sweet Potato with Tex-Mex Beef Topping

No readymade Tex-Mex seasoning was used.  

I cooked the sweet potato my ususal way, first 5 min in the microwave and then brushed with coconut oil for 20 min at 200 C in the air fryer. But wrap them in foil and put them in the oven if you like.

I bought ground beef yesterday at LIDL. All other ingredients were in stock. LIDL does not have Mexican seasoning in their regular offerings. Sometimes as specials at Mexican week.

But I use the single spices and herbs I have at home. One is cumin and the other is coriander and for heat fresh and dried chilis.

A little salad goes well with a filled sweet potato. This makes it a complete meal in my eyes.

While the sweet potato was doing its thing, I started the ground beef in a dry pan without any oil. There is enough fat in the meat. It took a couple of minutes to brown completely, seasoned with salt, pepper, ground cumin, coriander and smoked paprika.

The onions and garlic went in with the chopped habanero pepper. A bit of sweet corn, cherry tomatoes and red bell pepper came next. It takes a bit until the meat is ready. Check the seasoning and heat and add more chili if you like. The juice of a lime finishes it beautifully.

I've cut the sweet potato in halves and spooned meat mixture on top. Served with some Greek yogurt (10% fat).

The salad was just more red bell pepper, some sweet corn and chicoree.

Ingredients:

2 large sweet potatoes

1 tbsp coconut oil

500 g ground beef

1 yellow onion, 2 green onions, 2 garlic cloves

1 habanero chili

1/4 red bell pepper

1/2 small can drained sweet corn

7 cherry tomatoes

Salt, pepper, ground cumin, coriander, garam masala, smoked paprika

1 lime

Greek yogurt

Pizza Hawaii

Sorry Italians!

Sometimes I need to satisfy a craving. A sweet and salty pizza. But I do not overdo it. Just enough pineapple chunks to have some sweetness.

I defrosted a ball of homemade pizza dough over night on the fridge and later rested it on the counter for 90 minutes to get it back to room temperature and the yeast back on.

Just enough for one serving. Cooked ham, some veggies, Mozzarella and a few pineappke chunks were at home. Time to roll out the dough on some baking paper.

As a pizza sauce I mixed a tsp of red Pesto with 2 tbsp of creme fraiche.

Black pepper and Italian seasoning on top and the pizza was ready to go in the oven at 250 C for 11 min.

Air Fryer Ham wrapped filled Pasta

The filled pasta are Swabian Maultaschen, this time with beef instead of pork. I saw them at the supermarket and had to give them a try.

Wrapping them in raw smoked ham is not the way to prepare them if you want to go pork free. Wrapping a pork filled pasta would have made more sense.

But you know me, always doing things my way. 

I cut the Maultaschen in the middle and wrapped them in one slice of very salty ham. The Air fryer had just enough room for 8 pieces, the two whole ones went in a beef broth to cook

From an other recipe, there was still Hollandaise sauce left in a package. I warmed it in the microwave and served it with the packages.

They were good, but I think the Air fryer is not the right way of preparing the filled pasta. It dries them out too much for my taste.

Pork Schnitzel with Onion Sauce

A long day of driving on the Nordschleife - Green Hell- at the Nuerburgring came to an end.

We started Daylight Saving Time today, that meant 1 hour forward and my alarm clock went off at 5:15 (4:14 winter time). I started my 2 hour trip to the Ring at 6 AM and it was pitch black.

A croissant from a Gas station stop and a hard boiled egg was my breakfast. 

At the Devil's Diner I had some French fries for lunch. 

Now I am sitting at the Restaurant Lindenhof in Nuerburg and enjoy my dinner. Schnitzel with French fries and topped with caramelized onions and a salad.

 

Red Pepper Rice Salad with Pork Belly Asia style

Asia style salads to use up leftover rice are wonderful. Pick and choose the ingredients and the dressing pushes it in right direction.

I had 3 slices of pork belly, about 1 cm in thickness each. I marinated them in some Lee Kum Kee Chinese Red Braising Sauce ( I don't know why it is called red, because it is pitch black). 20 minutes are enough.

I grated half a carrot, chopped a green onion and a very big red bell pepper. The rice needed 2 min in the microwave to get fluffy again. Mix it together and put it in the fridge for 15 min.

The pork belly slices went in the pan with a tablespoon of oil and were cooked on medium heat and often flipped.

The salad dressing:

2 tbsp grapeseed oil

1 tdp toasted sesame oil

2 tbsp rice vinegar

1 tbsp mirin

2 tbsp Tamari

1 tsp agave syrup

Japanese pepper, lemon salt

Asparagus and Bacon Tart

Tarte Asperge et Bacon á l'Huile.

I used a recipe from one of my many Goumand magazine issues as the reference. But made it my own version.

The dough is special. I've never used that much olive oil in one. It came out of the Thermomix as a very crumbly mass. But a little floured surface and a bit of kneading made it in a easy to roll out dough. 

It was rolled out directly on the buttered baking dish. No baking paper added. It worked fine. The dish went in the fridge for 30 min then.

The green asparagus ends were cut off and it went in the steamer for 13 min and rested for 5 min in it.

I did not use bacon but Italian raw ham. A much tastier choice.

The cream on top was easy to prepare, just eggs, skyr, creme fraiche, Emmenthal cheese and seasoning, lots of seasoning.

Preheat the oven 180 C. Bake the tart for 30 min.

Dough:

250 g flour

1 tsp salt diluted in 120 ml cold water

4 tbsp good quality olive oil

1 tsp Herbes de Provence

Additional flour for work surface

Butter for the baking dish

Topping:

400 g green asparagus, ends cut off

100 g raw Italian ham

3 eggs

100 g Skyr

200 g creme fraiche

Piment d'Espelette

Salt, pepper, Italian seasoning, dried chives

 

 

Trip to a nice Bakery

Sometimes using a mode of transportation is not the most satisfying one, but the place you reach with it makes it so much better.

I heard about a small bakery, the baker worked in Normandy once, that sells goods you can not find in a German bakery. These baked goods are like the ones I usually buy on my grocery hauls in France.

That made me curious. The citys name is Bretten. It is in Baden-Württemberg, South'East of Bruchsal. The bakery is called Leonhardt.

It was a miserable weather day for a day trip. Rain and fog and generally unpleasant. I took out an electric car for a testdrive. My next one should be an electric car. No so easy for a Petrolhead to find the right one.

But the trip to the bakery was worth all the effort.

I bought a black olive Fougasse, an rectangular shaped almond baguette with whole almonds through out the bread and pastries.

A small Cheesecake with cherry filling and an awesome pistacchio wreath with dark chocolate covering.

The MASERATI GRECALE FOLGORE was not so great, but the baked goods were awesome.

Red Pepper and Gherkin Meat Sauce with Pasta

I bought ground beef this morning not knowing what to cook with it.

A short Google search brought up an interesting combination of veggies and beef and that was the recipe to try. But I made it my way.

Serve it with pasta or rice

Recipe for 3:

350 g ground lean beef

1 red onion, 2 garlic cloves, 1 green onion

2 tbsp olive oil

2 red bell peppers

3 tbsp tomato paste

150 ml tomato passata

6 medium gherkins

75 ml gherkin brine

75 ml chicken stock

1 tsp sugar

Salt, pepper, tomato seasoning, Italian seasoning

Start with onions and garlic in a medium hot pan with oil. Gradually toss in the red peppers. Season and give it 5 min. Take it out of the pan.

A bit more oil and now brown the beef and season it. Srape a free space in the middle and add tomato paste and cook it a bit. Now in with gherkin brine, chicken stock and tomato passata.

Start the pasta or rice now.

Pour the veggies back in and add diced gherkins

Sugar and more seasoning now. Let it cook open to reduce the liquid a bit. 

Top with some grated Grana Padano

 

Aji de Gallina or Chili Chicken from Peru

This recipe needs a lot of steps and prep work in the kitchen.

It is served with potatoes and rice. Why the double carbs, I don't know. 

The amount of heat is up to you. I left out some of the hot chilis because I take food to my sick neighbor more or less daily until she has her operation and can move around more.

A bit of hot sauce for me made it spicier.

The first step is the chicken stock to prepare. I had thin chicken breast strips. They went in the vegetable stock to poach after the stock cooked for 45 minutes. I let the heat just on until the thin strips went in, closed the lid and turned off the heat. After 10 minutes the meat was done.

It just needed to be shredded later. The potatoes went in a small pot on the side and cooked until done. I peeled them later and reheated them for serving.

Cook a couple of eggs.

I ripped a breadroll apart and soaked it in chicken stock.

The orange bell pepper and the fresh red chili went in the blender with some of the chicken stock.

Onion and lots of garlic went in a pan with some oil. Seasoned with salt and pepper, cumin and tumeric. The bell pepper mix went in to cook out the liquid. Then I added the  soaked breadroll and a teaspoon of Sambal Olec and a quarter package of evaporated milk.

After cooking it for 8 min, I poured that in the blender and made a fine sauce. 

Back in the pan the shredded chicken added to warm through. More seasoning and a bit more hot sauce.

The rice was ready, the eggs cooked and the olives pitted.

Ingredients:

350 g chicken breast strips

50 g leek, 1 large carrot, 2 celery stalks, 1 green onion, 2 dried chilis, 1 bay leave, 10 black whole peppercorns, 1/2 tsp salt, 700 ml water

1 large orange bell pepper

1 onion

6 cloves of garlic

1 tbsp oil

tumeric, cumin

85 ml evaporated milk

1 red chili

3 tsp Sambal olec

Salt and pepper

1 breadroll

3 eggs

4 potatoes

Black olives

Longgrain rice

 

Roasted Fennel on Leek Creme

This is a vegetarian French recipe.

When I read it first, it sounded very complicated. But that is not true. Just a bit of planning ahead and the whole process needs an hour and 15 minutes.

Start with the leek cream. It can simmer in a pot until it is soft, then use a strong blender and add the creme fraiche. Now you only have to keep the leek cream warm.

While this is cooking, take a good look at the fennel bulb. I was lucky to find a large one without any bleamishes on the outside. I only cut off the dried stems and saved the fennel fonds. Cut through the middle and washed.

It went in a cast iron pan with a lid to cook and later to roast. Chop some more herbs and crush some hazelnuts.

Recipe for 1:

1 large leek

1 large fennel bulb

2 cloves of garlic

1 small white onion

2 small or 1 large potato

Olive oil

1 tsp Butter

60 ml creme fraiche

Honey

Hazelnuts

Fleur de Sel

Pepper

Veggie stock

Leek cream:

Chop onion, potato and leek. In some olive oil start the onion, then add the leek and after 3 more min the potatoes. Season with salt and pepper.

Fill up with veg stock and cook covered on low heat for 10 min or until the veggies are cooked. Use a fine mash sieve over a bowl and drain the leek. Just leave enough liquid to blend. Add the creme fraiche and use a strong blender. Pour back in the pot and keep warm.

Fennel:

Chop the garlic and fry it in oil in a pan. Add the fennel halves and let them cook 3 min. Now add a little water and close the lid. The fennel will need about 20 min. Open the lid and let the remaining water evaporate. A bit of butter in the pan, a good seasoning of Fleur de Sel on the inside of the fennel and 2 tsp honey.

Turn over and braise the fennel to get some color. Chop the herbs and add the hazelnuts. Serve on top of the leek cream.