A Mezédes feast at a Greek Taverne in town

A girls night out with great food!

I am on an adventure to check out the Restaurants in my neighborhood. This is one of them.
We went to a Greek Tavern called ELA! The word means come or come in English.

They serve not the usual Greek platters of food which are starting with all kinds of Greek Gods or Goddesses names, but they serve small plates with seasonal food. It is similar to Spanish Tapas.
The best way to eat here is to come with friends and sit around a small table and share the dishes.
The three of us did just that.

The table was tiny and the waiter had to play Tetris to get 4 or 5 dishes on the table in one serving.
Each of us ordered their 4 favourite ones to try and so 12 dishes came to us.
After that, we wanted to finish the evening with some sweets, but there were non on the menu. The chef came and recommended 2 desserts to share with 3 spoons - what a great idea. We were so into these desserts that I even forgot to take a picture.

We all love Tsaziki and that was no.1 on our list. Then Tamaras- white fish roe cream and Fakes salata - a lentil salad with thyme. Aubergine salad was next.
Great tasting black olives.
Have you heard of Kolokithokeftedes?  Grated Courgette with Carrots bind with some cheese into balls served with some mint dip. Delicious.

More hot dishes followed.  Hart Greek cheese coated in breadcrumbs and deep fried with lemon juice.
Meatballs with tomatoes and cheese out of the oven and Suflaki.
A prawn and cheese dish came last. It was too salty for my taste. We ate all of the dishes with fresh baked olive bread.

After 12 shared dishes we were full.
Two lovely sweet treats helped us to finish our evening. Walnuts  almonds and rusk crushed and drenched with honey and baked in the oven topped with vanilla custard with cinnamon. Finger licking good. The other was a small tower with creme patisserie between two layers of cake and topped with chocolate ganache and a cherry.

Carrot Ginger Fond with Brook Trout

The fish should be the star of the show - but the Fond is!
And the Lemon Baharat Potatoes are going so well with the brook trout too. All in one - a great dish.

On TV I saw someone at the "Perfect Dinner" or "Come dine with me" in other countries, prepare a carrot fond and served it with the entree. I wasn`t really following but just saw the final photo of the dish. The fond was the winner in my opinion.
In a newspaper clipping I found a recipe with the brook trout served on some carrot ginger fond. A recipe from Austrian chef Elisabeth Grabmer.
I took both takes as an inspiration on the fond/jus and come up with my own version. It is no so complicated as it sounds. The jus not only goes with fish, but you can serve any white meat with it too.

recipe for the Carrot Ginger Fond:
500 ml carrot juice mixed with a little apple juice
half of an orange - juiced
half of a lemon - juiced
30 g fresh ginger
1 shallot
1 tbsp rapeseed oil
2 tbsp Noilly Prat
salt and pepper
1 tbsp brown sugar
1/2 tsp anise seeds
1/2 tsp fennel seeds
1/2 tsp coriander seeds
1 tsp veg stock powder
1 tsp potato starch in 2 tbsp water

1 brook trout fillet
2 tbsp oil
2 knobs of butter
salt and pepper
lemon juice

Peel and chop shallot and ginger, in rapeseed oil saute both until the shallot is tender, add the seeds and give them 2 minutes, add Noilly Prat, the orange and lemon juice and last the carrot apple mix.
Add seasonings and cook without a lid for 20 - 30 min to reduce to 1/3 of the liquid.
Dissolve the starch in water and gradually add to thicken the sauce. Then drain it through a fine sieve and reheat and serve.

Prepare the brook trout.
Season it on both sides and in some oil on medium to high heat brown the skin side. When you see the white come up around the fish, drain the oil from the pan.
Add the butter and turn the fish over and just finish it. A little lemon juice ups the flavour.
Put on top the  jus, skin side up.

Serve with some asparagus and Lemon Baharat Potatoes.

Lemon Baharat Potatoes

Greeting from the Orient.

My BFF was on tour here in Germany and on her trip she went o a big Turkish/Arabic Supermarket. She knows that I love to check out things that are unknown to me and she went to the spice board in the supermarket. The word "Oliven" on a jar caught her eye. It was a spice blend with the name Zeytin Baharat. It ingredients of garlic, marjoram, basil, oregano,mint and sumac sounded good. She bought it for me.
I googled the spice blend and found a potato side dish that sounded delicious. Since I was looking for a side to my fish dish, that gave me the reason to try it .

Great spice blend! I can recommend the way to prepare tasty potatoes in a pan.

Recipe for 2:
450 g potatoes
1 small red onion
1 tsp dried parsley or chives
1 lemon zest and juice
1 1/2 tsp Zeytin Baharat
60 ml rapeseed oil
salt and pepper

Peel and cut the potatoes in 2 cm cubes.
Zest and juice the lemon
add them to a bowl with parsley and 1 tsp of Baharat.
Mariante the potatoes for 30 min.

Add rapeseed oil and salt and pepper.
Bake in a wide pan for 10 min,
Add the sliced onion
Bake for 10 more minutes.






Add a bit more Baharat if you like.

Pudding Rice with Mango

A super ripe mango is a wonderful fruit, but a mess to eat. I wanted to use it before it went off.
I started to cut it open and had the juices run over my fingers. I dropped as much ripe flesh into a bowl and looked at it. Not so nice, no other fruit to make a smoothie, no yogurt in the fridge to mix it with.

On a cold day a bowl of pudding rice sounded great to me. When I make these kinds of sweet rice I usually use risotto rice like carneroli or aborio rice. But I had none at home. Some forgotten pudding rice sat in one of my many metal cans. O K , why not. I like my rice rich and creamy, so an egg and some lemon or lime juice is a must to finish it.


recipe for 2:
175 g pudding rice
20 g butter
1 pinch of salt 
800 ml whole milk
1 tbsp vanilla sugar
2 tbsp brown sugar
2 eggs
1 lemon.
1 ripe mango

Wash the rice and in some butter give it a good coating in a pot. After 2 min add the salt and the milk and bring to a boil, add vanilla sugar and brown sugar and cook for 20 - 25 min until the rice is soft .
Separate the eggs and beat the egg white stiff with a little salt.
Press the juice from the lemon.

Pasta with smoked Salmon and Physalis

When I checked my fridge I had one slice of smoked salmon left.  Eating it just as it is was one choice, but not enough to feel satisfied. Pasta for dinner sounded great and the salmon would be the final touch on my dish.

A bit of tomato would look nice on the plate too, but my tomato season has ended and since then I have not bought any from a shop.
What now. Some orange coloured physalis caught my eye. The look like cherry tomatoes. That inspired me to chuck a few halved ones into the pasta.
The sweet and fruity taste goes remarkable well with the smoked salmon.

Recipe:
120 g pasta
1 slice smoked salmon, use more when you have some
3 tbsp double cream
1 1/2 tbsp parmesan
3 physalis
Salt and pepper

Cook the pasta al dente and drain it.
Heat up the cream, season and add 1 tbsp parmesan.
Mix the pasta in.
Top with smoked salmon and halved physalis and a big more cheese

Swede and Carrot Curry

Swede is a typical winter root vegetable
 It is not very popular especially with old people.

It was their main staple after WWII. I bought one on the weekly market. A bit of curry was a way to prepare it without any meat.
Some dried whole spices and some fresh aromatics help the veggies along.
You can go one pot with meat and bacon or just prepare it vegetarian.

Recipe:
500 g swede
2 large carrots
400 g mushrooms
3 shallots
3 cloves of garlic
2 spring onion
1 knob of ginger
1 veg stock cube
1 tbsp tomato paste
1 tsp chili flakes
200 ml coconut milk
50 g dessicated coconut
1 tsp cumin
1 tsp coriander
1 tsp fenugreek
1 tsp mustard seeds
1 tsp curcuma
2 tbsp veg oil
Salt and pepper
1 tsp dark brown sugar
1 tsp lemon juice
1 tbsp parsley

Chop everything.
Heat up the oil and get the dried spices in to pop.
Add onions, garlic and ginger and tomato paste.
The coconut milk follows next.
Then get all veggies in. Fill up with 500 ml stock and season.
Cook until veggies are tender.
Add sugar and lemon juice and dessicated coconuts.
Garnish with parsley.

Plantaine & Buckwheat Pancakes GF

When I buy a plantaine it usually ends fried. I have one since last week sitting around and on my way home I knew I had to prepare it. It was still on the green side, so lots of starch and no sweetness.

When I stood in the kitchen, I was no longer looking forward to fry some food.
The next move was a trip through Google until I found a way to prepare the plantaine without frying it.
The answer to my cooking problem were some pancakes. The recipe sounded fairly simple, just peel the plantaine, crack eggs and put both with a little salt into a blender. Make a fine batter.

I looked at the batter and it looked rather thin. To stabilize it a little I went for buckwheat, because I wanted to stay gluten free on this dish.

Bake them in rapeseed oil on medium heat for 3 minutes on each side.

It was just two pancakes, a little blue cheese and some dressed salad and voila, the dinner today was ready.


recipe for 2 pancakes:
1 green  plantaine
1 tbsp buckwheat flour
2 eggs
1 pinch of salt
rapeseed oil
blue cheese
lettuce with some dressing