Plum Cake and Plum Peach Cake

It is plum time here in Europe. Prune or Quetsche in Alsace. A bag of them went home with me.

Sable pastry was available in the fresh produce isle. I was looking for some shortcrust pastry, but only sable and puff pastry was in stock. Who says that you only can use shortcrust pastry for a plum cake? I want to use an 16 cm and a 10 cm baking pan. A round ready made pastry was just enough for both of them.

I covered them with some crumble containing a little oats and cinnamon. Should go well the the plums. The amount of plums were not enough for both baking pans. The little one was stuffed with some Nectarines too. Best way to get it in the oven.

This time there is no recipe for the crumble. I did not weight anything. I made the crumble like my Mom did in the past. Just throw in butter and double with sugar and flour/ oats. Add some salt and cinnamon and feel the consistency. Is it too buttery, add more dry stuff. Is it too dry, just throw in a little more butter.

Baking time is 40 min at 200 C.

Garlic Prawn Linguine

This is a very simple dish. Just 5 ingredients.

We bought not only salmon for the dinner, but two packages of cooked prawns. I wanted to make the pasta dish a bit fancy, but my friends asked for simple. Just leave everything green out in the dish.

I roasted a good amount of garlic, added ground chili flakes and the prawns. Some pepper and dried thyme.

The linguine went strait out of the pot into the pan with a little cooking water.

Ingredients:

500 g linguine, 400 g prawns, 4 tbsp olive oil, 5 cloves of garlic, chili, pepper, salt

That's it! Hot and tasty!

Salmon Soup from Finnland or Lohikeitto

Cooking with friends is always fun. Cooking for a friend and giving her free time to work is a pleasure. Doing that in a foreign kitchen is a challenge, but I love that. 

Our grocery shopping before that left us with huge portions of everything. That store is for professional kitchens, restaurants and shop keepers. On my own, I can not go in there. 

For this soup 450 g of fresh salmon is needed. We ended up with a whole side of salmon, about 1,45 kg. We had the choice of a box of leeks, about 15 kg or a package of 10 leeks. Guess what we took? I found oven baked potatoes in a pack of 4 in the fridge isle. Carrots either a box of 20 kg or a package of 2 kg. Happy to take them.

Recipe for 4:

450 g fresh salmon

2 large baked potatoes, 2 carrots, 1 leek, 1/2 bunch fresh dill

2 liters veg stock or fish stock, 100 ml double cream, 3 tbsp oil

Salt, pepper, mild red chili flakes

Take the skin off the salmon and cut it in 2 cm cubes. Set aside.

Chop leek and carrots and start them in oil. While they are cooking, peel the baked potatoes and cut them in bite size pieces. Add to the softened veggies. Aftet 2 more min, add stock and season. Bring to a boil, reduce the heat and cook fir 10 - 12 min. Add the cream and some of the chopped dill. 

Put the salmon cubes in. Close the lid and cut off the heat. The salmon will get done in the remaining heat. That way no white will come out of the fish. After 5 min, stir and add the remaining of the dill.

Cilantro and Tahin Sauce with Sweet Potato Vermicelli and oven roasted Sweet Potato

When you hate cilanto / coriander and are not a huge fan of tahini - keep your hands off that recipe.

The sweet potato taste is not strong enough to beat the sauce mix. But it you like that taste, you have to give it a try. The original recipe I found on Pinterest called for spaghetti. But I wanted to finish the last sweet potato vermicelli in the open package.  More sweet potato FTW.

The work for this recipe is forgettable. Cook the vermicelli. Peel the sweet potato and cube it, season it and stick it in the oven. Mix the cold sauce. What´s not to like? 

Recipe for 1:

100 g sweet potato starch vermicelli, 2 tbsp dark soy sauce, salt , 1 tsp sesame oil

4 tbsp tahin, 3 tbsp hot water, 2 large stalks of cilantro with roots, 1 clove of garlic, 1 knob of ginger, salt and pepper

1 sweet potato, olive oil, salt, pepper and dried herbs.

Heat up the oven to 180 C fan. Stick the chunks of sweet potato in for 25 min.

Use a wide pan 1/2 filled with water and some salt, add soy sauce. When the water is boiling, get the Vermicelli in and let them get soft. Cook only for 6 min. Drain and add a little sesame oil.

Chop the roots of the coriander in small pieces, chop the rest with the stalks. Grate garlic and ginger and mix everything with tahini and water. Pour it over the vermicelli and wait for the sweet potato chunks to get soft. Bring all together. 

Turkey Drumstick with oven roasted Potatoes

I went grocery shopping in France again. One of the things I bought was a piece of turkey leg with joint. I wanted something with no fuss to make when I came home from the trip. Heating up the oven and seasoning the  meat was one thing. Cutting small potates in wedges and seasoning them with olive oil and salt and pepper and some dried herbs was the other. 

When the oven was hot, both went in for 50 min. During that time a had enough to do to unravel all the stuff I bought and pack a bag for my friend. When I go shopping over there, I am asked to bring a couple of goods for her too. Mostly different cheeses and sausages and some cookies. 

When everything was unpacked and repacked, lunch was ready.

Ingredients:

1 turkey leg piece, mixed chicken seasoning, pepper

7 small potatoes, olive oil, salt, pepper, Herbes de Provence

Put both in the oven at 180 C fan for 50 min. After 30 min turn the leg and the potatoes.

Prawns with Sweet Potato Vermicelli and Kai Choy

I shopped at Asia Go in the morning. The lunch theme was Korean cuisine.

When I ate sweet potato starch noodles for the first time I was surprised that they were so chewy. I liked it a lot. A bigger package went home with me.

The freezer section of the Asian store had prawns in all sizes. I took a bag of huge ones and just defrosted 6 of them for a meal. The fresh produce isle is flanked with high wooden crates containing all kinds of veggies in plastic wrap. They are ready to grab. The usual bok choy and Napa cabbage is there mostly all the time. But this time an other kind of green caught my eye. Stalks like bok choy or chard, but a lot more light green leaves and some kind of some yellow pieces in the middle. At first it reminded me of the Italian Rappa.

The name on the wrapper said Kai Choy. A quick check on the smartphone revealed mustard kohl. That went into my shopping basket with a bunch of fresh cilantro with the roots still on. They will go in an other dish this weekend.

recipe for 1:

100 g sweet potato vermicelli, 2 tbsp dark soy sauce, salt, 1 tsp sesame oil

1 spring onion, 3 cloves of garlic, 3 stalks kai choy, 1 red bell pepper

6 defrosted cleaned prawns

2 tbsp soy sauce, 1 tbsp oyster sauce, 1 tsp sesame oil, 1 tsp canola oil, 1 tsp sesame seeds roasted 

salt and pepper, chili is optional

Use a wide pan an fill it 1/2 with water, add some salt and 2 tbsp of dark soy sauce. Cook the Vermicelli for 6 min. Drain and toss them with a little sesame oil to prevent clumping.

Wash the kai choy and take the leafy part off the stems. Chop the stems and the leaves but keep them separat. Cube the red pepper and chop spring onion and garlic.

In a second pan, heat 2 kinds of oil and start with onion and garlic. After 2 min add peppers and the stems from the kai choy. Give that a good 5 min and season with salt and pepper.

Now add soy and oyster sauce and the same amout of water. In with the leafy greens. Give that 2 min and scrape it to the side of the pan. Add the prawns and cook them on each side for 1,5 min. Add the Vermicelli and stir everything together. Finish with sesame seeds.

Risotto with Arugula, Chard and Spinach served with Trout

Greens in a risotto are easy. I bought a package of mixed salad greens. I was on the lookout for Baby spinach. That was out. But in the same isle of the supermarket fridge was a pack of Arugula, Chard and Spinach.

At the fishmonger I  somepink trout. The risotto with the greens goes very good with trout. It does not over power the trout.

Recipe for the risotto for 2:

120 g carneroli risotto rice, 600 ml chicken stock, 120 ml white wine

2 spring onions, 2 garlic cloves, 2 long green peppers, 2 tbsp butter

150 g mixed salad greens, 3 tbsp Parmesan cheese

350 g trout , seasoning  olive oil

In butter start onion, garlic and green peppers. After 5 min, add the rice snd coat it well. Pour in the wine and let it cook down.

In the meantime wash the mixed greens and let them sit in the colander.  Bring the kettle to a boil and pour the hot water over it. Let the greens sit. Later squeeze the water out and chop them.

Now in with 1/4 of the stock. Cook until gone, stir often. Do that until the stock is down anf the rice is done. In the last 5 min, add the salad greens and finish with Parmesan.

Season the fish and put it skin side down in a hot pan with a little oil. Depending on the thickness, the fish will need 3 to 5 min on this side. Flip it over and finish it for 2 more min.