Smoked Pork Shoulder on Sauerkraut

I love a good piece of smoked pork. The meat is not to salty and it is very succulent.
it needs a long time to cook, so that the raw meat is completely done. The piece of pork shoulder I bought was on the bone, so one third of the piece I bought was bone.

I used a big can of one of Germany s leading brands of Sauerkraut. Hengstenberg. I inhered the can from the cleaning out the cupboards of my Dad s last household. It sat in my cupboard for more then a year. He loved Sauerkraut.
The side dish was a pot of creamy mashed potatoes.

Recipe:
850 g smoked pork shoulder
1 can of sauerkraut, about 800 g
3 small onions
8 juniper berries
1 tsp caraway seeds
1 tbsp goose fat
150 ml sparkling wine
pepper
800 g potatoes
100g milk
50 g cream
50 g butter
salt, pepper, nutmeg

Put the meat into a pressure cooker and fill the water up nearly to the top. Bring to a boil and close the lid, wait until the pressure mark comes up, reduce the heat and cook under pressure for 30 minutes. Steam off and check the meat if it is cooked all through the bone.

In a pan melt the goose fat, add the chopped onions and give them 2 minutes.
Drain the liquid from the can of Sauerkraut and pour the kraut into the pan.
Add juniper berries and caraway seeds and sparkling wine and close the lid and cook for 20 min.


Cook the potatoes, drain them, mash them and add cream, milk, butter and seasoning.
Enjoy!

Guinea-fowl with apples in Cider

Pintade au Cidre is the origin of this recipe. The whole bird is cooked in the oven on top of veggies and apples and with cider as the liquid.

I bought the bird in France so I made kind of a French recipe.
When you have all the veg and apples done and the bird sits on top, just stick it into the oven for 45 minutes.

After it was finished, I chucked the remaining carcass, skin and leftover veggies in a pot, filled it up with enough water to cover it and cooked it for one hour. Now I have 1 liter of stock to use for soup in the next week. Waste not- want not.

recipe serves 2:
1 Guinea- fowl about 1,1 kg
4 apples
3 carrots
200 g shallots
1/4 leek
1 spring onions
5 Savoy cabbage leaves
3 cloves of garlic
3 bay  leaves
400 ml cider
4 tbsp butter
chicken spice or paprika and chili
salt and pepper

Use a deep ovenproof dish about 40x30 cm.
Preheat the oven 175 C.
Clean the veggies and quarter the apples with the skin on.
Lay the cabbage leaves on the bottom of the dish, scatter the veggies and apples and season with salt and pepper.
Clean the bird, dry it and rub it with butter all around. Season.

Put it breast down on the veggies.
Bake for 45 minutes.
Eat with bread.

Savoy Cabbage Chestnut Pasta vegetarian

My friend gave me a huge package of South Tyrolian chestnut pasta, she bought from a farm store during her vacation there. Now I finally found a dish that goes great with it.The taste of the pasta is a subtle nutty flavour. I did not taste chestnut though.

I am still working on reducing a big head of Savoy cabbage and that is a good way to eat some of it. It is vegetarian. And it tastes even better when topped with a huge blob of Savoy cabbage walnut pesto.

recipe:
250 g chestnut flour tagliatelle
6 sun dried tomatoes in oil
5 Savoy cabbage leaves
1 huge spring onion
3 cloves of garlic
2 tbsp olive oil
2 tbsp creme fraiche
chili salt and pepper
50 ml pasta water
+
2 tbsp Savoy cabbage walnut pesto and some Pecorino shavings

Cook the pasta al dente.
In a wide pan heat up the oil and start with spring onion and garlic, give it 2 minutes and add the strips of dried tomatoes.
Shred the cabbage into 1/2 inch strips and toss it into the pan. Season with chili salt and pepper
Cook for 5 min.

Add some pasta water and put on a lid and let it steam for 6 min.
Finish with some creme fraiche and add the pasta.
Toss and serve with some pesto.

Savoy Cabbage Walnut Pesto

1. Preparing a whole head of cabbage into several dishes is a new challenge for me. Winter veggies are at their best in the moment. Savoy cabbage is one of my favourite kinds of cabbage, it is a bit finer then the other kinds of cabbage and the taste is less strong.

The basil you get from the supermarkets at the moment are not at their best, so I thought why not take a chunk of cabbage and make that into a pesto.

You will need some stronger tasting nuts then pine nuts to make a distinctive taste, so I chucked a hand full of walnuts into the blender.

recipe:
150 g Savoy cabbage
50 g walnuts
40 g Pecorino cheese
50 ml olive oil
2 cloves of garlic
salt and pepper

Wash the cabbage leaves and take the hard middle bit out and roughly cut it up. Chop the Pecorino into small chunks and get everything into the blender and make a pesto.

Ham and Cheese Pancakes

The last day before Lent is Pancake Day. But it is not celebrated here in Germany. We usually eat fried filled donuts.

I was looking for some pancakes. But savoury is my favourite.
Checking the fridge I found cream cheese with chives and shallots and cooked ham.
The important thing I learned from my Mom is that it is good to give the batter a minimum resting time for 15  minutes. It makes a better batter.

Recipe for 3 pancakes:
5 tbsp flour
1 pinch of salt
1 tsp sugar

3 eggs
120  ml milk
1/2 tsp baking powder
2 tbsp bubbly water
1 tbsp melted butter
3 slices cooked ham
50 g cream  cheese

Make the batter.
Combine the dry stuff first.
Crack in the eggs and give it a good whisk.
Loosen with milk and water and melted butter to a cream like consistency.
Let it rest for 15 to 30 minutes.
Use a medium pan with a lid.

Pour in a third of the batter and wait until the top shows bubbles lift and check if the bottom has some colour. Flip and close the lid to steam.
Check the colour and place on a plate.
Put cream cheese and ham on top and form a roll.

Rabbit in Cider

It is usually called Lapin au Cidre. It is an idea I came up with after my grocery shopping trip to France where I bought two rabbit legs. The meat is very lean and you have to take care that it does not dry out while cooking. I bought a Savoy cabbage too and some of the leaves went into the pot .

This is the second time this week that I used  my pressure cooker. It reduces the cooking time by two thirds.

Recipe for 2:
2 rabbit legs
2 tbsp flour
3 tbsp oil
500 ml chicken stock
350 ml cider
1/2 leek
2 small onions
2 cloves of garlic
2 bay leaves
1 tsp rhyme
1 spring onion
2 small swedes
2 tbsp Ayvar
200 g shredded Savoy cabbage

Season the rabbit with salt and pepper and coat with flour.
Prepare all the veggies.
In a pressure cooker heat up some oil and roast the veggies for 3 minutes. Get them out.

Heat up the rest of the oil and brown the meat a bit. Pour in the cider and deglaze the pot. Add the stock and the rest of the seasoning, the veggies and bring to a boil. Close the lid and cook under pressure for 23 minutes.
Steam off, open the lid and taste the sauce.
Serve with some Baguette or rice.

Navarin d`Agneau - Lamb Stew

This is a recipe I have not known about until this weekend. I bought some small pieces of lamb and checked the writing on the package. Then I checked Google.

It is a spring recipe with root veggies and other veg. It takes a long time to braise - if you do not  use a pressure cooker. The taste is intense and very delicious.

recipe:
400 g lamb shoulder or short ribs
2 tbsp oil
2 tbsp flour
4 yellow navettes
8 small red potatoes
1/2 leek
2 small white onions
3 spring onions
4 cloves of garlic
2 bay leaves
2 tbsp tomato paste
5 drops Tabasco
1 tbsp Agave syrup
1 stick rosemary
500 ml lamb stock
200 ml red wine
salt and pepper

Peel the veggies and cut into big chunks. Wash the potatoes and cut into 2-  3 pieces.
Season the lamb with lots of black pepper and salt and coat with flour.
In the pressure cooker heat 1 tbsp of oil and chuck in all the veggies, season and let them get some color.
Get them out of the pot and add more oil.

Brown the meat on all sides- makes a lot of smoke- and add tomato paste, cook for 2 minutes, get in the red wine and scrape the bottom of the pot.
Now pour in the stock and add bay leaves and rosemary and a bit of more salt and pepper. Bring to a boil and close the lid and let the pressure rise. When the sign is out, reduce the heat and let it cook for 23 minutes.

Get the pot off the flame and into the sink and let cold water run over the lid and use the whistle to reduce the steam, open and put it back on the heat.

Add the veggies and bring back to a boil.
Close the lid again and bring back to pressure and cook for 11 minutes, steam off and taste the sauce.
You can either mopp up the sauce with Baguette or as I did it, with some small pasta.