Lentil Soup with Goat Cheese and Bacon

This is a de luxe French soup created by  2 Michellin star Chef Tim Raue. His Berlin restaurant is in the top 50 restaurants of the world. It is delicous and just needs a bit planning for the right timing of the components for the soup. And it does not need outrageous ingredients.

I started with Italian panchetta, fresh from the Deli counter of my supermarket. I asked for 0,5 cm thick slices. Placed in baking paper on a baking sheet and topped with a smaller oven proof dish. 15 min on 170 C - perfectly crispy. Just resting on kitchen to get rid of extra grease.

While that was in the oven, I prepared the goat cheese cream. Heat 75 ml of milk and add 75 g slices of goat cheese to melt. Use a stick blender to make it creamier. Set aside to cool down. Add the 75 g Mascarpone cheese and stir well. Put in the fridge.

Now the lentil soup. 

100 g onion, 75 g bacon, 160 g red lentils

1 bay leaf, 900 ml chicken stock, 100 ml double cream, 1 tsp Piment d' Espelette

Sprouts

Chop bacon and fry it off in a pot. Add chopped onions and give them some time. Add lentils and stock and bay leaf. Cook for 25 min. Put in a blender after you removed the bay leaf.

Add cream and Piment d'Espelette and reheat. 

Serve with a dollop of goat cheese cream and a panchetta chip

 

Okonomyaki Sortedfood style

Sorry, people from Japan. This is a more Western version of the classic Osaka style Okomomyaki. I have got the idea from Sorted. They used all kinds of Heinz sauces and mixed them in with their recipes. One of the guys made the Japanese pancake.

I was in Japan twice and came to love the Hiroshima Okonomyaki with the Soba moodles. But I tried the Osaka style one too.

That is a lot easier to prepare at home in a pan. Not everybody has a tepanyaki plate at home.

I added some Bull's Eye BBQ sauce to the batter and used veg stock instead of water. That made it very savoury.

Ingredients for 1:

3 slices of bacon, 2 eggs, 2/3 cup flour, salt, 1/3 tsp baking powder, 200 ml veg stock, 1 tbsp BBQ sauce

2 cups China cabbage, 1 spring onion, 1 grated carrot

Okonomyaki sauce, Kewpie mayo, Ao Noori flakes

Make the batter and let it rest while you prepare the veggies. Keep the green part of the spring onion aside for later.

Mix it all in the batter. Fry off one side of the bacon first. Turn it and pour the mix on top. Use medium heat to cook. Then flip and cook the other side.

When it is done, put it on a plate with the bacon side on top and brush Okonomyaki sauce on top. Drizzle Kewpie and sprinkle with onion greens and Ao Noori

China Cabbage Nimono with Tuna

Nimono is Japanese and means in some kind of stock cooked vegetables. Nimono is often used for Bento Boxes. Some kind of vegetable as a side in the box. But this dish is actually a very inexpensive kind of full meal. Served over rice it will fill you up on a very low budget. Only a few ingredients and very fast to prepare.

A whole head of China cabbage for one person is a lot to eat. You have to get creative. That was the reason why I gave it a try. I used the tuna water from the cans asmentioned in one recipe I found. Next time I will use some home made stock. The canned water tasted like metal. A bit of dashi stock or even a good veg stock should be a better base to this dish here.

ingredients:

China cabbage more is better, it will wilt down a lot while it cooks

75 ml stock, sancho pepper, shimichi togarashi

60 g canned tuna, 2  - 3 tbsp light soy sauce

1/2 cup short grain rice

Cook the rice while you prepare the veggies.

Ricotta and Spinach Sauce Spaghetti

This recipe was developped from a fridge raid. I cleaned some shelves and checked the veggie drawer and put the things on the brink of going to the bin on the counter. All things still looked and smelled decent, if a little on the wilted side.  The expiration date was just reached on the tub of ricotta.

Best time to go against food waste and cook something tasty. Easy is always a sauce for pasta. And it is a quick fix. The time the spaghetti will need, including the time the water for them to heat up, is the time the sauce will take.

Ingredients:

125 g spaghetti, 2 cloves of garlic, 1 spring onion, 1 tbsp olive oil

150 g baby spinach, 70 g cherry tomatoes, 100 g ricotta, 30 g toasted pine nuts

nutmeg, salt, pepper, thyme and chili flakes

Toast the pine nuts in a dry pan. Set aside.

Just wash the veggies, and peel the garlic. Chop it together with the spring onion and toss it in a wide pan with some olive oil. Next in with the baby spinach leaves. Since they are still a bit wet, they will wilt fast. Season with nutmeg, salt and pepper.

Cut the cherry tomatoes in halves and in with them. Now add the ricotta. Take a couple of tbsp of pasta water to loosen the cheese. Season with thyme and chili flakes

Take tongs and get the spaghetti out of the pot directly into the pan. The leftover water on them will bind the sauce.

Parsnips in Lemon Butter

Parsnips are a fall and winter vegetable. The sweetness of the roots makes it a vegetable that kids love. But today they wont get it often. It is a forgotten veggie that made a comeback in the last years. They can be eaten raw, cooked, roasted or as a mash. Today I roasted them in a pan with butter and lemon.

These roots need a little love. They tend to be a bit woody in the thicker parts. Either cut out the core or cook them a little longer.

Recipe for 2:

500 g parsnips lemon , salt flakes and szechuan pepper

1 tbsp Olive oil, 2 tbsp butter, zest of 1 lemon

Later 50 ml Noilly Prat and 50 ml water.

Finish with a few drops of lemon juice

Cook in a pan. After a couple of minutes, add Vermouth and Water and close the lid and cook on medium for 10 min or until they reach the firmness you like.

Rabbit Legs Mallorca Style

I finally found some fresh rabbit legs. It is so difficult to get some here in Germany. And since the Pandemic has hit France very hard, I had no chance to go on my grocery shopping tours there.

The idea of this recipe is from Chef Tim Mälzer. I made it my own way as always.

The legs are braised in a vegetable sauce on the stove and you eat it with a piece of bread.

Rabbit is a very lean meat and you have to be careful not to dry the meat out. But the short cooking time helps to prevent that.

Recipe for 2:

2 rabbit legs, 50 g fatty bacon, 3 onions, 4 cloves of garlic, 1 tsp oil

2 coeur de beuf tomatoes, 2 bay leaves, tsp veg stock anf 100 ml water, 4 tbsp Osbourne Brandy, salt and pepper, 1 carrot, 2 tsp agave syrup

Salt the rabbit legs, cut the bacon in thick strips and start that with a little oil. Brown the legs on both sides. Add 1 chopped onion and the fine cubed carrots and use a box grater  to grate the tomatoes into a pulp. Season with more salt and pepper and let the tomatoes luquify.

After a couple of min get it all out of the pan. Put in some oil and toss in the onion strips of the other 2 onions, the garlic and the bay leaves. When the onions get soft and took some color, drizzle the agave syrup over. Let them caramelize and then pour in the Brandy.

Get the rabbit legs with the tomato sauce in, add veg stock and water and turn down the heat and cook the legs open for 30 min, turning them a couple of times. Serve with bread.

Sweet Potato Beet and Apple Galette

The recipe looked good as a picture. I started to read it and thought: taste wise bland and boring.

I took the challenge and made a very tasty kind of galette with the basic ingredients and a couple of tricks. I often stumble across recipes that are leaving a bland taste on my tongue and I start adding to them in my mind. The 5 tastes of sour, salty, sweet, hot and umami should be tackled in a dish. At least a couple of them. There are so many people who do not trust their senses to season up to the max. Often food is lacking salt or sourness. Just a pinch of more salt or a drop of citrus helps so many dishes.

Sweet Potatoes are not my absolute favourite veggie. I like them as fries, as "toast", as "buns" for burgers and sometimes just eat them raw. In combination with other veggies, they go well.

recipe for 1 Galette:

1 roll ready made shortcrust pastry

1 apple, 1 pre cooked red beet, 1 small sweet potato, 1 spring onion

150 g Spundekäs or cream cheese with paprika and onions, 50 g regular cream cheese

25 g roasted hazelnuts, 1 spring majoram, 1 sprig rosemarie

2 tsp ginger syrup, chocolate salt, szechuan pepper mix, pepper

Heat up the oven 200 C.

Roll out the dough and spread the cheese on top in a circle. season the cheese.

Slice apple, red beet and sweet potato in thin slices. Put the sweet potatoes in a microwavable dish with a dash of water and heat it up at 800 Watts for 2 min. If you do not have one, just boil them for 2 min.

Make a circle, season, sprinkle onion and herbs on top. splash the ginger syrup around and put it in the oven for 15 min.

Let it rest 5 min before serving.