Zucchini and Cream Cheese Pasta

I am going grocery shopping in France tomorrow, finally. It is a long time since the last time. 

That means cleaning the fridge and getting rid of all bits and bobs that resided in it. Most of the items went in to some dishes the last couple of days. Only very few had to go in the waste can. After my not so great puff pastry tart from yesterday, I needed some comfort food.

With the leftover piece of zucchini, some green onions and 2 different mostly empty cream chreese packages the direction of this dish was clear. 

Recipe for 2:

225 g capellini pasta

200 g zucchini (courgette), 2 spring onions, 2 garlic cloves, 1 tbsp olive oil

30 g cream cheese, 40 g cheese cream, 50 ml double cream

Salt. Pepper. 2 tsp pesto Genovese, basil

Chop the veggies in small chunks and saute them in oil for 3 min. During that time start the pasta.

Add the cream and the 2 cheeses to the pan and let them melt. Add the pesto. If the sauce is on the thicker side now, no problem. Just scoop the pasta directly out of thr pot in the pan. That transfers enough starchy water to make the right consistency. Finish with basil.

 

Puff Pastry with Cheese and Salmon

This is not a normal way to make a puff pastry tart. It is like a French Tarte Tatin method of covering the filling with the puff pastry and turning it over after baking.

I saw a short reel on the internet and watched it 3 times and rememered the sequence of food items.

I needed to buy the puff pastry today. I went to the local Discounter and grabbed a package. There was only one kind to choose from. I unrolled it and used a bowl to cut out circles to cover the stacks of food. The dough felt a little off, but I used it anyway.

After baking I tasted a bit of the pastry and I missed the buttery flaky taste. I pulled the package out of the waste bin and started to read. No butter in sight! This pastry was made with palm fat and the package boosted the Vegan sign. Meh...

Recipe for 3 tarts:

1 ready made puff pastry with butter!

1/2 courgette, 50 g camembert, 60 g graved salmon, 3 tsp honey, 3 tsp pine nuts

3 tbsp double cream

Preheat the oven to 200 C fan.

Use baking paper and spread 3 blobs of honey on it. Top it with pine nuts. Cut the cheese in slices and in 4 cm chunks. Stack them on top of the nuts.

Cut the courgette in 2mm rounds and set 5  on the cheese in a flower petal style. Season with salt and pepper. Top with the salmon.

Use a bowl that is wider then your stack and use it as a template to cut out the puff pastry. Lay it on top and scrunch the pastry around the stack to create a wall. Brush with cream.

Bake for 15 min or until golden brown. Flip over to serve on a plate.

Flatbread with Dates and Pear

From my Boulour Salad with Dates are some still in the box. Now this is a second way to use some of them up.

What I remembered from last time, the dates are very hard and dry. I took the last bit of my PIMS out and let them sit in the heated up alcohol for a while. It only helped a little, but the PIMS tasted later even better :-)

A flatbread with yeast is not so fast to prepare. The dough needed 90 min to proof beside the heater. Usually I use baking powder as a raising agent.

The recipe makes two flatbreads. One portion of the dough went into the freezer for an other day.

Recipe for 2:

Dough:

250 g flour, 4 g dry yeast, 1/2 tsp salt, 1 tsp sugar, 2 tbsp olive oil, 140 ml warm water

Bring it together and knead it for a couple of minutes. Put it in a bowl sprayed with some oil, cover it with a towel and let it rise in s warm place for 90 min.

Topping:

2 ripe large pears, 4 shallots, 4 dates, 2 tsp oregano, salt, pepper, 1 tbsp olive oil, 150 g soft rich cream cheese.

Roll out the dough on baking paper and poke some holes in it with a fork. Spread olive oil on top.

Cut pear and shallots in slices and place them on the dough. Season with salt, pepper and oregano.

Bake for 12 min at 230 C. 

Chop the dates and slice the cheese and top the bread with it. Bake for 5 more min.

Air Fryer Cheesecake

I use my Air Fryer often. But I never baked a cake in it. The first try is a cheesecake.

There are so many recipes on the internet. It differs with the size and shape of your Air Fryer. Round or square, large or on the smaller side. Mine is round an the pan I used was 16 cm.

There is a bake function on the dial. I used that and it bakes at 180 C.

Ingredients:

250 g room temp cream cheese

70 g white sugar, 3 drops lemon juice

100 g double cream

1 tbsp potato starch

2 eggs room temperture

When you use the ingredients at room temperature, you only need a bowl and a whisk to bring it together. When everything is fridge cold, use a blender.

Take a sheet of baking paper and crumble it. Press it in the dish. Cut off the edges that are too high. They will burn otherwise.

Fill in the batter and tap the dish a couple of times on the board to get the air bubbles out.

Bake at 180 C for 20 min. Let it rest for 5 min in the still closed Air Fryer. Take the dish out and place it in the cold for 2 hours, lightly covered. Since we have winter here, the balcony works just fine at 2 C.

Thai Curry with Chicken

I took a short trip and went to a farmer's market.

They are specialized in poultry products, but sell organic fruits and veggies, pastries and breads and a lot of local products from the area. You can get flowers and knick knacks that are quiet charming too.

I bought some chicken legs. On one of the shelfs was a variety of jars with different sauces. All made from a small local company near by. They sell their products in various shops and markets in a range of 100 km. The shelf had Thai curry, Satey Sauce, brown Mothersauce, Tomatosauce and a couple of others. The size just good for 2 to 3 tportions.

I used some of my veggies to bulk out the sazce and put the chicken legs in the oven. The organic chicken was very high quality.

Ingredients for 2:

2 chicken legs and salt and pepper.

In the oven at 180 C fan for 45 min.

1 carrot, 1 garlic clove, 1 spring onion, 1 yellow bell pepper, parsley

1 tsp coconut oil, 200 g Thau curry sauce

1 cup Jasmine rice

Peach Jell-O

We have a American Sweet Store in the Mall LOOP 5. I bought some packages of Jell-O.

It was a long time ago I ate that stuff on my many trips to the USA. But I was not impressed years ago. Sorry to say, I am still not impressed.

I had peach Jell-O with artificial flavour. Yes, the artificial flavour was easy to spot, but I missed the peach flavour. It tasted just sweet and I had a problem to pinpoint the peach.

The only real tasty thinks I could pinpoint were the chunks of mandarine orange I've thrown in.

I was looking forward to this treat tonight to eat while I watch the Super Bowl from Arizona. Instead I will make a bowl of popcorn.

Boulgour Salad with Dates from Israel

This salad is sooo tasty. Mint, dates, cucumber and all the other ingredients sends you strait to the Beaches in Tel Aviv. 

The boulgour is just the transport module for all the flavours. Without it, the salad would overpower everything.

Best serve it at room temperture. When you store it in the fridge, get it out an hour before serving it.

Recipe for 3:

130 g large boulgour, 500 ml veg stock

150 g cucumber, 3 tomatoes, 1 spring onion, 2 tbsp lemon juice, 5 mint leaves, 1/2 bunch parsley, 2 Madjoul Dates

3 tbsp olive oil, 125 g Greek yogurt, salt, pepper

20 g pecans, 15 g pistacchios, 15 g hazelnuts

Cook the boulgour in veg stock, then drain it and cool it down.

Take the wet bits out of the tomatoes and the cucumber. Chop the veggies and take the pith out of the dates.

Toast the nuts in a dry pan and chop them a bit. Make the dressing and bring all ingredients together. Let the salad sit for 30 min.