My Salad Dressing

 There is nothing more annoying that to have spent 1 hour cooking a main dish and now, of course, you still need to do the salad...seriously. Who has time or energy to season it decently? sometimes I eat the leaves raw cause I am just fed up of cooking.

And this is why it has taken me 13 years to publish a recipe of salad dressing, cause in all these years, I just could not be bothered to make one!

But our trip to Australia taught me a great trick that I do not want to forget. My mother in-law, the queen of salads, adds always a little bit of syrup to them! it is sheer magic, they taste so good. So I figured I could add this to a salad dressing. 

So here is my invention for you all. My dressing is 150 ml total, by the way.

INGREDIENTS:
-80 ml of olive oil.

-20 ml of balsamic vinegar.

-25 ml of apple vinegar.

-25 ml of maple syrup.

-1 tsp of salt.

-some cracked pepper.

-some rosemary, thyme, oregano, and dukah.

No recipe! 

mix it all together and give it a good stir in your jar. Obviously you can correct the flavour, if it is too salty, or sweet or bitter....just add more of the opposite ingredient, but I think my recipe is a great balance.

I'd say Paul Newman would congratulate me. ;)

Taco Seasoning

 Store-bought taco seasoning has always kinda given me the creeps about all the stuff that seems to have going on. But putting together all the spices required for mexican food is just too much.

I made this recipe today and I am quite happy with it.

INGREDIENTS:
-1 tablespoon of chili powder.
-2 tsp of cumin/spanis comino
-1 tsp smoky/picante paprika

-1 tsp of sweet paprika (my addition here)
-1 tsp salt
-1 tsp ground black pepper. 
-1/2 tsp of garlic powder
-1/2 tsp of onion powder
-1/2 tsp dried oregano
-a pinch of red pepper flakes 

And that's it. Put it all in a jar, give it a good shake and season your Mexican food. Should have made this a long time ago.....and that photo is Chicago, Mexican Waukegan. 

Succulent Tomato Sauce

So you buy a bunch of fresh basil and it is great for your curry or laksa. And then what do you do with the rest of the leaves that going bad, withering in seconds? 

One of my many flatmates in this life, taught me this italian tomato sauce recipe. Easy and tasty. I made it the other day and I just could not stop licking the spoon. I figured I'd write it down here so that I can recreate it.

INGREDIENTS

-1 can of peeled tomatoes (400 grams) 

-a little oil.

-3 garlic cloves smashed.

-3 sticks of fresh rosemary.

-a bunch of basil leaves.

-any random tomatoes you have in your fridge.

-1 tsp of salt.

-1 tsp of sugar.

STEPS:

1. Pour tomatoes in saucepan, a little water, a little oil and smash tomatoes a bit.

2. Now add garlic cloves that you have smashed a bit, the rosemary sticks, the sugar and the salt, and now let it all simmer for over an hour, stirring slowly. An amazing sauce begins to appear....you can let it simmer for 2 hours altogether. 

3. At the end of this time, I add the basil, not before otherwise it kills the flavour.

4. When it is done I pick up the rosemary stems and throw them out and the same with the garlic. 

5. I completed this sauce with grated carrots, red onions and 400 grams of true mince and of course spaghetti.

That's it. Such a wonderful wonderful sauce. 

Great Chicken Broth

 Okay, so this broth is very good. Liquid gold, the author calls it. Here is the recipe. I'm very impressed at this lady Marion. Her recipes are winners. 

My only variation of her recipe is adding a celery stick to the equation. Obviously her recipe is for more volume, more soup. 

INGREDIENTS:

-2 litres of water 
-1 free range chicken skeleton
-1 clove of garlic smashed.
-1 green onion.

-1 celery stalk (my addition)

-1-2 bay leaves (my addition)

-3 slices of ginger.
-some peppercorns.
-1 teaspoons of salt.

-1 prawn (optional at the end)

STEPS:

1. First of all, you are much better off watching the video she has in her recipe. It is a great video. But anyway, basically you need to put all the ingredients above in a pot, bring it all to a boil and then let it simmer for 1 hour or so. 

Just remember to smash a little with the blade of the knife the ingredients: the peppercorn, the garlic, the green onion so the flavours come out in the water easier.

2. After that I let it cool off and basically I let it all sit down in the stove for 1 day (obviously when it is cold, NOT in summer). The flavours get richer the longer you let it sit there. Then I put the whole thing in the fridge and the grease after some hours comes up to the surface.

3. After that, or even after 2 days, I throw in the trash everything that's in the pan and put the broth through a fine sieve.

4. And voila! there you have your great broth. Season it maybe with more salt if you want.

Pics: Singapore, the country of fines.

 

Pickled Cucumbers or "Pickles"

Pickled vegetables! 

Did you know that you can pickle any veggies? Basically it is the art of preserving food with vinegar, a brine made of vinegar, water and other spices. 

I had been after this recipe for a long time, I had to conquer it to be a true homemaker. And here it is, a great blog post of Kitchn that is just beautiful to look at. I love this food blog.

INGREDIENTS:

-2 medium very fresh cucumbers.

-1/2 cup of vinegar.
-1/2 cup of water.

-1 tablespoon mustard seeds.
-pinch of salt.

-3 or 4 tablespoons of  white sugar 

-1 star anise.

-3 bay leaves.

-some blackpepper corns.

STEPS:

1. Put in a pot all the ingredients that I write in the list except for the cucumbers and heat up slowly for 15 minutes until it comes to a simmer, this way all the flavours come out and mix. 

2. In the meantime, slice up the cucumbers and place in jar. (Some blogs out there say you need to get water out by adding salt to the cucumbers for a while in a bowl and bla,bla, but seriously I don't see the need for that, they taste awesome freshly cut).

3. Now bring the liquid to a boil raising the heat and when it is bubbling, quickly pour over cucumbers in the jar and close them right away tightly.

That's it. Now let it cool and then place in fridge.  If you want them to be very sweet, add 1/2 cup of sugar, but more sour 1/4 cup is good. This is totally a country town recipe, isn't it? 

Pic: Australia, Victoria.

Homemade Minced Garlic

                                                             

We just got back from Australia where I have been using minced garlic to cook all the time. Basically all recipes begin with this if you want some kind of flavour in your food. I get to Spain and no minced garlic in supermarkets, not a chance to find that here. People in Spain would think it is absolutely ridiculous to buy or make minced garlic but it saves so much time!  

So I have googled how to make it yourself and oh! so easy. All you need is:

INGREDIENTS 
-3 garlic knobs.
-olive oil.

-a pretty small jar.

-a food proccessor.

STEPS:

1. Peel all the garlic cloves and put them food processor for 10 seconds.

2. Place in jar and fill it up with oil slowly, stirring the garlic so it is all coated with oil, which is the preservative.

I am so happy to have garlic ready to go for any recipe in the fridge. It lasts in the fridge for 6 months!  This recipe is for everyone.

Pickled Red Onions

I have loved these pickled red onions that I still needed to do from my list of meals to cook and conquer  from last year. It's so incredible that sometimes in life you are into cooking, and then suddenly you are not AT ALL. So last year was my cooking year, but this year it has definitely been NOT my priority (I am sure you have noticed giving my lack of publishing). 

How important it is to ride the waves of the moment!!! because moments come and then they just leave! and the chance may not be there anymore to explore any given topic, like this one. 

So! after this long prologue, here is this simple yet impressive recipe that Courney Adamo published the other day in her Instagram, and remided me that I yet needed to learn to pickle vegetables. 

So here it is:

INGREDIENTS:
-4 small red onions or 2 big ones. 
-1 cup of water.

-1/2 white vinegar.

-1/2 apple vinegar.

-2 +1/2 tablespoons of honey.

-1 teaspoon of sugar.

-2 + 1/2 tsp of salt.

-1/2 tsp of red pepper flakes.

STEPS:
1. So this brine could not be more simple! Just slice all the onions thinly and place in jar. 
2. Add all the ingredients in a little pot and bring to a simmer for 1 minute.
3. Add the brine into the jar and let it sit there until cools off. Once it cools off place in fridge.

That's it. They are pretty great these onions for sandwiches, salads, a bit of a crunch and colour and obviously it takes away the spiciness of the onions, it changes the flavour. A great easy recipe that will make you feel like you have achieved true womanhood.

 

My Mom's Marmalade Recipe

      

Yesterday I managed to make something I had been meaning to do for a long time: Marmalade with my mom! It's so fun and cool! Not hard either. 

We had some old figs and it turned out amazingly, the way the sugar melts is incredible, it becomes this amazing paste. So here is the magic recipe and the proportions, which is basically that you add 1/2 of sugar of the amount of fruit, so for 1 kg of fruit you add 500 grams of sugar. The sugar and the lemon are the preservers.

INGREDIENTS:
-400 grams of figs.

-200 grams of white or granulated sugar.

-1/2 lemon.

STEPS:

1. Cut up your figs in little pieces and place in a pot, add the juice of a lemon.

2. Now add the sugar to high fire, and now stir, stir, stir, and suddently it all begins to melt, keeping stirring or it will burn. 

3. Now you need to let it boil and keep stirring for 15-20 minutes and then this amazing thick paste begins to appear in front of your eyes. It is all caramelized...glossy, gorgeous paste.

4. Now after 20 minutes of the sauce bubbling up and you stirring constantly pour in your glass jar and close immediately. It will seal and make a popping sound.

  

How to make Streusel (topping for desserts)

Germany is basically covered in Streusel. 

All bakeries have that in common....drooling mouth watering desserts covered in crunchy buttery Streusel like in the photo of Berlin.

 Well it turns out it is not such a big deal at all. I made it the other day for a coffee cake (and the cake ended up in its entirity in the trash), but the saving grace of the cake was that I learned to make Streusel and I made so much that I froze it and now I am putting it on all muffins. It is awesome.

 In Germany they make it with only butter, flour and sugar, but I like this american twist and brings cakes and muffins to another level, like Pro-level.

INGREDIENTS:
-1 cup of brown sugar (170 grams).

-1+3/4 cups of flour.

-3/4 cup of cold butter (170 grams).

-1+1/2 cups of pecans or walnuts (optional).

-1+1/2 teaspoons of cinnamon.

-1/2 tsp of salt.

STEPS:

1. Cut the cold butter into little cubes and add to a bowl with the rest of the ingredients (except for the nuts). 

2. With your hands mix it all together until it all becomes this brown mix. The butter will be a little dissolved but still will have chunks. 

3. Now add the nuts that you have chopped up before to make them smaller.

That's it! Now freeze it! and you will always have it ready to top up desserts. It is great. I use brown cane sugar cause it is not too sweet, or coconut or any brown sugar that is not crazy sweet like white.

 

Roasted Tomatoes

 Do you ever have a bunch of tomatoes going bad? 

Wondering what to do? Roast them and freeze them! Why did I never think of it? But of course Britanny had the idea. But what the heck to do with them next, you are probably asking. It will make a great great sauce for your next pasta dish trust me, charred tomatoes are so delicious, sugary and acidic and just super complex flavour.

INGREDIENTS:.
-1 kg of tomatoes (or whatever you have).
-a drizzle of olive oil.
-a good pinch of salt all over.
-3 or 4 garlic cloves that you have to remove later.

1. There are no steps in this recipe, simply put the tomatoes in quarters in a tray and drizzle them with olive oil, salt, place the garlic and let it roast at full speed, both high and low fire at 250 degrees, max temperature. 

2. Let them cool, bag them and freeze them. No need to worry about peels or anything, it all goes inside but hey NOT the garlic cloves! 

They are so so good, you won't regret it.

How to make Ranch Sauce

This ranch sauce is so so good. I mean there are zillions of recipes out there, but I wanted one with dried herbs. I mean, who has 4 different types of fresh herbs? So I found this one, and it did not have sour cream or something really fattening and it has worked like wonderfully. I could not find dried chives so I bough them fresh and it was wonderful...but next time I will try to find them dried. Be careful with the salt, do not put more than the quantity there.

INGREDIENTS:
-1/2 cup of mayonnaise.
-1/2 cup of buttermilk.
-1 tablespoon of fresh chives.
-1/2 teaspoon of dried dill.
-1/2 teaspoon of dried parsley.
-1/2 teaspoon of garlic powder.
-1/2 teaspoon on onion powder.
-1/4 teaspoon of salt.
-1/8 teaspoon of pepper.

STEPS:

1. Mix the mayonnaise with the spices.
2. Stir in the buttermilk and mix it all really well.