Well, now it is "official": I love spinach. Okay, I am still only falling for baby spinach, but who cares for such a tiny detail, spinach is spinach after all. I wanted something light for lunch today, also something that is preapred easily and can be eaten outside. Spinach quiche with goat cheese seemed to be perfect. So I took my camera, a good book and I spent almost the whole afternoon enjoying the sunshine, listening to birds singing. Once in a while we all need a little break, right?
Ingredients:
for 6 quiche á 12 cm
for the pastry:
250 g flour
150 g soft butter, cut into pieces
1 egg
1 tablespoon water
1 teaspoon salt
for the filling:
150 g goat cream cheese
100 g ground mature goat cheese or pecorino
1/4 teaspoon butter
150 g spinach
1 shallot
1 clove garlic
3 egg yolks
150 ml cream
nutmeg
salt
pepper
Put flour into a bowl, add butter, salt and egg and start to work everything together with your fingertips, until it starts to form crumbs. Then add water and knead a smooth dough. Chill for an hour. Any leftover can be stored in the fridge for a week or frozen for up to 3 months.
Melt butter in saucepan, satuee diced onion, add sliced garlic and spinach and keep on stirring util the spinach is wilted. Press out any excess liquid from the spinach. Puree spinach with cream cheese, cream egg yolks. Stir in cheese and season with salt, pepper and nutmeg. Preheat the oven to 180°C. Cover quiche forms with the pastry pour filling into it and bake for 10-15 minutes.
This week, I've planned to cook and bake quite a lot, because I simply can not resist all those gorgeous spring vegetables. I have plenty of ideas, now I only need the opportunity to realise them. Friday is going to be busy once more, because I am going to bake some rhubarb tarts for sale again. I am already excited!
These quiches have been on my mind already for a month, but yesterday finally I managed to bake them. One of them is a simple potato and onion quiche with a lot of cheese on top. Feel free to add some bacon, however it stands on it is own and is perfect without it. The other quiche a gorgonzola-barba di frate quiche. In case you can not find barba di frate simply use some baby spinach instead.
Ingredients:
(pastry recipe adapted from Michel Roux)250 g flour
150 g soft butter, cut into pieces
1 teaspoon salt
1 pinch of sugar
1 egg
1 tablespoon cold milk
400 ml cream
2 eggs
fresh majoram
3 medium potatoes
1 onion
100-150 g cheese e.g. gruyére
1 bunch of barba di frate or 2-3 handful of baby spinach
70-100 g gorgonzola
1 tablespoon pine nuts
nutmeg
salt, pepper
Put the flour in a large bowl and add the butter, salt, sugar and egg into the middle. Rub these ingredients togehter with your fingertips. Then rub the butter mixture into the flour until it resembles coarse breadcrums. Add the milk and knead a dough as fast as possible. Chill dough for an hour. The pastry can be kept in the fridge for a week or frozen for 3 months. Preheat the oven to 180°C. Roll out pastry about 2 mm thick and line a tart form and . Line the base of the pastry with baking parchment and then fill it with baking beans and blind bake for 15 minutes. Remove the beans and parchment and return to the oven for another 5 minutes to cook the base. Let it cool. Whisk together the eggs with the cream, add fresh majoram to the half of it, and season both with nutmeg, salt and pepper. Slice potato and onion with a help of a mandoline and place layers of potato on the bottom of the prebaked tart, season each layer, then put a layer of onion on it and cover with the rest of the potatoes. Pour egg-cream mixture over it and sprinkle with grated cheese. For the other quiche put spinach or barba di frate onto the bottom of the tart, pour egg-cream mixture on it, add gorgozola chunks and pine nuts on top. Bake for 25-30 minutes on 180°C.
Yesterday, I have started the "Empty the Freezer" project again. This time the goal is to have enough space for the stocks that I am going to use during the holiday season. Though I haven't reached my goal the last time, but at least I have won a bit more empty space. This year I have a better chance, because there are not so much that I have to use before I start with the preparations for Christmas. Of course the most important things like the Hungarian túró and sour cherries will be saved, at least most of it. I wonder what I am going to find in the boxes, that I have forgotten already since a long time. I started the emptying process again with homemade puff pastry and some fresh goat cheese. I have also found some leftover crumble so a tart seemed to be a good idea to bake. There are still a couple of pumpkins in my pantry, so I decided to use one of them.
The crumble did a good job on highlighting the taste of the pumpkin, it might seem strange, but I really loved this combination together with the fresh goat cheese and the pumpkin seeds.
The preparation is pretty easy, just roll out the pastry and prick with a fork. Put thin slices of pumpkin on top and cover with a mixture of egg-cream-milk and parmesan cheese, seasoned with salt and freshly grated nutmeg. Sprinkle it with crumble, pumpkin seeds and fresh goat cheese then bake and serve lukewarm.
The truth is, that I am not a fan of Swiss chard at all, unless it comes in a form of a puree, but eating sauteed leaves, brrr, that is not my cup of tea. The same with spinach, I do not like cooked spinach, but fresh baby spinach in a salad is indeed awesome, or a spinach sabayon or a cream, but no leaves please. Once in a while I like to give these vegetables a new chance in their "leaf form". This time I couldn't get home without this beautiful bunch of red Swiss chard from my greengrocer, and I decided to give it another go in a form of a quiche.
Ingredients:
(pastry recipe adapted from Michel Roux)250 g flour
150 g soft butter, cut into pieces
1 teaspoon salt
1 pinch of sugar
1 egg
1 tablespoon cold milk
350-400 g mangold
1 garlic clove
nutmeg
1 egg
2 egg yolks
250 ml double cream
feta cheese
sliced almond
salt, pepper
Put the flour in a large bowl and add the butter, salt, sugar and egg into the middle. Rub these ingredients togehter with your fingertips. Then rub the butter mixture into the flour until it resembles coarse breadcrums. Add the milk and knead a dough as fast as possible. Chill dough for an hour. The pastry can be kept in the fridge for a week or frozen for 3 months. Preheat the oven to 180°C. Roll out pastry about 2 mm thick and line a tart form and . Line the base of the pastry with baking parchment and then fill it with baking beans and blind bake for 15 minutes. Remove the beans and parchment and return to the oven for another 5 minutes to cook the base. Let it cool. For the filling melt butter and sautee chopped garlic together with the sliced mangold stems for about 5-7 minutes,then add chopped mangold leaves and sautee for another 3 minutes. Season and let it cool. Whisk together the egg yolks, the egg and the double cream, season and pour it over the mangold, that it is already in the tart shell. Sprinkle with almond and cubed feta cheese and backe for 30-35 minutes.
In French cuisine, a quiche is a baked dish that is based on a custard made from eggs and milk or cream in a pastry crust. Usually, the pastry shell is blind baked before the other ingredients are added for a secondary baking period. Other ingredients such as cooked chopped meat, vegetables, or cheese are often added to the egg mixture before the quiche is baked. Although quiche is now a classic dish of French cuisine, quiche actually originated in Germany, in the medieval kingdom of Lothringen, under German rule, and which the French later renamed Lorraine. The word ‘quiche’ is from the German ‘Kuchen’, meaning cake.The original 'quiche Lorraine' was an open pie with a filling consisting of an egg and cream custard with smoked bacon or lardons. It was only later that cheese was added to the quiche Lorraine. The addition of Gruyère cheese makes a quiche au gruyère or a quiche vosgienne. The 'quiche alsacienne' is similar to the 'quiche Lorraine', though onions are added to the recipe. The bottom crust was originally made from bread dough, but that has since evolved into a short-crust or puff pastry crust. (source:wikipedia) 
Well, enough history! Instead of the usual fish dish on Fridays, I decided to prepare something else for lunch. I found a forgotten pointed cabbage, I guess it was in the fridge for about 2 weeks... I also had some bacon, leek, some leftover short-crust pastry and a small piece of Vacherin Fribourgeois, that is one of my favourite cheese. So it was obivious that I am gonna bake a quiche.
Ingredients:
(pastry recipe adapted from Michel Roux)250 g flour
150 g soft butter, cut into pieces
1 teaspoon salt
1 pinch of sugar
1 egg
1 tablespoon cold milk
125 g bacon, cubed
250 g pointed cabbage
half a leek
fresh majoram
1 egg
200 ml cream
150 g cheese such as Gruyére, Emmentaler or Vacherin
salt, pepper, nutmeg
Put the flour in a large bowl and add the butter, salt, sugar and egg into the middle. Rub these ingredients togehter with your fingertips. Then rub the butter mixture into the flour until it resembles coarse breadcrums. Add the milk and knead a dough as fast as possible. Chill dough for an hour. The pastry can be kept in the fridge for a week or frozen for 3 months. For the filling fry bacon, as soon as it starts to brown add thin sliced leek and shredded cabbage and fry for 5-7 minutes, season and stir in the majoram, then let it cool. Preheat oven to 180°C. Roll out pastry about 2 mm thick and line 4 flan dishes. Line the base of the pastry with baking parchment and then fill it with baking beans and blind bake for 15 minutes. Remove the beans and parchment and return to the oven for another 5 minutes to cook the base. Let them cool. Mix the egg with the cream, season and pour it over the filling, sprinkle with grated cheese and bake for 15 minutes.
Last weekend I watched a cooking show on a German channel with Tim Mälzer, who is a well-known cook in Germany. He was also one of the first cooks who's recipes I tried and also one of his cookbooks was the first I've bought. That Saturday afternoon he baked an asparagus pizza, not with a usual pizza dough, but one with quark. I had no idea what to prepare today for dinner, when I remembered that recipe. I thought why not give it a try. It was absolutely delicious and it is prepared so quickly! Besides if you forgot to make your pizza dough early enough, it is a great alternative! It is actually kind of a mix between a pizza and an Alsatian tarte flambée. Of course I haven't used asparagus as it is no longer in season, but some courgette, spring onions, bacon and crème fraîche.
Ingredients:80 g quark (20% fat)
3 tablespoons olive oil (i forgot to add)
1 egg
175 g flour
1 teaspoon baking powder
saltWhisk quark, oil and the egg together. Sift flour, baking powder and salt. Add the dry ingredients to the wet ones and knead a dough. Preheat oven to 230°C. Roll out dough and add anything you desire on top and bake for 15-20 minutes.
There are many types of pizza out there, but my favourite is the pizza napoletana that may not be thicker than 3 mm and it must be baked for 60–90 seconds in a 485 °C stone oven with an oak-wood fire. Of course in no way one can ever bake the perfect pizza at home because of the high temperature that is needed, but at least I have a stone in the oven, so that is half of the success. In our village there is a pizza stand that opens once in a month and there I have had the best pizza ever, at least so far. But who wants to wait for moment of their opening every month? Especially not, if you are foodie, you just need the challenge to bake it. Sure you are going to be disappointed on the way to your perfect pizza but the day will come where you gonna find it! The authentic Neapolitan pizza is made with local ingredients like San Marzano tomatoes and Mozzarella di Bufala, however today I chose Prosciutto di Parma and baby artichokes for topping. So meanwhile I was searching for the perfect recipe since quite a long time, but some weeks ago I have found it! It is not a surprise if I tell you that it was right in front of my nose in Locatelli's fabulous cookbook. Today, I used a cookie cutter to have them look like Locatelli's Pizzette, or at least kind of...
Ingredients: 375 g flour
200 g lukewarm water
4 tablespoon olive oil10 g fresh yeast10 g salt
For the sauce:
200 g canned tomates
1 tablespoon olive oil1 garlic clovehandful of basil leaves
1/4 teaspoon oregano
a pinch of sugarsalt, pepper
For the sauce heat olive oil add sliced garlic and fry until golden brown. Pour canned tomatoes into the frying pan, add basil and bring it to boil. Remove from the heat and sieve. Bring it to cook again, add oregano, sugar (if needed), salt, pepper and cook it until it is thick enough to spread it on a pizza. Set aside and let it cool.
For the dough mix all ingredients together and knead a smooth dough, it takes about 10 minutes. After you need to work with it like with the grissini: Turn the dough out onto a clean surface and stretch into a rectangle. Work your way over the entire surface of the dough making deep indentations with eight fingers at once. When the surface of the dough is covered with indentations, fold it in half turn it ninety degrees, stretch it out to an A4 sized rectangle and repeat the indentation making process again. Let the dough rest for 20 minutes, and now you can cut into the portions you want it. The dough need to rest for at least 4 hours in the fridge before using it, but not longer then 8! Heat your oven to the highest degree and bake them.
This month's challenge is hosted by Rosa from Rosa's Yummy Yums, who invited us to bake pizza like a real pizzaiolo. Well I screwed the whole thing up, because I guess I used the wrong flour (dough was pretty brownish) and at the end when I wanted to get it out of the oven it fall down and made a big mess inside. But! I wanted to try this pizza dough recipe from Peter Reinhart since long, so I am going to bake this challenge once more. For the pizza I made the same sauce like the last time, and as topping I used ham and champignons with loads of mozzarella, because this is my favourite. The double challenge is on my to cook list for tomorrow, so I am going to post it somewhen this week.
BASIC PIZZA DOUGH
Original recipe taken from “The Bread Baker’s Apprentice” by Peter Reinhart.
Makes 6 pizza crusts (about 9-12 inches/23-30 cm in diameter).
Ingredients:
4 1/2 Cups (20 1/4 ounces/607.5 g) Unbleached high-gluten (%14) bread flour or all purpose flour, chilled1 3/4 Tsp Salt
1 Tsp Instant yeast
1/4 Cup (2 ounces/60g) Olive oil or vegetable oil (both optional, but it’s better with)
1 3/4 Cups (14 ounces/420g or 420ml) Water, ice cold (40° F/4.5° C)
1 Tb sugar
Semolina/durum flour or cornmeal for dusting
DAY ONE
Method:
1. Mix together the flour, salt and instant yeast in a big bowl (or in the bowl of your stand mixer).
2. Add the oil, sugar and cold water and mix well (with the help of a large wooden spoon or with the paddle attachment, on low speed) in order to form a sticky ball of dough. On a clean surface, knead for about 5-7 minutes, until the dough is smooth and the ingredients are homogeneously distributed. If it is too wet, add a little flour (not too much, though) and if it is too dry add 1 or 2 teaspoons extra water.
3. Flour a work surface or counter. Line a jelly pan with baking paper/parchment. Lightly oil the paper.
4. With the help of a metal or plastic dough scraper, cut the dough into 6 equal pieces (or larger if you want to make larger pizzas).
5. Sprinkle some flour over the dough. Make sure your hands are dry and then flour them. Gently round each piece into a ball.
6. Transfer the dough balls to the lined jelly pan and mist them generously with spray oil. Slip the pan into plastic bag or enclose in plastic food wrap.
7. Put the pan into the refrigerator and let the dough rest overnight or for up to thee days.
DAY TWO
8. On the day you plan to eat pizza, exactly 2 hours before you make it, remove the desired number of dough balls from the refrigerator. Dust the counter with flour and spray lightly with oil. Place the dough balls on a floured surface and sprinkle them with flour. Dust your hands with flour and delicately press the dough into disks about 1/2 inch/1.3 cm thick and 5 inches/12.7 cm in diameter. Sprinkle with flour and mist with oil. Loosely cover the dough rounds with plastic wrap and then allow to rest for 2 hours.
Or
9. At least 45 minutes before making the pizza, place a baking stone on the lower third of the oven. Preheat the oven as hot as possible (500° F/260° C).
10. Generously sprinkle the back of a jelly pan with semolina/durum flour or cornmeal. Flour your hands (palms, backs and knuckles). Take 1 piece of dough by lifting it with a pastry scraper. Lay the dough across your fists in a very delicate way and carefully stretch it by bouncing it in a circular motion on your hands, and by giving it a little stretch with each bounce. Once the dough has expanded outward, move to a full toss.
During the tossing process, if the dough tends to stick to your hands, lay it down on the floured counter and reflour your hands, then continue the tossing and shaping.
In case you would be having trouble tossing the dough or if the dough never wants to expand and always springs back, let it rest for approximately 5-20 minutes in order for the gluten to relax fully,then try again.
You can also resort to using a rolling pin, although it isn’t as effective as the toss method.
11. When the dough has the shape you want (about 9-12 inches/23-30 cm in diameter - for a 6 ounces/180g piece of dough), place it on the back of the jelly pan, making sure there is enough semolina/durum flour or cornmeal to allow it to slide and not stick to the pan.
12. Lightly top it with sweet or savory toppings of your choice.
13. Slide the garnished pizza onto the stone in the oven or bake directly on the jelly pan. Close the door and bake for abour 5-8 minutes.
It is time again for the Original Recipe Event launched by Lore from Culinarty. Since days I knew exactly what I am going to prepare, however I was not sure at all if it is going to be tasty.
I had all ingredients at home: a piece of celery left from the soup I cooked yesterday, one pear from the saffron pears I prepared lately, a half pack of grated almonds, half cup of yoghurt, a piece of smoked cheese. However using only these ingredients it would have been totally bland. That is why I thought to bring some colour to it in a form of a beetroot. My experiment turned to be a light and tasty lunch!
Ingredients:
150 g flour
3.5 g dry yeast
40 g butter
60 ml milk
1/2 teaspoon sugar
1/4 teaspoon salt
1 beetroot
1 small celery
1 pear
250 ml yoghurt
1 egg
50 g grated almond
100 g smoked cheese
juice of 1 lemon
nutmeg, lemon pepper
salt, pepper
Knead a dough out of flour, dry yeast, butter, lukewarm milk, salt and sugar. Set aside for 30 minutes. Preheat oven to 200°C. Slice celery, pear and beetroot with a help of a mandoline. Sprinkle lemon juice over the pear. Butter a tart form and put rolled out dough into it. Place sliced veggies and fruit in it and add mixed yoghurt with egg, almond and spices. Add grated smoked cheese on top and bake for 25-30 minutes.
First of all a big thank you for Millie from Kuul Kat who baked this fantastic bread some days ago and encouraged me to bake it myself. She is great in baking bread and an inspiration to me. So we are talking about a baking technique called Pain à l'ancienne. The technique uses delayed-fermentation. Delayed-fermentation means that you make the dough then delay the fermentation by retarding the action of the yeast by chilling the dough. Ice water is used to mix the dough and then the fridge is used to hold the dough overnight. The recepie is from Peter Reinhart. The recepie is very easy and you get a fantastic crispy bread! As I had no time for cooking, I thought to make a pizza from part of the dough, as Millie mentioned in her post that the dough is great for this purpose as well. I have never made pizza sauce before, but I was very happy with my first trial from today. Yum. I can not wait to try other breads as well and bake my first real pizza with a good pizza dough recepie.
Ingredients:764 g white bread flour16 g salt
5,5 g active dry yeast550 g water with ice cubes
Knead a dough with a help of your mixer using the kneading attachment. Knead for 8 minutes. The dough is ready if it does not stick to the side of the bowl, but still does to the bottom. If it is not optimal add more flour and water as needed. When done, transfer it to another bowl which is oiled, and also add some oil on top of the dough. Now place it to the fridge and leave it there for 24 hours. The next day get it out and let it double its size. It takes about 5 hours. Flour a working surface and add the dough, sprinkle more flour on its top. Slice it and place on a floured baking paper. Preheat oven to 260°C and add boiling water in a baking form on the bottom of the oven. Place formed breads and with a help of a sprinkler sprinkle water on the sidewalls of to oven, so that it gets nice and streamy inside. Water should not touch the dough. Bake for 20 minutes.
Ingredients:1 onion1 carrot
1 celery stalk
10 small date tomatoes
150 ml chicken stockfresh basil, majoram, rosemary, thyme, oregano
1 tablespoon tomato puree
2 tablespoon milk
olive oilsalt, pepper
Heat olive oil, add grated onion, carrot and celery and stir continously while cooking for 2-3 minutes. Add peeled date tomatoes, tomato puree and stock. Reduce and add chopped herbs and milk. Season with salt, pepper.
