dinner Archives - Page 2 of 3

Mediterranean Garlic Ricotta Shrimp Pasta

July 12, 2019

This quick and rich garlic ricotta shrimp pasta is incredibly creamy and luxurious and has a lovely sour and salty flavor from lemon and glasswort (sea asparagus).

Even on the busiest and most stressful days, I want to eat a real meal. Something delicious and creamy with a character. It’s pasta I usually crave on these days. What do you crave in the busiest of days? Let me know in the comments below. Sometimes I make pasta salad and nibble on it during the day. Pssst… don’t tell anyone!

But for reals, the amount of pasta we eat. And it’s not only because we’re busy. It’s mostly because we love pasta. If you’re a pasta lover like me, then this is the recipe for you.

The flavors here are mild but so indulging and balanced. The lemony ricotta sauce with peas and shrimp is to die for on its own, but then you add some garlic and glasswort and you’ve got a treat that you can make in seconds.

Have you ever tried glasswort?

It is apparently also called sea asparagus and grows in salt marshes. It is edible both raw and cooked and delicious either way!

I tried it for the first time last weekend when I randomly saw it in the store and I just had to try it.

What does it taste like? It’s like eating the sea and I mean that in a good way. It is very salty so you should be careful with how much you put in a dish. I especially love the crunch. It kinda reminds me of the exploding candy that I ate as a child. Remember, the ones that feel like there are bubbles popping in your mouth.

Not to worry. If you can’t get your hands on sea asparagus, you can still make a super delicious garlic ricotta shrimp pasta. You can add some pickled capers for the salty Mediterranean flavor. Works just as nicely.

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Mediteranean Garlic Ricotta Shrimp Pasta

Course Main Course

Cuisine Italian

Keyword shrimp pasta

Prep Time 10 minutes

Cook Time 10 minutes

Total Time 20 minutes

Servings 4 people

Author Anja Burgar

Ingredients

250 g dried pasta
1/2 cup ricotta (100g)
1 cup fresh or frozen peas (100g)
300 g shrimps peeled and deveined
15 g glasswort (sea asparagus) or alternatively, 2 TBSP pickled salted capers
2 TBSP butter
3 cloves garlic
a few springs of thyme
zest of 1 small organic lemon
juice of 1 small lemon
salt to taste
black pepper to taste
grated parmesan cheese for topping

Instructions

Bring a large pot of salted water to a boil. Cook pasta as long as stated on the packaging stirring every two minutes. Once cooked, drain the pasta, but leave some pasta water to use for the sauce.
While your pasta is cooking prepare the sauce. Place a large skillet on medium heat. Add butter and garlic and fry for a few minutes stirring occasionally. When the garlic turns lightly golden, add the shrimps, peas, glasswort, and thyme. If you are using capers instead of glasswort add them midway through cooking (when you turn the shrimps). Season with salt and black pepper. Cook for 4-5 minutes and turn the shrimps midway through. Shrimps are done when they turn pink. Remove the shrimp, peas, and glasswort (or capers) from the skillet.
Add ricotta, lemon juice, lemon zest and a little pasta water to the skillet and whisk to make it creamy. Add just enough pasta water for the sauce to be creamy but not runny. Remove from the stove. Season with salt and black pepper.
Save a few shrimp, peas and glasswort (or capers) for decoration. Return the rest of the to the skillet and mix.
Add the cooked and drained pasta to the sauce and mix to coat the pasta with the sauce.
Serve warm and top with the remaining shrimp, peas and glasswort and some grated parmesan cheese.

Vegan Pea And Asparagus Quiche

June 12, 2019

This simple vegan pea and asparagus quiche recipe is so easy to make and a great way to treat your guests!

I can’t believe it’s already the middle of the year! I feel like the Winter has been way too long this year (although, I love it so much). Not even a month ago I was still wearing a winter coat and this past weekend I’ve been swimming in the sea. Crazy!

I’m so glad it’s summer already. Okay, late Spring, but it feels like Summer 🙂

If there’s one ingredient I love about this time of year it’s asparagus. I love it raw because it tastes kinda like peas and I love eating peas raw just as well. But both of those are also incredibly delicious cooked. So, today I’m sharing a recipe for a vegan pea and asparagus quiche that I created together with the lovely Tereza Poljanič from Teresamisu.

We were secretly admiring each other’s work for a long time, so we met a while ago and came up with the idea of creating a couple of recipes together. If you don’t know her yet, go check her out! Tereza is a multi-talented lady. She runs her blog, a TV cooking show, writes cookbooks and so much more. Such an inspiring lady!

Back to the recipe!

This was my first time trying out tofu filling. I don’t cook with tofu very often so I was pleasantly surprised by how flavorful the filling came out. It’s a very simple filling. All you need is some onions, garlic and some herbs like basil and mint. We used pumpkin seed tofu, but you can use any firm tofu. The almond milk makes it all very creamy and ties everything together.

Place some fresh asparagus and peas on top, bake and that’s it.

Oh yeah, and we included a delicious crust recipe. Here are some tips on how to make the crust flaky and how to prevent it from shrinking during baking.

How to make a flaky pie crust:

Use cold ingredients and use your hands as little as possible so you’re not warming up that dough.
Little chunks of butter (or coconut butter) should still be visible in the dough. The size of the chunks shouldn’t be larger than a pea.

How to prevent pie crust from shrinking?

Resting the pie crust is crucial. It should rest after making the dough and after you’ve rolled out the dough and placed it in the pie tin
Don’t overwork the dough. This way it gets too firm and shrinks.
Don’t stretch the dough when placing it in the tin.
Poke holes in the bottom.
Use pie weights or dry beans to weight down the crust while pre-baking.

5 from 1 vote

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Vegan Pea And Asparagus Quiche

Course Main Course, Side Dish

Keyword vegan quiche

Prep Time 20 minutes

Cook Time 45 minutes

Resting Time 1 hour 30 minutes

Total Time 2 hours 35 minutes

Author Anja Burgar & Tereza Poljanič

Ingredients

Dough

280 g all-purpose flour (1 1/3 cup)
140 g coconut butter (or regular butter for a non-vegan quiche) chilled and cubed, (1 1/4 stick)
4-5 TBSP ice cold water
2 tsp salt

Filling

400 g Tereza’s Choice pumpkin tofu or any other firm tofu
100 ml almond milk (1/3 cup + 1 TBSP)
1 onion
2 cloves garlic
bunch of basil and mint chopped
handful of peas
handful asparagus

Instructions

Dough

Combine flour and salt, in a food processor. Pulse to mix. Add the butter and pulse a few times. You should still be able to see some small chunks of butter no bigger than peas.
Sprinkle 1 tablespoon of ice water over flour mixture at a time. Pulse a couple of times. If you pinch some of the crumbly dough and it holds together, it's ready. If not, keep adding water one
tablespoon at a time.
After the dough has chilled in the refrigerator for an hour, you can roll it out. If it is too stiff, let it sit for 5-10 minutes at room temperature before rolling.
Sprinkle a little flour on a flat, clean work surface and on top of the dough.
Using a rolling pin, roll it out from the center of the dough. Every once in a while you may need to gently lift under the dough and add a sprinkle of flour.
Using a rolling pin, roll it out from the center of the dough. Every once in a while you may need to gently lift under the dough and add a sprinkle of flour.
When the dough has reached the right size, gently roll it around the rolling pin and place it over the pie tin. Do not stretch the dough.
Use your hands to gently press the dough into the tin.
Use a rolling pin to roll over the edges to trim them.
Place the prepared crust into the refrigerator for another 30 minutes, then take it out and use a fork to create small holes on the bottom. Don't worry, once the dough is baked the wholes will disappear.
Place a piece of aluminum foil onto the crust and add dried beans or pie weights onto the crust and bake it for 15 minutes at 200 °C.
Take the baked pie out of the oven and leave to cool slightly.

Fillling

Meanwhile prepare the tofu filling. Caramelize the onion and add garlic at the end. Then blend the tofu in a food processor with 100 ml of almond milk and the caramelized onion and garlic, blend until smooth consistency.

Finishing the Quiche

Add the filling on top of the pie crust, lastly add peas and asparagus on top. Brush with a little olive oil and bake another 20-30 minutes at 200 degrees Celsius.

Wild Garlic Risotto

April 16, 2019

A beautiful and delicious spring wild garlic risotto recipe that complemented with parmesan cheese and garlic roasted prawns. The best Early Spring feast!

One of my favorite things to forage this time of year is definitely wild garlic. I love the green patches of this aromatic herb and I love how delicate it is.

Lately, there’s been a lot talk about picking other poisonous plants instead of wild garlic. The reality is, if you pick carefully and smell and feel every leaf, there’s no reason to worry, as long as you know how it should look and smell. So if it’s your first time picking, I suggest you go with someone that knows wild garlic. I always pick one leaf at a time, so I’m sure I don’t pick anything else.

Did you know the wild garlic blossoms are also edible? And very pretty, too 🙂 You can see some buds in these photos, but they weren’t open yet when I shot this. I haven’t’ been in the forest this past week, but I’m planning on going today and see if I can find some wild garlic blossoms 🙂

If you follow me on social media, you probably know I’ve been featured in Odprta kuhinja magazine two weeks ago. I created this wild garlic risotto recipe for the magazine together with two other delicious recipes, that I’ll also be sharing on the blog sometime soon. You can find Slovenian versions of the wild garlic risotto recipe here. The other two recipes (I’ll be just a little mean and not tell you what they are), also in Slovenian, are here 🙂 and here 🙂

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Wild Garlic Risotto

Course Main Course, Side Dish

Cuisine Italian

Keyword risotto

Prep Time 10 minutes

Cook Time 25 minutes

Total Time 35 minutes

Servings 4 people

Author Anja Burgar

Ingredients

350 g short-grain rice
5 cups vegetable stock
2 shallots peeled and finely chopped
3 TBSP butter
60 g Parmesan cheese finely grated
80 g wild garlic finely chopped
200 g cooked prawns
2 cloves garlic peeled and crushed
1 TBSP cooking oil
black pepper
salt by taste

Instructions

Heat the stock to a simmer in a medium saucepan, then remove from the heat and cover so that the stock stays hot.
In a large, heavy-bottomed saucepan, heat the oil over medium heat. Add the chopped shallots. Sauté for 2 to 3 minutes or until slightly translucent.
Add the rice to the saucepan and stir it with a wooden spoon so that the grains are coated with the oil. Sauté for another minute or so.
Add a ladle of hot vegetable stock to the rice and stir until the liquid is fully absorbed. When the rice absorbs almost all the stock, add another ladle of stock and repeat the process.
Continue adding the stock, one ladle at a time, for 20 to 30 minutes or until the grains are tender but still firm to the bite.
Stir in finely chopped wild garlic, 2 TBSP butter, and some black pepper. Remove from the stove, cover and leave to rest for a minute.
Meanwhile, heat the oil over medium heat in a medium saucepan. Add crushed garlic and sauté quickly until golden. Add cooked prawns and cook for 30 seconds, stirring occasionally, to cover them with garlic and butter.
After the risotto has rested for a minute, stir in the Parmesan cheese and mix to combine.
Serve immediately with garlic roasted prawns and some extra Parmesan cheese.

Notes

Be careful seasoning the risotto with salt. If your stock is already salty, you probably won’t need to add salt at all. Remember, you are adding Parmesan cheese at the end, so this will also season the risotto!

Wanna try something else with wild garlic? Try these sardine pâté and wild garlic sandwiches.

Kale and Radicchio Quinoa Salad

March 24, 2019

This healthy Kale and Radicchio Quinoa Salad is a Winter favorite at our house. With fresh kale and radicchio, quick spring onion pickles and feta cheese I’m sure it will be in yours too.

Today’s recipe is inspired by all the delicious Winter leafy produce that is still available although the long-awaited Spring has arrived. This salad is loaded with some of my favorites like kale and radicchio.

A lot of you have been asking me to share more quick lunch recipes. So here’s another one. And the great thing about it? It’s meant to be cold so it’s super easy to take with you to work! Yay 😀

Alight, so here’s the deal. I usually make quinoa warm and throw in some roasted veggies when I need to take lunch with me. So it occurred to me I should make it a dish that’s meant to be eaten cold in the first place. Like a salad. And whoa, was I right! You should see my husband’s reaction to this kale and radicchio quinoa salad. He was super excited. Who wouldn’t be, just look at these colors!

The best part of this salad is the quick spring onion pickle. It literally takes a few minutes and you can make a bigger batch so you can use it on other dishes as well. In this recipe, I use the pickling liquid as a vinaigrette. Since I cook chunks of beetroot with the spring onion the dressing has a beautiful vibrant pink color. And this salad is all about color.

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Kale and Radicchio Quino Salad

Author Anja Burgar

Ingredients

3 cups quinoa cooked
5 big kale leaves chopped finely
1/2 radicchio (I used Chioggia variety, but others can be used as well), chopped finely
50 g feta cheese crumbled
2 TBSP sunflower seeds
parsley for topping

Quick Pickled Spring Onions

2 spring onions white parts, sliced into 5mm strips
1/4 small beetroot chopped into 4 chuncks
4 TBSP apple cider
2 TBSP water
4 TBSP caster sugar
salt to taste

Instructions

Quick Pickled Spring Onions

Add all ingredients to a small saucepan and bring to a simmer. Let cook for about 5 minutes. Remove beet chunks and cool before using as a dressing.

Kale and Radicchio Quino Salad

Mix cooked quinoa, chopped kale, chopped radicchio, feta and pickled spring onions with the pickling liquid. Mix well.
Sprinkle sunflower seeds and chopped parsley on top.

Roasted Orange Chicken

January 31, 2019

Tender roasted orange chicken marinated in orange juice and soy sauce served with roasted potatoes is a quick and easy dinner recipe everyone will love.

Hello guys! I have an exciting new recipe

A lot of people have told me lately that they look for quick lunch and dinner recipes that are healthy as well. I always loved anything roasted, more so lately with my son keeping me busy. Anything that can be prepared in advance and doesn’t take a lot of my time is super handy.

I made this roasted orange chicken last week and I love how it turned out. I need to make something quickly with a few ingredients I had in the fridge. You really don’t need a lot of fancy ingredients to make a fancy meal. Doesn’t this look fancy? Trust me, no fancy ingredients were added. Oranges are the not-so-secret ingredients that add such a nice color and make it looks like you worked your but for the meal 🙂

The marinade ends up making the most delicious sauce and adds so much flavor to he chicken. Wanna know the best part? I took me less than 10 minutes to prepare before tossing into the oven and relaxing!

The whole family was sick the past month and a half. It’s been only a few days since we’re actually all okay and we’re hoping it ended. There’s nothing less fun but being home with a sick kid or being sick yourself or even worst both of you sick. We weren’t able to go out for more than a few minutes a day and we were FREAKING OUT!

We were drinking lots of elderflower turmeric tea and eating a ton of soup! And finally got better… fingers crossed.

To be honest, a lot of the time I wasn’t even able to cook anything even slightly decent. Thank god for my mum, we were crashing her lunches a lot. Parents rock, right? I hope my son says that about me some day!

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Roasted Orange Chicken

Course Main Course

Keyword chicken, roasted chicken, roasted potatoes

Prep Time 10 minutes

Cook Time 50 minutes

Total Time 1 hour

Servings 2 people

Author Anja Burgar

Ingredients

500 g chicken thighs (approx. 2 chicken thighs)
400 g young potatoes
1 orange cut in slices
1 whole garlic bulb
1/2 TBSP soy sauce
2 TBSP freshely squeezed orange juice
1 tsp ground garlic
1/4 tsp crushed black pepper
1/4 tsp cayenne pepper
2 TBSP olive oil
salt to taste
10 thyme springs

Instructions

Preheat the oven to 190 °C.
Combine together soy sauce, orange juice, ground garlic, crushed black pepper, cayenne pepper, and 1 TBSP olive oil. Pour over the chicken thighs and let sit until you prepare the potatoes.
Cut potatoes in 2 cm chunks and drizzle with 1 TBSP olive oil and add salt to taste. Mix well.
Place potatoes in a baking tray and add chicken thighs skin side up. Add orange slices and thyme springs.
Roast in the preheated oven for 50 minutes.

Shredded Chicken Enchiladas With Homemade Enchilada Sauce

December 24, 2018

These shredded chicken enchiladas are my absolutely favorite enciladas. The recipe is super easy and it even includes a homemade enchilada sauce that’s made with little effort in only 15 minutes.

I can’t believe tomorrow’s Christmas already. Hasn’t December just begun??

I had plans to do some thorough house cleaning plus some more baking and decorating, but my son’s been home all week long with a cold and an ear infection. Although I can do some cleaning with him around and helping, there’s just no way I can do it in detail. Still, it was fun having him at home, we haven’t had the whole day to ourselves since he started kindergarten.

We’re making plans what to eat during holidays. Me and my husband are huge fans of Mexican food. So I’ve made a recipe for chicken enchiladas with a homemade enchilada sauce. The recipe is very easy! We usually end up making too many so we eat them again next day for breakfast. Okay, I admit, maybe we make too many on purpose 😛

We have a favorite Mexican restaurant and we used to only order beef enchiladas there. We’re crazy about beef! Then one evening we decided to try chicken enchiladas. I guess we always order them with chicken ever since. They use cabbage in the filling and it just goes so well with chicken and the tomato sauce. So that was the inspiration behind this recipe.

For the filling you can use leftover chicken, because we all know big Christmas dinners leave us with a ton of leftovers. I hate throwing food away and love recipes that transform those into something very delicious.

I hope you are having wonderful holidays and I wish you peaceful and loving moments with the ones you love!

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Shredded Chicken Enchiladas With Homemade Enchilada Sauce

The BEST chicken enchiladas, hearty but full of veggies!

Course Main Course

Cuisine Mexican

Keyword chicken enchiladas

Prep Time 20 minutes

Cook Time 30 minutes

Total Time 50 minutes

Servings 4 people

Ingredients

Chicken enchiladas

8 corn tortillas (20cm/8inch)
1 cooked and chopped chicken breast (leftovers can be used)
1/4 cabbage head
1 carrot
1 red bell pepper
1 onion
2 cloves garlic
400 g mozzarella (shredded)
1/3 cup pomegranate arils
1 lime
1 avocado (cut into thin slices)
chopped coriander

Homemade Enchilada Sauce

800 g canned tomatoes
1/2 cup pomegranate juice (or cranberry juice)
juice of half a lime
1 TBSP peanut butter
2 cloves garlic
2 bay leaves
1/2 tsp cayenne pepper
1 tsp smoked paprika
1 fresh chilli
salt and pepper to taste

Instructions

Homemade Enchilada Sauce

Preheat the oven to 180°C.
Place all ingredients in a pot and bring to a boil. Let simmer for 10-15 minutes or until it thickens a bit.
Use a blender to make a smooth sauce.

Chicken enchiladas

Thinly slice cabbage and onions. Cut red bell pepper in small chunks and grate carrots.
In a skillet sauté onions, cabbage, carrots, and red bell peppers. When they soften add garlic and sauté for another minute.
Place the sauteed vegetables in a big bowl and add shredded chicken breast, half of the shredded mozzarella and 1/3 of enchilada sauce (or more if the mixture seems too dry). Mix well and divide into eight parts. Use each part to fill one tortilla and roll them o keep all ingredients inside.
Add 1/3 of enchilada sauce to the bottom of the baking pan. Place rolled tortillas on top and pour the remaining 1/3 of enchilada sauce over the tortillas. Add the other half of mozzarella on top and bake for 15 minutes or until the cheese is golden.
Use pomegranate arils, avocado, lime and coriander as garnish. Serve warm.

Spicy Goat Cheese Pesto Pizza

July 6, 2017

Italian flavors with a twist in one delicious spicy goat cheese pesto pizza loaded with fresh cherry tomatoes, mozzarella and black olives. I could eat this pizza every day!

Wow, the summer this year. I can’t complain. Sunny weather, nice breeze and Aperol spritz in the evenings – what else could I wish for? The baby is sleeping very well so far, during the night as well as the day and his playtimes are getting longer. Finally! I absolutely love singing to him with his curious eyes on me all the time 🙂

In a couple of days we’re heading for some much needed vacations beside a beautiful lake under the mountains. Even though we love the seaside, we’re more of a lake and river type of swimmers. We love the sunny beaches and the waves by the sea, but hate the salt. The place we’re going to is quite isolated with just a couple of vacation houses nearby. So hopefully we’ll get some peace and quiet.

Okay back to the recipe. I have a ton of basil in the garden. A couple of years ago I sowed an entire bag of seeds in one small pot and it turned out the best idea ever. Why? Because you can start picking basil as soon as it starts growing leaves. Of course it’s way too crowded and I pick the whole plants in the begining to decrowd the pot. I leave some to grow into big bushy plants.

Basil was the whole inspiration for this recipe. I love pesto esecially with basil. I tried making it with goat cheese and it is seriously delicious. Add some mozzarela, tomatoes and olives and put all of them on the best pizza dough and you’ve got a treat. I included an amazing and very easy pizza dough recipe, but you can use your own. My whole-grain spelt dough would work just as well.

This pizza dough rises slowly in the fridge for a day and it is the best pizza dough I’ve made to this date. In fact most pizza places will make the dough in advance as well. Slow rise at low temperatures makes the dough nice and elastic, so you can strech it out very thinly. I didn’t do this with this pizza, but I love making it super thin for my tomato sauce pizza only. Which reminds me… I should totally share the recipe.

Second thing with making your pizza dough perfect is high temperature. Although I sometimes bake it at 230°C only, to make it more bready. Again look at the photos, the dough turns out looking something like that. If you crank up the temperature you’ll get an even crunchier crust. One thing I always do is place the baking tray in the oven when I turn it on, so it heats uo nicely. A pizza stone would be an even better option, but I don’t have one (yet) 🙂

I’ll stop babbling and get to the recipe. Have a lovely day you guys!

Italian flavors with a twist in one delicious spicy goat cheese pesto pizza loaded with fresh cherry tomatoes, mozarella and black olives. I could eat this pizza every day!

5 from 1 vote

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Spicy Goat Cheese Pesto Pizza

Servings 4 people

Ingredients

Pizza Dough

4 cups bread flour
1 1/2 cup lukewarm water
1 sachet of yeast (7g)
1 tsp sugar
2 tsp salt

Goat Cheese Pesto

1 cup chopped basil
30 g mild goat cheese
20 g parmesan
3 TBSP pine nuts
2 cloves garlic
1 tsp chilli flakes
3 TBSP olive oil (or more if necessary)

Spicy Goat Cheese Pesto Pizza

pizza dough
goat cheese pesto
400 g mozzarella
500 g cherry tomatoes
100 g black olives
2 tsp chilli flakes
basil for decoration

Instructions

Pizza Dough

Mix all ingredients in a stand mixer or by hand. Knead for about 10 minutes or until the dough is smooth and soft, but not sticky.
Slightly oil a big bowl with at least double the volume of the dough. Leave the dough rest in the bowl covered with plastic wrap for about an hour or until double the size.
Knead again and return to the bowl. Cover with plastic wrap and save in the fridge for 24 hours. Be sure to use a large bowl, because the dough will continue rising in the fridge!
Remove from the fridge, divide the dough into four an knead again to for four balls. Cover with a cloth and leave at room temperature at least an hour before using the dough.

Goat Cheese Pesto

Place all ingredients except basil into a food processor and pulse until finely chopped. Add basil and pulse for a few more seconds.

Spicy Goat Cheese Pesto Pizza

Preheat the oven to 230°C or preferably as hugh as your oven goes leaving the baking tray or pizza stone in the oven. If using pizza stone make sure you leave it in the oven long enough to be extremely hot.
Uncover the dough, but don't knead again from this point on. Use a small amount of flour to spread the dough into a desired shape. In this recipe form a 20 cm circle with a thick edge.
Spread basil pesto over the thin center of the dough and cover with sliced or pulled-appart mozzarella. Top with cherry tomatoes, black olives and chilli flakes.
Bake in the preheated oven for 10-15 minutes depending on the thickness of the crust.
Decorate with more basil leaves before serving.

Cherry Braised Beef Brisket With Creamy Mashed Potatoes

June 1, 2017

This cherry braised beef brisket is incredibly tender and comforting. When served with some creamy mashed potatoes it makes a perfect dish for the rainy spring days.

We are actually having very hot days for days now. It almost feels like summer, so I’m only wishing for rainy days. Don’t get me wrong, I love summer and sunny days, but the heat came way too quickly, I’m not prepared! Well, at least I get to wear some nice summer dresses and I get to diss the socks, which I hate 🙂

Okay, our cherry tree is again full of cherries, we can’t eat them all, they ripe so fast. We’re making juice for the winter and save some in the freezer. Besides we eat tons of them every day and I’m not complainig. Who doesn’t love fresh cherries?

Even though I L.O.V.E. cherries in desserts and drinks, I’m also loving how wonderfully they complement savory dishes. Remember the Cherry, brie and bacon grilled quesadillas? So yummy!!

Me and my husband absolutely love braised beef and when we got hold of a nice piece of brisket with ribs we couldn’t resist but adding some cherries and some lovely herbs from the garden to some classical braising veggies, like carrots, onions and celery. Result… AMAZING!

Seriously. It’s not like you can tell there are cherries in the dish besides the pieces of cherries, obviously. But they add such a nice sweet flavour. I can’t get over it, I’m doing this dish again for the whole family this weekend.

Since this recipe takes 6 to 7 hours to make, we started cooking at five in the morning. Luckily we wake up at that time anyway to feed the baby 🙂 I’m guessing we’ll be braising more now that we’re waking up at night 😉

One more thing that’s completely unrelated. I’ve been on the best treasure hunt since I’ve started shooting food. My friend is cleaning her grandma’s old apartment so she invited me to go and take a look if there’s anything I’d need for my photography. Well, I found a huuuuge bag of goodies 🙂 I’ve even used some of them in this photoshoot. I know I’m bragging, but I can’t help it 😉

Have a great day you guys!

This cherry braised beef brisket is incredibly tender and comforting. When served with some creamy mashed potatoes it makes a perfect dish for the rainy spring days.

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Cherry Braised Beef Brisket With Creamy Mashed Potatoes

Prep Time 30 minutes

Cook Time 7 hours

Total Time 8 hours

Servings 4 people

Ingredients

Cherry Braised Beef Brisket

1 kg beef brisket
400 g cherries depitted
2 big carrots
2 onions
2 celery sticks
5 cloves garlic
3 rosemary springs
a handful of basil
5 thyme springs
1 l chicken stock
salt
black pepper
cayenne pepper

Creamy Mashed Potatoes

8 medium sized potatoes
200 g butter room temperature

Instructions

Preheat the oven to 140°C.

Cherry Braised Beef Brisket

Season the brisket generously with salt, black pepper and cayenne pepper.
Sear all sides of the brisket on a hot skillet with a splash of oil for about a minute or two.
Move the brisket to a plate.
Cut carrots, onions and cellery into 1 cm chunks.
In the same skillet sweat the carrots, onions and cellery for about 10 minutes.
Move the brisket and the vegetables to a baking tray and add cherries, garlic, rosemary, basil and thyme and add the stock.
Bake in the preheated oven for 6 to 7 hour or until the meat gets very tender and almost falls apart. when sliced.
Remove from the oven and move the meat to a plate. Cover it with tin foil. Meanwhile use a hand mixer to thicken the liquid. You can mix all of the liquid with vegetables, or you can keep some vegetables to be seen in the sauce.

Creamy Mashed Potatoes

Cook potatoes in salted water until tender. Start with cold water! Cooking time depends on the size of potatoes.
Remove the skins and add butter. Mash with a masher until creamy.

Flourless Green Pea Fritters

May 19, 2017

These soft and fluffy flourless green pea fritters with seasonal herbs make the most delicious healthy breakfast.

I’m ending this wonderful week with these fluffy green pea fritters. It’s really been a great week. The baby gave us his first real smile. He’s smiled to everyone in the family at one point during the week. I couldn’t imagine how exciting that milestone was before it happened. The most wonderful thing 🙂 Now I’m looking forward for more and more of these cute teethless smiles and the sparks in his eyes.

He’s been letting us sleep during the night enough not to feel tired during the day, although I do take at least one short nap with him during th day. It’s just so cozy lying next to him and feeling him next to me while I’m sleeping 🙂

Okay, let’s head to the recipe. I’m very excited to share it with you. I’m a huge fan of pancakes, I make them at least once a week for breakfast, but they are usually sweet. I wanted to make a savoury recipe for easy and quick pancakes, that I’ll be able to prepare while taking care of a newborn. And it really is that simple.

The batter is made in a food processor or a blender and the pancakes take only a few minutes to cook. So perfect! There’s a little cottage cheese for extra creamines and flavor and rolled oats to bring it all together. Since so many herbs have started to grow, I’ve also added some from the garden and the forest. I used wild garlic and chives, but you can add whatever you can find in the garden, like mint, basil, thyme, oregano… So many yummy variations 🙂

And I realised that they are also super delicious cold, so they’re perfect for picnics 🙂 Hoping for lots of those these summer. ‘Cuz who doesn’t love picnics, right? We’re going on one today. Yay!!

I’ve been working on this recipe before the baby, when we’ve had a new roof window installed. I had to test the new light source for photography. I like it so far. A bit different than the straight side light, but just as interesting. What do you think?

Have a great weekend you guys!

These soft and fluffy flourless green pea fritters with seasonal herbs make the most delicious healthy breakfast.

5 from 1 vote

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Flourless Green Pea Fritters

Prep Time 5 minutes

Cook Time 5 minutes

Total Time 10 minutes

Servings 15 fritters

Ingredients

Green Pea Fritters

1 cup peas (if using frozen, thaw and drain before making the fritters)
1/2 cup roled oats
1 cup parmesan cheese grated
1/2 cup cottage cheese
2 eggs
1/2 tsp baking powder
a handful seasonal herbs (wild garlic, chives, basil, thyme...), coarsely chopped
salt
black pepper

Sauce

1/2 cup sour cream
2 TBSP lemon juice
zest of 1/2 lemon

Instructions

Green Pea Fritters

Place all ingredients in a food processor or a blender and mix until the batter is uniform.
Fry spoonfulls of the mixture on preheated frying pan with a little oil for 2 minutes on each side or until golden.

Sauce

Place all ingredients in a small bowl and whisk.
Serve with warm or cold fritters.

Pull-Apart Chicken Spanakopita (Greek Spinach Pie)

March 16, 2017

This chicken spanakopita (Greek spinach pie) is the best comfort food I can imagine for spring. Hearty and rich, flavored with cheeses, leeks and chicken, but also loaded with fresh spinach. And to top it all, it make s a perfect early picnic dish, since it is pull-apart. I don’t think anything could make me more excited right now.

You all know by now, how excited I get when I see spring starting to blossom. If I’d have to choose I’d say winter is my favorite season, but there’s something magical about early spring. The thing I love the most is to go out in the forest and pick fresh new wild foods. By now I’ve already picked the earlies small fragrant leaves of wild garlic and I’m waiting for more spring goodies to start growing.

I didn’t use wild garlic in the recipe, although it would fit in just perfectly.

Since we’re talking about wild food, I’d love to know your spring wild food favorites? 😀

Chicken Spanakopita

I love anything wrapped in phyllo dough or even making my own phyllo dough. Okay, I cheated with this one, I bought it 😉 But whenever I have time I make my own. It makes a huge difference. If you have the chance to find freshly made phyllo dough in your local food market, buy it. Your dishes will go from great to awesome.

I mean it!

Spanakopita is originally made without meat and in layers of phyllo dough. I added chicken for some extra flavor and to make my hubby happy 😀 I figured why not make it easier to serve and make it more like individual böreks. Imagine if börek and pie would have a baby, it would look like that! Wrapped in mini rolls and served without cutting.

The ingredients are pretty basic but delicious each on it’s own. For sure, spinach is the hero of the dish. And you can get amazing fresh baby spinach in spring in any food market. I like combining it with leeks, since it makes the food so incredibly sweet and fragrant. The combo with feta, chicken and nutmeg is so good.

To hold it all together, I made a ricotta, egg and cream mixture and poured it over the rolls. This also makes the pie dense and creamy in the bottom, but the top stays crunchy. So make sure you dont pour the mixture all the way to the top.

It might no be a traditional spanakopita, but it is just as delicious and the main ingredients remain feta and spinach.

With some extra foodies 😉

These would be awesome at a picnic party or any party for that matter. They take a little time to assemble, but the cooking process is sooo simple. Since it is quite rich, you can actually feed up to about 8 people with it, if they are not huge hungry men 😉 or me!

This is by far my favorite spring pie and I’d serve it with spring strawberry layer cake in a glass following as dessert.

Picnic menu, done!

A glass of roasted peach and strawberry fizz to go along and you’re good to go 🙂

This chicken spanakopita (Greek spinach pie) is the best comfort food I can imagine for spring. Hearty and rich, flavored with cheeses, leeks and chicken, but also loaded with fresh spinach. And to top it all, it make s a perfect early picnic dish, since it is pull-apart. I don't think anything could make me more excited right now.

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Pull-Apart Chicken Spanakopita

Prep Time 30 minutes

Cook Time 55 minutes

Total Time 1 hour 25 minutes

Servings 6 people

Ingredients

Chicken Spanakopita

16 sheets phyllo dough
300 g chicken breast 1cm cubes (or use leftover chicken)
1 small leak cut into quarter lenghtwise and thinly sliced
3 cloves garlic finely chopped
500 g fresh spinach (or frozen and drained of excess water)
200 g feta cheese crumbled
1/4 tsp grated nutmeg
1/4 tsp ground black pepper
1/2 cup olive oil

Egg Mixture

2 eggs
60 g ricotta cheese
60 ml whipping cream
a generous pinch of salt

Instructions

Egg mixture

Mix all ingredients for egg mixture together with a fork or a whisk, to get a smooth creamy texture.

Filling

In a preheated skillet roast chicken breast cubes with a tablespoon of olive oil for a minute or two until they get golden.
Add leaks, garlic and spinach and cook uncovered for about a minute or until the spinach cooks down. I you're using baby spinach this will take a minute, older spinach takes two to three minutes. If there is any excess water in the skillet drain it before filling the pie otherwise it will get soggy.
Remove from heat and add feta, nutmeg and black pepper. Mix well and set aside.

Assembly

Preheat the oven to 180°C.
Line a 23 cm (9 inch) cake mold with baking paper.
Lightly coat one pyhloo sheet with olive oil, cover with another phyllo sheet and coat with olive oil again. Over the long edge of the dough spread one eight of the filling about 4 cm wide. Roll the dough to get a long roll. Now roll this into a snail shape and place it in the cake mold. Repeat until you've used all the sheets. I like to start placing the rolls on the sides first and add the last one in the middles, since the last one usually has less or more filling than the others. This makes the pie look more even.
Coat the tops with more olive oil and bake for 20 minutes.
Remove from the oven and pour the egg mixture over the baked rolls.
Return to the oven and bake for 30-35 minutes.
Remove form the oven and wait for 5 minutes before removing the rim. Be careful, it's still hot!
Serve warm or cold.

Popped Beans and Steamed Broccoli Salad

January 19, 2017

Whoever says comfort food can’t be healthy, has obviously never tried popped beans and steamed broccoli salad with toasted spicy nuts and lemony mustard dressing. Hungry anyone?

Whoever says comfort food can't be healthy, had obviously never tried popped beans and steamed broccoli salad with toasted spicy nuts and lemony mustard dressing. Hungry anyone?

Hey, hey! We’re having broccoli today.

Hmmm, the rhyme was unitntentional, I guess I’m feeling poetic 😛

I have a habit of steaming broccoli instead of roasting them. I dunno, I think it’s because of the vivid green color it keeps. Plus, it’s quicker 🙂 I was thinking what would go well in a steamed broccoli salad and then I remembered a Jamie Oliver show from a while ago. Can’t even remember the recipe, but I know he roasted the beans on a pan until they started popping. I tried those before and they were great. So, it sounded like an awesome idea to add them to the broccoli. Turnes out it was the right decision and with some added chopped parsey, pomegranate seeds and spicy nuts this makes a perfect winter salad.

The best thing about this salad is, it can be both a warm or a cold salad. For a warm salad, you dress it while everything is hot, for a cold salad, you rinse the broccoli with cold water after steaming and then decide if you want the beans and nuts to be warm or not. It’s up to you!

I’m seriously obsessed with mustard dressing. Although I’m normally not a fan of mustard as a condiment, it’s so amazing if you use it as seasoning.

This dressing is probably the one I use most on daily basis, because it’s super simple and mustard gives it an extra depth and richness. It works really well with bitter winter salads like radicchio.

So, some updates on what’s been going on in my life lately. We’re starting to prep more seriously for the baby. Yep, barely starting. I mean we have bought some things, made some and we’re getting lots of second hand stuff from friends, but we still have sooo many chores until I can really say, now we’re ready. We still have 10 weeks, but you never now, when the baby might surprise us. Oh, I have to tell you about the cutest little pants I’ve sewn. They are the cutest, but I’m affraid the fabric is not strechy enough and they’ll probably be to small to fit even a newborn. Luckily, I’m stacked with fabric and I’m making new ones 🙂

Ok, enough baby talk!

Besides all the baby preparations, we’re also starting to prep for the new dance show that we moved from Spring to Autumn, because of… well, baby. Yesterday, I started making my part of the coreography. You can imagine a big belly and a fast dance + some floorwork. It was fun, but also very chalenging!

Great, your all updated now, so let’s start cookin’!

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POPPED BEANS AND STEAMED BROCCOLI SALAD

Course Salad

Keyword bean salad, broccoli salad, healthy, quick

Prep Time 5 minutes

Cook Time 10 minutes

Total Time 15 minutes

Servings 4

Author Anja Burgar

Ingredients

STEAMED BROCCOLI SALAD

1 big broccoli
1 cup cooked red beans if you’re using canned, rinse well before cooking
3 TBSP mixed seeds sunflower seeds, sesame, black sesame…
1 tsp crushed chilli flakes
1 tsp ground garlic
1/2 cup pomegranate seeds
a bunch of parsley chopped

LEMONY MUSTARD DRESSING

5 TBSP olive oil
3 TBSP lemon juice
1 TBSP mustard
pinch of salt
pinch of pepper

Instructions

Steamed Broccoli Salad

Cut the florets away from stems and cut them into bite size chunks. Cut the thinner stems into 1 cm chunks. Peel the thick main stem and cut it into 1 cm cubes.
Boil a little water (about a finger’s width) in a steaming pan and add the steming basket. Place the stem parts of broccoli into the steaming basket and the florets on top. If there are any leaves from broccoli place them right at the top. Cover with a lid, reduce heat to low and cook for about 5 minutes or until you can easily pierce the broccoli with a fork, but it’s still vibrant green. Be careful, because broccoli can go from vibrant to brownish color quickly.
If you prefer your broccoli to be cold, rinse immediately under cold water to stop it from further cooking. If you’re serving it warm, just remove from steamer and let it drain.
In a bowl mix together garlic and chilly flakes.
Heat a big skillet over medium-high heat and add beand and half of the garlic and chlli mixture. Cook them for about 4-5 minutes, tossing every now and then. Once you see most of the beans open, add the nuts and toss every now and then for a minute. Remove from heat and add the remaining garlic and chilli mixture.

Lemony Mustard Dressing

Beat all ingredients together with a fork.

Steamed Broccoli Salad

In a salad bowl, mix together broccoli, parsley, 2/3 of beans and seed mixture, 2/3 of pomegranate seeds and dressing. Top wih the remaining 1/3 of beeans and seeds and the rest of pomegranate seeds.

Orange & Pecorino Ravioli with Rosemary Brown Butter

December 29, 2016

These humble but exciting pecorino ravioli with orange zest and brown butter flavored with rosemary will bring any dinner to a new level!

It’s so exciting making your own pasta. And it’s not even that difficult. Actually I’d say it’s one of the easiest doughs for a beginner. Some may not agree, but I’ve tried many different types of dough and pasta is the only one that was successful every time. Even if it wasn’t perfect, it was managable. Don’t get me wrong, there’s a whole science behind a perfect pasta dough, which I should probably cover in another post, but if you follow some basic rules, there shouldn’t be many problems.

Basic rules:

1 egg per 100 g flour. Works every time.
The dough should rest at least 30 minutes. This makes the gluten form and the dough becomes elastic and easier to handle. You will notice a huuuge difference in dough before and after resting just by touch.
Lightly flour the dough before rolling it out, especially if you are using a pasta machine, otherwise it will start sticking and tearing when you get to a thinner setting.

Oh, and one more thing! When you start bringing the dough together it might look a little dry but after a couple of kneads it will hold together much nicely and after 10 minutes of kneading it will start forming tiny bubbles under the surface, which means it’s done. Wrap it up and wait. You’ve got the best pasta dough in th world ready and waiting!

So, we’re making ravioli. It’s a type of filled pasta that comes in many shapes and sizes. The filling can be whatever you like it to be. But since it’s almost New Year’s Eve I’m all about fancy shmancy 😀 So I used pecorino as the main focus of the dish, mixing it with some fresh ricotta cheese and freshly grated orange zest. The zest will give it a kind of richness and freshness. And to make it even more psh we’re adding brown butter with rosemary on top.

The pecorino ravioli are perfectly savory and flavorful on their own, so they shouldn’t be drowned in a strong flavored sauce. Brown butter is just delicate enugh to enhance the flavores but not overpower them.

I’ve never made brown butter before, but once I tried it on these pecorino ravioli, I’m sure it’ll become a regular at our house. The nutty taste of the brown butter is so delicious and very different from plain old melted butter. Plus, you can make it in advance and keep it in the fridge for when the opportunity comes.

Great, so we’ve got everything covered. Let’s get preparing for the New Year’s Eve party and making some delicious orange pecorino ravioli. Have a great party, folks!

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ORANGE & PECORINO RAVIOLI WITH ROSEMARY BROWN BUTTER

Course Appetizer, Main Course

Cuisine Italian

Keyword brown butter

Prep Time 35 minutes

Cook Time 2 minutes

Resting time 30 minutes

Total Time 37 minutes

Servings 4

Ingredients

PASTA DOUGH

4 eggs
400 g all-purpose flour

FILLING

250 g pecorino grated
250 g ricotta
1/4 tsp nutmeg
1/4 tsp black pepper
zest of 1 orange

BROWN BUTTER SAUCE

120 g butter cubed
3 stems of rosemary

GARNISH

grated pecorino
orange zest
rosemary

Instructions

Pasta

Sift flour into a bowl or onto the countertop, make a well in the middle and add in the eggs. start mixing the eggs adding in flour little by little, until the dough comes together. For this first step you can alternatively use a food processor. Knead the dough by hands for about 10 minutes, until you see tiny bubbles form under the surface. Wrap the dough in plastic foil and let it rest for at least half an hour. The dough will become much softer and strechier with resting, so don’t skip it!

Filling

Mix pecorino, ricotta, nutmeg, black pepper and orange zest in a bowl.

Brown butter sauce

Heat a sauce pan over medium heat and add butter and rosemary. As the butter melts it will start bubbling and changing color from light yellow to golden and lastly brown. The mik solids will start to separate from the fat and will form a dark brown sediment. When this happens and the butter is brown with a nutty smell, pour the butter to a cold bowl. If you prefer to remove the sediment pour the butter in the bowl slowly, leaving the sediment in the sauce pan. Remove the rosemary.
You can prepare the brown butter sauce while waiting for pasta dough to rest and reheat it over low to medium heat before serving.

Rolling pasta

Cut pasta into 8 pieces and roll each one out as thinly as possible using a little flour to prevent sticking. You can use a rollin pin (the more labor intense method) or use a pasta machine (the easier method) and roll the dough starting at the thickest setting, continuing to the thinnest setting that the dough can still handle. If it starts tearing you should stop one setting thicker. I suggest running a test with a tiny portion of the dough before going full scale.
When the dough is rolled out spread it over a flat lightly flouered surface and cover with a tea towel.

Filling pasta

There are many shapes of raviol. The easiest is a simple square or rectangle. Spread a heap teaspoon of filling 4 cm apprart over the lenght of a rolled out pasta. Using a brush or a finger lightly wet one long edge of the dough and the part between the filling. Fold over one half of the dough lenghtwise and press around the filling to get all the air out. Using a pasta cutter or a sharp knife cut rigth in the middle between the filled parts and use a fork to press around each ravioli, so the dough really sticks together and doesn't open during cooking.

Cooking pasta

Boil water and add salt like for any other pasta, then add the ravioli and cook for about two minutes.
Meanwhile heat up the butter.
Drain and serve onto plates adding brown butter on top and garnishing with some more pecorino, orange zest and rosemary.
Serve immediately.

These humble but exciting pecorino ravioli with orange zest and brown butter flavored with rosemary will bring any dinner to a new level! Click to find the whole recipe or pin and save for later!

Mulled Wine Christmas Cheeseburger

December 15, 2016

All the amazing tastes of Christmas in one mulled wine Christmas cheeseburger. Who says Christmas should be celebrated with a roast?

Mulled wine in a burger… Say what?

Yes, well, if I can’t drink I’m at least eating mulled wine, although it sounds weird 🙂 But seriously, this is the most Christmas flavored burger I’ve ever had. And I can’t tell how beautifully the house smells after simmering the mulled wine for half an hour. It’s like a potpourri, but you can eat it afterwards 🙂

I’m all about Christmas this year, which you’ve probably guessed from my previous recipes. I’m like seriously anxiously waiting for the C day. Not sure why, it’s probably the hormones 😛 Anyway, tree is decorated and more cookies will be baked. All I needed is an awesome savory dish that would match the season. First think that came to my mind was mulled wine. I wasn’t sure if I could acually make it into a thick sauce, so I tried. And it was crazy good. It’s like a mulled wine jam.

Which gives me an idea. I should try it with peanut butter. Yeah, I’m gonna try that, you should, too 😀 And tell me if you love it!

So, let’s get into details. By now you know mulled wine sauce is the most important ingredient of this Christmas cheeseburger. But it wouldn’t be a cheeseburger without some cheese!!

I’m using matured cheddar to contrast the sweet sauce. It has just the right saltiness and spiciness to go perfectly with mulled wine. Plus, who doesn’t love cheddar. When I was cutting the slices, I ate one and left one for the burger… my husband is probably wondering, where all the cheddar went 🙂

And of course, we shouldn’t forget the ORANGE. This cheeseburger is simply not so awesome without it, so don’t leave it out. Seriously! Besides the amazing Christmasy flavor it also gives some freshness and juice. Yum!

Ok, final thing, then I’m leaving you all alone with the recipe. Which is very simple, I might add.

The buns! For the first time in my life I made pretzel buns. Crazy! I make my own bread all the time, but never really went for pretzels. I found a very easy recipe for pretzel buns by Eat in my kitchen and I love it. Really simple and incredibly tender, so if you feel confident enough to make your own buns, I strongly recommend you to try them.

I know your dying to try the Christmas burgers with mulled wine sauce, so go for it!

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MULLED WINE CHRISTMAS CHEESEBURGER

Course Main Course

Keyword beef burger, festive burger

Prep Time 5 minutes

Cook Time 40 minutes

Total Time 45 minutes

Servings 4

Ingredients

MULLED WINE SAUCE

1 1/2 cup dry or semidry red wine
1/2 cup dried cranberries
1/4 cup dried sultanas
1 TBSP honey
1 tsp salt
1/2 tsp cinnamon
1/2 tsp ground ginger
9 cloves
1/2 medium-hot chilli deseeded
orange zest of one orange

CHRISTMAS CHEESEBURGER

500 g minced beef
4 pretzel or burger buns
1 big orange sliced to 5mm slices, peel removed
120 g matured cheddar thinly sliced
big bunch of arugula
salt
pepper

Instructions

Mulled Wine Sauce

Put all ingredients for mulled wine sauce in a small saucepan. Bring it to a boil, then reduce heat and let it simmer for 30 minutes.
Use an immerse blender or a regular blender to thicken the sauce. You don't need to make it completely smooth.

Christmas Cheeseburger

Divide minced beef into 4 and make patties that are slightly larger than the bun.
Heat a pan and add a tablespoon of oil. Fry the patties for about 4 minutes on one side. Turn around, season with salt and pepper and cover with slices of cheddar. Cook for another 4 minutes for a medium burger or for 5-6 minutes for a well done. Cover with lid if the cheese needs some help with melting.

Assembly

Cut the buns in half, spread the mulled wine sauce on the bottom part, add the burger patty, top with arugula and slices of oranges. Cover the burgers and enjoy!

Use Yor Noodles - Mulled Wine Christmas Cheeseburger

All the amazing tastes of Christmas in one mulled wine Christmas cheeseburger. Who says Christmas should be celebrated with a roast? Click to find the whole recipe or pin and save for later!

Bacon Wrapped Prunes With Herbed Feta Dip

November 10, 2016

Indulgent finger food for the best party you’ll ever throw, but not without these crispy bacon wrapped prunes and a decadent herbed feta dip!

Yay, finally sharing this recipe with you!

I’ve been making it for a while now, but never got around photographing and posting it. But with the holiday season slowly arriving, I felt like, I owe you this recipe, because – yes, I’m gonna say it – it’s amazing. It’s dried fruit wrapped in bacon. Who wouldn’t love that?! 🙂

There’s a little story about how I got to this deliciousness. It happened on our honeymoon a little over two years ago. I know many people decide to go to some perfect tropical beach for their honeymoon, but we decided to make a road trip through Europe. We made over 2500 km in 16 days and saw soooo many things and sights. One of them was the lovely town of Kaunas in Lithuania. It gave out the vibe of still being stuck in the old time with all the old communist monuments and decaying facades, but that actually gave the town a really special character.

Anyway, convinced that the nightlife would be pretty much non existant we headed to the center of town. Well, we were dead wrong. It was vibrant and lively with all the people siting in the restaurants and pubs, drinking, eating and having a blast. Looked so fun that we had to join. For the first time ever we tried mulled beer. Delicious, btw! We also tried some finger food. Among other we had tiny packets of prunes wrapped in bacon that were filled with some kind of nuts. That was such a clever and incredibly delicious appetizer! Soft and chewy, but crispy on the outside and in the middle. Clever, I’m saying. I’ve been making my own version ever since.

I’m in love with this presentation, with the tree springs, holding together the bacon wrapped prunes. There’s another story behind that.

I usually spend New Year’s Eve with friends in a cabin somewhere in the wild (sometimes not so wild). One year we decided to throw a fancy dress-yo’self-very-pretty kind of New Year’s Eve party. These pretty bacon wrapped prunes were a must! Of course, we were not at home and we didn’t have toothpicks that would hold the whole thing together so we headed to the garden and cut some tree springs and solved the problem. Easy 😀 They looked so much better than with good old toothpicks. Don’t you think they look festive?

In case you are like me – always in need of some dip, here’s a recipe for a simple feta dip with fresh herbs. I used parsley and chives, because that’s what still growing in the garden, but you can add whatever you’ve got on hand.

Go ahead, try them out on the side of some mulled mandarin juice! I sure will 🙂

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BACON WRAPPED PRUNES WITH HERBED FETA DIP

Course Appetizer

Prep Time 15 minutes

Cook Time 15 minutes

Total Time 30 minutes

Servings 30

Ingredients

BACON WRAPPED PRUNES

30 prunes pitted
15 thin bacon slices
25 g almonds chopped finely
1 tsp olive oil
2 tsp ground sweet red pepper

HERBED FETA DIP

100 g Feta Cheese
60 g Greek-style yogurt
a bunch of herbs I used parsley and chives, chopped
pinch of pepper

Instructions

BACON WRAPPED PRUNES

Preheat the oven to 180°C.
Heat a pan over medium-high heat, then add chopped almonds. Roast for a minute, until they start smelling sweet. Remove from heat and add olive oil and ground sweet red pepper. Toss around to coat the nuts and set aside too cool a little.
Cut bacon in half.
Fill the prunes with nuts and wrap them in bacon, securing ends with toothpicks.
Place them onto a baking paper-lined baking tray and bake for 12-15 minutes or until the bacon gets golden and crispy.
Best served hot.

HERBED FETA DIP

Combine all ingredients in a food processor, to get a smooth dip. Keep in the fridge before serving.

Pumpkin Risotto with Goat Cheese, Pancetta & Cranberries

October 20, 2016

I’m totally in love with each single bite of this delicious pumpkin risotto!

So true… Comforting and warm like a hug. Ok, I’m getting sentimental, but that’s what rainy days are all about, right? Squeezing under a soft wool blanket, watching TV or playing board games. Watching Breaking Bad and eating tons of cooked chestnut is basically all we do these evenings. I know, I know we’re so lazy! That’s what cold and rain does to us. Um, yeah, autumn is awesome. Anyone else so psyched about that?

And peeps, my weird pregnancy smell and taste is gone and I can cook as much as I want now 🙂 Happy me! My weight is probably gonna start going up more quickly now, but well, that’s supposed to happen eventually 😛 My bump is already visible and I can’t stop caressing it 🙂

Ok, enough on my prego belly. I’ve moved on from eating pasta almost every day to cooking normally, so I prepared a creamy pumpkin risotto with some delicious goodies on top.

Risotto is really a very simple dish. That’s what’s so great about it. Easy and quick to make, but add some good seasonal ingredients to it and it gets so sophisticated.

Never had a pumpkin risotto? It’s about time to start, because pumpkin adds such a nice flavor and creaminess to the risotto. What autumn recipes are all about is combining sweet with savory, so I’ve done that again. Pumpkin by itself is sweet, but I’ve added some dried cranberries on top for some sweet crunch. And who doesn’t love a little crispy panchetta and goat cheese with all of that.

This is the fanciest cozy meal I’ve had this autumn, for real!

I promise people are gonna love you for cooking them pumpkin risotto, whatever goodies you choose to put in 🙂

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Pumpkin Risotto with Goat Cheese, Pancetta & Cranberries

Prep Time 5 minutes

Cook Time 40 minutes

Total Time 45 minutes

Servings 4 people

Ingredients

2 cups rice
6 1/2 cup vegetable or chicken stock
3/4 cups pumpkin purée (find recipe in the notes of my Mini Pumpkin Pizza recipe)
1 small onion , small cubes
8 pancetta slices
60 g goat cheese crumbled
4 springs thyme + some for garnish
1/3 cup dried cranberries
black pepper

Instructions

Preheat the oven to 175 °C.
Place pancetta slices on a baking tray lined with baking paper and bake them for 10 minutes or until they get golden and crunchy. Transfer them to a paper towel lined plate, to remove the excess fat. When it cools crumble it. Keep the fat that is left in the baking tray for later.
Wash rice under cold water and drain.
In a sauce pan boil the stock, remove from heat and leave covered.
Place a large skillet over medium heat and add the remaining pancetta fat and if necessary add a tablespoon of olive oil. Add onions and cook for 2 minutes until they get soft. Add the drained rice and fry for additional 3-5 minutes stirring constantly. When the rice gets translucent add pumpkin purée, thyme, pinch of black pepper and 1 laddle of stock (or more). You want the rice to just be covered with liquid. Cook stirring occasionally until the liquid has dissapeared into the rice. Then add another laddle of stock. Continue doing that for about 20-25 minutes or until the rice is al dente. With the last laddle of stock add half of the pancetta crumbles.
Serve immediately and top with the rest of the pancetta crumbles, goat cheese, dried cranberries and more thyme.

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Cherry Braised Beef Brisket

Creamy Mashed Potatoes

Instructions

Cherry Braised Beef Brisket

Creamy Mashed Potatoes

Flourless Green Pea Fritters

Ingredients

Green Pea Fritters

Sauce

Instructions

Green Pea Fritters

Sauce

Chicken Spanakopita

Pull-Apart Chicken Spanakopita

Ingredients

Chicken Spanakopita

Egg Mixture

Instructions

Egg mixture

Filling

Assembly

POPPED BEANS AND STEAMED BROCCOLI SALAD

Ingredients

STEAMED BROCCOLI SALAD

LEMONY MUSTARD DRESSING

Instructions

Steamed Broccoli Salad

Lemony Mustard Dressing

Steamed Broccoli Salad

ORANGE & PECORINO RAVIOLI WITH ROSEMARY BROWN BUTTER

Ingredients

PASTA DOUGH

FILLING

BROWN BUTTER SAUCE