Pomegranate Curd Bars with Seedy Pine Nuts Crust - and a Baby Shower!

My friend Zita Nagy who I met in 2011 during the Food Blogger Connect in London welcomed her first child - a cute baby boy - yesterday! What great news! Congratulations Zita and Ivan! May you little treasure Adam be a happy healthy little bundle of joy to his parents!

Together with other food blogger friends we decided to throw a surprise baby shower for her but we are slightly fashionably late now :)

 Zita's blog Zizi's adventures (in English and Hungarian) is specialised in vegetarian and vegan cooking and shares healthy recipes combining fresh produce and raw foods. Her blog and she herself is a big inspiration to me to stay on track and include more raw foods in our diet. She's also a wonderful person and I am very happy to know her.
This year she and her boyfriend are experiencing a great life changing moment - welcoming their first child and jumping into the wonderful experience of being parents.


Parenting is one of a kind experience -  it's moving, ecstatic, exhilarating, energising and empowering but exhausting in the same time too. It makes you go to lengths you never expected you're capable of,
it constantly asks you to learn new skills and improve old ones, makes you a better teacher and sets you on a path to become a better person.
And at the end of the day it's totally gonna be worth it.

Zita and Ivan, I know you are going to be great parents and I wish you lots of happiness, wisdom and feeling of fulfilness in your new role. Congratulations!

As Zita is one of the healthiest food loving persons I know, my recipe for the baby shower includes lots of seeds, almond butter and to be true to myself - pomegranate molasses and rose water.

Pomegranate has been a symbol of fertility, abundance and prosperity in a number of world cultures and in Christianity is linked with resurrection and eternal life.
I really love its sweet-sour taste, that some people might find too sour, and for me it is like both sides of parenting, so I thought that would be the perfect choice.


Here are the rest of the recipes from the little belated virtual baby shower:

The wonderful Tuscan Sweet Zucchini Cake Scarpaccia from Giulia of Jul's Kitchen

The new mom's friendly Nourishing Stout & Oat Drink  from Regula aka Miss Foodwise

The succulent Moghrabieh Salad with Preserved Lemon and Coriander Pesto  from Beth of Dirty Kitchen Secrets 

The crunchy Whole Wheat Flour Cocoa Cookies from Jasmine of Labna - Amore in Cucina  

The fabulous Cheese Pie from Εpirus Kasopita from Artemis of Woderfoodland

The healthy Kiwi Carpaccio with Pecans and Manuka Honey from Sarka of Cook Your Dream  

The luscious Ricotta and Dark Chocolate Cake from Emiko

Simone: The heavenly fragrant Pistache Raspberry Cakes from Simone of JungleFrog Cooking 

The veggie blissful Fresh Pea Souffle with Goat Cheese from Karin, the mastermind behind the baby shower and Yum and More 

And that's my recipe

Pomegranate curd Seedy bars with a hint of Rose Water

Products:

for the crust:

100 g whole pine nuts

50 g whole pumpkin seeds

50 g whole sunflower seeds

100 g breakfast oats

170 g almond butter

2 tsp pomegranate molasses

2 tsp rose water

for the curd:

10 egg yolks

200 g honey

150 ml pomegranate molasses

70 ml pure pomegranate juice

juice of 2 lemons

200 g butter - cubed

50 ml rose water

Method:

For the crust:

Combine all seeds together with the almond butter and the pomegranate molasses - knead well with your hands. Finally add the rose water to the sticky mix. Press it flat on a lined rectangular tin and leave in the fridge for 15 minutes. Bake at 180 degrees for 10 minutes. 

Set aside and leave to cool down completely. 

In a bowl mix the liquid ingredients and the honey and put over a pan of simmering water until the honey dissolves completely. 

Transfer to a sauce pan with a thick bottom and incorporate the egg yolks mixing with a whisk on medium heat. Whisk continuously to prevent lumps from forming until the mix starts to thicken - about 20-30 minutes .

The mix will still stay quite liquid and will set more with tie and as it cools down.

Remove from heat and add the butter cubes one by one. 

Leave to cool down for 15 minutes in a fridge.

Top the seedy crust with the pomegranate curd and bake in a 180 degrees C pre-heated oven for 20 minutes.

Remove from heat, leave to cool down (it will be quite liquid) and leave it to cool and then keep in fridge overnight. On the next day cut rectangular shapes with a sharp knife. 

Hidden Egg cake for Easter - a Success and a Failure

I admit I was a bit carried away by the enormous possibilities that the hidden cake technique allows. My idea for another hidden cake was to hide colourful eggs inside. I had the egg cookie cutter shape already (I must confess here I've got lots of cookie cutter but am more a cake person than a cookie person I'm afraid. So hidden cakes are perfect for me.) What I needed more was cake in four different colours and I was thinking of yellow, green, red and blue.
For the yellow and green eggs I was to use shapes cut out from the leftover better from the cake I already made - the hidden chick one.
So I needed blue and red colours. I thought of blueberries for the blue and beetroot for the red.
And that's where the failure happened.
Staring with the beetroot - I made a paste of cooked beetroot and a very little bit of warm water. However, I had the impression beetroot is very colouring so I decided to use it gradually until I get the required colour - that was  exactly 2 tbsp. The batter had a very nice dark pink shade and I happily put it in the oven. It had a pinkish crust too so I expected to see a light pink inside. But the result was pure yellow on the inside - a mystery. I either used not enough of the paste or something went wrong between the batter ingredients and the beetroot. Still needs improvement.
The blueberries idea did not work either so I thought I should use a little bit of blue food colouring this time and mix it with part of the pink (from the beetroot) batter. It went violet as expected.
Until baked - when the colour was blue-green ... a total mystery if you ask me. Still not sure how that happened.
So I should either use much higher quantities - as with the spinach from previous cake, or I should change the colouring agent.
However, I could go only with the green and yellow eggs anyway. (I did put the blue one too though).




For encasing the eggs I thought of a chocolate pound cake and adapted a recipe. I was lucky to have some Valrhona Dutch-process raw cocoa powder (read all you need to know about cocoa powder on David Leibovitz's post) to give it a really chocolaty feel.

The quantity I used are for two cakes, although I have to admit the second cake got less batter and had different shape as the cut out eggs were not well covered under the batter.
I believe if there is no second cake inserted the quantity will be well enough for a one pound tin.

The recipe is adapted from the Mango pound cake and Joy of Baking's Pound cake .

Chocolate pound cake for encasing a hidden cake 

(makes two loaves)

Recipe:

4 medium eggs

170 g sugar

100 g butter at room temperature

4 tbsp milk

160 g self raising flour

25 g unsweetened Dutch-process cocoa powder

1 tsp vanilla essence

Method: 

Beat the butter and sugar until soft and fluffy. Add the cocoa powder and beat until well incorporated. Add the eggs one by one beating with a mixer for 20-30 seconds after each.

Finally add the flour and vanilla essence and mix with a mixer for 15-20 seconds until well incorporated. If needed finish by hand.

Assembling the hidden cake:

Line a cake tin with baking paper. lay a very thin layer of the batter on the bottom and place the cut out forms closely one behind the other. 

Cover with the batter up to almost entirely covering the forms, just a very little of the top can be left peeking. Spoon over the cut out egg forms so their tops are covered with the batter too.

Bake at 160 C fan n oven (180 C) for exactly 30 minutes. Leave on a wire rack to cool.

Sprinkle some icing sugar and cocoa powder on top or don't. It's great both ways! 

Happy faces guaranteed when you cut!

Hidden chick cake for Easter

I learned two totally unexpected things through these this cakes.

First, there is a spinach cake and it tastes great!
And second - you can twice bake a cake! (well, partly)

Let me tell you more about it!

1.Have you ever believed that spinach can be used for sweet dishes? I personally didn't have even the slightest idea. However making the Ombre cake recently made me think about food colouring and what can be done to use natural dyes - I was thinking particularly about green. It could be done using a lot of matcha of course but I wanted to give the cake to kids and too much green tea seemed inappropriate  so I thought about spinach instead. The idea seemed quite crazy to me but knowing that nothing is really invented and everything new is a well forgotten old thing I thought I should google that crazy idea and check if someone had already done it.  I wanted to specifically check how green the green colour would be.
Well for my enormous surprise - there was that recipe! It's a Turkish cake recipe Ispanakli kek (Spinach cake) and I couldn't be happier. That's the recipe I need. The colour looked pretty intense and the texture seemed great (And in reality it looks exactly as on the photos).
The spinach taste is there only immediately after baking and is completely disappeared a couple of hours ago.  After baking I realised the cake was too sweet to my taste, I could happily go with 1/3 less sugar so I should adjust that next time I bake.
Concerning quantity - it was a bit more than I needed for the specific cake I was making, so for hidden cake probably half should do fine, or it will make two 1 lb loaves.

2.Bake a cake and then bake it some more? How crazy *that* sounds?
Yes, it is possible and trending at the moment and no, the part that is already baked does not go harder.
To make it you need two cakes of different colours and a cookie cutter. You also need some free time.
The possibilities are endless!

With the approaching Easter I thought of a hidden Easter chick cake and a hidden Easter egg cake. I did both!

For the hidden Easter chick I chose to use green and yellow cakes. The green one is a spinach cake and for the second one I did a mango pound cake. (This one was also too sweet - next time maximum 200 g sugar).

Easter green hidden chick cake 

Recipe:

(makes 4 cakes)

for the mango pound cake: (from Parita's World)

makes 2 loaves or one very big and one smaller

3 medium eggs

200 g sugar 

113 g butter - soft at room temperature

1/2 medium sized mango peeled and the pulp pureed 

250 g self-raising flour

1/2 tsp vanilla essence

Method:

Beat the butter and sugar until fluffy, then add the eggs (I did all at once) and beat with the mixer for about two minutes. Add the mango puree and mix well, then the butter and vanilla. Beat on low speed for 15-20 seconds and finish by hand if not homogeneous.

Fill in paper-lined loaf cake tin(s) or flat tins to 2/3 of the height and bake for 45-50 minutes at 180 degrees C or 160 C fan oven.

Remove from oven, leave to cool on a rack and when well cool slice thickly and cut out forms using a cookie cutter. 

The cut out forms should be aligned one behind the other in the tin like this.

 And then covered with the second cake batter for Spinach cake.

for the Spinach cake: (from Binnur's Turkish Cookbook)

Recipe:

3 medium eggs

200 g sugar

300 g spinach leaves stalks on - blended with 50-70 ml hot water to fine puree
100 ml light olive oil
1 tsp vanilla extract
310 g self-raising flour
2 tbsp freshly squeezed lemon juice

Method:

Mix the eggs with sugar. Add the spinach puree, lemon juice and olive oil and mix well. Finally add the flour and vanilla and mix until homogeneous.
This mixture pour over the prepared cake centres - a baking paper-lined loaf tin with the arranged cut outs of the previous cake. The amount of spinach cake should be 2/3 of the tin height, but in case the cut out forms are sticking out, spoon some cake batter over them to cover. When the cake rises it will hide the entire  forms underneath.

*These products will be enough to make two cakes. Alternatively, half of the mix can be baked in a flat tin to prepare more hidden cake (as I did).

Bake for 30 minutes 180 C or 160 C fan oven. Leave to cool on a rack and wait until completely cool.

Wait to see the kids surprise when they discover the hidden picture :)

Blue Ombre cake with Nutella Swiss Meringue Butter Cream

Ombre cake is a kind of white cake with layers of graded hues of the same colour and is usually joined together with butter cream  To make shiny velvety ruffles or roses as decoration outside it goest perfectly with the lush Swiss meringue butter cream. I tasted it and it's beyond divine. Honestly I don't think I will be willing to make any other butter cream any more.
I am usually sceptical towards cakes that have too much sponge and not enough cream so I did not expect much from this. But I couldn't be more wrong.

Food notes:
The sponges are white cake which I found with water and with milk. Better results with milk.
I had to adapt the original recipe increasing by half to achieve a 12 cm high and 8 inch wide cake. To get nice height with the original recipe the diameter of the cake needs to be smaller - 6 inches would work best in my opinion.
The texture of the sponge of the recipe I used was very nice and light, and together with the butter cream they made a perfect match - my only regret is I did not double the butter cream amount (I should have) and that I chose sugar paste for coveting the cake instead of butter cream - this cake just craves the butter cream  Any next time I am doing that cake it would be with butter cream on top.
The colouring of the sponges was a bit weird as the colours of the baked sponges are a bit different than what they seem like raw. However the best results of graded tones I achieved with silver spoon colours vs paste colours.
Colour wise - with milk an a whole egg the sponge is yellowish which makes it kind of green when adding blue colour - so I had to correct with a bit of red but the amount I used first was too much and it turned violet - not what I was aiming at.



The ruffles - quite happy with the shades. I had to use two shades of blue colour and each coloured sugar paste was "diluted" with white to get gradients.

To make them more wave-like I cut out semicircles from top of the sugar paste stripe (check tutorial by Bubble and Sweet) and then frilled.

Know how:

Sponge recipe from the Nasi Lemak Lover blog

Swiss meringue butter cream by the wonderful tutorial of Sweetapolita

Ruffles of butter cream from bubble and sweet

Ruffles of sugar paste from Bubble and Sweet 

 My Cake Inspirations on Pinterest 

Products:

For the cake:

For 5 sponges about 12 cm high

(recipe adapted from here)

makes five sponges, each bowl of dough weighs  400 g

532 g plain flour

3 tsp baking powder

1/2+1/4 ts. Salt

300 ml milk

2 1/2 tsp vnilla extract

525 g caster (fine) sugar

6 medium eggs

340 g butter

food grade colouring

several drops of fresh lemon juice - it is supposed to make colours more striking.

Method:

Beat the butter with the sugar and add the eggs one by one beating with the mixer at medium speed and the milk with vanilla.

Mix the flour with the salt and baking powder and incorporate with a fork or spatula.

Divide the cake in 5 bowls each should weigh 400 g.

colour it with the selected colour starting with the darkest shade.

I used mostly blue and a very little bit of red - less than one drop for the medium sponges. Add a ccouple of drops of fresh lemon juice.

Line some cake tins with baking paper and bake for 30 minutes at 180 C. Remove from the oven and leave for 5 minutes to come away from the rims of the cake tin. Then remove and leave to cool down well.

Swiss meringue butter cream blue ombre cake nutella dolphins fish ruffles

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For the butter cream

Swiss meringue butter cream

(Half of  Sweetapolita's recipe)

5 egg whites

250 g  caster sugar

340 g butter at room temperature

300 g Nutella

Method:

Heat the egg whites and sugar on bain marie - in a bowl over simmering water (the water does not need to be boiling just slightly simmering) and the bowl with the eggs does not have to touch the water. Heat slightly until the temperature reaches 71 degrees C. Don\t worry if using raw egg whites as this is the temperature of pasteurisation - the egg whites are cooked.

Remove from heat and beat with the mixer starting with lower speed and then increasing. 

When the meringue is not warm any more start adding the butter one cube at a time.

Then beat until in reaches the desired consistency and look. (Check the Sweetapolita post for guiodance).

When the butter cream is ready - divide in half and mix one half with the Nutella cream until smooth.

Keep in the fridge for a couple of hours and join the cakes.

Cover the cake and sides with the rest.

If using butter cream to pipe over the cake - the recipe needs to be double. 

Store in the fridge for 12 hours to harden.

Then cover with the rolled out sugar paste (I use Dr Oetker's Regal Ice)

My first cake of this type was this:

Cauliflower and Broccoli Gratin

I got the idea of this dish one day when I needed to prepare something yummy and with vegetables very fast and I was amazed by the results! It was so good (and so quick and unpretentious to make) I have been cooking it ever since. The best bit - my difficult to please toddler loved it too and still does!
It can be served on its own or as accompaniment to roasted meats or as we found out today - with wholegrain pasta.
The cumin and ground coriander (seeds) bring out more flavour and you'll never have the impression of blandness.

The recipe is much faster and healthier than cauliflower cheese although somewhat similar.  It needs a 3 minute preparation and 30 -40 minutes baking and you can do some varieties to it - like cauliflower and broccoli gratin, or you can add blue cheese to the cream - delicious! But still quite heavy.
The good news - it's great for someone on he LCHF (low carb high fat) diet or food combining. Cauliflower is low carb and high in fibre and vitamin C among others and broccoli is one of the so called *super foods*.

So next time when wondering what to eat don't pick up the phone for a take away or pizza but indulge in something better, faster and at a fraction of the price!
Bargain huh?!

Cauliflower and broccoli gratin

Products:

600 g cauliflower

(or 400 g cauliflower + 200 g broccoli)

400  ml double cream

*extra optional - 50 g blue cheese or even better 4-5 tsp Creme de St Augur

1/2 tsp cornflour for dusting

2 garlic clove

1/2 tsp cumin seeds crushed

salt, pepper

1/2 tsp ground coriander

100 g cheddar cheese

*some dill for sprinkling - optional

Method:

Wash cauliflower and divide into florets.

Wash broccoli, divide into florets and blanch in hot water for 4-5 minutes. If using broccoli leave them on the bottom of the dish and cover with the cauliflower as broccoli tend to burn out faster.

Dust the florets lightly with the cornflour and arrange in an oven dish (makes enough for 20 cm diameter dish). Add the spices and garlic. Mix and cover with the double cream. *Add the blue cheese (creme de St Agur).

Bake in a preheated oven for 30-40 minutes at 170 C until the florets are soft enough. Sprinkle with the grated cheese and return to the oven for another 5-6 minutes.

Serve warm.

Some historic photos of previous attempts:

Mushroom Omelette Reinvented

If you have been interested about nutrition and weight loss you must know about the lchf diet (low carb high fat). Its main point is that in order to feel satisfied and not hungry you better consume fats instead of the other two groups of nutrients - proteins and carbohydrates (and carbs are the worst). This of course is a quite simplified explanation and whoever is interested might read more about it on DietDoctor.com. Although it sounds a bit harsh at times (like excluding and avoiding all fruit from diet) I can see the logic behind it.
I was researching on savoury options to eat this weekend after shamelessly indulged in cakes and high sugar content (and I am going to write about it soon) when I found that suggestion of mushroom kind of pâté that can be used for omelette filling I don't remember where. The idea seemed so good I had to try it asap.
And this is what I came up with. 
Alternatively the mushrooms could be blended when cooked for smoother spread.

Mushroom Omelette 

Products:

(Serves 1; filling serves 4-5)

for the Mushroom filling:

10 g butter

450 g mushrooms

3-4 cloves garlic crushed

3 tbsp finely chopped coriander leaves

Salt

100g Philadelphia cheese

for the omelette:

2 eggs

5 g butter

Method:

In a pan heat the butter until melted and add the diced mushrooms and garlic on medium to high heat. Brown for 5 minutes. Add the coriander leaves and salt and brown until all juices are absorbed (10 minutes).

Remove from heat and leave aside to cool then combine with the Philadelphia cheese.

Make the omelette - melt the butter on high heat and add the beaten eggs. Turn over to make sure it's ready in both sides. (approx. 2-3 minutes)

Leave to cool in a plate for a while. Spread the mushroom filling and roll.

Ready!

The mushroom Philadelphia filling can be made in advance and kept in the fridge for a couple of days.

Beef and Dark Ale Pie with Puff Pastry Lid

I love reading cooking blogs often more than some magazines or big food portals and there is a reason for that. The reason is honesty.

Blogs are honest - the pictures you see are honest - no matter what equipment the blogger has used - from sophisticated DSLR cameras, tablets or mobile phones. The blogger would photograph the food as he sees it and would write about his own experience with it.

The most important for me to trust a recipe is to see it either step by step or to see the finished result. It is somehow understated that what is written should reflect what you see in the pictures. How otherwise could you decide whether you should give a recipe a go or not? There are far too many recipes that are either not explained well or just don't work and you don't need to waste your time, efforts and money on a non-working recipes or such with unpredictable results.

I remember the time when cookbooks had no pictures a all or very scarce usually in the middle of a large co book with a not of the photo which recipe is photographed and where to look for it in the book. I used to study the picture and then the recipe and was trying to figure out how following the method I should get the result in the picture.

I still do and this has helped me catch discrepancies between what I read and what I see. And that's when I feel deceived. It might be a nitpicking but when a recipe says garnish with chives I expect to see chives in the picture and not lamb's lettuce let's say.

Or when the recipe says to cut the meat at big chunks you don't expect to see finely julienned meat on the photo right? It's all about trust. And how to achieve what you see in the picture.

Don't get me wrong though - I like well styled photos, I even like overstyled photos. What I am calling for is a matching description and method. Because I need to trust the recipe so I could modify it the way I like without messing with the basics and still get a great result.

My research for ale and beef pie lead to several good looking results, one of which was Jamie Oliver's and this is what I came up with.

 

My new favourite oven dish is a ceramic tagine - a deep casserole-style dish with a pointy lid but I guess all types of casseroles would do. The beef I used was my favourite Lefe brune.

I know it is not English hence not really an ale but the Guinness one is far too sour and bitter for my taste and I needed a more round taste. Lefe brune is fantastic.

 The other cheating I did was with the herbs - besides some fresh sprigs thyme I also used one pot of  *****'s herb infusion pot of thyme, bay leaves and parsley, but that could very well be replaced by the fresh herbs.

 As the puff pastry lid is placed on top of the dish and cooked for 15 minutes only - the beef and ale needs to be already cooked - so I just redistributed in individual pots with individual lids for serving suggestion and photographic purposes but the more sensible way would be to cook in one big pot. I also cooked the meat the day before as the flavours develop better after a day and on the day of the party the only thing needed to be cooked is the pastry lid (so it stays fresh and crusty too).

Beef and Ale Pie 

serves (8-10)

Products

1.5 kg beef brisket - cut into 2 cm cubes
2 tbsp olive oil
2 tsp fine corn flour

1 cup carrots - I used Chantenay trimemd

2-3 trimmed leeks chopped

4 red onions sliced

500 ml dark beer - (I used Lefe brune)

250 ml beef stock
1 pot herbal infusion or alternatively 

1-2 Bay leaves
3-4 sprigs thyme - leaves only 
1 tbsp chopped parsley

Salt to taste

250 g mushrooms sliced

200 g ready made all butter puff pastry
1 egg

Method:

Heat the olive oil and fry the sliced red onion and leeks for 3-4 minutes until soft and golden. In the meantime  dust the beef in the corn flour and add to the pan. Stir and turn for a while and add the beer, carrots, stock and spices. Finally add the mushrooms. Put a lid on and bring to the boil. Reduce heat to low and simmer for 20 minutes.

Transfer to an oven dish with a lid and bake to 180 C for 1h 30 minutes. Remove from the oven - stir and return to the oven for another 50 minutes. The liquid should be reduced and thickened.
Remove from the oven and keep overnight.
On the next day - work with chilled pastry - roll out the pastry and cut lids enough to cover your dishes. I cut one big circle for the oven dish (which was a tagine) and several smaller for the individual dishes.
If you feel creative you can cut out forms out of it as leaves, flowers, animals or anything else to decorate the pastry lid. Finally brush with the beaten egg (or better use the egg yolk only) and bake in 200 C preheated oven for 15-20 minutes until golden.
Better served warm.

A 5 Minute Meal - Eggs in Garlicky Yogurt Sauce

Are you so busy and with so little time left that even stacking a sandwich for lunch seems like impossible job ms of the days? Have you been watching Jamie Oliver's 15 minutes meals and wishing you were as skillful and fast as he is?
Well if that's the case I've got a recipe for you. It's full with fats and proteins and lacks the carbohydrates which we all should avoid anyway. And that makes it good if you're trying to eat low carb. You need very few ingredients that probably would already be in your fridge - butter, eggs, yogurt and feta + garlic and paprika.

It's an adaptation of traditional Bulgarian recipe called Яйца по Панагюрски (Eggs Panagyurishte-style) and consists in poached eggs in garlicky yogurt sauce. I don't really fancy runny poached eggs so to poach them takes me too long. But I found a way to cheat it - my method is to make something between scrambled eggs and an omelette in a pan and then cut to stripes and serve in the garlicky sauce.
The most delicious part of the total recipe has always been the paprika heated in little bit of butter until it just turns colour - no more than 20 seconds.

All yours and ready to eat in 5 minutes or less if you're fast enough.

The smell of paprika in heated olive oil - always transports me back to childhood afternoons  under the vine trees at the back of my grandparents' town house where I first got familiar with this taste. These days will never come back but the memory is evoked every time with the smell of sweet paprika in heated oil. I guess that's why I am so found of it :)




Here you go!

Products:

(Serves 1)

 2 eggs

A litle bit of butter - around 5 grams

80  g feta cheese crumbled

4 tablespoons of Greek-style yogurt - go for the full fat - no carbs in it.

2 small cloves of garlic

1 tsp good quality paprika

10 ml olive oil 

My method:

First heat the pan and melt the butter. Crack the eggs inside and with a spatula break the yolks a bit so it starts to look like omelette. Fry on one side for 1 minute.

In the meantime crumble the feta in your serving bowl, add the crushed garlic and the yogurt - mix.

Turn the eggs on the other side for another minute. When ready slice with the spatula and add to he yogurt mix.

In the hot pan heat the oil and add the paprika - it does not require too much cooking as the paprika would burn very quickly and go bitter - I don't leave it more than 20 seconds.

Pour over the eggs and your lunch is ready!

Delicious!

Sesame-Topped Feta Bread Rolls

Bread rolls are a popular first or second breakfast in Bulgaria and as we love to cook (especially bread-like dough things) almost every family would have at least one favourite recipe for them and many would have even more.
This rolls are based on our family's favourite recipe for jam filled rolls but updated and adapted for a savoury type. I blogged the sweet recipe some five years ago here.
The original recipe is with lard as it makes the rolls softer but to be honest the lard I bought had a very unpleasant smell which I don't remember the one we used at home (wholly home produced) had ever have. It was so bad I had to drop it and replace with sunflower oil  - using it was out of the question.
Another difference is the flour - for some reason everything I knead and bake with flour bought in the UK has a darker appearance - compared to the clear white one that is achieved with Bulgarian flour. Apparently bleaching is not the answer to this mystery, as bleached flour had been banned for use in the European union. I shall investigate further when I buy some Bulgarian flour and make another set of rolls.
Meanwhile if anyone has any ideas on this please share!

The recipe is very simple and the only thing needed is some three hours to complete the recipe from start to finish.



Products:
yields 6x8 = 48 rolls

2 eggs

200 ml lukewarm milk
3 heaped tsp dried yeast - I used Allinson
1 tsp sugar
1 tsp flour

200 ml sunflower oil
600 (sometimes 900) g flour
1 tbsp salt

350 g feta cheese

1 egg for eggwash
sesame for sprinkling

(I bet it would be even better to mix crumbled feta with butter and to fill the rolls - to try next time)



Method:
In the milk sprinkle the yeast with sugar and flour and leave until it rises.
In a deep bowl mix the eggs with the oil. Add the risen yeast with the milk and the salt. Gradually add the four and knead until everything becomes a smooth ball. Cover with plastic wrap and leave for an hour to double its volume.
Divide into 6 balls. Roll out each ball on slightly floured surface to a circle 1/2 cm thick.
Cut to 8 triangles.
Place the crumbled feta at the wide part of the triangle and start rolling to the sharp end. The roll is ready.
Proceed with the rest of the triangles.
Place on an oiled and floured (or covered with aluminium foil) tray leaving spaces between as they will rise again. Leave for another 40-50 minutes to rise again.
Wash with the beaten egg and sprinkle with sesame. Bake at 180 degrees fan oven for 20 minutes (other ovens may vary).


So how about a Good morning with breakfast in bed?

Lamb, Prunes and Quinces Tagine with Lemony Parsley Couscous

New Year comes with new resolutions, although this year they are similar to last's: cook healthier and reduce desserts as much as possible to include more savoury dishes on the blog and shed some pounds.
That might be a difficult task to do as desserts are my main interest. However I've recently realised most of the nice savoury recipes I cook never get to this blog as they are finished too soon and I'm so keen on cooking and trying ideas with sweet that I don't really have the time for savoury.
But this must change now and what a better way to start the year with a recipe from renowned book author Claudia Roden.

It's from the amazing book Arabesque featuring recipes from culinary hotspots Morocco, Lebanon and Turkey. As with most of her recent books - I want to try every recipe in and even the scarcity of photos is tickling the imagination and curiosity pushes me to check how exactly these dishes would look like when cooked and I feel free to interprete and adapt (which I did).

I got my hands on a clay tagine dish these days and of course what was the first thing I would try and cook in it? Of course a lamb tagine. To make use of some quinces I also happened to have at home what a relief to find out a lamb and quinces tagine in this marvellous book?
To be honest, at first looking at the ingredients I thought the taste was going to be too bland - as spices are not much or in large quantities. But they turned out to be just right - not overpowering in any way, but complementing the tastes.

I did some frivolities with the recipe as adding some dried prunes, changing the method to a simpler one (because of a lack of time) and adjusting the spices a bit. The result was amazing! It's definitely a recipe to revisit. Or at least try its version with pears.

Lamb Tagine with Quinces, Dried Prunes and Lemon&Parsley Couscous

Products:

1.7 kg lamb shoulder diced roughly

juice of 1/2 lemon

1 and 1/2 quinces

1 tsp cinnamon

1 tsp ground ginger

1 tsp ground cumin

1 tsp saffron

salt, plenty of black pepper (1 full tsp)

2 large onions sliced

12 dried prunes

3-4 tbsp fresh coriander

olive oil

50g butter

lemony couscous with fresh parsley

250 g couscous

350 ml boiling water

juice of half lemon

4-5tbsp olive oil

salt

freshly chopped parsley leaves

Method:

Cut the lamb and add the lemon juice. Leave for some 30 minutes to marinate.

Heat 2-3 tbsp olive oil in a pan and brown the meat for 2-3 minutes. Add the onion and spices and leave to the moderate to high heat for more 15-20 minutes. Finally add the peeled and chopped quinces and the prunes.

Transfer to an oven dish or tajine and bake for 2 hours at 180 degrees C.

Serve with couscous. 

To prepare the couscous:

Cover the couscous with half of the boiling water and add the rest gradually. Add the olive oil, salt and lemon juice and mix well until fully absorbed. Finally add the parsley leaves.

Mix well and serve.