4 boys + 2 adults = one oven pancake

Well, perhaps not on one go, but I can tell you there was a big whole in it already after the boys.
 Strawberries with icing sugar and vanilla sugar + whipped cream. Not bad as an afternoon snack for the children on holiday.

This is a very traditional and a very common Finnish dessert / afternoon snack. Pancake made in the oven is the option chosen when you get lazy for staying by the stove for making crêpes. Perfect for the warm summer days.

I used the whograin flour as part of the mixture so this can be considered the healthier version... I also reduced the amount of butter a bit.

Our healthier oven pancake

1l milk (not the nonfat version please)
3 eggs
70g melted butter
1 dl sugar
1,5tsp baking powder
1 tsp salt
1,5 tsp vanillasugar
3 dl wheat flour
3 dl wholegrain wheat four


Mix all the ingredients together and leave for at least 30min.
Put into a deep oven tray (the size of the oven...) on baking paper and bake for 30-35min in 200 degrees.

Spanish Pork Chops ?

Not being a "connaisseur" of the Spanish cuisine, I'm not sure what is so Spanish in this recipe. That's how the original was called in the Delicious magazine. Perhaps it is the combination of porc and olives, and the smoked paprika ?

Be what it may, this was eaten in our house in record time... Of course, the boys were starving as well - having run outside for the whole day. They're already on summer holiday. Here in Finland the schools close in the beginning of June, and the children return to the classrooms in the middle of August. This year the summery weather started at the same time that the school ended. We've had 10 days of fantastic beachweather. So much it seems that the rest of Europe has been under water and shivering with cold. Is this the Nordic warming instead of the global one ?

I felt the original recipe was a bit grey. It's summer after all - there needs to be colour. So I added a few things - chorizo, onion, sweet peppers... I changed some other things as well, so below the recipe as we had it. 

Spanish Pork Chops 

4 big chops
olive oil
3 crushed garlic gloves
2 tsp smoked paprika
2 tsp ordinary paprika
fresh thyme sprigs
1 lemon zest and juice
2 tsp fennel seeds
2 tsp red wine vinegar
half a kilo small (new) potatoes
2-3 chorizo sausages. sliced
big splash of white wine
1,5 dl vegetable stock
handful of green olives
parsley and mint
2 onions thinly sliced
2 tbsp red wine vinegar
salt and pepper
little sweet peppers sliced

Preheat the oven to 200 degrees. Put the chops into a bowl with the olive ilive, garlic, paprikas, thyme, lemon, fennel seeds and vinegar. Add salt and pepper and let marinate for 30min.

Put the sliced onion in a little bowl and add vinegar, salt and pepper. Let marinate until the dinner is ready. In half an hour the tang of the onion has mellowed into a refreshing sweetness.

Clean and slice the potatoes and mix with some olive oil, salt and pepper and the chorizos. Roast in the oven for 20min. Add the wine and stock and set the chops on the top. Put back in the oven for 15min. Add the olives, half of your sweet peppers and put the tin again in the oven for 5min.

Let the tin wait for a few minutes and sprinkle parsley, mint, onion and rest of the peppers on the top.
Enjoy.

Time for a picnic

The sun is shining. I'm sitting outside with my boy, enjoying the garden picnic and having faith in the beach picnics coming soon. This bread tastes like summer.

I've made something similar years ago- probably a recipe from Mr Oliver. This time I was reading the new Finnish Food and Travel magazine when a recipe by a Finnish chef Timo Linnamäki caught my eye - The below recipe is my take on the idea.

The great thing about the recipe is that everyone can fill the bread with whatever they prefer. Next time I'll try parma ham and blue cheese or mozzarella with pancetta and tomatoes... Mozzarella should be fun on a picnic - who can stretch the longest string ?

Anyways, give this a try. I guarantee you'll feel the summer coming.


 Picnic Bread

3 dl hot water
1small pot (200g) turkish yoghurt
2 small bags of dry yeast (11g each)
1 tbsp honey
2 tbsp olive oil
2 tsp salt
4 dl wholegrain wheat flour
4 dl ordinary flour  (+ the help needed for working the dough i.e. 1-2 dl - depending on the weather and flour)
1-2 handfuls of mixed seeds (sunflower. pumpkin)

Fill the bread with your favourites - this is what I used this time.
shredded spinach
1 red onion
a couple of spring onions
half a packet of feta
2 tbsp chili-paprika sauce (by Tannisen a Finnish brand)
2 boiled eggs
mint and basil

Mix the water and yoghurt. Add the yeast, honey, salt and 1 tbsp of olive oil. Mix and leave for a few minutes. Add the flour gradially mixing and kneading well. Add the seeds.
The dough is pretty wet at this stage. If you want, you can add 1 dl of flour but I let it rise for 30min and used then a lot of flour while working with the dough on the table.

While you wait for the dough to rise, sauté the onions on a pan and wilt the spinach on them. Leave to wait.

Add 1 tbsp of olive oil to the dough and scrape it on the table (with generous amount of flour). I worked directly on the parchment paper so there was no need to move the bread in the end. Roll the dough to the size of an oven pan. Add the filling and roll the bread. Form a big bagel out of it.

Put the oven on to 200 degrees (C)  and put the baking tray in the oven. Leave the bread to rise for at least 15 min. Cut the surface and spread some water on it so that some more seeds will stick onto it.

Bake the bread with the fan on for 10 minutes and then without the fan for 15-20 min. Take out of the oven but leave to cool on the baking tray.

Red wine onion jam put in a tart... can you think of anything better for an April lunch ?

 Well, add the gorgonzola type blue cheese and a lot of thyme...

Cooking is 1/3 creativity, 1/3 luck and 1/3 innovative stealing. It is not easy to come up with something totally new in the kitchen nowadays. Seems like most of the ideas have already been presented by someoe else. At least in our house, cooking is mostly a patchwork of ideas picked up in different places and put together to create something that is more than the sum of its parts.

This tart definitely adds up to the level of eternal favourites "chez nous".  The main idea comes from Delicious-magazine (my favourite), the onion jam is slightly modified from the one from Rachel Allen and the pastry is the old Finnish favourite for pigs in a blanket. In the pastry I use the Finnish "rahka" which is a kind of quark but in a completely unsweetened form. If you can't find similar, you can try with Greek yoghurt or just buy ordinary readymade puff pastry.

Salty-sweet red onion pie

Make the jam and the pastry the day before - less time and work required during the morning before lunch.

Jam :
25g butter
6 red onions
150g caster sugar
1 tsp salt
1 tsp black pepper
1 dl balsamic vinegar
1,5 dl red wine (something quite sturdy)
a splash of Marsala (or sherry or something similar)
2 tbsp blackcurrant jam 

Slice the onions and cook them at a low heat with butter and sugar for about 30min. Add the rest of the ingredients and let it cook for 45min more. The jam is quite liquid still in the end but don't worry, it'll set once cold.
Put in to a jar and into the fridge to wait.

Pastry (or readymade puff pastry)  :
250g  rahka (quark)
250g soft butter
4 dl flour

Mix quickly to form a dough. Wrap with clingfilm and put to fridge until the next day (or at least for 30 minutes before using)

The next day

Roll the dough and put it to a pastry tin (diameter appr. 24 to 26 cm) Don't roll it too thin but leave at least to 5 mm. 

Spread the onion jam to the bottom. Cut pieces from the blue cheese and drop them evenly on the onion jam. Chop a lot of thyme and add on the top.

Mix 2 eggs, 4 egg yolks, 2 dl cream and 2 tbsp Dijon mustard and pour the mixture into the tin.

Scatter crushed hazelnuts on the top.

Bake in the oven (200 degrees celsius) for about 30min. Let it cool to room temperature and serve with green salad.

Hazelnut chocolate meringues

Whenever I have some eggwhite leftovers, I seem to make meringues. This time I also had some hazelnut crush and when I hear "hazelnut" my brain immediately thinks of chocolate.

So, there was no way around it. This is what we had for dessert yesterday.

Valrhona is the preferred dark chocolate brand in our house. This time we opted for the fruity Manjari (64%) which was melted and spread on the meringues with a little silicon brush.

What chocolate brands do you find the best to use ?

Meringues are so easy to make and the variation possibilities are endless. Look here for the basic recipe and one of our latest taste experiments.

Warm salad for the cold spring

We still have snow on the ground... Spring is the time when the heavy stews and roasts give place to light salads and everything green, but in this cold weather we still need something that warms. Luckily the world is full of wonderful recipes for warm salads.

Also, we should eat more vegetables, for ecological reasons, for health reasons and also, for economical reasons. For some reason though, I seem to often lack inspiration and imagination. Most of our regular recipes have meat. This one doesn't  but it still gives you this hearty feeling of not being hungry soon. It also warms you up, both because it is eaten warm and because it has heat from the spices.

I think the original recipe has been taken from the Delicious -magazine, but this is probably no longer like the original. Evolution takes place in the kitchen.

Warm Aubergine - Halloumi Salad

2 aubergines (eggplants) in pieces
1 garlic with cloves separated but not peeled
1-2 tbsp Harissa-paste
2 tbsp olive oil
2 handfuls of dried chickpeas soaked and boiled according to the package instructions
1 red oignon sliced
1 tbsp white wine vinegar
salt and pepper
(1 red chili if you really like the heat - we passed as children ate this also)
a package of halloumi sliced
zest and juice of 1 lemon
1 rtbsp oil
rucola and coriander (cilantro)

Put the oven on to 190 degrees (C) Roll the garlic cloves in oil and put them to the oven for a while (15-20min). Mix the aubergine pieces with oil and harissa and add with the cloves. Leave into the oven for about 30min - until the aubergine is cooked and garlic soft and mushy. Mix in the chickpeas and put back to the oven for 10 minutes.

Once the aubergine is in the oven add some white wine vinegar on the oignon. Add some salt and pepper and leave aside.

Take the aubergines and garlic and put them into a serving bowl. Brown the halloumi slices on a pan with little oil. (With the chili if you use it). Add to the salad, you may want to cut them into bitesize pieces.

Mix the lemon zest and juice with the oignon. Add oil to your taste. Check for the seasoning. Mix with the salad.


Add rucola and coriander. Mix and serve.


The leftovers are great with pasta the day after (just add a bit of the pasta cooking water).

Bread in a Pot - A Blogisphere Classic

This bread recipe has been going around in the Finnish foodblogs for a while, but I guess it originates from outside Finland. What is interesting in this, is not so much the list of ingredients or the time it takes for the levain to form. The main interest is the method of baking the bread in an oven pot.

I've tried the pot cooking method also with a couple of other bread recipes and it works every time. There is something in heat of the pot and the humidity created by having the lid on that the bread dough seems to love. Please, go and try for yourself. I'm sure you won't be disappointed.

B

Bread in a pot 

7 dl flour (wheat, spelt...)
2 tsp salt
0,5 tsp dried yeast
3,5 dl lukewarm water

Mix the dry ingredients together and pour in the water. Mix, cover with clingfilm and leave in room temperature for 12-18 hours.

Preheat the oven to 225 (celsius) and put an oven pot with a lid to warm inside.

Mix some flour into the bread dough and form a round bread. Cover loosely with clingfilm and let it rest for 30min.

Once the oven (and the pot) are hot put the bread inside the pot and put it in the oven with the lid on. Let it bake for 30 minutes, then remove the lid and let the bread bake for 15 minutes more.
Take the bread out of the oven and out of the pot. Let it cool slightly (easier to cut) and enjoy with melting butter...

Salted liquorice meringues - anyone ?

Some time ago we made a cake with the boys.  You know, marzipan butterflies, glitter and all. To change from the normal cream and jam filling, we actually filled it with lemon curd chantilly and salted liquorice. So delicious.

To those who love the salted liquorice I mean. The taste for it seems to be somewhat Finnish. I don't think I know anyone non Finnish who enjoys the black sweets. At least the Husband seems to have some kind of a gagging reaction just by the sight of them.

Anyways, as we had both the egg whites and the salted liquorice leftovers, I decided to make some meringues with black spots.

Nothing is easier to make than meringues. I know, everybody thinks they are difficult, but really - it's just patience you need - and of course a clean bowl, whisk, sugar and eggwhites with no traces of yolk in them. Not being of the patient kind myself, I actually succeeded in making meringues only after I got the kitchen mixer. Now I can just forget it on for a while and do other things.

Minimeringues with salted liquorice

Put the egg whites (3 in this case) to the mixer bowl, install the whisk and put the machine on for a few minutes. You can add a couple of drops of lemon or lime juice if you want. Helps the whites to foam. Empty the dishwasher to keep you occupied.

Add sugar (2-3 dl) and put the machine on. Put the oven on (130 celsius - no fan) Fill the dishwasher with everything in the sink and lying around in the kitchen. Check on the kids (shout from the kitchen - not a good idea to leave the machine alone). When the egg whites have formed stiff peaks the meringue is ready.

You can mix the salted liquorice (Turkish pepper crush here) to the eggwhites now - or just sprinkle it on them before putting them to the oven. You decide.

Use a piping bag or two spoons to get the meringues in the form you want. Put them to the oven and leave for about 30min. Turn the oven off and leave the meringues in to dry for the night.