Sunday, 30 June 2013

Home-made vanilla custard (budyń)

The word and a kind of dessert that has absolutely no translation into English. This is not a pudding, this is kind of a Polish custard, I'm sure you'll love it. 
Here, thanks to MojeWypieki is the recipe:


Ingredients for 3 small portions:
  • 500 ml of milk
  • 1 tablespoon of butter
  • 8 g of vanilla sugar
  • 1/2 of vanilla pod
  • 2 tablespoons of potato starch
  • 2 yolks

Preparation:
  1. Scrap out the seeds from the vanilla pod.
  2. Boil 1,5 glass of milk with the butter, sugar and vanilla. 
  3. The rest of the milk mix with potato starch and yolks using for example a blender (hand mixer). 
  4. Add the mixed ingredients to the boiling milk and butter and quictly turn down the heat into the lowest one and keep stiring, till it boils. 
  5. Boil for one minute, stiring.
  6. Pour to small, (glass) bowls. 
  7. You can eat it warm or cold, for example with fruit syrup, chocolate, nuts, fruits. 
  8. Bon Appetit :)

Scrambled Eggs with Tofu

 

A perfect idea for a breakfast for those who don't have much in their fridge or who bought tofu and don't know what to do with that or for example, for those, who have stale bread ;)
Recipe, partially from http://www.kwestiasmaku.com/dania_dla_dwojga/sniadania/jajecznica_z_tofu/przepis.html

Ingredients:

  • Tofu
  • Oil/butter
  • Eggs
  • Pepper
  • Salt
  • Bread

Optional ingredients:

  • red/yellow/green chopped pepper
  • 1/2 chopped onion
  • chopped chive

Preparation:

  1. If you didn't open your tofu yet - open it, dry on a paper towel. Chop into smaller or bigger pieces - as you wish. Sprinkle pepper and salt on them.
  2. Take a frying pan, put some oil or butter on it, heat.
  3. Put the tofu on pre-heated frying pan (be careful it will splash a little).
  4. Fry for 1-2 minutes (they get softer, but the longer you fry, the harder they become)
  5. Add optional ingredients if you want to.
  6. Move to one side of the frying pan, add eggs, add some pepper and stir (exactly like preparing basic scrambled eggs.). You can also add other condiments that you like.
  7. Put the slices of your bread in a toaster, and prepare some toast. You can put some butter on them.
  8. Bon Appetit :)

An inspiring break

Well, I haven't been here for a while, but it doesn't mean I was doing nothing that time :) I prepared some new recipes, so keep looking for new inspirations :)

I have always heard of Spring Rolls, but I have never tried it, I have no idea why. That was a huge mistake :) I tried them recently and I fell in love ! You do need to try it. I have already bought spring roll wrapping... :) the recipe soon... :)

Thursday, 27 June 2013

Caramel Net Coffee

Another nice looking basic coffee :) We are getting slowly to the Latte Art :) It isn't really that hard to learn, but what is crucial is well steamed milk. It needs to be very thick.

Ingredients:

  • one-two teaspoons of coffee
  • water
  • around 50 ml of milk (or more if you wish)
  • caramel sauce

Preparation:
  1. Pour your coffee to your cup. Leave some space on the top of your cup for the milk
  2. Prepare steamed milk in a milk jug. 
  3. Take a spoon and put it gently on the edge of the jug, so that the milk that is still a liquid(the bottom of the milk jug) is poured to your coffee. (do it only if you want a white coffee. If not - skip that part)
  4. Take a spoon and put the steamed milk gently on the top of your coffee, starting from the middle. Cover the entire surface.
  5. Take the sauce. Open it and without pressing it yet, start making circles around the top of your cup, starting in the middle. If you practised for a while, press the bottle with the sauce (still making circles from the middle), so that it goes out. Make a caramel-spring on the top of your coffee.
  6. Take a toothpick(or another clean thing of that kind - might be even a needle) and immerse it a little bit in the middle of our coffee, pass it through the coffee to the edge of the cup 4 times (like on the clock - full hours - 9,12,3,6) A net appears :) You can add more lines, between those you already made.
  7. Bon appetit!

Wednesday, 26 June 2013

Strawberry-lemon muffins

Fresh, soft, mouth-watering muffins with seasonal fruit - strawberries :) lemon + strawberries = a perfect match :) I do recommend. Even children should be smitten with them :)

Ingredients:

  • 1,5 glass of flour
  • 1,5 teaspoon of baking powder
  • 115 g of butter
  • 3/4 glass of sugar
  • 2 big eggs
  • lemon peel made from 2 lemons
  • 1 tablespoon of lemon juice
  • 1/2 glass of buttermilk or kephir or 12-18% sour cream
  • 1-1,5 glass of strawberries
  • ready made icing sugar (you can use self-made from this recipe)
Preparation:
  1. All the ingredients should be in a room temperature. 
  2. Sieve the flour and the baking powder into a bowl. Put aside. 
  3. Put the butter and sugar in a food processor's bowl and using a mixer, mix it till it gets bright and smooth. 
  4. Add one egg, mix till it links. Add another egg, mix again till smooth. Add lemon peels and lemon juice, mix. 
  5. Taking turns, add a little flour and a little sour cream to the dough, stir after adding every ingredient till it links with the dough, using a tablespoon. Continute, till both ingredients finish. 
  6. Take you muffin forms, put paper muffin cups inside (if your muffin form is made of silicone, you don't have to put paper muffin cups). 
  7. Put the dough to every muffin cup to its 3/4 height (or less, not more) 
  8. Put in every muffin 3-5 pieces of strawberry. Don't worry if they stick out of the muffin dough.
  9. Bake in 180C for 20-25 minutes. Using a toothpick, check whether your cupcakes are ready or not. Read how to do it HERE.
  10. Cool them. 
  11. You can decorate your muffins with icing sugar, either ready-made or you can prepare your own. 
  12. If ready made - follow the instructions on the packing (boil the packing), cut a small hole in the packing, and making round moves slowly pour the icing on every muffin. 
  13. Home-made icing sugar here. 
  14. Bon appetit!

Coffee: Orange Mocha and Classic Latte

My own recipe created during savouring coffee in a restaurant ;) made in frappe version, because of gorgeous summertime :)

* For both of them, you can add as much milk as you want to. Especially on the top - because latte coffee has a lot of milk. But this is the element I leave for your own preferences :)

Orange Mocha: (foreground)


Ingredients:

  • 1 drop of orange extract or orange syrup (around 5 ml, depends on a syrup)
  • 1 teaspoon of cocoa
  • 2 teaspoons of sugar (if you use bitter baking cocoa and you like sweet coffee - but this is optional)
  • 50-100 ml of milk
  • 100-150 ml of coffee
Optionally:
  • Ice cubes
Preparation:
  1. Add orange extract or orange syrup
  2. Put the cocoa on the bottom of the latte glass(preferably). Gently patter the glass on the surface, so that the cocoa is beaten in the glass and won't mix that easily with the milk.
  3. Add sugar if you wish.
  4. Add milk slowly, pouring it to the glass down through its side.
  5. If you want - add ice cubes. (2-3)
  6. Using the same method as with the milk, add coffee.*
  7. Bon Appetit! :)


* If you want frappe - firstly percolate coffee and put it in the freezer.


Basic Coffee: (background)


Ingredients:

  • 50-100 ml of milk
  • 100-150 ml of coffee
  • sugar (optional)
Optionally:
  • Ice cubes
Preparation:
  1. Add milk.
  2. Add sugar if you wish. Stir.
  3. Add ice cubes if you want to. (2-3)
  4. Add coffee slowly, pouring it to the glass down through its side.
  5. Bon Appetit! :)
* If you want frappe - firstly percolate coffee and put it in the freezer.

Tuesday, 25 June 2013

A method for a night's hunger nightmare

There are days (especially during the summer) when you can eat absolutely nothing during the entire day, but when the evening starts you could devour a horse. And simultaneously you want to stay fit and not put on weight. How to combat that urgent need? 

Here is your answer...



this particular smoothie is my own idea
Ingredients:
  • 1 apple
  • 150-200g of strawberries
  • 2 teaspoons of lemon juice
Optional ingredients:
  • ice

Preparation:
  1. Wash, peel and chop the apple. Put aside.
  2. Wash the strawberries, throw away the green tops/hats.
  3. Put the strawberries in a food processor. Blend till smooth. 
  4. Now you can add 2-3 ice cubes if you want to. Blend till smooth.
  5. Add a few pieces of chopped apple. Blend till smooth. Repeat the actions till all the chopped pieces of apples are blended.
  6. Add lemon juice.
  7. Bon appetit :)
This particular smoothie, if not blended for too long is really thick and what comes after that - very filling. You will probably need a spoon to eat it ;)



Pear breakfast with the scent of the cinammon

Well this is my own idea. I was fed up with the small amount of varieties I have when it comes to savour breakfast. So I upgraded my it :) I am also a big fan of cinnamon which explains its presence. But it does match here.

Ingredients:


  • 150-250 ml of milk (measure your own amount - put as much as you always do while preparing cereals/cornflakes/etc)
  • 1 pear (or 1 banana), washed, peeled and chopped
  • from 1/2 to 2 teaspoons of cinnamon
  • cornflakes (preferably), some honey-cereals will be fine too, muesli, granola, etc (I used basic fibre flakes)
Preparation:
  1. Boil the milk on a low heat (as much as you like). 
  2. Wash, peel and chop the pear, put it in a bowl.
  3. Put the milk in (the hotter the milk the faster your cereals will change into pulp)
  4. Add cereals/other and cinammon to the bowl.
  5. Bon Appetit!

Monday, 24 June 2013

Sweet Omelette

Delicate, like a sponge cake, magic mix of whites and yolk. If your parens have ever told you that you can't mix whisked, stiffed egg whites with yolks because it will be a complete disaster - prove that they were/are wrong ;) 
Thanks for Kwestia Smaku for this recipe -
The original recipe isn't for a sweet omelette. So I changed it a little.

Ingredients: (1 omelette)

  • 2 eggs
  • a pinch of salt
  • 3 teaspoons of sugar
  • 2 tablespoons of flour
  • a little bit of butter 

On the top:

  • powdered sugar
  • golden syrup
  • honey
  • jam/marmalade
  • fruit
  • cinnamon
  • cocoa

* If you have a really big frying pan, you can use 3 eggs and 3 tablespoons of flour.

Preparation:

  1. Melt some butter on your frying pan. (butter must cover the entire frying pan, also sides)
  2. Seperate whites and yolks. 
  3. Stir the yolks.
  4. Put the whites in a bigger bowl (food processor's bowl) add salt and start beating the egg whites(high speed of the mixer). After a few seconds add sugar. Keep beating, until the whites are stiff.
  5. Reduce the speed of the mixer to average, without stopping the mixer add yolks (around 1/2 of a minute)
  6. Reduce the speed of the mixer to the lowest and add flour. Mix only for a few (10) seconds, till it links.
  7. Turn on the heat and put the omelette on the frying pan on a middle/low heat.
  8. Look at it carefully - it is different than a pancake, it is harder to look if the bottom is ready or not. Frying every side will take around 3-4 minutes.
  9. How to turn the side? You can either use one big spatula or two smaller  (not recommended, because it is a very delicate kind of cake) or you can take another greased frying pan (bigger preferably) and try to put them together and turn over. You can also take it out from the frying pan, put it on the plate, cover the plate with the frying pan and then flip so that the omelette is on the frying pan again.
  10. Put it on a plate and add 'toppings' :)
  11. Bon appetit! :)

* Well-prepared omelette should be stiff after frying and should neither crincle nor get softer.


Lemon Cupcakes

Recipe from this website, as always, a little bit changed ;)

Ingredients:

  • 1,5 glass of flour
  • 1,5 teaspoon of baking powder
  • 115 g of butter
  • 3/4 glass of sugar
  • 2 big eggs
  • lemon peel made from 2 lemons
  • 1 tablespoon of lemon juice
  • 1/2 glass of buttermilk or kephir or 12-18% sour cream
  • ready made icing sugar (you can use self-made from this recipe)
Preparation:
  1. All the ingredients should be in a room temperature. 
  2. Sieve the flour and the baking powder into a bowl. Put aside. 
  3. Put the butter and sugar in a food processor's bowl and using a mixer, mix it till it gets bright and smooth. 
  4. Add one egg, mix till it links. Add another egg, mix again till smooth. Add lemon peels and lemon juice, mix. 
  5. Taking turns, add a little flour and a little sour cream to the dough, stir after adding every ingredient till it links with the dough, using a tablespoon. Continute, till both ingredients finish. 
  6. Take you muffin forms, put paper muffin cups inside (if your muffin form is made of silicone, you don't have to put paper muffin cups). 
  7. Put the dough to every muffin cup to its 3/4 height (or less, not more) 
  8. Bake in 180C for 20-25 minutes. Using a toothpick, check whether your cupcakes are ready or not. Read how to do it HERE.
  9. Cool them. 
  10. You can decorate your muffins with icing sugar, either ready-made or you can prepare your own. 
  11. If ready made - follow the instructions on the packing (boil the packing), cut a small hole in the packing, and making round moves slowly pour the icing on every muffin. 
  12. Home-made icing sugar here. 
  13. Bon appetit!

Icing sugar

Ahh, that's a very useful tool, to make your cakes or cupcakes  not only taste good but also look wonderful :)It is a very easy way to decorate cakes, cupcakes, cookies, etc. in every pattern imagined.




Ingredients:
  • 1 glass of powdered sugar
  • 4-5 tablespoons of water
Optional ingredients:
  • flavoured extract - vanilla, almond, lemon, etc.
  • food colouring

Preparation:
  1. Put all the ingredients together and stir to get a desired consistency of the icing (needs to be thick). 
  2. Put into a piping bag and distribute over cake, cupcake, etc. in any pattern desired.
  3. Bon appetit ;)

Sunday, 23 June 2013

Strawberry cake


Mum's recipe.That automatically sets it in a good position in the hierarchy of recipes. :)
Extremely easy, extremely quick, possible to be prepared with every fruit you wish. Even if it doesn't look attractive to you, the taste will change your attitude... ;)

Ingredients:

  • 3 glasses of sugar
  • 3 glasses of flour
  • 1 margarine (200g)
  • 5 eggs
  • 3 teaspoons of baking powder
  • 1/2 glass of milk
  • powdered sugar

Preparation:
  1. Melt the margarine, put aside to let it cool down.
  2. Sieve flour and baking powder into a bowl, put aside.
  3. Take a springform pan or other (rectangular) form. Grease it and put the baking paper all over the form (put even more, so that some paper sticks out of the form - it will help you taking out the cake from the form)
  4. Mix eggs and sugar in another  bowl, till bright and smooth. (around 5 minutes)
  5. Continue mixing and add the mix of flour and baking powder gradually till everything links.
  6. Without stopping the food processor (slow rotation of the mixer) add cooled down margarine and then the milk - everything also gradually.
  7. Now, according to the type of the cake - everything needs to be done quite quickly - put the dough into the form, add fruit (cram them in the dough, so that you get fruit cake not cake, cake... and fruit on the very top)
  8. Bake for 45-50 minutes on 180C and when the cake gets golder, slowly decrease the temperature (160, 150, 100C). The cake requires attention, not to burn it. Turn down the temperature when it starts getting gold, because from that point it is very easy to burn it (everything happens quite fast).
  9. When it is done and cooled down, sprinkle the powdered sugar on the top.
  10. Bon apettit!


Home-made bread

Very tasty bread, quick in preparation, because instead of other recipes it doesn't require leaving the dough for 12-24 hours. And you can add other seeds if you want to. I do recommend it. 
I have got the recipe from my workmate ;)

Ingredients:
  • 1 kg of flour
  • 100 g of baker's yeast
  • 3 teaspoons of sugar + a little bit of milk
  • 2 tablespoons of salt
  • 1 litre of warm water
  • 1 glass of sunflower's seeds
  • 1 glass of flax seeds
  • 1 glass of pumpkin's seeds
Preparation:
  1. Put everything in a pot. Stir, so that all the ingredients mix and you get the dough. 
  2. Leave for a while. ( it rises)
  3. Stir again.
  4. Put in a bread baking form. Leave for 15 minutes.
  5. Bake for 1 hour and 15 minutes in 180C-200C
  6. Bon appetit :)
* It is highly probable that you will have a lot of dough from that recipe for more than 1 bread baking form. Bake everything at once if possible (everything needs to be placed at the same level in the oven - in the middle - remember, we always bake in the middle level of the oven, not to burn the top or the bottom)
* To keep the bread fresh, you can freeze some of it. Defrost during the night before using.

Thursday, 20 June 2013

Raspberry Frappe


What an extremely hot day, here, in Poland! The real summer is not with us yet, buuut to my great astonishment, we could experience a Sahara conditions today! So how to cool yourself down during such muggy day? A raspberry frappe is the answer - cooling down & waking up miracle. Surprisingly, raspberries matches here. :) But unfortunately strawberries don't (I tried).
The recipe comes from: http://www.mkcafe.pl/przepisy-kawowe/przepisy/malinowe-frappe

Ingredients (for 2 cups):

  • 60-80 g of raspberries
  • 1 teaspoon of sugar
  • 1 square of dark chocolate (optional)
  • 2-4 ice cubes
  • espresso/coffee*
  • 100 ml of 30-36% cream or steamed milk
  • chocolate chips (optional)
* no measure of ml here, because it depends on the height of your glass (it is good to take Irish coffee glass) and on your own taste.

Preparation:

  1. Prepare ice cubes if you don't have any.
  2. Prepare your coffee. Leave it till it cools down
  3. Put raspberries, sugar and chocolate in food processor. Mix till smooth.
  4. Put the puree on the bottom of your glass. Add ice.
  5. Tilt the glass and carefully, pour the coffee slowly on the side of the glass (it is advisable to prepare a coffee in a jug - it is easier to put its spout on the edge of the coffee glass and pour the coffee slowly into the glass) It needs to be done carefully not to mess up the fruit puree bottom.
  6. Put whipped cream or steamed milk on the top. Add chocolate chips on the top if you want to.
  7. Bon appetit :)



Home-made chocolates

A definite gourmet sensation. Easy to prepare, can remain in the fridge for a quite long time.
Can be prepared out of every kind of chocolate, but definitely those made of milk chocolate are the best.
The filling may vary as well. 
I used a lot of silicone forms to prepare them, even ice silicone forms. Surprisingly they seem to be the best - cause they are big enough and vary in shapes :)
The original recipe comes from this website, but I have changed the filling from raspberries to strawberries.


Ingredients: (for 25-30 chocolates - it depends on forms)
  • 150-200 g of raspberries/strawberries
  • 1 tablespoon of sugar
  • 200 g of white chocolate
  • 50 ml of 36% cream
  • 200 g of milk chocolate (good quality preferred)

Optional ingredients:
  • 1 tablespoon of vodka

Preparation:
  1. Take a pot and put inside strawberries/raspberries with sugar. Boil for 2 minutes, then rub it through the sieve, throw away the kernels.
  2. Now it is the right moment for optional ingredients. Add vodka and boil till the excess of water evaporates.
  3. Break white chocolate to smaller parts and add it to raspberry/strawberry puree. Then add also cream. Stir everything till the chocolate melts and everything is smooth. Cool the puree. It should get thicker after cooling.
  4. Prepare your silicone form (here, it needs to be silicone form, because other way, you wouldn't be able to take your chocolates out of the form).
  5. Melt your chocolate - put it in a pot with double bottom and put it on the lowest heat. This is very important - because your chocolate instead of melting may burn and there may be some lumps*. A good idea is to heat the pot and turn off the heat. The chocolate will melt (because of the warmed up pot) and no lumps should appear.
  6. Take a pastry brush, put it in the melted chocolate and apply it to every hole in your silicone form. Do it precisely - spread the chocolate over the entire hole - both bottom and sides. Wait till it dries and put another tier of chocolate.** Wait till it dries.(you can put them in the fridge for 15-30 minutes)
  7. Put something around one teaspoon of the fruit puree into every hole. Do not fill the entire hole till the edge - leave some free space for the last closing tier of chocolate.
  8. Using a pastry brush/a teaspoon put the last tier of chocolate on every small chocolate. Once you put both the puree and the last tier of chocolate - put your chocolates in the fridge for at least an hour.
  9. Carefully take them out of the silicone form (bundle out of the form). These chocolates may remain really for a long time in a room temperature. But keep them in the fridge if there is no need (no guests ;) ) for keeping them on the table.
  10. Bon appetit ! :)

* If there are lumps but the chocolate is not burnt - add one tablespoon of milk (or more if you see after stiring that one is not enough), warm it up and stir.
** the bottom and sides of your chocolates need to have double tier of chocolate not to break while taking them out of the silicone form. This is why it needs to be done precisely and twice.

Smoothie

The easiest and the tastiest juice in this world that will cool you down during a hot day.
The idea for this smoothie comes from this website. But - again - I changed it a little bit :)

Ingredients: (for 2-3 cups)
  • orange juice (from 1 orange)
  • 1 peeled mango
  • 1 banana
  • cherries - fresh or frozen
Optional ingredients:
  • 1/2 tumbler of milk
  • sugar
  • 1-2 tablespoons of greek yoghurt
  • ice

Preparation:
  1. Wash the banana and put it in the freezer.
  2. Put orange juice and chopped mango to your blender/mixer/food processor. Mix till smooth.
  3. Add banana. Mix till smooth.
  4. Now it's time for optional ingredients (except for ice). Add carefully one element, mix, taste it, add another. Try it after every mixing so that you are sure that your smoothie suits your taste.
  5. Add ice, mix till smooth.
  6. Now you can make two - pour the smoothie in one cup so that you have a yellow smoothie.
  7. Leave the rest in your food processor and now add cherries. Mix till smooth.
  8. Bon appetit :)

Tuesday, 18 June 2013

Classical Panna Cotta

Ohh how much I love preparing those little desserts! Perfect with coffee, vanilla-flavoured jelly-like dessert, easy to prepare and without using the oven :) 

Panna Cotta might be prepared in dozen of different flavours(many different extracts might be used instead of vanilla - like almond, coconut, rum, citrus ones...) and in many different shapes(it is up to You what kind of receptacle or form You'll pour it into :) )

Original recipe from this website.

Ingredients: (for 4-7 portions)
  • 3 teaspoons of powdered gelatin
  • 2 teaspoons of vanilla extract
  • 250 ml of 30-36% cream
  • 250 ml of milk (2-3,2% of fat, not less)
  • 80 g of sugar
optional ingredients:
  • 1 tablespoon of rum 
  • 1 tablespoon of white wine
Decoration:
Fresh fruit(for instance: strawberries, raspberries, wild strawberries, cherries), fruit mousse, caramel, chocolate, nuts

Preparation:
  1. Put the gelatin in a tumbler and suffuse it with 2 tablespoons of water. Leave it for 5 minutes.
  2. Take a pot and put the cream, milk, sugar and vanilla extract inside. Stir till the sugar is melted.
  3. Add optional ingredients if you want to.
  4. Boil and take it out quickly from your cooker. Add the gelatin and stir quickly for more or less 1 minute till the gelatin melts completely.
  5. Pour the mixture into cups.
  6. Cool it. Cover with (for example) aluminium foil and put in the fridge for at least 4 hours (entire night advisable)
  • How to take Panna Cotta out of the cup?
To take it out easily you can put the cup for a few seconds in hot water. Then, keep the cup upside down and shake more or less gently till it comes unstuck from the cup's side. Be careful it may fall down!
Another way is just to put the knife inside the cup's edge and cut it inside near to the edges of the cup.

British Crunches

This is a mouth-watering example of using the golden syrup :) Easy to prepare, quick to do, good for lunch and for coffee :)
Original recipe comes from this website, but I modified it a little bit.

Ingredients:

  • 110 g butter 
  • 120 g of sugar (preferably brown sugar) 
  • 1 good tablespoon of golden syrup (you can use honey if you don't have it, but that will change the taste of crunches) 
Preparation:
  1. Put all the ingredients in the pot, boil and stir till smooth. 
  2. Take if off from the cooker. 
Ingredients:
  • 150-200 g of rolled oats (not more than 225g) 
  • 1-1,5 teaspoon(s) of ground ginger 
  • some almond flakes 
  1. Turn the oven on and set for 190 Celsius degrees, so that it has time to preheat 
  2. Add the rolled oats and ginger to your pot. Stir. If you want some more rolled oats - add them. 
  3. Prepare your baking form - if not made from silicone - put the baking paper in or grease it with butter 
  4. Put the mixture in a baking form* and sprinkle the almond flakes on the top. 
  5. If the oven is already heated to 190 Celsius degrees, put the form inside the oven and bake for 5-15 minutes** 
  6. After baking, wait 10-20 minutes till it gets thicker, easier and generally possible to be divided into smaller parts. 
  7. Bon appetit! :) 
* you can use any form you like - I do recommend flat (like for a tart) forms. You will get as thick/big cookies as your form is - if you will use tart form - cookies will be like mine - there will be a lot of them but they won't be thick. If you decide on a bread form - less cookies, but bigger(thicker).

** Look at them carefully. Very often the baking time depends on the oven. Sometimes, 6-7 minutes is perfectly enough.

How to check that ? Observe your crunch - if it is gold, you can take it out. Don't let the edges get burnt (golden dark) because these parts will be bitter and not really tasty. So if you see that it starts getting darker on the edges - take it out from the oven.

Golden Syrup


Well-known in many countries in the world, sweet and tasty, very useful - it can be used with many dishes from pancakes through cookies to coffee. Extremely easy to prepare and while closed in a jar, can remain in a room temperature for a long, long time.
The original recipe comes from this website.

From this recipe you will get around 1 litre of golden syrup.


PART 1:


Ingredients:

  • 200g of sugar
  • 50 g of water
Preparation:
  1. Take a bigger pot and boil the sugar with water using the average ring's power on your cooker. Boil it till the sugar caramelizates and till the consistency will be liquid and the colour golden dark (be careful not to burn it! that will change the taste into bitter and we don't want that to happen)
  2. Take it off from the electric cooker's ring. 


PART 2:

Ingredients:
  • 1 kg of sugar 
  • 600 ml of hot (boiling) water 
  • 2 tablespoons of lemon juice 
Preparation:
  1. Carefully add the hot water to your pot with golden dark, caramelizated sugar (be very careful, the reaction might be literally 'bombastic'). Add sugar and lemon juice.
  2. Turn on the cooker on the lowest fire power and stir it.
  3. Boil on the lowest fire for 45 mintues (during that time it is advisable not to stir it) so that the syrup can get thick.
  4. Cool it, put in jars, close. Keep the golden syrup in locker in the room temperature.
  • When hot - the syrup won't be that thick, it will become more thick after cooling. 
  • If cold and not thick enough - put it back in a pot, boil. 
  • When too thick - add some hot water and stir. 

Malakoff Cake

Deriving from Austria, this cake isn't as hard as it seems to be. Mostly, because it doesn't require turning on the oven even for a single second ;)
Personally, I wouldn't call it a gourmet sensation, but it is, indeed, very tasty and its appearance is impressive on the table.
The recipe comes from this website.

Ingredients:

  • 25 dag/250g of ladyfingers 

Filling: 
  • 1/2 jar of black currant/raspberry jelly 
  • 1,5 glass of milk 
  • 1 vanilla pudding 
  • 4 tablespoons of sugar 
  • 25 dag/250g of butter 
  • 3 tablespoons of powdered sugar 
  • 10 dag/100g almond flakes (the original recipe requires roasting them, but I skipped that part) 
Punch:
  • 1/2 glass of white wine 
  • 50 ml of rum 
  • 2 teaspoons of sugar 
Decoration:
  • whipped cream 
  • whatever you want - you can use ready-made chocolate decorations, chocolate biscuits, (candied) cherries, blueberries, etc
Preparation:
  1. Prepare the pudding (boil it with milk and sugar, as the  recipe on the packing says), cool it. 
  2. Take a food processor, put the butter and powdered sugar inside and mix. Without stopping add one tablespoon of pudding, then another, till you mix all the pudding with butter and powdered sugar. 
  3. Mix all the ingredients of the punch (use any container you want, even a glass)
  4. Prepare a springform pan, cover the bottom with ladyfingers (preferably only one tier). Impregnate these ladyfingers with your punch. (1-2 teaspoons of punch per 1 ladyfinger is much enough, you'll see in what way your ladyfingers will react on 1 teaspoon of the punch - be careful not to make a mush)
  5. Take the currant/raspberry jelly and using a spoon, put some spoons of the jelly on a different parts of the ladyfingers, then link so that it covers the entire surface of the cake.
  6. Take the cream, prepared in the food processor, put a thick filling of it on the jelly. Don't worry if your jelly mixes a little with the cream. It is very hard to avoid it. If the entire surface is covered with cream, sprinkle it with some almond flakes. 
  7. Repeat points 4-6(ladyfingers, jelly,cream, flakes) till all the ladyfingers are gone. (save some cream for the side of the cake)There should be 2-3 tiers. The last tier are almond flakes. 
  8. Put your cake in the fridge.
  9. When the cake (especially the cream) gets harder (after some time, 1-3 hours) take off the side and use the rest of the cream on the cake's side. Then sprinkle cake's side with almond flakes. 
  10. Decorate the top of your cake with anything you want - biscuits, chocolate decorations, whipped cream, etc
  11. Keep the cake in the fridge.
  12. Bon appetit :)

Monday, 17 June 2013

(Un)usual pink coffee

Who said that coffee needs to be boring, black or white?
Well, well, it doesn't.

All we need is just ... our favourite coffee, and milk, which is mixed with colouring liquid (if not available in your shop, try internet shops) in our favourite colour. I used pink (even though this is not my favourite colour).


Ingredients:


Coffee:


  • one-two teaspoons of coffee
  • water

Optional ingredients:

  • one tiny drop of vanilla or almond or orange extract
  • once cardamom seed at the bottom of your coffee cup

Colourful milk:


  • around 50 ml of milk but it depends on your own taste
  • one colour you like


Preparation:

  1. Add optional ingredients if you wish. Pour coffe (without putting any milk yet) - leave some space on the top of your cup for the milk
  2. Put your milk in a milk jug. Put one drop of the colour into your milk. If you want more intense colour, put more drops, but one after another, not to exagerrate. 
  3. Prepare steamed milk.
  4. Take a spoon and put it gently on the edge of the jug, so that the milk that is still a liquid(the bottom of the milk jug) is poured to your coffee. (do it only if you want a white coffee. If not - skip that part)
  5. Take a spoon and put the steamed milk gently on the top of your coffee, starting from the middle. Cover the entire surface.
  6. Bon appetit!

The easiest ice-cream in this world - fruit ice cream


Well, according to the fact that it is almost summer, let's start from preparing some fruit ice-cream.

All we need is:


Ingredients:

  • one piece of every fruit we like - preferably citrus ones, like:
  • one orange
  • one kiwi
  • one mango
  • and of course some ice-cream form. I do recommend silicone ones - whatever we prepare. It is much easier in use. It is getting more and more popular, so we can buy a lot of forms almost everywhere.

 Here is an example of a form.

Preparation:

  1. Wash, peel and chop every fruit.
  2. If you don't like kernels or pulp - dab every fruit, one after another through sieve to get rid of them (I skipped that part)
  3. Put the first fruit in a blender/liquidizer - mix.
  4. Divide the fruit mousse - put some of it in every ice cream form hole. Don't forget to put the sticks.
  5. Freeze.
  6. Wash the blender and mix another fruit. Repeat the actions, dividing quite equally the mousse. Freeze again.
  7. Wash the liquidizer. Mix another fruit - of there is still a place for filling in your ice cream form and repeat previous steps. Freeze.
  8. Bon appetit ;)