Chicken Pot Pie

It has been a month since I’ve last eaten pasta, mainly because I’m trying really hard to reduce the size of my fabulous (motherly as my ex called them) hips. The road to not eating pasta has not always been easy. I have had my great days where I haven’t given my lovely friend pasta a thought but at times it can also be torture, where all I want to do is stuff my face with a big bowl of creamy pasta. I do still eat comfort food and putting something together might take some more planning but I’m hoping that it will all be worth it in the end…please tell me it will be.

I love stews and pies but have never had the courage to actually made one, but that all recently changed. In the past my friend Shannon has made a chicken pot pie recipe that can knock anybody’s socks off. She kindly sent me the link and before I could blink, I was in the kitchen cooking a storm away. This is one of Barefoot Contessa’s recipes and if you’ve heard of her, you’ll know that a tub of butter will get you anywhere.

This is fabulous recipe but it is not one that you can put together in twenty minutes. I’m sure there are ways you can cheat and eventually I will figure them out because I’ll be making this again but making this the first time nearly took me nearly 40ish minutes. The ingredients are as follows:

3 whole chicken breasts                                  2 tablespoons olive oil

5 cups chicken stock                                       1 chicken bouillon cube

12 tablespoons unsalted butter                         2 cups chopped yellow onions

¾ cup flour¼ cup heavy cream                         2 cups frozen peas

½ cup minced fresh parsley                               Salt and pepper

4 medium sized carrots, diced and blanched for 2 minutes

Before I go on, I should probably mention that there is also a list of ingredients for how to make the pie crust but I cheated and bought puff pastry which I used instead of laboring in the kitchen for hours.

I took the chicken breasts and rubbed them with olive oil, salt and pepper and roasted them in the oven for approximately 34 minutes. I then cut up the chicken into small cubes but mine weren’t that small and I have decided that next time I’m going to shred the chicken.

In a small pot, I heated chicken stock and one bouillon cube and left that to simmer for about twenty minutes. In a large pot (do use a large one and not a medium one like I did, it will make stirring so much easier and you won’t have to share your food with the stove either) I melted the butter and sautéed the onions for about 10 minutes until they were translucent. I then added the flour, stirring constantly (and I mean constantly) and slowly added the hot chicken stock to the sauce. The recipe indicates to leave this to simmer for about a minute until it thickens but I stirred mine all the way. The last part was the easiest, I simply seasoned the sauce, added the heavy cream, chicken, carrots and peas and hello I had a wonderful pot of chicken stew. I then took the puff pastry and baked it in the oven for about 10/15 minutes and when I dished it up, I simply tore off a piece and put it on top of the stew.

I am so proud of myself, this chicken pie dish is AMAZING and I’ll be making it again. The only negative aspect was that the stew was a bit thick but the taste was oh so good. This is a keeper, definitely worth making especially on a cold winter’s day.

Apple Crumble

A craving is like a drug, one that won’t go away until it has been fed. Mine started about a week ago when one of my students told me that her favorite dessert is warm apple pie with vanilla ice-cream and at that moment I knew that I badly needed some. I think I sulked for a day really wanting some and quickly realized that if I wanted apple pie I would have to make it myself.  Apple pie implies making a crust and that also implies baking and you all know that baking isn’t my cup of tea so I researched apple crisp and crumble recipes and decided on making the crumble instead. I realize that I took the easy way out but I promise one day I’ll challenge myself and make pie – that is of course after I’ve taken a course on how to make pie preferably somewhere in Italy with a hot Italian standing oh so close behind me showing me how to kneel dough…

I got home late on Thursday night and quickly ordered groceries and realized this morning that I forgot the ice-cream so I got up, showered and walked into town. It was and is bitter cold, but if you’re like me, determined to make something then nothing is going to stop you. I found my ice-cream and some other stuff that I didn’t really need, got home, took off my boots, walked into the kitchen poured myself a glass of wine (no, 2pm is not too early to start drinking) and started baking.

I found this recipe on epicurious.com and just love what they have. For this crumble I needed:

2 ½ cups of old fashioned oats

1 ½ cups of brown sugar

1 cup all purpose flour

1 cup (2 sticks) chilled unsalted butter, cut into ½ inch cubes

Nonstick vegetable oil spray (but butter works as well)

4 pounds Granny Smith apples, peeled, halved, cored, each half cut into 6 slices

3 tablespoons fresh lemon juice

1 tablespoon ground cinnamon

I pre-heated the oven to a180 degrees, put on some sexy music and started making this dish. I mixed all of the dry ingredients together, added the butter and “rubbed” everything together until it became moist clumps and set it aside. I peeled, cored, and cut the apples into thin slices and not into six slices as the recipe indicated.  I then mixed the apples with fresh lemon juice from a whole lemon (never underestimate the power of a lemon, I was clearly not thinking when I added the juice of a whole lemon), added some ground cinnamon and then realized that I had to add ½ cup of brown sugar into the apple mixture but I had put everything into the dry mixture (removing or trying to remove sugar from a dry mixture is no piece of cake).  I then transferred the apple mixture into a deep dish, sprinkled the topping on top and baked for approximately 50 minutes.

Apart from having added too much lemon, the crumble tasted great and looked good as well. I gave some to my roommates and they loved it and suggested I should make it over Thanksgiving. I ate the crumble with vanilla ice-cream and it was heaven in my mouth. I have one slice left and the longer the crumble sits that better it tastes. I major hit and I’ll be sure to make this again adding less lemon and maybe a bit more sugar (don’t hate a girl for having a sweet tooth). 

Italian Wedding Soup

I love soups and will be the first to admit that I’m not very good at making them but hold on, the soups that I’ve made (not that many actually) have come out pretty good, but I haven’t been able to master them yet. There is something about soup that terrifies me; maybe it’s something to do with the long ingredient list. Have you even seen anybody make soup using only five ingredients, because if you have please have them contact me.

If you happen to have a semi-soup phobia as me, you’ll be happy to know that there is “help” for us and the help ladies and gentlemen is can soup. I absolutely love can soup and miss them tremendously. I’m in my kitchen at the moment, grilling some vegetables (I am on this new health regime where I’m trying to eat more vegetables and TRYING not to eat carbohydrates at night), but I would kill for a grilled cheese sandwich and a can of chicken or mushroom soup.

At one point in my life while I was living in America, Thursdays used to be grilled cheese and can soup days and if I could turn back the clock, for a couple more of those days I would. I’ve come to the conclusion that we take the availability of food for granted. If I went into a store here in Poland and asked someone to show me where the canned soup aisle is, I would get laughed at. At the moment I have one can of imported mushroom soup that I paid a fortune for but I’m saving that for a rainy day

It must be that time of the month because I have been craving everything and one of those things was Italian Wedding Soup. Italian wedding soup and I met about six or seven years ago and it was love at first sight but he is sadly no longer available to me. I searched the Internet nearly like a mad woman until I found the perfect recipe and I think I did. While doing my recipe research, I stumbled upon a new cooking website called www.recipegirl.com and that is where I found my Italian Wedding Soup made by Barefoot Contessa. Let me just have a moment here and say how much I love Barefoot Contessa, she is simply amazing and when you get a moment, be sure to Google or you tube her. Anyways, I got home late Friday night and quickly ordered a few groceries online and crossed my fingers that I would find everything and I did except for fresh spinach. Seriously, how difficult would it really be to sell spinach in September?

This recipe really consisted of two separate stages which were later combined into something unbelievably good. The first step was to make the meatballs which consisted of the following ingredients: ground turkey, turkey sausage, breadcrumbs, minced garlic, fresh parsley, parmesan and pecorino cheese, milk, one egg and some salt & pepper. For the meatballs I only used about 500grams of turkey because I couldn’t find any turkey sausage. I should probably mention that here one can only find one type of sausage and I’ve got no idea what is in it, but I do know that it’s raw white sausage that’s cooked for approximately ten minutes and put on bread or the same sausage but instead of being raw and white, it’s orange and smoked.  I combined all of the ingredients into a bowl and mixed everything together and rolled them into 1-inch mini meatballs and baked them in the oven for about thirty minutes. After I took them out of the oven, I just had to taste one and boy where they good. They were crispy on the outside and juicy on the inside and the cheese added a little extra oomph.

After eating about five meatballs (still making sure they all tasted the same) I started making the soup. In a large pot I sautéed some carrots, celery and onion until softened. I then added ten cups of chicken stock and ¼ cup of dry wine and brought everything to a boil. I also added a cup of pasta to the broth and simmered for eight minutes or until the pasta was tender. Last but not least, I added the meatballs and ¼ cup of fresh dill.

I am proud of myself because this soup came out great. It really is unbelievably good and it is something I will definitely be making again. The meatballs were delicious, the carrots were borderline soft, the pasta was al dente and the dill gave it a nice twist. Next time I make this, I’ll have to find spinach just to see how it changes to the flavor of the soup and less pepper because I might have over seasoned it just a bit. I still have about a bowl left in the fridge and the longer the soup sits, the better the flavors become. Definitely a keeper!!

Frozen layer yogurt cake

I recently got back from England, where I spent little more than five weeks working at a summer camp. My experience was fabulous, the weather was ideal (for me it was but maybe not for the rest of the population) the people I met were incredible and the food, well let’s just say there was so much of it. I’m not a very big breakfast person but in all honesty, breakfast was the best. Every morning breakfast consisted of the following; eggs (usually fried or scrambled), bacon or sausages, toast (if we were lucky we would get bagels – oh how I miss you) and croissants but by the time we got finally got to the “buffet” table, they were usually gone. England feels like home but home isn’t there at the moment.

I’ve been back for approximately two weeks now and have lost my food-mojo. I realize that food-mojo might not exist but appetite sounds less exotic at the moment. It makes me sad to report this because I love food but it is true and the culprit ladies and gentlemen is the weather. A heat wave has taken over Poland and being awake takes up a lot of effort in itself so by the time I get to the kitchen nothing seems to be appealing. I’ve been living off a sandwich or two, so pathetic but oh so true….

I received my last Jamie Oliver magazine and have decided that I simply cannot afford to renew my subscription, so I’m going to have to make use of my 12 marvelous magazines that are currently building up dust in my room. The last magazine is all about summer, so I got a little bit excited and wondered if I could find something that called my name. I was able to find something that I hope is going to taste good and it’s in the freezer setting as we speak.

I’ve decided to make a layered yogurt cake that simply consists of four different types of fruit and a bit of natural yogurt. I got up this morning and told myself that today would be the day that I got off my pretty ass and walked to town. Walking into town was a horrible mistake on my part. It is about 34 degrees but it feels like 40 something with so much humidity, I feel as though I am back in Sicily and can’t seem to get comfortable. Yes, I even took an ice-cold shower but I’m still feeling incredibly HOT.

I ended up buying bananas, peaches, raspberries (should be interesting) and strawberries, which I might add were very expensive and not quite as sweet as the ones I tasted in England. I lined a loaf tin with clingfilm and in a food processor blitzed the bananas with four tablespoons of yogurt, poured the mixture into the loaf tin and placed it in the freezer for about 15 minutes. After about 15 minutes, I repeated the process with three more layers of fruit. I just recently finished the last layer, the raspberries looked gorgeous but the banana and peach mixture looked like baby food. I cheated a bit when I blended the strawberries because I added a bit of sugar but we all know that sugar is good because it supplies the body with energy. I managed to use up all the fruit that I purchased this morning and if you’re curious to know what happened to the rest of the yogurt, let’s just say it befriended the drain.

The cake looks delicious but the taste wasn’t really delicious, rather refreshing. The raspberries overpowered all the fruit.  I’m not sure if I would make this again, but if I did, I would use definitely include blueberries. Presentation a hit but the taste was a miss and I’m not sure what the purpose of the yogurt was. 

Lemon-rhubarb chicken

I seem to cook less as the days are getting warmer. Summer equals being lazy and not doing much and cooking somehow seems to require quite a bit of energy. It was my turn to cook Sunday dinner this week and before this week had started; I knew it was going to have to be something light. At one point I was contemplating making pizza but it was a no go however, I am determined to make it.

I challenged myself and decided to use rhubarb, an ingredient that I have never tasted nor held before. I found an amazing bon appétit lemon- rhubarb chicken recipe that was posted on epicurious.com and knew that it would be an interesting cooking adventure.  Do you ever notice that people always seem to use the same ingredients over and over again, why are we so hesitant to try something different?

This week I decided to make lemon-rhubarb chicken, jasmine rice (let me just say this up front – I cheated and bought the box kind), a side order of carrots & green beans and a quick and easy cheesecake (don’t get too excited because there is a twist and it’s not your average cheesecake). The recipe was split into two part; one being the stuffing and the other the sauce. Before I started cooking I took out all the ingredients and laid them on the counter so I wouldn’t forget anything. Chopping the rhubarb took up quite a bit of time and 30 minutes later I was ready to begin. I made the rhubarb stuffing first which consisted of 2 tablespoons of chopped shallots, 2 cups of rhubarb and lemon juice. In a pot I melted 2 tablespoons of butter, added all of the ingredients, sautéed it for approximately 5 minutes and seasoned it with salt and pepper. To those of you who don’t know me, I am a very vocal person and when I tasted the stuffing I screamed. It had the nastiest taste ever! It was extremely bitter and tangy and I hate bitter food with a passion and hoped that somehow the sauce would even out the taste.  

 

Next step was making the sauce. In a large pot I melted butter, added 2 cups of rhubarb, ¼ cup of shallots and ginger. Sautéed for about ten minutes and added some sugar and ¼ cup of brandy, chicken broth, star anise and a bay leaf. The sauce simmered over low heat for an hour. After an hour I discarded the solids in a strainer and added some of the stuffing into the sauce. When I think of a sauce, I picture something thick and this sauce wasn’t. It was more of a broth but boy was it delicious. It was sweet with a bit of tanginess and this is something I will have to make again. So damn good.  After the sauce was done, I preheated the oven and stuffed the chicken with the rest of the leftover stuffing.

While the chicken was baking in the oven, I stared making the rest my menu. I cooked the rice and by that I mean I just put two bags of rice in a boiling pot and ten minutes later it was done. I love rice and when I was younger I knew how to cook it but than I moved to America and got lazy and started buying the box kind and now have difficulties cooking rice. I realize how stupid it must sound, but it’s true. In a separate pot I boiled water and cooked some cut-up carrots and green beans which I later coated with butter and breadcrumbs and lightly fried it. This is a homemade recipe my mom used to make and it is tasty. While I was busy getting the vegetables and rice ready, I would ever now and then check on the chicken and glaze it with some of the sauce.

I know I have said this before and I will say it again – I am baker but I really wanted to make some kind of a dessert. In a wine glass I crumbled some ginger cookies, next came the cream (in a bowl I whipped some mascarpone cheese, vanilla extract, sugar and heavy cream. I thought the mascarpone would be sweet and took a big bite only to realize that it had no flavor and it was my second horrible surprise of the day which resulted in another scream), on top of the cream I added some good quality strawberry jam and fresh strawberries and that ladies and gentlemen is my version of a cheesecake.

Dinner was delicious; the sauce was the winner by far, the vegetables were crunchy and the dessert was oh so good that I more or less licked the bowl (not with my tongue but finger). The only downfall is that I might have overcooked the chicken by two/three minutes. Lovely light Sunday dinner.

Falafel Burgers

My food journey this week had me reminiscing my fabulous time in Sicily and just how much I miss it. A few years ago on a hot summer’s day, my friends and I were sitting in a café (but I think it was more of a “healthy” fast food place) in an alley enjoying each others company. I think our aim was to go to this place because it sold cheap beer and we all know how refreshing ice cold beer is on a hot day. It was a fabulous evening, not only did we have lots of beer but we also ordered food and smoked a hookah. For only 10 Euros one could order a big hookah delivered to your table with your choice of tea leaves. Is it possible to get high on tea leaves, because I’m sure nobody did? One of my friends had ordered a falafel burger and after taking a bite, I knew I needed to order one for myself. Who would have thought that vegetables and spices could make a burger taste so good. It was a priceless evening;  a bunch of us sitting outside somewhere in an alley, surrounded by tons of people going on about their own business, drinking beer, smoking and eating falafel burgers.

 

I was browsing the bbcgoodfood website this week and jumped with joy when I came across a falafel burger recipe and just knew that this would be the one to make. Friday morning after I finished teaching I quickly went to the store and bought all the ingredients that I needed. The main ingredient for a falafel burger is chickpeas. I am not a fan of beans regardless of how good they are for our bodies (and whenever I eat them, I feel bloated and it leaves me farting which is so embarrassing but true) but have come to love chickpeas.

I got home, took out all of my ingredients and “throw” them into a food processor. Oh the joy of a food processor, can you just imagine how difficult life would be if we have to stir, chop, mix, smash things ourselves?  A quick little note here, I do not own a food processor but my friend Shannon does and I promise that one day when I have my own place, I’ll be the owner of a fabulous funky looking food processor.  I took one can of chickpeas, a few garlic cloves, some fresh parsley, cumin, coriander, chili powder, flour and salt and the food processor did the rest. Once everything was blended smooth, I then shaped the mixture into four patties and fried them for approximately four minutes on each side.

 

The taste of these burgers was really good, the combination of all the spices worked well together but they kept falling apart. When you make a burger you usually add an egg or breadcrumbs to keep the mixture together, but the falafel recipe didn’t include any of that.

The recipe only called for adding two tbs of flour but that simply isn’t enough. I will make this recipe again, but will have to tweak it a bit and add something to keep it all together.

All is all a wonderful recipe.

Burgers

A burger should be an easy thing to make but in reality it isn’t. I spend this week worrying about how to make the perfect burger. I must have looked at about five or six different websites trying to find the perfect recipe. I live with two wonderful friends who happen to have a bit of a different taste to food than I do. Knowing what they like and don’t like was something I also had to take into consideration while I was searching.

I don’t particularly like red meat but from time to time I’ll have something with ground beef in it (guess my body needs the protein, right?). I am not someone who tends to order a burger in a restaurant but recently I have found a sandwich shop near my house that makes the best burgers. A simple classic burger but it is seasoned well and cooked to perfection. Pure joy I tell you. Summer is more or less here and I didn’t feel like making anything heavy today so I decided on making a burger. Hold on for a sec, I didn’t just make one burger but ended up making two different kinds and get ready for this, I also made rosemary roasted garlic potatoes and cream corn (I can hear your thoughts – what the hell was she thinking?) but it wasn’t as difficult as I thought it would be. Most women can multi-task and I happen to be one of them.

I woke up this morning with the start of a sinus headache and by the time I got up from my afternoon nap I was in serious pain. I took something and off to the kitchen I went with my wild bed hair, headache and pj’s (Sunday is the one day where I don’t worry how I look, so please do not judge me). I knew that if I wanted to have everything ready at the same time I needed to be focused and organized.

Step one:

I started on the potatoes because I knew that they would take the longest to cook. I preheated the oven to about 230 and I washed and cut up some potatoes into 1-inch wedges. I took the potatoes and mixed them together with a couple of smashed garlic cloves, some salt and pepper, fresh rosemary sprigs (I think everyone is meant to have a rosemary plant in their kitchen so if you don’t, please do get one the next time you are out) and some olive oil. I then layered the potatoes onto a hot tray and baked them in the oven for approximately 45 minutes but every ten minutes or so I would turn them.

Step two:

While my potatoes were baking I decided to make my first set of burgers. I made some fabulous Spiced Thai Burgers that (a) one of my friends had sent me and (b) that I couldn’t eat because they were too bloody spicy. The basic components of a spiced Thai burger are: ground turkey, peanuts, scallions, garlic, chili, fresh coriander, lime and some salt and pepper. In a food processor I mixed the peanuts, scallions, garlic and chili. I could not find fresh chili but I was able to find some in a jar. I don’t eat chili and they looked so small so instead of only using one I decided to use four or maybe five (sometimes it is good not to change the recipe!!!) and added the mixture into the turkey along with some lime zest and  juice, fresh chopped coriander and some salt and pepper.

Step three:

While the spiced Thai burgers were “marinating” in the fridge, I started making the other burgers. Making these burgers was difficult because I still wasn’t sure how exactly I would be seasoning them. I decided to go with the less is more theory and just ended up seasoning them with some salt & pepper, and Worcestershire sauce. I then put them in the fridge for about ten minutes. You know what they say “the longer you leave the burger, the better it will taste”.

While my burgers were marinating I started making cream corn. I have always loved cream corn and for as long as I can remember I have always eaten it straight from a tin.  One of the joy’s of living in a big country is that you can find anything. Since moving to Europe about two years ago and found out that I couldn't  find nor buy cream corn here, my heart has been broken. One of my dear friends Shannon is always making her own things; her theory is that if you can’t find it then make it yourself. About a month ago she made cream corn and it was tasty. So after thinking about it and talking about it forever, I finally decided that I would try making my very own cream corn. This recipe called for combining corn, heavy cream, salt, sugar, butter in a pot and adding some milk and flour and stirring it until it thickens. I made the cream corn and it tasted good but I still prefer the one from a can. Guess some things are meant to be from a tin.

When I finally had all the cream corn ingredients in a pot, I started frying up some bacon and burgers. At certain moments I had my right hand stirring the corn and my left hand flipping burgers and making sure my bacon wasn’t burning. Multi-tasking is possible but not always easy. Fifteen minutes later everything was ready. By everything I really mean everything; burgers – check, crispy bacon – check, roasted potatoes – check, cream corn – check and the rolls were in the oven – check. I ALSO somehow managed to set the table with a few extra burger goodies.

 

I had a little bit of everything but really only loved the rosemary roasted potatoes and the “regular” burgers. The potatoes were so good. I don’t eat a lot of potatoes but every time I do they seem to taste fabulous. The so called regular burger wasn’t regular but delicious (the secret is to coat the burger with some mustard while it’s cooking), it was juicy and cooked to perfection. Served with some sautéed onions (made those as well), cheese and bacon made it all even better and it makes my mouth water just thinking of it again.

After taking a bite of the Thai burger I decided that I wasn’t going to eat it. It was too spicy for me. The burger was seasoned well (both my roommates preferred this burger) but it was too much for me. Not sure if I would make this burger again but it is a wonderful recipe to pass on to someone who likes spicy food.

Apple Crumbe

When life gives you lemons we are meant to make lemonade – okay true but only if you are allowed to add tons of sugar. When I think of lemons (mind you this does not happen often) I just want to take out a medium sized sugar jar and burry the damn lemons underneath it. As some of you might notice here, a lemon is an ingredient that I have a taste for. But nevertheless I ended up using it this week.

I had a sudden craving for apples this week and wondered what kind of chicken apple recipe I could find but then thought to hell with it and decided on making apple crumble instead. I found myself surfing the food network website until I found the perfect apple crumble recipe written by the one and only Melissa d’ Arabian (I have never heard of her nor do I know who she is) and before I knew it I was in the kitchen cooking up a storm so to speak.

To make an apple crumble we need the following ingredients:

apples

zest & the juice of one lemon

a bit of sugar

a bit of cinnamon

a pinch of salt

some flour

brown sugar

unsalted butter and a cup of oats.

At the moment I am currently located in Europe in one of the international cities of Poland and for most part we can find everything except for crabmeat, creamy salad dressings and most of the American stuff that I need and miss and a long list of other things but that isn’t important at the moment. I quickly popped by a grocery store and had the hardest time finding oats. I stood in front of the cereal aisle and believe it or not, they didn’t have oats. Seriously how difficult would it be to import oats? Long story short I did indeed find oats at an international shop and nearly paid a fortune for a five small sachets because selling it in a box is obviously too difficult.

This was such an easy recipe to follow. I pre-heated the oven and combined flour, sugar, salt and oats in a bowl. In another bowl I simple mixed sliced up apples, cinnamon, salt and lemon juice and I just had to take a taste to see what the filling would taste like. I tasted an overpowering taste of lemon and when that hit my tongue I cringed and added some more sugar. In a casserole dish I melted the butter and poured the butter into the flour mixture and incorporated it with a fork. In the baking dish I “arranged” the apples and topped it with the flour mixture and baked it for approximately 45 minutes.

I just love a hot sweet dessert with ice-cream served on the side. The apple crumble was delicious. The oats topping was crunchy, the apples were all soft and gooey and even a bit sweet but you could take the tartness of the lemon. Had I not had ice-cream, I don’t think I would have been able to eat this. The lemon added a bit too much tartness for my liking. I will make this again but I will have to double the amount of sugar and cinnamon. What can I say…this gal has a sweet tooth.

Shepherds Pie

I am not a huge fan of potatoes or red meat but every now and then I just have to have some. A wonderful way of having two things you don’t really like it to simply combine them together with a few extra bits of this and that…

In my first year of college I was sitting in the cafeteria enjoying lunch with another student (no I do not remember her name or what she looked like – sorry) when she mentioned the words “shepherds pie”. Right than and there I demanded for her to tell me more. This woman’s recipe sounded so amazing…mashed potatoes, ground beef and her secret ingredient was creamed corn. I remember writing down every word and before I knew it, I was baking my very own shepherd’s pie. People let me tell you it was delicious. So delicious that I have been using the same recipe for the last decade (okay maybe not decade, I’m not that old!!)

As most of you might have noticed I am a big foodie and over the years I have been watching Hell’s Kitchen on and off. I recently got back into watching the show and I absolutely wish I could meet Gordon Ramsey. On TV he seems like the worst dragon but a big part of me believes (and hopes) that he is a sweet gentleman in real life. For some reason I cannot get myself to believe that someone could be that cold and rude, but than again we don’t live in a perfect world so anything is possible.

This week I decided to step into Gordon’s “kitchen” and cooked his famous shepherd’s pie. Before I give you all the juicy details about my cooking experience this week, you’ll be happy to know that I wasn’t cooking in my pj’s and I am proud to inform you that maybe this will not become a habit after all.  The recipe called for a few simple ingredients and most of them I had at home. I purchased ground beef, Worcestershire sauce, red wine (the recipe called for about ¼ cup but believe me more was needed), tomato puree (this is something I never have in my cupboards) and the rest are things I always seem to have – carrots, onions, fresh rosemary & thyme (but I cheated here and used dry thyme), garlic, salt and pepper.

I began by cutting up a few potatoes and made some mashed potatoes. I always find it interesting what people use to make mashed potatoes. According to chef Ramsay one needs heavy cream, butter, egg yolks and parmesan cheese and according to my friend Shannon one needs butter and milk (a small note her – Shannon’s potatoes are AMAZING) but I make mine with butter and sour-cream. Don’t pull your nose at me…try it and you’ll see just how delicious it tastes!!!

While the potatoes were boiling, I stared all the prep work and made the beef mixture. Into a pan I poured some olive oil and added the meat (according to the recipe the meat had to be stirred as if my life depended on it – and that is just what I did).  After stirring for a few minutes, I then added the rosemary, thyme and garlic and did some more stirring. I then quickly HAD to add the carrots, onion and did some more stirring and last by not least added the sauce, tomato puree and red wine and did some more stirring. At this point my arm started hurting and I was in serious need of a glass of wine.  No where in the recipe did it indicate to put in the salt and pepper and truth be told salt and pepper wasn’t enough. After tasting the beef I had to added a little more of my own stuff….if I remember correctly I added some curry, cayenne pepper, and maybe even some cinnamon (guess I was going for the Greek flavor) and it all tasted good.

For the final part I scooped in my meat mixture into a deep dish and then spooned mashed potatoes over the top (I did leave some mashed potatoes and meat so that I could taste/eat while I was waiting for my pie to bake) and sprinkled a generous portion of parmesan cheese and into the oven it went for approximately 20 minutes. While the pie was baking, I was enjoying the exotic smell in the kitchen and ate the little that I had put aside but that little ended up being more than I thought it would be and by the time my pie came out I wasn’t that hungry anymore (a brief note here – do not taste/eat your food while cooking).

All in all I was happy with the recipe – the beef mixture was juicy and semi-sweet with a bit of a spice. The potatoes were oh so good with a crispy cheese topping and the combination of everything put together worked well but I don’t think I will make it again. Old habits don’t always die and as much as I enjoyed making and eating chef Ramsay’s shepherds pie – I enjoy my own version better and will be making it more often after I have mastered how to make my own creamed corn.

Warm Zucchini Bread

A good friend of mine emailed me on facebook asking if I would bake her a cake. As some of you know baking is a dangerous territory for me, but curiosity got the best of me and I opened the link she had sent me. Joanne wanted me to bake a “Leprechaun Trap Cake” that was layered with at least seven different kinds of food coloring. This looked like something from a candy shop and I couldn’t help but laugh out loud. I am not Martha Steward and I could never even attempt to try to bake something so extravagant (okay maybe in a different life).

In honor of Joanne, I decided to bake something today. Before I tell you what it is, you’ll be happy to know that I did not use a Jamie Oliver recipe. I stepped out of my comfort zone and explored the wonderful world of www.foodnetwork.com and found an amazing Zucchini Bread recipe that Emeril Lagasse created.

Zucchini and I have never been real friends up until about three years ago and then it was love at first sight. I was living in Italy at the time and during one of my early morning English lesson’s a student told me she was hosting a party and me being a foodie asked her what she was making. In a very detailed description she told me about a zucchini dish she was going to make and when the lesson ended I stopped at a market on my way home and bought all the ingredients and it was amazing and I have been a fan of zucchini ever since.

What is it about zucchini that is so delicious? It is a plain green vegetable that tastes bland but if prepared properly can taste amazing. I have always in the past just grilled zucchini but this week I decided to try something new and as I am writing this I am surrounded by an exotic smell coming from the oven and I just want the cooking time to speed up (just peeked at the timer and five more minutes to go).

I woke up early this morning and had the sudden urge to bake and just like the preview week I was in the kitchen wearing my pajamas cooking away (I was well aware that I was in my pajamas and think that maybe this will become a habit of mine). The recipe was quite easy to follow and I really hope that I didn’t leave out an ingredient. I preheated the oven to about 180 and then shredded an unpeeled zucchini – if Emeril was sitting in my kitchen I would probably ask him why the zucchini needed to be unpeeled but he is the chef and he knows best and I’m just following the recipe.

Ever notice how ingredients always seem to end of everywhere regardless of how neat we try to be. In a bowl I sifted flour, cinnamon, nutmeg, baking soda, baking powder and salt (part of me understands the purpose of sifting but another part of me wonders why bother…at the end of the day it will all be combined). Sifting the dry ingredients was no picnic simply because I don’t own a sifter so I had to use a pasta strainer instead which led to an arm work-out and dry ingredients everywhere. I then took another big bowl and combined brown sugar, an egg and some butter. Touching butter is something that I truly don’t like doing. I find it to be too sticky and oily and getting the grease off my hands is easy.

After I creamed the wet ingredients, I added the dry ingredients and mixed it all together. I then added the shredded zucchini and some walnuts. The recipe calls for pouring the mixture in a pan and baking it for 55 minutes. The bread did indeed bake for about 55 minutes but there wasn’t any pouring because the batter wasn’t liquid but rather nearly a firm ball of dough. I panicked but just for a moment and thought the hell with it and prayed that it would work out for the best.

Ladies and gentlemen this recipe is a winner. It came out great…crispy on the outside and moist on the inside.  The very small downfall is that it’s a bit too sweet for my taste (next time I will use less sugar or cinnamon and yes there will be a next time) but the combination of walnuts on the inside and a slice of butter on top brings it all nicely together. A big hands of applause to Emeril Lagasse.

Spinach & Ricotta Cannelloni

I had quite an interesting cooking experience today, the end result was marvelous but the process was quite frazzling.  Now here I am sitting on the floor thinking to myself how happy I am that it’s over. My theme for this week was Italian, oh boy how I do love pasta. I decided on making a Spinach & Ricotta Cannelloni recipe that I found in my recent Jamie Oliver magazine.

I guess you might be thinking why another Jamie Oliver recipe and the answer is simply because I like his recipes (even though I don’t always understand his choice of ingredients). Whenever I look at recipes I tend to look at the pictures first and the pictures in his magazines are simply divine. They are so vibrant that it would be a sin not to cook them.

After “memorizing” the recipe, I knew I was going to have to personalize it mainly because I am not a big fan of spinach. I can eat spinach but only in small quantities. There is something so wrong about eating it; and I am yet to meet someone who absolutely loves it –loves it in a way that I love strawberries on a hot summer’s day with lots of sugar on it.

This recipe called for multi-tasking which I can normally do but multi-taking while cooking is quite a different story. Let’s just say I had “crap” scattered all over the place. I started by cutting up some onions and two cloves of garlic which I put aside for a bit. I was suppose to use fresh spinach leaves but that didn’t happen because I am currently located in Poland and Poland is well know known for cabbage and I still have to find a store that sells all kinds of fresh herbs. I cheated and used a frozen bag of shredded spinach which I dumped into a medium sided pot and seasoned it with salt, pepper and nutmeg. One minute later I removed it from the pot and set it to one side. I then added the chopped onion, garlic, two tins of tomatoes, a bay leave and some lemon zest into the post. The recipe itself stated that we should just season it with some salt and pepper but let me tell you, that is not the case. Seasoning tomato sauce with just salt and pepper in my opinion is simply not enough. Tomatoes tend to have a bitter taste and need to be sweetened with a little something extra. My tomato sauce was seasoned with salt, pepper, sugar, curry and red wine. It was sweet with a bit of a spicy kick. While my tomato sauce was simmering I moved onto the next step and this is where I personalized the recipe. I took out a jar of homemade bolognaise and poured half of the sauce into a small pot (there is nothing wrong with good quality bolognaise) and then added some raw ground beef (some of you might know this as mince) and cooked it for about twenty minutes.

My next step was creating a spinach stuffing which consisted of using the previously cooked spinach, about 250grams of ricotta cheese, some parmesan cheese and one egg. I was suppose to use a piping bag (what the hell is a piping bag?) but I don’t own any of those fancy bags so I simply used a regular freezer Ziploc bag and had one of my roommate spoon the mixture into the bag.  This was my first time stuffing cannelloni tubes and let me tell you it was not an easy job. Never stuff food wearing your pajamas people; I learned the hard way today that it’s not a very smart idea. Please do not judge me for cooking dinner in my pj’s because Sundays are my “don’t care how I look kind of days” and I am allowed to me and do whatever I please.

Now getting back to stuffing the cannelloni, I had somehow managed to splatter

spinach all over my top -guess that happens when one squeezes the mixture to fast. I then took the bolognaise and stuffed the remainder of the cannelloni’s and let me tell you this is where the “fun” really started. I had to cut a small opening in my “piping” bag and a piece of plastic fell into the cannelloni as it was being filled (no I did not remove it because I could not be bothered re-filling the tube and just prayed that no one would come across the plastic) and after I had filled all the tubs, I poured the sauce over and layered some fresh mozzarella cheese on top and into the oven it went for approximately 40 minutes.

While my pasta dish was baking, I started preparing a side order of grilled zucchini which is my favorite vegetable dish thus far and so easy to make. I simply sliced up the zucchini, seasoned with it with salt and pepper, dipped it into an egg and breadcrumb mixture and fried it for six minutes and bam – zucchini is ready. Italians love bread so I decided to make my own garlic bread. As I was chopping up some garlic I accidentally cut my finger…lovely just what I needed, my second disaster but after a quick mini band-aid break I was ready to get back into the ring and finished this meal. When the pasta was ready I quickly put the garlic bread into the oven and five minutes later we were all ready to eat. (a small note here that when I opened the oven door I was greeted by a slap of smoke that went straight to my eyes – disaster number three….)

Dinner however was delicious. The pasta sauce was rich but not in an overwhelming way with a bit of sweetness and spiciness to it. The cannelloni’s were sooo good but I preferred the bolognaise ones rather then the spinach ones. My last disaster of the evening happened when I took my first bite and bit into the plastic that had previously fallen in. Oh well, guess it was just my luck. I really enjoyed my cannelloni experience but I have never cooked something where I had so many bad things happen to me. Dinner was a tasty success and I am going to think of my little disasters as luck for my next upcoming cooking journey.

Crema Fritta

We all love dessert and if you happen to know someone who doesn’t, feel free to introduce them to me so that I can sit them down and tell them what they are missing.  For as long as I can remember my mother has always been an amazing baker. When it comes to cakes that woman knows what she is doing. One of my childhood favorites is something that she calls "alcoholic".  An alcoholic is a rich dark chocolate cake filled with jam in the center and topped with chocolate frosting that consists of sour cream, cocoa, sugar and brandy.  My mouth is watering at the moment and I want that cake!!

I love cooking and I know what my strengths are and making dessert isn’t one of them. I took home -economics in high school and remember my first baking assignment. I had to bake cream puffs and long story short, the cream had no place to go because the puffs wouldn’t rise. I ended up serving the cream next to my flat puffs…the reaction on my teachers face was priceless. When it comes to baking, the experience is always interesting but the outcome usually ends up disastrous. My unfortunate baking is a continuous circle.

I am simply not meant to bake but that didn’t stop me from trying one more time. I love to challenge myself or try to do it as often as I can and here I am, writing about my baking journey.  In the latest Jamie Oliver magazine they have pages of Italian desserts and having lived in Italy I know how delightful they are. I decided to try making Crema Fritta which is simply deep-fried custard.

To make the custard, you need to boil 500ml of milk. Into the milk you need to place one vanilla pod (yesterday afternoon I quickly popped into a store and bought a vanilla pod. I realized two things; the first is that I wasn’t aware of how expensive a vanilla pod would be and the second is that I’m not sure if it is reusable. Is it reusable?) and one rind of either a lemon or an orange.  Why do cookbooks/magazines use fancy words…a rind really, why not just use the word skin?

While I was waiting for the milk to boil, I moved onto the next step. In a bowl I added 500g of sugar, three egg yolks and 50 grams of cornflower and mixed it together with a wooden spoon. As the milk started boiling, I removed the vanilla pod and rind and slowly added half of the milk into my egg/sugar mixture stirring constantly. I then poured the custard into the pot with the remaining milk, returned it to the stove to cook for a few more minutes. While I was stirring and waiting for the custard to thicken (which took a while, or so it seemed) I gave myself a little speech, you can do this, you can do this. As the custard was thickening I felt so proud of myself. I was actually making custard from scratch and I was kicking-ass, in a good way mind you.

After the custard was made, I poured the mixture onto a baking sheet that I had covered with clingfilm beforehand and then covered the surface with more clingfilm. After it cooled for a while I put it in the fridge for a few hours. Just before taking it out, I took a pot filled it with oil, whisked three eggs whites together and took out some breadcrumbs. Dipped the custard squares in the egg whites, breadcrumbs and fried until golden brown.

These little treats are out-of-this world, crispy on the outside, soft and gooey on the inside. I now honestly understand why people fry dessert. If you love custard then this recipe is a must. I am looking at the plate trying to restrain myself from eating them all in one go. A few hours have passed since I stared writing this post and I'm happy to report that there are no more crema fritta's left. My roommates and I enjoyed the last few outside on our little terrace, surrounded by music, stars and candels.  A fabulous recipe for a fabulous evening.

Roasted Shrimp with Rosemary & Thyme

I came across a wonderful shrimp recipe and just knew that I had to cook it. I realize some of you might be wondering why shrimp, what’s so special about it? In all honesty, I don’t really know. I can’t find the correct wording to describe the texture of shrimp but if you asked me what chips or chicken tasted like I would have no problem giving you a mini description. To me chips are crispy with a hint of salt or any other spice and they are so good that you can’t simply just have one or ten but the whole packet and yes all in one go AND if you’re really feeling brave feel free to lick the packaging as well.

About a week ago I received a recipe for Roasted Shrimp with Rosemary & Thyme emailed to me from finecooking.com.  After reading the recipe and yes also looking at the picture and realizing that I would only need eight simple ingredients I decided that this would be the one.  The recipe called for olive oil which I always have on hand, black ground pepper and salt which is a must in our household, fresh rosemary sprigs, fresh thyme, shrimp and white wine vinegar. I had all of the ingredients at home minus the shrimp and the white wine vinegar which I ended up omitting because I’m not a fan of vinegar. 

The preparation time was approximately five to ten minutes and it was the easiest recipe to make. I first pre-heated the oven to 200‘. I then poured some olive oil into a baking dish, added a few rosemary leaves, thyme, chopped up a few garlic gloves, some pepper and into the oven the baking dish went. This mixture was supposed to cook for roughly 12 minutes.

Six minutes into the cooking time I decided to take a little peek and boy did I freak-out. I had smoke coming from the oven, the rosemary and thyme were black, and although the whole mixture was black nothing seemed burnt (but a brief second I thought I was going to have to start over) and after I showed it to my roommate who said it looked fine, I took a risk added the shrimp and shoved the whole thing back into the oven.  Twelve minutes later I was ready to eat.

It all looked so good; the shrimp was cooked to perfection, the herbs sautéed in olive oil gave the shrimp a pleasant color but (yes, there is a but) the flavor was bland. I was not happy with the taste at all. I think I might know what the problem is; I did not use fresh thyme and maybe didn’t add enough rosemary. If I were to cook this again, I would definitely season it stronger. In all honesty I was disappointed, it all seemed too easy and simple and it didn’t come out as I expected. Not a winner but maybe worth trying again someday.

Roast Chicken with Lemon and Rosemary Roast Potatoes

I am a huge foodaholic and miss watching the food network channel, miss watching Emeril saying “bam/feel the love” whenever he adds an ingredient into a dish, or watching Barefoot Contessa add huge globs of butter into nearly everything and let’s not forget Paula Deen who is a chef that every person wants in their own kitchen.

While living in Europe I discovered another fabulous chef, not American but English this time. I remember standing in a bookshop briefly browsing through magazines when I came across Jamie Oliver – his magazine was of great quality and the freshness of the paper really impressed me, as if I was opening a new book for the first time. The recipes and pictures were out of this world and 45z later (which is a ridiculous amount of money to pay for a magazine -an English book cost 45z and who in there right mind pays that much for a magazine) I walked out feeling as if I had just won the lottery. One magazine led to another and before I knew it, I had purchased a two year subscription and am currently the proud owner of eight marvelous magazines.

Recently I came to the conclusion that I would like to do more than just look at my lovely cookbooks and magazines, so I have decided that I’m going to start a little project. Every week I’ll pick a recipe, either from my books/magazines or simply find one on the Internet. My aim is to cook something that I’ve never cooked before and write about the experience…regardless of whether the outcome is good or bad.

I began my journey yesterday and was tremendously pleased with the outcome. I ended up cooking Jamie Oliver’s Roast Chicken with Lemon and Rosemary Roast Potatoes and to put it in a nice way, we all ate like kings. The recipe itself was pretty easy to follow and I’m happy to announce that there were no mess-ups along the way.

Step one was seasoning a 2kg chicken and leaving it to marinate overnight in the fridge. Touching/prepping a whole chicken is not what I call enjoyment but someone had to do it. The following afternoon the chicken baked for 45 minutes. While the chicken was baking, next came the potatoes which were very easy to prepare because I simply had to parboil them with a whole bulp of garlic and a lemon. After my potatoes were cooked, I removed the lemon and carefully stabbed it ten times (have you ever held a lemon after it has boiled in hot water, well for one its hot and two it was light, as if I was holding a water balloon. I really wasn’t expecting that) before putting the lemon, garlic and some thyme into the cavity of the chicken. I then took the potatoes, some fresh vegetables and lay them around the chicken and sprinkled some fresh rosemary. Before returning the chicken/potatoes back into the oven, I laid some sliced bacon on top of the breast and further cooked everything for another 45 minutes.

While everything was baking, I decided to cook two small side dishes. I sliced up some carrots, cooked them in some salted water and served them with butter and parsley. I also made my favorite zucchini dish, which simply consists of slicing zucchini into thin slices, dipping them into an egg batter and breadcrumbs, lightly frying them on each side and shredding some parmesan on top. This zucchini is heaven in your mouth, it really is.

As my chicken was hitting the 45 minute mark, my mother arrived and I slowly started panicking mainly because the chicken wasn’t quite fully cooked yet (I had this perfect picture of how I wanted everything to look)  and I also wanted to impress not only my mother but also my friends.  Fifteen minutes later, everything was cooked and we all sat down for a lovely meal. The chicken was roasted to perfection, the skin was crispy and the insides were juicy. The potatoes were crispy, the garlic was sweet and rosemary gave it all some extra oomph. You know a recipe is great when everyone wants seconds and "flight" to see who can find the last piece of crispy bacon.