Spring Has Sprung (carrot salad)

I work at a university, so I expect to hear some stuff in the workplace that does not normally feature during an office day. I don’t bat an eyelash when I overhear a bragging session about copious amounts of alcohol consumed on a Tuesday night. Teary conversations about how, exactly, “that bastard dumped me” don’t register on my radar anymore. And complaints of “I haven’t been able to do laundry in three weeks” just make me giggle. But today, I was faced with a case of Too Much Information, Entirely.

The local student paper does a piece every week called Cute Couple. Two people are interviewed about their relationship and things they like about each other. You get useless, but entertaining, information like “I love her blue eyes” and “he makes great omelettes”. Apparently, someone thought this was boring and decided to spice things up. This week, they added the question “what’s your favourite sexual position?”.

They answered. For all their colleagues/ fellow students to read.

Seriously.

Much more pleasingly, spring was also announced by students today. When I stepped out of the building during lunch break, there they were. Spread all over the grass, soaking up the rays. Feeble rays, admittedly, but a sure sign of spring nonetheless. Finally. And what better way to celebrate the onset of spring than with a salad? So I give you: carrot salad.

Like all grated carrot salads, this is easy going. You grate a few carrots (just two large carrots gave me the bowl you see above) and mix them with a tablespoon or so of lemon juice. Toss in a good sprinkling of poppy seeds and a handful of raisins. Et voila: carrot salad. No exact directions necessary, but please don’t skip the poppy seeds. They give the mixture that festive crunch perfect for celebrating spring.

Amsterdam Food

From the side:


And from the front:

Kaaskamer van Amsterdam (Amsterdam's Cheese Room), Runstraat, Negen Straatjes (Nine Streets, Jordaan neighborhood)

Microwave bacon

A girl on the bus this afternoon, quite loudly while the rest of her conversation with friends had been hushed: “Well, obviously she is a lesbian.” And obviously the rest of the bus chose that exact moment to pause its conversations. The now-bright-red girl: “Not that there is anything wrong with that, of course.”

Ah, the joys of putting your foot in it publicly. I sympathize- I am about to talk about something considered shocking by quite a few people. Well, my man anyway, but I am inclined to think he is not alone. What is this shocking thing, you ask? Why, it is love for bacon. Crispy bacon, to be exact.

I’ve tried being a vegetarian a few times, but failed each time. I do not eat that much meat, but cannot stand the idea of never eating certain meaty treats again. One of my strongest ties to the carnivorous world is streaky bacon, cooked for so long that the fat crackles between my teeth when I bite into it. I like it on sandwiches, in salads and pastas and love it on its own. There is one drawback, though. (Well, two if you count the high saturated fat count, but sometimes it is worth it for a mouthful of salty perfection.) The smell of cooking bacon, no matter how delicious when you are anxiously awaiting your first bite, is far less compelling when it lingers in your house two days later. And linger it does.

Fortunately, there is a quick and easy way to cook bacon that does away with the problem. Would you like to know the secret? Go on, you know you do.

Here, I’ll tell you: a microwave oven and some baking parchment. You put the bacon on a sheet of baking parchment (I’ve put mine in a special “crisping pan” in the picture, but you don’t need to- it is handy to keep melted fat from getting everywhere, though), put it in the microwave and blast it for a few minutes at high power. Check for doneness and keep cooking in spurts of one or two minutes until the bacon is done to your liking. It takes about seven minutes in my oven to reach a perfect, crispy golden brown. Quicker than frying it in a pan, and far less chance of charring it to oblivion.

You’re welcome. Just let me know next time you need me to share a foolproof, hot and salty trick with you.

Chocolate Cloud Cake

The first thing my brother said when he stepped into my house for dinner the other week was “Hey, a collapsed cake”. The very first- no “hello, how are ya”, no “good to see you”, just the observation. He’s such a charmer, that one.

It’s not really his fault: Nigella Lawson’s Chocolate Cloud Cake is an attention grabber. Fresh out of the oven it looks like a regular chocolate cake. It is a bit cracked on top, but nothing out of the ordinary. As time passes, however, the crack spreads and deepens, eventually taking with it the entire top of the cake as it sinks several centimeters. The outer edge of the cake is left standing, so what you end up with is a bowl made out of chocolate cake.

A lesser person might have been disappointed if they had created a cake that sinks, every single time. Not Nigella. Instead, she filled it with softly whipped cream and called it a chocolate cloud cake. Genius, I say.

I am sure you will agree with me she’s a genius after you make this. The cake has an intense chocolate flavor but isn’t dense or heavy like many of its siblings. The whipped cream topping (spiked with a bit of yogurt in my version in a feeble nod to my arterial health) is a perfect complement, saving you from chocolate overdose so you can keep eating. Because you will want to keep eating- it is that good.

As if that weren’t enough, this cake is astoundingly easy to make too. The only possibly intimidating step, the whipping of egg whites (or is it just me who lives in fear of non-stiffening whites?) is made foolproof by the admonition to whip them until they hold their shape but are not stiff. Ha! Whipped whites that don’t require that test where you hold a bowl of eggy peaks over your head to test their stiffness. Or are you not supposed to take that seriously?

Left-overs of this beauty keep pretty well in the fridge. They lose their ethereal lightness, but gain a pleasant fudginess. Probably not a great dessert for a dinner party, but excellent as a tea-time treat or breakfast. (Not that I eat chocolate cake for breakfast, of course. I am just guessing. Or not…)

Chocolate cloud cake

Adapted slightly from Nigella Bites, Nigella Lawson

Serves 8-10

250 gr dark chocolate
125 gr unsalted butter, softened and cut into cubes
6 eggs: 2 whole, 4 separated
175 gr caster sugar
23 cm springform cake tin
250 ml whipped cream
150 ml Greek yogurt

Preheat the oven to 180°C and line the bottom of the cake tin with baking parchment (I use re-usable silicone baking paper).

Melt the chocolate in the microwave (start with two minutes at 600 W, stir, leave to stand for a bit, stir again and see if it needs another microwave blast). Mix in the butter until melted.

Beat the 2 whole eggs and 4 egg yolks with 75 gr of the caster sugar, then gently add the chocolate mixture.

In another bowl, whisk the 4 egg whites until foamy, then gradually add the 100 gr of sugar and whisk until the whites hold their shape but are not too stiff.

Mix a dollop of egg whites into the chocolate, and then fold in the rest of the whites. Pour into the prepared tin and bake for 35–40 minutes or until the cake is risen and cracked and the centre is no longer wobbly. Cool the cake in its tin on a wire rack.

When you are ready to eat, place the cake on a cake stand or plate for serving while it is still in its tin and carefully remove the tin. Mix the whipped cream with the yogurt and whip some more until the mixture is firm.

Fill the crater of the cake with the yogurty whipped cream, gently swirling your spoon or spatula to create alluring waves

A sign?

Meet the sausage sandwich I had for lunch some time last week. Me eating smoked sausage is a true sign of winter. It happens once in a blue moon, and only if it is really cold. So it isn't a particularly good sign that I had this in the second week of March.

A far better sign: today I caught a whiff of strawberry- it was probably perfume, but my oh my, did it transport me to summer. Could this be a sign of warm weather to come? Please?

Food from Far

Injera, Habesha restaurant, Addis Ababa, Ethiopia

Burgers Rule (chicken burgers)

People around me seem to think burgers are unhealthy. Something you eat when you’re on the road and the only food options for miles around is a drive-thru, but not something you would choose to serve at home. I say they are wrong: burgers rule. With bread for carbohydrates, meat for protein and onions for vegetables (what? they are vegetables- and you could even add tomatoes, pickles, lettuce for extra health) they are a complete meal. They’re easy to make and even easier to eat (who doesn’t love a portable meal?).

Plus, and this is the big seller in my book, you can do all sorts of tasty variations and surprise yourself with how well your kitchen experiments can work. Who wants finicky pasta sauces that taste funny with the smallest odd ingredient, risottos you can ruin by getting the stock just a little wrong or, worst of all, expensive cuts of meat that end up resembling leather if you aren’t careful? Far better to fry up some ground meat, add a bit of sauce, clothe it in a roll and call it dinner. Try it tonight, with these tasty chicken burgers.

Chicken burgers

Serves 2

300 gr boneless, skinless chicken thighs
juice from half a small lemon
1 shallot, peeled and quartered
large handful of cilantro leaves
glug of oil
4 rolls (crispy or soft, your call)
½ cup yogurt
1 small clove of garlic, minced
zest from half a lemon
garnishes (ripe tomatoes would be good here, but use whatever strikes your fancy)

Start by mixing the yogurt with the garlic and the lemon zest. Leave the mixture in a cool place while you’re making the burgers.

Cut the chicken thighs in large chunks and place in the bowl of a food processor. Add the shallot and cilantro and pulse the processor until you have a relatively fine chicken-onion-cilantro mixture. Add the lemon juice and stir well. Form the mixture into four patties with wet hands.

Heat the oil in a non-stick skillet and fry the burgers until done- about four minutes on each side should do it, but check carefully because eating raw chicken is not a good idea.

Put the cooked patties in the rolls, add the garlic sauce and garnishes and eat.

Deadline Soup (split pea soup with frankfurters)

Deadlines are my friend. Without them, it is all too easy to potter around, doing bits and pieces but not getting all that much result. Which is another reason why it is so wonderful that winter finally finally finally seems to be packing its bags. (Oh winter, you’ve forgotten to stash a few bits and pieces in your luggage. There are a few grey clouds here. A slew of rain there. And, please, could you clear out those icy temperatures? Thank you very much.) Just this week I got my act together for two winter deadlines:

Ice skating before the ice rink closes for the season. Yes, you read that right. Frozen water, and I went on it with thin metal blades strapped to my feet. I’m not fickle. I’m flexible (although you wouldn’t say so if you saw me on said ice).

I’ll be honest. That wasn’t actually a deadline I was planning to meet. When I invited my cousin for a skating lesson with my man and me, I was picturing the two of them on the ice, and me sitting on the side line. Wrapped in a warm coat, feet snug in Ugg boots. Alas. My man was more than happy to sign on as an ice skating teacher, but only if I went out on the ice with them. And if I agreed to a trial run with just the two of us. Cue me on the ice last Sunday, doing a good impression of Pinocchio before he turns into a real boy.

The second deadline I met went down more smoothly, I dare say. I made a pot of the quintessential winter soup: green peas with sausage. Split pea soup has always intimidated me a bit. It seems like everyone has an opinion on it- it should be thin, or so thick that you can stand a spoon in it. It should have bacon, smoked sausages or even whole pork legs. Plus, have you ever seen a bowl? Not the most attractive thing in the world, is it?

But a recipe by Nigella Lawson made me see the error of my fears. There is a picture in Feast of the most delicious looking yellow mud (her word, not mine), with chunks of sausage. Just looking at it made me feel warmer and I couldn’t wait to make Yellow Split Pea Soup with Frankfurters. Unfortunately, the store only had green split peas and it turned into regular old green sludge. Tasty green sludge, though, so I’m not complaining.

If you hurry, I think you can just squeeze out a pot, too, before spring arrives. Or if we’re really unlucky, you’ll have time for seventeen batches. But I hear winter is packing its bags, so we’re good. I hope.

The exact recipe is on Nigella’s website and I’ll tell you what I did below.

Nigella Lawson’ Yellow Split Pea Soup with Frankfurters

Serves 6-8

1 onion
1 carrot
1 clove garlic
1 stick of celery
2–3 tablespoons vegetable oil
3 twiggles of mace
500 gr split peas
1.25–1.5 litres chicken stock
2 bay leaves
approx. 8 frankfurters

Peel the onion, carrot and garlic and cut the onion and carrot into rough chunks. Pulse them in a mini food chopper until finely chopped.

Heat the oil in a Dutch oven. When warm, add the chopped vegetables from the processor and cook for 5–10 minutes, until soft but not brown.

Add the split peas and stir till they’re mixed with the vegetables and all have a glossy layer. Put the mace in a tea egg and hang it in the pot. Pour over 1.25 litres of stock and add the bay leaves, then bring to the boil. Cover, turn down the heat and cook for about an hour until everything is tender, adding more stock as needed.

Chop the frankfurters into thick slices and add them to the soup when it is fully cooked. Warm through for a couple of minutes and serve hot.

Really Useful Cake (Yogurt Cake)

I’ve been wondering: Are there other people out there who eat maple syrup straight from a spoon? Who get overly excited when a recipe mentions maple syrup? And who might even –gasp- like its flavor better than chocolate? Those people should bake this cake by Clotilde at ChocolateandZucchini, cut a thick slice and eat it drenched in maple syrup.

That’s what I did last weekend, and thinking about it still puts a smile on my face. I used Greek-style yogurt (a staple in my fridge) and had to bake the cake for quite a bit longer than the recipe, but other than that? It was perfect. (Well, one thing. There was a slightly funny smell, which I associate with recipes that have a lot of baking soda in otherwise mildly flavored baked goods. Does this happen to anyone else?) It is gently sweet, not greasy at all and the crumb has a pleasant density you can sink your teeth into. Add a glug of maple syrup and you have the perfect tea-time treat.

Even if you’re not into maple syrup, this is a good cake to have up your sleeve. It will go down well with the butter fearing crowd, for instance. Not a smidge of the yellow stuff in sight. And it has yogurt. Now, what is more healthy than yogurt? Perhaps best not to tell them about the oil, though.

Also, I bet this cake would be fantastic slathered in whipped cream and sprinkled with M&M’s. And if you need even more encouragement than all this (really? maple syrup, healthy, whipped cream… none of these do it for you?), there’s one more thing: this is fantastically easy to make. So hop to it, you have a cake to make.

Easy Like Sunday Dinner (Lemon Artichoke Pasta)

Sunday nights pose a food challenge in my house. When I do not have people coming over for dinner, I find it difficult to get my act together on Saturday and buy ingredients for two dinners. Since shops don’t open on Sundays around these parts, an end-of-weekend challenge tends to result.

There used to be a good Turkish take-out place around the corner to solve the quandary. Unfortunately, it turned into a run of the mill shoarma place with little going for it aside from its industrial strength garlic sauce. There is pizza delivery, of course, but the places in my area can’t quite cope with the Sunday night rush hour and a pie can take hours to arrive. Literally. The last three times we dialed for tomatoes’n’topping on dough it took 2½, 1½ and one hour, respectively. Progress, I suppose, but not what you want for a relaxed meal to end the weekend.

Often, the only viable solution is to piece together a meal from whatever is floating around the kitchen and pantry. That always includes garlic and onions, and usually canned tomatoes, pasta and yogurt. A good base for quite a few meals, I am beginning to find out. Last week, there was the garlicky bean dip and this week lemony pasta with artichokes saved the Sunday.

The sauce for the pasta is loosely based on carbonara sauce, with garlic instead of pancetta and with lemon zest added for brightness. Oh, and a touch of cream, because that makes anything taste better (although it is not really necessary here, so don’t let a lack of left-over cream stop you from making this pasta). The artichoke topping combines the earthy flavor of artichokes with lemon juice for some zing and caramelized onions for sweetness. Tossed together with a pile of pasta, they taste luxurious but not heavy. Plus, this dish seems like it was a lot more trouble than it really is. Beats a a pizza that takes 2½ hours, no?

Lemon artichoke pasta

Serves 3

1 400 gr bag frozen artichoke bottoms, thawed*
1 large onion, peeled and sliced into thin half moons
1 tbsp olive oil
zest and juice from half a small lemon
½ tsp sugar, optional
2 eggs
2 tbsp cream, optional
about 50 gr freshly grated parmesan
freshly ground black pepper to taste
1 garlic clove, peeled and sliced into six pieces
knob of butter
300 gr dried pasta

Heat the oil in a wide skillet that will fit all artichoke bottoms in a single layer later. When the oil is hot, add the onion and turn the heat down to medium. Cook, flipping onions occasionally, until onions are soft and have a golden color. Add the lemon juice and about ½ cup of water (there should be a thin layer of water in the whole pan), stir and taste. Add the sugar if you want it a bit sweeter (a little goes a long way). Add the artichoke bottoms in a single layer, with the stem end of the artichoke nestling in the watery onion mixture. Cover the pan and cook for about seven minutes.

Meanwhile, bring a pan of salted water to a boil.

Mix the eggs with the cheese and the pepper, and the cream if using.

Add the pasta to the water when it boils and boil until al dente. Uncover the pan with the artichokes when the artichokes are tender but still firm. Continue to heat over low heat until pasta is done. When the pasta has about three minutes to go, place the butter and garlic pieces in a small sauce pan and melt over low heat; simmer until needed.

When the pasta is done, take about ½ cup of the cooking water from the pan and drain the pasta. Put the pasta back in its hot pan and add the melted butter but not the garlic pieces. Then add the cheesy egg mixture and the lemon zest and stir quickly and thoroughly, until each piece of pasta is covered in a saucy layer. Divide the pasta over plates and add artichokes (cut them into pieces first for ease of eating while watching a movie on the couch, but keep them whole for a prettier look). Serve hot.

* Buy frozen artichoke bottoms at a Middle-Eastern supermarket, or subtitute with any other sauteed vegetable that takes your fancy. Don't use canned artichoke hearts, though. They have a harsh acidity that will overpower the fragrant lemon zest.