Shrimp cocktail, Thai style

This was the starter for our Good Friday dinner (us secularized Swedes don't mind indulging on that day. Either.). A huge bunch of salad in our organic fruit and vegetable box, some shrimp in the freezer, the need for something fresh and savory with a punch, and the idea of a Thai style shrimp cocktail was born. To be honest, the original idea was to make fresh spring rolls but with salad leafs instead of rice paper wrappers, but the salad didn't want to roll up neatly so we ended up with something that looked more like burritos. To keep them from unrolling we served them standing up in shot glasses, and then I realized that hey, this is more of a shrimp cocktail than a spring roll.
Whatever it is, it's delicious and was a perfect start for our dinner. It was followed by a Tunisian lamb tagine with apricots and almonds (we've blogged about it here although this time we made a slightly different version) and for dessert an assortment of cheeses (Beaufort, Manchego, a fantastic unpasteurized Brie, and an anonymous but delicious blue cheese of French origin) accompanied by an amazing port.
I don't have any measurements in the recipe, just eyeball it. The Prik Nam Pla, or dipping sauce, is the most important part of this dish, so don't get scared off by the fish sauce and skip it!



In a bowl, mix shrimp (we used frozen and thawed, but fresh is of course better), some julienned carrot, de-seeded cucumber in thin slices, julienned papaya, fresh cilantro and white sesame seeds. Place a spoonful on a salad leaf and roll it up in a fashion that works for you.
Serve with the dipping sauce.



Prik Nam Pla - Thai dipping sauce

2 tbsp fish sauce
2 tbsp fresh lime juice
1 tbsp demerara sugar
½ red chili, finely chopped
2 tbsp cilantro, finely chopped

Mix all the ingredients and let it stand for a while. Taste before serving if you want to add more lime juice. We ended up doubling the amount of lime juice, but that was a tad too much. Wait until the sauce has been standing for a while before tasting it, because the flavors mature and if it's too "fishy" when it's just been made, it might be perfect 20 minutes later.

Daring Cooks February: Mezze

The 2010 February Daring Cooks challenge was hosted by Michele of Veggie Num Nums. Michele chose to challenge everyone to make mezze based on various recipes from Claudia Roden, Jeffrey Alford and Naomi Duguid.

This was a really creative challenge with only two mandatory parts: pita bread and hummus. Then it was up to the Daring Cooks to fill their mezze tables with tabbouleh, falafel, baba ganouj, lebneh, feta cheese, olives and whatever else Middle Eastern finger food they could think of. Fun!

I recently had a fabulous mezze meal at a Lebanese restaurant in Stockholm, and was looking forward to being inspired for the Daring Cooks challenge. But come the day of mezze making, I wasn't in the mood for tons of little dishes (going to the Middle Eastern supermarket and buying their ready-made stuff felt like cheating) and then there was the usual time constraints resulting from the usual procrastination, so I ended up a bit outside the box. But still, I hope, within the spirit of the challenge. My not-so-mezze mezze table ended up consisting of:

• Tunsian lamb tagine with dried fruit
• Orange salad with feta cheese and mint
• Pita bread
• Hummus

Let's start with the mandatory parts of the challenge, the pita bread and the hummus. The pita bread was easy to make, even if it took quite some time to roll it all out and bake it. It tasted real nice and I'm happy to have a reliable pita bread recipe now. The recipe makes a lot though, we got about 20 (more or less) round breads measuring about 15 cm in diameter. Next time I'll quarter the recipe if making just for the two of us.

I have to admit I took some liberties with the hummus (sorry!). When I worked in the kitchen at Kibbutz Hamaapil in Israel, I made loads of hummus and learned that tahine is not a necessary ingredient. What is necessary, however, is olive oil. So I omitted the tahine, added olive oil and also ended up forgetting the garlic. (Oups.) I served the hummus like we always did at Hamaapil: drizzled with olive oil and sprinkled with paprika powder.

The recipe for the Tunisian lamb tagine with dried fruit comes from the lovely book Citrusköket (the Citrus Kitchen) by Caroline Hofberg. I've made a few changes to the original recipe. It's a lovely, warm, spicy and fragrant stew that you can serve with couscous or bulgur, but we just ate it with pita bread and some thick yoghurt.

As a side dish I made a small salad with oranges, feta cheese and mint. These flavors work really well together and the colors are lovely.

Thank you Michele for a fun and creative challenge! Wanna see the other Daring Cooks creations and all of the recipes? Visit the Daring Kitchen where you will find the recipe archive and the blogroll. Our lovely host Michele has posted a lot of great mezze recipes on her website.

Tunisian lamb tagine with dried fruit
(adapted from Citrusköket by Caroline Hofberg)

500 g boneless lamb shoulder
100 g dried apricots
100 g dried figs
3/4 dl almonds, peeled
1 tsp cumin
1 tsp coriander seeds
1 orange
1 small yellow onion
2 garlic cloves
½ g saffron
2 tsp paprika powder
1 cinnamon stick
1½ tbsp freshly grated ginger
1½ tbsp concentrated vegetable stock
5 dl water
1 tbsp cornstarch (Maizena)
1 tsp harissa

1. Soak the dried apricots and figs in hot water.
2. Roast the almonds in a dry pan until they get a little bit of color. Set aside until later. In the same pan, toast the cumin and coriander seeds and set aside.
3. Peel the orange with a potato peeler (you want quite long bits of peel with as little of the bitter white stuff as possible). Juice the orange. Set aside peel and juice.
4. Chop the onion and garlic finely.
5. Cut the lamb shoulder into cubes about 3×3 cm. Fry them in some olive oil until they are a nice brown color.
6. In a large pot, fry the onion and ginger carefully so that it becomes soft but doesn't get any color. Add the toasted cumin and coriander seeds, saffron, paprika, the cinnamon stick and the grated ginger. Fry for about a minute, stirring constantly.
7. Add the meat and stock, water, orange peel and juice. Boil over low heat for 1–1½ hours.
8. Drain the apricots and figs, cut them in smaller pieces and add them to the pot. Boil for another 20 minutes.
9. Remove about ½–1 dl of the liquid from the pot and use it to dissolve the cornstarch. Pour it back, stir well and let the tagine thicken for about 5 minutes. Season with harissa. Add the almonds right before serving.

Orange salad with feta and mint

Cut a couple of oranges into fillets (segments without any white peel). For two, I used two small blood oranges and a larger regular orange. Crumble up some good feta cheese and sprinkle on top of the oranges. Drizzle with a little extra virgin olive oil, season with freshly ground black pepper, and, for the final touch, add some fresh mint leaves.



Pita Bread

Recipe adapted from Flatbreads & Flavors by Jeffrey Alford and Naomi Duguid
Prep time: 20 minutes to make, 90 minutes to rise and about 45 minutes to cook

2 tsp regular dry yeast (12.1 grams)
2½ cups lukewarm water (591 grams)
5-6 cups all-purpose flour (may use a combination of 50% whole wheat and 50% all-purpose, or a combination of alternative flours for gluten free pita) (497-596 grams)
1 tbsp table salt (15 grams)
2 tbsp olive oil (29 ml)

1. In a large bread bowl, sprinkle the yeast over the warm water. Stir to dissolve. Stir in 3 cups flour, a cup at a time, and then stir 100 times, about 1 minute, in the same direction to activate the gluten. Let this sponge rest for at least 10 minutes, or as long as 2 hours.
2. Sprinkle the salt over the sponge and stir in the olive oil. Mix well. Add more flour, a cup at a time, until the dough is too stiff to stir. Turn it out onto a lightly floured surface and knead for 8 to 10 minutes, until smooth and elastic. Rinse out the bowl, dry, and lightly oil. Return the dough to the bowl and cover with plastic wrap. Let rise until at least doubled in size, approximately 1½ hours.
3. Place a pizza stone, or two small baking sheets, on the bottom rack of your oven, leaving a 1-inch gap all around between the stone or sheets and the oven walls to allow heat to circulate. Preheat the oven to 450F (230C).
4. Gently punch down the dough. Divide the dough in half, and then set half aside, covered, while you work with the rest. Divide the other half into 8 equal pieces and flatten each piece with lightly floured hands. Roll out each piece to a circle 8 to 9 inches in diameter and less than 1/4 inch thick. Keep the rolled-out breads covered until ready to bake, but do not stack.
5. Place 2 breads, or more if your oven is large enough, on the stone or baking sheets, and bake for 2 to 3 minutes, or until each bread has gone into a full balloon. If for some reason your bread doesn't puff up, don't worry it should still taste delicious. Wrap the baked breads together in a large kitchen towel to keep them warm and soft while you bake the remaining rolled-out breads. Then repeat with the rest of the dough.

Hummus

Recipe adapted from The New Book of Middle Eastern Food by Claudia Roden
Prep Time: Hummus can be made in about 15 minutes once the beans are cooked. If you’re using dried beans you need to soak them overnight and then cook them the next day which takes about 90 minutes.

1½ cups dried chickpeas, soaked in cold water overnight (or substitute well drained canned chickpeas and omit the cooking) (301 grams)
2-2½ lemons, juiced (89ml)
2-3 garlic cloves, peeled and crushed
a big pinch of salt
4 tbsp tahini (sesame paste) OR use peanut butter or any other nut butter—feel free to experiment) (45 grams)
additional flavorings (optional) I would use about 1/3 cup or a few ounces to start, and add more to taste. You can use sun-dried tomatoes, olives, roasted peppers etc.

1. Drain and boil the soaked chickpeas in fresh water for about 1 ½ hours, or until tender. Drain, but reserve the cooking liquid.
2. Puree the beans in a food processor (or you can use a potato masher) adding the cooking water as needed until you have a smooth paste.
3. Add the rest of the ingredients and mix well. Adjust the seasonings to taste.

You say potatoe I say potato

Potato salad. Say that, and most people, at least here in Sweden, will think of stuff out of a plastic jar bought at the local supermarket. Potato salad served with thinly sliced cold roast beef is the staple food of many parties here in Sweden - the kind where you have to serve many people and do it quite cheap. I detest it. Not those kind of parties, and not roast beef and potato salad per se - and great, now I am thinking of Per Se which definitely does not serve potato salad and roast beef, but if they did it would of course be heavenly, and which I would give my left thumb to eat at. Ahem, getting back on track here... No, what I detest is that kind of potato salad where sad, mealy potato pieces are drowned in gluey, artificial-tasting "mayonnaise", shock full of additives for that unnaturally long shelf-life. Yuck. Usually, I prefer potato salad with just potatoes, some capers, red onions, olives, and a vinaigrette. But recently, I tried to make one of those mayonnaise-based potato salads at home and guess what: once again it is proved that home-made is better.

This time we ate it with smoked mackerel, last time it was with grilled chicken. That time we also added some finely chopped leek because we had that at home, but forgot about the mustard. Take away or add what appeals to you, and remember that the measurements aren't that crucial - taste yourself forward. We weighed everything tonight (very chef-y, huh?), but consider this recipe a sketch for your own experiments. The salad can be eaten both warm and cold.


Tasty, but not very photogenic...

Potato salad

4 servings

700 g new potatoes
40 g gherkins (cornichons)
25 g small capers
115 g crème fraîche
40 g mayonnaise
20 g mustard (we used a type of coarse, sweet Swedish mustard, decrease the amount if you use Dijon)
Fresh or frozen dill, to taste
Salt and black pepper, to taste

Cut the potatoes so they are in equal bite sized pieces. No need to peel them if they're new and pretty (I never peel new potatoes). Boil them in salted water until soft. Let them cool slightly while you cut the gherkins in smaller pieces. Mix the potatoes (I leave the peel on) with the gherkins and capers. Carefully mix in he crème fraîche and mayonnaise - you can do this while the potatoes are still warm. Season with mustard, dill, salt and pepper to taste.


Summer dinner: Potato salad, smoked mackerel with various peppers, lovely Swedish organic tomatoes.

Summer seafood salad

We have a heat wave in Sweden at the moment, with temperatures of around 25-30°C. With weather this lovely, and the vegetable section of the grocery store filling up with fresh and beautiful produce, you just have to make salad. I invented this one last week and made it for lunch for myself. It turned out so good we ate it for dinner as well the same night. Making it is super quick, ten minutes and your done. You could use shrimp if you can't get crayfish tails. I won't give you any exact measurements, just adapt the recipe for your hunger level.



Salad with spicy crayfish and sweet chili dressing

Put some mixed greens, whatever kind you want, on a plate. I used a ready-made salad mix. Add a couple of centimeters of cucumber, cut in smaller pieces. Throw in some diced melon, I took a variety of cantaluope , but honeydew would also work (not watermelon though).

Heat some oil in a pan, take a little bit more than you normally would - it's used for dressing later. Add some paprika powder and chili powder to the oil and let the spices fry for a while. I used ancho chili which I think has a warmer, more subtle heat, but use whatever kind of chili powder you want. Throw some crayfish tails in the pan. In Sweden they are sold in brine and flavored with dill. If you use those, strain and dry them carefully before frying. Fry the crayfish tails quickly, otherwise they will get tough and stringy.

When the crayfish are done, simply place them on top of the salad-cucumber-melon, and pour the warm spicy oil over them.

For the sweet chili dressing, simply mix some sweet-chili sauce and crème fraîche. I used about 2/3 crème fraîche and 1/3 sweet chili sauce, but you have to taste your way forward. Serve immediately.

TNT chicken salad?

I had no inspiration whatsoever for dinner cooking tonight, and I also felt very particular about what I wanted to eat. It had to be quite light and preferably a bit fruity, but I also wanted something... well, gooey is probably the best word actually.

After much cookbook page turning and searching through the brain-based recipe index, I actually found something that seemed up that alley. In the Thanksgiving and Christmas chapter of Nigella's book Feast there's an Asian-style salad with left-over turkey in a peanut butter based sauce (Nigella calls it Bang Bang Turkey for some reason I can't quite comprehend). We didn't have any leftover turkey (we have never had any leftover turkey, seeing as us Swedes aren't big turkey eaters other than smoked turkey breast on sandwiches), and I couldn't find all the ingredients for the sauce in the grocery store so I played around and as usual, my version bears little resemblence to the original recipe (which by the way can be found here if you don't happen to have a copy of Feast. Scroll down about half way for the Bang Bang recipe).

Anyway, it was quite light and fruity and definitely gooey so it did do the trick! In the spirit of Nigella I will also name this dish after explosive noises. Or you could just call it Peanut and Hoisin Chicken Salad, if you're boring like that.



Big badaboom chicken salad

For the sauce:
3 tbsp crunchy peanut butter
2 tbsp Hoisin sauce
1 tbsp water
2 tsp neutral-tasting oil

1 whole grilled chicken
50 g spring onions
½ cucumber
1 mango
1 handful of fresh cilantro

Start with the sauce: simply mix all the ingredients and put aside.

Remove the skin from the chicken and get the meat off the bones. Shred the meat by tearing it apart using your hands. Put the chicken meat in a bowl, add the sauce and mix around so that the chicken is coated in gooeyness.

Finely chop the spring onions. Cut the cucumber in half lengthwise and then in thin half moon slices. Cut the mango in smaller pieces. Put all the veggies and on a plate (this salad should be served on a large plate, not in a bowl) and mix around. Top with the chicken. Bang - you're done!

The World's Tastiest Salad

We've taken a Easter holiday from the blog the past week, which we've spent celebrating Markus' birthday, visiting the parents and eating way too much candy. Now it's time to get blogging and cooking again, and boy, do we have something special in store for you today: The World's Tastiest Salad! Yes, I believe this may be it.

This is our summer favourite, and is best eaten outside on a warm summer evening while the sun is slowly setting, together with a glass of cool rosé wine. Its perfect for those hot summer days, because it requires almost no work, just some cutting of very soft stuff.

It's not warm enough for outside eating yet (at least not in the evenings), and there was no rosé in the house, but the salad tasted just as good as we remembered it from last summer. I bought Spanish strawberries and they were surprisingly good, but I can't wait until the Swedish ones are ready because then: perfection. Just a month and a half or so left...



The World's Tastiest Salad

Two handfuls of mixed greens e.g. rocket, maché, baby spinach etc. (no iceberg lettuce, please)
Half a small galia melon
A handful of fresh strawberries, halved or quartered depending on size
A few fresh figs, sliced
A chunk of chèvre (goat cheese), in small pieces
A couple of thin slices of parma ham

This salad requires no dressing, and should be served on a large plate, not in a bowl. Place the greens on the plate. Add the fresh fruits. Roll up the slices of ham and top with those and the chèvre. Devour.

My first time

Poaching eggs, that is. I found this salad in a Jamie Oliver cookbook, Happy days with the naked chef, that I got at the annual book sale a few weeks ago. I made a few changes, like omitting the garlic since I'm going to sit on a bus for four hours this afternoon and wanted to be nice to my fellow passengers. I had never poached an egg before, and I was a bit freaked out when I saw the surface of the water covered with coagulated egg white and I couldn't see what was below. A horrible inedible mess? Cthulhu? But it worked, and the salad tasted lovely: the crispy bread, the salty pancetta and parmesan, the perfect egg with the yolk still a bit runny... I'm probably freaking Markus out here because he hates eggs and would think that I have ruined perfectly good pancetta and parmesan with this, but if you do like eggs, try this, because it's great!



1 chunk of French or Italian style bread
Olive oil
Flaky sea salt
3 strips of pancetta
A handful of mixed greens
More olive oil + white wine vinegar
1 egg
A small piece of parmesan cheese

Take the chunk of bread, remove the crust and tear it into bite sized pieces. I used organic French country style bread made with stone ground rye, but ciabatta or a baguette would work as well. Sprinkle olive oil on top and season with some sea salt. Put in the oven at 200 degrees C for 8-10 minutes, until the bread is crusty. Cut the pancetta in smaller pieces and place that on top of the bread. Put in the oven for another 4-5 minutes until the pancetta is crispy as well.
Place a handful of mixed greens on a plate and drizzle some olive oil and vinegar on top. Put the bread and pancetta over the salad. Now, poach the egg. Bring water to a simmer in a pot, and crack the egg into the water. Don't stir, don't do anything, just let it boil for 4 minutes (more if you don't like your yolks runny). You will probably end up with a lot of coagulated egg white on top of the water, but when you remove the pan from the heat and lift up the eggs with a perforated ladle, you will find that the white has surrounded the yolk and that all your worries were unfounded! Place the egg on top of the salad, and finish off with some shaved parmesan. Enjoy!

Kamut, a new discovery

Last week we got red beets in our organic fruit and veggie box. I love beets, Markus not so much, so I get them all by myself! Today I boiled them and made a lunch salad with a stellar flavour combo: red beets, chèvre and honey. I wanted something more substantial in the salad as well, and while browsing the rice and pasta section of our small neighborhood grocery store (overpriced and with a lot of ready-made junk - we live in a student area) I found organic kamut. I had never tried that before and was pleasantly surprised. The nutty flavour worked really well with the other ingredients (speaking of nutty: pine nuts would also be great in this salad) and the texture was pleasant - a bit chewy but not stuck-in-your-teeth grainy. A nice alternative to bulgur, quinoa or couscous. I used just-boiled beets and kamut in my salad, so it was partly warm (I think warm salads feel more filling for some reason), but it would work with cold ingredients as well. I could see a big bowl of this on a buffet table, served with thinly sliced herb-marinated roasted lamb. Mmmmmm.........



Kamut salad with red beets and chevre

1 quite big lunch portion

1 portion of kamut
3 small red beets, boiled
50 g chèvre (goat cheese)
1 handful fresh baby spinach
Honey
Olive oil

Boil the kamut as directed on the package. Slice the beets thinly. Mix kamut, beets and spinach, sprinkle the chevre on top and drizzle a little olive oil and honey over the salad.

Green and blue salad

This salad contains a number of green ingredients and one blue - blue cheese. You want to use a firm blue cheese that crumbles but doesn't get all smeary. We use Swedish Kvibille Gräddädel, but I don't know how internationally available that is. You could either add the cheese as is, or turn it in to a dressing by mixing it with some crème fraiche. Today we opted for the former.

We got a big bowl out of this, enough for the two of us and some leftovers for lunch tomorrow.



Green and blue salad

2 handfuls of mixed greens (we used mostly baby spinach today but aragula/rocket, maché and swiss chard also works. But please, don't use iceberg lettuce.)
1 pear
2 stalks of celery
100 g firm blue cheese
½ dl walnuts

Rinse the greens and put them in a large bowl. Dice the pear, slice the celery and dice/crumble the cheese. Mix everything and top with walnuts. Done!

Asian beef salad

This was a dinner last week, on one of the few days I've been at home lately - I have been very busy. We got bok choy (pak choy/pak soi - this Chinese vegetable has a lot of spellings) in our organic produce box last week. While I really wanted to attempt to make char sui (Cantonese BBQ pork) served with rice and bok choy - one of our Hong Kong favorites - I had neither the energy nor the time to run around looking for all the required ingredients. Uppsala lacks a Chinatown...

So instead, I made a beef and rice vermicelli salad. It incorporates a lot of flavors used in various Asian kitchens, but is in no way authentic. It's like Jamie Oliver once said: it's got a little Asian fusion thingie going!

I'm not giving you any amounts this time cause I have no idea how much I used. But this is what went into the salad

Thin rice noodles (vermicelli)
Thinly sliced beef ("lövbiff" in Swedish)
Salt and black pepper for seasoning the meat
Mango
Alfalfa sprouts
Bok choy
Peanuts
Fresh cilantro
Freshly squeezed lime juice

Cook the rice noodles as directed on your package*. Cut the beef into bite sized pieces if needed. Fry the beef quickly in a hot pan with some butter - do not overcook cause then it will get dry and stringy. Season with salt and pepper. Cut off the hard stems of the bok choy and toss it around in a hot pan with some butter until it gets soft. Dice the mango and chop the peanuts coarsely. Mix all the ingredients into a salad and pour the lime juice over it. We ate this with chopsticks (to maintain our skill level) and I'm happy to report that I can still pick up peanuts with chopsticks!

*Does anyone have a tip on how to prevent the noodles from sticking together in a big lump once they're cooked? I really want to make a Vietnamese salad based on cold vermicelli, but I don't want it to be a cold lump of vermicelli...