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The German name for this is Erzgebirgischer Linseneintopf and it comes from the Ore Mountains (Erzgebirge) region. I had this several years back in a pub in a tiny village there called Seiffen. This is where wooden Christmas decorations such as nutcrackers and window candle arches are made.
I checked a couple of recipes on the internet and kind of adapted it to what made sense to me. I think it's pretty authentic, but I could be wrong.
One of the recipes I found said words to the effect that the people of the Erzgebirge were in the past never "troubled with the burdens of wealth" and this is certainly an economical meal. It is also perhaps not something that would be to everyone's taste. In fact, it probably sounds like food from hell, gruel slopped scowlingly into a metal prison tray, but it is actually very tasty.
First make a roux in a large pot by melting 50g of butter at a medium heat and then sprinkling in the same amount of flour. Bring them together and let the roux fizz for a couple of minutes, stirring every 30 seconds or so. This is done until the flour takes on a caramel colour. The flour can also be actually toasted without the butter for added frugality.
Then start adding stock, slowly at first, while stirring so that the roux "melts" properly and without lumps. Whenever I make ham I like to boil the smoked ham first and then finish it in the oven. I keep and freeze the smoky, salty water for use as a stock. However, I didn't have any such stock left and used just plain water, boiled in the kettle first.
Trim two ribs of celery, slice them in three lengthways and finely chop into 1cm pieces. Peel, trim and slice two carrots into four quarters lengthways and also chop into 1cm pieces. Add these to the liquid and leave to simmer for 10 minutes or so. I didn't use any this particular time, but a chopped onion would not be out of place either.
Then pour in 500g of brown lentils. I got a kilo bag of them in an ethnic shop for €2.20. Now peel and chop two medium-sized potatoes into smallish chunks and add about 15 minutes after the lentils go in. The aim is to have both done at the same time. These will further thicken the liquid.
Chop 100g of lean smoked pork into small strips and add to the pot. I got this in a Polish-style shop. Usually smoked pork belly is used, but I didn't have any and used lean instead. If I was using pork belly I would have fried it in the butter and then taken it out before making the roux.
Take three of four gherkins and slice before also adding to the pot.
At this stage the stew is cooked, but unseasoned. The seasoning is done with... some pepper, some salt, some of the liquid from the gherkin jar, some sugar and some Worcester sauce. So, as I said maybe not something to everyone's taste.
The aim is to get a nice savoury taste with a subtle sour note with a tiny hint of sweetness to round it off: nowhere near as pronounced as, say, Chinese sweet and sour, but noticeable all the same.
The Worcester sauce adds additional sourness as the gherkin liquid is actually quite a dilute vinegar. It also adds additional darkness to the colour. Interestingly, a company called "Exzellent" in Dresden has manufactured Worcester sauce for many, many years and both Dresden and the Erzgebirge are in the same corner of Germany, so I find the addition of it allowable to an extent, even though the recipes I saw did not include it.
The stew is served with a sausage on top, usually a Bockwurst/Frankfurter/Wiener type sausage, either whole or sliced.0 -
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I was making these the other day and as I have been lurking this forum for a while now, stealing recipes here and there, i decided to take pics and post the recipe.
I had to make these in large proportions for a party but the following ingredients would do roughly two sheaths of ribs:
65ml of soya sauce, I prefer dark.
1 Medium onion,
2 Chilli's
3 cloves of Garlic,
1 Thumb size piece of ginger,
2 heaped spoons of dark brown sugar,
tbs groundnut oil.
Black pepper (pinch)
Chilli lovers can add as much Chilli as they like, this sauce seems to love chilli.
Method:
Get some ribs:
Rougly chop all ingredients and add the soya and peanut oil:
Blend the lot until you get a rough paste, then stir in the sugar:
Cover the ribs gerously with the paste, the more generous you can be at this stage the better but beware, you want this to reduce to a sticky coating so too much can also be a bad thing.
Cook them in the oven at 150 deg (fan) until the sauce reduces. These are also great if you throw them in the oven until the meat is cooked and carmelise them on the BBQ afterwards.
You wouldn't believe how well these go down, and how much kitchen roll people will go through wiping these off their faces!
Enjoy!0 -
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Recipe for the best burger I've ever had (my OH made it, I really just watched and gasped in joy):
Get 1/2 pound minced beef (I used organic steak mince, don't know if that makes a difference), mix it up with some diced onion, tbsp sweet paprika, heaped tbsp wholegrain mustard, 2 tbsp worchestershire sauce, 1 clove chopped garlic, generous amount of cracked black pepper and salt. Form into burgers and then make a hollow and stuff in some cubed cheddar. Pack the meat around the cheddar to enclose it in a secret magic pocket of deliciousness.
Sear in really hot oil for 1 minute each side (don't put them in the pan until the oil is good and hot), then cook on low-medium heat for 15 mins, turning occasionally.
Eat with all the toppings you can manage!
We had it with pickled red cabbage, mayo, ketchup, raw onion, tomato, lettuce and toasted floury baps.
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Boeuf Bourguignon
Serves 4
Toss 1kg of chuck or shin of beef, cut into large pieces, in seasoned flour. Let it colour (caramel brown, not grey! Very important) in a little oil and butter in a heavy casserole on high heat, in batches. Remove.
Add 100g of smoked lardons and fry until golden. Set aside together with the beef.
Add 20 pearl onions. Brown them lightly then add 20 button mushrooms. Once golden, remove.
Turn the heat down to medium. Add a large finely diced onion and a stick of finely diced celery. Sautee until they soften. Stir in 1 tbsp of tomato puree.
Pour in a bottle of red wine (burgundy, pinot noir, chianti), together with 6 medium carrots cut at 1 inch length, 3 lightly crushed cloves of garlic, 2 bay leaves, and 1 large sprig of thyme. Turn the heat up and let it boil rapidly for about 3-4 minutes.
Return the beef/lardons to the pot and add 300ml of beef stock.
Season and turn the heat low to a simmer, for a good 2 hours, until the meat is tender.
Add the pearl onions and mushrooms and continue cooking for 30 minutes.
Remove thyme and bay leaves before serving.
Best left overnight to allow the flavours to mellow.
Serve with crusty bread, mash, boiled spuds, petit pois, buttered noodles, whatever you fancy.0 -
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Thought I'd post up a photo of my attempt at Susie_Q's burgers!
I had to edit the recipe based on what I had at home!! I used a pound of steak mince (made three massive burgers), I didn't have onion
, used lots of cajun spices, plenty of wholegrain mustard, didn't use worscestershire sauce as I didn't have any, put in a few chopped cloves of garlic, a tiny bit of flour, and sea salt and black pepper.
Instead of using the cheese in the middle, I put it as a topping (will definitely try it in the middle the next time though, sounds amazing!!) When the burgers were ready, I just stuck them under the grill for a couple of minutes and put the cheese on top to melt it.
Other than that, I cooked them as per the recipe above, searing them on each side, before reducing the heat for fifteen minutes.
We had the burgers on toasted baps with loads of salsa (with onions, Jalapeno peppers etc), lettuce, and bacon. Served with chips.
They were amazing!
(Sorry about crap quality of photo - I had to take it in a rush, or otherwise the burgers would have gotten all cold and eaten!
) 0 -
Summer Pasta
This is an ideal lunch, or accompaniment to a main meal, is easy to prepare. For best results, make it a day before. I made this yesterday for two vegetarian friends and they absolutely loved it, as did I.
I made a variation of this.
Swapped pasta for quinoa, as I'm trying to cut down on flour. Also used fresh oregano - because I was in Lidl, and the fresh plant sort of waved at me
Really loved it - refreshing. It will become a lunch regular.
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I made a variation of this.
Swapped pasta for quinoa, as I'm trying to cut down on flour. Also used fresh oregano - because I was in Lidl, and the fresh plant sort of waved at me
Really loved it - refreshing. It will become a lunch regular.
the quinoa is a great idea. i might give this ago next week for lunch0 -
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Thought it might be a good idea to post this recipe here.
Cauliflower Pizza Base
23 cm round pizza tin (with a slightly raised edge), lined with baking parchment - per person - 360 calories.
Preheat oven to 230° C
Ingredients- 120 grs grated/riced cauliflower - 24 cal
- 60 grs grated cheese - mine was gouda and gave me 246 cal - You can use a lower fat cheese, but you need some fat for 'melt factor'
- 1 large egg - 90 cal
- 1 tsp dried thyme
- 1 tsp dried oregano
- 1 tsp dried basil (yes, dried works best for this)
- 1 tsp garlic powder
- pinch cayenne pepper
- freshly crushed black pepper and sea salt to taste
Preparation- Grate/rice the raw cauliflower in a food processor, it is fast and efficient.
- Blanch the cauliflower for 2 minutes in salted boiling water.
- Drain in a colander. Shake well to get more water out.
- Return to the pan on a low heat to evaporate any excess moisture. Alternatively, you could press the water out with a clean tea towel.
- Leave to cool.
- Beat loose the egg.
- Mix all the ingredients together and pour into your lined pizza tray.
- Smooth it out evenly.
- Cook in the preheated oven for 15 to 20 minutes.
- Leave to set slightly or cool completely to be topped at a later time. I made more than was required so I could store some in the freezer.
- Choose your favourite pizza toppings and put under the grill/broiler for 5 minutes. Keep an eye on it as it may burn quickly.
- Leave to rest for 5 minutes till everything has set before slicing and serving
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I wasn't a calorie counter myself until recently. Health reasons, am happy enough with my weight. Needs must and all that.
But I enjoy food and even when I am 'dieting' I don't feel the need to punish myself with flavour lacking, uninteresting foods. If you know what I mean.
And who knows people who need low carb or low calorie meal ideas can get some kind of inspiration.0 -
Bit of speed cooking Herself out shopping for the day, and Calum crawling around playing with toys. Hm. Strap him into his bouncer seat and start pulling out pans and knives and turn on the kitchen fan for the white noise and then…
Right, and we’re off How fast can you cook chicken ramen from scratch?
Chop some spring onions (save the top inch or two for fine slices for a garnish at the end), a slightly-bigger-than-thumb-sized bit of ginger (you want to go heavy on the ginger for ramen) and a single clove of garlic (I love garlic, but you want to go light on it for ramen), smashed and minced fine, and also a little bit of chilli (about an inch of a large fresh chilli, deseeded and with the inner membrane removed and then julienneed very fine – you just want warmth, not heat). A pack of instant noodles (you can do ramen with lots of different kinds of noodle, but these instant ones are the ones I first had in Wagamama’s ramen and I’m fond of them, plus, they’re cheap! ), chicken breasts and bamboo shoots and some baby spinach (out of frame to the left). And some frozen chicken stock, also out of frame to the left (it’s not cheating, it’s made from scratch ahead of time
)
First, the chicken. Trim the breasts, season with salt and white pepper, then into a warm (not hot) pan with some olive oil to slowly grill (it doesn’t have to be a small cast iron pan, but it doesn’t hurt if it is). We leave these alone, turning once during cooking.
Now, in with some peanut oil into the hot wok, then all the chopped spring onions, garlic, ginger and chilli and stir fry for about 30 seconds, no more – you want this to taste fresh, not charred. Now add the frozen stock and about a cup of boiling water from the kettle to stop the aromatics from burning while the frozen stock melts.
Now, just let it sit in the wok for a few minutes, stirring every so often to stop anything sticking to the bottom and burning and let all the frozen stock melt and let it come back up to a boil. Then add the noodles first (dump the flavour packet and the broken bits into the bin). Let the raft of noodles just float there, then take two handfulls of spinach and rip and tear it onto the top of the bubbling stock. Leave for a moment.
At this point the chicken should be done; take it from the pan, and slice it.
Now, with tongs toss the noodles in the broth (they need a total of three minutes to cook properly). When they’re done, lift the noodles and spinach from the broth with tongs, and place in the serving bowl (you want a big bowl even for a little serving with ramen btw). add some bamboo shoots on top of the noodles and then heap the sliced chicken on top of that; then ladle on a few ladles of broth until it looks like ramen instead of a heap of spaghetti
Serve with a little chocolate on the side if you added chilli btw…
30 minutes from Zzzzzz to OmNyomNyom. Why’s the time important? ‘Cos this takes ten minutes to eat and your average naptime is 40 minutes
You have ten minutes - commence shovelling! 0 -
A while back, I treated myself to a subscription to America's Test Kitchen (which is basicly an internet magazine that tests pots, pans, mixers, knives, and all sorts of kitchen toolage, but they give you a side order of recipes from a sister site as well). One of the recipes they had was for a braised turkey dish, where you broke down the turkey, roasted it at a high temp for a while to brown the skin, then braised it to finish. Tried it, and it sortof worked - the turkey was like sponge instead of dry shoe leather. I knew I was cooking xmas dinner this year and I had an earlier recipe in mind as well, so I bought a few turkey breasts over a month or two and tested some ideas, and here's the end result, which I used for this xmas's dinner to some success.
Warning: There's no turkey skin. I don't care - I think people who eat skin are wierd. So no complaints. Besides, there's an easy solution. Buy a second turkey and roast that for the skin
To start with, my family rarely get to the legs during xmas dinner, and I really hate picking over carcasses for dark meat the next day, so I figured why waste it and I just ordered a turkey crown this year. Hell, herself and myself together can't finish one turkey breast, so why not, especially when it wasn't the only meat dish (there was beef wellington for xmas dinner as well). BTW, this recipe works well with just a turkey breast too, so for smaller roast-type-dinners, this is pretty good too.
My order didn't quite go as cleanly as planned - to me, turkey crown means two breasts still attached to the keelbone, but with the rest of the carcass removed. To my butcher it means a turkey without the legs but everything else still attached. So I had to start with some basic butchery, and I just peeled the two breasts off the carcass. Normally I'd make stock with the carcass, but I'd saved a few litres of the stuff from the practice runs to make the jus without fuss today, so I just discarded it (it's xmas, all my pots including the stock pot are in use - I don't recommend this as a regular thing though, just chuck it in the stock pot and don't waste it).
First cooking step - brine the turkey. My brine consists of:- 4 litres of water
- 1 cup of salt
- 1/2 cup of golden castor sugar (any brown sugar would do)
- 10 black peppercorns
- a few sprigs of thyme
- 10-12 juniper berries
- 4-6 allspice berries
- 4 bay leaves
- a sprig or two of sage
- a large orange, cut into quarters
- 4 vegetable stock cubes (or stock pots - the "herb infusion" ones worked nicely here)
The next day, take a deep roasting tin. I had to go search for mine, its a good 8.5cm deep. Your average roasting tin won't cut it for turkey breasts (they're usually fine for chicken though, and this should work for chicken too). Break down two large white onions, four or five ribs of celery and three or four carrots - exact amount depends on the size of the ribs/carrots, but you're trying to end up with roughly equal amounts of all three (that's not a standard mirepoix, but it works for this recipe). Mix these in the roasting tin (note that the tin here is cold; this isn't a case of heating it in the oven and then chucking in ingredients, like with roast spuds). Now add in four or five cloves of garlic (cut in half and the bitter green spout removed, but not smashed or diced).
Now remove the turkey from the brine, and rinse it with cold water. Careful not to splash too much, it's still poultry and you still have to watch the hygiene, even if it's not the dreaded chicken. Place the breasts, skin side up, on the mirepoix. I said there wasn't any skin in this recipe, I didn't mean we remove it before cooking
Liberally season the turkey and the mirepoix with salt and pepper, and add a few sprigs of thyme and sage over the turkey. Quarter another large orange and put the quarters at each corner of the tin; quarter a lemon and put each quarter at each side of the tin, so the turkey is covered in herbs and surrounded by citrus. Add a bay leaf too if you like that taste.
I don't time roasts or meats when cooking; instead I do the right thing and use a probe thermometer So at this point, I stuck the probe into the deepest part of the larger breast.
BTW:
Best €30 I ever spent in my kitchen. Just saying.
Now, make up some stock. I've used chicken stock from stock pots or cubes; and I've used vegetable as well; this time though, I had a few litres of turkey stock saved up from the last practice run, so I used most of that instead (I saved about a half-litre, I'll explain why later). I added all the stock to the roasting tin, and then topped it up with water until the liquid just covered the turkey (this is why you need the deep tin). Then I covered the tin with a double thickness of tinfoil and crimped it to the tin as solidly as I could, making sure the thermometer lead was feeding out okay.
Now, into the oven, set your thermometer alarm for 160F (72C) and turn the oven on (from cold) to 100C (212F) (you can use any temperature down to about 80C but modern ovens and low temperatures don't mix so well and 100C is about as far as I can push mine).
Yes, that's low. Don't worry - when the meat hits 160F internal, it's done and perfectly safe and white, all will be well.
Now, close oven door, and go away for, oh, around three hours. That's why the thermometer has an audible alarm - you no longer have anything to do here. No turning, no basting, no worries at all. Just leave the thing, it's fine.
After the three or so hours, when the meat hits 160F internal, take it out of the oven (btw, if it goes up higher because you were busy, it's more or less okay to about 170F - beyond that, you're back into tough chewy leather territory, and all this effort has been wasted). Set it aside on a trivot/silicone heat mat/cork mat/table you don't mind destroying with heat from the roasting tin. And just leave it. At any point for the next hour or two, that turkey will remain at a nice hot temperature and be ready to serve, but if you have roast spuds or anything like that to do, just go do them now and leave the turkey sit there. It'll stay hot and not dry out, it'll be fine.
When you're ready, remove the turkey from the braising liquid, remove the skin and discard (it'll be pallid and unpleasant looking anyway, so just chuck it - it's not waste anyway, because its collagen is in the braising liquid, more on that in a moment). Now carve into thick, 1-cm-at-least, slices and serve. It'll be juicy, tender and you won't ever roast another turkey again (unless you're one of those skin-loving freaks )
Now, about that braising liquid. Take it, strain it, squeezing those veggies to get everything out. Chuck the strained-out solids, they're now useless. Now, you have two options with the liquid (And you can mix and match them).- Take a small saucepan, add a few tablespoons of butter, melt it over medium heat, then add in flour a teaspoon at a time, stirring all the while until this basic roux comes together; when it does, add a cup of the liquid and whisk to form a jus. Add more liquid until you get the desired consistency. Serve over the turkey.
- Take the liquid and pour it into a large container and put that in your freezer until it freezes into a solid block. Take this solid block, wrap it in muslin or cheesecloth, and set it in a collander over a bowl until it melts completely, giving you a muslin full of turkey schmaltz (which you could use for cooking if you're not squeamish - chicken schmaltz is a big part of some classic ethnic jewish dishes), and a bowl full of crystal-clear turkey stock, which you can re-freeze in smaller containers for future use. (I used this for cooking the xmas turkey and making the jus so that I could make the jus while the turkey was still sitting in the roasting tin unopened).
There you go - really moist turkey and jus and turkey stock to play with afterwards. Enjoy!0 -
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