Who's angry? Sometimes I'm not so sure about that ... I manage! Whatsoever, the Italian word 'arrabiata' means 'anger'. So we are just having some angry pasta. Maybe it helps as well to channel your feelings and don't make life bad for any people.
This recipe is for a few weeks already on my list to post. I don't know, what kept me so long. Maybe I wasn't too sure about it. Just have a look and say what you think ...
A better picture would have helped to post it earlier, but I do it now anyway.
Ingredients:
500 g Orecchiette pasta, cook it at some point
Olive oil
2 cloves of garlic, cut in slices
A splash of Vermouth, extra dry
2 tbs of tomato puree
2 red peppers, cut into small pieces
2 red chilies, or more if you are really angry
A handful of black olives, without stones
2 tbs of capers
Salt
Parmesan for serving
Method:
Start with heating up the olive oil. Add the garlic and fry for 2 minutes. Then add a splash of Vermouth, followed by the tomato puree. Continue for 2 minutes.
At this point add the peppers, the chilies, the olives and the capers. No big deal!
Let it all cook in for a while. Maybe you have your pasta ready then.
Check, whether the sauce needs some salt.
Mix in the pasta with the sauce, adding some of the cooking water as well.
Serve with some freshly grated Parmesan.
Well, I'm not feeling angry right now, but maybe another day. For me, though, cooking in general helps me to get into a better mood. So, get your pan ready and go for it!
Disgusting! Since I was disposed to this word spoken by a friend of mine in his typical Yorkshire accent at various occasions I came to use it too often as well. Yes, I know, that is disgusting!
While I don't want to classify the following cheesy meatballs as disgusting, you have to judge for yourself as regards the chili sauce.
The meatballs themselves are based on a recipe by Jamie Oliver: Mountain Meatballs. I simply adjusted at to my personal amounts and availability.
The chili sauce contains a little bit of this and a little bit of that. I will roughly state the ingredients, but the real content has to remain shrouded in mystery.
Ingredients Meatballs:
1 red onion, finely diced
300 g minced meat
1 tsp Dijon mustard
1 tsp dried oregano
A few bashed cumin seeds
1 tsp bashed up coriander seeds
1 handful of breadcrumbs
1 egg
Salt and pepper
50 g grated cheese
Ingredients Chili Sauce:
1 onion, finely chopped
5 cloves of garlic, finely chopped
Tomato puree
Honey mustard BBQ sauce
Water
Curry ketchup
Sweet chili sauce
Coffee liquor
Method:
Heat up some olive oil on medium heat and then soften the red onion dice in it. 10 minutes will do. Remove the onion pieces from the pan and put away to cool down.
Then start the sauce and do the same with the stated onion as you did with the other onion. Hm ... sounds strange to me ... ah ... forget it ... no worries ... just do it. Then add the garlic.
Meanwhile you can also start heating up your oven to ... eh ... let's say 250 °C.
Now add all your other ingredients for the sauce to the pan, bring to the boil and then reduce to a simmer.
Back to the meatballs ... mix all the other ingredients apart from the grated cheese together and form ... eh ... 4 large meatballs out of it. Get a quarter of the grated cheese ... wait ... that's about 12,5 g and press it into each meatball and close with meat around it so the cheese is more or less in the center of the meatball.
Throw your meatballs into an oven-proof dish and transfer ... no throwing here ... to the oven for 25 minutes.
In the meantime the sauce is disgustingly bubbling away. It gets more and more sticky ...
The 25 minutes are over. Remove the meatballs ... don't burn yourself ... and pour the disgusting sauce over the meatballs and ... shove the dish back to the oven for 15 more minutes.
After that you still can decide whether to eat it or not. Well, surprisingly the sauce didn't taste disgusting as to be expected or announced. It rather tasted interesting.
Oh, I know what people mean, when they say interesting. It's the polite way of saying disgusting. But, really, it didn't taste like that. Frankly, it was rather good. It simply was a sticky mix of sweet and hot and ... there is only one way of finding out ...
Goedendag! Hoe gaat het met jou? Ik wil je graag uitnodigen. Wat zegt u?
What? You didn't understand a thing? Well, it doesn't matter, my Dutch isn't that good either, anymore. In fact it never has been, although it should ... or maybe not.
Anyway, I want to invite you to have a soup together with me, a chicken apple soup. I improvised this recipe after a friend told me, he had tried something like this after having something like this in the Netherlands. Let's have a try then.
It might be Dutch, but then again, it might not be. I haven't taken the time to try. Nevertheless we leave it that way.
Ingredients:
150 g chicken breast, cut in bite-sized chunks
1 red onion, finely chopped
2 cloves of garlic, finely chopped
1 tsp minced ginger
1 red bell pepper, cut into stripes
1 red chili, finely chopped
750 ml water
6 tbs apple compote
100 g pasta or rice (I had rice pasta ... he he he)
Salt for seasoning
1 spring onion, chopped in rings
Method:
First fry the chicken breast pieces from all sides and put aside.
Get yourself a sufficiently sized pot and gently fry the onion in oil. After a few minutes add the garlic and the ginger and let it go for a few more minutes.
Then it's the time for the bell pepper and the chili to make it's appearance on the cooking scene. Put them in the pot and proceed with the cooking for a few more minutes ... eh ... that is until the bell pepper has softened a bit.
Pour in the water and bring to the boil. After that reduce the heat and add the chicken, the apple compote and the rice pasta. Let it all simmer for about 15 minutes. The chicken should be cooked through.
Finally add the rings of the spring onions and turn off the heat ... ready to serve.
You can always try. Normally, maybe, you wouldn't put such things together, but you never know, if you don't try. It might be the case you discover some nice flavours.
Een fijne dag nog! Tot straks!
A few days ago I decided to give Cooking Around the World a new design. Basically I changed the background colour and the welcoming banner for the blog. I hope you like it! When you look at the picture there are foods and places. One of these places I can see every day, if I want to. Have a guess which one that is! However, there are other places there, I'd rather like to see more often.
Additionally I adjusted my Facebook page as well. It has to reflect the blog.
While I was at all this I decided to change my profile picture. You can only see it partly, but I'm wearing an Indian kurta. It looks like this ...
I just wanted to mention those things. Keep it in mind as you read on. Strangely, things fit all together once more.
Have you ever thought about doing a themed dinner party? You dress up for it, maybe do some decoration, put on music and it all fits to the food you are going to have. How would you like that?
What about doing it alone ... a one person themed dinner party?
Let me tell about it ...
There is a certain person that is running this blog called Belleau Kitchen. As he is doing this random recipes challenge every month I cannot resist, but take part in it. Quite often you end up with cooking food you wouldn't have otherwise.
This time we have the theme 'cuttings, memories and clippings'. That means I have to go and search my shelves for those hidden cuttings and clippings to find some recipes. I don't have as many cuttings and clippings as others and they are also not so well organized.
Anyway I got myself a small pile and rolled the dice of random. I ended up with number 3 - therefore I went for the third sheet of paper.
It was a clipping from a health journal of a health insurance company and ... strange enough ... it featured some Indian dishes. Did I say some? Yes, five to be exactly. Taking the number three further I decided for the third dish and it was ... dhal.
Well, that would be something to have as a side dish. Due to this fact I randomly decided to do the fish curry mentioned on that clipping as well. That is called 'Saraswat Machchi Kadhi'. I tried my Hindi dictionary on that, but gave up quickly. Then I asked the Internet and it called it Goa style fish curry. I even found the same picture of it as was used in this health magazine article.
I made sure I had all the needed ingredients and then, went for it ...
First of all I put on my Indian cooking kurta. Well, I simply declare it that one from now on. By the way, it is not the one shown in the picture above. I have a few more other ones. Why do I have so many Indian clothing to wear? Go ahead and ask me, if you like to know!
Then I put on some music from the soundtrack of a famous Indian movie ... as far as I know.
Now our Indian themed cooking party can start.
Good thing I still had some urid lentils on stock. They went into a pot covered with one centimetre of water.
Meanwhile I prepared the marinate for the fish. I squeezed one lime and mixed the juice with some freshly grated ginger, mustard powder, sesame seeds and coriander seeds. The white fish fillet was cut into small bite sized pieces and went marinating.
Before I continued with the dhal, I brought some basmati rice on the way.
Back to the dhal. I freshly picked a green chili from one of my bushes on the windowsill, cut it in half and tossed it in with the lentils. If I were to change the recipe, I would cut it into small rings and add it to the lentils. Anyway, one bay leaf, a chopped onion and two chopped cloves of garlic went in, too. Here also some grating of ginger is necessary. Some curry powder rounds it up. Now heat it up on medium heat and let it go for 20 minutes, checking every now and then and working through with a spoon.
The fish has nearly enough marinating. However, there is still some chopping of an onion to do. That one made me cry slightly. Then half four tomatoes, spoon out the seeds and then cut the tomatoes into small pieces. Now take the fish, pat it dry and fry it for 5 minutes in sesame oil at a medium heat.
Don't forget to give some attention to the rice when it's ready and to the dhal. After the 20 minutes you have to turn off the heat of the dhal.
Take out the fish from the pan and put aside. Now fry the onions in the pan.
If I hadn't already enough work with cooking I suddenly decided it would be a brilliant idea to have a cucumber raita with it all, as well. So I took some of the chopped onions and put the together with some halved slices of cucumber, cumin, salt, yogurt and water and mixed it all up.
Add some curry powder to the onions in the pan. Then add the remaining fish marinade and some 250 ml of coconut milk to the pan and bring to the boil.
What about some naan breads. Yes, that would have been lovely, but I'm not that crazy today and make some on my own. No, I even didn't buy any ready made ones to just warm up. Sadly!
Remove the green chili and the bay leaf from the dhal and heat the dhal up again, if necessary. We are almost there.
Let the tomatoes meet their destiny by adding them to the boiling coconut milk mixture. I guess the fish can go for some swimming, too. Go for it! Warm it up again.
If I'm right now, all the food is ready. You just need to plate and bowl it up and decorate everything with some fresh coriander. I already know that the remaining coriander will not survive too long in my kitchen. I should use it up in the coming days.
Here we are with the food ...
Sitting alone at the table and tasting the fish curry, memories spring to my mind. The food wasn't dangerously spicy. I still remember the fish curries of my Tamil friends and Tamil food in general. They always used to say they have to adjust the spices to the European palate. However, the first time I tasted a dish, I had the feeling it wasn't adjusted sufficiently.
Having this fish curry in front of me, I wished it would be going at least a bit in that direction. Don't get me wrong, it still tasted delicious. It was only thinking. While doing this I thought ... well, I'm sitting here all by myself eating this lovely food ... and then ... I put away the fork and went on eating as we used to do it with the best tools ever, my fingers.
Once more, I managed to end up with something lovely, doing random recipes ... and that's not cheating. After all, why should I keep any clippings with rubbish recipes.
Moreover, I ended up with fish again. This wasn't the first time either.
So far about random recipes this time. Time and again, I thought about cooking through one cookbook. After all, I nearly baked myself already through a book about French bread.
Now I have a few books in mind I seriously want to choose one from and go completely through it and report about it here on my blog. One of the books on that list is 'Tasting India' from Christine Manfield (Christian and Christine?). That post now made me hungry for that book. However, things haven't been decided in the final and I won't start before April.
In the meantime I still have a voting going on my Facebook page. If you don't mind, please head over there one time and give your vote. That would be very much appreciated. You can also suggest other books to make it more interesting.
You see, once more, it came all together ... strangely ... as last time. India was on my mind and suddenly it's all India!
Any thoughts? Just leave a lovely comment!
We managed already one month of 2013. What do you think? So far it was pretty much the same as in 2012. Well, there have been a few negative changes over the past few days, but ... it's always better to focus on the positive aspects of life ... hm ... like food, for example Mexican food.
You have still have nearly half a month to participate in the current Bloggers Around The World with the theme Mexico. As I was preparing my own entry the other day, Pimiento Mexicano con Huevos, I promised you to tell you what I did with the leftovers I had.
That pizza was one thing. In fact it was quite easy. Just prepare you usual pizza dough and then top it with the leftover Pimiento Mexicano con Huevos. Well, it was not exactly what I did. There were a few more ... eh ... special things I did.
First of all I substituted the semolina flour I usually add to my pizza dough with corn flour. Fine, this was the main thing. I also added a bit more cheese and sprinkled a bit of black pepper and olive oil on top. Now, that's all!
This pizza was quite nice and enjoyable. What a shame I can't have pizza right now. Maybe next week again ...
Now it happened also to be the case that there were leftover tortillas. In fact that was already kind of cunningly schemed beforehand. I wanted to have a tortilla soup.
Here is how you could do it as well ...
Ingredients:
50 g bacon, chopped into small bits
1 small onion, finely chopped
1 red chili, finely chopped
4 wheat tortillas, cut into stripes
500 ml beef stock
Salt
50 g grated cheese
Method:
To start with we slightly brown the bacon, onion and chili together in our pot.
Then we add the stripes of the wheat tortillas and pour over the beef stock. Season the soup according to your taste and bring to the boil.
Ready! You can fill the soup into individual bowls. Toss in some grated cheese and put it either briefly under the grill or if you don't have one, just go for it ...
Have you noticed something else in connection with this blog? Well, maybe you can check it later, but on Monday it will be one year after my first post. Just saying!
It's time to turn up the heat and have some Mexican food. After all we are already having entries for this month's Bloggers Around the World. Either everyone is turning to have more time or it is an easier theme this month or even both.
Anyhow, I already prepared a few things to share with you this month. After all this theme is kind of special to me, but we have to wait until after the cooking before I disclose some further facts about me ... this time in connection with Mexico and Mexican food.
The main stars of the following recipe are bell pepper and eggs.
Let's go for it then ...
We need:
Splash of olive oil
1 red onion, finely copped
1 yellow, red , and greed bell pepper respectively, cut into stripes
2 red chilies, finely chopped
2 tbs tomato puree
100 ml cream
100 grated cheese
2 hard-boiled eggs, quartered
We do:
Gently fry the onion a little bit and then add the bell peppers together with the chilies and then sauté them for about 15 minutes.
At this point add the tomato puree and cream and let go for another 10 minutes.
Now you add the cheese, spoon it through and let the cheese melt. That shouldn't take too long.
Finally add the eggs and let things on heat until the eggs are also warmed a bit. Once more, that shouldn't take too long.
Serve together with some wheat tortillas, which can be easily prepared by yourself as well. You just need flour, salt, cream and water to make the dough.
Dig in!
So far about my entry for Bloggers Around the World: Mexico. However, I can tell you, that I had leftovers. What I did with them I'll tell you later.
Now again some facts:
- The first cookbook I ever bought was about Mexican food.
- That was what started my interest in cooking.
- Sometimes I turn on Mexican music, when I'm cooking Mexican food.
- It would not sound too nice, if I would sing along.
- I have been to Mexico once.
- I stayed for about 5 minutes and took me longer to get out then in.
- I would like to go to Mexico, properly at another time to see some ancient ruins.
- There is also a book I have about the Maya ruins and at one point I even thought of becoming an archaeologist.
- My Spanish could use some polishing up.
- Enchiladas belong to my favourite foods.
So, here we are already at the end of this post. Have you made up your mind yet and decided what you are going to cook for the Mexican themed Bloggers Around the World? Or what do you think can be done with the lefovers of Pimiento Mexicano con Huevos?
'I guess now it's time for me to give up. I feel it's time.'
In 2012 ... a lot of things happened that shouldn't have had!
'Whatever I said, whatever I did, I didn't mean it.'
While kicking 2012 farewell I was a bit mean and some started worrying ... well, at least some worried whereas a lot wouldn't, if I'm not there anymore.
What now?!
Was the beginning of Cooking Around the World something that shouldn't have happened? Will anyone miss crazy stories intertwined with cooking that don't have anything to do with cooking? What about recipes that make the truth appear on your hips? Besides that who can stand the truth???
Then there are the things that have the capacity to bring you a burning sensation several times to your body ...
... 2013 ... Happy new year? Who knows about such things???
It's up to you to be happy ...
Besides that ... things go on as they have been before ... but will it be back for good?
The answer is shrouded in darkness ...
You didn't understand a word? Well, then directly continue with the burning ... and have a Hot'n'Fruity Potato and Carrot Curry ...
Ingredients (everything you don't like is optional, but then you might end up with nothing much):
1 red onion, finely chopped
500 g potatoes, peeled and cut in cubes (sort of)
500 g carrots, peeled and cut in cubes (you know)
1 tbs flour
500 ml vegetable stock
1 chili (oh, oh, I used a habanero one), finely chopped
100 ml coconut milk
2 tsp mango chutney
2 tsp curry powder
Juice of one lime
Preparation (beware not to make 'the' mistake):
Let's talk business now and put this Hot'n'Fruity Potato and Carrot Curry together.
We start off by softening the onion in a pan with some oil at low heat. After that we chuck in the potatoes and the carrots and turn up the heat a bit to fry them a little bit. You will see some colour appear on the potatoes.
Spread the flour all over it ... if you can and then pour over it the vegetable stock. Go with a wooden spoon through it and ... add the chili. While talking about chillies, just keep in mind to be careful, when handling them or otherwise they will burn also in another way. We will talk about this a bit later again.
Did you add the chili? I did and the coconut milk, mango chutney and curry powder goes in as well. Spoon things through again to have it all spread evenly (sort of).
Then it's time to put a lid on it and let it simmer for at least 30 minutes.
Don't worry too much about the things you don't have! After all, you could have added some pieces of chicken breast and some pieces of mango as well, but ... we didn't ...
So, don't worry, be happy!
After the simmering is over, turn off the heat, remove the lid and add the lime juice. Use that spoon once more. Then you are ready to heat. Should you be as stupid as me and have used the habanero chili, you will have quite a burning feeling in your mouth. However, there will also be a certain fruitiness. Guess why!
Once the meal is over, I hope you are still happy ...
Nevertheless, there comes the point in once life where you have to rub your eyes, because of something ...
... what a stupid idea!!! A really stupid idea, when you have handles chillies and removed the seeds with using your fingers. Even if you wash your fingers afterwards, something still remains. Yes, rubbing your eyes using those fingers is really stupid ...
... yet another reason to cry! Will it ever end?
I only know that this was not the first time I did this chili part and for sure it will not be the last time ...
If you dare to try this Hot'n'Fruity Potato Carrot Curry, let me know what you think about it!
That's all for now, but is it back for good?!
