Die Hard with a Vengeance and ... a Zucchini Dream Salad

Yes, I'm still here, still healthy and alive. But then again, so you might have guessed. Right, I haven't been around here much, lately. However, it will be very hard to get rid of me completely. You never know, when I might pop up again.

While I am already here, we could also try to do something useful. I hope it doesn't feel like a vengeance to you. As I choose this for the title of this blog post, in fact, I'm not quite sure where we do have the vengeance here. After all, I'm not really the vengeful type.

Maybe the vengeance results from the other side. Me looking to much at food on the Internet and getting greedy about cooking more again, there had to be consequences. Alternatively, there might be some other explanation as to what happened to me. I will tell you in a jiffy ...

These days I have the custom of getting up early, like shortly after 5 am and even on the weekends I just make it to 6 am or a tiny bit more. Last night, though, sleep didn't like me that much. My brain - yes, there is one - was going back and forth, back and forth, back and ... I guess you get it. Where was it going? Exactly! Food! I kind of dreamt about what to have for breakfast. I wanted eggs and I wanted to do something with zucchini.

From this there resulted my zucchini dream salad ...

As the brain carefully had prepared everything during the night, it was a sure and quick thing to get the salad up and running and being eaten. Here some more details ...

Ingredients (for one person):

110 g shavings of zucchini

2 hard boiled eggs, quartered

6 black olives, cut into three pieces

4 brazil nuts, chopped up

A little bit of lemon juice and olive oil

Salt, pepper, chilli flakes

Grated parmesan

Method:

Yes, here we go. Use a potato peeler to get the shavings of the zucchini. If you like - and that is what I should have done, but didn't - shave off some more zucchini than mentioned in the ingredients.

In a bowl dress up the zucchini with salt, pepper, lemon juice and olive oil. Then arrange on a plate together with the eggs and the pieces of black olives. Sprinkle over the chopped up nuts for the crunch. In fact, use other nuts, if you want to.

To finish off, you can sprinkle over some extra olive oil. Grate over the parmesan and season with some chilli flakes.

Then ... dig in ...

As I mentioned in the outset, I had the salad for breakfast, but naturally, you can have it anytime. It has round about 500 kcal and has its good portion of protein and of course some good fats. So, no worries!

Did you have a similar experience before, like 'dreaming' about a dish that you wanted to cook. I hope you didn't loose too much sleep because of that. Anyway, it didn't do me anything bad. I still felt fine during the day and didn't have to fight fatigue.

I hope you liked my little zucchini dream salad. If you just toss all the ingredients together quickly you have a ... yes, right ... quick meal.

Do you have some recipes like that? What do you prefer for breakfast? Do you have salad for breakfast sometimes? Or strange things?

Thank you for stopping by and thank you for your precious time you invested for reading this little blog post right to this point.

Now I will go on and live free but not ...

Je ne parle pas français - Salade Pastourelle

Eh bien, je ne parle pas français. Well, I tried it at school for some month, but honestly I don't really understand much French. Nevertheless I like French cooking. Now, some time ago, I had strange ideas when travelling. I thought I might get a cookbook, when I'm on holiday ... in that country ... in the local language. As a consequence, I ended up with an Italian and a French cookbook. Great, I'm not really able to read it properly. So I didn't really make any efforts to try some recipes.
Here is, where it starts to get interesting. Dom from Belleau Kitchen has another entertaining idea for this month's random recipes. The theme is time for a spring clean and the idea is to give those books you would get rid off another go. Anyway, I wouldn't even think of getting rid off any of my cookbooks, even those I can't read properly. Nevertheless, I wanted to give one of those two books a go. The rolling of dice decided for the French one, which is Je Sais Cuisiner by Ginette Mathiot, and the random choice came up to Salade Pastourelle, which freely translated has to mean Young Shepherdess Salad. Have a look ...

This was the second try to select a random recipe for I by no means wanted to make anything with rognon de bœuf. Sorry, but no. I wouldn't know where to get beef kidneys and I don't want to know what they taste like.
So I was lucky I came to the salad section with the second attempt. Still there would be the challenge to translate the ingredients and the recipe. Then I reduced the amounts to m needs and came up with the following.

Ingredients:
5 small round onions, cooked, roasted, whatever
1 pickled gherkin, finely sliced
3 anchovy fillets, sliced
2 hard boiled egg yolks
50 g tuna in oil
2 tsp. capers
8 pitted olives
Vinegar, oil, salt, pepper
Freshly chopped parsley

Method:
Another problem with the book was, there are nearly 2000 recipes in the book, but no pictures of the dishes at all and the instructions are very limited.
However, I was so focused on getting the small round onions, that I totally mixed things up and got the wrong ones, for in the recipe it said you should boil them in salted water for 30 minutes. My onions needed no cooking at all, because they came in a jar  and where already roasted.
Accordingly my sole job was to get the egg yolks ready and then carefully mix all the ingredients together. Well, the egg yolks and the parsley where supposed to feature as a garnish.
Now I can not say whether I got this salade pastourelle right, but I liked it and as a matter of fact had another one the day after, however without egg yolks. I wasn't ready for more eggs that day.

I reckon, that cookbook has a lot of good French recipes in it. Fine, a few might be towards a direction I don't want to go, but I guess I could work a bit more on my French and have another go at something else. Maybe then I'll be able to figure out, why I got the book in the first place ...

Telly ... Brain ... Plate ... Chicken Pie

While I was doing some research for the Bloggers Around the World South Africa, I came across Masterchef South Africa. Did I tell you this before or am I having a déjà vu? Oh ... either way it would mean my brain is not functioning properly. That wasn't what I wanted to get to.
Anyway, in that episode the contestants where supposed to visit a restaurant, sample a dish and then cook it. Something like that I like as well. Fine, for one team it was chicken pie. From that moment I fancied to make chicken pie. 
Apparently that was about one month ago.
Now I like to share with you what got to my plate after it went from the telly through my (malfunctioning?) brain ...

Chuck Away the Telly ... Have Some Twisted Round Pizza Bread

Right there in the most of the time dark corner sits a piece of equipment, the television set. I got it from work some months - or was it years? - ago and I almost never used it for tuning in into some television programs. Fine, once I connected a free SAT receiver to try to connect to the already installed satellite dish for the house. The receiver broke before the seek run was over. It never recovered.
Sometimes I watch a DVD using the television, but ... I don't really need it. I might as well chuck it away. I never switched it on since I live here.
Do I believe that television broadcasting is entirely evil and good for nothing?
Well ... eh ... um ... eh ... no, not really. A workmate told me how I can watch telly on the Internet ... after all a lot of channels give the opportunity to watch their program online ...
Since then I discovered some nice programs.
For instance, since we are visiting South Africa for Bloggers Around the World, I started watching Masterchef South Africa from 2012 and ... I love it.
Now I would stop talking about television programs and get to some cooking, but ... eh ... just briefly ... the following dish is inspired by Paul Hollywood's Bread, which I watched once. Maybe it was the last show that was running.

I didn't really remember the recipe, but just took up the basic idea. What did I do then?

Getting Angry ... Arrabiata Pasta

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!