Banana Bread

Homemade pita bread!!

Nothings like a homemade pita bread with all the accessories you´d like!

For the pita, I use:

- 1 dl water

- 1 teaspoon dry yeast

- A pinch of salt

- A teaspoon of sugar

- 1 spoon of olive oil

- 5.5 dl fine flour

Mix all the ingredients in the same order, let it rest for 45 min.

Divide in 3 pieces, flatten them out in a pita form and let it rest for 30 more minutes in a handkerchief.

Flatten them out once again, before putting them on baking paper and brushing the top with olive oil.

Yes, it takes some time to make it, but I can tell you that it´s worth it!!

Spinach/aubergine lasagna

This is a great dish that´ll last for day or two if you are lucky. Being students, this is a great way to spare money.

You only need:

- 500 g of spinach

- 300 g of ricotta cheese or 3 mozzarella

- 1 egg

- 50 g butter

- 2 aubergines

- half a pack of lasagna plates

- some parmesan and mozzarella for the topping

Add the spinach in boiling water for 4 minutes and take it out to rest. Set the spinach on some kitchen paper so that it dries a bit. In the mean time, fry the sliced aubergines in olive oil and garlic. Add some white wine if you have some, or just water to give it some moist. Fry till they are nice and soft.

Boil the lasagna plates, and begin making the cheese and spinach mix.

Mix the egg, ricotta cheese, butter and spinach together and wisp. Begin plating the lasagna by adding the aubergine mix first, then plates, then a big layer of spinach mix, and repeat it once more. Finish by adding lasagna plates on top and garnish with a good layer of cheese.

Begin by putting it in the oven at 180 degrees celsius for around 30 minutes covered by aluminum paper. Take the paper off and let it cook for 5-10 more minutes with only top heat to create the crust.

This is great with a salad. Do not underestimate a great lasagna!

Celery root soup

Hello People!

Some days ago I went to a chinese grocery store, and found lot of different interesting vegetables and spices i´ve never seen before! I do not think that i´ll use some of the weird yet extraordinary stuff right away, but they´ll come on this blogg some day.

I have had a lot of inspiration this week, and I have loved every second of it!

2 days ago I made a creamy celery root soupe with a poached egg. For this I used a little number of ingredients, but the taste is incredible. Follow these steps:

- 250 ml of chicken stock is a sauce pan

- 1 peeled and cut celery root

- 2 peeled potatoes

- salt and pepper

instead of having the lid over, put some aluminum paper right over the cubes. This will make them soft faster, and not crunchy or medium soft. Bring it to the boil. When it´s really soft, put it in the mixer and add 2 oz of cream and just a little fresh finely cut chili. Mix while it´s hot, or else the soup will get lumpy.

For the poached egg, bring some water to the boil, and lightly season it with salt and olive oil. Give the water a swirl, so that it looks like a tornado. This will make the egg white turn around the egg yolk and create a perfectly shaped poached egg. Plate, season, add some olive oil and serve.

Italian Challenge? Done!

Hey everyone! This is my answer to the Challenge n°3 posted by Alex. Unfortunately, I haven't been cooking in my very small kitchen and as I came back to my parents' house for the weekend, I cooked for them using this challenge for the recipe.

Yes! The first step was to go straight to the food market near my parents' village to find inspiration. Everything always looks so delicious, it was hard to decide what to do even if I had an idea in mind the day before. Finally, I decided to make Langoustine Raviolis.I bought everything fresh from the food market and headed back to the kitchen to prepare the dinner.

First, I made the pasta dough from which I cut my raviolis. I used 250gr of flour, 2 eggs and a little bit of water.  Made a ball shape with it and let it rest in the fridge for 15 minutes.

I took the raw langoustines (I had 20 langoustines for 4 persons) out of their shells and kept the heads and claws aside. I put these heads and claws in water with thyme, bay leaves and white wine (sauvignon sec) to make a reduction for the sauce. Let it boil until only few centimeters of liquid are left.

Take the raw langoustines meat and add it in a hot stove with olive oil for 2 minutes. Take the langoustines out and chop them into very small bits. Add 2 spoons of crème fraîche and a drop of white wine, mix it all together with your hands and let it rest.

Take your dough ball out of the fridge and flatten it. Add flour if the dough is sticky. When it is well flattened, take a glass a cut circles in it, this will be the raviolis. Add your preparation in the middle of the circles and close them by joining one side with the other, making half circles.

While you wait for everyone to set the table and start to get ready, I recommend that you enjoy fresh oysters bought at the food market  with a glass of this delicious Sauvignon gris that you've been using for your recipe:)

Time to finish! Boil water with salt and olive oil, turn down the temp control a little bit and add the raviolis in it. When they come up to the top of the water, they are ready.

For the sauce: take out the liquid from the reduction (the colour might be greyish, don't worry, it doesn't mean it isn't delicious), put 5 spoons of crème fraîche in a pan, add 3 small spoons of the reduction, the juice of one lemon, white wine and salt & pepper. To avoid damaging the raviolis by using a sieve when they are ready, I actually put them in a rag, very effective!

My chèvre!

A delicious and easy to make goat cheese salad. Watercress and roman salad is great for this dish because you get that crunchy feeling.

In the frying pan add:

- 1-2 whole cherry tomatoes

- 2 pieces of bread rubbed in with garlic and seasoned

- 1 slice of goat cheese

- Olive oil

- Fresh thyme

Do not use Butter, ore else the goat cheese won´t have a nice crust.

For the vinaigrette, mix:

- 2 parts Olive oil

- 1 part vinaigre

- Salt and pepper

- Juice of half an Orange

- 2-3 spoons of honey (depends on how sweet you want it, but I use 2)

Mix it roughly, so the texture is right. It should have a funny brown color, and slightly creamy...

Plate, add some walnuts and finish by adding the vinaigrette. The acidity and sweetness of the vinaigrette works perfectly with the goat cheese. Personally I could eat 2 plates and still want more! It´s that delicious...

Foie Gras

I made myself a great little appetizer a few days ago. Foie gras with romano salad, walnuts, extra Italian virgin oil and a home made pomegranate caramel. I first put some water in a saucepan with a lot of sugar (do not know the exact measurements, but approximately 100 ml of water and pour sugar at one place till it forms a large peak in the pan. Mix it with the water, juice and seeds from a fresh pomegranate and let it create itself. If you do not like the acidity of the seeds, sieve it... Plate and serve!!

A great french plate that´ll always make you smile.