flank & tosca

certain someone was going to the market hall to get some bones for the dog so i asked him to bring "a flat piece of meat". he responded by asking "you mean like a flank steak?", he used that exact word...seems he's been reading my cooking magazines...

we had decided to grill the flank steak despite the fact that it's been raining for 3 days. the grilling was somewhat wet business...anyhow, here's the final result, delicious if i say so myself... 

i marinated the flank in soya sauce, sesame oil, rice vinegar, lime juice, grated garlic & ginger, chopped lemon grass and chili. sorry, there really isn't a recipe here, little of this, little of that...

i use a sturdy plastic bag, the clean-up is so much easier this way. had it marinating in the fridge for 6 hrs, took it out 1 hr before grilling. it's best to scrape off as much of the bits and pieces so that they don't burn on the grill...

for the salad "bed" i used shredded cabbage, sliced carrot (this slices with a peeling knife), ride noodles (with sesame oil), sauteed sweet onion (pictured here)...

...and blanched runner beans and sweet corn.

for the dressing i mixed soya sauce, sesame oil, lime juice, grated ginger and garlic and chopped chili and some sugar. firery stuff, but in a very good way.

whoa! obviously i didn't all the bits and pieces off. the flames did tame off, grilled the meat approx 4 mins per side.

let it rest for a while...

...before slicing part of it...

...to top off the salad, added lots of cilantro and parsley. we pigged out, the was only a tiny portion left of the salad, and about half of the meat. leftover meat will make great sandwich filler.

whilst doing whatever else i cooked up a veggie stew with roughly chopped onions, thinly sliced carrots, chopped celery sticks, chickpeas, crushed tomatoes, chopped zucchini and bell pepper and rye pasta (yep, there is pasta with 24% rye in it, very tasty), added some chicken stock for more flavor. this will make several lunches and/or dinners for both of us to take to work.

i (gasp) bought a tosca cake few weeks ago and although it was very good it seemed to fall short on what i'm used to. there was a time in the good old olden days when my mom made tosca cake very often. it's relatively easy to make and when it's perfect it's divine... but what you'd expect with all that butter, sugar, almonds and cream.

despite having well over 100 cookbooks i didn't find any "good" recipe for a tosca cake in them. i also searched the internet, but most of those recipes seemed to be just semi-clever variations of the real thing...so what is one to do? call mom...i have no idea where she has picked up this recipe:

for the cake:

4         eggs
2.5 dl  sugar
5    dl  all-purpose flour
3    tsp baking powder
200 gr butter, melted and cooled
1    dl  cream (or milk)

beat eggs and sugar until fluffy, add flour+baking powder mixture alternating with butter and cream. pour batter into two 20cm round loose bottom baking tins (or one 20x30 cm deep baking tin) and bake in 175C oven for 15 mins (until browned a bit and almost set in the middle)

for the tosca topping:

100 gr     butter
2     dl     sugar
2     tbsp all-purpose flour
2     dl     cream (or milk)
200 gr     sliced almonds

place all ingredients in a heavy bottom pot (i used a frying pan), mix well and let simmer for a few minutes until the mixture thickens a bit...

cakes are ready to be topped with tosca...

after dividing the topping between the two tins, they were baked for another 15 mins in 175C oven. as i forgot to rotate the pans mid-baking this one remained a tad undone in the middle and the tosca caused a sinkhole in the middle...but not to worry, it's still very, very delicious.

this is how both of them were supposed to look...

next time i will halve the amount of butter in the cake part. don't get me wrong, not trying to lighten this up, just think that smaller amount might do the work quite sufficiently. i will have some for breakfast tomorrow...

cottage food II: grilled lemon herby chicken, raspberry tart, and others

i've been back and forth at the cottage, as i had leave last week. cottage is always, well mostly anyways, about simple food. here, grilling flat chicken (martha calls it spatchcocked, how to here) while enjoying the scenery.







before you go thinking i've used semi-rotten meat...that bluish color comes from sage and thyme that i put under the skin with very thin slices of lemon.







about half an hour into grilling the birds (on medium-low) i noticed all the fat on the gridle...and remembered that there was some left-over boiled potatoes in the fridge. the chicken fat did wonders on the potatoes, just don't tell your cardiologist! total time for the chicken was about 45 mins.







made a poor man's greek salad (no olives) to go with the chicken, basil on the side. if it had been me, mom and certain someone the basil would have been in the salad (basil works surprisingly well with feta cheese), but for some reason dad will not eat "greens" in a salad...go figure.







naturally, i did make a stock from the backbones. the sage and thyme gave a strong flavor, the stock'll make a great soup later on (it frozen now).







mom then...not sure her medication is alright, the amount of energy she has, wears me out. she's been in the woods for weeks now, picking this and that, and these raspberries. the wild kind is far superior to the garden variety, so sweet and bursting with flavor. as there was so much berries, i needed to figure out what to do with them...







...and a recipe for blueberry tartlets in maku magazine gave me this idea...(it seems that the recipe isn't on the website yet.)
i made the crust with all-purpose flour and some oats, butter and one yolk. there really isn't a recipe but any shortbread type crust will do.






for the custard layer i used half of a vanilla pod, scraped the seeds and blended them into sugar with the blade of a knife, the seeds will distribute more evenly into liquid or flour. i learned this trick from tv (the great educator!), a danish cooking show called "the sweet life". like the name says it's all about the sweet goodness...now, if danish wasn't so hard on my ears...







this trick (the cling film right on the surface of the custard) i learned from anna, i think...







the crust could have been a tad thinner, other than that, perfect summer tart. the glaze was made with jelly sugar that doesn't have any animal products in it.







from sweet to savory, as mentioned earlier, the chaterelles are plentyful. here, sauteed with onions and butter (let your conscience tell how much you can use), the longer in lower heat, the better.







a slaw with carrots, white cabbage, root celeriac, flat-leaf parsley, chives and mayo.







mom's potatoes...from the ground into a pot in 5 mins, they taste amazing, but new potatoes usually do. or maybe it's the fact that mom buried fish parings into the ground with the seed potatoes...







my new favourite, giant white onions grilled on low heat, for a long time. you could use butter, but it's really not necessary, tiny amount of oil will do. i've contemplated on adding some balsamic reduction to this but so far it's just perfect as is.







i have a handy electric grill at the cottage, perfect for the onions, and keeping other (gas)grilled goods warm.

grilled veggies & ham wrapped potatoes

last week i went a little crazy at the produce counter...it seems i have developed a craving for zucchini and eggplant, bought too many and needed to figure out what to do with them (it was too hot to even think about cooking them in the oven). decided to take the easy way out...grilling them outdoors. i had also gotten two huge sweet white onions that i sliced thickly (1½cm) and skewered them (did soak the skewers for 20mins in water) before placing on the grill for a few mins per side, delish!







the sweet onion wasn't totally co-operating with me, the slices were breaking up when i inserted the skewers, so i chopped some of them. luckily i remembered that i had a perforated grill pan (that i've had for, hmm, at least 5 yrs and never used...)







huge button mushrooms turned great on the pan as well.







zuzzhini, eggplant and the onions...







i had some left-over boiled new potatoes and some serrano ham laying around in the fridge...







this was a dangerously delicious discovery...the crispy, salty meat wrapped around the sweet, soft potato, they were good even cold.







after this lunch there was plenty left over for me to take to work, for certain someone to take to work. i even made a salad with couscous on the third day...







people, eat your veggies!

bbq, peonies

summer leave just started and we decided to grill for the first time (?!?) this summer. pork was on order, just plain with some oil before placing them on the grill, glazing it only towards the end of cooking time. button mushrooms with lemon and parsley as a side. granma mami's cast iron pan is beautifully seasoned but since i have a ceramic stove i got get much use out of it. the pan was perfect for this







simple summer lunch, green salad with just iceberg lettuce and arugula








certain someone built this deck at the shack last year. today we spent most of the day on it, early afternoon it got too warm (another ?!?) and we added a "shade" made out of a sheet... not very martha stewart but got us thru the afternoon. however, there are plans to make a more permanent and prettier solution. some of the potted plants were put on the sill of deck







one example







another, i should have paid more attention to the names of the plants i got. i think i need to revisit the garden center just to get the names...







aah, don't you just love the hint of pink waiting to burst out!







in case i've forgot to tell, i love peonies







there are many ants in the budding blooms, i need to ask martha if i should do something about them








these here are the carrots i planted in big ikea "bucket", looks like we might actually get a dozen or so carrots. that is if the rabbits don't figure out how to get to them first. last year they got my malgolds...







breakfast today, sorry kids, i will make some for you as well at the cottage






ps. happy birthday, older niece!