Plat du jour: oeuf poché



This food is not teen and comes directly from... Denmark!

Well, it is a french recipe, i know, but my egg-poché-meister is half dannish, half french. This is for you, Johannes Siverstsen, from who i took all my knowledge*.

The ingredients:
egg
water


The method:
make the water boil;
break the egg into a cup;
put the egg inside;
wait;
take it out;
eat.


The tips:
- have your eggs into the fridge, so that they are colder and easier to work with;
- use the cup to throw the egg into the water the smoothest possible: put it closest, half underwater maybe, and spin it slowly;
- control the boilness of the water: don't put the fire to high, it is going to break your egg in some ghostpieces of white thing;
- just tooth the yellow part of the egg when you are sure it is time to eat it!

The addons:
my poché tonight goes with "french" (portuguese) bread with cream chesse and copa (an expensive salami). my salt flower (from guérande!) is over, so i decided not to use any salt: do like me, exchange your salt by a good olive oil: it is very well exchangeable in almost any case.

do your fill combination! when i mean it is not teen food, maybe trying to shield myself from the tradition, i mean it only depend on us to do teen food!

(one last nasty photo for you :) )



*in fact, this is not true at all: once, i was in the veryfarland, in the countryside, my grandpas farm. i had nothing to do, so i decided to take a look at the books in the shelf. i found a very interesting book, called "Claudias book of the modern woman - kitchen"; i read it, and found 3 egg-poché recipes: the traditional one, something i don't remember, and the "twisted" one... well, have in mind that if you are a modern woman, you are able to make a big waterspout into the pan with some spoon just before throwing the egg inside and let it spin... this, my lords, is really freak food.

natural strawberry sweet (by h.chiurciu)

My friend said something that is true: a very important deal of fooding is how it makes you feel when you cook or eat something.

Today I made a natural stawberry sweet. It was almost like a jelly, actually, and I find it a very interesting activity. Natural sweets, made by cooking fruits (sometimes with a little sugar and spices) are a very simple and tasty way of saving fruits from rotening.

So, I had a whole pack of strawberries that were already getting "over-ripe". I washed and cut them in halves, and cooked with a little of sugar (no more than 5 teaspoons! fruits are already sweet enough, at least for me) and a spoonful of vinegar - don't really know why, some people add a bit of vinegar to keep the cooking pan from getting stained, others to keep the fruits from darkening with the heat or to cut the sweetness of the whole thing; sometimes i think i only do that because i watched that "courage dog" cartoon, and a ghost-aunt kept saying that the secret to her jellies was a bit of vinegar. In any case, it seems to work really fine!

I cooked it on very low fire, adding small sips of water from time to time to keep it from getting dry too soon - for me, that is when all the strawberries are not entirely melted yet.

And be ready: you need to keep standing and stiring the pan for something like 1 hour! Be sure not to let too much of it stick to the sides of the pan and burn.

After all the fruits have vanished on that beautiful and sweet-smelling red goo, stop adding water and reduce it to the point you wish. I dried it substantially, almost to the hard-candy point maybe. It got really thick and of a deep red, beautiful!

I don't know why people don't make this more often, since it is so easy and delicious! Maybe it is because it takes a reasonable amount of time to get ready, but i find it most relaxing.

The slow cooking of the ripe fruits, softly melting into a sweet and scentfull substance, transforming itself with the heat... Everything floods your senses, the smell, the colors, the sound of the whole thing boiling (or even a good music playing). It is a great way to meditate, if you ask me!

And the best part is you can make it with almost any fruit you want! Bananas, apples and mangoes are my personal favourites. You can try adding the spices you like, too: cinnamon, anise, cardamom, clover, ginger...

Enjoy yourself!

Make life a bit sweeter, and share it with your dear ones.

=)

Pasta with Fresh Tomatoes (by h.chiurciu)

Today I had a realy simple and delicious lunch that I'd like to share with you all.

Macaroni is a very popular food, for it is simple and it can taste really great when done properly. But I see most people doing always the same business - pasta cooked on water, ready-made tomato sauce heated and cheese on top. I don't like that too much. And I confess I don't like that bolognese sauce either, at least not the usualy seen one - with "minced meat". And then I see some fancy-ass restaurants selling "pasta with fresh tomatoes sauce" for a small fortune, like it's something sooooo special...

And somehow it is, but it shouldn't.

That's why today I show you a really easy, healthy and tasty way for making your pasta. :)

Stir on olive oil a small onion, well-chopped, untill it gets goldy. Add some 4 or 5 red tomatoes also very well chopped (it is better to use them the most ripe as possible, though I usually use them a little pale) and let it cook for a while. It will become a thick paste. You shoul add a sliced zuchinni now, and let it cook with the tomatoes. Don't forget to adjust the salt, as well as throwing a pinch of sugar to keep it from tasting too acid.

Add a bit of water and keep it cooking untill the tomatoes melt nicely, always letting it more watery than you want it. Now all you need to do is add the pasta - today I used a mini-penne for my lunch, and it tasted really great! I recommend this kind of macaroni, instead of spaghetti-like ones: penne, farfalle, etc. Let it cook alltogether, untill it's dried-up the way you want.

It is done!!

I added just a pinch of basil, because I love it.

It tastes as simple as it is, and sometimes that's all that you need: a simple, delicious lunch to keep your day shining with health and freshness!!

;D

The Basic Cream Soup (by h.chiurciu)

Today i had a great dinner, so i write about good things! =)

I don't know about you there, reading this, but here in Brazil (and specially at São Paulo) it is friggin' COLD! On a night like this, nothing warms your soul & body more and more nicely than a good bowl of soup. So, tonight i'll show you the basics for making a great CREAM SOUP.

I cannot say this is my specialty (Tiago himself has seen at least one of my failures on this matter!), but it surely is one of my favorites ways of cooking and I've been training on it for a few months now. It all started when i saw an Onion Cream Soup recipe at my girlfriend's place and decided to try it out. I'll teach you how it goes! =D

You'll need 4 big onions (maybe 5 or 6 of smaller ones), a cup of flour, 2 to 3 spoonfulls of butter and some boiling water ready to be used- as you see, all very simple ingredients!

First thing is to slice your onions very thinly! If your knife abillities are not that great, you can use a slicing device - but beware not to destroy your onions!

On a big cooking pot, melt down your butter on slow flame. Add the sliced onions, add some heat and gently fry them. Pay attention not to let your onions get too dry, or else they may burn; add more butter if necessary. As onions are somewhat acid vegetables, a nice trick is to add a pinch of sugar to them - but not too much, this is not a dessert!

Once they are well-fried, it's time to add the flour and make the cream.

You can do this in two different ways:

HARDCORE WAY: Throw your flour on the steaming onions while stiring it quickly! Mix it all up untill you get a very dry and hot mixture; then, add boiling water and mix it well.

PROS: you see the magic of the flour-turning-into-cream right in front of your eyes! it makes you feel a true alchemist and can impress deeply your dinning-company. ;)

CONS: it's possible you'll get flour-clogs in your cream; you may need to work your way with a spoon to dissolve them, but this can be minimized using sifted flour.

PRECACIOUS WAY: Gently mix your flour on a glass of water, making sure there are no clogs and it is all well dissolved. Add it to your pan out of the fire.

PROS: you'll get a more homogeneous mixture, greatly avoiding clogs and needing less abillity; you mayimpress your dining-company with how precacious and thoutghfull you are! ;)

CONS: well, it's a bit less exciting. =P

Now what you'll want is a boiling somewhat-waterish cream: add a little more water for that and let it boil for a good while (maybe 1h or so), cooking the flour and melting the onions into the cream. Keep adding water to keep it cooking, just stopping when you feel that it's all done and the thickness is the same as desired. You should taste it and add salt just then (not to repeat my last post ridiculous mistake).

It is done!!! =D
If you wish, before serving, add some fresh mint leaves and a mixed egg to it - they will give your soup a very special taste!

If you manage to make it right, congratulations!! You made your very first cream soup, and also learned all that you'll need to keep making cream soups! - of course, you'll need to reduce the amount of onions depending on the kind of soup you are aiming for.

Tonight, I made myself a very tasty Spinach Cream Soup using this exact principles.

I used just one onion and added a bit of garlic to it; shamefully, i also added a pinch of ready-made vegetables-sauce, but a fairly good one. After the cream was done, I added a handfull of chopped spinach leaves and boiled it for a few minutes. I also added the cracked egg at the end, and a bit of nutmeg during the process.

And it tasted quite great!!

All i wish is that i had sharen it with a dear one... but then i write here and share it with you! =)

Hope you guys try it out and make lots of delicious hot cream soups for your winter!!

tosta con tomateen (by h.chiurciu)

So today i had breakfast, and it was my favorite in the world breakfast: the spanish tosta con tomate! Of course, i am no great spanish tomatoaster, but i’ve figured out a rather simple way of enjoying this great dish at home.

First, a tomatoe: ideally big, red and ripe, but i usually use any tomatoe i find on fridge. You peel it (wich can be not so nice in a cold weather, if the tomatoe was in fridge like mine), slice it in four or whatever and microwave it! A minute and a half, within the medium potence, shall be enough. It is supposed to melt down in a fresh pulpy sauce. Then i like to smash the pieces to make the sauce a bit thicker and add a bunch of salt and olive oil (in Spain, they use A LOT of salt, but you can take it easy if you want). One could season it with oreaganne, but i dislike the idea for it is too italian and pizza-ish and everybody puts oreganne on everything and i’m sick of it. (added by Tiago: i’m sick of what we know by oreganne: it seems to me that it is very well possible to have really great flavor with a fresh one, not this “dry” thing we have in the supermakets.) So i stick with the original Spanish Flavor: salt and olive and tomatoes!

Then you use it with the bread. You can use any kind of bread, toasted sliced bread or toasted regular bread or even a regular old bread, like i did. I suggest you stick with the toasted or dried-up breads, because of the delicious way the tomatoe re-hidrates the stiff dough while still leting some parts of it really crunchy and interesting to bite. I used a stiff and 3-days-old mini-portuguese bread - portuguese bread is a kind of bread that i have never seen anywhere outside brazil, not even in portugal (added by Tiago, again: in fact i have heard that in Argentina they have a suppose portuguese bread as well, very similiar to ours, but in paris i went to a portuguese bakery and there was nothing about this.); i find the best here in Pirituba, so when you come for a visit you should stop by and try it!

This is what i find one of the worlds best breakfasts in the world, because of everything: it is simple, nutritious, delicious and makes you feel like a classic anarchist! ~ or even a fascist, if thats your zing, because everyone can enjoy a good tosta con tomate!!!

Tiago: But, what about the beverage? How can it fit to a liquidbreakfast?

H: Personally, i dont use to have liquidbreakfasts; in this case, i find the tomatoe all the liquid i need to have. But if you like, you can combine it with cofee or orange juice, I suppose.


T: ok, i do agree. but, what about tomatoes juice? I mean, as beverage.

H: What about it? I use bottled ones to make gazpacho! But that’s hardly a breakfast. I like it, as a beverage, but when i was a kid i liked it more (maybe because it was the best thing i could have on wedding parties). Maybe it’s quite the young drink, now thinking.