" VERY BERRIE" BREAKFAST BOWL

AUTUMN HUMMUS

Hummus - Middle Eastern Cookery. A paste or dip made of chickpeas mashed with oil, garlic, lemon juice, and Tahiti and usually eaten with pita – that is what you find browsing at Google. But do you know that this delicious dish can be also served as main course? It’s very healthy, refreshing, tasty and nutritious. Let’s see what happens when you mix it with autumn season vegetable – pumpkin. Z iVery simple but interesting recipe:

AUTUMN HUMMUS

1,5 kg of fresh pumpkin, you may use Hokkaido – nice sweet taste

1 can of pre cooked chickpeas (or 1 large cup of dry chickpeas - cooked)

½ cup of fresh yogurt

olive oil

garlic clove

bunch of cherry tomatoes per one person

small spoon of fennel seeds

small spoon of cumin

black pepper

salt (I have used Flore de salt  - lemon taste)

bread – brown, pita, tortilla – depending on you - bio if possible

1 large cup of vegetable stock

½ of lemon

4 large portions

 

 

Step by step:

Clean the pumpkin and cut in two similar halves. Cut the first half in small pieces, add butter, pepper, salt, vegetable stock – and then cook in a pot for max 10 minutes, till it gets soft, but still compact in texture.

Pre heat the oven to 185 degree Celsius, cut the second half of pumpkin in to suitable pieces (depending if you wish to serve one big piece or several small pieces on one plate), use baking paper as a base in the pot, then place the pumpkin, cherry tomatoes. Use salt (Flore de salt), pepper, olive oil, and fresh herbs (what you have by hand – basil, rosemary, thymine – they all fit great with this dish). Cover nicely all the vegetable with oil and then bake for aprox 25 – 30 minutes, till they get nice & crispy.

While baking concentrate on the first part of pumpkin – cooked! Drain the cooked water, pour the pumpkin in to a higher bowl (or mixer – Vitamix) and add cooked chickpeas, yogurt, 4-5 spoons of olive oil, grain one garlic clove. Mine while take the fennel seeds, cumin, salt and pinch of brown sugar. Bake them on a pan, till you smell the flavors – 3-4 minutes. Then use a mortar to crush the hot mixture. This is a traditional way, how rise the flavors and taste of the herbs and spices. You will fall in love with this procedure. I always feel like a old witch – hahahahaaaa! Add the spices and lemon juice to the pumpkin / chickpea bowl – and mix till you get nice smooth compact texture. And yes – our pumpkin hummus is ready. Always taste your result. It may happen, that you’ll have to balance the flavors little bit.

The rest is very easy. Just place the hummus on a plate. Add crispy baked pumpkin & tomatoes, sliced bread. Give it the last touch of olive oil, Flore de salt and pepper…..and enjoy!

 

SUNNY SALAD

Well what can I say? We should not complain about silly things and be grateful for all what we have. Everyone around me knows that I’m not that kind of person complaining about small thing sin life. I’m a very happy person 99,9% of my life. But there is this one thing I miss so much – summer sunshine! We can’t fight the nature, but why did someone up there decided to pour rain on our heads for more than a month??? I really charge my batteries each summer. There fore this colorful salad full of summer flavors:

SUNNY SALAD

1 large yellow zucchini

1 large cucumber

1 fresh fennel

8 – 10 cherry tomatoes

15 pc anchovies

1 lemon

1/3 cup of olive oil

large spoon of honey (or two if you feel like it!)

chili

½ spoon of estragon mustard

black pepper

salt

4-5 portions

 

Step by step:

Use the carrot peeler. Peal the zucchini in to thin slices. Bring a pot of water to boil and let the zucchini cook for 2-3 minutes. Then take out the zucchini and let it cool down under cold water – Blanche it! This process helps to keep the zucchini in nice color& softens the structure.

Peal cucumber the same way, cut fennel in to nice thin pieces. Cut cherry tomatoes in half.

Place all vegetable in to salad bowl. Add anchovies.

Prepare the vinaigrette as follows:

Mix olive oil, estragon mustard, honey, juice from ½ lemon, cut chili, pinch of salt, pepper in to a nice vinaigrette sauce. To smooth the thickness of the sauce, add 2-3 large spoons of cold water.

Pore the vinaigrette over the salad and leave it for at least 30 minutes, till the flavors combine.

Serve it as a main course, but is also suitable as adding to meats, or dips for party. Enjoy!

CRISPY CHICKEN AND PORK PAN

With three kids and full time job, I may not find enough time for cooking in the working week. But I just can’t imagine leaving my kids without honest home made food. Therefore I try to cook fresh, easy and as simple as possible. Here is my recipe for nice meat & vegetable dinner. Enjoy!

CRISPY CHICKEN AND PORK PAN

2 pc of pork flitch

6 pc chicken leg

4 large carrots

1 large onion

¼ kg Brussels sprouts

medium pumpkin  - any kind

1 big lemon

garlic

olive oil

salt

pepper – black & red

fennel

cumin

honey

 

For 3-4 person

 

Place meat in to pan, sprinkle with salt, black pepper, cumin & fennel. Add ½ of fresh squeezed lemon juice, olive oil & large spoon of honey. Use your hands and mix the meat with all the flavors. Add bits of lemon and garlic (just cut the whole bunch of garlic in to half, and place it in to pan – you’ll gen a nice sweet garlic paste after baking) and pure one cup of water in to the pan. Heat up the oven to 180 degree Celsius. Cover the pan with foil and bake covered for 35 minutes. Then take of the foil and bake for another 15 minutes uncovered. Sprinkle the meat with gravy from the pan now and then – it will give the meat a nice crispy touch.

Meanwhile cut the vegetable in nice thick pieces (carrot, onion, pumpkin, Brussels sprouts), add olive oil, salt, pepper, cumin. Then place on to oven next to the meat and bake on the dame temperature, till it gets nice crunchy.

And that is it! If you wish, you may prepare nice fresh tomato/cucumber salad as addition to the warm dinner. My kids loved this meal, and the empty plates have been the proof!

FISH & GREENS FOR KIDS

We all find excuses, why our kids don’t like to eat vegetables and fruit. Yes, it’s a tough  job to convince these little monsters to eat something, what they see as disgusting, soggy and tasteless. My mum always used to say:

“Put it in your mouth, and if you don’t like it, just spit it out.”

Luckily, she didn’t have to use this sentence very often. My children are used to eating vegetables and fruits from their early years. But I completely understand many of you out there, who try the impossible without any progress. All I can do is recommend an easier way to convince your kiddos to eat more veggies and fruit.

Two things you should try – involve them while cooking, and try to “hide” every ingredient they could moan about – mix it, mash it, wrap it, make it look better!

FISH & GREENS FOR KIDS

1 big sweet potato

4 carrots

1 fennel

bunch of young spinach

1 onion

1 clove of garlic

bit of fresh ginger

½ cup of veg. stock

herbs – thyme, sage

salt

pepper

From the freezer:

1 cup of frozen young peas

10pc of king prawns

1 slice of salmon filet

 

If you have fresh prawns & salmon even better – 

in that case they’ll need 2-3 minutes less for cooking! 

 

Start with the sweet potato.  Peal it, and cut ¾ into thick potato fries, use baking paper and put them on a hotplate. Addonion sliced into large chunks (onion will get nicely sweet and soft) to the plate. Add virgin olive oil, salt & pepper. Use your hands to stir the mixture. You want the oil to be all over the potatoes – that will make them crispy and they won’t dry out. Pre heat the oven to 180 degree Celsius. Place the potatoes inside and roast for approx. 15. minutes.

Clean the carrots, cut into small pieces (smaller pieces will cook faster). Heat extra virgin olive oil in a pot. Add the second half of the cut onion. Wait till it gets “glassy”. Then add carrots, 1/3 of sweet potato, garlic, herbs and grated ginger over the top. Let is sizzle for 2-3 minutes. Then add frozen peas and stir for another 2 minutes. You should still have a little bit of sauce in the pot – but just a tiny bit! Add prawns and salmon. Don’t worry that they are frozen. They will soften and the juice from prawns and fish wil prevent the dish from burning! Give it a nice stir, but be careful with the salmon. Don’t turn it too much – you want to have a nice fillet of fish. Add a bit of stock, put the lid on the pot and let it cook for 5 minutes. Then take the fish and prawns out of the pot. Your potatoes should be ready in the meantime. Turn off the oven; add the fish and prawns to the potatoes hotpan, and let them rest in the oven. It will take only a few minutes for the dish to be ready

Now you have a pot full of yummy greens. Since I know that my eldest doesn’t like to eat spinach that much, I decided to divide the greens into pots. Add the spinach in one half, and let it cook - only for one minute – it doesn’t need more. Turn of the heat and mix both “sauces” – you will end up with kind of orange and green sauce. To make it even more yummy for children – you may add cheese or fresh cream – but it’s not necessary.

Take a plate – and make your own design for dinner. You may try to make a funny face or kind of animal on the plate. Kids love such surprises. But if you are in a hurry – don’t worry. As I wrote before – let them cook with you. They will slowly start bulding a relationship with every ingredient. Have fun with it!

For the salad – just cut fennel into nice thin slices, add a bit of brown sugar or honey, fresh lime, salt, pepper & olive oil. Stir well, and let the ingredience work together for 5 minutes. So simple and delicious…

So! Good luck to all the mamas out there……