Zakąska Agnieszki !

Ok, first things first. Let us deal with the pronunciation of the dish. ZA-KAUN-SKA. It sounds complicated, but it is not so complicated to make if you are a gifted baker or as in my case, a gifted observer! Yeah, I am playing the part of the student with this dish and it is from the Polish cuisine. Agnieszki in the name of this dish stands for the innovation and the modification introduced by the person cooking, Agnieszka. At this very moment she is cooking it and I am writing this. ( Wednesday, 17.11.2010, 20:00 )

Wash the leeks (2) and discard the hard green part. Cut into round slices the rest of the onion. Peel the celery (1) and cut in into nice 1 inch cubes. Add these together into boiling water and add along one table spoon  of butter, some salt and 2 spoons of sugar. Within few minutes, the room is filled with the magnificent smell of onions and celery. Celery, by far, has the most interesting smell for a vegetable that I have ever come across! Once the celery is 70 % cooked, take it off the heat. Strain the water off and transfer the boiled vegetables to a hot pan with melted butter (1 spoon). Now add two cubes of vegetable stock and cook until the stock is spread over the vegetables. The cubes are actually well concentrated vegetable stock containing vegetables and spices like thyme, rosemary and turmeric and salt. One good idea to substitute this would be to use the readily available Knorr veg clear soup powder (oh yeah, EUREKA!).

Pour nearly 150ml of cooking cream (25-30 % fat, thick) over the prepared vegetables and mix evenly. Now, into a nice glass oven able bowl, spread a layer of French pastry (yet again readily available) so that the pastry lines the base and the sides of the bowl. Prick the bottom with a fork so that the pastry can breathe when in the oven! Transfer the vegetable-cream mixture into this and cover the top with strips of the pastry in random or netted orientations. Pre-heat the oven to 180 Celsius and then put this inside for 40 minutes (@ 180 degrees ). Allow to cool for a few minutes before serving. Play around with spices if you need to make it hotter! 

Oh, the taste is divine. Leeks and celery and cream with mild spices. The taste will transport you to the nostalgic 1800's of Europe. The ingredients might be tough to procure in India, but I know that people reading this will add their names to the second part for their own modification introduced! 

The kissable garlic : Aglio oilo

I was making spaghetti for dinner and I told Prashanth and Ramki “machis, tomorrow you are going to eat spaghetti in Italy. So don’t complain there that it is not as good as my preparation!” and that is exactly what happened. Probably it was just my luck that that particular restaurant in Venice did not serve us well, but as soon as Prashanth uttered those words, we could not stop laughing.

Many people would not eat garlic just because it would impart mouth odor and make it difficult to socialize. But when deep fried, garlic does not impose this restriction. And I am a huge fan of garlic! Who cares if the mouth is going to smell, I cannot restrain myself from garlic fried in ghee or when put in rasam. Me and my sister used to fight over who will get the extra garlic after amma has partitioned and rationed it out for us!

Aglio oilo is a basic simple spaghetti recipe that I would term as the kissable garlic. This is one of my most favorite non creamy and non gravy based spaghetti that can be enjoyed for its pure flavor of garlic and chili without interference from oregano or any other expressive seasoning. I love the olive oily feeling all around my mouth when I eat this.

Heat just a little excess of good olive oil in a pan. Fry finely chopped garlic until it is fried well. Add coarsely ground deseeded green chili paste into this. Toss in a few pieces of red bell pepper or minced celery or both. The red bell pepper and celery are just very optional for people who like some extra vegetables in their plate. Now add the well cooked and strained spaghetti into this and stir. Add salt and sprinkle just a dash of black pepper powder. Mix well so that every spaghetti strand is bathed in olive oil and the garlic pieces are spread well into them. Serve hot with an optional garnish of grated or powdered cheese.

Note: Add at least 5-6 huge pods of garlic. Chop it as finely as possible, but don’t make a paste out of it. Chili can be added as per your levels. 2-3 should be optimum.

The magic of fermentation: Sauerkraut

I can never stand this statement “oh, finding food abroad is so difficult, how do you manage? Have you started to eat meat?” Give it a rest dear people. Finding food is easy when you first find your tongue. Keep an open mind to relish and approach new food and flavors. Don’t be suspicious about food. The very first touch down on your tongue is going to tell you the taste and until that time, be with an open mind. And it is always polite to tell, “I do not like how it tastes” rather than spitting out and yelling “It tastes terrible or it is the worst dish.” No one is going to cook and present something that is terrible, well, unless you have displeased your wife!

Tastes can be unique, divine, smooth, spicy, heavenly, elevating and the list can just keep continuing how your mind is going to perceive it. One persons like can be another persons dislike when it comes to taste and there is yet another category called acquired taste. I feel sauerkraut would, for me, fall under this category.

Sauerkraut is the most common food you would come across when living in or traveling Europe. Most popular in Germany, Poland and Bulgaria and served almost with every other form of food, Sauerkraut forms an essential part of lunch. To put in simple language, Sauerkraut is nothing but fermented cabbage. The lactobacilli bacteria acts upon the cabbage and ferments it naturally turning it into this very healthy sauerkraut and as the name suggests, it is a little sour. It is abundant is vitamin C when consumed raw and can be added in salads.

Remove the first few leaves from cabbage. Do not wash the cabbage. Finely shred it and put into a food grade plastic vessel. Do not use the cabbage stems for they would spoil the smoothness of the sauerkraut. Pack the shredded layer of cabbage tightly and sprinkle rock salt. One handful of rock salt should be sufficient for one cabbage. Allow it to stand for sometime. The salt will cause the cabbage to water out. Now take a plate that can just fit into the vessel and press down on the cabbage until the water accumulates on top of the plate leaving the cabbage beneath the plate. Allow this to stand for 3 days. This might take more time in European countries but in India, 3-4 days should just be fine. Remove the liquid from the top before taking out the sauerkraut and if you want to store it for more days after removing some, then after placing the lid back on, pour the same liquid over. If you find some moulds growing, do not panic, just scoop them out. You will get a fermented smell which is distinct of the sauerkraut. Before adding the salt you can add cumin seeds or fennel seeds to impart a slight flavor to the sauerkraut.

Add this raw to salads or cook it well in a pressure cooker. The cooked sauerkraut can be an excellent accompaniment to boiled/smashed potatoes. Further more, sauerkraut can be used as a filling in number of dishes.

Note: The cabbage will turn mild translucent upon fermentation. The sauerkraut can also be taken out and used when it is just half fermented. This is referred to as fresh sauerkraut and makes an excellent salad. It is also advisable to place a heavy weight over the lid so that the cabbages are pressed down further away from the liquid on top. Wrap the weight in a plastic cover to avoid any contamination.

Pure Polish, Pierogi

Discovering new food for my tongue is always the exciting part of every tour I make and I take time to sit on the internet just to do research on the traditional food and find out the vegetarian options available. Before my trip to Krakow, Poland, I could interact with two Polish friends who guided me to Polish food that I have eventually fallen in love with. I was blessed in two ways. One, I could find out the exact restaurant they suggested and they served awesome Peirogi and two, I was able to relish proper home made Peirogi prepared in the traditional way. When I first told my friends that I ate Pierogi with potato fillings they stuck their tongue out and mocked that it was Ruskie and not traditional and then when I told them about the sauerkraut filling, they accepted me into the league of Pierogi lovers.

Pierogi is the first Polish fascination I am going to write about and then later follow this up with another wonder as soon as I cook it. The day I ate Pierogi, it was Vinayakar chaturthi and it felt like I was not missing the kozhakattais. Well, this is a very crude comparison just with respect to how it looks! Then when I described it to amma, she reminded me of the Chinese kozhakatais (well, she invented this name) she used to make. But yet again it would be blasphemous to compare Pierogi with this, even though the outer layer is the same. And oh, this is the egg less version!

First a dough needs to be made with all purpose flour. Make the dough with dilute milk, salt and a small pinch of sugar. Egg lovers can add in one yellow into this and Vegans can just ignore it and proceed. Once the dough is made, make small Chapattis with it, 3 inches in diameter. Thanks to Amma and sister for this effort for without them my Pierogis would have lost shape!

Be creative with the fillings. But here is the traditional one. Saute sauerkraut (a separate blog is coming up on this), finely chopped onions and finely chopped mushrooms. Use very little oil to sauté them and add some cumin seeds and a dash of pepper after all these vegetables have been added. Cook them well and add salt, take off the flame and then add finely grated cheese. Mix well. The cheese will melt mildly and make the filling thick. You can ignore the cheese and substitute the sauerkraut with finely shredded cabbage. Alternatively you can play around with smashed potatoes and cheese or blue berries and strawberries!

Now place a spoon of this filling in the middle of the 3 inch Chapattis and close it and seal the edges properly. Do not over stuff it, but make it in such a way that it is full and fat and properly sealed. Drop these into hot boiling water in batches and carefully cook them. Melt butter in a skillet and sauté these boiled Pierogis in this. Do not fry them too deeply but just until you start to see the fry patterns appearing. Garnish with roasted onions!

Guru Batik to Aang, Banana curry soup!

You read it right! It is a soup made with bananas. I am a huge fan of the Avatar series, No, not the hollywood movie made by Cameroon, but the original cartoon series that has now been made into a movie by Manoj.

Aang drinks up a juice given to him by Guru Batik and exclaims that it tastes like onion-banana juice. Before I could see the expression on Aangs face, my face went into a twisted contortion and a repulsion for a taste I have never experienced. I just could not imagine this combination and thought that it was cartoony fun.

One day in the mensa, the menu read, banana curry soup : 60 cents. This is not huge money to experiment with an un-experienced taste and when I tasted it, I had to go back for two refills. To put it in Aangs perspective, it sure will help gain spiritual highness!

There are not many convincing recipes about this Estonian soup on the internet and so my curiosity drove me to ask dear Frau Fidan Batman about this. And then I cooked this the very evening for dinner.

Take a vessel and add cut bananas into it. Add water just enough to submerge the bananas and let it boil until the bananas are cooked. Saute finely chopped onions in butter along with a very small piece of garlic and an equally sized ginger. Once the onions are translucent, sprinkle curry powder (coriander, cumin, fennel, pepper, cinnamon, paprika and turmeric) and salt. Transfer into blender along with the boiled bananas and blend until very smooth. Transfer back into vessel and bring to required consistency with water. Cook on low heat and finish off with cream. Before serving, in the cup, add few pieces of unsalted banana chips into the soup.

* picture to be uploaded soon

* the curry powder is not our usual Indian curry powder!

Saluting Aphrodite:Tzatziki ; First steps into Greek cuisine

The Greek mythology has always fascinated me. The world of Gods, just like our own mythology has much to offer for knowledge and fascination. It is my dream to visit the Islands of Greece one day to satisfy my hunger for history, art,mythology and food! In fact, in ever country I set my foot on, I try to learn about the traditional food and taste as much as the vegetarian plate has to offer. There have been some quite huge bills because of this and I don't regret any one of them, with just Venice being an exception. I will write a separate blog on this issue soon!

Tyatziki is a simple introduction to the Greek cuisine. It is a dip that can be had with variety of items, the non vegetarian list being bigger than the vegetarian one. My suggestions for this dip would be just about anything starting from Samosas, pakodas, masala vadai, bajji, baturas, naan, grilled vegetables, spicy rice variates and cutlets.  Or just dip your finger in and keep eating it! To simply define it in terms of known items, Tzatziki is the Greek alternative for Raita!

The main ingredient required is thick thick curd. Suspend curd in muslin cloth overnight and use the condensed yogurt. Peel cucumber, remove the seeds and grate them. Squeeze them dry. Add this to the curd(200gms). Finely mince 2 big pods of garlic (use a garlic press for best results) and add. Next goes in finely chopped Dill (5 leaves), salt, white pepper powder( a table spoon), 2 table spoons of extra virgin olive oil and 2 table spoons of lemon juice. Mix well and the dip is ready! It is a very healthy dip too and stays up to to one week in the fridge!

My first Italian love, vegetarian Bolognese

I didnt know the difference between Spaghetti, Pasta, Penne, Macaroni, Linguine and Noodles. Yeah, the first time I made noodles by boiling it and adding the pre packaged masala, I thought I made spaghetti and it was Italian. And then my knowledge bank grew and learnt the noodles is Chinese! And when I first ate spaghetti, I thought it was a modified version of the Chinese noodles. Years have passed and I have matured!

I landed in Germany on a Wednesday and it was pommes (french fries) day in my mensa (canteen). Come the first Monday and I asked the serving lady (Frau Fidan Batman) what was the menu for vegetarians and she told me that they have spaghetti with vegetarian variant of Bolognese sauce. Though it looked suspicious to me at first, I trusted the dear old lady and took it and she served it to me with a topping of powdered cheese. I never knew how to eat it and spilled quite some on my shirt and felt embarrassed about it and after coming to lab, I googled on how to eat spaghetti with the fork and spoon! I fell in love with this bolognese the very first time and asked the Germans what their version contained. It was minced meat and then I went to the canteen people and asked them about my bolognese and they assured me that it was just vegetables! 

As a curious connoisseur, I always want to cook what I relish and after years, I ventured into cooking Italian masterpieces and the first one was Bolognese. It originated in the beautiful city of Bologna in Italy and is listed as the most favourable and delicious spaghetti topping. I had a hard time finding the right recipe and so I went to the Italian restaurant near my house and found out from the chef his secret. The funny part was that, I did not eat in that restaurant. It is a heavy budget one for a student and so I told them that it is just to satisfy my curiosity and they bought it looking at my innocent face!

Finely mince carrots, mushrooms, onions and celery. The finer your cut them, the better the sauce will be. Heat olive oil and add the cut vegetables into them, all at one go. When they are sauted well, add little concentrated tomato paste and mix. This is the right time to add salt and freshly grounded pepper and a sprinkle of nutmeg powder. Stir and add 150ml of dry white wine and allow it to boil until the wine nearly evaporates. Now add in as much of tomato puree you want to and cook for at least 30 minutes on low heat.

Traditionally this sauce does not contain oregano, but a little flavour will not harm it. Italian prefer this with pasta, but I prefer this with spaghetti and garnished with generous amounts of cheese!

This is a picture of my first bolognese preparation. Appa was the first to taste it here in Germany! I am going to cook it tomorrow and will post the updated one soon!

Romance, Tiramisu!

First, "dear Mom, I know you were upset when I told you that I am going to make Tiramisu. And yeah, you guessed it right, it does contain eggs. But right from childhood I got used to eating eggs in various forms. Cakes, ice creams and chocolates and it removed my aversion to it. Also, after eating this heavenly dessert at restaurants and authentically in Italy, it is very very difficult to restrain from it. I hope one day you eat this, prepared by me, and give a thumbs up."

 My first encounter with Tiramisu was in Lindau, Germany, 2006. Yeah, it is Italian, but you are seldom exposed to all these when you are in India. For me "Senthil softy" was one of the best and it will still remain so! And here in Germany, European cuisine is prominent. So, on a vegetarian food starved party, Tiramisu came to my rescue. The second time was in Rome and the most recent one was in Venice. And suddenly one day, my dear friend Vasudha sent me an email explaining how to coquere Tiramisu at home. When I read the instuctions, I knew I was going to make it, asap! 

I have a very good foodie with me here, Tez. He shares the same amount of enthusiasm I have for cooking and so we decided to make this a joint venture. Two many cooks spoil the broth is an old saying, but it never spoils when the cooks have the same frequenzy! After a real good game of Badminton, me and Tez went to the market to buy the ingerdients. Fresh eggs(4), Mascarpone cheese(500g), sugar, loeffel biscuits (a.k.a Ladys finger or just Tiramisu biscuits), whiskey, good coffee powder and cocoa powder (which we actually missed).

I was a bit skeptical actually. Eggs, yeah, okies, not an issue. But when I read the instructions, I realised, raw eggs! As I have already said, once you have tasted Tiramisu, its hard to give up. So, I proceeded. First dividing the egg yolk from the white, I added generous amounts of sugar (4 big spoons) into the yellow and beat it until the sugar dissolved. I smelled it several times to make sure it didnt smell raw, it actually did not. This put a smile on my face. When Tez added the mascarpone into this, I was so tempted to eat this mixture. Mascarpone is divine! Few minutes of beating and this became a soft cream. Next is to beat the egg white until it becomes soft and fluffy. Best is to use an electrical whipper, but since we were not equipped with it, it was muscular whipping. After adding the fluffy whipped whites into the creamy beaten yellow-mascarpone, I felt like diving right into the bowl! This mixture was set in the fridge for an hour.

We then made thick espresso coffee and after it cooled down, added the whisky to it and dipped the loeffel biscuits into this mixture and arranged them in a bowl. A layer of the prepared cream on top, and yet another layer of biscuits dipped in coffee-whiskey and then one final layer of cream on top. We didnt have the cocoa powder to sprinkle on top, so with a little sad face and a curse to our memories, we set it in the fridge for 4 hours.

Tez then calls me to my mobile " Machan, my entire house smells of Tiramisu and the taste is better than the ones we get here in Germany. We should sell this da!"

Tiramisu, sounds exotic, tastes divine, not so difficult to make! A perfect dessert for a candle lit romantic evening! Buon appetito !!