Two Cheese Risotto

I love rich rice dishes in the winter, and this is hearty enough to serve as a light meal.

This undeniably rich and creamy risotto is just the thing to serve on cold winter evenings when everyone needs warming up.

Serves 3-4

Ingredients:
1 litre / 3/4 pints / 4 cups vegetable or chicken stock
7.5 ml / 1 1/2 tsp olive oil
50 g / 2 oz / 1/4 cup butter
1 onion, finely chopped
1 garlic clove, crushed
275 g / 10 oz / 1 1/2 cups risotto rice, preferably Vialone Nano
175 ml / 6 fl oz / 3/4 cup dry white wine
75 g / 3 oz / 3/4 cup Fontina cheese, cubed
50 g / 2 oz / 2/3 cup freshly grated Parmesan cheese, plus extra, to serve
sea salt and ground black pepper

Directions:
1) Heat the stock in a pan and leave to simmer until needed.

2) Heat the olive oil with half the butter in a pan and gently fry the onion and garlic for 5-6 minutes, until soft. Add the rice and cook, stirring all the time, until the grains are coated in fat and have become slightly translucent around the edges.

3) Pour in the white wine. Cook, stirring, until it has been absorbed, then add a ladleful of hot stock. Cook, stirring, until the stock has been absorbed. Gradually add the remaining stock, a little at a time, allowing the rice to absorb the liquid before adding more, and stirring constantly.

4) When the rice is half cooked, stir in the Fontina cheese, and continue cooking and adding stock gradually. Keep stirring.

5) When the risotto is creamy and the grains are tender but still al dente, stir in the remaining butter and the Parmesan. Season with salt and pepper, then remove the pan from the heat. Cover and leave to stand for 3-4 minutes before serving

Variation:
Stir in a handful of chopped fresh herbs with the Parmesan.

This recipe is from Italy's 500 Best-Ever Recipes edited by Jeni Wright.

Fresh Fig, Apple & Date Dessert

This dessert is totally out of season now, but with such a low sugar content, only in the marzipan, I just couldn't resist posting it.

Sweet Mediterranean figs and dates combine especially well with crisp dessert apples to create this appetizing dessert. A hint of almond serves to unite the flavours.

Serves 4

Ingredients:

6 large apples
juice of 1/2 lemon
175g / 6 oz fresh dates
25g / 1 oz white marzipan
5 ml / 1 tsp orange flower water
60 ml / 4 tbsp natural yogurt
4 ripe green or purple fresh figs
4 whole almonds, toasted

Directions:

1) Core the apples. Slice them thinly, then cut into thin matchsticks. Put into a bowl, sprinkle with lemon juice to keep them white and set aside.

2) Remove and discard the stones from the dates and cut the flesh into thin strips, then combine with the apple slices. Toss to mix.

3) In a small bowl, soften the marzipan with the orange flower water and combine this with the yogurt. Mix well.

4) Pile the mixed apples and dates into the centre of four plates. Remove and discard the stem from each of the figs and cut the fruit into quarters without cutting right through the base. Squeeze the base with the thumb and forefinger of each hand to open up the fruit.

5) Place a fig in the centre of each apple and date salad, spoon in some yogurt filling and decorate each portion with a toasted almond. Serve.

Cook's Tip:
When choosing fresh dates, select those that are fat and shiny, with skins that are golden and smooth. You may wish to remove the skin by squeezing the stem end, but the figs, however, have thin skins that are edible.

This recipe is from Italy's 500 Best-Ever Recipes edited by Jeni Wright.

Heaven and Earth

or Himmel und Erde in German.

I love traditional foods. I enjoy learning about other cultures. And I'm fascinated with history. All these interests are satisfied in a fabulous cookbook my sister gave me years ago -- Elisabeth Luard's The Old World Kitchen. Actually, I don't think my sister so much as gave it to me as that I borrowed it and never returned it! :-) Then, much later, she said I could keep it. Thanks, sis!

Here's a very simple, traditional German recipe that combines three distinctive flavors, potatoes, apples, and bacon. For the bacon, I recommend if at all possible that you get some locally raised, pastured, without the nitrates and nitrites.

The German kitchen has some particularly good potato recipes, inluding delicious pancakes made with raw grated potatoes and served with apples or stewed fruit; and an excellent dish known as "Heaven and Earth" which mixes boiled potatoes with apples and crisp fried bacon. This mixture of fruit and vegetables, sweet and sour, is characteristic of northern country cooking -- Holland, Belgium, Alsace, Czechoslovakia, Poland, and Scandinavia all have similar mixtures. Immigrants to America, particularly the German and Dutch settlers in Pennsylvania, took their sweet-salt dishes with them and adapted the recipes to local ingredients. The resident Indians already used sweet maple syrup to dress their meat. Thence developed those peculiarly American dishes such as pumpkin-and-marshmallow pie to eat with the Thanksgiving turkey. Waffles with maple syrup and bacon, even the peanut butter-and-jelly sandwich, belong to the same tradition.

This makes an excellent supper or light luncheon dish.

Serves 4

Time: 40 minutes

Ingredients:

2 pounds (6 medium-sized) potatoes
2 pounds apples
one 8-ounce slab of bacon in thick (1/4 inch) slices


Directions:

You will need a large saucepan and a small frying pan. If the potatoes are new and small, you merely need to wash them. If they are old, peel them closely and quarter them. Put them to boil in plenty of salted water. Peel and cut the apples into chunks the size of the potato pieces. Add them to the potatoes after 10 minutes. Finish cooking both together. By the time the potatoes are cooked, the apples will be soft but still holding their shape.

Meanwhile, dice the bacon and fry it in its own fat. Drain the cooked apples and potatoes. Pile them into a hot dish and scatter the crisp bacon, with its cooking juices, over the top. Serve immediately.

Suggestions:

Cook 1 pound of fresh sausage (bratwurst would be most appropriate) with the bacon. Serve all together.

Fry a handful of fresh bread crumbs in the bacon fat until crisp and golden. Scatter of the potatoes.

Rhonda's Apple Butter

(Image from http://www.organicgardenfood.com/rts/index.asp?action=page&name=14690&siteid=1507).

Fall! Apple Season!! ! Make your own healthier version of apple butter. With a slow cooker, it's easy.

Makes about 2 pints apple butter.

Ingredients:
4 lbs. apples
2 tsp. cinnamon
1/2 tsp. ground cloves

Directions:
1) Peel, core, and slice apples. Place in slow cooker.
2) Cover. Cook on high 2-3 hours. Reduce to low and cook 8 hours. Apples should be a rich brown and be cooked down by half.
3) Stir in spices. Cook on high 2-3 hours with lid off. Stir until smooth.
4) Pour into freezer containers and freeze, or into sterilized jars and seal.

This recipe is from Rhonda Burgoon in the Fix-It and Forget-It Cookbook.

Rice with Lamb, Carrots, Onions and Spices

Lamb, rice, and yogurt go awesomely wonderful together. Here's an ancient dish that is as nutritious as it is delicious. It's also fairly easy to prepare. And alternate method to that described below -- instead of precooking the lamb, saute the cubed lamb along with the onions, garlic and oil before adding the rice and the other ingredients. This will allow the lambs' natural juices to add flavor to the rest of the rice.

The recipe below is from Ghillie Basan's The Complete Book of Turkish Cooking All the Ingredients, Techniques and Traditions of an Ancient Cuisine.

An ancient Mongolian dish and a great Anatolian favourite, this pilaff -- Kasgar Pilav -- is cooked in a large pan and eaten communally with yogurt as a meal on its own. As you travel further east in Turkey, variations of this dish appear under different names, identifying it with Uzbekistan, Turkmenistan, and Azerbaijan.

Serves four

Ingredients:

30 ml / 2 Tbsp ghee, or olive oil with a knob (pat) butter
2 onions, chopped
4 garlic cloves, chopped
about 450 g / 1 lb cooked lamb, cubed
2 medium carrots, peeled and coarsely grated
350 g / 12 oz / 1 3/4 cups long grain (brown) rice, rinsed and thoroughly drained
5 ml / 1 tsp ground cinnamon
10 ml / 2 tsp ground allspice
1 litre / 1 3/4 pints / 4 cups lamb or chicken stock
sea salt and ground black pepper
a few parsley sprigs, to garnish
thick and creamy natural (plain) yogurt, to serve

Directions:

1) Heat the ghee, or olive oil and butter, in a heavy pan and stir in the onions and garlic. Cook until they begin to colour. Toss in the cubed lamb and cook for 1-2 minutes, then stir in the carrots.

2) Toss in the rice with the spices and pour in the stock.

3) Stir the rice and season with salt and pepper. Bring to the boil and boil for 1-2 minutes, then reduce the heat and simmer for 10-12 minutes (for brown rice this will be around 30 minutes), or until all the liquid has been absorbed.

4) Turn off the heat, cover the pan with a clean dish towel and place the lid on top. Leave to steam for 10-15 minutes.

5) Transfer to a serving dish, garnish with the parsley sprigs and serve with dollops of creamy natural yogurt.

Per Portion:
energy 621 kcal / 2590 kJ
protein 30 g
carbohydrate 77.1g, of which sugars 4.2g
fat 21.2g, of which saturates 9.5g
cholesterol 86 mg
calcium 51 mg
fibre 1.1g
sodium 100 mg

Ancient Quince Wine

Image from http://www.allotment.org.uk/greenhouse/fruit/assets/quince.jpg.

I have a new cookbook which delights both my love of healthy foods and history. It's Roman Cookery: Ancient Recipes for Modern Kitchens by Mark Grant. I see Amazon has a new revised version listed with a different cover than mine, but I'm assuming the recipes will be the same.

I love fermented beverages, both for their health and their nutrition. This one is from Bassus in the tenth century AD, in Geoponica (Country Matters), which refers to sources from more ancient writers. This fruit wine is quite easy to prepare even today.

Oinos Dia Melon

"Put the sweetest smelling quinces into an earthenware jar and pour over some wine. Then, having poured over the wine, leave for three days, and use on the fourth."
-- from Bassus in Country Matters

Quinces have a most attractive scent when ripening on the tree. For this drink you really need freshly picked quinces, as those bought in shops have already lost that heady aroma. This capturing of the perfume of a fruit recalls an Italian dessert described by Elizabeth David which consists merely of placing a peeled and sliced peach in a glass of wine. Quinces, however, have too much tannin in them for this, and I think they impart a finer flavour if left whole in the wine.

Ingredients:

1 bottle sweet white wine
3 fresh quinces

Directions:

Wash the quinces in cold water. Decant the wine into a glass jar with a lid. Place the quinces in the wine, seal the jar and leave for three days. The wine will have a strong bouquet of quinces for serving with a dessert.

Turkish Music

Take a music break and watch this music video from one of my favorite Turkish artists, Mustafa Sandal. Enjoy the sites around Turkey, especially Istanbul.




This one is a bit different, but interesting.

Green Beans with Tomatoes and Dill

Here's one of my favorite ways to fix green beans. This recipe is especially good with the broad, flat type of green bean.

This is a delicious "olive oil" dish. As part of a meze spread, it is served at room temperature, but in a Turkish home, it may be served hot as a side dish to accompany grilled, broiled or barbecued poultry and meat, or as a main course with a dollop of creamy yogurt. When runner beans are in season, it is a favourite family meal, served with yogurt and lots of warm, fresh crusty bread to mop up the sauce. The taste of fresh dill is an essential part of the dish. These olive oil dishes, which have survived from the Ottoman Empire, include leeks cooked in olive oil, celeriac, green beans, artichokes, and borlotti beans.

Ingredients:

1-2 onions, roughly chopped
2 garlic cloves, roughly chopped
30-45 ml / 2-3 tbsp olive oil
500 g / 1 1/4 lb stringless runner (green) beans, trimmed and each cut into 3-4 pieces
15 ml / 1 tbsp honey or a sprinkle of stevia
2 x 400 g / 14 oz cans chopped tomatoes
a handful of fresh dill, roughly chopped
sea salt and ground pepper


Directions:

1) Put the onions, garlic and oil in a wide heavy pan and stir over a low heat until they soften. Toss in the beans, coating them in the onions and oil, then stir in the sugar and lemon juice.

2) Add the tomatoes and bring to the boil, then lower the heat and add the dill. Cook gently for 35-40 minutes, or until the beans are tender and the tomato sauce is fairly thick.

3) Season with sea salt and pepper to taste before serving.

Serves 4 (as a main dish)

From Turkish Cooking: Classic traditions, Fresh ingredients, Authentic flavours, Aromatic recipes by Ghillie Basan.

Home-Style Tomato Juice

Now that tomatoes are so plentiful, here's a great way to make your own tomato juice.

Makes 4-5 1-cup servings.

Ingredients:
10-12 large tomatoes
1 tsp. sea salt
1 tsp. seasoned salt
1/4 tsp. pepper
1 Tbsp. sugar

Directions:
1) Wash and drain tomatoes. Remove cores and blossom ends. Place in slow cooker.
2) Cover and cook on low 4-6 hours,or until tomatoes are soft.
3) Press through sieve or food mill.
4) Stir in seasonings. Chill.

This recipe is from Jean Butzer in Fix-It and Forget-It Cookbook.

Cacik -- Cold Cucumber Soup

Happy July 4th! In celebration of this year's holiday, I'm going to repost a recipe from last year's July 4th. We're eating a lot of cacik this year. With the heat and fresh cucumbers and garlic, this cold Turkish soup just can't be beat. My kids guzzle this down. I can never make enough.

Ingredients:

• 3 medium cucumbers (400 g)
• 3 cups yogurt (plain, good quality) (770 g)
• 2 cloves garlic (6 g)
• 2 teaspoons sea salt (12 g)
• 1 cup water (250 g)
• 1 1/2 tbsp olive oil (20 g)
• 3-4 sprigs dill (10 g)

Directions:

Combine finely chopped or shredded cucumber with yogurt. Mix thoroughly. Add crushed garlic. Season with sea salt. Dilute with cold water. Mix well.

Pour into individual serving bowls. Sprinkle with olive oil. Garnish with coarsely chopped dill.

Chill and serve.


Cultural Notes:
This soup is a popular way of serving cucumbers and yogurt all over the country. Served with meat dishes, pilafs or boreks. In winter, lettuce or shredded carrot is used instead of cucumbers. dried mint is substituted for dill.

This recipe is from Samples from Turkish Cuisine by Ayse Baysal.

Pesto

We've got fresh basil in the garden! And with fresh basil, you have to make pesto.

I love pesto because it's so easy and delicious AND nutritious. Plus my kids gobble it down.

Ingredients:
2-3 cups fresh basil
1/4 - 1/2 cup olive oil
3-4 cloves garlic
3-4 TBSP pine nuts
1/4 cut up hard cheese, like Parmesan

Directions:
Here's the hard part -- place all the ingredients in a large capacity food processor and turn it on. Gosh, I'm tired. :-)

Serve over your favorite pasta and enjoy!

Roast Garlic with Goat's Cheese Pate

This recipe is from Italy's 500 Best-Ever Recipes, edited by Jeni Wright.

This pate is particularly good made with the new season's walnuts, sometimes known as "wet" walnuts, which are available in the early autumn.

Serves 4

4 large garlic bulbs
4 fresh rosemary sprigs
8 fresh thyme sprigs
60 ml / 4 tbsp olive oil
4-8 slices sourdough bread
sea salt and ground black pepper
shelled walnuts and fresh thyme sprigs, to garnish

For the pate:
200 g / 7 oz / scant 1 cup soft goat's cheese
5 ml / 1 tsp finely chopped fresh thyme
15 ml / 1 tbsp chopped fresh parsley
50 g / 2 oz / 1/3 cup chopped walnuts
15 ml / 1 tbsp walnut oil (optional)

1) Preheat the oven to 180 c / 350 f / gas 4. Strip the papery skin from the garlic bulbs and place in an oven proof dish large enough to hold them snugly. Tuck in the rosemary and thyme sprigs, drizzle the olive oil over and season with a little sea salt and plenty of ground black pepper.

2) Cover the garlic tightly with foil and bake in the oven for 50-60 minutes, opening the parcel and basting once halfway through the cooking time. Set aside and leave to cool.

3) Preheat the grill (broiler). To make the pate, cream the cheese with the thyme, parsley and walnuts. Beat in 15 ml / 1 tbsp of the cooking oil from the garlic and season to taste with black pepper. Transfer to a serving bowl and chill until ready to serve.

4) Brush the bread slices on one side with the remaining cooking oil from the garlic, then grill (broil) until lightly toasted.

5) Divide the pate among four individual plates, drizzle with walnut oil, if using, and sprinkle with black pepper. Add some garlic to each plate, garnish with shelled walnuts and thyme sprigs, then serve with toasted bread.

Energy 371Kcal / 1534 kj; fat 32.7 g; saturated fat 11.3 g; carbohydrate 5.1 g; fibre 1.7 g

Dilled New Potatoes

Now that the small, red new potatoes are coming in, as well as the dill in my garden, I'm discovering a great way to serve the two together. The dill adds a delightful touch to a basic buttered potato recipe to really herb it up.

Ingredients:
red new potatoes
butter
sea salt
pepper
bunch of fresh dill
chives

Directions:
Cut potatoes in chunks and boil until soft. Transfer to serving bowl and toss with butter, sea salt and pepper to taste. Then top it all off with a bunch of minced dill and chives.

Greek Chicken in Slow Cooker

Here's an easy, healthy dinner that can be started in the morning and ready when you come home.

Ingredients:
4-6 potatoes, quartered
2-3 lbs. chicken pieces
2 large onions, quartered
1 whole bulb garlic, minced
3 tsp. dried oregano
1 tsp. sea salt
1/2 tsp. pepper
1 Tbsp. olive oil

Directions:
1) Place potatoes in bottom of slow cooker. Add chicken, onions, and garlic. Sprinkle with seasonings. Top with oil.
2) Cover. Cook on high 5-6 hours, or on low 9-10 hours.

This recipe is from Judy Govotsus in Fix-It and Forget-It Cookbook.