Sunday 29 April 2018

Home made Granola

Tried a previous version of granola where the oats are baked in the oven.
However, I find it more practical to do it in a sauce/frying pan

What you need

  • jumbo oats ca 1 kg
  • 6 tablespoons butter or vegetable oil
  • 6 tablespoons honey or maple sirup or a juice of some kind (e.g. apple)

Further ingredients

  • 1 teaspoon cinnamon
  • mixed nuts and seeds, e.g. pumpkin, sesame, hazelnuts, almonds 
  • grated/desiccated coconut
  • mixed dry fruit
  • a touch of rose water

Equipment

  • deep frying pan
  • large bowl

How you do it

  • heat up the frying pan. No butter/oil at this stage!
  • when hot add ca 50% of the oats to it.
  • Continuously stir/mix for ca 5 min
  • then form a well in the centre of the pan and add butter/oil and honey/sirup/juice to it
  • stir/mix for another 5 min 
  • the oats/mix should take on a golden brown tone/colour
  • take off the heat and pour the content into the bowl
  • let the pan cool down a bit. Wipe it clean and do the next batch of oats as described above
When you processed all oats and put them into the large mixing bowl it's time to add all the other ingredients you want for a nice home made granola/muesli 

Monday 2 April 2018

Labskaus

Labskaus is a traditional Northern German dish, particularly in places such as Hamburg or Bremen. The dish was an easy to make dish with few ingredients but very nutritious at the same time.
During my time in Hamburg I had the dish on numerous occasions.

Finally, I got around trying the dish myself.
It's based on a recipe from (in German) https://www.springlane.de/magazin/rezeptideen/labskaus-hamburg-original/


What you need

  • 2 whole beet roots. You can get them ready for consumption in most supermarkets. However, it's more fun to buy the actual roots and prepare it yourself. For this dish I am using 2 roots.
  • 4 potatoes
  • 1 large onion
  • 200-250g corned beef
  • salt, pepper
  • gherkins and a tablespoon of the juice
  • 30ml of stock
  • 2-3 eggs
  • mackerel or better still - rollmops - to go with Labskaus. But you may well eat it on its own

Equipment

  • blender
  • kitchen mixer and mixing bowl
  • casserole or medium sized pot. 2 of those if you want to cook potatoes and beet roots at the same time
  • frying pan

How you do it

Cooking the beet root

  • fill a pot with water and bring it to a boil
  • when boiling put the whole beet roots into the water and keep cooking at high temperature for 1 hour.  
  • put the beet roots on the side and let cool down
  • peel the roots and put in blender - or a handheld blender. Alternatively, you can squash them with a fork

Putting it all together

  • bring a pot of water to the boil. add a bit of salt
  • peel and quarter the potatoes and add to the boiling water
  • let it cook until soft - usually 20min
  • drain the potatoes when done and add to a mixing bowl
  • chop onion and add to the bowl
  • add the mashed beet root
  • open a can of corned beef, cut it up a bit and add to the bowl
  • season with pepper and salt
  • add a bit of stock and juice from pickled gherkins (1 tablespoon)
  • Finally, mix it all up. In a kitchen mixer use a lower setting and let it mix for a few minutes
  • put the mix into an oven ready form. preheat the oven to ca 70 C to keep the Labskaus warm
  • heat up a frying pan with butter or oil and break a couple of eggs into the hot pan
Once the frying eggs are ready you can pull the warm Labskaus out of the oven. Server the Labskaus on a plate and top it with the frying eggs.
Best served with a gherkin on the side. 

A mackerel or rollmops go well with it