Tortillas with shrimps!

After a few days without me 'signing in', here I am again :D with a new recipe.

This time there are no photos unfortunately, because we were both way too hungry to wait, so you'll have to try it for yourselves to see what it looks like. :D

I got some shrimps(about 225g), they can be either frozen or fresh. You'll also need some tortillas (I used Spar 8-pack, wheat; but you can use corn tortillas as well), mustard, tomatoes, pepper (I used half of a medium sized green one), courgette (half), and sour cream.

First turn on the oven to 150°C for the tortillas. Take 5 and spread butter or margarine on each of them. Put them on a baking tray (cover with baking paper) and cover them with aluminum foil so they don't lose the moist. When the oven is ready, put them in for 15 minutes. Take them out, don't leave them to cool off in the oven.

While softening tortillas in the oven, chop all vegetables into small cubes. Heat some oil in the pan and put the veggies in. Add some salt and spread Indian spice mix from Kotany (I mentioned one of them in one of the previous posts)generously over the colourful mix. After about 3-5 minutes (check courgettes, they will take the longest, if they are nicely tender, they're done) add the shrimps and stir well.
Leave for about 3 minutes. Add a two big spoonfuls of sour cream and one spoonful of mustard - regarding mustard: it gives this special taste, which some of you may not like if you are not very keen on mustard anyway. You can replace it with some lemon juice to give the dish that souery feel. Mix well and turn off the stove. if the mixture is a bit watery don't worry, it's only the juices from the vegetables, and if you just leave it, tortillas will still be nicely soft and moist.

Prepare two plates - one for the tortillas before and one for the tortillas after :)(after you fill them in). Turn the oven on to 200°C.

Now you fill each tortilla with 3-4 spoons of the mixture and make a wrap. I placed them in a small ceramic baking tray (like cannelloni) and covered with cheese. You can spread some beaten egg so they get a nicer glow. You can also place each tortilla wrap separately on to a larger baking tray. Place them in the oven and bake for 10 minutes or until golden brown on top.

Enjoy ;)

Apple pie

Hi there!
This weekend I wasn't really up for cooking, but I will share a recipe from a book I've had at home since I can remember. One of the recipes is for American apple pie. And it's amazing!!!! Believe me... tried and tested many, many times, in its original version or a bit 'customized ;) RECIPE...

You'll need some patience with the dough... but don't worry, there's a trick in it too :) Prepare a big bowl and a 23-24cm baking tin.

Take a big bowl and sift in the flour (250 g). Add the baking powder (half bag) and mix. Melt the butter or margarine (125 g) and pour it in the mix. And that's the trick. In the original recipe you don't melt the butter, and believe me it's almost impossible to make a dough, unless you are willing no to use your hands for some time.


Mix all the ingredients well and add 2-3 spoons of water so you'll be able to get a smooth but firm dough out. Cover it in plastic foil or aluminum foil so it won't lose moist and let it rest on a room temperature for 15 minutes or so. DON'T place it in the fridge as the butter will harden and you won't be able to roll out the dough.

While the dough rests, you prepare the filling. You will need 4-5 ripe and big apples. I prefer the kinds with a bit sour taste, otherwise the taste is too sweet.
You must grate the apples into a bowl (you can use the one you used for the dough :)). If the apples are too juicy (fresh ones - seasonal - usually are) you must squeeze them at least a bit, or the pie will be too sappy. And the juice is perfect to treat yourself while 'slaving' on the pie ;)

Turn on the oven - 200°C. Ok, now you have the apples, add at least one teaspoon of cinnamon. Add two spoons of brown sugar (looks better), about two spoons of cream. At this point, it's all up to you: you can add raisins (I don't like them, so no raisins for me), nuts of any kind (just chop them roughly, about spoon or two), some other spices (if you have one that you specially like - nutmeg for ex.). You take a well mixed ingredients aside and roll out the dough. Knead it well just before you do. You must come out with the bottom, top and the rim of the baking tin, which must be well greased before you put in the dough. Put in the bottom and the rim - like making another tin inside :) you can place a piece by piece inside, you don't have to do it in one stroke :D Now toss in the apple mixture about, it should come about 2 cm thick. Flatten the top so you'll be able to put the dough top. You can now spread some egg on top so it will shine nicely - it's just for the decoration.

Put it in the oven and bake for about 30-40 minutes.

Serve hot and add a ball of vanilla ice-cream...

Goldies

So, I promised Petra asparagus, but we only ate asparagus soup, which I got from an amazing cook, I still have soooo much to learn from :)

So today its GOLDIES... (supposedly) golden oven baked potatoes and a nice chicken with courgette, tomato and apple... and lot's of spices :)

I took the idea of the golden potatoes from the book of Vale-Novak company (Ljubezen skozi želodec) and it goes something like this: heat the oven to 200°C, chop 3 medium sized potatoes (for two, but you can take more or less, depending on how hungry you are) and slice them into thin circles only a few millimeters thick. Melt about 15g of butter and spill it over the potatoes and stir well so that all potatoes are well covered with butter. Place baking paper on the tray and spread potatoes. Bake for about 20-25 minutes, but if you leave them inside for 30, no harm done.

While potatoes are baking, chop about 200g of chicken breast into small cubes, do the same with one tomato, half courgette, and half an apple (use a very ripe apple, I used Jonagold). Add some oil to the pan and put in chicken breast pieces. Wait til they are all completely white. Now here are spices... if you don't have all of these, it's ok, I just have to try them and mix them (sometimes it doesn't turn out quite as expected, but, if you don't try you don't know). I used some nutmeg and cinnamon (for the apple), some sweet red pepper, cumin, saffron (Maestro has them all ;)) and salt. Then you just stir all this and put in all the chopped vegetables and wait, so all the juices come out. Lower the temperature to 5 (from 9, is what I have) and just about every five minutes. And in about 15 minutes you're done. :D

Asparagus... again

Yes, because it's the season, because my fridge is completely full and because they are awesome for your health, specially kidneys. If it's your first time eating asparagus, don't be scared when you go to the loo, afterward since the kidneys do their work extremely well and all those bad things stuck in there just have to go out!

And since today's lunch wasn't something unbelievable to make, just a quick recap:
a handful of asparagus as long so you can put them into the baking tray you'll need.
Preheat the oven to 200°C. In between boil some water and then put asparagus in for a couple of minutes. Then make about 3x3cm squares of ham and role each asparagus in it. Place them in the baking tray and cover with cheese. Bake for about 15-20 minutes and serve with plain rice.

Bon Apetit!

Been away...

...for a while. But now I'm back again.
Did quite some cooking though in between.
Yesterday I posted a recipe (or whatever you may call it) on my Facebook, but I'll do it here as well once more. So, here it goes.

Buckwheat pasta with asparagus, walnuts and ham

I took 140-150g of (Spar-Vital) buckwheat pasta, but you can basically take any kind of pasta and cook according to instructions on the bag ;) or by the taste, but let me remind you that pasta or any other food made of buckwheat can make you full rather quickly, so don't make it too much.
Boil the water and put in the asparagus, but don't cook them fully, just so they become a bit tender (2-3 minutes in a boiling water). A handful of about 10-12cm long should do, but you decide if you want more or less. Take them aside and chop them to about a 1-1,5 long pieces.

Now you take some ham and chop, so you get really small pieces. Place a bigger pan on the stove with a few droplets of olive oil. Add the ham and about two spoonful of roughly chopped walnuts. Wait for a few minutes or by the time it all starts to smell really nicely ;) but don't wait for the ham to get too brownish!!!
Now add the asparagus and right before you toss in the pasta, add two teaspoons of low-fat sour cream (it's not necessary, but it gives a bit creamier taste). Now add the cooked pasta and mix all well together.

And you're ready to go :) You may want to add some Parmesan cheese when serving the dish, but it depends on the taste... I'd recommend you first taste it without it. You can find the recipe here.