Pumpkin jam!

Ok, it's winter! It's snowing and very cold. This means it's time to get cosy in your home and make some delicious foods to warm your body. This is a pumpkin jam recipe to go with your warm bread or scones.

Ingredients:
1kg of yellow pumpkin
700g of brown sugar
2 sticks of cinnamon
1 teaspoon of cinnamon powder
the rasp of one lemon
pinch of ginger powder or 1cm of fresh ginger rasped

Put all ingredients in a pan and mix together and leave for at least 10 just so that all the flavours get friendly with each other ;-). Then put it in the fire and let it cook slowly for 1-/+ hour while stirring once in a while. You know it's ready when it's thick and you can leave a tunnel with your spoon.

Bon apetit!

Chocolate walnut candy! (picture will follow)

I love candy's but I love to make them even more! So let the sugar come!

350g chocolate as black as you can find preferable 92% cacao broken in little pieces
390g condensed milk
30g butter
150g walnuts broken into little pieces

a pinch of salt


Put the chocolate , condensed milk, butter and the pinch of salt in a pan and take it to the fire. Let it all melt slowly while stirring. When melted add the nuts mix it again a bit and take the pan out of the fire. Put the mixture in a square deep dish of about 25cm side to side covered in vegetable paper and let it get cold and afterwards put it in the fridge for some hours. With a knife cut it in squares and wrap them individually in plastic foil .


Yummy yummy!

Peanut butter! (picture will follow)

Yes you can make your own peanut butter! I'm all for making your own jams, peanut butter, hummus and so on. I love the fact that I can make them for my family, they love it and I know what's inside. It's more simple than you may think!

Ingredients: (for about 300g of peanut butter)

250g of peanuts virgin ones (that you can roast on your own) or unsalted already roasted peanuts
1/2 spoon peanut oil
pinch of salt
1/2 teaspoon of ginger powder
1/2 teaspoon of brown sugar

Mash everything to your taste (some people like it very well mashed others like it with little pieces inside! Then add the mixture in sterilized pots (boil them or wash them very well and dry them very well as well). Keep it in the fridge for about 3 weeks!

Enjoy your home made peanut butter!

Carla's pasta!

Ingredients:

600g black cuttle-fish pasta (you can buy the pasta or make regular pasta yourself and then deep it into the ink of the cuttle-fish and leave for one hour in the ink and then put it to dry. Will post a regular egg pasta recipe soon)

600g of mixed sea food

1 chopped onion

a few small Roma tomatoes chopped

2 garlic cloves

1/2 Spanish pepper

pinch of sea salt

olive oil

bit of rasped ginger

200g fresh chopped basil

Cook the pasta in water as prescribed in your pasta recipe or as it says in the package! When cooked pass in cold water and leave aside. Put the garlic, tomatoes, onion, pepper and ginger in a fry pan with a bit of olive oil and fry until the mixture is a bit brown. Then add the seafood and turn it time to time for 5 minutes. When the fish is ready put the pasta in a bowl sprinkle some salt above the pasta, a bit of olive oil and then the mixture with the fish on top! You can add some Parmesan or Gruyere cheese on top but the pasta is so tasteful it self it doesn't need cheese.

Bon appetit!

Courgette jam!

I love to make jams because your house just smells great afterwards and you can enjoy it for a long time! And it's a perfect gift if you are invited to dinner or lunch. This one I made for my friend Tina. You get for big jars out of this recipe.

Ingredients:

1kg courgette (cleaned and fine rasped)
750g brown sugar
1 rasp of a whole lemon
2 cinnamon sticks
1 spoon of cardamon powder

Put all ingredients into a large pan and mix everything together and leave for an hour! Then take it to the fire and let it cook for 1.5 to 2 hours. First at a big flame and later at the smallest. When it's sticky and you can make a "road" with a spoon on the pan it's ready! Divide the jam into sterilized jam pots, fill the pots close them and turn them outside up to great a vacuum and leave like that until the first time you use it.

Enjoy!

Lemon cookies without eggs!

Ingredients:


300g flour
1 teaspoon of baking powder
70g butter
150g sugar
2 spoons of milk
1 spoon of lemon juice



Mix all ingredients in a bowl! Role on a table and make with forms (I used a star and an airplane for these ones ) or your hands the cookies. Put in the pre-heated oven for 10 minutes -/+ at 170 degrees. And they must be soft before you take them out of the oven because they get dry outside the oven. Decorate to your taste or not they don't need decoration.


Enjoy!

Rice pudding the Portugese way!

Ingredients:

3 egg yolks
1l milk or soy milk
150g brown sugar
100g round grain rice or dessert rice
15g butter
2 cinnamon sticks
1 whole lemon pod
pinch of salt

Take a big pan and add the milk, cinnamon, lemon, butter and salt and boil until it reaches the boiling point and take out of the fire add the rice and leave to rest for one hour. Then put the pan in the fire again and take to boiling point and then leave to cook the rice softly until the rice is soft. When the rice is ready take the pan from the fire and add the egg yolks mix it well with the milk mixture. Take the cinnamon sticks and lemon out of the pan and put the mixture into a deep serving bowl. Spread cinnamon on top of the mixture. Let it rest for one hour and then keep it in the fridge until it's cold and it's ready to serve!

Bom apetite!

Simple tasty cake!

Ingredients:

4 eggs

100ml yogurt natural or vanilla ( can be soy yogurt )

30og brown sugar

300g flour

100ml sunflower oil

100g cocos small slices or powder

1 teaspoon of baking powder

Mix all ingredients together put into a baking form and take to the pre-heated oven of 180 degrees and bake until you put a knife in  and it comes dry. It should  take about 45 minutes to bake. Decorate to your taste or not without decoration it’s very tasteful also.

Ready it is!

"Stamppot" my way!

Stamppot (eng. "mash pot") is a traditional Dutch dish made from a combination of potatoes mashed with one or several other vegetables, sometimes also with bacon. These vegetable pairings traditionally include sauerkraut, endive, kale, spinach, turnip greens, or carrot and onion (the latter combination is known as hutspot). It is usually served with sausage or stewed meat. I'm not a big fan of the traditional Dutch stamppot which involves lot's of butter and sausage witch is made from unknown pieces of meat and more animal left overs I made stamppot my way. With ingredients I like and want to share it with you!

Ingredients:

900g potatoes

500g wild spinach (only the leaves)

100g pumpkin seed

100g sun dried tomatoes cut into little slices

300g of Brie cheese preferable in a role made into pieces/ rounds to fry

1l of milk or soy milk

teaspoon of nutmeg

teaspoon of cardamon

teaspoon of sea salt

olive oil

1 chopped garlic

1cm chopped Spanish pepper

honey

First put the garlic, pepper and tomatoes and olive oil into a pan and heat the pan until the garlic is brown and put aside in a little bowl. Pass the spinach though warm water and then put them aside in a strainer. Cook the potatoes in the milk, nutmeg and cardamon and salt until they are ready to mash. Take them out of the fire but keep the milk in and cover them. Get a pan to fry the cheese in! Put the pieces of cheese in the pan with honey on top of them and fry one side for 1,5 minutes then turn them and fry that side also for 1,5 minutes. Take the pan out of the fire. Take the milk out of the potatoes and then mash them. Join the spinach and the garlic tomato mixture in to the mash. Serve in a plate the mash with pieces of cheese on top and spread some the seeds on the plate. And it's ready!

Eet smakelijk!

American cinnamon pancakes with maple syrup!

It's cold outside and it Wednesday afternoon! This is the day of the week that kids in Holland go to school until 12 o'clock. That means that we have to entertain them and friends they bring with them from school. Today Noah brought with him a very shy girl so to break the ice I made them Cinnamon pancakes the thick and small American ones. They loved them! So I will share the recipe with you.

Ingredients:

2 eggs
400g (less or more) flour
100ml milk
1 tea spoon (good filled) of baking powder
a small cup of sunflower oil
a pinch of salt
1 eating spoon of cinnamon
1 eating spoon of sugar
teaspoon of port wine
maple syrup

Mix all the ingredients except the maple syrup with a guard in a bowl into a creamy mush. Bake them in a pan with a little bit of oil as you would do with normal pancakes but much smaller. When ready serve with maple syrup!

Enjoy your pancakes!

Soup, to warm up in this winter weather!

It's snowing outside the streets look great! Very peaceful and so beautiful all covered with wonderful powder snow. So I thought it's time for a great nutritional soup. Because soup warms up body and soul. So here we go!

Ingredients:

200g potato chopped in small squares or balls

400g of chopped vegetables for soup such as carrot, onion, leek, cabbage

300g of meatballs or tofu balls

4cm piece of ginger

2 pieces of garlic

olive oil

half a Spanish pepper

teaspoon of sea salt

1l vegetable bouillon (you can either make the bouillon yourself or buy some ready made bouillon. Soon I will post some bouillon recipes)

First of all put some olive oil (half a cup) in soup pan add the garlic, pepper, ginger and fry it a bit until you smell at the flavour's and it starts to get brown. Then add the potato's and vegetables and cook them for 20 minutes, then add the meatballs or tofu and cook it for 10 minutes. When it's cooked take it out of the fire and leave for an hour or more. Then cook it all again for 10 minutes and ready it's is.


Bom apetite!

Pizza from scratch!

Ingredients:

450g flour

200ml water

15g yeast

1 tea spoon salt

2 spoons olive oil

Make with the hand or a food processor a ball with all the ingredients. Divide the dough in 2 parts and stretch both parts into a round pizza. Put for 5 minutes into a pre-heated oven at 200ºC.

Then take the pizza out of the oven garnish to your taste and bake it for 10 to 20 minutes.

And ready it is! Buon apetite!

Beans, spinach, herbs and Yogurt! (4p)

Today we eat spinach with sunflower seeds, beans, yogurt sauce, herb cookies and Pappadums!

Ingredients for herb cookies:
- 3 eggs
- 300g of flour
- 100g of coriander
- 100g of parsley
- 50g of sage
- 50g of mint
- 50g of thyme
- pinch of salt
- a small cup of sunflower oil or olive oil
- a small cup of milk
- half a pepper (fresh)

Put the eggs in a bowl together with the flour and mix them together. Then put all chopped herbs, salt, pepper oil and mix everything together into a creamy mixture if it's to thick add milk until it's like a thick pancake mixture. Pre-heat a pan and fry the mixture dividing it like small little pancakes. just a few at the time.

Ingredients for the yogurt:
- 250g thick yogurt
- 2 spoons of fresh mint leaves chopped
- 1 tea spoon of chili powder
- 2 spoons of fresh lemon juice
- 1 teaspoon of honey
- olive oil
- pinch of salt

Put the yogurt, the mint, the chili, honey and lemon juice in a bowl mixed them all together. Then pour some olive oil on top and sprinkle with salt to your taste and ready it is.

Ingredients for the spinach:
- 1kg spinach
- 50g sunflower seeds
- 1 garlic
- 1cm of Spanish red pepper ( fresh )
- some olive oil ( extra virgin is the best tasting one in combination with the spinach )
- pinch of salt

Put in a pre-heated ( pre-heated just a few seconds ) pan with the olive oil the garlic well chopped, the pepper and the seeds. When they are well browned add the spinach bit by bit until it's cooked but not too much the minute it starts diminishing take it out of the pan and put into a bowl and it's ready! Add salt to your taste.

Ingredients for the beans:
- tin can chicken peas 500g
- tin can kidney beans 500g
- a hand full of chopped coriander
- olive oil extra virgin
- Spanish red pepper 2cm chopped
- 2 garlics chopped
- pinch of salt

Strain all the beans and wash them in cold water. Then warm the beans in a small amount of water pre-boiled so that they stay firm and " al dente ". Put the beans in a bowl add the garlic and the pepper and pour olive oil to your mix them in the bowl and it's ready!

Serve with some pappadums!

Your healthy meal is ready, enjoy!

Got to love food!

I started this blog because I love food and want to share my recipes with all of you! Often people ask me for a recipe so I think it's easy to post recipes and food knowledge's in here than to have to mail them to people individually. So let's get started with a simple family week day recipe.

Got to love food!