Roasted Potato, Garlic and Rosemary Bread

Some time ago, we purchased on Amazon a book of Jeffrey Hamelman ‘Bread: A Baker's Book of Techniques and Recipes’. I have to admit that it is pretty advanced and sophisticated as for a home bakers like us. It’s a great source of essential, accurate and detailed technical information and a comprehensive array of artisan formulas. However, long, time consuming recipes, minimal number of photos, lots of yet undiscovered by us terms, such as oxidising, autolyse, stages of fermentation... I could probably go on and on about it.... I could see the lack of my knowledge in those unsuccessful baguettes I made few months ago.... Even though I followed all the steps, they were hard as a stones... hehehe But the Rome wasn’t built in one day, was it? And I don’t give up easily, believe you me! 

Today, I looked into the book again with an intention of trying again, one bread immediately caught my attention and it actually doesn’t need any pre-fermented sourdough culture (mine unfortunately died recently as I forgot to feed it). Since, I promised to dedicate all September posts to potatoes, there it is – Roast Potatoes Bread. So, reading the formula, I was a bit reluctant and worried that it will come out rubbish again... therefore, I've searched internet and looked into one of my favourite polish baking blog of Liska (nick name of the author) and obviously found this simplified version of Hamelmans’s potato bread. Liska’s one doesn’t need pate fermentee made the day before baking. However, Hamelman’s recipe suggest roasted potatoes rather than boiled potatoes (as in Liska’s formula). I find that oven roasting them concentrates the flavour in a way that boiling them does not. Moreover, leaving the skins on saves time and the dark skin bits contrasts nicely with the crumb colour once the bread is sliced. Hamelman also suggest using other ingredients, such as garlic and rosemary which I used in this recipe today and I have to say that they are beautifully composed in the entire recipe. So, the result is that: Simplified recipe of Liska + Roast potatoes, garlic and rosemary of Hamelman = Full Success!!! Just have a look at the photos.

Roasted Potatoes, Garlic and Rosemary Bread

100 g potatoes 

400 g strong bread flour 

200-250 ml of water 

1.5 teaspoon salt 

1 teaspoon sugar 

1.5 tsp dried yeast 

3 tablespoons olive oil 

3 cloves of garlic 

2 sprigs of fresh rosemary 

Wash the potatoes, dry them and cut into small cubes. Bake potaotes with garlic and rosemary and a few teaspoons of olive oil in the oven preheated to 200 degrees. Then, cool the potatoes and mash with a fork carelessly. Do not discard the burnt skin as it will your loaf a nicer colour and better taste. Mix all the ingredients in a large bowl. Add the water gradually as the amount depends on the type of flour and consistency. Knead smooth and elastic dough (by hand or mixer). Transfer to a bowl greased with olive oil, cover with foil and set aside to raise for an hour. Then, form a round loaf with your hands, and transfer to the basket lined with the cloth and solidly floured to raise. Allow to raise for 45-60 minutes. If you have got a pizza stone – insert it into the oven and heat to 240 degrees. If you don’t have a pizza stone, just use the baking tray lined with a baking paper. Spray the oven walls with water or ideally, put about 1 / 2 cup of ice cubes onto a bottom of your oven. Transfer your raised dough into the oven and bake. After 10 minutes, reduce temperature to 210 degrees and bake for another 15-25 minutes. Cool your loaf down for a good 30 minutes before you start to consume it. And enjoy! 

I definitely recommend the book of Jeffrey Hamelman 'BREAD. A baker's book of techniques and recipes.' to those, more experienced home bakers. 

Hasselback Potatoes with Spinach Cashew Pesto

Anyone who doesn’t like potatoes, please raise your hand!!! I doubt there is such person! Or at least, I’ve never came across anyone who doesn’t love potatoes. Our love to any type of potatoes knows no boundaries. They can be either sweet or salty, boiled, baked, roasted, fried... you name them and we love them... This is one of the most, if not the most versatile root vegetables, potatoes are simple, rich in nutrients and vitamins and delicious in any form. In fact, we might dedicate the entire, chilly September posts to different potatoes recipes of the world. 

So let's start with this very banal and impressive Hasselback Potatoes. The recipe has its roots in Sweden and is named after Hasselbacken, a Stockholm restaurant which first served the preparation in the 1700s but you'll also see them referred to as "accordion potatoes" on some menus. To this day, they are still prepared very similar to the original recipe so that each potato is cut into thin slices, but not the entire diameter of the potato, and then roasted in a buttery olive with garlic resting between slices. However, many like to play around with seasonings and garnishes. In addition to the stylish look, there is still a phenomenon in this method – with the additional crevices that are exposed to high temperature of your oven, it becomes beautifully crispy on the outside and delicately soft and creamy inside. This definitely enhance the potatoes’ flavour. Prepared this way, they can be served as an appetizer, as a side dish to the main course or snack. We recommend leaving the potato skins and eat the potato with it, because all the most valuable nutrients, such as Iron, Proteins and Vitamin C are located just beneath its skin. 

Ingredients (for two hungry peeps) 

2 large potatoes (any kind), thoroughly washed and dried. 

4 garlic cloves 

4 tablespoons unsalted butter 

coarse sea salt and pepper 

3 tablespoons olive oil 

Preheat oven to 220 degrees. Thinly slice garlic cloves. Set aside. Rinse and scrub potatoes well. We’re keeping the skin on so it needs to be clean. Slice a thin layer off of the bottom of the potatoes. This will give them a solid base to rest on to get sliced. Slice into the potatoes but not completely through them. Slice potatoes, creating very thin rounds connected at a base. Slide garlic slices in between potato slices. You might actually need to shove them in… the potato might be pretty tight. Just be careful not to tear the bottom. Place potatoes on a baking tray. Generously sprinkle potatoes with salt. Top each potato with a layer of butter. Drizzle with oil. Bake for 1 hour or until tender on the inside and crisp on the outside. Remove the tray about every 15 minutes to baste potatoes in the oil and butter on the pan. This will make the skin crispy and delicious and the potato extra buttery. When cooked through and crispy, remove from the oven, cool for 10 minutes. Top with spinach pesto and serve. 

For the Spinach Cashew Pesto

Inspiration from Joy the Baker

2 loosely packed cups of spinach 

2 garlic cloves 

1/4 cups roasted cashews 

2 teaspoons fresh lemon juice 

1/2 teaspoon lemon zest 

1/3 cup freshly grated Parmesan cheese 

salt and pepper to taste 

1/3 cup olive oil 

Place garlic cloves, spinach, nuts, lemon juice, zest and Parmesan cheese in the bowl of a food processor. Blend until spinach is broken down and, whiles still blending, slowly pour in the olive oil. Turn off food processor, taste and add salt and pepper as needed. Serve over potatoes! any excess of pesto can be stored in a jar in a fridge and used for any type of pasta or just with a garlic bread as a snack.

Enjoy and have a lovely weekend!

Jamie's Oliver chicken welfare campaign and roasted chicken :)

We honestly admit that we love meat (all kind) but we don't have to be a vegetarians to understand the importance of animal welfare. As a carnivorous person myself, I have to put up with the fact that animals have to die. Nevertheless, it matters about animal welfare, and it's best if the animal's life is reasonably good and it grows well in the most natural environment for quite a while before it ends up being killed and eaten. Particularly notable are the chickens that seem to be grown in the most appalling conditions and this is because of the increasingly growing demand of the world market. Thus, hens, which hit the shelves of our favourite stores look great, but do we realize what kind of life they led before they were so beautifully arranged to attract our eye in the supermarket? The whole thing about animal welfare was already publicly raised by a number of organisations but the celebrity chefs have the biggest input in this matter... especially, Jamie's Oliver whose campaign in 2007 was to make people aware of the conditions in which chickens were kept, so then people could make informed decisions about what to eat, rather than allowing the factory-farming industry to hide the shocking truth.What's interesting about his campaign is that it doesn't urged people to an absolute transition to vegetarianism, but to stimulate an informed choice. We have already made a choice... And you? We strongly recommend you to watch the entire experiment of Jamie Oliver HERE. 

And here we go... on the table today is this beautiful, tasty free range chicken - recipe by Jamie Oliver.

Roast chicken with vegies and herbs

1.5 kg chicken 'free range'

2 medium onions

2 carrots

2 sticks of celery

1 bulb of garlic

olive oil

Sea salt and freshly ground black pepper

1 lemon

small bunch of fresh thyme, rosemary, sage, or a mixture of all these herbs

Take your chicken out of the fridge 30 minutes before it goes into the oven. 

• Preheat your oven to 240°C/475°F/gas 9 

• There’s no need to peel the vegetables – just give them a wash and roughly chop them 

• Break the garlic bulb into cloves, leaving them unpeeled 

• Pile all the veg and garlic into the middle of a large roasting tray and drizzle with olive oil 

• Drizzle the chicken with olive oil and season well with salt and pepper, rubbing it all over the bird 

• Carefully prick the lemon all over, using the tip of a sharp knife (if you have a microwave, you could pop the lemon in these for 40 seconds at this point as this will really bring out the flavour) 

• Put the lemon inside the chicken’s cavity, with the bunch of herbs 

To cook your chicken

• Place the chicken on top of the vegetables in the roasting tray and put it into the preheated oven 

• Turn the heat down immediately to 200°C/400°F/gas 6 and cook the chicken for 1 hour and 20 minutes 

• If you’re doing roast potatoes and veggies, this is the time to crack on with them – get them into the oven for the last 45 minutes of cooking 

• Baste the chicken halfway through cooking and if the veg look dry, add a splash of water to the tray to stop them burning 

• When cooked, take the tray out of the oven and transfer the chicken to a board to rest for 15 minutes or so 

Enjoy and have a nice evening!

p.s if you want to read a bit more about chicken welfare, have a look here, and here and here. 

Gnocchi or dumplings? that's the question - part II

And again, it will be about gnocchi... I can’t help it that I love them and if only the day had 50 hours I would do them every single day... I have written about them before here (click). But I will write again! So, after all my investigations trying to find out whether they are polish or italian invention, and although they are done exactly the same way, I felt that it would be fair to leave polish dumplings being dumplings and Italian gnocchi being gnocchi... The former dumplings will always remind me of home, made by my Mum, who always served it with some meat or mushroom sauce. Oh! And I can’t forget to mention that dumplings were a hit of students’ life – we used to go to these cheap milk bars where you could buy them for pennies with accompaniment of butter milk.... oh, happy student days... But gnocchi on the other hand will always be associated with my first funny trip to Italy and will remind me of something fancy, different types potatoes, fancy ingredients, cheese sauces and Italy itself of course... 

Today, we did fancy gnocchi! We combined British and Jamaican sweet potatoes together with parsnips, blue cheese and pine nuts. Check this out! It tasted absolutely gorgeous! 

500g parsnips 

500g sweet potatoes 

50g parmesan 

2 tablespoons olive oil 

175g plain flour 

1 large egg 

25 g butter 

400g fresh spinach 

125g blue cheese 

Method: 

Preheat oven to 180 ° C. 

Cook the parsnips in a pan of boiling, salted water for 3-4 minutes, then drain and place in a baking tray with the sweet potatoes. 

Drizzle half the olive oil, then roast for 30 minutes until tender, turning regularly. Whizz in a food processor, then push through a potato ricer into a bowl. Allow to cool. The secret of good gnocchi is that the potatoes must be completely cool before combining with flour and eggs. 

Stir the parmesan into cooled mash, along with the flour and egg yolk. Season well, turn out onto a lightly floured surface and knead until smooth. Divide the dough in half. Roll both halves out into 2.5 cm diameters logs, then cut into 3cm pieces and place on a floured plate. 

Bring a pan of salted water to the boil and cook the gnocchi in batches for about 2-3 minutes until they float to the surface. Remove with a slotted spoon and drain. Melt half the butter in a frying pan over medium heat, then add the spinach. Fry for a few minutes, until wilted. Season with nutmeg to bring out its flavour and a hint of chilli. Melt the remaining butter and fry the gnocchi for a few minutes until lightly golden. Serve on a bed of wilted spinach with the blue cheese and pine nuts sprinkled over.

Enjoy!

‘You like tomato and I like tomahto...’, the best ever tomato soup…

Well, there are as many types of tomato soup as many people on Earth. 'You like tomato and I like tomahto ...' I don’t know the person who doesn’t like tomatoes, not to mention tomato soup, on which most of us probably grew up. From childhood, I remember the one with sour cream and rice or pasta made with chicken broth made on previous day. Then, in busy student days, when there was no time to cook proper food, there was a trend for a readymade hot cup of Knorr tomato soup and I wasn’t that bad, I have to admit! Later, after the first visit to Italy, we tended to prepare this lovely tomato, basil and parmesan cheese with garlic croutons. Since we have an access to a variety of spices and products of the world, our famous tomato soup transformed with each cooking - once delicate in flavour and creamy and spicy with a hint of the smoked paprika, and another time with plenty of rosemary and yoghurt ... I could go on and on about it... After all these experiments, it was time for something more traditional with a hint of something new... While searching for inspiration, we combined a few different recipes we’ve known already and in this way we came up with the best tomato soup we’ve ever eaten. 

Our tomato soup 

1kg San Marzano tomatoes 

2 large carrots 

4 garlic cloves 

1 large onion 

½ l vegetable stock 

sea ​​salt 

Freshly ground pepper 

Pinch of smoked paprika powder 

Olive oil with white truffles 

A few tablespoons of Greek yoghurt 

Pasta 'Stellette Stars' (small, in the shape of stars) 

Preparation:

Preheat the oven to 180°C. Wash the tomatoes, peel them and cut crosswise. Peel the carrots, onions and garlic. Arrange all the vegetables in a baking dish, sprinkle with olive oil and season with salt and pepper. Bake for approx. 1 hour. Remove from the oven and peel off the skin from the tomatoes. Using a blender, puree all the vegatables until you’ve reached the desired consistency. We like more lumpy consistency rather than completely purred. Add your vegetable broth and smoked paprika powder and season with salt and pepper as you like. Lastly, stir in two or three tablespoons of Greek yoghurt. Serve with the pasta stars previously cooked. And sprinkle the soup with some truffle oil as you serve. 

There are few versions of the Gershwins’ ‘Let's Call The Whole Thing Off' song... however, our favourite one is that sung by Elle Fitzgerald and Luisa Armstronga, which you can listen here as you eat your favourite tomato soup :)

Enjoy! 

Eat, eat, and your appetite will come... :)

Oh Dear... it’s one of those days that you've got no appetite and most of all I can't eat anything. But the dinner with friends is set for 2pm... Mamma mia! What am I going to do now? I flip through the culinary books and magazines nervously but none of the recipes satisfy my capricious taste today...I look at photos of beautiful dishes and they do not move me somehow... After half an hour of browsing through I find it... Yes yes, I got it!!! I yell at the entire kitchen... and at that moment the phone rang - 'Beloved, we just left the house, and will see you in an hour...' - announced friends. OMG, and I haven’t even started... oh well, I have to quickly think of something to impress them before the main course and even stimulate the appetite for what is about to begin. And once again, I realized why I love the Italian way of eating, relaxing and indulgence in the kitchen... They are the ones who invented antipasti, appertizers... or whatever you wanna call it... 

The history of antipasto traces back to the ancient Romans who featured antipasto as a stimulant before the main meal. It evolved from two very different cultural conditions – extreme wealth and the poverty of necessity. The wealthy used the antipasto as a prelude to a multi-coursed banquet. For the poor, antipasto was a street food eaten while working or shopping. 

Like the opening credits for a film, the appearance of the antipasto announces to the crowd that something special is about to begin. Even the sight of small appetizers beautifully prepared can change the mood of gathering, luring guests to the table... And their main purpose is to stimulate the appetite (which I need today) and the taste buds without a sense of fullness. It is served cold or at room temperature, its components as colourful as possible. But most of all, they need to encourage your guests to start the meal... even if your appetite is not agreeing with you today... 

A good antipasto plate will always have some combination of fresh melon or tomatoes, thinly sliced cured meats like prosciutto, marinated olives or mushrooms, vegetables, cheese, and seafood. Look what we did...

Rocket Salas

Serrano Ham thinly sliced 

Honeydew Melon bites

Thin flakes of Parmiggiano Reggiano

A pinch of freshly ground pepper

A few drops of raspberry-blasamic glaze

Recipe for Raspberry -Balsamic Glaze

2 cups fresh raspberries

1/3 cup balsamic vinegar 

2 tablespoons sugar

In a small saucepan over medium heat, bring 1 cup raspberries, the balsamic vinegar, and the sugar to a simmer. Allow the mixture to simmer, stirring occasionally, for about 15 to 20 minutes. The balsamic glaze is done cooking when it has reduced in volume and thickened.

All components of your antipasto arrange on the plates, sprinkle with freshly ground pepper and drizzle with rasberry-blasamic glaze. Serve before main meal and you'll see the faces of your guests! They will be delighted!

Enjoy!!!

Late Night Baking...

It happened… I decided to learn to bake cakes... I have to admit that I never had a particular spirit either a will for baking. And the first and the only attempt to bake a Brownie was a total failure. My Brownie had a rather runny consistency and we could easily sip it from the cup.... heheheheh 

In this way, I gave up all the baking attempts for years. However, since I’ve managed to bake some beautiful loaves of bread, I thought why would fail to bake some simple cakes... and succeeded!!! A few days ago, we enjoyed our scrumptious, homemade banana bread. The reason I chose this for my big baking return is that the recipe is so easy to make and obviously because of bananas.... who doesn’t like bananas? It's one of those fruits that you can do absolutely everything - from the cocktails and cold and warming desserts to cakes and muffins... And I even noticed that lots of my British friends enjoy their double toasts with slices of banana in the morning.... to one's heart content!!! 

As always before the great kitchen challenges I searched the Internet totally and I found this great recipe, the effects of which can be seen below. This bread is perfect for breakfast or unexpected Sunday visit of your friends... Literally super fast....

Banana Bread 

Makes 1 full-sized loaf or 2 small loaves 

Preheat the oven to 180 degrees. 

In one bowl, combine: 

1/2 stick (4-5 tablespoons) butter, softened 

2 eggs 

2 or 3 very ripe bananas 

2/3 cup sugar 

Use a potato masher, fork, or spoon to squish the banana and mix the ingredients together. It is alright for there to be small (1 centimeter) chunks of banana in the batter, but you want most of the banana to be reduced to mush. 

In another bowl, combine: 

1 1/3 cup all-purpose unbleached flour 

3/4 teaspoon salt 

1/2 teaspoon baking soda 

1/4 teaspoon baking powder 

1/2 teaspoon cinnamon (optional) 

Combine the wet and dry ingredients and mix until the ingredients are blended together. 

If you like, stir in additional ingredients here, such as chopped walnuts or pecans, dried cherries or apricots, or chocolate chips. A handful (about a half a cup) is about right. 

Pour the dough into greased baking pans and bake until a toothpick inserted in the center comes out clean. Small loaves take around 30 minutes, a normal-sized loaf takes around 50 minutes. 

Remove from the oven. This bread is great warm, but it is excellent cold too. 

After they have cooled for 5 or 10 minutes the loaves can be removed from the pan to cool. Once they are cool they can be individually wrapped and frozen. 

Enjoy and have a lovely evening!