Winter Magic

Happy Winter Solhverv

Stand by me with Music for Change

Quick Minestrone Soup

I used to make real Minestrone Soup and begin by soaking the dried beans. But this is a quick and delicious soup without dried beans so maybe it doesn't really qualify as a Minestrone, but it is for me. Perfect right now in November when it is getting gray and cold and dark and wintry outside. It is also good with a November cactus (above) which started blooming again November first.

Quick Minestrone Soup

Onion, garlic, carrots, celery, tomato paste or canned tomatoes, salt , pepper, oregano, thyme, water

Chop vegetables very fine. Add fresh grean beans, parsley root or other seasonal vegetables if you want. I grate my garlic. Sauté in olive oil. Add tomato paste or canned tomatoes. If using canned tomatoes, blend them so they are finely pureed. Add water and spices. Bring to a boil and simmer until the vegetables are cooked. Add dry pasta of your choice and boil until cooked.

Halloween- eating pumpkins and Hokkaido squash

As a kid, I wouldn't touch pumpkin pie, but I have found that almost all kids like pumpkin cake and toated pumpkin seeds. And lots of kids have eaten my cake, because I used to have a Halloween party every year at the little library I worked at which was combined with a school library. There would come around 50 children and adults each year who would carve pumpkins so the seeds and filling flew around the room and dress up in costumes and play pumpkin bowling, and pin the frog in the witch's cauldron. When I started no one in Denmark knew about Halloween, but today it has quickly caught on and they sell Halloween pumpkins and Halloween do dads everywhere. But trick or treating hasn't really started here. There is another holiday in January where the kids dress up and go from door to door. They prefer to get money, but I give them candy.

PUMPKIN CAKE

1 cup cooked and mashed pumpkin

I use a Hokkaido squash that I cut in pieces, scrape out the seeds and loose center, peel and chop and boil in water for 10 minutes until soft and easy to mash. I put in less water than squash and just mash the squash with the remaining water. Of course I have also used regular pumpkins but Hokkaido squash are smaller and look and taste like pumpkins.

2 eggs

½ cup oil

1 t. almond extract

1 T cinnamon

½ cup raw sugar (Once I forgot the sugar and although my son wouldn't eat it, my friends thought it was fine- pumpkin has a natural sweetness)

1½ cup flour (whole wheat)

1 t baking soda

1 t. baking powder

If the batter is too thick add some buttermilk

bake about 30 min in greased 9" pan at 350

ICING

confectioners sugar, 1 t cinnamon, 2T boiling water

PUMPKIN MUFFINS

this is almost the same recipe with less oil, less sugar, less egg and I leave out the cinnamon but you can use it.

1 cup cooked and mashed pumpkin

1 egg

3 T oil

1/3 cup raw sugar

1 t almond extract

1 ½ cup whole wheat flour

1 t baking powder

1 t baking soda

some buttermilk

bake in greased muffin tin about 25 min. before baking make pumpkin faces with raisins on top.

1½ cups whole wheat flour

TOASTED PUMPKIN SEEDS

rinse and drain pumpkin seeds. Mix olive oil and 1 t. salt. Mix seeds with this. spread on a baking sheet and toast in the oven. I toast and eat the whole seeds with the husk.

Congo Squares

My mom found this recipe in a newspaper and it became a big favorite. I can see on Google that it has been a favorite in many families from the 1950's and on. A childhood friend and I have been emailing about the name, and I think she might have found the answer - there is a Congo Square in New Orleans. Maybe the recipe originates from around there.

CONGO SQUARES
2/3 c. margarine melted (I use oil and that works out fine)
2½ c. brown sugar (I use 1 cup and that's enough)
3 eggs
Mix these first then add:
2½ c. flour (I use whole wheat four)
2½ t. baking powder

1 package chocolate chips
Bake 20 minutes in a greased 9" x 15" pan 350 oven. Cut while warm and remove from the pan to a rack to cool. Otherwise they stick to the pan.

Wok- a Magic Pot

I am certain that my wok is magic, because all food made in it is so delicious. It's like it can't go wrong. My present wok is the best one I have had- it is made of thin cast iron and has a little flattened part on the bottom. My more classic wok rusted and wasn't as wonderful as this one.
BASIC RECIPE STIR FRY

finely diced vegetables (choose several with an eye for different colors and shapes- I think the visual is very important in chinese food)
onion and garlic (always)
other favorites here are chinese cabbage, peppers, mushrooms, bean sprouts, celery, carrots, string beans, pea pods, broccoli ...whatever.
Meat - we use mostly finely diced raw chicken or turkey, sometimes beef or pork, sometimes we make small meatballs we add at the end or we add diced ham.
While we fry the meat and vegetables we either boil basmanti rice (with curry powder in the water) or boil some kind of chinese noodle. sometimes egg noodles, sometimes rice noodles or udon noodles.
Fry in peanut oil, starting with what takes longest which is meat, then onion, garlic and celery and we use ginger powder but fresh is better. then add vegetables after how long they need like broccoli and carrots need longer than mushrooms or peppers.
When everything is fried we add roasted cashews, shrimp and sometimes pinepple chunks. then we add soy sauce and maybe some pineapple juice and then mix in the rice or noodles and serve.

Gourmet Cooking and Kitchen Fires

When were were 17, a good friend on the street and I decided that we should really learn to cook dinners, considering we would be moving away from home soon. We decided that she would cook for her family one night a week, and I would eat with them, and I would cook for my family one night a week, and she would eat with us. Soon we ended up dueling to see who could make the best, gourmet, three course meal. We were both scouring Julia Childs and the New York Times cookbooks and making complicated recipes with exotic ingredients, that I am sure neither of us used again when we moved away from home. I will never forget the night when one part of my meal was deep fried meatballs. Suddenly the pot of oil for deep frying started shooting flames. I don't know why I didn't think to just put the lid on (maybe the pot didn't have a lid), but while my mother tried to get an ancient fire extinguisher to work, I ran over to the neighbour who said, use flour, not water. Home again and dump a bag of flour on the oil which worked. Finally the meatballs got fried, and the meal was served. We were all (my girlfriend included of course) sitting at the dining room table instead of the usual kitchen table, in honor of the fancy meal, when my father came home and heard the story of the fire. He took the old fire extinguisher and said, "This is easy to use", and he promptly sprayed it over the table.

Daniels Coco Crazy Cake

Daniel had an idea for a Coco Crazy Cake with cocoa, coconut and coca cola. I said immediately that you couldn't bake a cake with coca cola. However, a quick search on Google proved me wrong. There is especially one recipe with cocoa and coke that is all over and comes from coca colas webpage. In fact they have recipes for salads, chicken and everything you can imagine with coke. Not what I want to start making. But our Coco Crazy Cake is delicious. Its a variation of my basic cake.
COCO CRAZY CAKE
Mix together:
1½ cup whole wheat flour
½ cup unsweetened cocoa powder
½ cup dried coconut
1 t. baking soda
Add:
1 egg
½ cup oil
½ cup coca cola
½ cup buttermilk (maybe a little more)
Bake in 9" round pan, 350 degrees, approximately 30 minutes
We made a white icing- just boiled water and confectioners sugar.

More about bread

When we were teenagers, my friends and I loved to go to Georgetown. We could spend a whole afternoon going in and out of the boutiques looking at everything, talking about our likes and dislikes and never buying anything. Most of the shopkeepers probably hated us.
But it was also in Georgetown we discovered Sam the Argentinian Baker. Or Argentinian, Russian, Jewish baker. He was a wonderful, gentle, friendly, white haired, little man who had a small bakery, where only he and his wife worked. He made the best bread I have ever tasted- a round russian bread, which had a dark crisp crust with a moist whole grain bread inside the crust. When asked the secret he said that he used all the different grains. I have never been able to bake a bread that came close to his. He would always beg us not to eat the bread hot, because it was bad for your stomach he said. But of course we couldn't wait and would break off pieces of the warm bread. He also baked fantastic knishes.
I have discovered that one difference between European bread and American bread is that in America there is often honey, molasses or other sweetener in the bread. I never use these anymore. Sams bread was without any kind of sugar.

Baking bread using the sponge method

Many years ago my sister sent me "The Tassajara Bread Book" by Edward Espe Brown. This book taught me to make bread by the sponge method. I gave the book to a friend over 10 years ago so this is my recipe and not necessarily the same as in the book but maybe it is. I love the sponge method because it's so easy to start a bread dough- no dirty hands, no kneeding, just mix everything together and let it stand. at least one hour but up to 24 hours. Often I have started my sponge in the evening and baked the next morning before work.
BREAD BY SPONGE METHOD
Sponge:
for one whole baking sheet of rolls (about 20) or one large loaf of bread or two smaller loaves
4 cups liquid. I use 2 cups buttermilk and 2 cups water. I heat my buttermilk and add cold water and then I have a liquid at room temperature.
Add 1 T. dry yeast
flour after choice so that the mixture is like porridge. I use oatmeal, rye flour and whole wheat flour. Mostly the first two at this stage. You can also add whole grains here. (I would soak them first)
Cover and let rise.
As I remember, the point of the sponge method is that the yeast develops best without salt, egg and oil which hamper its growth.
After at least one hour, (tho I always wait at least 2 hours) add olive oil (I use one large wooden spoonful which is 2-3 T) 1 T. salt and more flour to make a dough. I use whole wheat flour here. Kneed well and shape. I roll my rolls in poppy seeds or sesame seeds. Bake on a greased baking sheet. Cover with a dish towel and let rise ½ hour. Baste with water or with beaten egg. Bake ca. 30 min. at 350 F.
The varients in this recipe are what kind of liquid. Regular milk gives a more cake like bread. How much oil, which oil or melted butter for a cake like bread. Egg/eggs can be added in the second step. what kind of flour. I use all whole grain flour but white flour can be used in varying amounts for a lighter whiter bread.