Going all juicy

Since my husband was diagnosed with a kidney cancer last year, we changed gradually our diet. Less meat, less pasta(once a week), baking cakes or scones  just time to time, more soups and vegetables dishes. It was hard to say that he can not eat anymore this or that so I was just trying to diminish the recurrence (white bread: once or  twice a week). He would ask sometimes for biscuits.  I have to say that I am easily tempted: I love white bread (baguette, banette, Parisienne, after all I am french 😉 ) and I do have a sweet tooth so it was difficult to resist.

Few months ago, his aunt who had herself a breast cancer gave him a book concerning anti cancer diet. I started reading it and since then have changed all my perspective of what we are supposed to eat and how. I would sincerely recommend it to everyone not only the ones fighting against the big C.

Everyday our body non only creates bad cells but also is exposed to toxins in our environment (in our food, in our air: pesticides, insecticides, bpa, collagen, cleaning products, perfumes etc.). Everyday our body needs to eliminate these toxins and bad cells.  Cancer appears when our body can not defend itself anymore and  these bad cells are not destroyed. It is up to us to help it in that “cleaning” process. In that quest we decided to eat as much vegetables, fruits and legumes as possible. One easy way would be juicing!!! So my husband bought a lovely juicer and since we and the children are all having fun trying new recipes. My favourite:

The slimming smoothie

Ingredients:

2 golden apples

two stalks celery

1 cucumber

1 peeled lime

3cm chunk of fresh ginger root

one half riped avocado

ice cubes

Juice the apples, celery, cucumber, lime and ginger. Place the juice, ice and avocado into the blender and blend until smooth.

I was totally surprised by juicing ginger, not as powerful as usually especially that I am normally not a big fan but that juice is so yummy. a perfect balance between the flavors the freshness of the cucumber and the spicy ginger, the acid lime with the smooth avocado, the right recipe  to detoxify after  the family feasts during Christmas holidays.

Happy new year to all!

When the goat invites himself at our dinner table!!!

Salade de chèvre chaud

goat cheese and feta Salad

This week was quite busy with the fact that I’ve started to work again. It’s sometimes hard to conciliate  family life and work, though really common now days for most of the women. I have to say that having a husband sharing some tasks and really being there for the children really helps and makes everything easier. He even can cook, that is sooooo handy ;-)!

With our four children (I know we are crazy, in this era, to have a big family), it is sometimes difficult to have a relaxed dinner so we often dine after the children are in bed. We take  that opportunity to cook something that the children will not like. Having a late dinner (usually after 8 o’clock) can really disturb our sleep so our meal choices are something light and often quick to realize. So despite  not being the season for it, but  being yet a  wintry  dish ;-), salad is often in our menu lately.

Our favorite is  “la salade de chèvre chaud”. Famous in my region, the south west of France, there is different versions of that hot goat cheese salad. Here is a simple one:

Salade de chèvre chaud

For this recipe, I bought the goat cheese already breaded, really practical in a busy life, but we can always do it ourselves for that we need: (serves 2)

Breaded goat cheese

5 tbsp bread crumbs
4 full tbsp goat cheese (mild and creamy preferably)
for a little variant we can add 1/2 tbsp chopped dried fruit (dried apricot works well)

mix the goat cheese and the dried fruit. Take 1  tbsp of the goat cheese mixture. Using your fingers form the goat cheese into a ball and then flatten it into a disc. Gently press the goat cheese disc into the toasted bread crumbs. Make sure all sides are coated. Repeat with the remaining goat cheese and bread crumbs. You should have 4 breaded goat cheese discs.

Hot goat cheese recipe

(serves 2)

9 large romaine leaves, torn into peaces

2 slices of bread

garlic clove

Salad dressing

3 tbsp sunflower oil

2 tbsp balsamic vinegar

salt and pepper

In a salad bowl, mix oil, balsamic vinegar, salt and pepper. Toss in the salad leaves torn into peaces. Share into 2 plates. Toast 2 slices of bread. When ready, spread the peeled glove of garlic all around the bread. Cut the slices in half. Fry the breaded cheese,  two sides.  Put them delicately in each piece of bread, and serve on top of the salad.

Bon Appétit!!!

goat cheese and feta Salad

Another salad made this week:

Improvised goat cheese and feta cheese salad with avocado, grapes, tomatoes, vinaigrette sauce

Teriyaki vegetables

The vegetables in the terryaki sauce in the pan

Living in Germany for quite a while now, I became more bored of cooking. Why so? First of all the shops nearby don’t appeal to me, they all look that they are continually “out of stock”, and piles of items to be restocked stand on the aisles, and there isn’t any  nice sweet smell in the air. Second, it is hard to find exotic fruits, fresh fish, different kind of vegetables… That  leads  to  boredom and that inevitable question: What am I going to cook? And this redundant question came again this morning in my mind despite the fact that I shopped the day before. At 12h20, I had not decided yet when some inspiration came: Teriyaki vegetables with rice. I don’t follow any recipe for the teriyaki sauce but this is the way that I like it.

For 4 persons:

1 courgette (or zucchini in the other side of the Atlantic)

5-6 medium mushrooms

100-150gr of mange-tout

1/2 red pepper

1 spring onion

500gr rice (I used long grain rice)

1 onion

water

3 tablespoons of soy sauce, 2 tablespoons of mirin (sweet rice win similar to sake), 1 teaspoon of honey (I used acacia honey), 2 cloves of garlic, salt, pepper, ginger.

1. The rice:

Fry the diced onion with some sunflower oil, add the rice, stir a wee bit and then pour the water (normally one cup more than the rice: if you put 2 cups of rice, add 3 cups of water for example) and salt, reduce the heat to the minimum, stir and cover with a lid. Let cook for around 10-15 minutes until the rice is cooked.

2. The Vegetables:

Fry the vegetables separately. Stir Fry the diced courgette first in a little bit of oil for 5-6 minutes, keep aside in a plate, then fry the sliced  mushrooms, then the red pepper and finish with the mange-tout.

Fry the sliced spring onion, add the mirin and the honey, let it boil and stir. Add the soy sauce and ginger. Let it reduce, then add the garlic, crushed and the vegetables. Stir for few minutes and Serve with the rice.

Frying the mushrooms… mmmhh

The vegetables in the terryaki sauce in the pan

On the plate with the rice and steamed baby aspargus

Yummy!!!

TV dinner!

Yesterday, as  everyone may have noticed, was St Valentine’s day. Usually I’m cooking 3-4 courses dinner for my dearest Husband, instead of giving a present, the occasion also for trying new recipes. This year was a wee bit different. With our boys activities, and coming back late, it would have been difficult to do such a dinner, so we decided to have a TV dinner(does not sound that romantic just depends how to do it or where 😉 ). While my boys were at their Karate  lessons, I went quickly shopping and grab few interesting articles not really knowing yet what I would prepare but at least I would have some fresh vegetables. I found a nice product, Soy pearls: little pearls  that explode in your mouth liberating a soy sauce flavour. Coming back home, after cooking for the children, I could concentrate on the  TV dinner. After 15-20 minutes, my “mises en bouche” were ready.

:

a general view

spoon with sour cream, cucumber, lamb’s lettuce, and soja pearls. Endive’s leaf with sour cream, apple, walnut. Omelette, sour cream, salmon and wakame. Omelette and baby aspargus.

mini blinis with sour cream and lump-fish roe, baguette with tapenade and lamb’s lettuce, omelette with sour cream and soja pearls.

Jamie Oliver’s pizza recipe

A lot of people always asked me for my pizza recipe. Not really measuring the ingredients, it was hard to give it to them until I encounter the Jamie Oliver one. Mine dough stays usually a wee bit more soft that’s all, so here we go!!!

Ingredients:

For 6 to 8 medium size pizzas: (Italian bases)

• 1 kg white bread flour or Tipo ’00’ flour, or 800g strong white bread flour or Tipo ’00’ flour, plus 200g finely ground semolina flour
• 1 teaspoon fine sea salt
• 2 x 7 g dried yeast sachets
• 1 tablespoon golden caster sugar
• 4 tablespoons extra virgin olive oil
• 650 ml lukewarm water

Preparation:

1. Mix the dry ingredients together.

2. Add the lukewarm water and the 4 spoons olive oil. Mix well until forming  a smooth ball of dough. Put the dough in a  large flour-dusted bowl. Cover it with a cloth and place it in a warm room for about one hour until the dough has doubled in size.

1 hour later

3. Knead it around a bit to push the air out with your hands – this is called knocking back the dough. Divide the dough up into as many little balls as you want to make pizzas – this amount of dough is enough to make about six to eight medium pizzas.

Roll the tiny ball into rough circle, transfer it to a olive-oil-rubbed and flour-dusted pizza pan. Layer it with a tomato sauce.

Here a recipe of our home tomato sauce:

2 tins (500 gr)

of full tomatoes

2 onions

2 tablespoons of olive oil

thyme, origano, bay leaf, salt, pepper, sugar.

Fried the onion slowly in the oil, when translucent  add the tomatoes cut in dice, let it boil then lower the heat, add the salt, pepper, thyme, sugar, bay leaf, oregano. Stir time to times. Let it cook slowly for around one hour.

4. To finish your pizza add grated cheese (emmental or gouda or cheddar if you like) and the toppings of your choice (salami,or  ham & pineapple, or tuna and onion, or goat cheese and honey etc.). Put in the oven for around 10 min.

Pizza is ready when the base is cooked

Classic pizza salami

tuna pizza

our quatro formaggi: goat cheese, gouda, bleu,and brie

Bon Appétit!!!

Mascarpone Cheesecake

Ingredients:

2*500gr mascarpone

400ml double cream

200gr caster sugar

150gr digestives biscuits or butter biscuits

50gr of butter softened

4 eggs yolks

4 tablespoon of cornstarch

2 bio lemon or lime

4 tablespoons of icing sugar

1. Preheat the oven at 210°C or th 7 . Place the biscuits in a bag,  place  them on a chopping board and bang the bag with a rolling pin until they are crumbed. In a bowl, mix together the crumbed biscuits with the butter. Take a spring form pan and cut some baking paper at the same size than your pan. Lay it at the bottom of the pan. Pat the mixture into the bottom, smooth it with a spoon. Bake for ten minutes. Set aside.

2. In a large bowl, combine the Mascarpone with the caster sugar, then the  egg yolks one by one, blending slowly, the cornstarch, double cream, zest and juice of the 2 lemons. Poor that filling over the baked crust.

3. Bake for 40 minutes. When ready it had to have a golden colour. Let it cool down.

4. Set in the fridge overnight for a better result.

Bon appétit!!!

Home-made ravioli with the pasta machine!!!

For years, I wanted to try home-made pasta. My husband had received a pasta machine for Christmas so here was the opportunity to try!

The dough that we tried was probably not the best: 1 egg per 1oo gr of flour… we will try next time a different recipe.

For the stuffing:

•  1/2 aubergine
• 1/2 courgette
• 200 gr ricotta
• 200 gr mushrooms
• 1 onion
• garlic, salt, pepper, thyme
• piment d’espelette

The kids enjoyed helping out.

The ravioli coming out ! They are too thin…

Finally in our plate!!!