Easy and fun cooking for everybody™
Spectacular inspiration I wasn’t suppose to cook on Tuesday, but since I couldn’t go visit my Dad, cos on the previous Thursday Mr. Kakuniu decided to twist his left rear paw so we needed to take him to the vet repeatedly whole week for shots, …
Royal Cutlets on Yellow Wax Beans Since I started blogging I wanted to cook this one meal. It’s extremely easy, yet very stunning and elegant. I think I ate it the first time at a dinner that was served by my Godmothers mother-in-law, I think, …
Almost perfectly diet dinners part 1
This past Wednesday Cookies was coming home very late and since he refuses to eat before he goes, I had to cook something slightly light. I was looking for an inspiration staring at a plank of ground beef, when i remembered this once pleasant meeting I had with one of my colleagues from work – Magda (yes, there is 5 Magdas, the other Madzia was a different Magda 0_o) and her bulgarian boyfriend Boris Madziorek – thats how I call her, wanted to cook for Boris something that will remind him of home – she choose a dish called Kufte and I liked it very much, so decided to make it for us for a light dinner one night. Why it was almost perfectly diet? cause I served it with boiled cauliflower and broccoli florets topped with cheese sauce… yeah baby!!! Cheese sauce is Cookies secret recipe, that he wrote (after some annoying nagging from my part) himself ;D
Bulgarian Kufte
Ingredients:
40 dag (1 lb) ground beef
1 egg
1 big shallot or medium onion
dry bun (if you don’t have – use bread crumbs)
salt, black pepper
1 tsp ground cumin (originally should be whole seeds crushed in the mortar)
sprinkle of vegetable oil
Preparations:
Put dry bun into the bowl and pour water, wait until soft and mushy – then squeeze the liquid off (yes I know, disgusting 🙂 ) Chop shallot. Put meat into the bowl, beat egg inside, add bun and shallots, salt, pepper and cumin. Mix thoroughly but not too long. Roll small meatballs – max 2 bites. Sprinkle some oil on top and put them on a hot grilling pan. One side on high fire, and turn the fire down when you flip it. Cover the pan for last 2-3 min to make sure kuftes are done inside.
Boiled cauliflower and broccoli florets with cheese sauce
Ingredients:
Both separated for desirable size – I like it small.
whole cauliflower
whole broccoli
Preparations:
Boil either separate, cause broccoli needs less time to soften then cauliflower or together 🙂 for the softness you like. We like everything very al dente. You can steam it as well – keeps more flavour this way.
For sauce:
2 kinds of cheese
milk
sour cream
butter
parmesan cheese
Creamy Cheese Sauce mix.
2 part finely grated (smallest possible) cheeses, in particular soft and easy melting, 1 part milk and 1 part sour cream… meaning 250 ml milk, 250 ml sour cream… mix together in a pot, heat up on LOW FLAME, stirring gently… add in a little butter and cook until somewhat liquified and somewhat mixed… and then melt it all down and there you go… cheese sauce. You can add a little ground black pepper like a PINCH and some grated Parmesan cheese too.
Arrange kufte and veggies on the plate and pour cheese sauce on the veggies, serve sprinkled with parsley.
Until next time, take care of yourself and each other 0_o
P.S. Cookies rated it 9 out of 10 0_o
YAY!!! Comments are available now and I now have become a Thai food “expert” Yes, Cookies sometimes shows some spark of genius and he managed to enable comments under the posts 0_o so feel free to use them – just pretty please… no trolling!!! 😉 …
People never stop to amaze me 😉 On Tuesday I was so out of schedule, since we forgot to buy ground meat and beetroots for a meatballs and beetroots day, that I didn’t know what to cook… Though Cookies this time got a good idea …
Polish Potato Salad
After my crying shame yesterday with the pulpetki, I felt today the urge to rehabilitate with something delicious and also very vegetarian 0_o. Cookies was all for the new experience, though HE SAID that he liked last night’s dinner – actually it was tasty, it just fell apart. But today… damn I’m pleased with myself so much that I feel like patting my own back 0_o. I can’t remember where I found the recipe for this salad, as I stored it in my recipe program and didn’t save the link. As usual the idea is very easy, not too many ingredients, though I believe method this time is very important. I changed the recipe a tiny bit, as I thought that potatos ask for a little spicy/sour dressing, so I added good amount of black pepper and a drip of white wine vinegar.
Ingredients for the salad:
5 medium potatoes
¾ kg white mushrooms – in the yard store I found nice big ones 😉
mushroom bouillon cube
1 shallot
some oil/olive oil and butter
parsley
salt
Ingredients for dressing:
2 tbsp mayonnaise
1 tbsp mustard
black pepper
white wine vinegar
Preparations:
Peel the potatoes then slice it not too thin (maybe 0,5cm), put into the pot, pour water to cover it and boil until soft (I was standing over it with Granny’s cooking buzzer, 10min max!). Drain and let it cool – try not to break the slices!!! Important for looks. In the meantime prepare the mushrooms, peel if needed, though you don’t have to if skin is not too thick or mushrooms aren’t too old. For sure don’t wash them in water, mushrooms like to soak, then it’s hard to fry them as they stew in water (they do either way, thats why you need to drain them 0_o). Additionally if the shrooms have some soil on them, you can utilize a paper towel to wipe it clean of the soil. As you will make all this decision process (peel or not to peel), cut the mushrooms into slices. Put butter and oil/olive oil on the pan, heat it up and toss mushrooms in. After some time, drain the water into separate jar/cup and add half cube of mushroom bouillon – stir and put aside. Arrange the potatoes on the plate, then drip a little of mushroom “juice” and toss some parsley on top, add mushrooms as another layer, put on shallots cut into thin strips.
Prepare dressing:
Mix the mayo and mustard, pepper and white wine vinegar – stir good. Pour nicely over salad and sprinkle with some parsley.
Serve cold or warm 😉 as you please, great both ways. Now, when I write it I think it would be nice to serve it with chilled white wine…
Until next time, take care of yourself and each other 0_o
P.S. That damn Cookies rated it only 8 out of 10!!!!!! He didn’t even appreciate that I didn’t leave a MESS in the kitchen – for him to clean 0_o
Feta Pulpetki, disaster or success? As today is Sunday, I wanted to shine in the kitchen and make something completely new plus that was very vegetarian… I was deliberating if I should post it, but since I’m not a fancy chef I’m prone to mistakes. …
Sweets, Sweets, GIMME MORE SWEETS!! What do you think a married couple should eat on their 6th anniversary day? Well, since we never do stuff as it suppose to be 0_o we ordered awesome, 57cm (22.5”) PIZZA!!! Damn it was humongous! …
Stuffed Pork Tenderloin with Rice and House Salad
This morning, before I went to work I asked Cookies what do we eat today… and he said… well I won’t repeat what he said 0_o Actually I hate to ask this question, cos it means either we eat chicken nuggets (Cookies favorite actually) – they are homemade though or I’m sitting for an hour thinking what the hell am I going to make this rainy Friday… (One day soon I will explain how do I deal with not having to brood into my coke zero thinking about what to cook.) Unfortunately last 2 days it didn’t work, cos us two brainiacs would have to cook mushroom soup without … mushrooms 0_o
So that led me into brooding over pork tenderloin, which Cookies took out from the freezer (I was hoping he would say he will make fries, but it didn’t work again! DAMN!) So, I’m sitting and brooding, nothing comes to my mind. I browsed my usual places, even allrecipes.com and others… nothing interesting. Most of those recipes needed at least 3-5h marinating. At least! I have 90 min before Cookies is coming back, since I try to be good Polish wifey, and feed my man the moment he comes back from work. I stood a good few minutes in front of the fridge thinking what the freaking hell I can make… then I got enlightened: I should use all the leftover veggies and stuff it into the pork… YAAAY solved!
Ingredients:
1 pound Pork tenderloin
Stuffing:
¼ of yellow pepper (though can be any)
1 small onion
5-6 mushrooms
2 tsp cranberry preserves
1 tsp strawberry jam
3 tbsp shredded cheese (had some leftovers from the chili Cookie made the other day)
salt & pepper
Preparations:
Clean meat in cold water, then dry with paper towels. Cut into 4 pieces, from the thinner end cut a pocket, sprinkle meat with salt and pepper, set aside.
Cube onion, pepper and mushrooms. Pour some oil on the hot pan, add a little butter (not a necessity, just gives more flavor). Toss onions, stew mixing till you start smelling it, then add the rest of veggies. Fry until soft and relatively golden. Salt and pepper it, add cranberry and then the strawberry jam, stir good until glassy, set aside till it cools down. Stuff mixture into meat pockets and close with some shredded cheese, sprinkle some oil on the meat, a tiny bit and toss on grill until not red anymore. Very important note – make sure meat is not too thick it may take very long to cook inside.
I served it with basmati rice and a house salad.
P.S. If you want to know what’s “a house salad” – well as the name says, it is a mix of all vegs you have at home with a dressing of your choice – this time french.
And Cookies took care of dessert 🙂
Until next time, take care of yourself and each other 0_o