Vegetarian Ravioli-Vegetable pan fry

           Vegetarian Ravioli-Vegetable pan fry

This is a dish from Hello Fresh Germany, my brother ordered for a while so he can learn new and vegetarian dishes. I love his approach of trying to cut out meat and diary as much as possible to send a message to our overcrowded market to reduce stress on our environment. Factory farming and cruel handling of animals should concern us all. There was a time where we bought what was season. When we butchered for the season. Now we are so spoiled to get what we want, when we want it and where we want it. This dish (and at least 1 more) is here to remind us how spoiled we are and how fortunate.  

This is what you need:

- 2 red Onions

- 2 Carrots

- 200 gr Mushrooms

- 200 gr Oyster mushrooms

- 1 pack of  fresh Ravioli

- 400 ml heavy whip (or crema media for less fat)

- 16 ml Worcester sauce

- 2 spring onions

- Salt, Pepper and Paprika to taste

- 100 ml Water

This is how you do it:

Cut all the vegetables and store separately. The onion half and then slice it. The Carrot cut in thin rounds or half moons. The mushrooms quarter, the Oyster mushrooms just rip in smaller pieces of 1 cm, the spring onions cut the white and store separately from the green.

In a large pan, add 1 TBSP oil and fry the red onions with a pinch of salt until nice brown and soft. Take them out and put aside.

Same pan, add another TBSP oil and the fresh Ravioli, Carrots, Mushrooms and white part of the spring onions for 5-6 min until the Ravioli are a bit colored. In the meantime, mix 100 ml Water and the Worcester sauce, heavy cream and Paprika and stir it together. Add the mixture over the Ravioli-Vegetables, reduce the heat to medium and simmer for 2-3 min until slightly thickened. Salt and Pepper to taste. 

For garnish, serve the meal in deep dishes and top it with the red onions and garnish with the green part of the spring onions. 

Guten Appetit 

Fish and chips or Backfisch

                                  Fish and chips or Backfisch

Achtung, jetzt gibt's Backfisch!!!! That is a phrase on every Fair in the south what makes northern style fried fish. Also, I have heard it on the market in Hamburg before. Backfisch is the german version of fried fish. Or fish sticks. However you want to call it. This specific recipe now is a copy cat and direct translation from star chef Stefan Henssler and his "schnelle Nummer". He also sells that combination at his Ahoi Restaurants in Hamburg as street food. I tried it there 2 weeks ago and was like OMG!!!! I would have never thought about that combo. Plus, his Remoulade sauce worked perfect yesterday with our grilled spanish Mackerel. The longer it sits, the better it tastes. I will write both dips here with the fried fish recipe. For the french fries or "chips" I trust you to find your own lol. 

This is what you need:

For the Remoulade sauce:

- 2 Egg yolk

- 1 TSP mustard

- Juice of 1/2 Lemon

- 200 ml Oil

- 1 TBSP Capers, diced 

- 1 hardboiled egg, diced

- 1 Pickle, diced

- 1/2 bunch of italian Parsley, cut finely

- 1 TBSP Sour Cream

- Salt, Pepper

For the Garlic sauce or Aioli:

- 1 Egg

- 1 spritz Lemon juice

- 1 TSP mustard

- 100 ml Oil

- salt, pepper

- 1 Garlic glove finely chopped or crushed

For the fish batter:

- 2 pieces a 150 gr Cod (or flounder is good too)

- Fish seasoning

- 200 gr Flour

- 1 TSP Salt

- 300 ml Seltzer Water (with bubbles) 

- 2 TBSP Vinegar

- 10 gr. Baking powder

This is how you do it:

In a tall but narrow glass, just enough space to fit your emergent Blender, add the stuff for the Remoulade: egg yolk, mustard, salt, Lemon juice and oil. Blend it until it gets thick. Remove into a bigger bowl. Now whisk in the sour cream and all the ingredients you chopped finely. Let it sit in the fridge. It will get thicker there, promise. 

In the same tall glass, add now the ingredients for the garlic sauce: egg, lemon juice, Oil, mustard and salt. This will get a lot thinner since its actually an Aioli. Now crush the garlic in to it and let it sit in the fridge as well. 

For the fish batter, whisk together the flour, baking powder, salt, vinegar and water. It will foam. It will make a nice, crunchy but light crust. Cut the fish into nice size of sticks. Heat enough oil in a large pan or fryer for the fish to cover. Add a thermometer to control heat. should be not more then 175 degrees celcius or 350 Fahrenheit. Coat the fish nicely and thoroughly with the batter and immediately put in the hot oil. Don't overcrowd the pan. Fry on each side for 2,5 min or until golden brown and then turn to the other side. When done, let it drip on Paper towels for excessive oil. 

I also made fresh french fries with it in the oven so it was done at the same time. I coated the fresh potato wedges in oil, salt and Paprika. Perfect combo.

Stefan Henssler now is adding HIS personal note to this dish with a mix of red Onion, Peperoni and Cilantro. I cut them all up into slices and added some salt, Pepper and Lemon juice and let it sit for a moment. 

To serve this dish, put the French fries on a plate, 1-2 pieces of fish, the Aioli around on the side, the Remoulade on top of the fries and the onion/chili/cilantro mix on top of the fish. It is an explosion of flavors in your mouth. Trust me. 

If you ever going to make this recipe or even just some of it, I would love to hear back from you. Leave me a comment on here.

with this:

Guten Appetit and AHOI  

Lemon Chicken

                            Lemon Chicken

We love Lemons. We love chicken. We love garlic and Rosemary. So it was a no brainer that we love Lemon Chicken. But, like mostly, I didn't like 1 specific recipe so I threw 2 recipes together - again. 

Well, you benefit from my experiments lol. Here it goes.

This is what you need:

For the Marinade:

- Chicken parts

- 2 gloves of Garlic, small diced

- 1 zest of a Lemon and 8 TBSP of Lemon juice

- 6 TBSP Olive Oil

- 3 TBSP Rosemary

- Salt and Pepper

For the cooking part:

- 100 gr Bacon, diced

- 1 Onion, diced

- 125 ml white wine

- 125 ml chicken broth

- 100 gr Sour cream

- Juice of 1/2 Lemon

- 100 gr sour cream mixed with 1 TSP sugar for the very end

This is how you do it:

If you have a whole chicken, divide it into pieces. If you just use chicken pieces, just add them into a big ziplock bag. To the chicken add the Lemon zest and juice, Olive oil, garlic, Rosemary and salt and pepper. Let it sit in the fridge. The longer the better.

Take the chicken out of the marinade. In a big pan, fry the Bacon until crispy. Remove. Add the Onion and on medium high until Onion and translucent. Remove from pan. Now pan fry on hot with the Bacon drippings the chicken parts, until chicken is slightly browned. Add the Bacon and the Onions back to the chicken. 

Pour over the chicken now the white wine and the chicken broth and the 100 gr of sour cream. Stir and cover and simmer for about 30 min.. 

Once the chicken is cooked, add the rest of the sour cream with the TSP sugar and the Lemon juice to the sauce. Adjust the Salt if necessary. We love to eat garlic bread with it. Also, some vegetables like Broccoli are good but you can also just serve a green lettuce. 

Guten Appetit

Belgian (german) Waffles

                  Belgian (german) Waffles

I know in the United States these are called Belgian Waffles. We do them in Germany too but we ain't call them "Belgian" lol. Well, anyway, this is how we do it

This is what you need:

- 100 gr of soft unsalted Butter (or Oil)

- 50 gr Sugar

- 7 gr. Vanilla sugar (or a bit Vanilla extract)

- 3 Eggs

- Lemon extract or the zest of a Lemon. You can even use the zest of an Orange

- pinch of Salt

- 200 gr Flour

- 1 TSP Backing Powder

- 125 ml Milk

This is how you do it:

Add everything but the flour, Baking powder and milk to a bowl and whisk it until its foaming and turn pale yellow. Now alternate the flour and milk to the dough (meaning a bit flour, then milk, then flour, then milk) 

Heat up your waffle maker and spray it with oil. Now add 1-2 ladle of the dough into the center of the waffle maker and spread it a bit to the side. Close and let it bake for around 1 min.. When nicely browned, take it out and add some powdered sugar. Repeat until the dough is gone.

Enjoy and Guten Appetit

Chicken Cordon blue with Bacon

                                   Chicken Cordon blue with Bacon

A friend of mine in Germany once made this recipe and I thought, everything is better with Bacon, right? So I actually liked this one better then the traditional Cordon blue (Blue ribbon). 

This is what you need:

- Chicken breasts

- Bacon

- Cream cheese

- salt, pepper

This is how you do it:

Clean the Chicken Breasts off of any access fat. Butterfly them carefully, but try to keep 3 sides intact. Now salt and pepper them from all sides, but not to heavy. With a knife apply some cream cheese to one side of the chicken (inside) and layer it with Bacon. Close the chicken and secure it with a tooth pick or metal stick.

In a pan, heat up oil or Ghee (for the buttery flavor) and sear both sides of the chicken breast. Now reduce the heat to low to medium and cook the chicken through, turning it around every min so it doesn't burn. You can also just finish up the chicken breast in a 350 degree oven until its cooked through. It will take a bit longer, but it leaves the chicken breast more juicy. Be patient with this process. You don't want an inside raw chicken but the outside burned. 

The sides and sauce to this is really your preference. My husband had it with mushroom cream sauce, we had it with brown gravy or with my Kraeuterrahmsauce from a previous recipe on my blog. I also invented already some sauces myself to this here (like in the picture: roux and then chicken broth and crema media with Tarragon herb, marjoram, thyme and oregano) 

Also, you can eat from french fries over mashed potatoes everything with this chicken breast. Let your imagination flow. 

Guten Appetit

Cauliflower Vegetable Casserole

                                 Cauliflower Vegetable Casserole

This dish I found in a german Magazine once and I liked how it sounded. It's actually pretty fast and easy to make and good to prepare ahead. It also would match with meats like a steak or Schnitzel. We usually it it plain as is. 

This is what you need:

- 1 head Cauliflower

- 2 small or 1 big head of Broccoli

- 2-3 Carrots

- same amount of hickory smoked, water added Ham

- Butter and Flour for the Roux 

- Milk for the Bechamel 

- Cheese to your liking. I use usually Swiss cheese

- Salt, Pepper, Nutmeg

This is how you do it:

Cut the florets off of the Cauliflower and Broccoli. Dice the Carrots in mouth size pieces. Bring a big pot of water to a boil. Add salt and now, on low heat, cook the Carrots and Cauliflower for 5 min.. After the 5 min add the Broccoli florets and cook for another 5 min.. They all should be soft on fork peak. Strain them and rinse with cold water to stop the cooking process. 

In another pot melt Butter and stir in Flour and let cook for 30 sec to 1 min.. Add Milk and stir constantly. You want a creamy consistency, not to thick. Now add a good amount of cheese. 2 handful will do it. Stir so it can melt. Season with salt, pepper and nutmeg.

In a casserole, pour in the vegetables and the sliced ham and stir to combine. Now pour the Cheese Bechamel over the Vegetables. You can now add a bit more cheese on top. 

Put the casserole in a preheated 350 degrees oven for 30 min.. 

Guten Appetit