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

Rohkostsalat - apple-carrot salad

              Rohkostsalat - apple-carrot salad

This isn't actually a salad. It's more a dessert. It's healthy and yummy but it takes some elbow grease (unless you have a Food processor with grater). You also need to use a whole milk Yogurt here, because your body just absorbs the nutrition in the Carrot with fat. 

This is what you need:

- 3 apples (or more)

- 3 Carrots (or more, equal to the apples)

- a spritz of Lemon juice

- Full milk Yogurt

- Sugar or sugar substitute 

This is how you do it:

Grate the apples and carrots in fine strips through the bigger side of the grater (or use a food processor with grater)

Add 1 TBSP or 2 (depending how much you use) just so the apples don't turn brown. Now add Yogurt so its a smooth consistancy. Shouldn't be to much but just enough to combine everything. Add sugar until you like the taste. Thats it. Cool and enjoy it. 

Schupfnudeln or Finger noodle

                           Schupfnudeln or Finger noodle

Schupfnudeln are basically the german version of Gnocchi. They are also know with the name Fingernudel (Finger noodle). The word "schupfen" comes from the way how they are formed, by hand. That technic was called '"schupfen". They are thick in the middle and pointy to the ends. Like Gnocchi, they are cooked but then they also are getting pan fried in butter to get them a crispy edge. You can eat them as a side dish, or make them in a meal with ground meat and sauerkraut and lots of Paprika powder and caraway seeds. In some areas that dish is called Schupfnudeln as well. I remember eating this a lot on medieval meetings. Along with "gschlamberts Kraut" but that is a different story. 

This is what you need: 

- 500 gr Potatoes (e.g. for mashing)

- 50 gr Butter

- 1 Egg yolk

- 100 - 150 gr Flour

- salt 

This is how you do it:

First cook the Potatoes and press them through a potato press (like for mashed potatoes). Let them cool a bit. Now add the butter, flour, salt and Egg yolk and work it until its a smooth dough. 

Use some flour on the work space and roll the dough in thumb thick rolls. Cut them at around 2 inches. Form them into the typical form but keep them around thumb thick. 

Now cook them in slightly boiling saltwater until they swim on the surface (around 5 min or less). Take them out and put them in a Colander. Then you can pan fry them until they are brown and crisp or keep them in the fridge until you need them. 

Guten Appetit

Haschee

                               Haschee

This is a fast dish, comfort food, hospital food and I don't know what. My daughter is keep asking for it and since I started this food blog for her, so she can look up all the recipes, I have to add it here. I cook a lot and my daughter keeps saying that my food is better then all the restaurants we go to and I should open my own restaurant, but its also mostly ethnic food, family recipes and authentic food from back home and our surrounding Countries. She enjoys it thoroughly. And I just figured that most of the recipes are made actually pretty fast. It doesn't take a lot of ingredients, but the right ones. 

This is what you need:

- 1 lbs of ground meat (whatever you want to use)

- 1 small onion, diced

- 1-2 gloves of garlic, finley chopped

- 250 ml Water (1 cup)

- 2 TBSP Brown Gravy or Sosse zum Braten

- 1 TBSP sour cream

- Salt, Pepper and Paprika powder

- shredded carrots, optional

This is how you do it:

In a big pot, saute the onion and the shredded carrots if you use them. I do, so it adds a bit of vegetable to the dish. When the onions are soft, add the garlic for 1 min.. Now turn up the heat and brown the ground meat. I usually push the onions to the side so they don't burn. Once the meat is nice brown and crumbly, season it with salt, pepper and Paprika. Then add the 250 ml of water and the brown gravy. Stir everything good. Bring back to a bubble. Take the pan off the heat and stir in the sour cream and that's it. 

We like to eat Noodles with it like elbow pasta, but also mashed potatoes or rice is going really good with it. \

Guten Appetit