I don't have a green thumb but...

I like the idea of growing your own food. In practice, though, this is limited to herbs such as cilantro and watercress. This year I wanted to try something new.

Today we bought tomatoes and sweet pepper - and roses as you can see...



And a pot of lovely minature basil (minette basil?) which hopefull will live longer...



I was also considering cucumbers. Any other ideas what we can grow on a balcony with a roof and windows? And what to I call such a balcony? It's not a porch, is it?

Dish of the day: chicken with apples / Danie dnia: kurczak z jabłkami

I saw the recipe in one of the newspapers and simply thought this should be good. Maybe because the couscous salad with apples is very popular in my house. I modified the original recipe slightly: skipped the bacon, used red onion instead of yellow.




You will need:
4 chicken breasts, cut
2 red apples, diced
1 red pepper, diced
1 yellow pepper, diced
1 green pepper, also diced
3 cloves of garlic, finely chopped
1 medium red onion, chopped
3 teaspoons of curry spice (I know I should make it myself, but I was rather tired)
crushed black pepper
3 tablespoons of rice oil (very nice)

Heat the oil in a casserole, fry the chicken. When it turns "white" add the garlic, onion, peppers and fry some more. Add some water if needed. Add the curry spice and apples. Cook until the apples turn yellow.

I served it with brown rice cooked with black cumin.

Yummy!

Taco à la Sørkedalen

Sørkedalen is a place where I lived for a good while after moving to Norway eight years ago. In many ways an idyllic place and a source of many good experiences in my life.

Foodwise it was a place of many good tastes and great freedom. One of the dishes, served typically on a Friday evening and made with chicken breast, was taco. Or perhaps "taco". I'm sure it had little to do with the original - also because it was served with lompe - but it was good and easy to prepare. Later on I have developed my version of taco à la Sørkedalen. I have retained the lompe instead of taco shells which are impossible and greasy and full of conservants anyway, and mixed my own taco seasoning, rather then rely on a readymade one.

Due to a phenomenon dubbed by the newspapers as a price war about minced meat I bought into it, so to say, and made my taco with minced meat this time.

For this you will need:
Taco spice mix made at home (recipe below)
some 500g minced meat or any other source of protein (beans, quorn)
1 medium onion, chopped
a few button mushrooms, sliced
1 tablespoon of oil
150 ml of water
6-10 lompe (2 packets of it) or taco shells, if you have to
tomato, cucumber, ruccola, sprouts, bell peppers, any other vegetables you like (washed and cut into pieces)

For the spice mix use:
1 tablespoon of plain flour
1/2 teaspoon of chilli powder
1 teaspoon of paprika powder
1/2 teaspoon of salt
1/2 teaspoon ground cumin
1/4 teaspoon cayenne pepper
1/2 teaspoon garlic, chopped
1/4 teaspoon sugar
1/2 teaspoon dried oregano

Mix everything in a small bowl.
Meanwhile heat the oil in the frying pan. Add your proteins with onions and mushrooms and fry until almost done. Add the spice mix, stir well, then add water and let it simmer until the water is almost gone.

Place a lompe on a plate, fill it with everything, roll and eat.

Vel bekomme!

Also I strongly recommend reading the Wikipedia entry on lefse and lompe since it is not well known outside of Norway. In case you would want to serve it to the underaged, the mix is slightly more spicey than the usual stuff.

Harira / Harira / Harira

When shadows grow longer
and the sun sets for the forthcoming night...
Then you can brighten your evening and strengthen your body with a Moroccan soup/dish known as harira. Tada! Here is a quicker (I don't have two hours to prepare my dinner) and vegetarian (costs less and friends can eat) variant.



For a large soup pot I used:
too much chickpeas (due to a slight miscalculation; soaked overnight and cooked as described here). I guess 1-2 cups of chickpeas should be enough (if so, you might use just half of the spices below)
2 teaspoons ground turmeric
2 teaspoons ground black pepper
2 teaspoons cinnamon
1/2 teaspoon paprika powder
1 pinch of saffron threads (optional)
1/2 teaspoon ginger, peeled and finely chopped
2 tablespoons butter
3 celery stalks, chopped
1 large onion, chopped
quite a lot of parsley, chopped
500g canned tomatoes
some zacierka makaronowa or soup pasta
1 egg beaten with the juice of 1/2 lemon
some more lemon to garnish and season with later on

Begin with the spices. Chop the ginger, mix with all the other spices in a small bowl. In another casserole start cooking the chickpeas (takes 20 minutes for me) - or simply open the canned ones. In a large soup pot melt the butter and add the spice mix. Let it cook for a moment or two to release the flavour and colours. Add the onion, parsley and celery. Cook stirring, then add the tomatoes and let it simmer until the chickpeas are done.

Add the chickpeas with some of the cooking water and pasta or zacierka, simmer for a while more. Add the beaten egg and stir.

Serve with some more lemon and eat, eat, eat!

Hot & spicy pasta with trout / Krydret pasta med ørret / Pikantny makaron z pstrągiem

For this spicy dish you will need:
Ca 500g of trout without skin and bones (or simply remove the bones at home)
1 tablespoon or more of pepper mix

2 tablespoons of olive oil
1 clove of garlic, chopped
1 medium onion, chopped

1 red chilli, seeded and finely chopped
1 can of hermetic tomatoes
fresh basilicum (I used parsley instead)

pasta of your choice

Prepare the pepper mix first by crushing one teaspoon of black pepper, one teaspoon of white and some dried cayenne peppers.



Then turn to the fish: wash it, dry it and cut into pieces, then spice with the pepper mix and let it rest in the fridge.

Prepare the sauce now: mix tomatoes, chilli and basilicum/parsley with a hand blender. Heat the oil in a casserole, fry garlic and onion together. Add the tomato sauce and let it cook on low heat.

Prepare the pasta. While preapring it, turn to the fish again. Heat a frying pan, add a little bit of oil and fry the pieces of fish. When the past and fish are done, serve with the sauce.



Smacznego!

Tartar sauce / Tartarsaus / Sos tatarski

You wil need:
300 g good mayonnaise or less if you see that other ingredients drown
salt and pepper
1 tablespoon of chopped onion (for example red)
1 teaspoon of lemon juice
1 tablespoon of chopped pickled small cucumbers, spicy ones
1 tablespoon of capers, chopped if large, otherwise just drained
¼ teaspoon of Dijon mustard
fresh chopped parsley

Mix everything into a spicy and chunky sauce. Serve with seafood or meat!
My question now is: is this the same as the Norwegian remulade?
Anyone?

Cajun potatoes with holy trinity salsa / Ziemniaczki cajun z salsą

This is one of my favorite dishes ever and I know at least one reader here to be fond of spicy potatoes, so I sure hope she is reading this post.

It's hot and it's spicy and it takes forever to make these but it is all worth it. Believe me. Well, maybe it doesn't take forever - it just is difficult to time. So prepare the Cajun potatoes on an afternoon when you have plenty of time and aren't too hungry to wait.



For the Holy Trinity salsa you will need:
2 celery stalks, finely diced
½ red pepper bell, finely diced
a piece of red onion, finely diced



For the rest of this dish you will need:
Cajun spice from the post below - the amount there should me enough for even 800 grams of potaoes.
Potatoes - washed, peeled if necessary and cut into wedges. The smaller potatoes you choose the better.
A few button mushrooms cut into fours and peeled whole shallot onions (both optional).

Preheat the oven to 200ºC. Pour some oil into a baking dish - enough to cover the bottom and place it in the oven.

Roll the potatoe wedges in the spice. Add the potatoes to the baking dish, toss and add what might be left of the cajun spice. Add mushrooms and whole onions.

Bake for some 45 minutes. This depends on the size of potatoes used, your oven and so on. Be prepared that it might take more than an hour. Turn occasionally.

Last time I made it I made some fast chicken meatballs - baked in the oven underneath the potatoes. I just need to remember to take pictures of food before I start eating. Everything looks so much better then.



Smacznego!

Cajun spice / Cajun krydder / Przyprawa Cajun

This spice is not so difficult to mix at home and way better than what you can buy in a shop. Contains less MSG and other enhancers used in spices.

You will need:
½-1 tablespoon of finely chopped garlic (depending on how garlicky you like it)
1 tablespoon of finely chopped onion
2 teaspoons of white pepper, crushed
2 teaspoons of balck pepper, crushed
2 teaspoon of dried thyme
½ teaspoon of dried oregano
½ teaspoon of cayenne pepper (or chilli powder) - less if you are delicatem, more if you are tough :)

Mix everything in a bowl with flat bottom and continue reading in a separate post on Cajun potatoes!

Edit: Next time I want to try it with fresh herbs instead.

Cilantro / koriander / kolendra

"Some writers say the leaves [cilantro] are used for seasoning, but this statement seems odd, as all the green parts of the plant exhale a very strong odor of the wood-bug, whence the Greek name of the plant."

Vilmorin-Andrieux, The Vegetable Garden (1885)