My Easter Menu

I just noticed that WordPress is adding advertising into my content in links which are not mine. How to tell the difference is that my links have a dotted underline and the ad links are solid and dotted together. Not cool at all.

Last week I was blown-away flattered by my Hungarian friend Zsuzsa (Zsuzsa is in the kitchen) when she invited me to participate in a blogging event to post your Easter Menu! You can read about Zsuzsa’s Easter here; she grew up very close to where my Mom grew up in Budapest. It’s really just a round up of past post recipes and a little bit about your Easter memories. How could I say no?  Thank you Zsuzsa, I would be honoured. Zsuzsa is taking part with the following Hungarian ladies: The author of this event, Éva from Takarekos Konyha (this blog is in Hungarian) and Elizabeth from Food and Thrift.

Growing up, Easter was always about bunnies for me. Yes, we went to church and all that but let’s be honest, it was about the bunnies! At eight years old, my very first pet bunny was an albino Dutch whom we called Boom Boom (he was called Boom Boom because he stomped his hind feet loudly). Sadly good old Boom Boom only lasted 3 years, but he made such an impression on me that I’ve only ever had bunnies as pets! I cried so much when he died that my Dad swore he would never let me have another pet because losing them made me too sad and he just couldn’t bear it. I was sixteen before I was permitted to have Boon, another albino Dutch but smaller than Boom Boom (no, we weren’t very imaginative with the names!). But I digress, back to Easter.

Mom and Dad in Edmonton with the Chrysler Tour in 1960

You already know that my Dad was a Puppeteer (and if you don’t, you can read about it here) and we had a family business with the puppet shows. Easter was a big time for us, these holidays meant that the malls, schools (note that this link is NOT mine) and some companies needed entertainment for their events and what’s not to like about a puppet show? So many of our Easters were on the road with the show. In fact, Boom Boom was first adopted because my Dad needed a live bunny for the show (he was the star, don’t worry, it was all very humane).

Believe it or not, the Show was about Bunnies.

And there were singing Eggs too

But Easter also had a serious side: FOOD! Chocolates, coloured eggs and of course, ham. I don’t have many of the recipes that we had at Easter but I’ve gathered a bunch I am going to have this weekend when we have JTs family for Easter Sunday lunch. I hope you enjoy them.

My Mom only used Canada Grade A Large size eggs

Hors D’œuvres were usually Deviled Eggs (here and here) and French Salad (Francia Saláta). I don’t have a post about Francia Saláta, but you can see Zsuzsa’s recipe here (my Mom never put potatoes in her version). I may do a new hors d’œuvres recipe I saw on my friend Lorraine’s blog of her recent trip to Amman, Jordan. It involves cheese and phyllo pastry, that’s all I can give you!

A wonderful addition to any Easter table

We usually had an Easter kalács (Zsuzsa made a gorgeous one here) but I’m making John’s Easter Cheese Bread instead.

The most succulent tenderloin ever

We’ve decided to go nontraditional and have a beef tenderloin for lunch. This recipe is my favourite way to serve this special cut of meat.

The only place you’ll miss the potatoes is on your waist-line!

I’m going to serve it with my traditional Celeriac Cauliflower Mash. And a wonderful lemony Asparagus from my friend Greg’s Rufus’ Guide.

It’s a symphony of colours

And a little tangy German Purple Cabbage Slaw.

Now if you had any room for dessert, I’m going to make Charle’s Sweedish Apple Cake (from Five Euro Food), which totally looks like the perfect ending to a rich and heavy meal. It’s really just all apples and then there’s more apples. The only flour in this is the use of the breadcrumbs as the base, thickener and likely adds a little texture. I love that I can make it sugar free too, since I have a diabetic and a hypo-glycemic in the house — I like to make only one dessert that everyone can enjoy and not make the person feel odd that they have something else.

I may not be able to comment on your blogs for the next few days but I’ll definitely read up when I get back into civilization with internet. Thank you for reading my blog and leaving comments, you really, really make my day. Thank you to every one of the blogs I read, you provide me with the inspiration for my blog and it really wouldn’t be the same without you!

Happy Easter to All!

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Hungarian Custard Squares (Krémes)

Hi Everyone, hope all my lovely readers in the North East fared well through that huge storm the other day. I watched it on the Weather Network radar and it looked absolutely brutal.

I have one more thing to ask of you lovely readers (in fact, my friend Smidge from Just a Smidgen also requested it). Kindly link your Gravatar to your blog, otherwise we have no way of knowing where you came from and we cannot comment on your blog. It’s in Gravatar.com, you’ll have to sign in and Edit your Public Profile, update your link to your blog in My Links. Thank goodness Smidge asked me to do this because believe it or not mine WASN’T linked! Thanks Smidge!

A friend dated a guy with whom we became close. They broke up, so we asked her if she would mind if we kept him; she said not at all. So we did. He came for dinner a few weeks ago and I made a Hungarian themed dinner party; Hungarian Cheese Sticks (Sajtos Rud), Celeriac Velouté with Caramelized Onion Focaccia Croutons (recipe to come), Chicken Paprikas with Nokedli (I updated the nokedli part as Barb mentioned to me that her’s didn’t turn out), a nice Hungarian Cucumber salad (recipe to come) and Krémes. I was looking for a new dessert that would finish off the evening in style so I ‘traveled’ all the way to British Columbia to my good Hungarian friend Zsuzsa’s blog and found these wonderfully delicious Custard Squares. She spoke very highly of the recipe so I knew they would not disappoint. They are labour intensive but well worth the effort. They totally remind me of Mille Feuille that was my favourite when I was a child. The pastry is fantastically flaky.

I divided the recipe into a third of the original as I didn’t need quite as many. JT said I should have made the entire batch (that’s a testament to how good they are!). Thank you Zsuzsa for a tremendous dessert. I turned the most of the measurements into weight because it was easier to divide into 3 that way! You should get yourself a digital kitchen scale (I have this one), it is essential for baking.

Although these squares sound rich, they really are not. Really.

Makes 8 squares in a 5″ x 9″ loaf pan (if you want more, please see Zsuzsa’s original recipe, she has excellent photos on the process of making the pastry too).

Custard Ingredients:

• 2/3 cup skim milk
• 1/3 vanilla pod
• 3 eggs separated
• 2 tbsp sugar
• 6 tbsp flour
• 1/2 tsp vanilla
• 1 pk gelatin
• 1 tbsp butter
• 4 tbsp sugar
• dash of lemon juice

Pastry Ingredients:

• 72 g all purpose flour
• 76 g butter
• 1 tbsp and 1 tsp cold water
• 1 tsp vinegar
• pinch of salt

Pastry Directions:

1. Heat the milk in a saucepan or microwave, scrape the seeds from the vanilla bean into the milk with a paring knife, and add the bean pod to the milk. Cover, remove from heat and allow the vanilla to infuse for one hour. Set aside.
2. Next make the flaky pastry. In a food processor with metal blades, combine the flour and chilled butter until it resembles a fine crumble. Add the salt and pulse to distribute. Combine the vinegar and the water and stream into the processor until a dough ball forms.
3. Generously flour a board and roll out the pastry into a rectangle and divide into 4 equal parts. Stack the four rectangles on top of one another and chill for twenty minutes.
4. Once chilled, separate each part and roll the dough into 4 very thin rectangles, roughly bigger than your loaf pan. Place in the bottom of your loaf pan, allowing the dough to form creases to fit into the pan. Repeat for the second rectangle, this will be the top. Bake in a preheated 400° F oven for 14-18 minutes keeping watch as the pastry burns easily.
5. When the pastry is golden brown, remove pan from the oven and immediately cut pastry into 8 squares (4 by 2). Wait a few minutes and carefully remove the squares and set them aside in the same order as they were in the pan, set aside.
6. Repeat with the other two rectangles and bake, this is the bottom layer (do not cut this layer). Allow to cool, and remove from the pan, and put a good layer of plastic wrap into the pan with a generous amount coming up the side (this will help you lift it out). Return the bottom layer into the bottom of the pan, smoothing out the side of the plastic wrap.
7. Next make the custard layer.

It’s misleading because it has cream in the name, but there is no cream in the recipe.

Custard Directions:

1. In a medium sized bowl beat the egg yolks and 2 tbsp sugar for 8 minutes (they will become thick and pale). Add the vanilla
2. In a separate bowl whisk together the flour and gelatine. Gradually add the flour mixture to the beaten egg yolks and continue to beat until smooth.
3. Remove the vanilla pods from the vanilla infused milk and gradually add the vanilla infused milk to the bowl with the eggs and the flour.
4. Over a simmering bain-marie cook the custard stirring it constantly until it reaches 80°C or 176° F with a candy thermometer (be careful as it can burn easily). As soon as it reaches 80° C remove immediately from the heat stir in the butter and set aside to cool.
5. While the custard is cooling whip the egg whites until soft peaks form, add the lemon juice and continue beating until almost stiff. Add 2 tbsp sugar and beat until shiny and stiff. You are trying to beat the sugar into the egg whites so they are no longer grainy (this takes several minutes).
6. Once the custard has cooled, press it through a fine sieve (my custard got a bit lumpy because I didn’t stir well enough as it was cooking)
7. Take about 1/3 of the egg whites and fold it into the custard to loosen it up. Then fold the remaining egg whites into the custard very slowly
8. Pour this custard onto the bottom layer of the pastry and even out using a spatula, pushing it into the corners and sides. Add the top layer of pastry in the same order that you removed it from the pan, leaving a little space between each one to allow your knife to slide through to make the squares. Refrigerate until the custard has set.
9. Once set, using the plastic wrap, lift the pastry dessert out of the pan onto a cutting board. Generously sprinkle with icing sugar. Using a wet knife, slice the custard into 8 equal squares, using your top pastry as your guide.
10. Serve cold, perhaps with a dollop of whipping cream.

Those little dots are from the vanilla bean that was infused in the milk

A little fresh raspberries would have looked awesome in this photo. The forks are from Hungary, my Mom bought them for me.

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My first guest post and Hungarian Cherry Squares — Cseresznyés pite

Hungarian Cherry Squares (Cseresznyés pite)

I am rather thrilled and honoured that my good friend Charles of Five Euro Food has kindly asked me to guest post. Charles has been a valued commenter on my blog for over a year now, and as most of you know, he takes his time to formulate interesting and thoughtful remarks; his comments are a joy to read and sometimes even have a bit of a chuckle over. Thank you Charles, your friendship is cherished, I hope to do your guest post right.

In keeping Charles’ tradition of a little peek into living in Paris, I will give you a little peek into living in Toronto and a lovely Hungarian family recipe. I ask that you head on over to Charles’ blog to check out our little adventure, but I will share my recipe here as well. I belabored over which recipe I would share as Charles’ guest post, because he takes so much time to photograph and document his recipes so well; I didn’t want to get ahead of myself and bite off more than I can chew (pardon the pun) so I hope you enjoy it. This recipe is a cherished favourite for my family (my brother always asks for it when I visit and now that my dear Mom is gone, it is up to me to carry on the tradition).

Cherry Squares

By Éva Hársfai-Robinson (1936-2005)

Makes 1 pan 9” x 13” about 20 squares

Cost: ~€0.31 ($0.40) each piece

Preparation time: ~40 minutes

Calories: ~120 calories per piece

Ingredients:

• 1 jar pitted cherries 500 mL to 700 mL, drained but reserve liquid
• 3 eggs separated
• 120 g unsalted butter (room temperature)
• 125 g caster sugar
• 250 g flour
• 1 tbsp baking powder
• ½ tsp salt
• 1 tsp vanilla
• About ½ cup milk – or use reserved cherry liquid (if you use the reserved liquid your squares will be a bit pink)

Directions:

1. Grease and flour 9” x 13” x 2” baking pan (22cm x 33cm x 5cm).
2. Preheat oven to 350° F (175°C)
3. Drain cherries, liquid reserved (you can use this as your liquid or make a delicious sauce or use it in soda as flavouring!)
4. Whip egg whites until a stiff but not dry (should be able to stand in a peak) – no need to wash the beater if you do it in this order, if you cream the yolks first, then you must wash the beater and dry thoroughly).
5. Cream egg yolks with butter and sugar until light and fluffy (should be a lighter shade of yellow).
6. Sift flour, baking powder and salt – dry ingredients.
7. Alternating dry ingredients with the milk (or reserved cherry liquid), fold into egg yolk mixture.
8. Fold beaten egg whites into the mixture.
9. Pour into greased pan. Note the dough should be quite thick, should have to spread it into the cake pan, it should not pour by it self.
10. Dot with cherries throughout (you may want to give each cherry a squeeze as you dot so ensure there are no pits!).
11. Bake in preheated oven for about 20 to 30 minutes (test with toothpick to make sure it’s done).
12. Cool in pan (don’t cut until it is entirely cool otherwise it will become ‘bacony’ or szalonás, as the Hungarians put it).

• Creaming the butter, sugar and eggs together takes patience
• I start out lining up all the cherries, but then I have to fill in the spaces so I can use up the whole jar!
• The cherries behave as they wish, so there is no point in lining them up anyway

They are moist and not overly sweet.

A short note: This was my very first guest post ever, and I am delighted that it was for Charles’ Blog. I have a new found respect for Charles’ blogging, over and above my original respect, which was plenty! The extra effort Charles puts into this blog is unparalleled, the ingredient shot, the video, the working shots etc., make this blog ever so wonderful to follow but impossible to follow in its footsteps!

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Hungarian Sweet Green Pea Soup with Dumplings — Zold Borsóleves

My friend John (from the Bartolini Kitchens) did a post on June 6 for Straw and Hay Pasta including fresh peas that were shelled. It was that vivid picture that John painted sitting at the kitchen table, shelling the peas that brought back such fond memories of my childhood that I had to recreate the recipe that his story conjured: Hungarian Sweet Green Pea Soup with Dumplings — Zold Borsóleves. I didn’t search the internet nor did I look at my mom’s recipe book as that would have been futile, my Mom cooked from memory and instinct. It used to drive my Dad crazy; she would make something he thought was delicious and he’d say, “this is delicious, did you write it down?” And she’d wave him away and say “no, but I can recreate it”. But it was never the same. It could have been our memory of the dish, or that she added a pinch of this or a pinch of that, and on this round may have gotten missed. At any rate, there is no recipe. I haven’t had this soup in over…(oops, there, I almost spilled the beans), in many, many years, but I have recreated it to my best recollection. And as I sat in the kitchen, eating this soup, I felt like I was 10 years old, sitting at the formica top and aluminum lip edge kitchen table. Thanks John.

This is a simple soup dictated only by the simple ingredients. Just water is used as the stock, to allow the sweetness of the peas to come through. After I made the soup, I did search the net to discover people put in carrots, potato, celery root, etc, but our’s was just peas, onion and garlic. My mom also used the young pods in the soup by carefully removing the hard membrane from the inside of the pod after it has been shelled. You can do this by bending the tip in toward the inside of the pod until the exterior cracks, and carefully peel the membrane away. It is hard and plastic-y, you won’t be able to eat it, so make sure you remove it entirely. Or you can just drop the spent pods into the soup for flavour and fish them out before serving.

Even though I pictured the dumplings made with Quinoa flour, I wish I had splurged and made white flour dumplings. The quinoa was OK, but it certainly didn’t have the bite and chewiness that the normal dumplings had. If I were to do it again, regular white flour dumplings. Although, I must say the quinoa made it a filling dinner.

The flavours of this soup conjured up all kinds of childhood memories

Serves 2 as an appetizer or lunch, or one good-sized bowl for dinner

Ingredients:

• 1/3 cup white flour (I used quinoa flour but it didn’t turn out as well)
• 1 large egg or egg white equivalent
• 1/4 cup onion, finely chopped
• 12-15 fresh green peas, shelled and pods prepared
• 2 cloves garlic finely minced
• 300 mL water
• non-stick cooking spray
• Salt to taste

Directions:

1. Shell peas and remove membrane from pods. Roughly chop pods into bite sized pieces.
2. Mix the flour and the egg in a small cup. The mixture should be thick so you can pinch small bits off and it doesn’t stick to your spoon (in fact, the chewier you like your dumplings, the thicker the dough should be). Set aside.
3. Coat the bottom of a soup pan with a good spray of non-stick spray and sauté the onions until translucent (you may need to add a bit of water to help it along). Add the garlic and cook until you can smell the wonderful aroma. Add the pods (not the peas) and cover with 300 mL water. Salt and taste, adding more as required (I ended up adding a good pinch — it should not taste salty, it should just bring out the flavours of this simple soup: peas, onions and garlic).
4. Bring to a boil and begin ‘pinching’ the dumplings into the boiling water. I used a small spoon which worked out to about 1/2 tsp size (or you can roll the dough into a narrow roll and cut with a knife) the dumplings will grow because of the egg. Add the peas and give give it a stir. Cook on boil for an additional minute until all the dumplings float to the top.
5. Serve immediately on your favourite Hungarian placemat. Sigh and enjoy the memories.

The Quinoa Dumplings were OK, but nowhere near the wonderful texture of my Mom’s old fashioned white flour chewy dumplings

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Christmas Baking 2011: Our Traditional Yule Log (Bûche de Noël)

Yesterday was Boxing Day, a tradition we’ve inherited from the UK. Although the history is quite different to what it has become today, it’s still a national holiday in Canada where many businesses are still closed and people get a day off. Except for retail stores! It’s a kind of Black Friday; sale madness and shopping frenzy! We’re heading down town to see if any bargains were meant for us, and we’ll be sampling our first new restaurant for lunch. In the meantime I have the final installment of the Christmas Baking Frenzy 2011 to share with you.
I have to admit that I have not made our Yule Log in years (since 2007, to be exact!). Charles at Five Euro Foods has inspired me to dust off my Mom’s ancient Hungarian Cookbook, drag out my Hungarian English Dictionary and bake my Mom’s traditional Yule Log. Our log is a marriage of the Hungarian Piskota (pronounced Pishkoata) and the traditional Canadian Yule Log with butter cream and a little of my Mom’s creative addition, whipped cream. But this year I forgot to buy the whipping cream and I had a logistic issue with transporting the cake so, like Charles I had to stick with a butter cream for the log. And some cute little snowflake decorations.

As I commented on Charles’ post that my Mom always decorated her Yule Log with little meringue mushrooms. When I was old enough, it was my job to pipe the mushroom shapes onto the parchment-lined cookie sheet and then when dried and cooled I would assemble them with the melted chocolate! What fond memories Charles’ blog brought back, thank you! Sadly, this year I tried three times to make my mushroom meringues and three times the meringue failed, so no mushroom meringues this year! Insert Sad face here.

Oh well, it seems that it’s usually me that eats them anyway, and I just don’t need it this year!

Gather 'round the table, y'all. It's time for dessert!

The Family Yule Log

Ingredients:

• 4 large eggs
• 120 g sugar
• 120 g all purpose flour
• 1 tsp vanilla
• 1 tsp grated lemon zest
• 2 tbsp granulated sugar.

Directions:

1. Pre-heat oven to 350°F. Line a 9″ x 13″ cake pan or jelly roll pan with parchment paper, carefully folding the corners. Spray with non-stick cooking spray.
2. Separate the eggs into two medium bowls. Beat the egg whites until stiff peaks form, but not dry. Set aside.
3. Beat the egg yolks with the sugar until pale and creamy and falls in a thick ribbon.
4. Fold in 1/3 of the egg whites into the pale egg yolk mixture.
5. Sift about 1/3 of the flour into the egg yolk mixture, then alternate folding in with the egg whites being careful not to deflate the batter.
6. Once all of the egg whites and flour have been folded in, the mixture will be thick. Pour carefully onto your prepared baking pan and spread out evenly. Bake for 20-25 minutes or until your cake tester comes out clean.
7. Lift the cake out of the pan using the parchment edges and lay onto a clean white cheesecloth sprinkled with the 2 tbsp sugar. Taking the short end, begin to roll the cake up tightly. Twist the cheesecloth ends tightly and allow to cool completely.

Rich Chocolate Butter Cream

Ingredients:

• 1/3 cup butter
• 2 cups sifted icing sugar
• 1 tsp vanilla
• 2 squares unsweetened chocolate melted and cooled.
• 1/2 cup seedless raspberry jam

Directions:

1. Cream the butter until light and fluffy. Slowly add the icing sugar and beat until entirely incorporated and fluffy.
2. Slowly drizzle in the melted chocolate and beat well.

Cake Assembly:

Directions:

1. Carefully unroll the cooled cake.
2. Brush the inside of the roll with the raspberry jam (if it is too thick, you may want to heat it up a bit but if you do, make sure it is cooled before you add the Butter Cream).
3. Spread about 1/3 of the butter cream on the inside of the roll. Carefully roll up the cake tightly.
4. Place the roll onto your serving platter, roll side down.
5. Spread the remaining butter cream evenly over the cake, covering both ends.
6. Decorate with meringue mushrooms and silly plastic decorations (sadly, I forgot where I put ours )

I wish to thank you all for joining me while I baked for the last couple of weeks.

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Hungarian Sour Cherry Soup and The Versatile Blogger Award (again!)

My dear Mom used to make a cold soup for Christmas dinner. I really don’t know why because traditionally it’s more of a summer-time supper (Hungarians used to eat their main meal at lunch and supper was just something light). My brother’s wife, Wendy fell in love with this soup the first time she ever had it and every year she asked my Mom to make it. Since my Mom’s passing I’ve made it from time to time, whenever Wendy asks but not as regularly (maybe mine is not a good !) This year I decided to make it without being prompted because I know the kids love it too! The tip about sorting through the cherries for seeds is from me. My brother used to always get the lot of seeds if there were any to be found in the soup!

I had a professor over for dinner when I was at University and I made this as a first course; he was ecstatic that we were having dessert FIRST!

Hungarian Sour Cherry Soup

Ingredients:

• 1 bottle sour pitted cherries in light syrup 540 mL/19 oz
• 3 cups water
• 40-50g granulated sugar (depending on how sour the cherries actually are)
• 5-10 cm lemon peel
• 1 cinnamon stick
• 2-4 whole cloves (I use a tea infuser so I don’t have to sort through the soup to fish them out)
• 1 cup non-fat Greek yogurt (the Hungarians use sour cream)
• 3 tbsp all purpose flour

Directions:

1. Strain the liquid from the cherries and put it into a medium sauce pan. Sort through the cherries making sure they really don’t have pits in them (I pulled out 5 out of my bottle) set aside.
2. Heat the cherry liquid, sugar and the water with the lemon peel, cinnamon stick and cloves until softly boiling.
3. Mix the flour with the yogurt well. Add about a cup of the hot liquid to temper the yogurt, then pour the entire yogurt into the softly boiling liquid. Stir well until it slightly thickens. Remove from heat and remove the cinnamon stick, cloves and lemon peel. Add the cherries and allow to cool. Refrigerate until ready to serve. It actually thickens as it cools.
4. Serve with a dollop of yogurt, if desired (we always forget!).

It

As you may have gleaned from the title of this post, I have again been bestowed with the honour of The Versatile Blogger award by my new friend Sharyn at Kale Chronicles. I’ve been intrigued with Sharyn’s blog as she doesn’t photograph her food, but paints a lovely little water colour about it or the inspiration she has garnered from the experience around it. Check out her blog, her recipes are off the beaten track and a nice change!

Thank you Sharyn for this honour!

The conditions of this lovely award are as below.

1. Thank the award-giver and link back to them in your post – check, see above.
2. Share 7 things about yourself – seeing as I really like talking about myself…just kidding, since I’ve done this before and many of my readers are from places far away, I’m going to tell you 7 things about Canada that you may not know ). You can read the first set here.
3. Pass this award along to 15 blogs you enjoy reading – I shall do my best to find bloggers who have not been given this honour previously, and I’ve come up with 7!
4. Contact your chosen bloggers to let them know about the award. – check

Seven Things about Canada you may not know:

1. Canada’s Prime Ministers do not have a fixed maximum term length, like the US Presidents. Our Prime Ministers can literally go on forever, or at least feel like they do
2. Our legal driving age is 16, but we now have graduated licensing. Way back when I got my license, I was able to get in the car and drive when and where ever I wanted, but that was a billion years ago! Ironically, our legal drinking age is 19! (Alberta, Manitoba and Quebec is 18).
3. Canada’s population is about 1/10th of the US and the majority of our residents live within 100 miles of the US boarder.
4. Although Canada’s Constitution was repatriated by Prime Minister Pierre Elliot Trudeau, we are still connected to the Queen of England through our Governor General. David Johnston is the 28th Governor General of Canada.
5. We spell words just like the British: colour, not color; neighbour, not neighbor; flavour, not flavor; favourite, not favorite — you get where I am going with this…my comments do not contain typo’s, we just spell that way!
6. In the 1970′s Canada began her conversion from the Imperial system of measures to Metric; by the late 1970′s all our roadsigns were converted and schools were teaching both. Although legally Metric is our form of measure, you will always find food sold in Pounds and Kilos, and fabric sold by the Yard or Metre (that’s another Canadian spelling, really).
7. We call electricity Hydro in Ontario, I suspect mainly because some of our power comes from Niagara Falls!

Blogs I humbly nominate for said award:

1. Profiteroles and Ponytales: I’ve known Barb for about 20 years; she is now a Wife and a Mummy and a “Big Wig” in a fancy firm downtown Toronto. I am happy that she is finally enjoying the benefits of blogging. Hope you pop by her blog and drop her a note.
2. Flavour Fiesta: I recently met Divya and am amazed and slightly jealous of her determination, dedication and perseverance with the launch of her extensive magazine. We’ve done magazines before at work and I know what an enormous project it is. She is also a fellow Torontonian! (and she spells like I do )
3. Grazing in the City: Bill is a southern transplant to Chicago and I really enjoy reading about discovering Chicago, one of my favourite cities of all time!
4. Bits and Breadcrumbs: Betsy is a fellow designer and she blogs about cooking and traveling (Canadian spelling!) and her lovely artsy-fartsy friends (sorry, that’s what we call ourselves up here !)
5. Back Road Journal: I just met Karen today and love her kitchen. I am looking forward to peaking into her life in the future.
6. A_Boleyn: Maria doesn’t have a blog, but she does document her food on live journal. She’s a substitute teacher, so watch your spelling and grammar
7. Eat Tori: I just met Tori and love the way she writes. She gets to go places I can only dream of.

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Happy Halloween, another scary story and Unconventional Chicken Paprikas

February 10, 2013: I have updated this post with additional instruction for the nokedli and a new photo.

It’s the eve of Halloween and we’re getting really excited about our fast approaching trip to Morocco. There are so many things still to do, like packing, for example!

Our House Decked out for Halloween

Pumpkin Lights in the Planters

Not withstanding, I promised a scary story, the final installment. So here it is… Sadly, my dear Dad was jaundiced from owning a home because the Russians had taken away his family home and he was afraid it would happen again, so we lived in a very nice newly built apartment in suburban Toronto. We had just visited Hungary the first time and both my brother and I were a little freaked out because we had seen museum after museum of archeological digs – mainly skulls (Hungary was the munitions centre of the Roman Empire and the country is littered with Roman Ruins). The skulls both fascinated us and freaked us out at the same time.
Upon our return to Canada we decided to share a room in our apartment, on his side the walls were decorated with Hot Wheels and on mine, Barbie wallpaper. Most nights were fine, but on occasion one of us would have a bad dream and crawl into Mom and Dad’s bed. On this night, it was my brother that ventured into Mom and Dad’s room for safety and my Dad came in and slept in my brother’s bed.
Waking up in the middle if the night is never fun when you’re little; everything is so dark and shadows seem alive! I should have felt safe because my Dad was in the room, but he was snoring away about 10 feet from me and unaware of the shadows. The head of my bed faced away from the window; we were on the second floor and plenty of street light poured in through the curtains — plenty to make evil shadows come alive, that is. I awoke with a start! There is a HUGE man in a cowboy hat standing at the foot of my bed; I see only the silhouette, there are no features, but he looks mean. I can’t speak, I can hardly breathe. I blink, oh my god, he’s still there. I blink even harder, damn, still there. I hide my head under the covers and count to ten. There is no man in the room and my Dad is right there not more than 10 feet from me. I know it’s in my head, but crap, it seems so real. I peak out one last time, and HE’S STILL THERE. Now, I really can’t breathe. I hide my head under the covers and I stay there; I imagine the lack of oxygen caused me to fall asleep, and when I woke up in the morning, with the sun pouring in, the shadow man was gone! Or the entire episode was a dream that seemed so real.

Year’s later, as an adult, I read about the Shadow People, and now wonder if it had been real!

Ready for the recipe? I have perfected this recipe over the years trying to make it healthier (Hungarians cook with a lot of lard and although it is flavourful, it is definitely not good for you).

Healthy Chicken Paprikas

Ingredients:

• 4 x 100g skinless boneless chicken breasts
• 1 roughly chopped medium sweet onion (I used vidalia)
• 1 cup cubed celery root
• 3 ripe red peppers
• 2 tbsp Hungarian Sweet Papkria
• 1-2 cups low sodium chicken stock
• 1 cup + 4 tbsp non fat Greek Yogurt or Sour Cream
• 1 tsp flour
• 2 tbsp vegetable oil

Directions:

1. Roast the peppers in the oven until the skins are black. Set into a bowl with a plate covering it to allow the peppers to steam.
2. Once peppers are cool enough to handle, peel the skins off.
3. Purée the peppers using an immersion blender until smooth.
4. In a large dutch oven, heat 1 tbsp oil and add the onions and cook until translucent. Add the Hungarian paprika, but be careful not to burn, this isn’t like Indian spices, paprika will burn quickly.
5. To the onions, add the celery root and 1 cup chicken stock. Add the puréed roasted red peppers, and a little more chicken stock. Cook for 1/2 hour on medium heat, until the celery root is soft.
6. Remove from the heat and purée until smooth. Pass through a fine seive.
7. Before returning the sauce to the heat, add 1 tbsp oil to the dutch oven. Chop the chicken breasts into bite sized pieces and brown in the hot oil. Add the paprika sauce back into the pan with the chicken and cook for 1/2 hour on medium heat or until the chicken is cooked through. You can remove from the heat and freeze for future use, or use right away.
8. Add 1 tsp flour to the yogurt and mix well (this will prevent the yogurt from separating when adding to the paprika sauce). Add the yogurt to the chicken paprikas and mix well.
9. To serve, pour into a large decorative dish and drizzle with the remaining yogurt, garnish with flat leaf parsley.

Ingredients for the Nokedli (dumplings):

Hungarian Paprika and the Nokedli Szagato (dumpling tool)

General rule of thumb for this recipe is 1 cup flour and 1 egg per person. In my efforts to make this a healthier meal, I generally use 1 egg for the pot and 4 tbsp egg whites and 1/2 cup flour per person. The nokedli are lighter and not as yellow as using full eggs, but the flavour is still there. You make the nokedli by hand using a small cutting board and a knife and just cutting off small bits of the dough right into the boiling water (Hungarians call this Csipetke) or you can use a nokedli maker.

• 2 cups flour (you can substitute whole wheat but it changes the texture a bit, so I would only recommend 1/4 cup ww and 1 3/4 white flour)
• 1 egg
• 12 tbsp egg whites
• salt and pepper to taste

The dough should be loose enough to press through the Nokedli maker without much effort, but it should not be wet.

Directions:

1. Beat egg and egg white until slightly frothy. Add salt and pepper.
2. Mix in the flour until it form a soft dough (I usually do this in the food processor). Add little bits of water if necessary to make a loose pasta-like dough (don’t worry if it’s too thick, you can add bits of the hot water to it as you are pressing it through the nokedli press.
3. In a large soup pot, boil water with salt.
4. Once the water is on a hard boil, start making the nokedli. You can make the entire batch in this one pot, they won’t stick together if you stir them once in a while. When you are done they should all float to the top. Pour into a colander and rinse with cold water.
5. Add the nokedli to a bowl and drizzle with oil so they don’t stick together.
6. When ready to serve, heat 3 tbsp butter in a large dutch oven. Add nokedli and reheat, crisping up the edges a bit (we like them crisped).
7. Serve family style in a large serving vessel.

Egéségedre! (to your health!)

 

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Hungarian Donkey Ear Cookies (Szamárfül)

Szamárfül was a popular cookie during the second world war in Hungary; my  mom always said it was because it had no eggs, although it does have butter (I don’t really understand the rationale, were eggs harder to come by than butter?). And I am not entirely sure of where the recipe originally came from, it was handed down to me by my mother, she had entered it into her first computer using DOS in the early 80′s and had several printouts which I inherited (I can find no other reference to it on line).

I posted this recipe quite a few years ago (December 2007), and I really don’t care for the photo anymore, so I decided to re-post with new photos! Tonight I am making the cookies for my nephew (Jack, 11) who adores them — we’re spending Canadian Thanksgiving with his family at their cottage this weekend. His Dad (my brother) is an amazing cook, but hasn’t mastered the art of baking, so every Thanksgiving, I bring about one hundred of these cookies (and believe it or not, they polish them off, lock, stock and barrel!).

The recipe is really no fail, you just need a little patience. The cookie is a simple yeast dough, with a little butter. It is rolled to about 2mm thick, cut into circles, and a small dollop of jam is placed in the centre. You then take this round cookie and fold it in half, then you pinch the edges tight. The challenge in making these delicious cookies is to pinch them down so the jam doesn’t escape and ‘burn’ while baking. Of course, as children, we always LOVED this melted jam because it caramelized to a wonderful candy coating. The cookie’s sweetness comes from the European Jam (which is generally thicker and with less pectin than the North American jam) and the confectioners sugar coating once they are baked. They are not an overly sweet treat.

My Kitchenaid set up with the pasta rolling attachment

A few years ago, I discovered that the thickest roller on my Kitchenaid Mixer Pasta Roller attachment is really the best and only way to go — it gives you the most consistent thickness of dough, and it avoids over working it. The dough renders a beautiful, flaky cookie pastry.

This year, JT offered to help, so I set up two stations on the island, and while I ‘rolled out’ the dough, he cut, filled and pinched. I did my share of cutting, filling and pinching too…but this dough is like the fishes and loaves, it is never ending…you keep taking the leftovers and re-rolling them…never ending! I am so lucky he helped tonight, otherwise it would have taken me a couple of hours to finish (we were done in 45 minutes). He even said he had fun doing this with me . His cookies stayed closed better than mine!

Two workstations set up made the job go much faster

You see how the jam has caramelized on the edges? That is the best part!

Donkey Ear Cookies:

(Szamárfül) makes about 100-130 cookies (we used a 5cm round cookie cutter this time and yielded 102)

Ingredients:

• 1 tbsp quick rising yeast
• 1/2 cup warm water + 1 tsp sugar
• 600 g flour (3-4 cups)
• 240 g unsalted butter (1/2 lb)
• 1/2 cup sour cream or yogurt
• Thick European jam (we used cherry for this batch)
• 1-2 cups confectioners sugar (for dusting)

Directions:

1. Dissolve yeast in warm water with sugar, proof for about 3-5 minutes.
2. In an electric mixer with a dough hook, mix margarine and flour until crumbly.
3. Add yeast and enough sour cream and kneed with the mixer until a shiny dough forms.
4. Cover and allow to rise in a warm place for 1/2 to 1 hr (you may also do this step in the fridge overnight if you won’t be making the cookies the same day. Allow the dough to get up to room temperature before you begin to work it).
5. Preheat oven to 350°F.
6. Roll out the dough into 2mm thickness and cut with a 5-6 cm round cookie cutter.
7. Fill each round in the centre with about 1/4tsp of jam.
8. Fold each circle in half and pinch edges really, really, really well (this dough has a tendency to pop open like a clam!).
9. Bake at 350F for 10-12 minutes (dough will be slightly golden), jam may have oozed out, it’s OK, really!
10. Immediately put cookies into a large bowl with icing sugar and dust generously.
11. Remove to a wire rack and cool.
12. Enjoy!

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Hungarian Korozot and Nuit Blanche in Toronto, October 1

October first was Nuit Blanche all over the world and we are very fortunate to participate every year in Toronto. It is a wonderful festival of all kinds of performance and installation arts all over the city. It starts at sundown (around 7pm-ish) and goes until the wee hours of the morning, should you choose. JT and I usually start our expedition in the south part of the city, near City Hall and walk a meandering path north exploring as many exhibits and installations along the way to Bloor Street. It was a chilly night in Toronto, around 7°C so we visit ed a few indoor exhibits along the way. We had a small snack before we started out, so we weren’t starving by the time we had dinner around 10pm. We always take the subway down so we don’t need to worry that we left the care a 45 minute walk away! I’ll took a few photos to blog about, but it’s usually very dark. Charles, I hope you had a chance to venture into Paris for this momentous event (it takes place in many major cities all over the world) — we’ve always found it such a blast in TO. Not sure if anyone reading lives in New York, but it’s happening there too! Toronto is expecting over a million people out in the streets tonight – it’s so cool walking around Toronto in the night with thousands of other people – it makes the city come alive with energy. Woo hoo! Let the festivities begin!

If you know me, you will know that I never serve alcoholic beverages without some type of food. I inherited this from my dear Mother, and I love it. I am always looking out for small nibbles that are tasty, not too filling (don’t want to spoil dinner, do we?) and easy to serve, with a martini or two! This is a dip that is commonly served in Hungarian households, I have modified it to my taste (and health…my Mom used to put softened butter in it!).

Korozot (Hungarian Fresh Cheese Dip)

Hungarian Korozot Dip

This is a modified recipe to suit my taste and to be a little healthier.

Ingredients:

• 4-6oz Goats Cheese (at room temperature) (the real recipe would use a soft unripened fresh cheese called Quark)
• No fat yogurt (for desired consistency)
• 2 tablespoons paprika puré (hot or sweet, your choice) (this is a Hungarian product that comes in a tube) OR tbsp paprika powder – try with smoked paprika for a totally different flavour
• 1 Shallot, very finely chopped
• 1 clove garlic (minced on a fine grater)
• bunch of chives, finely chopped

Directions:

1. Blend the goats cheese, shallot and garlic in a food processor until well mixed, adding the yogurt a tablespoon at a time until desired consistency is achieved.
2. Remove from processor and fold in chives.
3. Serve at room temperature with crostinis. This is much better the next day when the flavours have had time to melt together.

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Bread Dumplings (to go with Vadas Hus)

Bread Dumplings

The Hungarian Vadas Hus works very well with these hearty dumplings — make sure you have plenty of sauce for them! Note, I usually eyeball these, so my proportions may be a bit off, but it is a very forgiving recipe that may be corrected with additional water or flour.

Ingredients (makes 4 largish dumplings):
You’ll want to double or triple this recipe if you are making with the eye of round, expect each person to eat 2.

• 1 large egg
• 3/4 cup of all purpose flour
• 3/4 cup whole wheat flour
• 1  cup of croutons (I used Marcy’s Whole Wheat Low Sodium but you may use your own – it’s what I had on hand)
• Dash of water
• 2 tbsp butter for flavour
• 2 tbsp grape seed oil (very high flash point, so you can get it very hot without burning).

Directions:

1. Break egg and a dash of water into a medium sized bowl, and whisk well with a wooden spoon.
2. Add both flours and mix to a thick but wet consistency adding water if necessary. Fold in the croutons and allow to sit for about 30 minutes This will allow the croutons to soften a bit. If the dough is still too wet, add a bit more flour (you want this about the consistency of shaggy bread dough, not firm bread dough).
3. Heat a large pot of water until it boils, season with salt.
4. Using a large ice cream scoop, scoop the dough one by one into the boiling water. The dumplings will float first, then sink and then float to the top when they are done. Remove from boiling water and set aside to drain.
5. Meanwhile, in a large frying pan, heat the butter and grape seed oil. Fry the dumplings turning when the sides are golden brown. The best dumplings are crispy on the outside and soft and tender on the inside. The croutons should not be dry any longer, they will just add a delicious bread texture to the dumplings.
6. Serve with the Vadas Hus (Hungarian Hunter Stew).

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