'gravad lax' or WYSIWYG salmon

'gravad lax'
Originally uploaded by kattebelletje.

I like eating out. I really do. I like the atmosphere and the ambiance of eating places, people toasting, waiters waiting, soft light, glasses of wine... And then I would like to write a good review because the food was so great. However, at the same time, I just can't write a positive blah blah blah blog post of dishes that I feel the restaurant should improve on... Here in Restaurant Cityhall in Leiden, we had the gravad lax starter from the daily menu. I took a snapshot of it - and.. do you see what is wrong with this picture? There is no dill in this whole dish to be found, not a sprig anywhere! True gravad lax is supposed to marinate in a mixture of dill, salt and sugar for at least 24 hours with a weight pressed on top! This was setback number 1. And, setback number 2, the accompanying sauce for gravad lax should be this wonderful sweet mustard and dill sauce, tangy and nice. The sauce here was white, and there was not enough of it (I hate it when there isn't enough sauce as much as when you get rolls without butter), and on top of it, it tasted like sauce tartare. The salmon wasn't bad, and the sauce was tasty allright, but I honestly don't understand why the cook or the menu writer, or whoever, wanted to call this creation gravad lax. They couldn't go wrong with the salad you would say, but alas, it was a little tasteless due to the lack of a proper vinaigrette. On top of everything (see picture) there were way too many onion rings. I mean, is this a hamburger or what! And even if it were, I wouldn't eat so many onions. (There were spring onion chunks scattered around the plate, too). There was a third surprise - which I discovered later, because the way I eat things is to start with the more ordinary things, and work from there to the tasty bits - : the dish turned out to be a WYSIWYG salmon. What You See is What You Get! Meaning, there was no more salmon than you see here : underneath the curly leaves of the salad the plate was empty. The salmon was draped in a kind of circle, so to speak... CityHall, you should do better! Your atmosphere is good, but your cooking could be on a higher plane!

babi ketjap | babi kecap

babi ketjap | babi kecap
Originally uploaded by kattebelletje.

A real easy dinner for somewhere in the week, when there is not much time or energy to really cook something up. I have this easy rice cooker which makes it really easy to cook rice; plunk in your raw rice, add 1.5 times the amount of water and put on COOK - it beeps when it is finished so you can start cooking your other things. Take fatty pork or pork chops (300 to 400 grams) which you cut into chunks or strips, add 2 tablespoons of oil to a pot, and fry in the hot oil until browned. You can add green bell peppers, onions or even chilis if you like this hot, don't forget to put in one or 2 cloves of garlic. Then, add Indonesian sweet soy sauce (kecap or ketjap), about 4 or 5 tablespoons, add 2 cups of water, add some salt and cook on a low fire for about 20 or 30 minutes. You can add a vegetable dish to this meal by stir-frying some veggies from the fridge - I think I used carrots, zucchini, chinese cabbage and onions. Serve with Indonesian stuff like seroendeng (a mixture of dry fried grated coconut and peanuts with spices) and crispy fried onions, both from the Asian store. The meat dish practically cooks itself and becomes a nice dark coulour with a beautiful tasty dark sauce. Enjoy!

cold noodles, Sichuan style

cold noodles by kattebelletje.

I had these Sichuan style cold noodles for lunch the other day; they make such a perfect simple meal! Their taste improves with time, when all ingredients mix with the noodles, so it is ideal to prepare this the morning before, or even the night before you are eating them. Cheap, filling, easy to prepare, and very tasty, what more could you want from lunch? So why aren't there noodle joints offering these as a quick snack?

Alas, I live in a tasteless country, suffering from the ICDB (I Can Do Better) scenario (meaning everywhere I go and order something simple, I feel I would have been able to make something tastier with the same ingredients - this doesn't mean I can cook so well, but it means eating places here seem to have uninterested, lazy, or even lousy cooks), so I take my own noodles to work.

How to prepare: take 60 or 70 grams cooked noodles, drained, or even soaked in cold water to prevent the noodles from sticking. For each serving, add 1 large tablespoon of sesame oil, 1 tablespoon of sesame paste, 1 tbsp of soy sauce, 1 tbsp of Chinese dark vinegar, 1 tbsp of white sugar, half a clove of crushed garlic (or leave this out when you are at work), and a large tablespoon of chinese chili sauce (or Yinyin sauce), or more to taste. Mix those ingredients in a bowl together and add to the noodles until all noodles are covered with sauce. Add more hot sauce if you dare, you should eat this as hot as you can handle! Add half a cucumber (or a little less), cut in slices and then in thin strips to go with the noodles and some peanuts (or pine nuts, as I did here). You could add some cold blanched bean sprouts as well...
Put in an airtight container and enjoy this meal with your chopsticks!

ravioli with 4 cheeses

homemade ravioli
Originally uploaded by kattebelletje.

I bought these new pasta plates, which you can see on the picture here... They are quite big and look definitely like the real thing, but, on the down side, they don't fit into the dishwasher so after dinner it is dishwashing by hand! But anyway. I felt like shaping raviolis, which can be a very comforting thing to do; taking it slow, all the time anticipating the end result of your efforts! I like making raviolis for 2 or 3 people, otherwise it might be a long affair... Make a pasta dough with 200 grams of pasta flour of 00 flour and 2 eggs and 1 egg yolk, add a little water if needed and knead until you have a supple dough. Let rest for 30 minutes. Meanwhile, take 250 grams of ricotta cheese and use a fork to mix some diced gorgonzola into it. Also, add a heap of grated fresh parmesan and a heap of grated old goat's cheese. I used my new Microplane grater for this! Add salt, pepper and nutmeg if desired. Now use a pasta machine to make sheets of thin pasta. Then with a teaspoon, put some filling on the sheet and fold in two - then seal the edges with pretty pleats (or use a ravioli wheel). Bring water to a boil and cook in simmering water for about 3 minutes, they don't take long! Melt butter in a saucepan and add 5 sage leaves. After cooking, add the ravioli to your (heated) pasta plates, coat with melted butter, toss very gently and grate more Parmesan on top.

grilled porcini risotto

grilled porcini risotto
Originally uploaded by kattebelletje.

The weather is not exactly like winter, but it is certainly not spring either! In fact, rain and wind keep howling around the house, so all you want is some homely comforting dish. This is one of them. Mushroom risotto with grilled porcini! I found the porcini in a Turkish delicatessen and bought them right away, for they don't show up often in your ordinary supermarket. Slice them and grill them in a grillpan over quite a high fire. Sprinkle some garlic and salt on top. Meanwhile, prepare a stock with a stock cube and some soaked dried porcini, keep warm on a low fire. Then, take 1,5 cups of carnaroli or arborio rice and sweat in a little olive oil until all rice is gleaming with oil. Add the stock ladle by ladle and keep stirring. When you have finished the stock add some hot water. Start tasting after about 12 minutes to test the doneness of the rice. It should not be mushy, but not stalky either! When almost done, add a spoonful of butter and stir until creamy. Serve on a heated plate with some chopped parsley, some grated parmesan and the grilled porcini on the side. By the way, I had rack of lamb as a secondi, and that wasn't bad either!

dandan mian (Sichuan noodles)

This three minute YouTube video (ripped from a Chinese cooking dvd), which I stumbled upon, tells you how to prepare dandan mian, the famous Sichuan spicy noodles which I make very often at home - and which my friends and family keep begging me to make for them when they come to dinner. (The other often-begged-for dish, by the way, is jiaozi. Noodles are easier.)

Although my version is slightly different, this recipe looks absolutely delicious and very easy to do. Here is how : (don't forget watch the action on the video now!) On a moderate fire, heat a chunk of lard until 60% hot (you can substitue this for oil), add 200 grams of minced (pork) meat, a slug of rice wine, 15 grams of sweet bean paste (tianmianjiang, a dark thick paste), a pinch of salt, and some soy sauce. Fry until the water has evaporated - and as soon as the oil comes floating on top of the meat and it starts smelling delicious, take it out of the pan [1:07]. Take two bowls and put in each one: two or three spoonfuls of soy sauce, 3 grams of MSG, 2 grams of chicken stock powder, 15 grams of shredded xuecai (preserved vegetable, you buy this in tins in the Chinese supermarket), 1 clove of pressed garlic, 3 or 4 spoons of sesame paste, and now watch the cook ladling this huge amount of chili oil in each bowl [1:54] - if you weren't hungry by now, you will be!

Add 25 grams of finely chopped spring onions and stir everything together with a ladle of chicken stock. Take 500 grams of noodles and boil until done (the fresher the noodles, the nicer the end result will be). Drain and lower slowly in the spicy sauce. Add a blanched vegetable leaf, then add a large scoop of meat sauce, and EAT!

grilled vegetables with romesco sauce

grilled vegetables with romesco sauce
Originally uploaded by kattebelletje.

This we had on new year's eve: a very large plate with grilled vegetables and the (defrosted) romesco sauce I made some weeks before. Grilling vegetables is quite an easy affair: just plonk some on a large oven tray and put it on 200 celcius or so for 30 to 45 minutes. You can add the quick cooking vegetables later on (like tomatoes) , but eggplant, zucchini, peppers and fennel can go in right away. The only annoying thing is peeling the grilled bell peppers.... Just have some good (yes, no-knead) bread with this meal! We had a shrimp cocktail with this, too, and a couple of hours later we had a utterly delicious jiaozi-snack with hot sauce, and even later, way after midnight, we had sweet dough fritters with sultanas. Lovely.

Happy New Year : oliebollen

Happy New Year : oliebollen
Originally uploaded by kattebelletje.

A very happy 2007 to you! Let 2007 be filled with delicious food, shared with wonderful people! To celebrate the new year, we eat the traditional oliebollen in the Netherlands. Most of the people here don't bother making these "oil ball" fritters by themselves, but buy them ready made at special snack counters which pop up on streetcorners in December. But then they are always mushy and never have the crispy crust which these oliebollen have when just baked. I made oliebollen last year, but don't remember from which book, so I browsed the web again, looking for a suitable recipe. You will need: 500 grams of white flour, half a litre of milk or buttermilk, 1 egg, 100 grams of sultana raisins, a handful of sukade (sugared lemon skins, used for baking), 50 grams of sugar, 2 packages of instant yeast (total 14 grams) and a pinch of salt. Add the yeast, sugar and salt to the flour, mix, put in the egg and stir, then add the milk slowly, stir until you have a batter. Mix and whip it until it is quite sticky, then add sultanas and sukade and cover with a damp cloth for at least 1,5 hours until you are ready to bake them. Heat vegetable oil in a special frying pan with high sides and wait for the oil to reach the right temperature. It is hot enough when a piece of bread starts to fry, but be careful, it shouldn't be too hot. Use an ice scoop to scoop out little balls of dough (which will be very sticky and runny) and put carefully in the hot oil. You can make 4 or 5 simulateously, The fritters will turn over by themselves when one side is done, but keep watching them to see if they brown correctly. They cook for about 8 to 10 minutes. Take them out, put them on a plate lined with kitchen paper and dust with icing sugar. Enjoy, also on the day after! Happy new year again!