Beef and broccolini stir fry for a trauma-free husband

After my husband got back from China I stopped making Asian food for quite a while – it already was something I cooked very seldom and from that it went to non-existing in our house.

Weeks ago I made an adapted version of Nigel Slater’s caramelized pork ribs for Joao and since he enjoyed them I thought that the Chinese food trauma was a thing of the past – that was when I reached for John Gregory-Smith’s beautiful cookbook for inspiration on something tasty and spicy and found a recipe for a beef stir fry – this is my version of his dish, and not only it tasted delicious but it was super quick to make, too.

Beef and broccolini stir fry
slightly adapted from the delicious Mighty Spice Cookbook: Fast, Fresh and Vibrant Dishes Using No More Than 5 Spices for Each Recipe

2 tablespoons canola oil
450g (1 pound) beef fillet, finely sliced
½ large onion, thinly sliced into half-moons
3 fat garlic cloves, finely chopped
2.5cm (1in) piece root ginger, peeled and finely chopped
1 carrot, thinly sliced
300g broccolini florets
salt and freshly ground black pepper
pinch of sugar
3 tablespoons soy sauce
1 large handful basil leaves, roughly thorn*

Heat a wok over a high heat and add the oil. Once hot add the sliced beef and stir-fry or 1-2 minutes. Add the onions, garlic, ginger, carrot and broccolini, season with the salt, sugar and soy sauce and mix to combine. Clamp on a lid and cook, stirring occasionally, for about 3-5 minutes or until the carrots and broccolini are cooked but still crisp – when I started cooking the beef it released juices and the liquid sort of steamed the vegetables once the wok was covered and also created a delicious broth in the end of the cooking time. If that doesn’t happen to your beef you might want to add some water or stock to the wok after adding the vegetables.
Check the seasoning, remove from the heat, add the basil and serve immediately.

* I personally think that the basil added nothing to the recipe – the flavor just didn’t match the other ingredients. Next time I make this I’ll add cilantro instead

Serves 4

Apple, raspberry and pecan muffin cake + "The Great Australian Bake Off"

After the disappointment with American version of “The Great British Bake Off” I wasn’t sure I would watch “The Great Australian Bake Off”, but when I read that Dan Lepard would be one of the judges I immediately changed my mind: I’m a huge fan of his amazing recipes, each and every one of them I have tried so far turned out delicious. The other judge is Kerry Vincent and the woman is merciless: her sour comments and lack of tact drive the contestants to tears – she’s a crankier version of Paul Hollywood, while Dan is absolutely adorable, much like Mary Berry (I like him even more after watching the episodes).

I had never heard of Kerry Vincent before and kept thinking that Delia Smith could be an excellent judge for the show, but I guess that being Australian is a requirement (I had no idea Lepard was an Aussie). :)
The show is not as good as its British cousin, but it’s way better than the American version – I highly recommend it for those of you baking fanatics (like me). :)

Speaking of Delia, this wonderful cake is an adaptation of a recipe that comes from her latest cookbook, which is packed with superb baked goods and beautiful photos.

Apple, raspberry and pecan muffin cake
slightly adapted from Delia's Cakes (I bought mine here)

275g all purpose flour
½ teaspoon ground cinnamon
1 level tablespoon baking powder
¼ teaspoon table salt
170ml whole milk, room temperature
75g granulated sugar
2 large eggs
110g unsalted butter, melted and cooled slightly
1 teaspoon vanilla extract
2 small Granny Smith apples, peeled, cored and in 1cm dice
100g raspberries, frozen and unthawed
1 heaping tablespoon demerara sugar
75g pecans, roughly chopped
icing sugar, for dusting

Preheat the oven to 190°/375°F. Butter a 20cm (8in) round cake pan with a removable bottom, line the bottom with a circle of baking paper and butter the paper as well.
In a medium bowl, sift together the flour, cinnamon, baking powder and salt. In a large bowl, whisk together the milk, sugar, eggs, butter and vanilla. Sift the dry ingredients over the egg mixture and fold in with a fork – do not overmix; fold in the apples, then transfer the batter to the prepared pan. Sprinkle the batter with the raspberries, then the demerara sugar and finally the pecans.
Bake the cake for about 1 hour, checking after 50 minutes – a skewer inserted in the center should come out clean. Cool in the pan over a wire rack for 30 minutes, then carefully remove the cake from the pan using the removable bottom. When completely cooled, invert the cake onto a place, peel off the paper, then invert it again onto a serving plate. Dust with icing sugar before serving.

Serves 8-10

Nib praliné brownies + a new band (at least new to me)

Days ago, while looking for good haircuts for fine hair (something that would make me look like I have tons of hair, which unfortunately is not true) I ended up on this lovely website and watching one of the videos I was introduced to “Foster the People” – I got hooked and can’t stop listening to their songs, especially “Helena Beat” and “I Would Do Anything For You”. Such a nice discovery.

I’m not usually that good to remember where and when I first found things, but I am quite sure that cocoa nibs were introduced to me by Alice Medrich; here the nibs are turned into a delicious praliné and then folded into brownie batter, and that alone made me drool when I read the recipe. The praliné recipe, however, yielded twice as much as the amount called for to be used in the brownies, but I went on and used the whole batch anyway – some of the caramel melted and formed a layer on the bottom of the brownies and that made slicing a little bit harder. Now it’s up to you: you can either follow the recipe below and use only ½ cup total of praliné in your brownies or you can go crazy like I did and caramelize the heck out of your bars – just make sure you have a sharp knife around. :D

Nib praliné brownies
slightly adapted from the adorable Luscious Chocolate Desserts

Nib praliné:
1/3 cup (40g) cocoa nibs
¾ cup (150g) granulated sugar
1/3 cup (80ml) water
¼ cup light corn syrup
pinch of salt

Brownies:
1 cup (2 sticks/226g) unsalted butter
112g (4oz) dark chocolate, chopped – I used one with 53% cocoa solids
1 ½ cups (300g) granulated sugar
4 large eggs
2 teaspoons vanilla extract
½ cup (70g) all purpose flour
1/3 cup (33g) unsweetened cocoa powder
1/8 teaspoon table salt

Start with the praliné: line a large baking sheet with foil and butter the foil. Spread the cocoa nibs over the buttered foil.
Heat the sugar, water, corn syrup and salt in a small, heavy saucepan over medium heat until sugar is dissolved. Increase the heat to high and do not stir any longer. Cook the mixture until a dark golden brown caramel forms, washing the sides of the pan with a wet pastry brush to remove any sugar crystals – it should read 160-165°C (320-330°F) on a candy thermometer. Remove from the heat and immediately pour the caramel over the cocoa nibs. Set aside to cool completely, then break into pieces- for a finer texture, process in a food processor.

Makes about 1 cup (you’ll use half this amount in the brownies)

Brownies: preheat the oven to 180°C/350°F. Lightly butter a 20x30cm (8x12in) baking pan, line it with foil leaving an overhang on the two longest sides and butter the foil as well.
Melt the butter and chocolate together in a medium heatproof bowl over a saucepan of simmering water (don’t let the bottom of the bowl touch the water). Remove from the heat and cool for 5 minutes.
Beat sugar and eggs with an electric mixer until thick and pale, about 3 minutes. Beat in the vanilla. With a rubber spatula, fold in the chocolate mixture just until blended. Sift the flour, cocoa and salt over the mixture and fold gently. Fold in ¼ cup of the praliné.
Spread the batter into the prepared pan, then top with the remaining ¼ cup praliné. Bake for 30-35 minutes or until a toothpick inserted in the center of the brownie comes out sticky with just a few crumbs. Cool completely in the pan over a wire rack. Cut into squares to serve.

Makes 20

Vanilla cookie buttons with strawberry icing and being tricked by my memory

I don’t know about you, but sometimes my mind plays tricks on me and I just can’t trust my memory. I was listening to “Never” the other day when my husband asked whose song that was. I told him it was Heart’s and said “remember that band from the 80s formed exclusively by girls?”, but he had no recollection of it. Then I decided to show him the music video, and there was a man playing the drums and another playing the guitar. “I could have sworn there were only girls on this band”, I said, and the hubby stared laughing. :D

Having too many cookbooks can wreck someone’s memory as well – thank heavens for EYB. I set up to make Nancy Baggett’s beautiful cookies – I was thrilled with the idea of a pink icing made without artificial food coloring – but really could not wait 6 hours for the cookie dough to chill (who has that kind of time these days? Not me). Ok, I’d slather the icing onto someone else’s vanilla cookies. As usual, I reached for Martha, but rolling cookie dough was definitely out of the question. I knew I’d seen drop sugar cookies somewhere, but my memory had already been tricked by people with big hair, I could not trust it. :) EYB helped my find John Barricelli’s super easy recipe, which I modified slightly for I did not want the cookies to spread – it turned out perfect.

Vanilla cookie buttons with strawberry icing
adapted from two great sources: The SoNo Baking Company Cookbook and The All-American Dessert Book

Cookies:
2 cups (280g) all purpose flour
1 ½ teaspoons baking powder
pinch of salt
½ cup (113g/1 stick) unsalted butter, softened
¾ cup + 2 tablespoons (175g) granulated sugar
2 teaspoons vanilla extract
1 large egg

Icing:
½ cup strawberries
2 cups (280g) icing sugar
1 tablespoon (14g) unsalted butter, very soft but not melted
generous ½ tablespoon corn syrup

Make the cookies: preheat the oven to 180°C/350°F. Line two large baking sheets with baking paper.
In a medium bowl, whisk together the flour, baking powder and salt. Using an electric mixer with the paddle attachment, cream butter, sugar and vanilla together until light and creamy. Beat in the egg. At low speed, beat in the dry ingredients just until incorporated. Make balls using 1 ½ teaspoons of dough and place 2.5cm (1in) apart onto prepared sheets. Bake for 10 minutes or until golden on the bottom. Cool on the sheets for 2-3 minutes, then slide the paper with the cookies onto a wire rack to cool completely.

Icing: Sift the icing sugar in a medium bowl. In a food processor, process the strawberries with 2 tablespoons of the icing sugar until puréed. Press the mixture through a fine sieve to extract as much of the strawberry pulp and juice as possible. Add 2 tablespoons of the strawberry pulp to the icing sugar, with the butter and corn syrup and mix to combine. Gradually add more strawberry pulp, mixing until desired consistency.
Dip the top of the cookies into the icing and place them onto a wire rack for the icing to set, about 2 hours – there might be some icing left.

Makes about 70

Broccolini and white bean soup to celebrate winter

Unlike most of my friends and colleagues I adore the cold weather we’ve been having here lately, and to be honest I really don’t get all the hate: a cold day in the middle of January is a bad thing, but to complain about the cold in July and August seems unreasonable to me.

I love soups and these wintry days are ideal to cook them – I don’t know about you, but cold soups are something I’m not fond of: I have tried several of them but they’re not my cup of tea – I like my soups piping hot, preferably with some nice crusty bread alongside. :)

Martha’s recipe calls for broccoli but as I often do with broccoli recipes I replaced it with broccolini – the problem was my husband loves it, too, and I almost had to hide the steamed florets from him before actually making the soup: every time I looked he was eating one of the florets drizzled with olive oil and sprinkled with sea salt. :D

Broccolini and white bean soup
slightly adapted from the wonderful and delicious Meatless: More Than 200 of the Very Best Vegetarian Recipes

450g (1 pound) broccolini, cut into florets
2 tablespoons extra-virgin olive oil
1 onion, diced
2 fat garlic cloves, finely chopped
2 cups cannellini beans, drained and rinsed
2 ½ cups (600ml) vegetable stock
salt and freshly ground black pepper
2 tablespoons pine nuts, toasted and cooled
shaved Parmesan cheese to taste, for serving

Steam broccolini until tender and bright green, about 1 minute. Let cool slightly. Reserve ½ cup florets for garnish.
Heat oil in a medium pot over medium heat. Sauté onion and garlic until translucent, about 6 minutes.
Add beans and stock and bring mixture to a simmer. Remove from heat and add broccoli; puree in batches in a blender until smooth. Season to taste with salt and pepper.
Garnish each bowl with the reserved broccolini florets, the pine nuts, and shaved Parmesan.

Serves 4