England

Fish & Chips

I'm a bit knackered lately so typing up the recipes will have to wait.. We are up to 22 countries now, only 10 left!

Germany

Bratwurst & Beer

Portugal

Bacalhau

Brazil

Dish three in our Sunday menu was a Brazilian Shrimp Stew, called Monqueca de Camarao. I really enjoyed this dish, plus I got to use some more of the wonderful palm oil from last weeks Nigeria dish. Yum!



Monqueca de Camarao
(recipe taken from www.globalgourmet.com)

Serves 4

Ingredients
Juice of 1 lemon
1 onion, chopped
1 clove garlic, finely minced
1-2 tbsp white wine vinegar
1/2 tsp salt
1 lb shrimp
1 tsp fresh coriander
1 tbsp tomato puree
Black pepper
1 1/2 cups coconut milk
2 tbsp Dende oil (I used red palm oil which I've been told is the same thing)

Method:
Make the marinade with lemon, onion, garlic, vinegar and salt. Marinate the shrimp for 30 mins. Put mixture into a suacepan and add coriander, tomato puree and black pepper. Add the coconut milk and cook over a low heat until the shrimp are cooked. Add the dende oil and continue cooking for another 10 mins.

Holland

Dessert today was just wonderful. Too wonderful in fact.. I could feel almost feel my arteries hardening as I ate it. But as a treat every once in a while I'm sure its fine. (This world cup food exercise has meant that my treats are far more frequent that usual.. but sure I will worry about that end of July!!).



Apple Beignets
Appleflappen
(recipe taken from www.godutch.com)

Ingredients
5 oz sifted self raising flour
1/2 bottle dark beer
1 egg yolk
1 egg white
large pinch salt
3 large tart apples
1 tbsp vegetable oil
oil for deep frying

Peel and core the apples and cut them into 1cm slices.
Using a whisk, mix the sifted flour with the beer making sure there are no lumps. Add the egg yolk, salt and vegetable oil and mix all ingredients well until the batter is smooth.

In a separate bowl,beat the egg white until foamy and stiff. Fold it a few times through the batter.

Drag the apple slices through the batter and deepfry them until they are golden brown.

Serve hot and sprinkle with icing sugar.

Paraguay

To serve with our Brazilian stew we wanted something that would be good for mopping up the juices, so we went to their next door neighbours Paraguay to find a recipe for Sopa Paraguaya - Paraguayan cornbread.

This dish worked perfectly with the stew, it was quite firm (looks like a sponge cake but its not) and could soak up lots of the sauce. The recipe called for cornmeal... which is polenta if you are looking for coarse cornmeal. Joaquin let me know that they would actually use something quite finer in Paraguay for their cornbread, I'm not quite sure what but I suppose you could use maize flour, although I think this might be difficult to source in Dublin. Use polenta, I thought it was lovely, but be aware that you may incur the wrath of an Argentian who knows best!



Sopa Paraguaya
(recipe taken from www.myrecipes.com)

Ingredients
2 cups grated parmesan cheese
1 tbsp butter
1 tbsp oil
1 chopped onion
1/3 green bell pepper
2 cups corn kernels (about 4 ears)
1/2 cup cottage cheese
3oz muenster or cheddar cheese
1/2 cup milk
1 tsp salt
1/2 tsp black pepper
4 large egg whites
1/2 tsp cream of tartar

Method:

Preheat oven to gasmark 6. Coat a 9in round cake tin with cooking spray and spinkle with the parmesan cheese.
Heat the butter in a pan with the oil and add the onion and bell pepper and cook until soft on a low heat, careful not to brown. Place onion mixture into a food processor with the cottage cheese and 1 1/2 cups corn and pulse until smooth. Place the pureed mixture in a bowl and add the corn, cornmeal, cheese, milk, salt and balck pepper.

Whisk the egg whites in a bowl until stiff and fold into mixture. Spoon into the prepared pan and bake in the oven for 30 mins. Cool for 10 mins before serving.

Honduras

Off to the Americas for Sundays dinner, and joined by our friends Anna and Joaquin.

Our starter, ceviche, is a typical dish from Honduras. Ceviche, for all those unfamiliar with it, is dish of seafood marinated in citrus juices which "cook" the fish without any need for heat. In this particular recipe the fish, seabass, was marinated for 6 hours until the flesh was white and flaky. I had never had it before, but my friend Anna who has travelled extensively in South America confirmed that it tasted as it should! I thought it was delicious and it seemed to go down well with the others.


Honduran Ceviche De Corvina
(recipe taken from www.foodnetwork.com)

Serves 4 as a starter

Ingredients
1 lb Sea Bass
Juice of 2 limes
Juice of 1 orange
1/2 cup coconut milk
1 jalepeno pepper, seeded and diced
1/2 red onion
1/2 red bell pepper
1 tomato
1 cup chopped coriander
1 sliced scallion
1 tbsp chives
1 tbsp olive oil
salt

Method:
Cut the fish into 1/2 inch dice. Combine lime juice, orange juice, coconut milk, jalapenos, red bell pepper, and red onion in a glass bowl and add fish. Cover with cling film and place in the fridge for at least 6 hours.

To serve pour off the liquid. I found the mixture had curdled a bit (the milk and citric acid I suppose) but once I removed the fish and wiped it a little it was fine. Add the remaining ingredients and serve.

Serbia

Dessert following our lamb dinner came from Serbia. It was a quick and easy dish to make however it was a bit too sweet for my tastes. Unless you have a particularly sweet tooth I would probably reduce the amount of sugar, perhaps by half.

The Photo for this dish was taken by my nephews Eoin (aged 8) and Niall (aged 6).



Pears with Nut Stuffing

(Recipe taken from www.recipes.wikia.com/wiki/Category:Serbian_Recipes)

Ingredients

1/3 cup sugar
1/3 cup water
1 tbsp lemon juice
4 ripe pears
1/3 cup chopped nuts
2 tbsp sugar
1 tbsp brandy
1/4 tsp vanilla extract
1/2 sour cream
1 tbsp sugar

Mix 1/3 cup sugar, the water and lemon juice and add to a pan with the pears. Turn the pears to coat in the mixture. Cover and bake for 25 mins at gas mark 6 until the pears are tender.
Combine the chopped nuts, brandy, 1 tbsp sugar, sour cream and and the vanilla extract and fill the centers of the pear halves with the nut mixture. (you'll need to scoop out the core with a teaspoon to do this)

Makes 8 servings

Ghana

Its been a busy few days, so I haven't had time to update the blog. I haven't stopped cooking though and the number of recipes that I need to update are starting to pile up!

Speaking of pile ups... wasn't the car crash that was the French world cup campaign one of the highlights of the tournament? If they had tried to fail more spectacularly I don't think they could have. Of course part of me is fuming that the stole a place in the world cup from Ireland and then didn't even seem to want to be there, but seeing them crash and burn like that does make it a little more bareable. So we have Uruguay, Mexico, Argentina and South Korea through so far... I'm hoping England join them today.

Anyway, back to the food. On Saturday we had my sister Serena and my nephew Eoin over to try some Ghanaian food, and as she is a big fan of it I decided to treat her to a roast leg of lamb.
Its hard to go wrong with a leg of lamb, its always mouthwateringly good unless overdone, but this recipe, which called for a marinade of sesame oil and cumin, was particularly delicious. And with roasted sweet potatoes cooked in the meat juices, we will definitely be revisiting Ghana in our kitchen sometime soon!

Recipe
(Taken from www.ghanamma.com)

Ingredients
1 leg of lamb
2 large sweet potatoes peeled
3 large floury potatoes peeled

Marinade
4 tablespoons ground cumin
1 tablespoon garlic salt
5 tablespoons sesame oil

In a large roasting pan make several cuts into the lamb, an inch or two deep.
Combine all the ingredients to the marinade and spoon over lamb, taking care to pour some into the cuts.
Preheat the oven to gas mark 7, cook lamb for 30 mins and then reduce the heat to gas mark 3. After 1 hour add the potatoes to the roasting pan. (I didn't have enough room in the roasting pan for all my potatoes so I poured some of the meat juices into a second pan and used that too, which worked out fine).
Cook for another 40 mins or until the potatoes are nicely browned and cooked through.



Oh I wish I was eating this again right now....

Nigeria

This dish was just fabulous, like nothing I've ever tasted before. I went back for seconds and everything... it was "lick the plate clean" good. And I don't say that lightly!

Egusi stew gets its name from egusi seeds, which are edible melon seeds. The recipe says that pumpkin seeds make a good substitute so I went with those. The unusal part of the dish is the red palm oil. I intitally thought that any old oil would do but that woudn't have been the same at all. The oil is thick, has a really earthy aroma and gives the dish a great red colour. Use olive oil and you would get a competely different (and not at all african) dish. We picked up the oil easily enough in the ethnic food store on Talbot street.

It probably doesn't look like much, blame my photgraphy skills, but its a super dish and one I would recommend to all. Try something different, give this dish a go.

Recipe

(taken from http://ezinearticles.com/?The-Spiciness-of-Nigerian-Food-and-a-Favorite-Egusi-Stew-Recipe-of-Western-Africa&id=2847527)

Ingredients:

1/2 cup pumpkin seeds

1 chicken, cut into 8 pieces

Salt to taste

1/3 cup red palm oil

1-2 tins tomatoes

1 small onion, chopped

2 habanero chile peppers, stemmed and halved

2 tablespoons tomato paste

2/4 cup water

1 1/4 pounds fresh shrimp, heads and shells removed

1 pound fresh spinach, with stems, chopped

Directions:

Put the pumpkin seeds in a food processor and blend for about 20 seconds until in a powdery form. Reserve.

Salt the chicken, then in a large casserole frying pan, heat the red palm oil over medium-high heat for about 5 minutes. Brown the chicken pieces on both sides, for about 6 minutes in all.

Place the tomatoes, onion, and habanero pepper in the food processor, and blend for about30 seconds, or until very smooth. Reduce the heat to low, and cover partially. Cook, turning occasionally, until the chicken can be easily pulled off the bone with a fork, or about 1 1/2 hours.

Add the water and shrimp and continue to simmer for about 10 minutes.

Add the spinach and the reserved ground seeds and continue simmering for about 10 minutes more, Serve immediately. This Egusi African Stew recipe makes 6 servings.

Ivory Coast

We did dishes from two countries tonight, Ivory Coast and Nigeria. Ivory coast up first....

I've never had yams before, I've seen them tons of times outside ethic shops in the city centre but never got around to buying some and cooking them. That's definitely going to change. I officially love yams!

Kind of like potatoes but a bit stiffer, they are absolutely delicious. The dish called for them to be boiled, mashed, mixed with egg and butter and baked in the oven. It might seem a little bit onerous, but its totally worth the effort.


Baked Yams (taken from http://www.answers.com/topic/baked-yams)

Ingredients

1 large Yam, peeled, cut into med pieces and boiled until soft (about 25 mins)
1 egg, beaten
1 tablespoon of butter
splash milk
salt, to taste
1 egg yolk, beaten
nutmeg and cinnamon for dusting

Method

Mash the soft yam pieces in a mixing bowl.
Gradually add the beaten egg, butter, and salt, mixing well to make sure that all ingredients are blended.
Spoon the mashed yam into an oven-proof casserole dish and spread the top with the beaten egg yolk.
Place it in the oven at gasmark 6 for 15 minutes, or until golden brown.
Sprinkle the top with nutmeg and cinnamon.

Just to note, we found that mashing yams is not as easy as mashing potato. It required a bit more elbow grease and at first we thought we had done something wrong, but Derek persevered and they became much smoother after a couple of minutes mashing... so don't worry if the same thing happens to you, keep mashing and it will all come right.

Greece

Cooking alone tonight, Derek was at his boxing club, so I had my friend Ailise keep me company and eat half the food.

I had originally wanted to do Spanakopita, a spinach and feta filo pastry pie, but we couldn't get filo pastry anywhere. I managed to pick up some nice looking lamb cutlets on my lunch break and keeping my fingers crossed that I had feta in the fridge, I picked a hungry Ailise up from work and headed back to my house for our Greek dinner.




Lemon Garlic Roast Potatoes

Ingredients

500g potatoes (I used waxy baby new potatoes, straight from my garden... not to brag or anything...;-)
2 tbsp olive oil
2 lemons, cut into small segments
3 cloved garlic, chopped finely
1 tbsp oregano
1 tbsp thyme
1 tsp sea salt
1 tsp onion salt
1-2 tbsp pine nuts

Method
Cut the potatoes into medium sized pieces. Toss with oil, lemon, garlic, herbs and salt in a roasting dish. Place in a preheated at gas mark 7 oven and roast for about 25 mins. Add the pine nuts and cook for a further 5 minutes.



Lamb Cutlets

Ingredients

4-6 medium lamb cutlets
1-2 tbsp Olive Oil
1/2 Lemon, juice
1 tbsp Thyme, chopped
2 garlic cloves, crushed
Salt & pepper

1/2 pack feta cheese
small bunch parsely
small bunch mint

Marinate the lamb in the oil, lemon, garlic and herbs, ideally it should be at least a couple of hours, but I had no time to do that and the flavour was still quite good.

Place the cutlets on a very hot griddle pan and cook for about 5 mins on each side.

Roughly chop feta, mint and parsley and mix together. Crumble over lamb to serve.




Creamy spinach
(not particularly greek - but went very well with the lamb and potatoes so I thought I would include it here)

1 kg bag baby spinach
1 tbsp ricotta
1 tbsp soft goats cheese
1 tbsp finely chopped dill
2 scallions/spring onions
salt and pepper

Put spinach in a pot over a medium heat and cook for a couple of mins until wilted. Strain water from spinach. Add cheese, herbs and onion and combine. Simple as that!

Slovakia

Slovakia.... where do I start with this dish? Its fair to say things didn't go to plan. I'm not sure what we were expecting making Slovak Liverballs (recipe courtesy of http://recipes.wikia.com/wiki/Slovak_Liverballs) but whatever it was we didn't get it. How could it go wrong? I like liver (especially as paté), I like meat in ball form (Italian meatballs are a case in point) - this was a dish I had high hopes for. I should have listened to all the family, friends and colleagues who looked at me as if I had lost my mind when I told them my choice of dish. But I'm stubborn, lesson learned!

Anyway it wasn't so much the ingredients that made the dish a bit of a disaster, it was the method of cooking. Boiled wet lumps of pureed meat is not a pretty sight, as you can see from the picture below (click and zoom in at your peril......)

But I'm nothing if not resourceful, I was not going to be beaten by a bowl of liver mixture, I put said mixture in a metal ramekin and made a little meat terrine. And doing what any self respecting Irish person would do when confronted with a plate of meat, we put it between two slices of bread and tucked in. It was surprisingly nice, like a rustic paté. I can't say its particularly Slovakian... but it was the best I could do!





Here is the recipe for those who like their sandwiches adventurous.


Slovakian Liverball (Sandwiches)

Ingredients

1 lb chicken livers
5 slices of bread - breadcrumbed
1 medium onion
1 tbsp chopped parsley
1 egg
6 tablespoons flour
1 1/2 tsp salt
1/4 tsp pepper
1 tsp marjoram
2 garlic cloves
1 tsp garlic powder

Method
In a food processor, combine liver, egg, parsley and onion.
Process until smooth
Add salt, pepper, flour and breadcrumbs.
Fill metal ramekins or a loaf tin with mixture.
Bake in the oven at gas mark 5 for 20 mins, or until a skewer comes out clean.

Denmark

It was a toss up between Frikadeller meat balls and cabbage or a pecan danish pastry for our Denmark dish. The pastry won.. and how could it not? Flaky buttery pastry, creamy sweet filling, crunchy pecan nuts, drizzled with icing and maple syrup.... mmmmmm. Now I'm not a domestic goddess, I don't have days to stay at home rolling and folding butter into layers of pastry, as much as I would like to... so I cheated. Frozen puff pastry isn't techically Danish pastry, but it was pretty darn close and it worked for me.



Cream Cheese & Pecan Danish
(recipe adapted from www.astray.com)

Ingredients

Pack frozen puff pastry, thawed
1 tub Philidelphia cream cheese
1/4 cup icing sugar
2 eggs
1 tsp Vanilla Extract
3/4 cup pecans, chopped

glaze
1/2 tub Philidelphia cream cheese
1 tbsp milk
3/4 cup icing sugar
handful chopped pecans

Maple syrup

Roll pastry to about 5mm thick. Cut into 9 rectangles.

Mix 1 egg, 1 tub cream cheese, 1/4 cup icing sugar, 1 tsp vanilla extract thoroughly with food mixer. Stir in the chopped pecans. Cut slanting cuts (about a third of the dough) into both sides of the rectangle leaving the centre plain. Spread the filling down the centre then take the strips and fold them over creating a plait. Brush with egg wash and bake in a pre heated oven, gas mark 5 for about 20mins until golden brown.

Mix the ingredients for the glaze, adding the pecans at the end. Drizzle over the cooled danish pastries. Drizzle with maple syrup.


Enjoy!

Algeria

I really wanted to like this dish, I really did. Fruit with meat was such a success with the Bobotie on Friday that I was really looking forward to Algerian Lahm Lhalou, or "sweet meat". Its made with lamb, prunes, raisins and served with couscous, and although it wasn't awful, and I did finish most of it, it didn't exactly set my world on fire either. Way too sweet! I'm not a huge fan of prunes anyway, although Derek likes them quite a lot, so maybe it was just a bad choice for a dish.

Anyway here is the recipe (taken from whats4eats.com) for those who'd like to do a better job than I did!



Lahm Lhalou

Ingredients

Stewing lamb, cubed -- 300g
Cinnamon -- 1/4 teaspoon
Turmeric -- 1/4 teaspoon
Ground ginger -- 1/4 teaspoon
Oil or butter -- 1/4 cup
Water -- 1 cups
Saffron (optional) -- a few strands
Prunes -- 1/2 cup
Raisins -- 1/8 cup
Sugar -- 3-4 tbsp
Orange blossom water (you can get this in the baking section in m&s) -- 1 tbsp

I added a tin of tomatoes too towards the end, to try to make it a little nicer.


I haven't given up on Algeria though, just next time I'll omit the prunes!

USA

USA for dinner tonight. The 1-1 draw was a good result for them... absolutely abysmal result for England. We're officially supporting England in this house (well Derek is.. my heart's really with Spain) so not the result we were hoping for. Its early days though, still all to play for. Nobody has shone so far... Germany tomorrow, maybe they will take things up a notch...

Anyway we went for Hamburgers and fries and a Vanilla Malt shake for our USA dinner. Not the healthiest dinner by a long shot but I suppose the home made stuff is better than going to the take away and it tastes a million times nicer.


Hamburgers
(serves 2)


Ingredients

150g minced beef
1/2 onion
1/2 beaten egg
handful of breadcrumbs
1 tsp dijon mustard
salt and pepper


burger buns
lettuce
dijon mustard
spicy mayo (2 tsp mayo, 1/2 tsp tomato puree, 1/2 tsp paprika)
streaky bacon
sliced gerkins
sliced tomato
cheese (we used grated gruyere we had left over in the fridge - otherwise a slice of cheddar would be perfect)


Method

Mix mince, mustard, onion, egg, breadcrumbs and season. Most recipes I've seen say you should saute the onions first before adding them to the mix but I always prefer to add them raw so they still have a little bit of bite in the finished burger... its up to you which way you prefer.
Divide the mixture into two patties and fry on a hot griddle pan for about 15 mins, depending on how thick you've made you burgers. If they appear to be browning too quickly just turn the heat down a touch and let them cook through slowly.

About 5 mins before the burgers are ready fry the bacon in a little oil until crispy.
Slice the gerkins and tomato thinly and make the spicy mayo. Then assemble the burgers whatever way you like.. I like lots of mustard and I'm not a fan of ketchup, but the best thing is that there are no rules.


Vanilla Malt Milkshake

5 tbsp good vanilla ice cream
200ml whole milk
1tbsp Horlicks (or any other malt powder)

Mix together and blend. Simple!

Australia

A bit stuffed still from last nights Bobotie so going with a snack for our Australia dish rather than a main. Anyway we need to keep some room for this evenings USA hamburger and fries!!

The biscuits we've chosen to do are called Anzac biscuits, they get their name from the Australian and New Zealand Army Corps. Apparently (according to wikipedia anyway) during WWI women would bake these biscuits for their husbands travelling the long distance to the front.

These biscuits are really sweet and delicious. Our first batch got a little burnt on the bottom, we got distracted by South Korea running rings around Greece. I don't think you can tell from the photo though - I might as well get good at disguising our cooking errors, I'm sure there will be plenty more in the next few weeks!

We are going our 5 year old nieces birthday party later so can offload the biscuits there and won't be tempted to eat all 30 ourselves. Mores the pity.


Anzac Biscuits

Ingredients

1 cup plain flour
1 cup oats (we used porridge oatlets)
1 cup brown sugar
1/2 cup coconut
125g butter
2 tbsp golden syrup
1 tbsp water
1/2 tsp bread soda

Method
Sieve flour into bowl. Add sugar and oats and coconut.
Melt butter in a saucepan and add golden syrup and water.
Stir in the bread soda into the butter mixture and add to the flour and oats, mixing thoroughly.
Make small balls (about the size of a walnut) and place on a greased baking tray. Make sure you leave about 4 inches between each ball as they spread as they cook.
Bake at gas mark 4 for 15 mins - be careful not to completely forget about them and end up with burnt biscuits.. not nice.

When you take them out of the oven they will be soft, but will harden as they cool.




Right, next game's up now... Argentina v Nigeria... c'mon Nigeria!!!!

South Africa

First day of the World Cup, and we decided to start with the hosts. I had heard of bobotie before but had never tasted it, we weren't disappointed! This is a dish that will certainly be added to our regulars.. its really easy to make, and tastes terrific. I wasn't sure about sultanas with beef but it works quite well.




Bobotie
(serves 2)

Ingredients

Slice of white bread, crusts removed
1/2 large onion chopped
large knob of butter
1 garlic clove, crushed
300g minced beef
1 tbsp madras curry paste
1 tsp dried mixed herbs
2 cloves
3 all spice berries
1 tbsp Mango chutney (we used mango, apricot and coriander chutney from tescos)
2 tbsp sultanas
6 bay leaves

topping:
200ml whole milk
1 egg

Preheat oven to gas mark 5
Soak bread in cold water (just enough to cover) and set aside.
Fry the chopped onion in the butter until soft and starting to colour. Add the mince and the garlic and cook for another 5 minutes until mince is brown. Add curry paste, chutney, spices, herbs, sultanas and two bay leaves, and salt and black pepper.
Cook for about 10 mins and squeeze the excess water from the bread and mix the bread into the mince until well blended. Fill a small oven proof dish with the mixture, pressing it down well.
For the topping mix the milk and egg, season with some salt and pepper, and top the meat mixture. Place the remaining bay leaves on top. Bake in the oven for about 30 mins until golden.