Grandma Russia

Borsh

I've been brought up on Russian food, so I'm really used those tastes being the ones associated with feeling at home and happy. I really struggle to make most Russian dishes, because they involve mincing your own meat at home, which is difficult and.. Well it's a little gross.. But not borsh- it's warm, creamy and it just hugs you.

I love making these homey gorgeous meals at Ralph's house. I spend a lot of time here, and I really like to make it feel like a home, which to me means making it smell nice, and be full of warm food and treats. My grandma has been visiting for the past month, and whenever she visits she teaches me recipes when we spend time together. This time I was determined to actually make something besides a book full of recipes I've never tried.

I really struggle with the vague recipes that eastern Europeans tend to have. They tend to go something like "add some meat and then add spices until it tastes right". This one isn't that different (I've tried to make it more concrete), but there's no minced beef!

This recipe has every vegetable I have ever thought of, and some that I only imagined when reading stories about horrible witches who feeds kids horrible vegetables (or something like that?). I'm not gonna lie, it took a while, but it was SO worth it. This soup was AMAZING! Great feedback from Ralph- and enough for me not to have to cook for a couple of evenings. One thing though- it ended up being a bit more dense than soup should be, so perhaps dial down the veggies a bit. I'll update the recipe when I make it again though.

Oh I should mention- earlier this week we had leftover soup with these rolls that Ralph made- super yum!

Borsh
From my super tiny grandma

500 g chuck beef
6 marrow bones

2 tblspn oil
2 onions
1 carrots
1 beetroot
1/2 celeriac
1 green pepper
2 small parsnips
1 tin tomato paste

3 medium potatoes
1/4 large cabbage

1 tsp salt - probably more
1 tsp sugar
3 - 4 bay leaves
1/4 tsp citric acid
freshly ground pepper
aromatic pepper (found in pickle mix)

fresh flat leaf parsley
fresh coriander
3 - 4 cloves garlic, crushed

sour cream
mustard (optional)

1) First, wash the meat and remove all the fat and sinews. Fill a pot with the beef, the marrow bones and water, and set on a medium heat. Remove foam forming before it boils with a tablespoon. Once it does boil, put it on a low heat and half cover with the lid. It's going to cook like this for 2 1/2 - 3 hours.
2) While the meat is cooking, clean the onions, carrots, beetroot, celeriac, green pepper and parsnips. Cut the onions into half moons, and slice the pepper into thin slices. The rest of the cleaned veggies get grated.
3) Put the oil in a large pan, and add the onion. Fry until the onion is golden. Now add the grated veggies and pepper. Put a lid on and stir occasionally. Cook until the veggies are soft. Now, add the tomato paste, mix through and continue cooking the mixture shortly.
4) Now, peel the potato (submerge in water to keep from browning) and shred the cabbage (it should make one full bowl, so you might not use all of it).
4) Once the meat is cooked and tender, cube the potatoes and add them. When the potatoes are cooked through, add the veggie mixture and the cabbage.
5) Now add (stir in between!) salt, sugar, bay leaves, citric acid, pepper and aromatic pepper.
6) Turn off the heat.
7) Add chopped parsley and coriander, and crushed garlic.
8) It gets better after standing for a bit, especially the next day.
9) Serve with sour cream, and on cold winter nights, add a teaspoon of mustard. Don't worry- it won't taste like mustard, but it will warm you up.

I feel like a really good cook having made this. Every Russian home must have their own version of borsh, and now I have mine! I've decided to learn to make some more Russian dishes, so expect more posts on those soon!

Nana Banana

Banana Muffins

It's difficult to talk about what made me want to make these muffins, because I can't remember what life was like before I knew they existed. I just know it was worse.. Much MUCH worse..

They weren't supposed to mean anything to me.. They were the one night stand of baking, with whom you fall in love and one day you tell the story of how you met to your grandchildren. I was making proper Russian Borsh (I'll post about it later in the week), and I thought, wouldn't it be nice to have banana bread to have for tea and for breakfast. Banana bread really means home to me- and that seems to be my most often used reason for baking things.

Unfortunately, I only have 2 loaf tins, a teeny one and a farm sized one. Neither of those would do for this loaf. So the decision was quickly made to make muffins instead. Also, I used wholewheat flour for these instead of cake flour (residual guilt from not using wholewheat flour in the pumpkin pancakes last week) so that they were a bit more healthy. It was the greatest decision I ever made. Picture tears in my eyes when I tell you, these muffins are the ones for me.

Banana Muffins
From The Ultimate Book of Baking by Heilie Pienaar

125 g unsalted butter
200 g sugar
2 extra large eggs
280g wholewheat flour
5 ml baking powder
2 ml salt
5 ml bicarbonate of soda
100 ml milk
1 cup mashed bananas (I used 4 small ones)
30 ml fresh lemon juice
5 ml vanilla essence

1) Preheat over to 180 C.
2) Cream butter and sugar
3) Add the eggs, one at a time, and beat until the mixture is light and fluffy.
4) Whisk the wholewheat flour, baking powder, salt and bicarbonate of soda together in a bowl.
5) Add the milk, about half at a time, alternately with the flour mixture, to the butter mixture, mix thoroughly in between.
6) Add the lemon juice to the bananas and add to the mixture, along with the vanilla essence. Mix well.
7) Turn into either a 23 cm loaf pan (and send me pictures) or into a muffin tin - it makes about 16 muffins. The loaf cooks for 50 - 55 minutes, and the muffins 15 - 20 minutes.

Ralph taught me the way to eat banana muffins. He cuts them in half, and toasts them in the oven (I like to put them in the microwave for 10 seconds too) and carefully smears on some marge.. And for breakfast, lunch and supper (I can't help it- I think about them all the time) you're in heaven.. Probably why they never last. Next time I'm definitely making some to freeze!

Brinner

Pumpkin Pancakes

Breakfast for supper- it's like a dream. From watching TV I've been brainwashed to think of two meals as taboo and just completely wonderful: ice cream for breakfast, and breakfast for dinner! Sorry about these photos- I took the with my phone quickly before we ate!

I'm not really big into change. I wouldn't be that person that sees something like squid, goes out and buys something I've never eaten before, and cooks a dish with it. I have to take small steps in almost familiar territory but I still get there! For example, a couple of years ago I would refuse to go near anything that contained onions, and now, here I am, making and eating bacon carbonara!

This time, as usual, I was looking around for something that doesn't take to long to put together but is still wonderfully delicious, as I really try to super yummy things for Ralph. The thing that really sold me on these pancakes was the blog post by The Curvy Carrot, the things that she said about pumpkin pancakes just stuck them in my mind. I love the healthy twist on the pancakes, but I ended up using a more simple recipe from Baking Bites, just because I wanted to use thing I already had in the house. Also, the recipes mention pumpkin spice, which I haven't found in South Africa, so I read up a bit and put together a combination of spices that worked wonders for me.

Once the idea of breakfast for dinner was agreed (actually I only thought it was- Ralph thought 'pumpkin pancakes' meant that I was telling him to make normal pancakes for supper), all that we needed was bacon and a nice tomato sauce that was very much like the tomato herb pan sauce to complete the meal.

Pumpkin Pancakes

Adapted from Baking Bites

1 1/2 cups flour

1 tsp baking powder

1/2 tsp bicarbonate of soda

1/4 tsp salt

1/4 tsp nutmeg

1/2 tsp cinnamon

1/4 tsp ginger

1/4 cup maple syrup

1/2 cup mashed pumpkin  (I used butternut. I microwaved it and mashed it)

1 cup buttermilk

1 tsp oil

1 large egg

1/2 tsp vanilla essence

1) Put all the dry ingredients in a bowl (flour,baking powder,soda,salt,nutmeg,cinnamon,ginger) and whisk to mix around nicely.

2) Put the rest of the ingredients (wet ingredients) in another bowl, whisk these nicely too.

3) Put the wet ingredients into the dry ones and mix well.

4) Fry pancakes on a medium heat. I fried two at a time on my medium pancake pan. They are ready to turn over when they resemble this:

It was one the best evenings I had in a while. Ralph's mom decided to join us at the last minute, and we had a lovely family supper at home. I love making food for people I love, and I'm so happy when they enjoy it. This meal was such a hit. The pancakes are soft, delicious, mushy, and sweet the bacon is salty and crunchy, and the tomato sauce brings everything together with a herby tangy flavour.

I'm so happy to finally be able to make pancakes that rise but aren't dry or flavourless! Ralph makes the best pancakes hands down, which usually means that he's the one making breakfast. At least now I can give him a break and a treat every now and again.