Pastry - Retro Food For Modern Times

Category: Pastry

01
May
2015

Rocking The Casbah

categories: Artichokes, Chickpeas, Cookbook Guru, Eggs, Morocco, Olives, Pastry, Potato, Salad, Tuna

The selection for March and April over at The Cookbook Guru was The Food Of Morocco by Paula Wolfert which really fits in with my explorations into Middle Eastern Food via Persiana and MENA.

First, the book is ENORMOUS!!!! If you dropped this on your foot, you would be in serious danger of breaking a toe. Or two. It was really quite difficult to choose the recipes to try, there were so many and so many that sounded delicious.

Second, it is beautiful – not just the recipes, the photography, the writing, everything about it is lovely. I would love to have this in my own collection as it is so well curated and contains so much of interest but sadly, it is quite expensive so, at the moment is just on the wishlist!

I have been sick for nearly a week now so I have left my run here a little late. Thankfully the anti-biotics have started to kick in and hopefully I can get this post out whilst it is still April somewhere in the world.

I have made four things from this book and whilst I would have loved to have a post for each, for the sake of brevity, I’m putting them all together so I can get something out before Christmas!!! I have also not included any recipes as that would have taken even more time but, if you like the look of anything let me know and I can send ’em through!

THE FOOD OF MOROCCO // BRIK WITH TUNA, CAPERS AND EGGS

I was not familiar with the brik, (pronounced breek) which is a Moroccan snack consisting of a very thin pastry called warqa wrapped around various fillings, one of which is this delicious but to me, uncommon, combination of tuna and egg.

Not surprisingly there was no warqa pastry at the local supermarket and because I was running so late on this, I could not shop for it so I used the much more readily available filo pastry for my briks. You can apparently also use spring roll wrappers, or if really brave, make your own warqa pastry.

So first up you saute up some onions, then add your tuna, capers, parsley and some parmesan cheese. And yup, this mix just on it’s own tastes AMAZING. I’m surprised there was any left to make the briks. Personally, I blame the hosts of reality tv cooking shows for constantly telling people to taste their food during cooking!

Then you make place the tuna mix on the pastry but make a little hole to hold the eggs. I don’t think it matters if it spills over a little like mine did.

Then you quickly seal this up and drop it into some hot oil to fry up – the idea being you want your pastry crispy and your egg still a little bit runny.

So, did I cook the perfect runny egg brik?

Sadly, no. My egg was cooked through. 🙁

This was not all bad though, it certainly made it easier to take the remainder for lunch the next day. And OMG, so tasty. I’ll definitely be trying this again and trying to nail that runny egg.

THE FOOD OF MOROCCO //POTATO TAGINE WITH OLIVES AND HARISSA

This tasted as good as it looks. And one for my vegan friends!!! The colours are so beautiful and the flavours blend together beautifully!

THE FOOD OF MOROCCO // THE BIRD THAT FLEW AWAY

This a lovely chickpea dish with a delightful name. Paula Wolfert explains that is it a “plat de pauvre” (a dish for the poor) that is made when you can’t afford to buy a chicken. It’s so good I think I would eat it regardless of whether I had a chicken or not!

THE FOOD OF MOROCCO INSPIRED // ARTICHOKE SALAD WITH ORANGE, LEAFY GREENS AND DATES.

A Spanish restaurant I am very fond of does a salad with oranges, artichokes and dates which is To. Die. For. In order to recreate it’s flavour, I used Paula Wolfert’s Orange, Leafy Green and Date Salad and added artichokes and some lemon and olive oil in the dressing. I think it worked really well and I loved the hint of orange flower water. It was not exactly my restaurant salad but it was pretty close. And look at how pretty it is!

Artichoke, Orange, Leafy Green and Date Salad

This was an amazing book and I am so glad that The Cookbook Guru drew it to my attention. The next few months we will be cooking from a book by a true legend of Australian Cooking, Margaret Fulton. I can’t wait. And I promise to be a bit more timely!

Have a great week!

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Moroccan Stewed White Beans Recipe – Vegetarian

09
Oct
2014

Rebel With A Cause – Smoked Trout Empanadas

categories: Chipotle, Cream Cheese, Finger Food, Fish, Mexico, Puff Pastry, Smoked Trout, Snacks, Starters

Have you ever read a recipe where the ingredients seem right….but the execution just seems horribly wrong?

The other day I was looking for something in…you know THAT room? Otherwise known as the room where we dumped all the crap we didn’t have a specific home for when we first moved in. Nearly a year later? It’s all still there. Thank the Lord for whoever invented doors. It makes it so much easier to metaphorically close the door and walk away from the room when you can literally close the door and walk away from the room.

I didn’t find what I was looking for in the room, because most things that go in there don’t come out. What I did find was a manilla folder full of old recipe clippings which included one for something called for Trout and Mascarpone Triangles.

Before we get to the point does anyone else have problems spelling mascarpone? For some reason in my mind it’s marscapone. I also can’t say the word “Preliminary” – that one just ends up a hot mess of r’s and l’s where they shouldn’t be.

But anyway, immediately in my head, (yeah the same one that can’t spell ma-scar-pone or pronounce pre-lim-in-ary) I had a vision of what these would be. They would look like exactly like these:

Hmm…except….maybe a little more triangular.

So, I was bitterly disappointed when I actually read the recipe and found it was nothing like that.

In fact, that whole recipe annoyed the hell out of me. In most cooking circles when you call something an X & Y triangle it’s pretty much a given that the X and Y are IN the triangle. Take these delicious looking cheese and spinach triangles from taste.com.au. Spinach and Cheese both EXACTLY where they should be i.e. inside the pastry triangle.

That is what I wanted from my trout and mascarpone triangles! Golden puff pastry filled with chunks of gorgeous pink smoked trout, creamy mascarpone, fresh herbs, a touch of chilli….that was what my mind told me a Trout and Mascarpone Triangle could, and should, be.

At best the original recipe is for trout and mascarpone ON triangles. And who the hell wants that? No one that’s who. I’m calling shenanigans on that recipe.

In some circles they say, if you can’t beat ’em, join ’em. In my circle I say if you think their recipe is a crock, make it like you think it should have been. And while we’re in the spirit of rebellion – the fancy pants Italian cheese I can’t be bothered writing the name of (because I would only have to re-write it to spell it correctly) can go fuck itself too. I’m using good old Philadelphia Cream Cheese. Which I forgot to take a photo of. The rest of the stuff is here:

I used a smoked trout, you could sub in smoked salmon if you prefer or cook a fillet of fish as per the original recipe. Or even used canned salmon or tuna to make these. Up to you. And I had an empanada maker thing but you could make triangles as per the original recipe. Or embrace the spririt of doing it your way and make them any shape you want!

If you are going to use an empanada maker, here’s how you do it from an expert,Connie Veneracion. Shame I didn’t read this until after I had made mine and hence some of mine were a little…shall we call them rustic? 😉

How To Use An Empanada Maker

And here is the revised, and in my not so humble opinion, vastly improved recipe!

Enjoy!

Smoked Trout Empanadas

Print Recipe

Ingredients

Scale

400 smoked trout or cooked fish of choice
1 tbsp lemon juice
1 red onion, finely chopped
100g cream cheese, chopped into a small cubes
1 canned chipotle chilli and approx 1 tbsp of the adobo sauce it came in
1 tbsp dill
1 tbsp parsley
2 sheets ready rolled puff pastry
1 egg, beaten
poppy seeds and chilli flakes to garnish (optional)

Cook Mode Prevent your screen from going dark

Instructions

If using a smoked trout, remove the skin and flake the flesh from the bones. Place this in a bowl with the cream cheese, red onion, lemon juice, chilli, dill and parsley. Mix lightly to combine.
Preheat your oven to 200C and line a baking tray with baking paper.
Cut four circles out of each of your pastry sheets, using your empanada maker or tracing around a small plate or cup.
Place 1 tbsp of the trout mixture in the middle of each circle then fold the pastry over to seal in the filling.
Crimp the edges to seal.
Place on the baking tray and brush with the beaten egg.
Sprinkle with the poppy seeds and chilli flakes if using.
Cook for 15 minutes or until puffed up and golden.

Lesson of the week – if you don’t like it, change it.

Have a fabulous week and fight the power!

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01
Jan
2013

Retro Food For Modern Times – Holiday Wrap Up

categories: Chocolate, Desserts, Eggs, Jelly, Lemon, Lime, Limoncello, Mushrooms, Vol Au Vent

Happy New Year!

Here’s what’s been going on since I last posted.

On Christmas Day, we gathered at my mum’s for a family lunch. I made the carrot and orange flower water salad featured in the last post and a lemon and lime tart with limoncello as my contribution to the meal. The tart was meant to look like this…

Sadly, it didn’t. I lack confidence with pastry so thought I would make it with a crumb crust. But I didn’t let the crumb set long enough so when I poured the filling in it all came loose and mixed in with the filling. I ended up covering it with a meringue (thanks again for that idea Monica) but when it was cut it didn’t have a nice sharp line between meringue, filling and base. It tasted wonderful; it looked terrible. I hate that. Why is it always when you have to cook for a large group of people that things go awry?

I was lucky enough to get lots of lovely vintage and vintage inspired presents – a selection of some are below!

Over the break I finally got to visit the Gusto exhibition at the State Library which explores the culinary history of Victoria. Among other treasures, they had an amazing array of vintage cookbooks which I was just itching to get my hands on!

The days between Christmas and New Year are tinged with sadness for me as my Nana passed away during this period a few years ago. In memory of Nana, I cooked some devilled eggs which was a dish she used to make quite often. My deviled eggs weren’t nearly as good as Nana’s stuffed eggs but they weren’t terrible….maybe next year I’ll get Nana’s recipe and do it properly! In the meantime, the recipe I used is here:

Asparagus rolls were another of Nana’s specialties. Nana’s asparagus came straight from the tin, the rolls were made with white bread with the crusts cut off, and the asparagus was melded to the bread with a mixture of butter and finely grated cheese. There may have been some mustard in there too…again, I’ll have to snaffle the exact recipe, if such a thing exists, off mum for next year. Ribbon sandwiches were another of the lovely, dainty things she made…..it’s funny, for someone who had a very sweet tooth, all of the best of Nana’s recipes were savoury high tea type delicacies.

On a more mundane level, I remember school holidays sitting in front of the television watching Days of Our Lives eating hard-boiled egg and tomato sauce sandwiches that Nana had made for me. Just in case you were wondering, these were eggs mashed into tomato ketchup on white bread. I kind of shudder at the thought of them now but back in the day….delicious!

Every year in the school holidays Nana would take me into the city and we would have Frog in a Pond at the Coles Cafeteria. I think Frog in a Pond maybe a uniquely Australian dessert so for those of you who have no idea what I am talking about here it is…

A link to the recipe is here:

http://www.taste.com.au/recipes/18303/frogs+in+the+pond

I made us some mushroom vol au vents…can you get more retro than a vol au vent? They were light and lovely after the rich food at Christmas. The recipe I used is here although I cheated and used bought shells. One of my goals for this year is to master pastry!!!

In between some house renovations, we had a boozy lunch and some fabulous cocktails with some girlfriends one day. The cocktails were served in jam jars and look almost as good as they tasted!

Ended the day on the couch watching Bond on the telly. The Spy who Loved Me…which has to be the best Bond song ever if not quite the best movie.

We had a very quiet New Year’s Eve as the dogs get frightened by the fireworks and we didn’t want to leave them alone at home. I lit a tea light – in one of these gorgeous candle holders made from vintage doilies – and reflected on the year gone and the one to come. 2012 was a turbulent year for many reasons and in some ways I was glad to see the back of it. I have a feeling 2013 is going to be a fabulous year! I also wish the same for everyone reading this and hope all your hopes and wishes come true.