Party Emergency-Four Simple Dips

What would be an informal gathering like without food? In one word-dull!
But you are not always ready to serve a four course meal, when suddenly you open the door and there is a bunch of friends with a few bottles of wine, ready to start a party. How to get out of the situation? If you live close by to a supermarket or at least have reasonable supplies at home, you can get through with 15 min worth of shopping and 20 minute worth o fassambley in kitchen.

So:
Party Emergency Kit

1. Chips (potato or nacho, my ones of choice are plain, but go for flavoured if you wish)everybody loves them if served in an appropriate way. Never, NEVER serve them by opening a bag and dropping it on the table with a phrase ''Help yourself!'' It's plain gross! Use a pretty plate or bowl or a basket. Serve 2 or 3 varieties for a more sophisticated look.
2. Crackers (choose different varieties to suit the differet tastes of your guests, some will go for rich and buttery ones like ''Tuc'', others will prefer wholegrain varieties, so called water crackers or rice crackers) The same rule as for chips applies, serve them on a platter rather than stright from packaging.
3. Crudites (vegetables cut into sticks, strips or any other managable pieces, you can use cucumber, tomato vedges, carrot and celery sticks, cauliflower florets, capsicum strips, basically everything that can be eaten raw)
4. Dips for the three C's mentioned above. In this section I'm going to suggest 4 of my party favourites.

Garlic Sour Cream Dip

Ingredients:

• sour cream
• lemon juice
• garlic
• mustard
• salt
• sugar

Method:

Finely chop or mince the garlic, mix all ingredients according to taste.

Easy Guacamole

Ingerdients:

• a ripe avocado
• olive oil (extra virgin grade)
• lemon juice
• garlic
• salt
• pepper

Method:

Mash the avocado into a fine puree. Add lemon juice, salt, pepper and minced or finely chopped garlic. Mix well, than while intensively mixing, thin to desired consistency with olive oil.

Sundried Tomato Hummus

Ingredients:

• canned chickpeas (also called ceci or garbanzo)
• garlic
• sundried tomatoes in oil
• sesame seeds
• olive oil
• salt and pepper

Method:

Mince or finely chop the garlic. In a dry pan toast the sesame seeds until golden. Add garlic and cook briefly. Transfer seeds and garlic to a food processor and process until whole seeds are not visible. Drain a can of chickpeas and add to the seeds in processor together with a handful of sundried tomatoes. Process the mixture until smooth. If it looks dry, add oil from sundried tomatoes or olive oil, or, if extremely dry, the liquid drained from the chickpeas. Season with salt and pepper to taste.

Curry Dip

Ingredients:

• salad or light mayonaise
• sweet tomato ketchup
• mild curry powder

Method:

Mix the ingredients according to taste.

Optional extras:

5. A fruit platter (you can't go wrong with that one)

6. A platter of 3 to 4 interesting cheeses (choose different types of cheese, hard, semi hard, blue-veined, spreadable that might serve as a dip as well)

7. A platter of sweet biscuits, confectionary and chocolates

Remembet about wine, long drinks, and plenty of soft drinks for abstainers, and the gastronomical part of your party is sorted.

The rest is up to you! Have fun!

A Nice and Simple Salad

No comments this time, just recipe.

Smoked Chicken Salad

Ingredients:

• smoked chicken
• Chinese cabbage
• daikon
• red capsicum
• white bread
• lemon flavoured pepper
• salt
• sugar
• olive oil
• wine vinegear
• smooth mustard

Method:

Dice the bread and fry it in a dry pan until crispy. Cut daikon and capsicum in strips. In another pan heat some olive oil, fry daikon and capsicum briefly until warm but still crispy. Season with lemon pepper. Make dressing by mixing mustard, salt, sugar vinegear and oil. Shred Chinese cabbage and mix with some dressing just enough to coat it. Pile the cooked vegetables on top of cabbage. Shred the smoked chicken (I like to leave skin on, it's not healthy, but it is delicious) and pile on top of vegetables. Sprinkle with croutons you just made and drizzle with dressing. Serve ASAP.

Christmas Baking

There is sooooo much to say about X-mas baking, however I'm not the most competent person in this field, I do make a batch of muffins or cookies from time to time, but I'm deffinately not a boulanger, and I would rather do a four course meal than an ellaborate cake (I have tried, taste is just ok, the look, not so much) But X-mas would not be complete without some baking, so I have found a nearly foolproof recipe and stripped it to it's bare essentials, tested a few times, and it really works, at least in the taste department.

Stollen

Stollen is a traditional German bread made for Christmas, the recipe varies from household to household, and it is charachterised by the vast amount of dried fruit used and almonds as the dominating flavour.

Ingredients:

• 1kg of flour
• 100g fresh yeast (preferred) or 20g of dry bakers yeast (I tested both and fresh yeast just works better, the dough is more moist and pliable and the surface of the loaf comes out smoother)
• 300-350ml milk
• 200g sugar
• A pinch of salt
• a combination of any of the following spices: ground nutmeg, ground cardamom, ground cinnamon, vanilla sugar or essence, ground bitter almonds or bitter almond essence, ground ginger, ground turmeric
• 400g butter
• 200g candied citrus peel
• 150g dark raisins or sultanas
• 150g golden raisins
• 150g candied dried cherries
• 200g sweet almonds
• a small amount of rum(traditional) or cognac, or Amaretto(in that case, do not use bitter almond essence), or Cointreau(for a special twist)
• some extra melted butter
• icing sugar

Method:

Soak raisins and cherries in alcohol overnight. Coarsely grind almonds in a food processor (or wrap them in a kitchen towel and crush with a rolling pin, if you really need to outsource your emotions). Chop candied peel finely.

Heat milk until lukewarm. In a small bowl combine the yeast, a spoonful of sugar and flour and the milk. Let it ferment until frothy and increased in volume (10 minutes or so, do not leave without attention, as you might end up with all the kitchen table covered in foam that acts as, and btw actually is, alive)

While the yeast ''wakes up'', in a big bowl combine flour, rest of sugar, salt and dry spices. Melt butter but do not heat it up to a high temperature as it may kill yeast. Add essences (if using) to butter. Pour yeast mixture and butter in the flour mixture, mix with your hands, add all the fruits and nuts and knead as if you were asked to give a massage to your sweetheart and they had reallllly tense muscles. Do it with love but with enough vigour too.

Shape the dough into a ball and leave to rise for 2 hours in a warm place, than knead lightly and shape into a loaf.

Bake in 180 degrees Celsius for 1.5 hours or a little bit less, test with a skewer, if it comes out clena, the stollen is done.

While still hot, brush with extra melted butter and dust with icing sugar. Keep it in a cool, dark place for at least 5 days to mature, before endulging with a slice of stollen and a glass of fragrant mulled wine.

An Asian Meal for a Latvian Bloke

Feeding a bloke is a tricky thing. On one hand, what could be easier than that, just get plenty of meat and remember that guys need far more calories than we, girls, do. On the other hand, the way to guy's heart goes through his stomach, and his heart is the place you really want to be at, isn't it? So why don't you spice up your relationship with a hot Asian meal? Just keep it simple enough, so you are not completely stuffed beforethe dish even hits his palate :)

Dead Easy Chicken Curry

Ingredients:

• an onion
• chicken breasts (2 average ones were just right for me and my hungry sweetheart)
• A few tablespoons of ''Patak's'' garam masala curry paste (or any other curry paste, red, green, Thai or Indian style, you pick, but I have a passion on ''Patak's'' since my New Zealand year, this taste just brings up nice memories. Check their webpage for their products www.pataks.co.uk)
• half a can of canned crushed tomatoes
• a wee can of coconut cream
• sugar and salt to taste
• oil

Method:

Dice the onion finely. Cut chicken in strips or smallish chunks. Heat some oil in a wok (or an ordinary pan, it really does not matter, I just prefer wok to a pan 'cos I don't like non stick coating) and cook onion until transparent. Add chicken, cook it unil it has lost it's pinkness. Stir in curry paste, add tomatoes and coconut cream, cook until chicken is done, adjust salt and sugar to your taste.

NB!Serve with the best rice you can afford and cook it in a proper way(nothing ruins an Asian meal as quick as gooey rice cooked in a plastic bag). I suggest puting the rice in a pot with a tight fitting lid, adding salt, shaking the pot so rice creates an even layer in the bottom of the pot, than putting your finger vertically in the pot so the tip touches rice, than pouring in cold water until it reaches the first joint of the finger. Than put on the lid and cook on a low fire until all the water is absorbed.

Spicy Butter Veggies

Ingredients:

• large knob of butter
• a good pinch of sesame seeds (optional)
• dry garam masala spice mix
• caraway seeds
• coriander seeds
• a thumb of ginger
• a mix of quick cooking veggies, fresh or frozen (I used frozen cauliflower, grean peas, green beans and some fresh capsicum)
• salt

Method:

Chop the ginger finely. Melt butter in a lidded pot, grind up caraway and coriander seeds in a pestle (adding some salt makes grinding more effective), add all the spices and sesame seeds to the hot butter, cook until fragrant. Add ginger, veggies and a little amount of water to create steam. Close the pot with a lid and cook until veggies are tender, adding a bit more water if it evaporates too quickly. When veggies are done, cook without the lid for a few minutes so the watre evaporates and butter browns. Serve on the side of Dead Easy Curry or just with rice as a main course for vegetarians or girls.

Hope you will enjoy this meal as much as we did :)

Fall Stew

Autum is the right time for warm and hearty foods. Gardens and fields are full of bursting ripe goodies that are crying to get eaten, so grab a pot, toss in the nicest looking, smelling and tasting vegetables and get the pot bubbling!

Sweet Fall Stew

Ingredients:

Use quantities to suit your taste.

• onions
• a clove of garlic
• potatoes
• carrots
• pumpkin
• apples
• pepper
• instant stock (Once I said that using instant stock is one of the worst kitchen fails, but since I live in a dorm I have found the little cubes rather handy)
• oil
• sour cream

Method:

Chop garlic and onions finely (a little trick for onion chopping- cut off the top part of an onion but leave the bottom where roots come out intact, peel off the skin, cut in half lenghtways. Sit them flat side down on a chopping board and make cuts starting from the top end and going nearly to the bottom, but not quite to the end so that the onion resambles a comb and holds shape, than chop the comb crossways) Heat some oil in a saucepan and brown onions and garlic well. Add scrubbet and diced carrots (at this stage you can brown them as well if you have time, but this step can be omitted), peeled and diced potatoes, peeled, deseeded and diced pumpkin and apple pieces. Add some water, pepper and instant stock, simmer slowly until everything is tender or mushy, stir through some sour cream and serve!

You can add different vegetables, herbs and spices, if you have them on hand and omit instant stock bor replace it with real stock, feel free to improvise. Remembet, this is just another example of dorm cooking, so it's less fancy than my usual style, but still tastes great!

A Little Bit of Greece

I know it's a little bit too late for a spinach recipe, as the season is over, but you still might get some, and even rather old and tough leaves will do for this recipe. Spinach is rich in iron, and iron is essential for producing hemoglobin (hemoglobin is that stuff that makes your blood red and more importantly transports oxigen through your body)
Spinach and feta pies are traditional for greek folk, I have never tried an authentic one, so mine are e far cry from the original greek recipe, but my family loves it.

Spinach and Feta Pie

Ingredients:

• 1,5 cups of flour
• 100 grams of butter
• 1 teaspoon of baking powder
• 1 teaspoon of salt
• a few tablespoons of milk
• 300-400 grams of spinach
• a block (300-400 grams) of feta cheese
• 2 eggs
• a handful of cashews
• pepper

Method:

Grate cold butter with a coarse grater, sift together salt, baking powder and flour, rub it together with butter to form crumbs. Gradually add milk until stiff dough forms. Roll it out and use a bit more than half to line a loose-bottom round baking tin.

Put spinach in a microwave proof container, add a spoonful of water and microwave on high for a minute or so. Let the spinach cool down for a couple of minutes, than squeeze out the liquid and chop it up. Chop the cashews in smaller pieces as well and brown them in a dry pan if you wish.

In a bowl mix eggs, feta, pepper, spinach and cashews (feta is salty, so you won't need any salt). Fill the dough shell with filling, cover it with the rest of the dough, pierce the top in a few places and bake in 180 degrees for an hour.

Serve warm or cold or pack in a lunchbox :)

Uni meals: rice, veges, saveloys

So, I have started that delightful part of my life- living in a university dorm. And it means cooking myself or eating crap or starving. Obviously I choose the first option!

Dorm cooking has certain qualities and you must mind a few things.
Cooking for one is a hassle, so one must cooperate. [check, my groupmate Egija is happy to cook together]
You won't have a whole lot of fancy equipment. [I have one non stick pot, two plates, a large mug that suits as a bowl as well, a good knife, fork, spoon, wooden stirrer+ Egija has got a similar pot, mug, bowl, knife, fork, spoon at least for now, we are going to get some more pots and pans, chopping boards, but not much more]
You are on a short budget [let's not talk about money, but you can imagine, can't you]
You do not want to shop every day, the time can be used for sleeping or studies and shops are full of temptations [see the statement above]

I and Egija decided to cook togeather on Thursday. At that stage she had no money but some rice, 3 saveloys, a little bit of sour cream, some gerkhin and mustard sauce in the bottom of the jar and instant stock. I had nothing, so I bought a bottle of ''extra virgin'' rapeseed oil (one letter and one step down from my favourite grapeseed oil, but 3 times cheaper and still tastes ok) salt, mixed pepper, some carrots, a garlic, parsley root, 2 small red capsicums, two onions (one smallish and one large) and half a loaf of rye bread and a bag of dried dates for breakfasts and suppers. That's what we made for two lunches!

Orange Vegetable Rice

Ingredients:

• a bag of bagged rice
• half of the parsley root and some leaves
• a smallish onion
• one clove of garlic
• a carrot
• a red capsicum
• 2 tbsp of sour cream
• 1 cube of instant stock
• oil
• pepper
• 2 saveloys

Cook the rice in unsalted water. In another pot brown finely chopped onion, parsley root and garlic in oil, add diced carrots and capsicums, add some spoonfulls of water and cook until carrots are semi-tender. Add the instant stock, season with pepper and add the cooked rice. Put saveloys in the same pot cook until carrots are done, add sour cream and chopped parsley leaves. Serve with love!

Sauteed Onions and Saveloys with Orange Salad and Rice

Ingredients:

• A large onion
• 1 saveloy
• 2 carrots
• a capsicum
• a clove of garlic
• 1 bag of rice
• oil
• pepper
• instant stock
• salt
• gerkhin and mustard sauce

Slice onions in rings and saveloys in fine slices, brown them in oil and season with salt and pepper. Cook rice in water with instant stock. Dice carrots and capsicums, chop garlic finely, mix them together and add oil, salt and pepper. Serve onions and saveloy over rice with salad and gerkhin mustard sauce on the side!