Sometimes the simple things in life are among the best, like this very easy and tasty cauliflower dish. Cauliflower with browned butter and bread crumbs is THE way to eat cauliflower in Poland, or at least in my family. To my pleasant surprise Pille wrote about the same dish some time ago as they also eat cauliflower in the same way in Estonia. In Sweden it’s often served gratinated in cheese sauce which doesn’t appeal to me at all.

This dish is one of those comfort dishes that I love to eat and the simplicity makes it a perfect snack or dinner when I’m very tired and hungry. When I was growing up we very often had it as a condiment or just ate it plain, nowadays I eat it more seldom as my dear husband dislikes cauliflower and I can’t eat a whole califlower by myself. But last week I found very small cauliflowers in the grocery store, perfect for one person and then I knew immediately what I would cook. This isn’t really a recipe, you just cook some cauliflower and then you take some butter and bread crumbs for the “sauce”.

Kalafior z bułką tartą (cauliflower with browned butter and bread crumbs)
(serves one)

1 small cauliflower (300 gram)
1.5 tbsp butter
1.5 tbsp fine dry bread crumbs

Boil the whole cauliflower in salted water for about 12 minuter, until soft enough but not too soft. You want it kind of al dente. If you’re using a large cauliflower then cut it in florets before boiling, and also boil it shorter. Drain the cauliflower and put it on a serving plate. Melt the butter in a pan, add the bread crumbs. Stir the mixture while it browns, this will take a couple of minutes. Pour/sprinkle the butter/crumb mixture over the cauliflower and serve.

It’s very warm and sunny in Stockholm this week, but unfortunately I’m back at work again. I would much rather be having picknicks in a park with nice books to read and yummy snacks. But you can’t get it all so I have to make the best of the evenings instead. For warm summer days or evenings this salad is a winner. I’m sure that many of you have already tried the combination of feta cheese and watermelon; the saltiness of the feta cheese goes perfect with the refreshing and sweet watermelon. Serve the salad with some spicy grilled chicken and fresh bread, and you have a perfect dinner for sunny evening that makes you forget all about going to work again the next day. You don’t really need a recipe for this, but for reference here’s what I put in yesterday’s salad:

Salad with feta cheese and watermelon
(serves 4)

around 1 kg watermelon, rinsed and sliced (and “peeled”)
200 gram feta cheese, sliced
a big handful of black olives
1 small red onion, thinly sliced
2 tsp extra vergine olive oil
Fresh basil leaves

Combine the ingredients on a serving plate. Drizzle some olive oil over the salad. Decorate with fresh basil.

This simple and refreshing summer salad with cottage cheese is very popular in Poland. I’ve eaten it every summer since childhood and will continue to do so. I make the salad exactly as my mother does, the way she learnt to do it from her mother, my dear granny.

Polish cottage cheese salad
(twarożek z szczypiorkem i rzodkiewką)

3 spring unions
12 large radishes
400 gram cottage cheese
150 ml crème fraîche (or sour cream)
salt
pepper

Slice the spring onions. Grate the radishes. Combine spring onions, radishes, cottage cheese and crème fraîche. Salt and pepper. Serve with freshly baked bread.

I love cheese and the funny thing is that I didn’t eat any blue cheese until a few years ago and now I can’t imagine myself without it. The Gorgonzola cheese is Italian and has a rather sharp yet creamy flavour. It’s perfect in food and yesterday I put it in my risotto which resulted in a great and delicious dinner. Risotto may sound difficult to make but it’s really easy as long as you take care of it and stir frequently. This risotto goes perfect with rocket/aragula/ruccola, cherry tomatoes and red onion.

Risotto al Gorgonzola
(serves 2-3)

1 small onion, finely chopped
50 ml Olive oil Extra Vergine
300 ml Arborio rice
1 litre warm broth (I used an instant one called “Italy” with pine kernels and tomato)
100 gram gorgonzola cheese, cut in cubes
20 gram Parmesan cheese, grated
pepper
(salt if needed)

Bring broth to simmer in large saucepan over medium heat.

In another pan heat olive oil, add onion and sauté until tender and colourless. Add rice and stir for a minute or two. Add 200 ml of hot broth; simmer until absorbed, stirring frequently. Add remaining broth 100 ml at a time, allowing broth to be absorbed before adding more and stirring frequently until rice is creamy and tender, about 20 minutes. When done the rice corns should be creamy with an al dente kernel. Stir in the gorgonzola and parmesan cheese. Season the risotto with pepper (and salt if needed). Transfer to bowl and serve, eat immediately. Don’t reheat in the microwave, it won’t come out good. Serve with red onion, rocket (ruccula) and cherry tomatoes.

It’s been incredible hot here in Stockholm the last week, up to 31 degrees C, and on such days you don’t actually feel like cooking and need to take short cuts. One of my favourite quick dinners is when I have some left over minced meat sauce from the day before or from the freezer. I just put a couple of table spoons of the sauce on top of white bread, top with slices of cheese and then bake the sandwiches it in the oven (200 degrees C) for 10-15 minutes. Serve the sandwiches with a salad. Quick, easy and so incredibly yummy (even though a bit unhealthy…). In the photo above I’ve used sauce containing minced meat, bacon, cinnamon and tomatoes but you can basically use any minced meat sauce.

Lately I’m eating a lot of chicken, and it’s so yummy! I love experimenting with soft minced chicken and here’s the latest result. These meatballs are delicious and creamy thanks to the parmesan but still delicate without a strong cheese flavour. The Dijon flavour only gives a vague hint.

Chicken meatballs with parmesan and Dijon mustard
(serves 3, makes around 25-30 small meatballs)

350 gr minced chicken
1 schallot onion, finely chopped
1 garlic clove, finely grated
1 tsp water
5 tsp dried breadcrumbs
3 tsp Dijon mustard
25 gr Parmesan cheese, finely grated
1 egg
1 tsp maldon sea salt
ground pepper

Soak the breadcrumbs in the water and combine with the rest of the ingredients in a bowl. Shape 25-30 small meatballs, it will be rather sticky and the meatballs will be fragile so a small amount of olive oil on your hands will help. As always when handling chicken make sure to wash your hands and all utensils carefully. Fry the meatballs in butter for about 10 minutes. Serve with pasta and some extra Dijon mustard.

I’ve had a craving for meat the last months and I’m cooking chicken at least once or twice a week. I even eat bacon nowadays and can’t understand how I could live without it for the last 6 years. That saltyness and crispness can’t be found anywhere in the vegetable kingdom, including all that terrible fake bacon. I guess that it’s only a matter of time before I start eating other meat as well but for now chicken and bacon is fine and I even tend to combine them quite often. Today though, I’m posting an easy weekday chicken dish which I made for dinner yesterday:

Spicy chicken meatballs
(serves 3, makes 14 oval meatballs)

350 gr minced chicken
1 small yellow onion, finely chopped
1 garlic clove, finely grated
1 egg
0.75 tsp dried ground sumac
0.75 tsp dried ground cumin
0.75 tsp dried ground coriander/cilantro
0.5 tsp dried ground cayenne pepper
maldon sea salt
ground pepper

Combine all ingredients in a bowl and shape 14 oval meatballs, it will be rather sticky so a small amount of oil on your hands will help. As always when handling chicken make sure to wash your hands and all utensils carefully. Fry the meatballs in butter for about 10 minutes. Serve with bulgur or rice.

This weekend I tried to figure out what to do with the piece of Taleggio cheese that I bought spontaneous a time ago. I finally decided for a risotto, even though I was really frightened as it was my first time making a risotto. But I must say that it’s not hard at all! Just stir, stir and stir :-) This risotto has a lot of taste, due to the creamy cheese. It’s a very stinky cheese but really delicious, especially in this risotto. To the risotto we had Anne’s twisted baguettes which were very easy to make and tasted great! Bake them, you won’t be dissapointed!

Risotto al Taleggio
(recipe translated from Zeta)

2 shallots, finely chopped
3 tbsp + 2 tbsp Olive oil Extra Vergine
300 ml Arborio rice
200 ml white dry wine
1 litre warm chicken broth
200 gr Taleggio cheese, cut in cubes
Maldon sea salt
pepper

Bring broth to simmer in large saucepan over medium heat.

In another pan heat 3 tbsp olive oil, add shallots and sauté until tender and colourless. Add rice and stir for a minute or two. Add wine and stir until evaporated. Add 400 ml of hot broth; simmer until absorbed, stirring frequently. Add remaining broth 100 ml at a time, allowing broth to be absorbed before adding more and stirring frequently until rice is creamy and tender, about 20 minutes. When done the rice corns should be creamy with an al dente kernel. Stir in the taleggio cheese and two tablespoons of olive oil. Season the risotto with salt and pepper. Transfer to bowl and serve, preferably with Anne’s twisted baguettes.

I ran out of ideas the other day and lucklily I found a recipe for this warm autumnal bulgur salad in Elle mat och vin. It really easy to make and I loved it, the combination of pomegranate seeds with chèvre and chanterelles was lovely. It’s perfect as starter, but you can also serve it plain as a main dish or as a side dish to meat or salmon. As always I adjusted the recipe a bit; I substituted the golden chanterelles with trumpet ones instead and adjusted the amounts.

Warm bulgur with trumpet chanterelles and pomegranate

3 dl bulgur
600 ml water
1 vegetable stock cube (I actually used fond instead)
1 pomegranate
1 litre of fresh Trumpet chanterelles
3 shallots (chopped)
200 gr chèvre
2 dl fresh plain leaved parsley (chopped)
0.5 dl fresh thyme
1 dl pistachios (coursly chopped)
Maldon sea salt
pepper

Boil the bulgur in the water and stock until done, this should take about 10 minutes. Set aside, put on a lid and keep warm. Rinse the pomegranate. Rinse the trumpet chanterelles, cut the biggest ones into halves. Fry the chanterelles with the chopped onions in butter until all the liquid from the chanterelles has dissapeared and they are done. Add salt and pepper.
Combine bulgur, chanterelles, parsley, thyme and pistachios. Crumble half of the chèvre over the bulgur salad and mix everything. Garnish the bulgur salad with the rest of the chèvre and the pomegranate seeds.

Many countries have their own versions of potato based dumplings; kroppkakor in Sweden, Klöße in Germany, Knödeln in Austria and so on. In Poland there are many dumpling variants made of boiled potatoes. We have the ones with savoury filling “Pyzy“, the sweet ones “knedle” and “kopytka” which are not filled with anything at all. Some people would probably want to add “pierogi” to the above dumpling list, but their dough normally doesn’t contain any boiled potatoes (apart from the filling) so they don’t really belong here.

Knedle ze śliwkami is typical Polish sweet dish, often eaten as a sweet dinner. The Polish kitchen isn’t always healthy… :-) Normally the dumpling dough is made of boiled potatoes, but I found a variant made out of quark (my middlename should be quark…) on the Polish food forum which I read. The result was excellent, and even Fredrik really liked these dumplings.

Knedle ze śliwkami
(makes 12, serves 4)

Dough:
250 gr quark (don’t use Kesella as it’s too runny; I made my own quark)
1 egg
120-130 gr flour
2 tablespoons of melted butter

Filling:
12 small sweet plums
12 tsp caster sugar

For serving:
melted butter
caster sugar
cinnamon

Wash the plums, pat dry and stone by cutting a gash. Stuff each plum with one teaspoon of sugar.

Boil water in a large pot.

Prepare dough in a bowl by mixing all ingredients. Work dough until firm, if the dough is too sticky add some flour. Divide the dough into 12 pieces, then flatten each piece with your hands and wrap it around each plum.