friederike's Reviews
1109 recipes reviewed. Showing 1 to 50Sort by: Book Title | Date | Rating | Recipe Title 
Die echte Jeden-Tag-Küche
By Sabine Sälzer
Graefe Und Unzer Verlag - 2004
A curious combination of pizza and quiche. Using yeast, the crust is that of a pizza,; the filling is that of a quiche, with a 2 cm layer of onion, some bacon and topped off with a mixture of egg and crème fraîche - but just a little of that, not as much as usually with a quiche.
The result was nice, but not particularly wowing. I thought it used way too much onion - 1 kg onion (or even less) would have worked at least as well (and believe me, it's less work, too - I was surprised how much onion I ended up with). I used only 200 g of crème fraîche, which seemed to work well enough, and 250 g bacon, which even could have been a bit more. And I also fried the onions considerably longer than 10 min, until they were just slightly soft.
This was actually meant to be my French contribution for the FIFA 2014-challenge (and actually I was planning to make a Quiche Lorraine, but then decided that I wanted it to contain onions), but now I wonder whether a onion quiche isn't perhaps more typical of the southwest of Germany. A quick search led me to near-identical recipes from both countries...
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Marie Claire Fresh + Fast
By Michele Cranston
Murdoch Books - 2009
Not very good. The balance was totally off. I used only about 3/4 of the tomato sauce, and yet it was too much and too strong, too concentrated and too salty. The pesto (I used a commercial one) and the parmesan didn't help either. The parmesan wasn't noticeable, apart from adding more salt, so next time I would skip that. I only mixed half of the pesto through the tomato sauce and dotted the pizza with the rest. The zucchinis didn't do anything either; I wonder if using chargrilled zucchinis might change that. By the way, one zucchini was about 350-450g and more than enough - no way you'd need two zucchinis to get 250g.
The base wasn't nice either - next time I'll probably use this recipe again.
Edited 30 April 2013:
We made pizza again, using the other dough, the other tomato sauce, a chargrilled zucchini, mozzarella and fresh basil, and it was a lot better! Still slightly salty - you can probably skip the salt in the tomato sauce altogether, but very nice. The zucchini was better in taste, though I'd make the strips short next time, just for ease of eating.
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Nest Koken
(, 2009)
Oh, wow! Excellent pie! Very full of flavours, the best proof that vegetarian food doesn't need to be dull at all, on the contrary.
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Essentials of Cooking (Cookery)
By James Peterson
Konemann UK Ltd - 2000
I remember making this when I started studying at the university. It tasted okay, but not very special (heck, I was glad I was able to produce something edible!), and if I would serve it, it would be as a side dish. Do you use homemade tomato coulis and not tomato sauce from a can, I'm sure you will taste the difference; and use a few herbs, I think thyme should go well.
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Website: David Lebovitz
Very delicious, incredibly moist! It's a bit like a carrot cake, it's not like you'll realize that your actually eating vegetables (DH claimed that he could very vaguely taste the courgette; I'm don't think I did).
The glaze wasn't visible as a glaze; instead it had been absorbed by the cake - it seems that there was too much liquid in proportion to sugar. I wanted to write that the glaze isn't strictly necessary as it only provides an extra sugar coating for an excellent cake that doesn't need it - but instead the lemon juice adds a layer of extra moisture that was actually quite interesting. If you want a real glaze, though, you'll have to use more icing sugar.
I used hazelnuts instead of pecans/walnuts/almonds and was very happy with this choice. I also accidentally used 1 tsp baking soda and 1/2 tsp baking powder, but that didn't really matter.
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Holländisch kochen: Gerichte und ihre Geschichte
By Erik Winkelmann, Christine Moser
Verlag Die Werkstatt GmbH - 2011
Very nice! It was a bit of a pity that the instructions were scarse - I didn't know if I had to chop the gingerbread into pieces before adding it, if only 40 ml vinegar leftover for the marinade would be enough, if the braise needed to be covered, etc. - otherwise I would have given 5 stars.
To address the questions I had: I decided to add the gingerbread slices in cubes - I didn't like the texture, though, so next time I will probably chop them finely or even pulverize them. Because I probably used a much larger pan than they did, I had to add 300 ml water above what was instructed, so I decided not to cover the braise. I also decided that 40 ml vinegar would be quite enough, as the other 60 ml of the original 100 ml in the marinade haven't disappeared but have simply been absorped by the meat.
It does seem to be Rheinischer Sauerbraten, which is probably the version most Americans know, containing gingerbread or lebkuchen and sugar beet syrup or apple butter. The only exception here is that the meat is cut into cubes, which means that the time for both marinating as for cooking is greatly reduced, very useful.
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All About Braising: The Art of Uncomplicated Cooking
By Molly Stevens
W.W. Norton & Co. - 2004
It’s a huge piece of meat, so when she says, ‘rub with coarse salt’, use your own good judgement how much salt you use. I used far too much, and it showed, luckily only in the sauce.
Apart from that, it was extremely delicious – at least tastewise. The meat, unfortunately, ended up being pretty tough, and I have no idea why. As for now, I’m happy to blame the circumstances (tiny microwave oven instead of the proper thing, a clay pot with a mind of its own instead of our Le Creuset Dutch oven), but I do hope this will change once we find a new flat. BF at least was very happy with it, but then again, he’ll be happy with any large piece of meat.
We had this with the Roasted Garlic Mash from BBC Good Food, May 2009.
Amendment 12. Jan. 2010:
Instead of just plain re-heating, we braised some of the meat for dinner for another hour or so; this time in a pan on the stove. What a difference! For all but one small part the meat was much tenderer than it had been the night before. So it is very likely indeed that the braise failed due to the oven and the clay pot. But how could one hour have made such a difference?
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Website: Chilli und Ciabatta
peho.typepad.com/chili_und_ciabatta
Speechless. This is a very classic German Christmas cookie (maybe even THE German Christmas cookie), they're notoriously difficult to get right, and these turned out just perfect. I would make them thinner than 1 cm, more like 0.5 cm, as they will rise when in the oven. Remember to add lots of icing.
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Weihnachtsplätzchen
By Brigitta Stuber
GU - 1993
Great variation of an otherwise classic Christmas cookie recipe.
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Die echte Jeden-Tag-Küche
By Sabine Sälzer
Graefe Und Unzer Verlag - 2004
This is basically a variation of Beef Stroganoff, only that it uses veal instead of beef (I read that some versions of Beef Stroganoff use sour cream and pickles(?) - I'm comparing it to this version using only cream). It very nice and works well with both Rösti(classic combination) and Spätzle.
Just like Beef Stroganoff, the meat tends to be cooked very very quickly, so watch out. We actually used pork instead of veal, which, although not authentic at all, tasted nice as well.
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Culinaria Spain
By Marios Trutter, Marion Trutter, Gunter Beer, Gunter Beer
Konemann - 2007
A very nice, very simple dish. Watch out, don't let the zucchini/courgettes cook for too long!
We served them alongside Hake with Cider, and this combination worked very well.
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Holländisch kochen: Gerichte und ihre Geschichte
By Erik Winkelmann, Christine Moser
Verlag Die Werkstatt GmbH - 2011
This was really nice! We used cod instead of zander as it seemed the most comparable fish. The glasswort made an interesting addition to the potato mash, though to my surprise it wasn't really salty. As a whole, the zander and the mash combined very well, and it was interesting to see this as a kind of modern take on the typical Dutch way of eating potato mash (Dutch often serve potato mash mixed with kale - being German, I prefer my kale served next to the potato mash, but this combination was really good).
DH tried to adapt the recipe by using the video blog for "Heston Blumenthal's Perfect Potato Mash", but unfortunately he managed to turn it into "DH's Perfectly Ruined Potato Mash" ("I guess with this stuff I don't even need to show up for Master Chef") - the taste was nice, but the texture was very, very gluey.
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Kürbis
By Martin Kintrup, Stephanie Wenzel, Klaus-Maria Einwanger, Tanja Bischof, Harry Bischof, Jörn Rynio
Graefe Und Unzer Verlag - 2007
Meh. The pumpkin was nice, the cod (our substitute for zander) was nice, but there was hardly anything that connected the two. The dill pesto surely didn't, on the contrary, I don't know what that was doing in this dish. And it didn't even look appealing!
Added 10 October 2011:
We fried another few pieces of cod and re-heated yesterday's pumpkin and rice when I thought of adding a little sesame oil and soy sauce instead of using the dill pesto, plus using a few drops of butter from the fried cod - and it was soo much better!
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Modern Moroccan
By Ghillie Bhasan
Hermes House - 2003
Actually, this is more of a dip than a salad, although you can also eat it as a side dish. I hardly tasted any tomato, except for a slightly sweet taste, and just a faint hint of aubergine. The rest was spice, spice and garlic; in a way, we joked, it was like a spicy garlic mayonnaise but with much better nutritional values.
It was extremely delicious, and you can be sure we'll make this again, be it as a side dish or as a dip. We used homemade Harissa and served it with Mutton Leg Chops with Ginger and Pomegranate Salsa and buttery couscous, and it went together really well.
Crosspost. Exact the same recipe was also published in Ghillie Basan’s other Moroccan cookbook, Moroccan: A Culinary Journey of Discovery.
Edited 21 March 2016:
Served with Lamb and Apricot Stew, which worked really well!
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Moroccan: A Culinary Journey of Discovery (Food Lovers Collection)
By Ghillie Basan
Parragon Inc - 2007
Actually, this is more of a dip than a salad, although you can also eat it as a side dish. I hardly tasted any tomato, except for a slightly sweet taste, and just a faint hint of aubergine. The rest was spice, spice and garlic; in a way, we joked, it was like a spicy garlic mayonnaise but with much better nutritional values.
It was extremely delicious, and you can be sure we'll make this again, be it as a side dish or as a dip. We used homemade Harissa and served it with Mutton Leg Chops with Ginger and Pomegranate Salsa and buttery couscous, and it went together really well.
Crosspost. Exact the same recipe was also published in Ghillie Basan’s other Moroccan cookbook, Modern Moroccan.
Edited 11 March 2017:
It's a good idea to steam the aubergine in batches, especially when using larger amounts than given. I also only chopped everything this time, and I think I prefer the puréed version.
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Ice Cream: The Perfect Weekend Treat
By Susanna Tee
Parragon Inc - 2004
We actually chose this recipe as it seemed to be the only one not containing any eggs (or parts of) nor any mascarpone (raw cheese - although that probably wouldn't have been a problem) as we served this to my pregnant SIL. It was quite nice, but it's also pretty simple and definitely needs some pimping. What about a quick sauce of (frozen) berries? Or some cantuccini or bitterkoekjes added at last moment?
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The Olive and the Caper: Adventures in Greek Cooking
By Susanna Hoffman
Workman Publishing Company - 2004
Gah, this was horrible! White wine I can imagine, red wine just was a recipe for disaster. Even worse, apart from the red wine, it lacked flavour and was pretty watery even though I hadn't even added all the water - I had to add a lot more tomato concentrate, a quarter cube of stock and more savory to make something of it. Plus points for incorporating cabbage, but that's the only positive I can find, unfortunately. We used savoy cabbage, and white beans from a glass which I only added at the very last moment to heat through.
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Snowflakes and Schnapps
By Jane Lawson
Murdoch Books - 2010
As several of the book reviews on Amazon (both .com and .co.uk) mentioned the excellent Winter Vegetable Crumble, we thought we should give it a try. And in fact, it was very nice - though it wasn't as mind-blowing as you would expect after reading the reviews at Amazon.
I really loved two aspects: the crumble and the sauce. The crumble wasn't really crunchy, but I loved the flavour of the parmesan combined with ground hazelnuts (which we used as we ran out of ground almonds - try it, it's really an unusually successful accident!). And the sauce was just really good in taste.
The weak point were the veggies themselves. The recipe uses four different types of root vegetables, and you definitely didn't necessarily taste that; they all had more or less the same flavour and texture, and it didn't really help that they were all coated in sauce and buried in crumble. We had the dish as a main, but as the veggies were near indistinguishable, it was a bit one-dimensional as a single menu item. Next time, I would probably serve it as a side dish and not bother with a variety of half-used vegetables but just pick one or two.
Last, the minor issues: next to being nearly indistinguishable, the vegetables were also too soft - I would reduce their cooking time by several minutes, and also take into account how long they sit in the hot water before it starts boiling.* Also, we had to raise the oven temperature to 200°C to get everything baked and golden brown in 20 minutes.
The dish also contained bacon/pancetta cubes. They were nice, but not really necessary, and you can easily omit them to make the dish vegetarian.
(*) I'll have to admit, though, that this is exactly how I boil potatoes - put them into a pot, bring the water to a boil, and only then set the timer to 20 min.
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vegetarian
By alice hart
- 2000
Very delicious! Our soup was just slightly too hot, probably because DH added Tabasco in addition to the dried chilli - use either of the two, but definitely add one of them, it made the difference between a good and a very good soup. With more liquid resp. less filling, you could also serve it as a vegetarian appetizer.
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Grown in Britain Cookbook
By Carolyn Humphries, Donna Air
Dorling Kindersley - 2009
Quite a nice salad. It's nice in flavour and looks very beautiful with the purple colour from the cabbage. The only problem is that even though I had chopped the cabbage as fine as I could, it was still pretty hard to chew. Also, it's clearly meant to be served as a side dish, not as a light main course or lunch box; it's too simple and one-dimensional for that. I asked DH if it would help to grate the cabbage to make it easier to chew; but he thinks that would reduce the visual beauty of the salad, while the chewiness would matter less if you served it as a side dish.
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Yan-Kit's Classic Chinese Cook Book
By Yan-Kit So
Dorling Kindersley Publishers Ltd - 1987
Very delicious, though on the salty side of things. I'm afraid there's little you can do as it's mainly the black beans that are so salty, but try to cut salt wherever you can, eg. omit the salt in the marinade, use water instead of stock in the sauce, and possibly use just a little less of the black beans.
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Cooked: A Natural History of Transformation
By Michael Pollan
Penguin Press HC, The - 2013
When in the last days of December, DH announced that his New Year's resolution was to learn how to bake bread, specifically sourdough bread, I thought I'd look at a whole year of baking and experimenting. First came a white bread with only yeast, then a whole wheat toast (with yeast and sourdough), and then, when he started researching how yeast and sourdough actually worked, I realized that the chapter about bread in this book was exactly what he was looking for. And not only that, he decided to follow the recipe published in the appendix, and the result was great - we've been eating this bread ever since.
This bread works particularly well if you use one part normal white flour, one part whole wheat flour (see photo with the single bread); personally, I also like the version using meergranenmeel, a flour made of wheat flour plus eight ground seeds/grains such as sunflower seeds, linseed, oats and rye (see 2nd photo, bread on the right). It's also a great idea to add things like whole seeds and nuts - I've had a bread with said meergranenmeel with extra whole sunflower seeds and linseeds, one with toasted hazelnuts and linseeds, and a whole wheat bread with (untoasted) walnuts - all worked very nicely, though we never added more than 45g of extra ingredients to make sure the dough doesn't get too heavy.
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How To Eat In
By Adam Byatt
Bantam Press - 2010
It was extremely delicious - but you'll have to like it, and not eat too much too quickly, as it is really fatty. But then again, hey, what did you expect, it's pork belly! We were slightly disappointed that we didn't manage to get a really good crust; not even when we placed it under the grill today (day 2). Yet, in the end, it was still very delicious without.
I'm also not too sure what to think of the apples - they were nice, yes, but they felt more like a side dish as they only touched the pork belly once everything was plated and served - not that that necessarily is a bad thing. Also, the sugar that was sprinkled on top of the apples didn't really caramelize, not that that was a surprise - you can better sprinkle it around the apples to make that happen.
We didn't make the polenta but opted for traditional choice, plain boiled potatoes. I was glad to have the salad, as the very flavourful dressing provided for a sauce the pork didn't deliver. If I'd serve this with polenta I would definitely make sure to make a sauce for it!
Served with Pumpkin with Rosemary on Rocket with a Plum Vinaigrette, with Elderflower Sorbet and Blueberry Ice Cream as a dessert.
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Delicious (NL)
(July, 2011)
This beverage actually had the potential for four or five stars, if not...
To begin with, we were sceptical about the juice of 3 limes, without the addition of any sugar. We juiced one lime - and boy, it was sour! And how could it have not been, with only white wine and fruit that isn't necessarily known for being very sweet? I added 3 teapsoons of golden caster sugar to get a nice (slightly sweet) drink.
Furthermore, it was actually just a bottle of wine with fruit added. I don't know why, but this bothered me, and I thought it was too strong for a summer punch. Also, I would have enjoyed something with bubbles, be it water or sparkling wine or whatever. Given that it was too sour anyway, I would probably use the juice of 1/2 - 1 lime next time, add a few cans of 7up/Sprite, and then check if it needs any extra sugar.
Minor point of attention: The grapes will sink to the bottom of your jug. Bear that in mind and add a spoon :)
Edited two days later to add:
We kept the sangria in the fridge for two days, and it has become a lot sweeter! Unfortunately, however, that hasn't made it any tastier, or more exciting. Rather go for the much more exciting Vruchtenbowle!
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The Perfect Scoop: Ice Creams, Sorbets, Granitas, and Sweet Accessories
By David Lebovitz
Ten Speed Press,U.S. - 2007
It's very delicious - but only for the first three spoonfuls or so. After that, it becomes sickening sweet. It helps a lot to serve this with a tangy sauce (i.e. cranberry sauce), but I wouldn't serve it on it's own. I doubt that the sour cherry sauce given in the book is tangy enough to counterbalance the sweetness of this ice cream, but we haven't tried that yet.
We had intended to serve this mousse together with Sour Cherries in Syrup and the Kahlúa Chocolate Mousse for DH's birthday dinner; I'm glad we tested the both ice cream and mousse recipes before. Apart from the sweetness issue, the white chocolate ice cream couldn't hold up against the mousse; the mousse definitely required something fresh. I'm lobbying to pair the mousse off with with the Orange and Szechwan Pepper Ice Cream or maybe the Chocolate-Tangerine Sorbet - we'll see what he'll decide.
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100 Great Breads
By Paul Hollywood
Cassell Illustrated - 2004
Hey there, this is Friederike's husband, also known around these pages as 'DH'. I have decided to try my hand at bread baking and I used this recipe to get started.
Since I was just getting started, this bread did not turn out great. Lots of that is due to me not having acquired the proper techniques. However, I have some gripes about the recipe as well: it, or the book for that matter, does not tell you how important kneading is for breads, the amount of water specified was not sufficient at all, and more salt and some sugar is also needed.
Consequently, this bread did not rise very well the first time, and tasted quite flat. The second time I added more salt and some sugar and kneaded better, and the bread turned out better as well. Even then, a yeast bread from white flour has a slightly boring taste. All in all, the recipe works, but the result won't be something to write home about.
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Pure Simple Cooking: Effortless Meals Every Day
By Diana Henry
Ten Speed Press - 2009
Chorizo-flavoured textures...
The punchline actually says it all - all we tasted was chorizo, carried by various textures. To make things worse, it didn't actually work as the cabbage needed to cook for 20 minutes, not 3. Admittedly, we used half a pointed white/green cabbage, not a Savoy cabbage, but I don't think that made a difference - the Savoy cabbage in this recipe needs to be cooked 15-20 minutes as well. I don't really see the point of this dish, to be honest.
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The Olive and the Caper: Adventures in Greek Cooking
By Susanna Hoffman
Workman Publishing Company - 2004
Without the sweet potato skordalia it was pretty boring. With the skordalia, it was quite nice - but then again I'm afraid I'll find a lot of things nice with skordalia (except for dessert!).
That might have been partly my fault for not adding the full amount of olive oil. I realized that the reason the olive oil was in there in the first place was probably to add deepen the flavour, but 1/2 a cup seemed like a bit much. In the end, I added half the required amount. I also accidentally added too much celery, but that wasn't tragic.
Compared to the very similar White Bean Soup with Bacon, the other recipe definitely was the more interesting one. I think the reason is that the other recipe uses stock instead of water, roasts the mirepoix (carrots, celery and onions) before cooking it, and it uses bacon, which is always a good flavour boost (however, the sweet potato skordalia is a good substitute!).
What I liked about this recipe is that apart from boiling the beans before they are soaked (which seemed a bit unnecessary, but perhaps there is a reason for that?), this recipe seemed much simpler. But perhaps it's just the roasting of the mirepoix and the pureeing which added the extra steps to the other recipe. A version in between both recipes would probably be ideal.
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Grains
By Molly Brown
Hardie Grant Books - 2014
A very delicious soup - in fact, in terms of flavour this definitely merits a 4 star rating, but I had several issues with the recipe.
First of all, I would definitely not describe it as 'elegant', on the contrary. Our first association was Snert, a coarse (but very delicious) Dutch pea soup. Nor did it look elegant - it had a coarse texture, even after I had pureed it with a hand-held blender, and it was light brown instead of white.
Then, the blending process: puree this soup with a potato masher? Really? Even the bacon cubes? You must be kidding! As just mentioned, I used a hand-held blender, and even then the soup stayed coarse. Not a bad thing, just not what was promised.
Last, flavour: I used the cream, and I wouldn't do it again, the soup is heavy enough by itself, and I didn't like the sweetness added by the cream. I actually made the soup a day in advance which was really helpful as there was a lot of fat and keeping the soup in the fridge overnight meant that it was easy to get rid of some of that fat. Alternatively, you don't really need to add any olive oil when frying the carrot, celery and bacon, as long as you add the bacon first (I always forget).
That said, I've cooked comparatively few recipes with grains, especially beans, and I liked this one. I might try the very similar version with skordalia from The Olive and The Caper soon.
Edited a week later:
This soup was actually a lot better than the version with skordalia from The Olive and The Caper. It's a bit more complex, but has more depth of flavour. However, if you want a vegetarian version, then substituting the bacon with skordalia (and the chicken stock with vegetable one) is the way to go!
Edited 24 November 2016:
We made this soup again, but chose not to purée it - and I actually quite liked it that way! Upgraded from three to four stars.
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Roast Figs, Sugar Snow: Food to Warm the Soul
By Diana Henry
Mitchell Beazley - 2008
Brilliant! The meat was so tender it just fell of the bones, and the sauce with apples/cider, rosemary and bacon (we used normal cubed bacon) was incredibly flavourful. Absolutely recommended, and a delicious autumn/winter dinner. Served with the remaining Braised Shallot (Onion) Confit), a very nice combintation.
Edited 2 August 2015:
Served with the cabbage as cooked according to this recipe twice already - savoy cabbage works really well with this dish, green/white cabbage less so.
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Website: Dr. Oetker
Very nice cookies! The texture was very good (crunchy yet fluffy), and then you had those chunks of chocolate... recommended!
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Meine Landküche
(Sep/Oct, 2011)
Just not worth the effort. I thought it would be a casserole, but actually it was more of a savoury pumpkin and cheese bread pudding.
My first issue with this recipe was the bread, as they didn't suggest using normal bread but required a specially baked loaf of pumpkin bread - only to make you cut it up and use it in this dish. Why should you do that? Why not just use leftover slices, and eat the freshly baked bread seperately? And who actually has the time to bake bread from scratch for a cooked dinner? Obviously, I just used normal, store-bought bread.
Then the proportions seemed quite off. I used about a third loaf of bread, and more than double the amount of pumpkin listed - after all, it's the pumpkin that's the most important ingredient in this dish. I also reduced the amount of cheese, though I later on figured that it could use a little more cheese.
However, in the end that didn't really matter. The bread was soggy, and the pumpkin and the cheese just seemed coincidental ingredients.
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The New English Table: Over 200 Recipes That Will Not Cost The Earth
By Rose Prince
Fourth Estate Ltd - 2008
Very nice, but I still prefer my both MIL's version (gotta ask her where her recipe's from), and the relatively similar Three Green Vegetable Soup. Quite liquid, if you like that, and needs to be salted heavily.
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Taste: A New Way to Cook
By Sybil Kapoor, David Loftus
Mitchell Beazley - 2003
Strip the watercress of its leaves and discard the stalks? Ms Kapoor, you’re not serious, what will left of the watercress? Hardly anything. I chose to ignore this direction and just used the watercress including the stalks (perhaps this is a misunderstanding, and she meant some tougher stalks that were already removed?). I used smoked salmon instead of bacon, and it was very delicious! Be careful with adding salt, though.
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How to Cook Everything Vegetarian: Simple Meatless Recipes for Great Food
By Mark Bittman, Alan Witschonke
Wiley - 2007
BF loved it, I found it just okay. The dressing was very nice, even ‘sophisticated’, but I disliked the fact that the rocket (or rather the lamb's lettuce we used instead of rocket) was prone to become limp due to the heat of the chickpeas.
Also, I felt it was a little dull due to the lack of interesting main ingredients - chickpeas and rocket (or lamb's lettuce) just isn't enough. I preferred the very similar Chickpea, Goat’s Cheese and Rocket Salad (with tomatoes) from Delicious Magazine (May 2009); perhaps I might make it with the Bittman-dressing next time.
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Website: Habeas Brulee
I wasn't too enthusiastic about this dish. The ground walnuts made the sauce somewhat granular, and also the sauce tasted slightly of something that I didn't add to the sauce, although I forgot quite what it was (I made this dish at least four month ago, and it didn't seem to be very memorable). I loved the plate in the photos, though!
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The Olive and the Caper: Adventures in Greek Cooking
By Susanna Hoffman
Workman Publishing Company - 2004
A very nice cake, goes well with coffee (haha :) ). I used zwieback and normal (not toasted) walnuts; you can probably tweak this recipe to make it suitable for people on a gluten-free diet as my guess is that it's easier to substitute the zwieback than it would be to substitute flour. I forgot to measure the quantity of the syrup and just poured everything over it, but luckily that wasn't a problem. I really liked the structure of the cake.
Because of the spices, it reminded me very much of Christmas and I'm considering making the cake again in December, though I would then probably use another syrup, i.e. vanilla, cinnamon or cardamom syrup, and perhaps even coat it in a layer of chocolate.
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Ice Cream: The Perfect Weekend Treat
By Susanna Tee
Parragon Inc - 2004
Very nice ice cream, though not overwhelmingly so. Actually, I ended up substituting most of the ingredients - pecan nuts for walnuts, sugar beet syrup for maple syrup, and koffie room for evaporated milk - turns out that contrary to what I thought the former was homogenised, sterilised, non-evaporated cream. I found out while making the ice cream (the cream didn't turn stiff when beaten) but otherwise I don't think the difference was noticeable.
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Die echte Jeden-Tag-Küche
By Sabine Sälzer
Graefe Und Unzer Verlag - 2004
Very nice. It was slightly too sweet in the beginning, though the addition of a little salt quickly resolved that. I made it as a lunchbox for DB, and to my surprise even the grated apples held well. I didn't make my own mayonnaise as described in the recipe, so it was a bit difficult to estimate the amount of mayonnaise to be used, but I guess in the end that's a matter of taste anyway. And I should have mixed the mayonnaise, yoghurt and seasonings before adding the apples and veggies, not after.
I was surprised that there seem to be two ways of preparing Waldorf Salad: those with celery sticks, such as in How to Cook Everything Vegetarian or in The Scandinavian Cookbook, and those with celeriac, such as this one. I've never before heard that you would prepare Waldorf Salad with anything else than celeriac before, so of course I'm absolutely convinced that this must be the original version :)
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The Wagamama Cookbook (Cookery)
By Hugo Arnold
Kyle Cathie - 2004
Not a success. It's being presented as (quote DB) 'the best thing since sliced bread' - but it's just not a very nice dressing, and far too complicated. And yes, they write that you need to practice this a few times to get it right - but who would want to practice a salad dressing? Really, I've got better things to do...
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Website: De thuiskok - NRC
Brilliant drink. It's fairly unusual (with cucumber, grapes, melon and ginger, amongst others), but these ingredients combine surprisingly well.
You might find it a little on the sweet side, in which case you could use a very dry sparkling wine, or replace it with white rum and sparkling water altogether (white rum might be a good idea either way). Don't use Ginger Ale for the alcohol-free version, much too sweet; rather use sparkling water.
Add the mint early on in the process, so that its flavours are absorbed into the drink as well - such a shame to use it only as decoration. Basil would work perfectly well, too.
The recipe is actually a punch - but why not serve it as a kind of white sangria, by adding more liquid in proportion to fruit? One of the reasons I really enjoyed it is that I can see it as a drink on a lazy afternoon on the balcony just as well as served during a flashy garden party. And with all its green ingredients it definitely is an eye-catcher!
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Website: BBC Good Food
Very nice, though to be honest you didn't taste the vodka - you might just as well just fry the chorizo before serving them.
Served with Pears in Parma Ham as an appetizer.
Edited 8 November 2013:
We had the rest of the chorizo today and only fried it - it ended up being hard and crisp, as opposed to the softer chorizo from a few days ago. So apparently even if the vodka does not impart a lot of flavour, it does help in keeping the chorizo soft, if that's what you like.
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The Kitchen Diaries: A Year in the Kitchen
By Nigel Slater
Fourth Estate Ltd - 2007
Very delicious! Watercress is a really good idea, it's peppery taste complements the salad very well. If you can't get watercress, rocket is probably the best substitute.
The dressing was very good. I used only the juice of half a lime instead of a whole one which was a good idea. The dressing could have used a little more chilli, though that will really depend on what kind of chilli you use (we used a large one as we couldn't get bird's eye chilli).
I was worried that it wouldn't be suitable as a lunch box salad - the grated carrots could dry out, the beef of course has a limited shelf life; but actually it worked quite well. Admittedly, we cooked the beef until it was done, just to be on the safe side. DH also mentioned that he would have liked to see a little more beef next time.
A lot better than the Thai Beef Salad we made before.
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Aufläufe & Gratins
A bit boring. It didn't really come together as a tart, it rather felt like a few random vegetables interspersed with a little puff pastry.
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Website: BBC Good Food
Nice but not particularly mind-blowing. It needs a lot more spices than specified (try using the double amount), and I felt that the sauce was too much liquid too - either cut back on the amount of liquid added, or try to make the sauce thicker one way or other.
Edited to add:
It also tastes nice cold, especially on such hot days as these. Definitely double the amount of spices and add some salt.
Edited 7 January 2015:
I made this again and used the double amount of spices - much better already, but still not particularly impressive. But even so, it is so easy to make that I guess it will end up being a standard on our weekday dinner menu. I forgot to add less liquid, but solved that by using the cooking liquid to cook the couscous, which works quite nicely.
I would also suggest changing the ratio of the vegetables - I don't think courgette/zucchini works particularly well in this dish, though I'm not quite sure substituting an aubergine for one of the courgettes would make it any better. Definitely add more raisins, perhaps one or two bell peppers, and possibly more chickpeas?
Upgraded from a 3 to a 4 star rating.
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101 Healthy Eats ("Good Food")
By Jane Hornby
BBC Books - 2008
Nice but not particularly mind-blowing. It needs a lot more spices than specified (try using the double amount), and I felt that the sauce was too much liquid too - either cut back on the amount of liquid added, or try to make the sauce thicker one way or other.
Edited to add:
It also tastes nice cold, especially on such hot days as these. Definitely double the amount of spices and add some salt.
useful (1)
Complete Vegetarian
By Nicola Graimes
Lorenz Books - 2006
Very delicious, very aromatic dish! Works just as well as a side dish and as a very simple main dish, if you serve it with some extra vegs.
Edited 30 March 2012 to add:
Very delicious. Contrary to what I thought I didn't have any sweetcorn in the cupboard, so I substituted it with more peas and carrot. I accidentally added 2 tsp whole cumin instead of 1/2 tsp, so I omitted the ground cumin at the end, but I added about a 1/8 tsp ground cardamom (which was a bad idea) and a 1/16 tsp cinnamon (which was good). The cashew nuts will be quite soft if you cook them along with the pilau - I would rather recommend roasting them in a seperate pan and adding them right at the very end.
Served 2 1/2 - 3 as a sole main course, so follow the advice above for an extra vegetable dish if it's supposed to be dinner.
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The Olive and the Caper: Adventures in Greek Cooking
By Susanna Hoffman
Workman Publishing Company - 2004
Hmm. A lot of effort, little result.
Obviously, one of the problems you will always have with aubergine is that it will absorb a lot of fat, but frying the potatoes slice for slice didn't necessarily make that better. You could circumvent this problem by baking the aubergines in the oven, and by cooking the potatoes until halfway done instead of frying them; this also cuts back the amount of work you'll have.
I also felt that the dish as a whole missed some kind of a sauce; I probably would have added a tomato sauce.
Other than that, it was nice enough, but not necessarily something I'd go back to.
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Essen & Trinken
(October, 2009)
Very delicious, but the title isn't correct. Instead it should be something like 'Braised Veal with Roquefort, Sage and Fried Pears'.
We didn't use veal but pork, and that probably was for the better. The meat was already slightly dry - veal would have been a lot drier yet. I think you could either use a t-bone steak to prevent this from happening, or fry the steak, braise the onions at the same time in a pan, then assemble and place under a grill to get the cheese melted. Speaking of cheese, the roquefort was too strong for this dish, though again pork could keep up better than veal would have done. I would suggest using a mild blue cheese or equal amounts of roquefort and mascarpone, or just mascarpone exclusively, as is the case in Falling Cloudberries very similar Pan-fried Veal Chops with Lemon, Sage and Mascarpone (might try that one later this week). Finally, the sauce: could have been a lot thicker!
Yet, all in all, very delicious and well worth the effort if you have the time!
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Culinaria Germany
By Konemann
Ullmann Publishing - 2006
The veal was expensive, and the result did not match the cost. I suspect the fault rather lies with me than with them, though I couldn’t put my finger on it...
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