Fenheļa-avokado salāti ar greipfrūtu / Mīlestības salāti

According to some statistic, most people will not get a romantic present on Valentine's Day. So instead of trying to figure out your feelings about Valentine's Day, "turn the steak around" (Swedish expression) and

give your loving attention to someone this Valentine's Day. Your kid, your dog, your awesome relative that always comes through for you (but what have you done for them lately?).
To celebrate you, your body, and the fact that it was still pretty light out yesterday at 5 pm (I could not believe it!), here is a delicious and pretty salad (recepte zemāk būs latviski). This fennel-avocado salad with grapefruit is also part of my 2015 foodie resolutions to make one new sweet and one new salty dish a month (so this is January's "salty", a bit belated).

Sastāvdaļas:

sviests

1 fenhelis

2 avokado

dažas greipfrūta daiviņas

olīveļļa

sāls (skaisti būs ar sāls skaidiņām)

 

Darba secība:

Pannā izkausē sviesta piku (jo vairāk sviesta, jo garšīgāk).

Noskalo fenheli un nogriež tam "artērijas" ("zarus", kas aug no sīpola) un ja ir kāds nesmukums, nogriež arī to. Sagriež fenheļa skaisto sīpolu ("sirdi") daiviņās vai strēmelēs, kā pats grib, un apcep sviestā, lai fenhelis kļūst mīksts un nedaudz zeltains.

Nomizo un sagriež avokado.

Nomizo dažas greipfrūta daiviņas, lai būtu bez baltās mizas (kā bildē).

Visu kārto uz šķīvja, apslaka ar olīveļļu un pārkaisa ar drusciņ sāli (jo ļoti viegli uzbērt par daudz).

 

Notes:

Greipfrūts ir vairāk skaistumam un mazam garšas akcentam, tāpēc labāk mazāk nekā vairāk. Lūdzu, es varētu šos salātus ēst katru dienu.

Receptes ideja no žurnāla Buffé, 2015.gada 1.numura, 15.lpp. Tur arī padoms, ka šie salāti brīnišķīgi piestāv pie laša - nu protams! Krāsnī cepts lasis ir Pieliekamā vispopulārākā recepte. Kamēr lasis savā nodabā cepas krāsnī, var sataisīt šos salātus, un vakariņas gatavas.

Lai izdodas!

 

Paldies, ka ieskatījies Pieliekamajā!



Musli batoniņi / Musli bars

How I "wasted" expensive musli, but there are lessons learned (recepte zemāk būs latviski). These musli bars are part of my 2015 foodie resolutions, and I'm happy to report that

this recipe checks two resolution boxes: both my "one new sweet thing a month" and "utilize all food".

One of the food items that I regularly throw out is egg white that I have left over after using the yolk. So I had this one musli bar recipe set aside for quite a while because it called for egg whites. I have now tried this recipe, and my conclusion is this: musli bars is not my thing.

 

I would have been so happy to eat this expensive, GI (glycemic index)-smart musli with milk, and I would have been so happy to eat a fig or two with my coffee. But in bar form, this snack was neither here nor there for me. I wanted the bars to taste much sweeter. Dip them in dark chocolate, perhaps?

Bottom line: I love this musli as a treat, I just won't put it in bar form. But I am glad I tried this recipe. Now the recipe in Latvian, and after that some conclusions in English again.

 

Sastāvdaļas:

7 dl (1dl = 100ml) musli (Risenta GI-gudrais muslis ar godži ogām, ķirbju un saulespuķu sēklām, kinoa un griķu pārslām)

12 žāvētas vīģes (apm. 250gr = 1 paciņa)

2 tējk. medus

1 ēd.kar. kanēļa (man bija par daudz, liktu mazāk)

4 olu baltumi

3 ēd.kar. sezama sēklu

 

Darba secība:

Uzsilda cepeškrāsni uz 125C. Sagatavo cepamo plāti ar cepampapīru (es izsmērēju arī ar sviestu, nezinu, vai vajadzēja). Ja muslī ir mandeles vai citi rieksti, nedaudz sasmalcina.

Sasmalcina vīģes, lai būtu diezgan lipīga masa ar vīģu gabaliņiem. Bļodā nedaudz sakuļ olbaltumus, tad maisa kopā visas sastāvdaļas, lai būtu lipīga mīkla.

Uz plāts veido divus kukuļus, lipina kopā, lai sanāk apmēram šādi:

Liek cepties krāsns viducī uz 20 min.

Atdzisušus sagriež gabalos un uzglabā ledusskapī slēgtā traukā.

 

Notes:

Recepte ir no paciņas, no Risenta GI-smart musli.

 

The awesome thing is that one of the egg-whites that I used was over a week, maybe two weeks, old. I am "thorough with hygiene" (such a Swedish saying :), "noga med hygien") when I save the egg-whites, so now I have learned that a chilled egg-white can keep in the fridge for quite a while (do the sniff test, of course, and use common sense).

 

Click here for my 2015 foodie resolutions.

 

Thank you for stopping by Pieliekamais!



Warm red beet salad with wheat berries

This red beet salad is part of my foodie resolution plan for 2015-  to respect and use up all food. Secretly I love it that this salad turned out so beautiful and fancy-looking (two people asked whether those were pomegranate seeds in the salad), and even fancy-sounding,

when all I tried to do was use up a bag of red beets that were about to wilt in the fridge.

This is what I did: I cooked the beets (unpeeled), and then the beets sat in the fridge for two days and nothing happened. I decided to fry up the beets (peeled) in some rapeseed oil (similar to canola oil, I think). I chose rapeseed oil over olive oil for the nuttier, richer taste of the former.

If you've ever eaten just fried up red beets, you'll know that it is not a very filling meal in itself. So I started looking for some carbs, and found a can of wheat berries. Canned wheat berries is one of my best culinary finds of last year. I drained and rinsed the wheat berries and added them to the pan, and lowered the heat. 

Then I remembered that I have a tetra of cooked big white beans, so in they went. And since one of the food items that I often throw out is wilted herbs, I decided to go ahead and chop up the whole package of dill that was sitting in the fridge.

I added a little lemon juice, and the final pieces of blue cheese that were also drying up in the fridge, and this turned  out to be one of the loveliest, and prettiest dishes of this year so far. It was also very filling.

There you have it! Now go look in your fridge/freezer/pantry to see what you can create today. And deciding that you'll make do with what you have at home, so no need to venture out to the store today, isn't that one of the neatest feelings ever?

Cozy weekend, everyone! It's snowing and so beautiful outside.

Thank you for stopping by Pieliekamais!

My 3 Foodie New Year's Resolutions for 2015

Here are my foodie New Year's resolutions for this year:

1. Utilize all food. What this really means is "stop throwing food away". A very popular statistic in Sweden states that every fourth bag of groceries gets thrown out. I'd like to hope that I am not that bad, but I do let some food go to waste. So the idea is to use up everything. I have a few specific ideas of how I'm going to do that. Below is a recent utilization attempt:

I had some button mushrooms that had almost started to wilt/mold in the fridge that I fried up in butter. I added some cooked carrots and chicken fillets left over from rosols (Latvian potato salad). I mixed in some cooked pasta with a feta-cheese like mix, and some sauteed fennel. And I also added some leftover salmon. This mix of "leftovers" was SO good, and so filling.

2. Make one new salty and one new sweet recipe each month.

By new I mean really take a new recipe and follow through. Perhaps a chance to crack open those cookbooks I've bought, but haven't really used.

3. Most importantly, have fun in the kitchen! I love the picture below:

I'd love to learn how to knock out "gourmet"-sounding dishes like chicken cordon bleu and the like, but most of all I would like to have this much fun in the kitchen.

Photo source: buzzfeed

We're going to have quarterly updates on these goals, so if you'd like to do this project with me (any one of the three goals, or all of them), the goal is to have the first update at the end of March.

So summarize: respect food, innovation, and fun!

Thank you for stopping by Pieliekamais!