30. Juni 2006

i am very inspired

oooooh, ordering this farm box (thanks for the propper english expression, tea!) was probably the best thing (food-wise) i have done in a long time! i was thinking about recipes, variations and dinner options all day! i virtually could not think of anything else at work and i am glad that i could leave early to meet my mother and my sister. they where in linz today and when they gave me a ride home i was rambling about my delicious veggies the entire way home :) i think i don't need to mention that my girls are inspiring me a lot!

today they inspired me to pimp my zucchini

2 zucchinis
1 onion
1 mozzarella
oil, salt, chili, fennel seeds

01 cut zucchinis in half
02 put in the oven and give them a quick roast to soften the inside
04 saute the onions in a little oil
05 scratch out a bit of the the inside and sprinkle with fennel seeds
06 put the zucchinis back in the oven
07 mix the zucchini-pulp with the onion and season with salt, chili a fennel seeds. keep stir-frying the mixture
08 cut mozzarella
09 when the pulp-mixture is done take the zucchinis out of the oven and put the pulp-mix and the mozzarella on top
10 bake for another 15 minutes or so, until the mozzarella is turning slightly brown.
11 this might work as a side dish as well :)

zucchini deluxe & überbacken

i have one word for you: a-m-a-z-i-n-g!!!

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29. Juni 2006

my very first "gemüsekiste"

gemüsekiste

perfect! now i don't have to carry my vitamins home anymore, the'll be delivered right to my front door! as i found out last week there's a farmer near linz who offeres various boxes of veggies, fruits, and you can even get bread and other bio-products from other local farmers! i ordered over the internet and i am quite content with how fast my order was processed and how very obliging they handled my calls and mails.

my first treasure chest is called "die bunte" (the colorful) and contains salad, strawberries, carrots, peaches, tomatos (oh damn, i forgot to mention that i don't like tomatos!!), lemons, zucchinis and onions. great! i am so looking forward to cooking dinner today!

addendum:

i was cooking the tomatos today, imagine that! i was so excited (and so hungry) that i completely forgot to take a picture and post it here :) i don't acutally have a recipe, but i made an italian-style sauce for my pasta. i was blanching the tomatos, then i peeled and diced them. i also used the delicious spring onions and did sauté them before adding the tomatos. i added some more basil and a little salt and threw in some mozzarella. this sauce was incredibly easy and quick and it tasted like heaven! and finally i can make use of unloved tomatos! i never ever would buy tomatos on purpose, but now i have a good recipe and i might hit the tomato display in the veggie section of my supermarket every once in a while ... oh wait, i don't have to! i can just wait for them to arrive on my doorstep :)

22. Juni 2006

colorful dishes

colorful abwasch

lately my siblings and i give eachother little presents for no reason from time to time. today was my lucky day because i got some rather special stuff from my sister and her boyfriend:

i am totally into glass and white as far as my tableware are concerned, yet my little sis knows that i need some color in my life. red for example. it's her favorite color and picking it for my new cereal bowl and coffee cup was a brilliant idea!

thanks baby! you know what's good for your elderly sister!

18. Juni 2006

if you want to pep it up, just "strudl" it!

on my last post i mentioned that i sometimes transgress my rule of low cal by wrapping my veggies up in puff pastry. as much as i like that, i really need to pull myself together in order not to drift off into my old habits.i figured i could still indulge in wrapped up food and make it a little healthier. on my quest to substitute the junk with healthy stuff i once more was digging into our family traditions.

i was always fascinated with the way my grandma used to make strudl. though it was mainly the plain old apfelstrudel on our menu we would also have a savoury strudl every once in a while.

the greatest thing however was watching my grandma preparing the dough for the filling , which we call "strudlziagn" - loosely translated as "pulling the strudl". i was sitting next to her, my legs dangling under the dinnertable and i was completely hypnotized by the way she was transforming a sticky lump into waferthin and perfect sheets of strudl the size of the dinner table. that was real art. it was tricky, you had to be quick and i never ever have seen one single hole ripped in her thin sheets of dough. you could virtually read a paper through it. how she managed to do this was beyond me. and it still is, actually.

sometimes some of the grandchildren where allowed to help and granny would give us little lumps of dough and a dish cloth and we would make a sticky something that was looking like a pizza. displeased with our poor achievments she would always grab the "pizza", scrunch the dough up, lifting it up in the air and letting it hang from her hands and pulling it in shape at first. when it had the right size she would place the dough on the cloth and with quick movements she pulled and tuged a litte - within less than a minute our lumpy stuff was a perfekt piece of raw material for her strudl.

in remembrance of my late grandmother i tried to make the perfekt strudl myself today. don't get me wrong, i have made strudl before. you just HAVE to make strudl when you're austrian :). but i always bought the thin sheets of strudldough. today i actually tried to make the dough myself and i did the "strudlziagn" myself as well. THIS was the real challenge.

125 g flour
1 tablespoon vegetable oil
a dash of salt
water as needed (about 100 ml)

01 sift the flour onto your working space or in a bowl
02 make a dent in the middle and add oil, salt and water
03 combine to a smooth dough and let rest at room temperature for about twenty minutes
04 you can use a rolling pin to bring the dough in shape. you can also use your hands and try the traditional way of "strudlziagn *ggg*

as you can see, i did not really succeed, i ripped the sheet while i was rolling the strudl. hey, this is really a hard thing to do with such delicate pastry! but even the leaking thing is rather nice to look at. so i don't count this as a flop, i actually am rather proud of the outcome.

strudl nacher

guess my grandma would be proud too ... well, actually, i think she would have grabed my lumpy thing and made some propper strudelteig out of it :)

i still miss her sorely.

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3. Juni 2006

watching my weight apparently makes me a pretty dull foodblogger

i hardly ever cook something spectacular now. i braise my vegetables, i steam my meat - actually i hardly ever eat meat. i feast on fruits and vegetables and the apple has replaced my beloved sausage sandwich. i switched to light stuff and products that have less calories, fat and e-numbers in them. strangely enough i have a weird craving for spelt, buckwheat and amaranth ... hm ...

i allow myself sweets though. well, not sweets actually, but sweet things. like 70% dark chokolate. i guess this is why i don't have the munchies for opulent dishes right now - it makes me stick to my plan and the good news is that i have like 3 kilos less than 2 weeks ago. and my pants fit better.

as i am getting acquainted to the odd bio lifestyle i sometimes can not resist wrapping up steames veggies and roast turkey breast in puff pastry which actually shoud be shunt from my fridge since it has way too much calories ... eh! what the hell!


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