Daring Kitchen: June - Terrine

Our hostesses this month, Evelyne of Cheap Ethnic Eatz, and Valerie of a The Chocolate Bunny, chose delicious pate with freshly baked bread as their June Daring Cook’s challenge! They’ve provided us with 4 different pate recipes to choose from and are allowing us to go wild with our homemade bread choice.

An ideal challenge for someone who loves pate. Unfortunately, the free-range chicken livers that were purchased for this challenge turned into a buttery rich meal with caramelized onions and grapes. More on that later.

We all know that I'm not a baker. Bread and I don't get along. There was the time, years ago, that I tried to make croissants. I put hours into the ordeal, only to wake up on Sunday morning, pop the effort of the last 6 hours into the oven and a few minutes later ask: where's the rest of them? I don't know why bread does not rise in my kitchen. Presumably, bread has risen in those kitchens when other people inhabited them, but there is no remaining evidence. This is my excuse for not posting photos of my malformed loaf.

Because I'm not posting on a malformed loaf, one could conclude that my pate was spectacular. The pate was spectacular, but only on relative terms. I thought it would be interesting to try something new, like a terrine or something that involved savoury jell-o. Years ago on the beach outside of Monte Carlo, I had a fantastic homemade terrine, made by my friend's mother-in-law. While I am aware of the fact that she is an excellent cook, as is her daughter, I thought I could improvise anything involving gelatin. Here, I was proven wrong. I should have added more gelatin to every layer. I tried spinach, roasted garlic & peppers and cream cheese with freshly grated horseradish. Did we eat it? Yes. Was it a surreal terrine on the beach of the South of France moment? No. Will anything be a surreal terrine on the beach of the South of France moment? Certainly. I just have to make a few phone calls first.

Daring Cooks May - Enchiladas

Our hosts this month, Barbara of Barbara Bakes and Bunnee of Anna+Food have chosen a delicious Stacked Green Chile & Grilled Chicken Enchilada recipe in celebration of Cinco de Mayo! The recipe, featuring a homemade enchilada sauce was found on www.finecooking.com and written by Robb Walsh.

When I read about the enchiladas I had to make this month, I got unnaturally excited. I haven't had much Mexican food since I moved over to Germany. I think there was a Mexican place not too far from where I live but it has since turned into a French restaurant, adding one more eatery to the list of "food from our neighbouring country". Mexican on the other hand, is not common. It is more common to find a Spanish restaurant here in Germany than a Mexican one. This is of course, the complete opposite of North America, where it is much easier to find Mexican food. (For an amusing take on this problem, see The Onion's article: Restaurant Turns Out To Be Spanish, Not Mexican)

Suffering from a lack of Mexican restaurants means that there will be a certain lack of Mexican ingredients as well. It is extremely difficult to find tortillas, for example. I could go to my local Turkish donair shop & get them to roll me yufkas, which are like kinda like tortillas. I could try to deconstruct a nacho chip & make enchiladas out of those. Fortunately, I have a friend from Central America who wanted to make tortillas and had a bag of corn flour at home. Neither of us really know how to roll tortillas. We've seen our moms do it (mine rolled roti - another flatbread like a yufka) but never knew how to do it ourselves.

rolling tortillas

Being far away from home, far away from not only families but the cultures we call home, it makes me aware of the value of cultural goods. The value of not only having my mom around - I'm already aware of her value - but also of having people with similar backgrounds around. The next problem in the enchilada recipe was Anaheim chilies. I don't know offhand what exactly an Anaheim chili is, but research showed that it's a mild chili. I bought the next best thing. Which resulted in a very deadly hot dish. Would this problem have been avoided had I been at home? Maybe not. But at least there, I have more than 2 chili varieties to chose from. Here, it was either red or green. I picked green.

Dinner was still edible. If only because there was some yogurt in the fridge and a bottle of tequila on the table. Being far away from home has drawbacks, certainly, but there's something to be said for spending an evening with friends who share commonalities.

Finished product: deadly hot stacked enchiladas

Daring Cooks - March - Risotto

The 2010 March Daring Cooks challenge was hosted by Eleanor of MelbournefoodGeek and Jess of Jessthebaker. They chose to challenge Daring Cooks to make risotto. The various components of their challenge recipe are based on input from the Australian Masterchef cookbook and the cookbook Moorish by Greg Malouf.

It's been a busy month. I haven't posted, I've been at work instead. I'd rather be posting. Frankly, if I hadn't completed the challenge the day it was revealed, I would have never got around to it. I was in the process of making a chicken soup with leftover chicken scraps from my freezer and I saw that this month's challenge involved making your own stock for risotto. So I cheated a little. It's The Daring Kitchen. I haven't adhered 100% to the recipies to date, why start now? I had the start of Jaden Hair's pho on the stove, from a previous challenge. This stock can be used for risotto, no problems. The thing is, I'm not really into risotto at home. Many people view it as aperfect comfort food - it has carbs, is creamy and warm - but I prefer to make fake risottos. I use quinoa. So 2 cheats. 1, I didn't use the proper stock (but it was homemade) and 2) I used quinoa instead of rice. Nonetheless, I was happy. I managed to accomplish at least one post for the month.

Daring Cooks - February - Mezze

The 2010 February Daring COOKs challenge was hosted by Michele of Veggie Num Nums. Michele chose to challenge everyone to make mezze based on various recipes from Claudia Roden, Jeffrey Alford and Naomi Dugid.

A few weeks ago, the fondest memories of last January came back: Mezze in Kuwait. For whatever reason, last year I found myself in the middle of the desert with a scarf in my hair, looking to explore. Exploring isn't easy for a woman alone in the Middle East. I was miserable. Our hotel was in the middle of nowhere and the internet connection was ridiculously slow. There was one thing that had me excited: having dinner in one of these private tents.


The food was fantastic. I have no idea what it was but it was great. Warm weather (for someone who lives in Germany), bright sun, a couple of camels & mezze. The only thing that made me really want to leave was a glass of wine and a slice of Spanish ham (neither of which are allowed in Kuwait).


When Michelle posted her challenge, I knew this would be a chance to taste those middle eastern memories. I planned to make the hummus with a roasted red pepper. I started to knead the dough for pita bread. Something came up, I had to put the dough in the fridge overnight. I took it out the next day, rolled it out & placed it in a hot oven. At this point, I should note that I've never been able to make bread. Bread never really rises in the oven when I make it. One of my pitas puffed up, but not really. I left them in a little longer, hoping they just needed more time. The result: pita chips. Oh well, not bad.

The hummus was divine, the olives I had just bought from the market were great, and I have this supermarket around the corner that sells fresh pita bread. As wonderful as the smell of freshly baked bread is, as long as I live close to good bakeries, I'm going to outsource the task of baking.

Daring Cooks - January - Satay Chicken

"The January 2010 DC challenge was hosted by Cuppy of Cuppylicious and she chose a delicious Thai-inspired recipe for Pork Satay from the book 1000 Recipes by Martha Day."

Words that should inspire me. Instead, they filled me with one of the most regretful sentiments, nostalgia.


Last year, the Workaholic and I found ourselves in the night market of Kuala Lumpur. It was an adventure that was slightly outside of our comfort zone, if only because we both had fears of eating undercooked anything and spending a day not able to leave the hotel. After scouring the street hawkers, we decided to nibble on small things, and the first thing we had were satay skewers. I've never been a huge fan of satay anything in the past, but they were there, they were small, they were non-committal. We ordered our skewers, the man told us how much it was while holding the meat-covered wooden sticks in the fire and just as we completed the financial part of the transaction, we got our meat. Were we afraid that this was undercooked & going to force us to make use of our international health insurance? Yes. We tenatatively bit in, dipping the meat in the little plastic bag of sauce that came with it. We were delighted. They were fantastic, succulent flavourful pieces of meat that, most importantly, dissolved all fear of hawker food. I fell in love with the food, the scenery and would so love to go back. I think the Workaholic would like to as well.

The satay skewers I made were 1) doomed to never be the satay skewers of my memories, 2) not grilled because my grill is covered in snow, and 3) not on skewers. I don't really think that the skewers made much of a difference, as the idea is to tenderize the meat through the marinade, and the meat was juicy and tender. They just weren't the same spices. This should come as no surprise, the recipe was a British interpretation of Thai, not potentially frightening Malaysian flavour that I had in mind.


The Workaholic bit into his dinner and asked, "Shouldn't they be spicier?" I had to agree. I followed Cuppy's recipe but it just didn't work out for us. The peanut sauce, on the other hand, was fantastic. The Workaholic found it to be too sweet (we don't eat any sugar any more) but I have been eating spoonfuls of leftover sauce out of the fridge (don't pretend as if you never do that!).

We may try other recipes for satay skewers that actually involve me going out to the grill and getting the burn marks I should. I might add fish sauce and chilis. Whatever I do, I'm waiting until the snow melts.

Daring Kitchen December - Something in a Croute

I've been ridiculously busy in the last little while. When the Workaholic gives me a hard time for not synching my calendar, I simply reply, "I haven't even had time to blog!" He then understands the gravity of the situation. If it weren't for the Daring Kitchen Challenge (and my constant threat of being kicked out for non-participation) I wouldn't even be blogging today. The challenge didn't really appeal to me right away, but I figured I could do some tweaking to make it more for me.

The 2009 Daring Cooks challenge was hosted by Simone of Junglefrog Cooking. Simone chose Salmon en Croute (or alternative recipes for Beef Wellington or Vegetable en Croute) from Good Food Online.

I'm allergic to fish. And I didn't really want to have beef. And then there's the problem with chicken that I prefer thighs and they don't really fit into crusts. And then the Workaholic isn't a big fan of mushrooms. What does this leave me with? Spinach. Feta. Sundried tomatoes and a bit of black olives. All of this in a crust of puff pastry. As mentioned before, I've been crazy-busy the last little while, so I'm not about to make my own pastry if I don't have to. I bought the only pastry in the store, which I think was the wrong kind. Oh well. It's what's for dinner. And it wasn't that bad. Actually, it was pretty decent.

Epinards en Croute (Spinach pockets)
1 c cooked spinach, drained of liquid
3 Tbsp cumbled feta
1 tsp tapenade (black olive paste)
3 Tbsp sundried tomates, marinated in oil, chopped
pinch cinnamon
pinch nutmeg
1 package puff pastry

Mix all ingredients except for pastry in a bowl. Roll out pastry, slice into 8ths. Divide spinach mix evenly over 4 slices of pastry. Top the pastry with remaining slices. Bake at 200° for 20-25 minutes until tops are golden brown.

Daring Cooks November - Quest for Sushi

The November 2009 Daring Cooks challenge is from Audax of Audax Artifex and Rose of The Bite Me Kitchen. They chose sushi as the challenge. The sushi challenge this month was harder than I thought. It involved letting other people into my kitchen. Allow me to explain.

A few weeks ago, I was having coffee with a friend. I then said that I had to go home but on my way, I had to stop by the Asian Supermarket. Because the Asian Supermarket stocks Tiger beer, my friend decided to bring his shopping bag to accompany me. The workaholic had been informed that I was on my way and was waiting.

On the 1km journey to the Asian supermarket, my friend saw approximately 20 stores that had interesting things in the windows. I concentrated my efforts on pulling the friend out of stores and towards the supermarket. Again, the workaholic is waiting.

30 minutes later, in the supermarket, my friend asks me what I need. I explain that I have to make sushi this month for The Daring Kitchen. The friend then informs me that, together with a mutal friend, he attended a sushi course a few weeks ago at the community college. Surely the mutal friend had the ingriedients I needed. One not-so-quick phone call later (reception problems) and I can pick up the vinegars & everything else I need. I grab my chickpea flour & explain to the waiting workaholic what happened.

To take ingriedients and not to offer a dinner invitation is out of the question, so my once humble sushi challenge has evolved into a sushi evening at my place. This is the time to remind you, my dear reader, that there is very little fresh fish in southern Germany. I buy an avocado a few days ahead of time (they too are of poor quality here), and I plan to buy fish.

The only fish I am not allergic to is tuna. The mutal friend, who brought over the ingriedients, said that the sushi instructor claims that there is good fresh fish to be had in Metro - the members-only-mega-size store. As it happens, this friend happens to have a membership. We make a date to go buy sashimi-grade tuna. I do my regular grocery shopping, trying to avoid buying pasta in 2.5 kg packages.

In Metro, we buy all the things I never knew I needed. My friend buys 2 kg of breakfast cereal ("it's my favourite!"). We save the fish counter for the end, so it stays cold. After having filled a cart with wine, Kaffir limes, Twix, gummi bears and who know what else, we hit the fish counter. "We'd like some sashimi-grade tuna", we say. "OK," says the lady behind the counter, "I have a 2.5 kg piece". We look at each other and ask, "do you have anything smaller?". "2.2" is the answer.

We leave the store with hundreds of things that we didn't come in for, and nothing that we actually wanted. It's Saturday night, 7pm, there is no chance of getting any more fresh fish before tomorrow's sushi night.

Invitations to roll and eat are for 6pm. Out of desperation, I open a can of tuna at 5pm, adding a bit of rice wine vinegar and chopped chives. It marinates & wasn't that bad for nigiri. Not comprable to the 2.5 kg loin of sashimi-grade tuna, but not bad. I cook the rice in the rice cooker & let the guys take over.

Preparing the cooked rice
(apparently, a sugar-vinegar solution is poured over the rice & blended in. Apparently this is what sushi is all about - not about the fish. Apparently.)

Making the omelette

(I think the key is to make a sausage out of an omelette & to roll the cooked layers, pouring more egg on as you go. I think)

Pressing the omelette into shape
(note the masculine hands that clearly do not belong to me)

The Nigiri Sushi
(a bit of immitation crab, some avocado, omelette, and the canned tuna topping)

I know that this month's challenge was to make a dragon roll, a decorative maki and some nigiri. I know I didn't make the decorative maki nor did I make the dragon roll - and strictly speaking, I didn't really make the nigiri either. Nonetheless, this month was still a challenge. One of the most important lessons I learned this month is: there's a sushi restaurant around the corner from my place. They have the conveyor belt and they're open Sundays until 10pm.

Daring Kitchen - Pho Ga

This month, the Daring Kitchen finally paid off for me. After the dishes I didn't have time for & the dishes that I thought were dumb, I finally hit the jackpot with the dish-that-I-never-thought-I-could-make-at-home. The October 2009 Daring Cooks’ challenge was brought to us by Jaden of the blog Steamy Kitchen. The recipes are from her new cookbook, The Steamy Kitchen Cookbook. The dish of the month was Pho Ga -Vietnamese chicken soup.

The first time I had Pho was when I was still in high school and the first Vietnamese restaurant opened in my hometown. Whenever I went in, it seemed as though I was the only person who was not Vietnamese and did not know what to order. A key lesson I've learned through these times is: if everyone around you is ordering the same dish, follow them. This lead me to Pho Bo. Since then, many Pho restaurants opened (and closed) in my hometown, sadly including the Happy Cow restaurant - the soup place with the picture of a laughing cow on the sign.

Since my school days, Pho has become somewhat vogue. I can understand this. In fact, I can even understand Anthony Bourdain savouring the moment of expectation:



Here in Europe, a good bowl of Pho is hard to find. Maybe I'd have better luck in Paris, but until now - no go. All the more reason to scream with delight as Jaden gave her Pho recipe, from her new book. I pretty much followed this recipe (as well as I can follow any recipe) but added the bones from a leftover roasted chicken to the stock.

Jaden has 2 versions of this recipe. 1 is long and involves making your own stock. The other is shorter & can be found in her new cookbook. I followed the long one, mainly because I had some chicken bones in my freezer that I was saving for a soup anyway.

Complete with the garnishes, the workaholic & I slurped up our soup & only wished that the chilis in Germany were hotter. I forgot the lime until my bowl was almost empty but it didn't bother me too much - I was salivating like Anthony Bourdain and looking forward to leftovers.

Out Before I'm Even In

After having only recently joined The Daring Kitchen, I think it's time for me to quit. The rules are simple: you make a prescribed dish once a month, following the recipe given. This should have been my indicator that this club is not for me. Instead, I was intrigued by the idea of belonging to a group of cooks around the world, united by one taste for one month.

I couldn't participate in August due to my vacation plans and furthermore, I didn't find the recipe all that alluring - even if it's from the chef of El Bulli. The month before that, I refused to participate because the key ingredient was skate. After having seen rays on a dive, I refuse to promote the fishing of these beautiful creatures. I'm also opposed to cod, the suggested substitute. So here I am, in September, preparing for the challenge.

Dosas. In theory, fantastic. I consulted with my Indian Friend J (IFJ), and he gave me some ideas. Then I read the recipe. The recipe that I have to follow. It calls for spelt. This is where I bow out & say "No, thank you". I was fine with the vegan meal. I was fine with preparing the 3 components of dosa, filling, & sauce. But somehow, following a recipe for Indian food taken from a trendy restaurant in Toronto seemed wrong. Don't get me wrong - Fresh has good food and some amazing lemonade. Although I think their noodle bowls are great, I just don't know how inspired I am to make them at home.

IFJ says that there's a place down the street that has super-crispy dosas on Saturdays. In the meantime, I made my own. The dosas are out of chickpea flour, the filling is a potato marsala (I cheated & used my Grandmother's favourite curry mix), and the chutney, again, I cheated & used grated coconut. The result: interesting, and certainly a healthy basis for the steaks I had later that night. I won't be repeating the recipe but I certainly have been inspired by it. I will be going to the Indian place down the street tomorrow for good dosas.