Hasenfrühstück

Ever since I started learning German, I've been interested in German cuisine and in trying traditional German recipes. As Easter is not that far away, various Easter recipes and paraphernalia began popping in my feed. Among them was this carrot and apple marmalade, called "Hasenfrühstück" or Rabbit's breakfast, which is typical, it seems, for German speaking countries, to be prepared at home for Easter.

As we love making home-made jams and carrots and apples are a staple in our home, especially in winter, I was quick to jump to the suggestion. 

There are plenty of variations on the recipe, as is the case of any recipe, so here are the proportions and the procedures that I chose for my carrot-apple-marmalade:

Ingredients:

• two big apples, cored and peeled, 500 g
• 700 g carrots
• 500 g sugar
• 200 g carrot and apple juice, store-bought
• juice from half-lemon
• half-teaspoon of apple pectin
  

Preparation:

Cut the apples and carrots into pieces (but better grate or chop in the chopper), cover with the juice of half a lemon, add 500 g sugar and 200 g juice (best would be fresh orange juice). Stir, heat up, turn the plate off and leave the mixture to stew and soften. Once the carrots and apples are soft enough, blend with an immersion blender. Even better, if the carrots and apples were grated in advance - we skipped that step, but experience showed that it the effort was recommendable.

As I was not sure, whether the pectin in the apples would be enough to thicken the marmalade, I added half a teaspoon of apple pectin. Alternatively, you might want to boil the jam a bit longer, until you get the desired texture.

Once the marmalade is ready, pour it hot into clean glass containers, close them tight and turn them over, until they cool. Store them in a cool and dark place.

Serve the marmalade with croissants or bagels and coffee and enjoy :) 

The taste is definitely carroty and might not be for everyone, but we liked it - it is fresh and different. Next year I would add more sour taste, to neutralize the sweetness - freshly squeezed orange juice instead of the carrot-apple juice and more freshly squeezed lemon juice - in hindsight I would have added the entire lemon squeeze - apples, carrots and citrus go really well together!

Bread with Dry Thyme

Today I came up with a recipe for a home-made bread with dry thyme and olive oil. The thyme is hand picked by Gaby and me during our hiking in the mountains and dried at home, so it's really very aromatic.

Tussock of thyme on Chepan mountain

Ingredients:

• 700 g flour
• 7 g instant dry yeast
• 1 tsp sugar
• 1 tsp salt
• 2 tbsp olive oil
• 450 ml warm water
• a handful of  dry thyme

Mix the ingredients, knead the dough and leave it to rise. Lately I leave the dough in the oven at 40-50C and it rises really well -overflowing the bowl. Take the dough out of the bowl and knead. Cut the dough into two halves and form two loaves of bread. I used the Italian method: spread the ball of dough flat, using the palm of your hand, fold about 1/3 of the circle and press with the palm of your hand, fold the second 1/3 part over and press, last fold in half and press again, then gently roll.

Thyme on Polovrak Mt. in Lozen Mountain

Leave the loaves for an hour to rise again. Mine are in the warm oven at 40C

Thyme on Vitosha, Bosnek

The loaves have doubled their size and are ready to be baked. Place them in a hot oven at 

240C until the crust is gold-brown, then turn the oven down to 200 C and bake until ready. 

I place a tin with water at the bottom of the oven to make the crust crisp yet still soft.

Fresh out of the oven. So soft and aromatic :) 

Leave on a rack to cool a bit. Best consumed still warm.
The children claim that this is the best tasting bread I've made so far :)))

And a picture of the full moon tonight, taken from the balcony

Artisan Bread

I was inspired for today's bread by the recipe and the story in Cook with a smile blog and while browsing through other Bulgarian blogs on Artisan bread it sort of amazed and amused me how similar all of our memories related to this delicious bread are. In my local shop in town I remember that only two types of fabric made bread were sold - bread from white wheat and from whole wheat flour. But in the village of my grandparents there was a local bakery that still baked hand-made artisan bread - with crispy crust and soft inside, that was so-o delicious. I remember waiting in line for the bread to be taken out of the oven. I remember the smell that made our mouths water in anticipation and eating almost half a loaf of still hot bread together with my cousin before getting back to my granny's :)))
Nowadays shops are full with an abundance of all kinds of bread and there are plenty of local bakeries that actually make better bread than me, but that delicious smell in the kitchen and that feeling that this bread came out of my hands - nothing can replace that. So I continue to bake ...

The recipe for Artisan bread is very simple, mine is sort of a compilation of several recipes and instructions I read on the net:

Ingredients:

• 400 g white flour
• 300 g warm water
• 1 tsp Himalayan salt
• 5 g instant dry yeast 

 

Mix the ingredients in a bowl with a spoon, you'll get quite moist and sticky dough. Cover the bowl with stretch-foil and leave in a warm place for 12 to 18 hours to rise and ripen. I made the dough about 6 PM yesterday evening and started making the bread this morning at about 10 AM - so that's some 16 hours for rising. This is how the dough looked in the morning - all bubbly and sticky. I took it out of the bowl and lightly kneaded it with plenty of flour to form it into a ball. Then I placed the ball in a slightly greased heat-proof glass pot, covered it and left it to rise again for about an hour.

When the dough had doubled its volume, I covered it with flour and made four cuts for the steam. My cuts turned to be too shallow, they should be at least 5-6 mm deep.

While the dough was rising, I turned the oven on at 230C for 20 min to preheat it. Then I placed the pot and a bowl of water at the bottom of the oven. I baked the bread covered for 45 min and additional 15 min after removing the lid, to get the hard crispy crust Artisan bread is known for.

And here it is - my deliciously smelling well baked loaf of bread.

I left it cool on a rack for 10 min. This bread is not cut with a knife - you just break pieces of warm bread,  cover it with butter and mixed spices, add some white cheese, bite into it and enjoy the moment :)

Having tasted it, hubby stated that I needn't bother with other recipes - I could simply stick to this one and he would be completely happy :) But I'm still on the learning curve of baking, still curious to try new things, so I've already picked my next recipe - a round bread with hard yellow cheese ;)

Peaches

Last year I made a few jars of peach jam and it was such a success with my family that this year I'm making it on an industrial scale :)))
Here's the recipe I'm following this year for a batch of 4 small jars:

• 1 kg of peaches, cut into small pieces
• 250 g of plums, cut into small pieces
• 650 g of sugar
• 1 teaspoon of citric acid.

Cut the fruit in a saucepan and cover with sugar. Leave in the refrigerator for 12+ hours. I usually prepare it in the afternoon and leave it for the night. Then (on the following morning) bring the fruit and sugar mixture to boil and leave for 3-4 hours covered with the lid to cool. Add 100 ml water and smash slightly with a hand blender (this is the new element I introduced this year - it gives the jam a smoother texture, which is preferred by the children, who love to spread their bread with butter and jam). Boil the jam until thick enough, add a teaspoon of citric acid and boil for 2-3 more minutes. Pour into clean dry jars while the jam is hot.

These are the jars with peaches only

and these are with peaches and plums. I've got another batch with peaches and plums already I made last night. I'm wondering what else I could try to mix with peaches, as the plums turned such a perfect addition.

The jam is very delicious with the home-made bread I've been baking lately - these small loafs were made following the recipe in Eva Toneva's blog:

And we also tried this a bit eccentric dessert - roasted peaches with oats, served with vanilla ice cream. We should've waited for the peaches to cool more, the warmth of the pulp accentuated the acidity of the fruit and contradicted the sweetness of the oats and the ice cream. Hubby didn't like it, Gaby and I did and Alex didn't even taste it. I'll make another try at it today, replacing the olive oil with butter for better taste and refrigerating the peaches a little before serving.