Beef Borek , A Fusion Recipe

When we first moved to Prague the only "ethnic" grocery stores to be found were run by Vietnamese. I say ethnic in quotes because technically they could be called that but where not quite what you picture when you think of ethnic shops else where. Having freshly arrived from living in Paris where any and every type of ethnic foods could be found this took some getting use to. Sure the Vietnamese markets had some ramen, basic asian condiments and the best fresh fruit and vegetable selections but it didn't quite make up for not finding some of the world ethnic foods and ingredients we love and missed. Fast forward to 2011 and things have really changed here. Now small ethnic markets selling Japanese, many asian products, basic Tex-Mex ingredients, authentic Italian, authentic Greek, and a variety of middle eastern products have begun popping up all over the city. Czechs seem to have embraced the idea of tasting and/or cooking world foods. Don't get me wrong Czech food is hearty and very tasty, but I do love variety in my choices of both restaurants and ingredients to cook with.

Last week my husband and I went to check out a new middle eastern market that opened up in our neighborhood. We both absolutely love middle eastern cuisine, definitely one of our favorites. As we wondered through the small isles we were delighted with the selection of products from north Africa, the middle east, and even India. Along with the mandatory Lokum for my husband we picked up some grains, deli delicacies, pickled veggies and a humongous pack of Yukfa, which is a thicker version of Turkish Philo dough. You will surely see the ingredients pop up in recipes in the coming weeks or months. But today I will be sharing what I cooked with some of the Yufka/Philo dough. The first attempt I made Rolled Beef Borek. Okay so these aren't quite Turkish Borek nor Balkan type Borek, but rather a fusion of both with my own take. But they did taste fantastic, so much so that my husband asked me to please remember how I made them so we could have them again soon. I've never made Borek before and I didn't have time to look up instructions prior to cooking so I just winged it. The second attempt I made the same filling and instead of rolling the dough I made a meat pie. Assemble it just as you would a regular pie by layering a yufka or two on the bottom and as well as the top. Hope you enjoy this as much as we did.

Rolled Beef Borek or Yufka Beef Pie

3 large yukfa or philo sheets
500 g or 1 lb. ground beef (or a mix of ground beef and pork)*
1 small yellow onion, finely chopped
4 garlic cloves, minced
2 small red pimentos or 1 small red bell pepper, finely chopped
1 tsp dried thyme
1/2 tsp dried rosemary
1 tsp salt
1/4 tsp ground black pepper
1 pack (450 g or 15 oz) frozen garlic creamed spinach (I made my own w/milk) , drained
Turkish beyaz peynir cheese or feta cheese
olive oil or vegetable oil

melted butter, for brushing the Yufka
1-2 large eggs lightly beaten, for egg wash

* Please note that Turkish Muslims do not eat pork. So if you aim to make this more Turkish based used ground beef only. *

1. Defrost and warm up the garlic creamed spinach. Make sure most of the liquid evaporates or you will have to drain it all of the excess liquid. Set aside. (You could also use fresh spinach instead of frozen.) Heat just enough oil to coat the pan, once warm Add the ground/minced beef and cook all the way through. Drain off all extra fat. Remove meat from the pan and set aside.

2. Add a little bit of oil to the pan and once warm saute the onions until translucent. Add the finely chopped pimento/ pepper and saute for 3 minutes. Next add the garlic and cook another 2 minutes. Add the beef back to the pan then sprinkle all of the seasonings into the pan, stir to distribute the spices well. Turn heat to low flame and allow to cook another 5 minutes. Turn heat off and set aside to cool slightly.

3. Preheat oven to 220 c and prepare a baking sheet. Have the melted butter and pastry brush ready. Once the beef has cooled down a bit, brush 1 extra large philo/ yukfa sheet with melted butter. Lay a thin layer of beef mixture in a straight line, top with the creamed spinach and feta. Tuck in the phyllo/yukfa and begin rolling up into a long tubular shape. Curl it into a coil/swirl shape and brush outer yufka with egg wash.

Bake in center of the oven for 20-30 minutes or until the dough is browned and crispy. Serve with a light side salad.

After dinner I decided to readup on Borek and all the varieties. Through Google images I came across Citra's blog with a great recipe for Turkish Borek with leeks. It looks so good and that will be the next Borek I make. Here's the link if you are interested.
http://c1tr4sinau.blogspot.com/2011/02/prasa-boreg-turkish-leek-pastry.html

Read more...

Picadillo and Cinco Recipes for Cinco de Mayo

Tomorrow is Cinco de Mayo or the 5th of May, a Mexican holiday. Last year I gave you a small history lesson about the holiday, and you can read the full post here. But to give you a brief summary , "Cinco de Mayo or 5th of May is a Mexican holiday celebrating the victory of the Mexican army over the French army in the battle of Puebla on the 5th of May 1862. Contrary to popular belief in America and other parts of the world, this is not the celebration of Mexican Independence from Spain..." I also told you that my family does not celebrate Cinco de Mayo. Regardless I thought I share an new Mexican recipe for those of you looking to celebrate.

Picadillo. Picadillo is a dish popular all over Latin America with slight variations and twists. It is made with ground/minced meat, tomatoes, spices and depending on the area different vegetables and seasonings are added. It's one of those dishes well known among Mexicans, other Latin Americans, and Filipinos but perhaps not as common to other people. Growing up my Mom made it often and I hated it. It wasn't that it wasn't appetizing looking, it was. It wasn't that the sauce and seasonings didn't taste good, they did. It was because I used to be really grossed out by minced meat. I don't know why but I just was. Ground/minced meat is still not my favorite meat but I'll eat it from time to time. However I do have to tell you that not having had Picadillo for so long made me really enjoy it and even go up for seconds.

I wanted to share an authentic Mexican recipe for Cinco de Mayo that is less common but muy delicioso. Plus Picadillo can be used as a main course or used as a topping or filling for any Mexican recipes. My version is different from many you will find online but it's my way and similar to my Mom's. I hope all of you my non-Mexican amigos enjoy my Picadillo as much as my American esposo and I did. Buen Provecho!!

Ingredients:

500 g or 1 lb. ground meat, pork or beef
2 medium potatoes, peeled and cubed
1 large carrots, halved and sliced
1 medium yellow onion, finely chopped
4 garlic cloves, minced
1 hot chile or more adjust to taste, finely chopped
Or substitute with Cayenne powder
2 large tomatoes, finely chopped

1 1/2 tsp. ground cumin
1 tsp. salt, adjust to taste
1/2 tsp. ground black pepper
1 tsp. paprika, for color

1 tbsp. vegetable oil
1/4 cup beef broth

White rice to serve (or use as a filling)

1. Heat the oil in a large pan, once warm saute the onion until soft. Add the ground pork/beef to the pan and cook all the way through. Drain off most of the liquid fat, reserve only a little bit to prevent burning. Add the minced garlic, fresh chile if using and cook for two minutes. Next add the potato and carrot pieces and cook for another 4 minutes. Next sprinkle all of the spices into the pan, stir to well combine. Add the chopped tomatoes, again stirring well. Pour the broth into the pan, cover and allow to simmer for 20 minutes under medium low heat.

Taste and adjust seasoning if needed. If serving the picadillo as a meal, it can be allowed to have a bit of broth. If using the picadillo as a filling, remove the lid and allow all of the liquid to evaporate.

Need more Mexican recipe ideas for Cinco de Mayo? Check out my archives or these top 5 :

~ Top 5 Spicie Foodie Mexican Recipes ~

1- Arroz ala Mexicana, Mexican Rice

2 - Zanahorias en Escabeche, Spicy Pickled Carrots

3 - Guacamole

4 - Taquitos

5 - Tostadas de Tinga

Read more...

Slavic Cabbage Rolls (My First Attempt) and The Huffington Post

I hope everyone is starting off their weekend well. I just found out that I'm on the Huffington Post (again), and that's a pretty neat way to start off the weekend. The feature this time is for "Ten Recipes To Jazz Up Your Weekend Breakfast." and mine is the Strawberry Banana Soy Breakfast Shake. Their selection (made by Honest Cooking) is a great collection of recipes so do make sure you check it out. Congrats to all the other featured bloggers too!! Now on to my recipe, hope you enjoy it.

Cabbage rolls, or stuffed cabbage, are one of those dishes that span many countries all with unique variations. To many of you cabbage rolls (stuffed cabbage) are a very common dish, perhaps even one you grew up with. To me it is still a fairly new one. I don't have any childhood memories of my mother making cabbage rolls for us. Now that I think about it I've never seen cabbage rolls on any authentic Mexican menus. Perhaps they do exist but I've never had the pleasure of eating one. The first time I ate one was about 5 years ago in Berlin, Germany. The first time I saw them on the menu I knew immediately what I was having for lunch. The waitress set down a cabbage roll the size of my head with a light and creamy white sauce over it, I wish I would have taken a photo. With huge anticipation and a big smile on my face I took my first bite, I loved it! My husband having grown up with cabbage rolls also agreed that they were fantastic. From that day forward every trip we made to Berlin we went to Joe´s Wirtshaus Restaurant right down the street from the Zoologischer train station. On several trips we even had both our lunch and dinner there, much to the amusement of the staff. Sadly I just learned that after 15 years they have closed down. I will greatly miss Joe's and all of their fantastic German cuisine. Auf Wiedersehen und danke Joe's.

The only times I have eaten cabbage rolls have been on our trips to Berlin, maybe because I felt no others could compare. Czechs also eat cabbage rolls but so far I've only found them in the frozen food section and I rather have them fresh. A couple of weeks ago while reminiscing about Joe's cabbage rolls I made it my mission to learn to make them. I searched high and low for a recipe that sounded or looked similar to Joe's. I wasn't able to find one so instead I settled for a standard regional version. In Czech they are called Holubky, in Russian Golubtsy, and in Polish Golabki. Both the names and ingredients are quite similar. Over the days I decided to wing it and experiment with my own take of a slavic variation. I used a local variety of white cabbage, typical Czech spices, the meat is a commonly found mix of ground pork and ground beef mixture. I didn't really follow a specific recipe, instead I read through many to get the idea of the standard ingredients used. So you could call these a Mexican girl's take on Slavic cabbage rolls, sounds kinda funny.

Ingredients:
Makes 12 rolls or 3-4 servings

1 head of white cabbage (700 grams)
1.75 lb. (or 800 g) ground pork and ground beef mix, or use just beef
1 medium yellow onion, finely chopped
4 garlic cloves, minced
1 cup raw long grain rice, or 2 cups/400 grams cooked
1 tsp. salt
1/4 tsp. ground black pepper
1/2 tsp. dried marjoram
1 tsp. sweet paprika
handful finely chopped fresh parsley

Tomato sauce to pour over the rolls before baking

1. Boil the rice and set aside to cool down. Bring a large pot of salted water to a boil. Remove any damaged or bruised outer leaves from the cabbage and discard. The first thing to be done is to soften the cabbage leaves in order to make them soft and bendable enough to roll up. Peel away the cabbage leaves from the cabbage and place in boiling water for upto 10 minutes or until soft and bendable. Remove each leaf from pot with a pair of thongs then set aside to drain.

2. Preheat the oven to 200C or 392F. In a large mixing bowl combine the meat, rice and all of the spices. Mix until all ingredients are well incorporated and spices are well distributed. Grab a softened cabbage leave and spread some meat mixture towards one end of the leaf. Tuck, fold and roll the cabbage then set the roll aside. Repeat until all of the meat filling is used up, this recipe made 12 medium rolls. Place the rolls inside a deep baking dish. There will be extra leftover cabbage that can either be placed on the bottom of the baking dish to form a bed on which the cabbage rolls are placed over to bake. In addition I also used some of the remaining cabbage to add to the tomato sauce. Finely chopped the extra or remaining cabbage and mix with the tomato sauce.

3. Pour the tomato sauce over the cabbage roll. Cover the baking dish with aluminum foil, place the baking dish in the center of the of oven. Bake for 45 minutes, then remove aluminum. Look at the cabbage and use a fork to test the softness of the cabbage leaves, making sure they are soft and wilted. Once cabbage rolls are soft bake uncovered a further 10 minutes to allow the tomato sauce to thicken.

In honor of Joe's I served with them with mash potatoes. To add to the whole slavic theme I also served a small bowl of Ukrainian Borscht,beet soup, as an appetizer. These may not be Joe's cabbage rolls but if I do say so myself, not bad for a first attempt.

Do you guys have any tips or recipes for cabbage rolls similar to the ones served at Joe's?

Read more...

The Mystery Canned Meat and Corn Beef Hash

I would first like to warn you that this is not going to be a pretty post and there will be plenty of canned corn beef bashing. Don't take it personal if you like this stuff, this is just my very opinionated opinion. Oh and vegetarians be warned you may want to look away.

This mysterious tin can has been in our kitchen cupboard for about 6 months (or maybe longer than I would like to admit to). We purchased it from a local English food specialty shop to use in ..... well I honestly can't remember. I have always had a biased opinion against canned foods like pastas or anything that contains meat "products". The exceptions to this would be most canned vegetables, some fruits, and tuna or other fish preserved in water or oil like tuna. Honestly it's not an issue of me thinking I'm above eating canned foods, it's more along the lines that I really do not like the taste.

So last week we finally decided to use it in something. I have eaten American deli style corn beef, you know those thin strips of delicious meat. But never have I tried this canned stuff, so I didn't know what in the world to cook with or in. But the first step was getting this annoying can opened. I nearly cut my fingers off because the little key thingamajig fell out of place and I couldn't keep turning it. Well finally got it opened and eewww! it looked so disgusting, it looked like dog food. As a matter of fact my dog used to eat food that looked like that, used to being the key word. I kept telling myself well I'm at least going to try it and not judge it by its looks, it was quite expensive after all. I gave my dog a little piece that he then quickly spit out, I mean the chunk went flying out of his mouth. Well this isn't a good sign I thought to myself, my dog is not a picky eater but he also wont eat just anything. So I began examining and removing this mystery meat out of its can, and the more I looked the more I didn't like it. Look what the heck is this? No wait I really don't want to know or talk about it.

Still trying to keep a brave face and strong stomach, I was still in the mindset that I would cook it and it would taste decent. As I consulted my friend Mr. Google it quickly became apparent that the safest and most common recipe would be Corned Beef Hash. In the photos I saw and looking at the typical ingredients I thought that sounds like something I'm going to like. So here is a pretty standard corned beef hash recipe.

1 can of corned beef
1 large green bell pepper,finely chopped
1 medium onion,finely chopped
1 large potato, cut into small pieces
salt & pepper to taste
1 tbs. vegetable oil or butter

fried egg to add on top of hash

1. Heat the oil in a large pan, fry the onion until translucent. Add the potatoes and fry for 5 minutes then add the bell peppers. Cook the vegetables until soft and stir often to prevent from sticking. While the vegetables are cooking try to cut the corn beef into small pieces. Once vegetables are cooked through add the corned beef pieces and stir to well combine. Sprinkle in the salt and pepper, stir well then cover and allow the corned beef to warm up. This should take about 8 minutes. Serve with a fried egg on top and toast on the side.

As I was cooking the hash I thought it didn't smell so bad, then I lifted the lid and got a big whiff of the hash and still thought it's not so disgusting. Then I tasted it - ran to the garbage and spit it out. OK, OK put on a brave face what kind of foodie are you if you won't even give it a chance. One more try, nope! definitely can't eat this, it's going in the garbage and Now! OK one last chance, I take a small sample to my husband asking if it was palatable to him. He laughed at my question then said , "Uhm its good" my jaw dropped to the floor in amazement of hearing those words, "Are you serious?!" OK! So I served it to him for dinner and I ate left over soup. He actually went up for seconds! WTH !

I had the nerve to actually complain (more like ranted) to our English friend about this disturbing and disgusting meat. Since it came from an English store and the brand comes up in many English sites, I figured everyone there eats up this stuff like it's their favorite thing in the world. So I would now like to apologize to English people for my ignorance and for blaming you guys for putting this stuff out in the world. That said I will never ever buy or allow a can, oh sorry a tin, of corned beef in my house!

What do you guys think? Do any of you like this stuff or am I the only ignorant one here?

Read more...

Steak and Roasted Pepper Sandwich

So I finally have the recipe what you will be using the roasted peppers from the previous recipe. I have been playing catchup since the hard drive incident and I hate to admit it but I fed my husband frozen pizza because I was so swamped with trying to finish the last of my to do list. But I finally made the sandwiches and prepared the recipe and photos. The recipe is our special steak sandwich served with roasted peppers and sauteed mushrooms. It it's a great meal that if you plan ahead for will take virtually no time to prepare and one that is still healthy and delicious. I like to call this a perfect hungry man sandwich, but honestly it's a meal I too enjoy very much.

Ingredients:
3 large bell peppers. roasted
1 lb. or 500 grams of sirloin steak
1 can of mushrooms ( actual mushrooms used 8 oz./230 grams)
1 medium onion
2 Tb. olive oil
salt
black pepper
2 tsp. granulated garlic
1 tsp. Paprika
cheese slices of your choice
Sandwich rolls

1. Roast and peel the pepper, this can take anywhere to 40 minutes, (please see previous post). Tenderize the steak and slice into thin bite size pieces, set aside. Drain the mushrooms and thinly slice the onions. Heat 1 Tbs. of olive oil and once it's hot saute the mushrooms until they begin to brown a bit. Then add the onions to the pan and saute until the onions are soft and transparent. Sprinkle salt and pepper to taste as well as 1tsp. of the garlic , stir and saute for another 5 minutes. Remove the mushrooms and onions from the pan and set aside.

2. Add the remaining 1 Tbs. of the olive oil to the same pan and saute the steak sprinkle salt, pepper and remaining 1 tsp. of garlic over the steak and cook until it is cooked through. Lastly add the mushrooms and onions to the pan then sprinkle the paprika over the ingredients and stir well. Turn the heat down to low cover the pan and allow the mixture to cook for another 10 minutes.

(The following is a suggested way of assembling the sandwich, you can choose to arrange as you like.) Slice the sandwich rolls and spread some steak and mushroom/onion mixture onto the roll. Then add some roasted pepper slices and cheese. You may choose to melt the cheese a little more by wrapping the sandwich in paper towels and microwaving for a few seconds or placing the sandwich under the broiler for a crispy bread and melted cheese.

Serve with potato salad, french fries, roasted potatoes, baked potato, chips or any other side dish you like.

Read more...