Verjus an interesting alternative to wine

Here is a website dedicated to Napa Valley Verjus..unfermented wine.

There are many recipes and a discussion of what Verjus is and is used for. Some of the recipes would work well for dieting if sugar was replaced with Agave syrup and oils amounts lowered.

http://www.verjus.com

Verjus an interesting alternative to wine

Here is a website dedicated to Napa Valley Verjus..unfermented wine.

There are many recipes and a discussion of what Verjus is and is used for. Some of the recipes would work well for dieting if sugar was replaced with Agave syrup and oils amounts lowered.

http://www.verjus.com

update me

Goede middag, vrienden!!
Hoe gaat het met je? Alles goed? Ik ben prima!

Today is my last day at work. From tomorrow i will not working here anymore. And Im totally free! Yihaaaaa!
And im excited to welcoming the new year. 2011.
Its a great experience to work here, but its not comfort for me, so thats why im quit.

Now, im seriously learning english and dutch. I need to fluent in english. Yeah to continue my life and unleash my dreams. Please pray for me.

Thats all. i will posting something interesting later ok?
just wanna info this thingy. bye bye

Calling all book readers...

One of my goals for the coming New Year is to start watching less tv reading more books. I use to read a lot when I was in highschool/college, but now life has just gotten in the way. So far I have only 4 books that I can think of that I am currently working on, or ones I would like to start, other than the Bible. So I need some ideas! What are some books you have read that you enjoyed? I tend to like non-fiction, books on marriage/parenting, true stories etc...

So what are your suggestions?

Enjoy what you read here at Golden Reflections? Please vote once daily over at Picket Fence blogs! Just click on the button below!

Traditional Scottish Steak and Sausage Pie with a Twist

There are a great many people in Scotland for whom New Year would simply not be New Year without the traditional steak and sausage pie, as pictured above. Steak pie in Scotland is very often considered to be as much of a New Year tradition as whisky. Around the world, of course, there are a great many different foodstuffs associated with New Year and a very popular one is pork. In many countries and cultures, pork is considered to bring good luck for the coming year when it is eaten as part of a New Year meal and this gave me an idea. Steak pie in Scotland is usually comprised of beef steak and beef sausages. What I have done here, however, is a piece of blatant fusion cooking, by making the steak pie with leg of pork steak and pork link sausages.

Steak and sausage pie is frequently served with any of a great many different accompaniments. It can be served with roast potatoes, boiled potatoes, mashed potatoes, or even chips as in this instance, as well as a wide and varied choice of vegetables. In this post, I am focusing on how to make the steak and sausage pie only but if you want to know how I prepare chips, you can find the full instructions by clicking here. The dwarf green beans which I am also serving as an accompaniment are simply washed and blanched in boiling water for five minutes.

Ingredients

1lb leg of pork steak
4 pork link sausages
1/2lb puff pastry
2 pints fresh chicken stock
1 small beaten egg for glazing
Salt and pepper

Method

If desired, you can have your butcher fully prepare the leg of pork steak for you by chopping it in to bite sized pieces. Alternatively, cut it yourself but do not discard any remaining fat. This is required to keep the meat moist. Put the steak only in to a dry pot and bring it up to a medium heat. This will cause the fat to begin to melt and allow the pork to seal and brown in its own juices. Stir the meat constantly during this process. It should only take two or three minutes.

When the pork is sealed, add the heated chicken stock and bring to a simmer for one hour. After this time, add the pork links for a further half hour's simmering. In order to minimise the chances of the sausages bursting, position them round the edges of the pot and ensure that the stock does not boil. Note that you may be required to add a little boiling water to the pot at this stage to ensure all the meat is covered.

After what will have been a total of one and a half hours simmering, turn off the heat, cover the pot and set it aside to cool for at least an hour. Building the pie when the meat is hot will cause steam to make the underside of the pastry soggy before it has a chance to start cooking.

When the steak and sausage is cool, add it to a 10" by 7" ashet or similarly suitable dish. Add enough stock to almost cover the meat and come within about an inch of the lip of the dish. Put the oven on to preheat to 400F/200C/Gas Mark 6.

On a clean, dry, floured surface, roll out the puff pastry until it is large enough to cover the dish and slightly more. The excess is used to crimp the pastry in place around and over the edges. Beat the egg and use it to lightly glaze the pie, before making two or three slits in the centre to allow steam to escape during cooking.

The pie should be placed on a baking tray and in to the oven until the pastry is risen and golden. This will vary from oven to oven but will generally take anything from thirty to forty minutes. When the pie is cooked, remove it from the oven and set it aside to cool slightly for around ten minutes, while the finishing touches are made to the remainder of the ingredients.

A pie of this size will provide two very generous servings or up to four smaller servings. I hope that you will try either my alternative steak and sausage pie this New Year, or the original version, and add a little bit of Scottish Hogmanay to your New Year celebrations. You may even wish to follow it up with the traditional Scottish malt whisky, raspberry and cream dessert, Cranachan, and a Gaelic coffee!

  The antidote to frustration is a calm faith, not in your own
      cleverness, or in hard toil, but in God's guidance.
                                                                   - Norman Vincent Peale

Wednesday Blog Hop

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Yes, But Corporations Are Different!

Pallavi Gogoi had an excellent article in Slate yesterday about how American jobs continue to move overseas.

All but 4 percent of the top 500 U.S. corporations reported profits this year, and the stock market is close to its highest point since the 2008 financial meltdown.

But the jobs are going elsewhere. The Economic Policy Institute, a Washington think tank, says American companies have created 1.4 million jobs overseas this year, compared with less than 1 million in the U.S.

This being Slate, the comments attached to the article are all about how corporations are greedy and the fatcats are getting tax breaks and blah blah blah, but they all miss the point. Corporations, like the commenters, shop around to find the best prices for what they want to buy. In the case of the commenters, it's food and clothing and transportation. In the case of the corporations, it's labor. The corporations are just doing what the commenters do - buying what they need at the lowest price available.

If you don't want the jobs going overseas, then cut the regulations and wages that make us more expensive.

Tim Robbins explains how it all works.

Food Meditation

Many years ago I took myself to the Miraval Spa. It's a wonderful spa and I had a number of mind altering experiences there. One of these was a class called a food meditation. Probably one of the most important spa classes I have ever taken.

We arrived in the dining room and met at a table with the nutritionist. She spoke to us about the fact that the body needs 20 minutes of attentive eating to register that it has eaten and instructed us to go to the breakfast bar and take whatever we wanted in whatever amounts we wanted. Not to be stingy with ourselves, but to load up on whatever we felt we wanted.

Then we were to come back to the table and silently eat for 20 minutes. No talking. No reading. No listening to music/tv. Just us and our food. After we would speak about the experience. We were to chew slowly really feeling and tasting the food in our mouths. Roll it around. Drink slowly again attending to the food. At first you feel foolish..but over the 20 minutes a personal awareness about self and food starts to emerge.

When we were finished we spoke of the meditation on our meals, for many of us a first. No one could finish what they had taken. All felt full with less than what they expected. The nutritionist explained that by focusing on what we were doing, really focusing,  our bodies could really have the full effect of the experience of eating.

I have found if I try to leave the newspaper, the tv..the talking aside and truly focus for twenty minutes it always results in my feeling more full, satisfied, relaxed and with less quantity. The effect of this meditation seems to last a while and then I notice myself sneaking the Times back to the table. Its a meditation that needs doing and re-doing to keep myself educated to its wisdom.

I encourage you to try a food meditation. It does world's to reset your understanding of you and food.

Food Meditation

Many years ago I took myself to the Miraval Spa. It's a wonderful spa and I had a number of mind altering experiences there. One of these was a class called a food meditation. Probably one of the most important spa classes I have ever taken.

We arrived in the dining room and met at a table with the nutritionist. She spoke to us about the fact that the body needs 20 minutes of attentive eating to register that it has eaten and instructed us to go to the breakfast bar and take whatever we wanted in whatever amounts we wanted. Not to be stingy with ourselves, but to load up on whatever we felt we wanted.

Then we were to come back to the table and silently eat for 20 minutes. No talking. No reading. No listening to music/tv. Just us and our food. After we would speak about the experience. We were to chew slowly really feeling and tasting the food in our mouths. Roll it around. Drink slowly again attending to the food. At first you feel foolish..but over the 20 minutes a personal awareness about self and food starts to emerge.

When we were finished we spoke of the meditation on our meals, for many of us a first. No one could finish what they had taken. All felt full with less than what they expected. The nutritionist explained that by focusing on what we were doing, really focusing,  our bodies could really have the full effect of the experience of eating.

I have found if I try to leave the newspaper, the tv..the talking aside and truly focus for twenty minutes it always results in my feeling more full, satisfied, relaxed and with less quantity. The effect of this meditation seems to last a while and then I notice myself sneaking the Times back to the table. Its a meditation that needs doing and re-doing to keep myself educated to its wisdom.

I encourage you to try a food meditation. It does world's to reset your understanding of you and food.

classical luxurious

Happy Thursday allemaal!!!

I had love Thursday so much, when i was in High School. :)

Today, i wanna share a little about a thing i really want!
Hopefully i will have it soon. Amen.
I think its fit in fashion category. well let see it!

yep its a luggage!
A leather luggage.
I heart it so much!
its classical and luxurious.

Is there anyone will buying me this thing? lol

The Best Hummingbird Video You'll See This Year

Click. Watch.

Thanks to our Grand Inquisitor for sharing this with us!

This Thing Needs To Be Melted Down And Formed Into Little Statues Of Hitler

It's a serrated blade attachment from my Cuisanart food processor. It's the single most destructive and dangerous kitchen implement in our house, responsible for more pain and bloodshed than everything else combined. I can't use the thing without it leaping up at me or falling down on me or sidling over towards me to attack. Slicing, poking, impaling, sawing, you name it, this hideous monstrosity has done it.

Evil? Oh yes. It's evil.

The blade and a Hitler statue. The resemblance is uncanny.

Rich Fudgy Chocolate Brownie Cake

Shall we roll out the year on a glorious wave of chocolate? Shall we? Why not? Here is the last post and final recipe of 2010 and it is for Rich Fudgy Chocolate Brownie Cake - whatever that conjures up for you, it is.



Here's the story: I was flipping through a magazine supplement from Woman & Home: Fabulous Christmas Food when my eye was caught by a dramatic photo of the perfect chocolate cake decorated with glistening glace cherries taken side view with a hint of icing oozing from between the layers: the voluptuous silhouette of the shiny red cherries atop the dark, moist cake proved irresistible. A glance at the ingredients which included 5 eggs for a start, 60% dark chocolate and lots of it too, soon convinced me that this cake aspired towards higher things than the regular tea table. With my nearest and dearest coming for the holiday, I wanted something luscious and I had a hunch that this was it.

                                                                                 

Turks - apart from our very own dear ones - don't celebrate Christmas but they do love New Year's Eve or Yıl Başı as it's called. Celebrating the 31st December has gone from strength to strength over the years that I have lived here. It is like Christmas all over again. Turkeys are roasted, trees are decorated, presents are exchanged, and the whole thing with such joy, it's as if it was always celebrated thus. It was always celebrated but in a much simpler way: my husband remembers his favourite childhood Yıl Başı treats were muz or bananas, and sosis/sausages. Hardly extravagant but symptomatic of those times when levels of income were much lower. This cake is a leap the other way: make it and it will be the star of your New Year's sofra.

Ingredients

Serves 10-12
you will need 2 x 23cm/ 9'' shallow sandwich tins

275g/9 1/2 oz 60% dark chocolate (I used 70% Lindt)

225g/8oz unsalted butter

400g/14oz caster sugar ( I use regular granulated sugar here in Turkey as it is quite fine)

5 eggs, beaten

1/2 tsp vanilla extract

200g/7oz plain flour

1/2 tsp salt

glace cherries to decorate

for the mascarpone filling:

125g/4 1/2 oz mascarpone, brought up to room temperature

60g/2 1/2 oz dark chocolate, melted and cooled

1-2 tbsp icing sugar, to taste

for the fondant icing:
175g/ 6oz icing sugar
3 tbsp water
25g/ 1oz cocoa powder
25g/1oz granulated sugar

Method

• Heat oven to 180C/350F/gas 4. Melt the chocolate and butter in a large saucepan over low heat and allow to cool for a few mins before stirring in the sugar. Add eggs and vanilla a little at a time, stirring well with each addition.

•  Don't worry if it splits, it will come back together when you add the flour. Fold in the flour in batches and stir in the salt. Divide between the 2 tins and cook for 20-25 mins, till a toothpick comes out with only a few crumbs.


                 

 



after baking


• Remove the cakes from the oven and allow to cool in the tins for a few mins before tipping on to a wire rack and allowing to cool completely.

• Meanwhile, make the mascarpone filling. Mix the mascarpone and chocolate together and add icing sugar to taste. When the cakes are cool, place one upside down on a plate and spread the top with the mascarpone filling. Top with the other cake, this time the right way up, and then make the icing.

• Sift the icing sugar into a mixing bowl. Put the water, cocoa powder and granulated sugar into a saucepan. Stir over low heat until the sugar has dissolved. Bring to the boil and draw off the heat. Pour on to the icing sugar and using a wooden spoon, beat to a smooth, soft consistency. Use while warm - this fondant icing sets very quickly.
• Decorate with the glace cherries and/or other cake decorations.

cuts like a dream

Tips

1. This cake will keep in an airtight container for up to 3 days.
2. Un-iced cakes, well-wrapped, will freeze for up to a month.
3. I preferred this icing to the one given in the original recipe which required a tin of condensed milk. Given that we don't get it here, and also that it is full of calories, I took the decision to have a fondant icing so that is not Woman & Home.
4. To my joy, we can now find mascarpone at any major supermarket here in Istanbul. It gives me a real thrill to be able to get the ingredient specified after so many years of making do.
5. I was very pleased with this recipe and so was the family.  Definitely one for high days and holidays.You can find glace cherries and in fact any other type of glace fruit from certain bakery shops. It is worth going in and asking if you see that the cakes on display contain them. Not as difficult to find as you might think.

 the very last crumbs

We're going to Assos, our beautiful Aegean village for Yıl Başı unless the weather turns icy.

Wherever you are, a very Happy New Year to you all and thank you so much for the encouragement and support you have shown me over the last few months with your emails and Facebook messages! I appreciate it enormously.

Baked Ratatouille

Before I came to UK and Europe I was so busy that I didn't blog about the food that I've been cooking. Though being busy on a lot things didn't hinder me to still cook the dishes I want to concoct. Cooking is one thing I won't get tired doing no matter how busy and tired I am after a whole day of work in the office. So having said that, I want to post the very first dish I baked in my newly acquired oven which was given to me by the owner of my apartment. They decided to buy one for me instead of me buying it because of the fact that I am renting a fully furnished apartment, so I think the owner just did the right gesture.

Inspired by the French cuisine since I visited Paris last October, I finally decided to make Ratatouille for the first time when I came home from my trip. And not to mess with the recipe, I baked it! Going back a few years ago, people became more familiar with the dish when an American animated film made it as a title. The film is about Remy a rat who wants to be a chef and be in the heat of the kitchen. Sounds gross but it appeared a little cute. Then people from around the world were surprised to find out that it's a famous vegetable dish from France. Ratatouille came from the Occitan word "ratatolha" of the Occitan cuisine. While touiller means "to toss food" This dish originated from Provence and Nice and spreading its different version around France and the entire globe.

There are different versions of doing this dish, I adapted the version of Julia Child which insisted the layering style. Ratatouille can be eaten with breads or filling for crepes. A really nice and interesting food for the vegetarian or vegan people. The vegan can eliminate the use of butter to eat this dish. So let me begin sharing this Ratatouille Nicoise & Provencal recipe...

BAKED RATATOUILLE

Ingredients:

• Aubergine
• Zucchini
• Butternut Squash
• Plump Tomatoes
• Red & Yellow Capsicums
• Thyme/ Marjoram/
• Paprika/ Pepper/ Salt
• Garlic
• Fresh Basil
• Mozzarella Cheese
• Olive Oil
• Butter (of course)

Procedure:

Cut the vegetables according to shape like the aubergine, zucchini and tomatoes. For the Butternut Squash and Capsicum, cut it diagonally. After cutting all your vegetables, prepare a large bowl. Put all the vegetables together then start adding the crushed Garlic, Thyme, Marjoram, Paprika, Pepper, Salt and Olive Oil. Toss them together then prepare an oval or circular ceramic baking tray. Add some butter on the tray then start arranging all the vegetables together in layers as Julia Child did in her cookbooks. Then pour in the remaining sauce it created in the bowl while tossing it. Top it with some butter, grated mozzarella cheese and fresh basil. Bake it on 350F from 40 minutes to 1 hour depending on the volume of you are cooking.

This is for all the people who are

Vegans & Vegetarians!

Bon appétit à tous mes!

big hug,
joanie xxx