Swiss Chard Lasagne

      

Milou's super dad has just turned into a gardening freak. After work, he steps into the house, rushes into the bedroom, and in seconds he puts on one of his favourite t-shirts and transforms into a gardener, his alter-ego. I see him asking neighbours about seeds, compost, plants which like sun and plants which like shade,and many other things about gardening he's not sure enough. He's planted all kinds of seed he could find in the market place and every day he comes up with some new smart ideas and whenever I have a look at him through the window I find him having already set up a little greenhouse replika or an affordable drip irrigation in his tiny garden.

One of our neighbours a few days ago dropped by and gave me a bunch of Swiss chard which she's been growing in her tiny garden. She's been sharing with Milou's super dad seeds and advice for a while. It was breakfast time and I had olny four sheets of dried yufka/phyllo on hand. The idea just walked into my head: A replika of Swiss chard lasagne. I'd eaten up all the cheese in the fridge the day before so I couldn't sprinkle with parmesan or any other cheese over the chard layers and the top. It would have tasted super delicious then :) Anyway, even without cheese, it disappeared in minutes but I'd remembered to put one slice aside to be delivered to our friendly neighbour. It serves 6 by the way.

Ingredients:

1 bunch of Swiss chard
3 tablespoons of vegetable oil
4 noodles of dried yufka/phyllo
2 medium onions, peeled and chopped
2 tablespoons butter
1 tablespoon flour
2,5 cups milk (warm)
sesame and black cumin
salt and black pepper

Method:

Step 1: Sauce

Melt the butter in a pan over medium-low heat, add the flour and cook gently for 2-3 minutes whisking constantly (this will keep it from getting lumpy), until softened. Gradually stir in the milk. Bring to the boil, stirring, add salt, then simmer gently over a very low heat, stirring, for 2-3 minutes until thickened. The method is almost the same as the béchamel sauce but I didn't let it thicken as much as to cover the spoon as we do with the béchamel sauce because I used dried yufka/phyllo sheets here - all the store had on hand (you can use dried lasagne noodles). So the phyllo sheets get moist enough with this sauce.

Step 2: Prep the chard

De-rib the chard, wash well, and let the chard drain on a kitchen towel (or some paper towels) for a few minutes, so that there’s no excess water on the leaves. Coarsely chop the chard, and set aside.

 Step 3: Prep the filling

Heat vegetable oil in a saucepan. Add the onion, and saute for a few minutes. Add the chard mix everything together and cook for five minutes, stirring, until almost tender. Add some salt and pepper. Remove from heat and set aside. Preheat the oven to 200°C.

  

               

Step 4: Assembling the lasagne

Place a layer of sauce in a lightly greased ovenproof dish followed by a layer of yufka/phyllo and spread some chard mixture over the yufka/phyllo. Repeat layering until all of the sauce, chard, and yufka/phyllo have been used up. Finish with sauce on top. Bake for  

    around 30 minutes or until the top is golden.

        

                          

 

A Slice of Spring

A Slice of Spring 

Princess Milou attended Majda's birthday party for the second time. We wanted to bake muffins for her but when the muffins rose and then fell flat in the center all together in harmony, and we immediately looked for another quick solution. I made a cocoa cake and prepared some chocolate sauce to top it with. We had bought some ground coconut in green colour and sugarpaste flowers and it was time we used them to create a garden of roses and other flowers on grass-like ground coconut. It was one of the easiest cake decorations we made but the cake was appealing to all the guest in the party in the end. They all liked it. It was quick enough too. Bake the cake, top it with chocolate sauce, sprinkle with ground coconut and place the flowers, that's it. Unfortunately, I was in such a rush that I could take only this photograph of the cake and called it 'a slice of spring'. 

Ingredients for Cocoa Cake

3 eggs

1,5 cups sugar
1 cup milk
1/2 cup melted butter
1/2 cup cocoa powder

1 teaspoon baking soda
1 teaspoon baking powder

1 teaspoon of vanilla extract

1/2 teaspoon salt3 cups flour

butter for the cake pan

Directions:

1. Preheat oven to 180°C. Butter and lightly flour a 24 cm round cake pan. In a bowl, whisk flour, cocoa, baking soda, baking powder and salt.
2. In a mixing bowl, cream butter and sugar until fluffy. Add milk and eggs, one at a time, beating until well incorporated. Beat in vanilla.
3. Add the flour mixture to the butter mixture.
4. Pour batter into the pan. Bake until toothpick inserted in center comes out clean, 25 to 30 minutes. Cool in pans 10 minutes before inverting cakes onto rack to cool completely.
5. Make the buttercream: In mixing bowl, beat butter and marshmallow cream until fluffy. Beat in cocoa, chocolate, vanilla, and 1 tablespoon water. If too thin, refrigerate about 5 minutes.
6. Place one layer on platter. Spread top with 1 cup buttercream. Place second layer on top. Frost entire cake with remaining buttercream. 

   
   

   Ingredients for  Chocolate Sauce
   1/2 cup powdered chocolate

   2 tablespoons cocoa
   1cup milk 

   1 tablespoon all purpose flour

   1/2 tablespoon low fat butter

   3/4 cup granulated sugar

   
   

   Directions  for Chocolate Sauce

   
   

   In a small pan heat milk, flour, cocoa and sugar stirring constantly. Bring to the boil and continue to stir until all of the sugar has been dissolved.

   Add powdered chocolate and butter to the pan of milk, flour, cocoa and sugar and stir.

   Remove the pan from the heat and stir the sauce until the chocolate and butter have melted and all the ingredients have blended together.

Whole Grain Muffins

Drizzling with chocolate sauce served its purpose. 

Some of my colleagues keep complaining about how difficult it is to find low fat mighty snacks around. They crave something at breaks and reach for the nearest bar of chocolate and crumple away the wrap in seconds with a sense of regret every time. Such an emotional reaction makes sense because they are still hungry after eating up a whole bar and besides they end up with a big number of unwanted calories at the end of the day. Since they are all well-aware of this fact, they immediately pick up the crumpled wrap back from the bin, straighten it well and use their microscopic vision to see the table at the back cover listing the fat and calories in the product and find out how many calories they've consumed. However, if they are careless enough to avoid adjusting the frequency and quantity of what they consume during the day, they just go to bed at night in contentment but seconds later they start to make an overall fitness plan to burn off those calories. Well, whether these reactions may sound familiar to you or not, many women need to find new or different low fat healthy foods they can enjoy as breakfast, for instance. So using all in the drawers and cupboards, I came up with these low fat spicy whole grain muffins. The smell and flavour of cinnamon ginger combination filled up the whole house and turned it into a home once again. Anyway, I took the muffins to my colleagues the next day and they all loved it. I accomplished a mini-goal and the last touch was drizzling with chocolate sauce to reward myself. 

   Ingredients

• 1/2 cup butter, melted
• 3/4 cup brown sugar
• 3 eggs
• 1 cup low fat milk
• 1 cup whole wheat flour
• 1 cup all-purpose flour
• 1 teaspoons vanilla extract
• 2 teaspoons baking powder
• 1/2 teaspoon salt
• ground cinnamon and ginger

For the Chocolate Sauce
1/2 cup powdered chocolate

2 tablespoons cocoa
1cup milk 

1 tablespoon all purpose flour

1/2 tablespoon low fat butter

3/4 cup granulated sugar

• 
  
• Directions (Muffins)
1. Preheat the oven to 190°C and lightly grease or line with paper baking cups 23/4-inch muffin cups. 
2. In a large bowl, blend together the flour, baking powder, cinnamon, ginger and salt. 
3. In a medium bowl, beat the egg, milk, butter and sugar until smooth. Add the vanilla extract.
4. Combine the two mixtures, blending until the dry ingredients are moistened. 
5. Fill the muffin cups about three-quarters full. Bake for about 20 minutes or until a wooden toothpick inserted into the center of a muffin comes out clean. 
6. Cool completely on a wire rack. 

   
   

   Directions (Chocolate Sauce)

   
   

   In a small pan heat milk, flour, cocoa and sugar stirring constantly. Bring to the boil and continue to stir until all of the sugar has been dissolved.

   Add powdered chocolate (or chocolate chunks in small pieces) and butter to the pan of milk, flour, cocoa and sugar and stir.

   Remove the pan from the heat and stir the sauce until the chocolate and butter have melted and all the ingredients have blended together.

   Serve the chocolate sauce immediately while it is still warm.

   Tip: You can make the chocolate sauce and store it in a fridge.  If you have any muffins left over, individually wrap them, put them in freezer bags and freeze for up to three weeks. If you double wrap, you'll keep them from taking on the taste of other foods in the freezer.

30th Birthday

30th birthday gift

I turned thirty, finally. I've been waiting for a long time to enter the age of thirty which I thought would give an end to the period of ongoing transition. Twenties was a long path of transition for me along which I'd been collecting pebbles. I collected a variety of different pebbles so that I would lay them for a new life structure on which I could build my own unique future. I thought the day I turned thirty I could just empty my pockets out and found it right there but even the path itself didn't come to an end on 10th April. Nothing happened. Nobody stopped me on the way and told me it was the time to let the pebbles go for the next period.  

Expectation of such an illusion was so inspiring, though. I kept on reading, writing, translating, taking photographs, and doing a million of other things I'd expected to help me build something totally new and huge. Nothing new or huge showed up. It wasn't frustration that I felt. It was more like confusion when you got out of the bus at the wrong stop. You are familiar with the neighbourhood but you can't tell where to go for a few seconds. Then it dawns on you: The transition is still going on. There are more pebbles to collect.

The problem is I'm not patient. I'm not patient enough to wait for another decade to see how the forties feel. I should preach myself not to rush. I am most welcomed to my thirties and I should just enjoy this part of the path right now. Spending too much time thinking about the next part would end up somewhere dark and depressing. "The dark is scary," as the owl who was afraid of the dark put it.

A Strawberry Fairy

Strawberry Fairy by Cicely Mary Barker

Cicely Mary Barker was an English illustrator who painted flowers with innocent joyful fairy children. Clothing and character of each fairy represented the flora in each illustration. When I saw this little strawberry fairy card, the idea of dressing Milou up as a strawberry fairy for her birthday party just walked into my head. Well, designers of her costume obviously were not as meticulous as Barker with the details but Milou looked like a real strawberry fairy in the end. Here are some of the pictures I took. I just wanted to share them with Princess Milou's fans. Enjoy.

This baby and toddler strawberry costume includes the red dress with ribbon straps and a green leafy collar, the matching leafy headband, and the white glittering wings. For further information about fairies don't forget to visit flowerfairies.com. 

Walnut Cookies

I craved walnuts which might mean I craved healthy fatty acids, potassium, magnesium, phosphorus, iron, calcium, zinc, copper,vitamin B9, B6, E, A, and many other minerals and vitamins they include. The wisest way to meet all my dietary needs for a better mental health was to bake some walnut cookies which were supposed to be full of them. They certainly served the purpose. Here goes the recipe and some of the pictures I took after they completely cooled down. 

Ingredients:

• 1 cup walnuts, finely chopped
• 1/2 cup (1 stick) butter, room temperature
• 1 cup brown sugar, plus more for coating
• 1 egg
• 2 teaspoons vanilla extract
• 1/4 teaspoon salt
• 2 cups all-purpose flour
• 5 g baking powder 
• walnut halves for garnish

Directions

1. Use a blender or a food processor to chop the walnuts finely.
2. With an electric mixer, cream butter, egg and sugar until light and well-blended. Beat in vanilla, salt, baking powder and flour, scraping down sides of bowl, just until dough comes together. Fold in walnuts.
3. Preheat oven to 180°C. Squeeze dough to shape into balls. Roll in sugar. Place, 3 inches apart, on a baking sheet. Gently flatten with the bottom of a glass (reshape sides if necessary). Press a walnut half into top of dough. Sprinkle wıth sugar.
4. Bake until golden brown, rotating sheet halfway through, about 15 minutes. Sprinkle with more sugar. Cool and serve.

   
   

   

   
   

Gingerbread Cookies

I've always wanted to bake gingerbread cookies but every time I felt like some ginger cookies I came up with one or two ingredients missing so some other cookies ended up in the oven. Well, I received some fresh ground ginger from Turkey a few weeks ago, and it was high time I made gingerbread cookies. But I was so sick and tired of the gingerbread recipes resulting in Christmas themed shapes and colours that I decided to cut the cookies in different shapes. After I'd looked everywhere in the kitchen for cutters in some unusual shapes that I might have bought earlier and put away somewhere around, I realised, to my surprise, that I had only cookie cutters in the shapes of angels, pine trees, shooting stars, snowflakes, stockings, bells, snowmen, candles, candy canes and all the other traditionally shaped cookie cutters. It was some other high time that I broke with the tradition and here is the result. I used a tart shell to cut the dough into sun-shaped cookies. The result was much better than I'd expected. Sprinkling powdered sugar was the last touch to my gingerbread cookies. However, I also remembered to cut out some more using a small tea glass, just in case! The recipe below is  one of Martha Stewart's basics.

Ingredients:

• 2 cups all-purpose flour (spooned and leveled), plus more for rolling
• 2 teaspoons ground ginger
• 1 teaspoon ground cinnamon
• 1/2 teaspoon ground nutmeg
• 1/4 teaspoon ground cloves
• 1/4 teaspoon baking soda
• 1/4 teaspoon salt
• 1/2 cup (1 stick) unsalted butter, room temperature
• 1/3 cup brown sugar
• 1/3 cup unsulfured molasses
• 1 large egg
• Decorating sugar or sprinkles (optional)

Directions

1. In a medium bowl, whisk together flour, spices, baking soda, and salt; set aside. With an electric mixer, beat butter and brown sugar until smooth. Beat in molasses and egg. With mixer on low, add dry ingredients; mix just until a dough forms. Place dough on floured plastic wrap; pat into an 8-inch square. Wrap well; chill until firm, 1 to 2 hours.
2. Preheat oven to 350 degrees. Divide dough in half. Working with one half at a time (rewrap and refrigerate other half), place dough on floured parchment or waxed paper; roll out 1/8 inch thick, turning, lifting, and flouring dough (and rolling pin) as needed. Freeze dough (on paper) until firm, about 20 minutes.
3. Loosen dough from paper. Cut out shapes, and transfer to baking sheets. Decorate with sugar or sprinkles, as desired.
4. Bake until firm and edges just begin to darken, 10 to 18 minutes, depending on size. Cool completely on baking sheets.