Delicious bruschetta with mushrooms and parmesan

Sometimes, just every so often, I get these crazy ideas in my head… I’m sure you’re all a bit sick and tired of hearing what a wonderful time we all had at the Plate to Page workshop that took place all the way back in May (and wow, did you see where they are heading in just a few days time?? Glorious Tuscany! Jealous!!) and I met so many wonderful people that if it was up to me I would be visiting all of them. And I will probably do so once my finances are back up to the normal level.. After having been to London and then straight into Weimar for prop shopping…. not a lot of money left in the bank I can tell you!!

Warm goatcheese with honey for dessert

But after having visited beautiful Weimar and having been “forced” to spend the days sweating and working – strictly no play – I felt I needed to pay Weimar and Meeta another visit. Weimar is not really close but it’s also not really far away and since I do love driving my junglefrog green car, I figured I might ask Meeta if she would mind me coming over for the weekend. Luckily she was immediately enthusiastic and so we set about planning the date. With all busy schedules planning a whole weekend can be a bit tricky but we finally managed to settle on the last weekend of September and what a glorious weekend it was!! The weather here in Holland had suddenly turned all warm and summery and while I thought the temperatures here were warm Germany was even warmer!

Do you see the subtle styling in the background done by Meeta?

We had a lovely weekend, with lots of chatting, a neighborhood BBQ (and I do have to apologize for my lack of German knowledge…!), we went to the market on Saturday, had a wonderful Greek dinner, went for a long bikeride and yes, we even had time to do some serious prop shopping too! Meeta had arranged for her ‘propguy’ to stay open until we had visited on the friday and ooooo, seriously… I could have spend easily hundreds of euro’s there.. *sigh* I did take back some lovely plates, cups and yes, even a 200 year old wooden board, that you have seen featured a few times already.

For lunch on Saturday we visited a small lunch cafe in Erfurt, called Mathilda and the food there was so lovely I wanted to share it with you. Maybe you’re ever in the area (and judging by the number of tourists while we were in Erfurt, you might easily..) it’s worth a visit. It’s a small but cosy place and the weather was so good that we actually sat outside in the shade (yes, in the shade.. too hot in the sun believe it or not!!)

We settled for two different bruschetta’s which we shared and a lovely green salad and then… then there was dessert. I had a delicious goatcheese baked with honey and Meeta had this chocolate cake made in heaven with vanilla sauce. I tasted a bit and wished I had that too.. We finished that all of with a delicious coffee. I forgot the name of the coffee but it waswith condensed sweetened foam at the bottom and some other goodness and it was just delicious!

I’m glad we went for a bikeride the next day so I could get rid of some of the excess calories!

Mathilda

Barfüßerstr. 1-2

99084 Erfurt

What's not to love about a good chocolate cake??

Shooting the chocolates

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Salad with bull's blood leaves and halloumi

As I have told you before I have a hard time resisting ingredients which I have not seen before and when they have an imaginative name like ‘Bull’s Blood’… well, there is only one course of action possible as far as I’m concerned and that is to put it in my basket! I was really shopping for pecans to bring with me to Germany as I spend a weekend there with Meeta from the blog ” What’s for Lunch Honey?” and we had a great time! (more on that possibly later) but finding those pecans was just an excuse to go to a shop at my favorite store in Amsterdam. I could really spend hours there just roaming around and the only downside is that I always (always!) come back with things I don’t really need. I do use them so rest assured that nothing will go to waste but still… it’s a struggle sometimes to have everything finished before the expiration date..lol..

Delicious dressing from I like that

The ingredients that went into this salad certainly had no risk of getting old or stale as they were all eaten outside on a gloriously sunny day the same day I bought them. Ofcourse there was my favorite cheese to use in salads which is halloumi. You can see some more halloumi related salads on my blog here, here and here. Key to this salad was another new find and that is a dressing by a company called ‘I like that“. Now to me, with a name like that it just had to be a winner. They have interesting flavor combinations and the company is originally located in South Africa. This dressing is so much more then the boring ones you can find in our regular supermarket. The flavors were intense and the smoked sundried tomatoes really shone through. I paired my bull’s blood leaves (which is essentially just a variety of beetroot leaves) with the crispy bits of fried halloumi, lovely juicy tiny tomberries and on top of that I quickly caramelized some toasted almond slivers with honey and put them on top of the salad.

Absolutely delicious and this will be a winner for me, if I could only find those beetroot leaves in my regular store! I could ofcourse grow them myself. Now there’s a thought for next year!

Salad with bull’s blood leaves, halloumi and tomberries

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Serves:	1
Prep time:	10 minutes
Cook time:	5 minutes
Total time:	15 minutes
Meal type:	Salad
Region:	Worldwide

Ingredients

• 2 handfuls bull's blood salad leaves (this is a type of leave from beetroot. Usually from seed)
• 100g halloumi
• 50g tomberries (very small yellow variety of tomatoes. Use any other tomato you want!)
• 1 tablespoon honey
• 1 tablespoon rock chives (the baby chives...)
• 2 tablespoons almond slivers
• dressing of your choice (I used dressing from 'I like that' (smoked sundried tomato vinaigrette))

Directions

Cut slices from the halloumi and cut those again in cubes. I like them medium sized but you can always make them as large or as big as you want. Heat a small layer of sunflower oil in a frying pan and once the oil is hot, quickly fry the halloumi until golden brown. Be careful as it does tend to spatter. Leave to drain on paper towels

Wash the salad leaves and put them on a plate with the tomberries.

Heat a frying pan and toast the almonds quickly until golden. Add a tablespoon of honey and stir making sure all almonds are covered. keep an eye on it, as it will burn easily.

Once the halloumi is slightly cooled, distribute over the salad leaves, add the almonds and the rock chives on top. Sprinkle some of the dressing on top of the salad and enjoy!

Note

I totally loved the combination of flavors in this recipe. The crunch of the halloumi with the sweetness of the almonds works really well and the dressing from "I like that", was just brilliant here. If you're making your own dressing I would go with similar flavors but really it's pretty versatile.

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Delicious greek salad

Every single time we go to Greece the very first meal I order is a Greek salad. There is nothing better then the taste of those gorgeous tomatoes combined with the salty feta and the juicy cucumbers. Yes, even the cucumbers taste better in Greece! And then enjoying that while the only other sounds are the soft clinging together of the boatmasts in the wind.

Greek tiny restaurant by the harbour

It’s been too long really since we last went to Greece. It will always be one of my favorite countries and fairly close too. With the current economic situation not being all too positive I’m not sure what that will do to the touristic site of the country. Will people still go to Greece or will they all decide it is not a good idea? You never know how situations like this will turn out. A lot of people in Greece are depending on tourism to support them. I’m certainly no expert when it comes to economics so I’ll better stick to what I do know and that is food. Obviously; as I have learned since; the food we get served in the majority of the Greek restaurants is really not the best. Touristic stuff, quickly put together. Although that is mostly true about the really busy places you can find really good and fresh food anywhere in Greece if you look a little harder. We’ve had some amazing seafood (I learned to eat fish in Greece after all) gorgeous moussakas and well, the Greek salad of course.

Simple but delicious!

I might not have made it into a traditional Greek salad. I’ve been served raw red onions on top in many cases, but I just don’t like that. I’m not a big fan of raw onions, so I left that out here and just kept to the plan and simple basics that are o so delicious and lightning quick to put together for a healthy lunch!

Greek salad

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Serves:	1
Prep time:	10 minutes
Cook time:	None
Total time:	10 minutes
Dietary:	Vegetarian
Meal type:	Appetizer, Lunch, Salad
Region:	Greek

Ingredients

• 4 tomatoes (Make sure you use really good tomatoes. Watery ones will not do here!)
• 1/2 Cucumber (Seeds removed and sliced)
• 100g feta (crumbled)
• 75g kalamata olives
• 2 tablespoons extra virgin olive oil
• salt
• pepper

Directions

Not much to describe here as it is basically cutting all the vegetables in biteable sizes, toss them together in a bowl, add the crumbled feta and olives, sprinkle with olive oil and pepper and salt and you're ready to go!

Note

Delicious and fresh and just for a minute - makes you feel in Greece again..

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• Quinoa, feta and walnut salad
• Tarly salad with orange hazelnut dressing – living leaner
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We all know dim sum right? Or should I say, we all think we know, dim sum? I thought I knew what dim sum was all about when I accepted to go for lunch in London with Alessio, Jackie, Su-Yin and Charmaine. I had not met the last two girls before, but we would eat and we would eat dim sum, so it had to be good…

I think Jackie picked the place Princess Garden in a side street of Oxford Street, so when Tom and I got of the plane, we went straight into the busy chaos of Oxford street and with some directions from Google maps we found the restaurant on North Audley street without any trouble. Our other four lunch-partners where already there and after saying our hello’s we all sat down at the table. While we arrived Jackie, Su-Yn and Charmaine were already discussing menu options while Charmaine proceeded to order them in fluent Chinese (I think it was Chinese, but then I have no idea and I forgot to ask..)

The first couple of bites we received were normal enough to not scare us. I think they probably felt we could handle those, but then we got this tasty looking dish in front of us and – as with every dish – we asked what it was. Jackie proceeded to tell us, without blinking an eye, that these were chicken feet.

Yes you didn't know but these are chicken feet...!

Chicken feet??? Yes, they are first deep frozen and then cooked and then fried (I might have gotten this all wrong, but I was so mesmerized by the look of these feet that I forgot to pay attention) and then dressed in a delicious sauce, to disguise them to make them look like food.  And yes, I did taste a tiny bit. Alessio, brave man, ate the biggest part of one foot and I stole one little joint from him. I mean; I could not walk away without at least trying, right? And to be quite honest; it was not as bad as you might have thought. It was crunchy (cartilage!!) but the taste was ok. Still the idea of eating the very same things we used to play with as kids after cleaning the chicken, sort of got me spooked a little! I actually think that the part I ate must have been the chicken’s toenail… Now you have to admit… that does not sound very good does it?

Curry like pieces of tripe

We then got loads more baskets in front of us and one of those was another first for me; tripe. I tried one piece and while it was not terrible to eat it’s also not going to be on my list of favorites.. lol… The rest of the food was absolutely delicious! I have to confess that I sort of forgot what we ate as it kept coming and every bite was as delicious as the next. It was also great fun to see Alessio and Jackie again and to meet Charmaine and Su-Yin. So thanks ladies and gentleman for giving us a great lunch experience!

Alessio eating his chicken feet

Jackie checking out the food

Charmaine and Su-Yin checking out the food

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Healthy salad with feta, orzo and tomatoes

Now you probably thought I would continue posting recipes for utterly decadent and unhealthy chocolate cakes, right? But no… sorry to disappoint; it’s time to get healthy again!

Talking of which I have a question for all of you… do you have any really good and really really fast recipes that you use for all those days that real cooking is just not an option?

I’ll explain what I mean. Tom and I really would like to get better in eating healthy and eating sensibly and also losing weight. We have are good moments, but what happens is that at certain points in the week we are too busy and those are the moments it all goes wrong and we end up ordering pizza or snacking on other unhealthy things… Weightloss and healthy eating down the drain. That just annoys me enormously and I know we have ourselves to blame ofcourse.

But how do you do it? To give an example of our current week schedule you can probably see the issue.

Delicious and healthy orzo salad

Tuesday I have a reportage in Friesland, about 2 hours drive from home. I will be back from work at around 8 pm if lucky.

Wednesday I have a wedding to photograph till 7.30. Home around 8.30.

Thursday I’m actually going out for dinner with a friend as it’s her birthday but let’s go with this week. When we are both home late and haven’t eaten anything in between we tend to resort to bad habits. So what I really want to try is to get some really easy and really fast recipes with virtually no cooking involved. Case in point; this recipe for orzo for instance.

Quick, delicious and fairly healthy.

So picture yourself, no grocery shopping possible anymore, so you’d have to do with things you have in the fridge, freezer or cupboard. What are your go to recipes for days where you have 10 minutes to whip up something? Sure we have some real easy pasta and rice and stirfry recipes but I need more variety….

Tell me your secrets on how to keep on track!

Orzo with feta, tomatoes and dill

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Serves:	2
Prep time:	10 minutes
Cook time:	None
Total time:	10 minutes
Meal type:	Lunch, Salad
Region:	Worldwide
Website:	Epicurious

Delicious quick and fresh recipe which is perfect for a light lunch or dinner.

Ingredients

• 3 tablespoons extra virgin olive oil
• 2 cups cherry tomatoes (halved or quartered depending on size)
• 1/2 cup dill (chopped)
• 1 teaspoon lemon zest
• 1 cup orzo
• 1,5 cup feta

Directions

Toss together oil, tomatoes, dill, zest and 1/2 tablespoon each of salt and pepper in a large serving bowl. Let stand at roomtemperature for at least 10 minutes.

Meanwhile, cook orzo in a pasta pott of boiling salted water until al dente. Drain orzo, leave to cool a little and then toss with the tomato mixture. Add feta and toss again

Note

Originally featured in Gourmet magazine in july 2008.

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