food

End of the year updates and a recipe

Publié le 21 Décembre 2017 par Charly C.

Catégories : #Cooking, #food, #dessert, #sweets, #updates, #baking, #recipe

Wow, hello to whoever checks this out!

What are my updates? Firstly I hope my "cooking block" will stop and that I'll be able to share more stuff here. Well I do have a few recipes to share, and I can't wait to do so because I feel some of you did wonder if I'll ever post anything here or not.

Another update is that now I have an online identity, as you can see - points to the "author's name" and I hope that one day [in the next 5 years?] I will have a book published under this name.

It's a pen-name but I feel it represents me well [I feel no connection to my ID name, sorry parents]. The book I want to publish will be a collection of short stories - horror and fictional? is that what they're called? - that I'm yet to write. :P

not my picture :(

I think you want the recipe more than anything, right? I wish there was a spoiler function for the other part.

marble poundcake with poppy seeds

This recipe is rather good for Christmas [or New Years] dinner [or lunch], so it came just in time. I have to warn you that I didn't follow any recipe this time, so you can refer to this one for specific instructions and more pictures.

I will however tell you the [approximate] quantities:

2 eggs
2 full table spoons of yoghurt [I used one with 1.5% fat content. Can be replaced with any fat percentage yoghurt, and even better, sour milk. ;) ]
300 grams sugar [measured]
regular cooking oil [1 table spoon? I didn't measure it]
10 grams of baking powder [most of baking powder in Romania comes in packets of 10 grams]
some orange essence [just because I didn't have vanilla essence. I didn't measure how much I used]
all purpose flour [not measured; enough to give the right consistency to the dough]
poppy seeds [I didn't measure, maybe 10 grams? a teaspoon? It's a very popular ingredient in Romania.]
cocoa powder, unsweetened [maybe 2 teaspoons?]

METHOD:

Preheat the oven. This is a step you can't skip, especially when cooking with gas.

This time, unlike other times, I just poured everything together in the bowl - except the flour, cocoa, and the poppy seeds. I mixed for some 20 seconds. I looked at the hour on my wrist watch for this one. ;)

Then I added in the poppy and the flour and mixed well. I prepared my round tray - maybe some 25 cm in diameter? and poured most of the dough in it. I saved maybe some 4 or 5 spoons in the bowl and added the cocoa powder.

I added the cocoa dough on top, trying to make some design - but you can't really see it since I didn't take pictures this time. I baked the cake for 45 minutes - 35 to 40 minutes would have been enough, but last times it was still underbaked [undocumented times] and I didn't want that to happen again.

When it finished baking, I just covered it in vanilla sugar and sliced it as you can see.

When it finished baking, I just covered it in vanilla sugar and sliced it as you can see.

I had my first try this morning, and I was pleasantly surprised and inspired to write this entry. YAY!

The coffee is from Japan, from the brand AGF Blendy. I have a Japanese friend and he kindly send me some Japanese coffee. I can barely read some hiragana and katakana... And although I started to learn some Chinese, it's definitely NOT enough to read the instructions. LOL

What can I say? This coffee was more bitter than life but really good :) The sachet in the cup was packed in the envelope I'm holding, and it smelled really good when I opened it. I added milk [off camera] to be able to drink it and also be sure I won't get shaky.

I hope you'll be able to try this recipe out.

I wish you Happy Holidays and lots of health in the upcoming year!

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Adventures in July

Publié le 13 Août 2017 par Charly Cross

Catégories : #adventures, #animals, #bucharest, #dessert, #food, #friends, #romania

I actually wanted to have such an entry almost every month, but this wasn't really possible, especially if I had something else to say, or if I didn't have enough time.

Unlike July 2016, this one was quite full. I had a pretty big task to write at the beginning of the month, and then 2 smaller ones. Well, this is not really something you might really be interested in, so, no pics to show off.

I also managed to stick more to a posting schedule, all thanks to my bullet journal. If it looks messy, it's because I have yet to discover a journaling method that works for me. Or that looks less messy. An if you think this is not a proper bullet journal notebook, you're right: it is an agenda used as a daily planner with no monthly spreads, with dedicated pages for each day, so on. It might serve better as a diary, if you were to write every day, a single page. I use the date written on the page, as page-number.

I was a beginner at bullet journaling. still am.

What stood out the most, was Ciel my pet crow being more active, coming to me to play, and all that jazz. I was really scared that he might be depressed, but I guess he's not. His favorite things to play with are items that are long and thin - line pens, pencils, drinking straws. He likes to play with pens so much, he learned where I keep them and goes to them to steal them. It's actually quite hilarious!

He knows which pens I don't want him to play with, and those are the ones he wants the most. Of course! Last night, when we returned from a stroll in the park, I found ALL the pens missing from their place, a bird dancing on the table, and the floor covered in pens. That was quite something to clean, HAHA!

This video is from the first day he started playing so much. I thought he's hilarious! He would keep on coming back for more pens! And, yes, I have several looking identical, for no good reason.

We also went out to have ice cream. And we did it as often as we could. What you need to know is that we found a few places selling really good ice cream. For instance, Ana Baking has one of the best salted caramel ice creams! Guys! You HAVE to go there if you ever visit Romania. Just don't order coffee or coffee based drinks: our tasted like something nasty, and we won't get that again.

Another awesome ice-cream we had was at this place called Caffeol. The ice cream came in a cone, dipped in a milkshake! We ordered the coconut flavor one which was inspired by the Raffaello bonbons. It even had one bonbon on top! Guys! One such drink is more than enough for 2 people! Sadly, if you want to order soy milk in your drink, you have to pay more :(

up close: Raffaello Maddness. picture by @calinescu_alexandru on instagram.

This place also sells some lemonades: some 5 flavors? there is classic lemonade, lemonade with melon, with strawberry, and I forgot what else. I managed to order a melon lemonade without lemon [say that 3 times fast!] and it tasted so good! It basically contains melon or strawberry, orange and lemon, so you can give up the lemon or orange if you really want. My partner has a sensitive stomach and citrus fruits, especially lemons are REALLY bad for their stomach.

that's one of their lemonades and a Snickers Maddness frappe. pic by @foodofromania on instagram

Sadly I lost my pictures of the drinks, so I had to search them up. Caffeol has 3 locations: one in the Historical Center of Bucharest - where we went, one in Brasov and another one in Ploiesti. Check them out if you visit Romania!

We wanted to go to the pool, however we didn't manage to get around to it. Hopefully, this month, we will go there. The thing is, we have a couple water parks, and lake sides where we could go to swim or relax, however it is not safe to go there, health-wise. Those waters are not as monitored, and since so many people go there, the waters are more likely to be contaminated with all sorts of bacteria and viruses. Going to a pool club of sorts, is more fancy and safe as far as your health goes. Here are a couple of pictures from 2 years ago.

This is actually a health center with a gym, sauna, swimming pool, and there is a restaurant as well. The place is located by a lake, but the pool is covered and not connected to the lake. It's really quiet and peaceful. Too bad the entrance fee is rather high in local currency.

This month also marked the first time I wrote something in Chinese, all by myself. I'm so proud of myself: I started studying Mandarin last year, but I was never consistent about it. However I do have something to show for it. Maybe I will post a separate entry with all the characters I DO know. Until then, this is what I wrote:

In all fairness, the "nice to meet you" line [the one before the short break] I wrote by looking it up and I have yet to learn how to say it without looking at the pronunciation. I can post a comment with the reading and translation if you want, just say so below ;)

There is one more thing that happened, right on the last day of July, but please stay tuned for that one, as I have a vlog about it. I will post it separately because this already became too long, and I need to write a few more explanations for the vlog.

Until next Sunday~~

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Poundcake with oranges

Publié le 18 Mars 2017 par Charly C.

Catégories : #Cooking, #dessert, #food, #sweets, #baking, #fruits, #recipe

My friend had this recipe for a cake made with natural orange juice and orange slices on top. The recipe is in Romanian, and I will try my best to translate it for you. Because you should try it the next time you want something different.

The recipe was recently found at the bottom of a drawer - it was being kept VERY safe as you can tell [aka we had no idea where it was]. I was cleaning that closet and the recipe resurfaced. yay! I don't have much to say at this point, so let's see what this cake is all about!

INGREDIENTS

For the batter:

175 grams [real] butter
175 grams [caster] sugar
2 eggs [beaten]
225 grams all purpose flour
2 teaspoons baking powder
2 oranges [peel and juice] - see below

175 grams almonds [grounded] - I substituted with some almond essence
a pinch of salt

For the syrup:

9 oranges
100 grams [caster] sugar
150 ml water

METHOD

Making the batter:

[disclaimer] the recipe said to mix all the ingredients at once. i didn't do that, because i know the consistency differs depending on how you mix them. so i will tell you how i mixed my ingredients. please use a mixer, and not a hand beater like i did [the cake turned out fine, just look at the pictures, but i don't think the ingredients ere mixed as they should have been.

1. Preheat the oven, prepare your baking tray, and make sure to have your butter at room temperature - it ill work faster this way.

2. Beat your butter and sugar together until you have a creamy looking mixture. My hand beater didn't manage to get the right consistency, luckily this didn't matter much in the end.

3. Add your beaten eggs, salt, baking powder, and orange juice and mix. Mine looked like this:

4. Add your flour, orange peel, and almonds and mix. This is what I had in my bowl at the end:

5. Throw in the oven on medium heat till it's well done. Mine took about 40 minutes. I use a gas stove and oven, and this means I cook and bake with fire. I have 8 heat settings, from 1 [lowest] to 8 [highest] - I can make pizza on settings 6 to 7. I usually cook [in the oven] using the setting 3 or 2, even 1 - I feel the heat is too strong at 3. I baked this cake at setting 2.

Making the syrup!

1. Use a small pot. Place the sugar, water and the juice from 6 oranges in it, and on a small fire [low heat].

2. Mix until the sugar dissolves.

3. Leave it on the fire for 10-15 min, WITHOUT stirring. When it's done, you'll have less juice [syrup] left in the pot.

Assembling!

Peel your remaining 3 oranges and slice them.
Place your cake on something to cool down, for some 10 min. [I left mine in the tray, you'll see why]
Take a fork and pierce the surface of the cake a few times, in different places.
Pour your syrup over the cake [if the cake is in the tray, this step is less messy]
Place your orange slices on top of the cake.

Now, you can devour it! :D

Check out this close up!

My friend can testify this was moist, flavored, and out of ordinary delicious! Much better than any other cake I baked before. I must admit, this time I too liked the texture - I'm picky in this regard.

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Cold zucchini stew for hot summer days

Publié le 6 Juillet 2015 par Charly C.

Catégories : #Cooking, #food, #health, #recipe, #tips, #advice

Or for cold winter days, depending on how you serve it, of course. If you want it hot, it's ideal in winter, and if you want it cold, have it in summer!

Be warned that in winter zucchini is more expensive, since it's in season in summer.

Yesterday I received these beautiful zucchini, and I decided to cook them. I really like zucchini food, more than any other way of preparing zucchini. These are brought from the countryside and are grown in a bio way, as people here don't like tasteless food ingredients.

The recipe is super easy and you don't need many things at all. Additionally, many other recipes follow a similar pattern, so if you know one recipe, you can make several types of foods.

INGREDIENTS

4 medium sized zucchini

young and pretty zucchini

some salt - about a teaspoon
some oil - 2 or 3 table spoons?
some condiments - I used black pepper
some tomato sauce
some all purpose flour

METHOD

Pour the oil in a pot and turn on the fire or heat.
Dice the zucchini and drop them in the pot.

Sprinkle with salt and set to cook with a lid covering them.
Mix from time to time with a wooden spoon or spatula.
You have about an hour till they're done cooking.
At the end, you will want to sprinkle your condiments, add the tomato sauce, and some all purpose flour if you find it the food liquid.
You might want to continue cooking for some 10 minutes more at this point, or turn off the heat and let it sit covered for the same amount of time.
Serve in a dish, either hot or cold, however you prefer!

bon appetit!

NOTES

You can cook this with chopped onion if you like. You'll have to saute the onion a little before adding the zucchini. Some people say it tastes better, but I disagree.
You don't need to add any water to this food because the zucchini will provide plenty.

I hope you'll like it if you decide to try it out!

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Midnight crepes - a blog entry

Publié le 11 Octobre 2014 par Charly C.

Catégories : #Cooking, #dessert, #food, #sweets, #story

Hello everyone.

Right now it's 1am over here. I just came from the kitchen where i prepared some crepes. I started them at something past midnight. This is the 3rd night I do this, granted, not in a row. I think I'm in the process of developing a new habit.

The midnight crepes are not all that special, they're regular, sweet crepes that you fill with anything you want that is sweet. In my case, these crepes seem to be better than the ones I make in the day-time. hmmm maybe my cravings determine me to cook better, or maybe i just like the food more.

In any case, the batter turned out exceptionally well, but of course i measured nothing. Water - 500 ml, 1 egg, 5 spoons sugar, pinch of salt, and several spoons of all purpose flour - 5 or maybe 6?

OOps, I should have cleaned the stove's top. Tonight the crepes are less burned, but I took no photos.

Well, this is all for now, bye~~

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Refilled bell peppers

Publié le 6 Août 2014 par Charly C.

Catégories : #Cooking, #recipe, #main dish, #tips, #food, #advice

Hello world~~~

Today's dinner will be "refilled bell peppers" with pork, carrots, and rice. People here love this dish, and so do I. This recipe calls for cooking both on medium heat and in the oven. It can be done all in the oven too, if you prefer. ;) This is a main dish, and I actually forgot what you can eat it with. Maybe a tomato salad, some yogurt or sour cream. You might want bread too, if you're a fan. The dish can be served warm or cold, depending on when you serve it. Sometimes these peppers taste better cold, or the next day if the person cooking them is really talented. If you ask me, this dish doesn't really need other side dishes.

Most main dishes use onions and (or) garlic, but I am allergic to them, so I used shredded carrots instead of onions. I hope the dish still tastes good. I had 10 bell peppers in total, but I only managed to use 7. That's how many fit in my pot, and not all of them had the same size. I broke 1 pepper and I didn't use it anymore for this dish, but I will use it for a sandwich, or some other dish. I will give you the quantities I used, and I want to mention before hand that I have some left overs I placed in the freezer for a future batch. You need a tall enough pot in so the peppers would stand on their tips. I used pork meat, but you can use a mixture of pork and beef, or just beef. I think beef will cook for longer, though, I'm not sure.

serving idea

INGREDIENTS

500 g pork meat. [1 pound?]
500 g uncooked rice [1 pound?]
2 long carrots
condiments: black pepper, salt, paprika,
thick tomato sauce
2 eggs
200 g sour cream [tastes better than yogurt]
3 table spoons of cooking oil [I used sunflower oil, the most commonly found and used here]
bell peppers [7 or more]

METHOD

First, wash the rice, and leave it in some water until you're ready to mix it. Peel and shred the carrots. Now, remove the core with seeds from the peppers, and wash the peppers. Make sure you don't break them. It is time to mix the meat, condiments, eggs, shredded carrots, 2 spoons of tomato sauce, and rice.

soaking rice, counted peppers, and the filling before mixing everything

With a spoon fill each of the peppers, but leave some empty space at the top as the rice will swell up. Place the filled peppers in the pot, with the opening up. Fill with water to cover them, and place on medium heat for an hour. I think you need medium heat, as I used low heat and things were going nowhere.

While the peppers boil, mix the sour cream with some 4 tablespoons of tomato sauce, some salt, some black pepper, the oil, and some water.

When boiling time is up, your pot is supposed to be half full with water. I had a lid over my pot and the water level never went down. This turned out to be a good things though, as I used some of the water in the sour cream and tomato sauce mixture. ;) The mixture has to be rather liquid, like tomato juice.

i edited this entry in july 2017, when i re-cooked this

When putting the sauce mixture over the peppers, make sure you cover them as well. Place the pot in the oven for 20 minutes. I stopped the fire in the oven after 25 minutes, and then I left the pot in there as it wasn't yet dinner time.

my leftovers before freezing time. can you tell I forgot to put tomato sauce in the mixture? hahaha.

Some notes:

This recipe can be altered for those who do not eat meat, by replacing all the meat with rice or soy. It is best to use some sort of lid for the peppers after filling them, so there will be no leak. You can use slices of tomatoes, potatoes, or pieces of peppers, like I did.

You might have figured out by now, that broken peppers may leak or break further, and you don't want that. Depending on the size of the peppers and number of people at the table, the serving size is 1 or 2 peppers per person. Use at least 2 table spoons of sour cream or yogurt on each pepper after you place them on the plates.

The same filling can be used for refilled zucchini or refilled tomatoes.

Please leave your questions in the comments below.Bon Apetit~~~

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My Linzer torte recipe

Publié le 24 Février 2014 par Charly C.

Catégories : #Cooking, #baking, #dessert, #food, #recipe, #sweets, #tips

Hello world~~~

I haven't updated in ages. Well, it is time for a brand new recipe, but first a little bit of a back-story. I received this round, flower shaped baking tray, so I had to try it out right away. And, in case you were wondering, yes, it has been used.

The recipe I used is one I posted already, but I twisted it up a little. The recipe is the one for vanilla biscuits. OK, truth be told, I haven't even measured the ingredients, I just freely poured. If you're a beginner, I highly recommend you measure them. The recipe for the vanilla biscuits uses almonds. I had no nuts around the house.

My gifted baking round/flower tray (on my bed) and compared to my hand.

Remember what I called this recipe? Linzer torte? This cake has a crust with some jam on top. If you research the recipe, you'll that the one I used comes really close to it. I used a cherry jam. I also gave up the lattice design the Linzer torte because of not having enough dough.

INGREDIENTS

200 grams butter
250 grams flour
70 grams sugar
some salt
some baking powder
30 ml vanilla essence
jam of choice

OPTIONAL

100 grams almonds or other nuts
some cinnamon
vanilla sugar
confectioner's sugar

METHOD

Leave the jam to a side. Preheat the oven and prepare a baking tray of choice, using your favorite method

Mix all the ingredients in a large enough bowl. You will need to use your hands for this. Get your hands wet so the dough won't stick to them. Mix really well.

Take all the dough and place in the baking tray. Take a lass with a regular shape to help you spread the dough evenly in the tray. It is best to make a little edge to prevent the jam from leaking over. Pour the jam on top, and spread it evenly. Feel free to add more nuts on top.

Place the tray in the oven, in the middle, with a medium-low heat. Baking last about half an hour. Using a toothpick to check if it's done is not very effective due to the jam on top. It is easy to burn this cake, so be careful.

Once it's done, remove it from the oven and let it cool. Once cooled, you can sprinkle confectioner's sugar on top.

Please leave your questions in the comments.

Bon Apetit

Originally posted on Feb 24, 2014 Edited in November 2018.

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"generic" pound cake recipe

Publié le 24 Novembre 2013 par Charly C.

Catégories : #baking, #tips, #Cooking, #dessert, #food, #sweets, #recipe

Hello world~~~

You might have many great pound cake recipes, and I cannot wait to find more. There are a few ingredients needed, just a few steps, and then, BAM! baking and voila!

I'll give you guys the quantities for a single loaf and the ones for 2 loafs in parenthesis, if you like it and want to try it again ;) This recipe doesn't need baking powder because the eggs and oil make it really fluffy.

not my picture :( it belongs to its maker

INGREDIENTS

4 large eggs (7 medium eggs)
1 cup sugar (2 cups)
5 tablespoons water (7 tablespoons)
5 tablespoons oil (7 tablespoons)
some salt
1 cup flour (1 1/2 cups)
vanilla, lemon, or other flavoring you like
cocoa (if you want it marbled)

METHOD

Pre-heat the oven and prepare your baking tray.
Mousse the eggs whites.
Place the sugar in a pot, pour the water over, and melt the sugar over some heat (like on the stove). Make sure you get a syrup like looking ingredient and that you don't burn it.
Pour the above syrup on the mousse and mix well.
Pour the salt over the egg yolks, mix with a fork, and pour over the meringue above. Mix well.
Add the oil and mix well.
Add the flour and mix well.
Add the flavoring and mix well.
Pour the mix in the tray and bake for some 30 minutes. A toothpick should come out clean if you prick the pound cake in the middle.

MARBLED CAKE

Follow the steps 1 to 8.
Pour the mix in the tray saving some 2 or 3 tablespoons of batter over which you pour the cocoa. Mix well and then pour on top of the rest of the batter with a left/right motion.
Bake it like above.

the cocoa mixture on the left. use a teaspoon to 'cut' the batter, to have some cocoa IN the pound-cake

You can further decorate your pound cake with any topping you like. You can also add raisins, nuts, or other dried fruits.

Bon Appetit!

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