French Savory Pumpkin Tarte

I have made this pumpkin pie recipe a bunch of times over the years. It's my favorite pumpkin pie - why add sugar to a dish when you can add cheese instead, right!? :P

Ingredients

For the crust:
1 1/2 cups all purpose flour
1/4 teaspoon salt
1 stick butter, cut into small pieces
4 tbsp (or more) cold water

For the filling:
400g of pumpkin, peeled and cut into small pieces
1 onion, diced
2 eggs
1 egg white
2 tbsp creme fraiche
1 tbsp parsley, chopped
50g parmesan,
50g gruyere,
25 g butter

Directions

Preheat the oven to 400 F.

Melt the butter in a pan and add onions and pumpkin. Cook until pumpkin is reduced to a puree. Let the mixture cool and add the eggs, cheese, creme fraiche, parsley, salt and pepper.

In a large bowl, add flower and salt. Use your hands to "massage" in the butter until the mixture has a slightly coarse consistency and when you pinch it, it sticks together in clumps. Add cold water and work into a dough. Make a thick disk, wrap in cling foil and chill for about 30 minutes.

Roll out the dough. It's easiest when you roll out the dough between two sheets of cling foil. Line a round baking pan with the crust, use a fork to make some small holes in the dough. Bake for about 10 minutes.

After the crust is pre-baked, brush it with the egg white. Add the pumpkin puree.

Turn the oven down to 360 F (360 °C. Bake for 30-40 minutes until done).

Avocados filled with Shrimp

This is a quick and simple recipe and it tastes great. It's easy to make the filling and bring it with the avocados to a party where the avocados can be cut and filled in no time. 

The recipe is based on this one, which uses crab meat instead of shrimps.

Ingredients:
Avocados
Cooked mini shrimp, chopped
Celery
1/2 - 1 Shallots

Mayonnaise
Cream cheese

Lemon or lime juice
Salt

Pepper

Chop celery and shallot very finely in a food processor. Mix with shrimp, mayonnaise, cream cheese, lemon juice, salt, pepper and sea food spice if desired.

Cut avocados in half and take out a little bit of the flesh to be mixed in the filling. Salt the avocado halves. Fill with shrimp filling. Add pepper or parsley to garnish.

Enjoy!

Fig and Bree Puff Pastry Bites

This recipe is similar the one I've made recently. But it's based on this recipe.

Instead of putting the puff pastry sheets in the oven with the filling already added, this recipe instructs the baker to pre-bake the puff pastry sheets, resulting in fluffier dough.

Ingredients:

1 puff pastry sheet

frozen figs

2 tbsp honey

1/4 cup water

brie

macademia nuts

blue cheese

pear

pecan nuts

cranberries

Heat figs, honey and water on the stove and let simmer until the liquid is thick enough to cover the back of a spoon. Remove from heat.

Roll out puff pastry sheet and cut into 12 rectangles. Place rectangles into muffin pan molds and bake for 12 minutes at 375 F (190 C). When done, remove from the oven and gently press down on the middle of the puff pastry cups. Fill 6 cups brie and top with macademia nuts and fig mass. Fill the other 6 cups with pear pieces, blue cheese, pecan nuts and cranberries. Return to the oven for 5-7 minutes until cheese is melted and puff pastry is golden brown.

Puff pastry pockets

I was browsing recipes with figs and puff pastry and found this one. It was surprisingly fast and because it included cheese it was much to my liking :)

Ingredients:
1 puff pastry sheet
frozen figs
2 tbsp honey
1/4 cup water
brie
1 egg, beaten

Heat figs, honey and water on the stove and let simmer until the liquid is thick enough to cover the back of a spoon. Remove from heat.
Cut puff pastry sheet into squares and line a muffin pan. Place some brie and a bit of the fig sauce into the puff pastry cups.
Fold the edges towards the middle to create little pockets.
Brush with egg.
Bake at 350 F (180 °C) until golden brown.
I served them with roasted Macadamia nuts :)

I thought that the liquid from the fig sauce was making these delicious pockets a bit soggy, although not excessively so. There were other interesting-looking recipes that included pre-baking the puff pastry. Definitely something I want to try out! :)

Pancakes

One Saturday I woke up realizing that I have never made pancakes from scratch. I quickly went about changing that.

Using this recipe I whipped together 

1 egg, beaten fluffy

3/4 cup of milk

2 tbs of butter, melted

1 cup of flour

1 tbs of sugar

1/4 tsp of baking powder and

1/2 tsp of salt.

Using 1/4 cup at a time I poured the batter on a hot pan and in zero-point-nothing (Null Komma Nix) I had 6 and 1 half pancakes for breakfast.

They weren't quite as fluffy as pancakes usually come (I believe it has something to do with either too much or too little liquid in the batter). But with berries, maple syrup and whipped cream they were quite enjoyable.

Chicken-Vegetable-Roll with Coconut and Peanut Butter

I've made this recipe on a whim while talking on the phone with my parents. So I was distracted. I think I originally wanted to make something else and then some ideas got jumbled up.
The ideas were:

• I should make something with this left over filo dough to finally get rid of it and never buy it again
• I should use this coconut creamer that I bought last week.
• No one is eating that unsalted peanut butter that sits in the fridge, what could I do with it..?
• Chicken and coconut and peanut butter might be good together, I should look up some recipes
• ..that fish that I cooked in milk turned out quite yummy..
• Oh, half a butternut squash in the fridge!

The result was ok, if somewhat weird.

Ingredients
filo dough (or puff pastry)
chicken
coconut milk
peanut butter
butternut squash, cut in 1 inch cubes
zucchini, cut into half slices
carrot, cut into half slices
Cashews
Soy sauce
onion, cut into cubes
salt, pepper, turmeric, paprika
egg, beaten

Preparation
Preheat the oven to 425 F (220 C). Roast butternut squash in the oven.
Turn oven down to 375 F (390 C).
Mix coconut milk and peanut butter in a pot and cook chicken in it until tender.
Fry onion until translucent, add salt and spices, add zucchini, carrot and cashews and fry until almost done. Add some coconut milk and a splash of soy sauce and continue frying for a couple of minutes.
Mix chicken, butternut squash and vegetables from the pan together.
Place sheets of filo dough into an oven pan, brushing each sheet with oil or butter. Place chicken-vegetable-mix onto the filo dough sheets and place more on top to cover.
Brush with the beaten egg.
Bake until the top is golden brown.

Autumn Mac and Cheese

This recipe is basically the same as the Mac and Cheese recipe that I posted a while ago. Only I've added roasted butternut squash and zucchini :)

Ingredients:
elbow macaroni
butternut squash, cut into 1 inch cubes
zucchini, cut into 1/2 inch slices
olive oil
1/4 cup of butter
1/8 cup of flour
1.5-2 cups of milk
0.5-1 cup of stock
0.7 lb of cheese (I used medium cheddar)
turmeric
white pepper

Preparation:
Preheat the oven to 425° F. Place butternut squash and zucchini in a bowl, drizzle with olive oil and stir until they are coated with oil. Place vegetables on a roasting pan and place it in the oven. Stir after 5-8 minutes and return to the oven for another couple of minutes until vegetables are almost done.

Cook the elbow macaroni in salty water until they are not quite done. Submerge in ice water to stop the cooking process. Drain. Combine with vegetables
Melt butter in a skillet, stir in the flour on low heat until the color becomes a light brown. Add the milk and keep stirring. Then add spices, stock and cheese. The cheese does not have to melt all they way.
Measure an equal amount of macaroni and vegetables and cheese sauce (e.g. 2 cups) and mix them together in an oven proof dish. Bake at 350 F for about 30 minutes.

Bagel Chips

Bagels go stale after a day or two.

To refresh them, you can dip them into water for a second and then bake them in the oven for 3-5 minutes at 325 F (160 C).

Or you can make bagel chips.

Cut them into slices and put them on a pan. Brush them with oil and add salt, pepper and/or other spices and herbs that you like. Bake at 375 F (190 C) until they are golden.  ..that happens quite fast, I almost burned my first batch as you can see in the picture :)

Serve with soup, salad or dips.