Author: lolitabopaa

Tahini mint roasted fish

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This must be one of the easiest fish dishes ever. Mix, pour over and roast. That’s it. And it’s basically done by itself.

Fish will cook under the sauce and will be tender and delicious. The best is to serve it with white basmati rice that will allow all the flavors from the sauce to come out.

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Ingredients:

  • 400g white fish
  • 110g onion
  • 80g tahini
  • 80 ml water
  • lemon peel of 1 lemon
  • lemon juice from 1 1/2 lemon
  • 20g mint
  • salt, pepper
  • 2 Tbsp olive oil for cooking

Instructions:

  1. Finely chop onion. Heat oil and add onion. Stir for aprox 15 min at medium temperature, until softened and slightly caramelized. It should not be burned, so add more oil if needed.
  2. In a blender mix at high speed tahini, water, lemon peel and juice, salt and pepper and  sautéed onion.
  3. Put the fish in profound baking dish. If the fish is thick, make couple of diagonal cuts so that it cooks more evenly.
  4. Pour the mix over fish and roast for 10 – 15 mins at 230ºc or until lightly brown.
  5. Serve with basmati rice.

Easy green

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I would say that Slovenians, we’re a salad nation. It sounds funny, but if there’s no salad in your meal, your meal just doesn’t feel complete. And for me a good salad is often enough to make a perfect meal.

When making salads, I follow couple of simple rules: it has to be colorful, needs to have different textures and flavors and has to be a play between sweet and sour.

The main rule for composing big salads is: crunchy base vegetable + one or two colorful accessories + some crunchy details or/and cheese.

As far as dressing is concerned, it should always taste more slaty and sour. That’s how it will be perfect on your salad. And my basic rule is: never put white dressing on cheese.

Simple.

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Colorful accessories.

I love putting fruits in salads. They add wonderful color and flavor. Oranges are superb in green salads. Just don’t forget to take off all that white skin.

Avocado is actually a fruit, not a vegetable. It is a good source of magnesium, potassium, vitamin K and vitamins B. It has high level of fat, but it’s good vegetable unsaturated fat. There’s about 15 g of fat in 100 g of avocado. You can easily use it as butter replacement in your other recipes.

Avocados are picked hard and green and will ripen properly at room temperature in one to two weeks. If you buy them hard and don’t want to eat them straightaway, keep them in fridge. If you want them to get ripe more quickly, put them next to bananas. And yes, you should always have them on stock!

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Crunchy stuff: nuts and seeds

Black cumin seeds always remind me of my trip to Egypt where we had wonderful bread with black cumin seeds in the morning. It was years ago and at that time I had no idea what it was. I’ve just remembered the taste. Since I’ve rediscovered it, it’s my favorite thing on oranges and goat cheese.

Couple of crushed nuts like pistachios, almonds, walnuts, roasted or not, will give your salad a full rounded body. Salted roasted whole almonds add crunchy and a bit rustic flavor.

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Soft goat cheese

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Ingredients

  • salad greens
  • 1/2 avocado
  • 1/2 orange
  • handful roasted almonds (in shells)
  • goat cheese
  • olive oil
  • 1/2 lemon
  • lemon thyme (optional)
  • black cumin seed to sprinkle
  • salt, pepper

Directions

  1. Cut avocado chunks. Peel and cut oranges. Remove white skins.
  2. Roughly crush almonds.
  3. Make dressing. Mix olive oil, lemon juice, thyme, salt and freshly ground pepper.
  4. Assemble green salad, avocado chunks and oranges, rough pieces of cheese. Sprinkle with almonds, cumin seeds. Top with  dressing.

Risotto primavera

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Finally! Spring is here! … and with it all the green goodness that comes along. Plants in my garden are going crazy. It’s a damn good beginning of the season! So far, I have wonderful aromatic herbs: thyme, mint, parsley, chives, basil… All I have to do is go out on my balcony and I have a handful of freshness for my dishes.

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One of the first veggies in spring are asparagus. At the market you will usually find them white or green, the difference being only in the way they are grown. Apparently the most recent thing is violet asparagus, but nothing can beat the wild ones. They have a distinct taste, but are hard to find if you don’t have a clue what to look for in the woods (like me…).
The lower ends should be removed since they are hard to eat and have much fibre. Also, white asparagus should be peeled, but I use the same technique on the green ones and eat the lower ends.

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In my opinion asparagus goes best with eggs and in a classical italian risotto, but since my garden is full of fresh herbs it is just screaming to make a light and fresh herbed asparagus rice with some nice greenish pistachios.

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Herbed asparagus rice

serves one as main or two as side

  • 80g integral (brown) rice
  • Tbsp olive oil for cooking
  • 1 small shallot
  • 1 small bouquet of asparagus
  • a handful of salted pistachios
  • mint, parsley, thyme and lemon thyme, chives
  • 1 Tbsp greek yoghurt
  • salt and freshly ground pepper for seasoning

Instructions

  1. Precook rice.
  2. Remove the ends of asparagus and peel if necessary. Cut in small pieces and set the tops aside.
  3. Finely chop shallot. Stir it on 1 Tbsp of oil for about 2 min. Add asparagus, except the tops and cook for additional 4 mis.
  4. Add the tops, sauté for about a minute, than add rice. Season with salt and pepper.
  5. Stir in pistachios and chopped herbs.
  6. Set aside and mix in 1 big Tbsp of greek yoghurt.

chocolate golden berries

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This time I’m not giving you the precise instructions how to make it. It’s pure gold. It’s physalis. It’s fleur de sel. It’s chocolate. Free your imagination. Be passionate and you will find the balance that works the best for you. It’s gotta pop up in your mouth when you eat it!

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Fleur de sel or salt flower is esteemed for its color, traditional production and of course flavor. Not even one is the same as the shape of crystals is largely dependent on the specific weather conditions. I’ve got mine from France, Ile de Ré to be precise. Fleur de sel works really well with sweets, like caramel, and it enhances the flavor of chocolate. And yes, there is a huge difference in flavor in comparison to ordinary industrial salt. When using it in chocolate, even if it look nice if sprinkled on top, I find the flavor better if mixed in the chocolate. It’s more smooth and the flavor itself develops gradually.

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Cacao butter. Really healthy stuff. If it does good to your skin, imagine what it does to your body from the inside than! You can make your own, raw chocolate by combining it with raw unsweetened cacao and some sort of sweetener. Since I’m a diabetic, I like to cut my carbs intake, so I use stevia extract or sucralose, which is derived from corn. But agave syrup, coconut sugar or honey can be more healthy alternative. If you’re running short on time, high quality dark chocolate will do either.

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And physalis berries, golden berries, with its slightly sour note balance so well the sweet and salty…

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Phisalis barries with dark chocolate and fleur de sel

  • phisalis berries
  • fleur de sel
  • any sort of sweetener if needed (don’t exaggerate!)
  • dark chocolate (min 80% cocoa) or DIY: cocoa butter, 100% cacao, sweetener

 

zucchini fennel salad

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Physalis berries (Physalis Peruviana) can be found under many different names as cape gooseberry, inca berry, aztec berry, golden berry, giant ground cherry, peruvian cherry. They are rich in vitamin C, essential amino acids, beta-carotene. They are packed with antioxidants and soluble fibre. They have a sweet taste with a sour finish.

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And thyme… it needs no words. It’s an amazing herb that goes well with sweet and sour, salty and spicy. I especially like using lemon thyme that adds a hint of freshness to your dish.

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Zucchini fennel salad with macadamia nut and physalis berries:

serves 1

  • 1/2 zucchini
  • 1/3 fennel
  • physalis berries
  • parmesan/feta/mozzarella (optional)
  • olive oil
  • lemon juice
  • fleur de sel
  • 5 macadamia nuts
  • mountain and lime thyme

Directions:

  1. Make thin slices of zucchini using a peeler. Cut fennel as thin as possible.
  2. Roast whole macadamias in an oven at 200*c for couple of minutes, just till they get light brown. Let aside to cool. Roughly chop or using a mortar and pestle crush in big pieces.
  3. Rinse well physalis berries, you can also cut them in halfs.
  4. Compose salad by adding all listed ingredients, sprinkle with flour de del, thyme, olive oil and lemon juice.

salmon greens with soy orange dressing

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It’s pretty colorless during winter here. That’s why I love spring in Ljubljana. I feel it coming. Sun, birds, flowers, riding my bike, people smiling everywhere… I love it! And what’s more, everything gets so colorful!

That reminded me of Tri express in Montreal, where I’ve eaten one of the best sushi ever. Full of colors, surprising combinations and tastes that pop up in your mouth. Pure magic!

So that’s how I came up with salmon salad with soy orange dressing…

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Smoked salmon salad with orange soy dressing:

serves 1

  • 2 slices of smoked salmon
  • 1/2 zucchini
  • 1/3 avocado
  • 1/2 orange
  • 1/3 apple
  • 2 Tsp soy sauce
  • chives

Directions:

  1. Slice very thin stripes of apple and zucchini; slice avocado as thin as possible.
  2. Squeeze half orange, add soy sauce.
  3. Combine all ingredients on a plate, add dressing and sprinkle with chives.