Simple chicken stew

Tonight I prepared a simple, quick and light chicken stew, based on the recipe for treya by Claudia Roden.


Serves 2-3

2 chicken breasts, chopped
1 fennel, washed and chopped
2 carrots, peeled and sliced
4 small potatoes, peeled and chopped
6-8 cardamom pods
a few parsley sprigs, chopped
1 tsp turmeric
1 tbsp sunflower oil
salt

Put all ingredients in a pan and add water until the ingredients are not entirely covered.
Bring to the boil, then lower the heat and let it simmer until it's cooked (around 15 min).

Notes
I had added 2 slices of pancetta, but this didn't do much for the flavour, so next time I will leave it out.
You might add a dried chilli pepper or lots of white pepper. Ginger could also be nice.
On a previous occasion I prepared this dish without potatoes and served it with rice - a special Claudia Roden version of rice with vermicelli, called roz bil shaghria.

Old books and bluebell forest

On April 13th I went to visit a library of old books and made a few snaps.

The first ones are miniatures from a manuscript of a medieval religious song book.

The next ones are from a book by Dodoens describing herbs en vegetables: fennel

I particularly like this one of the 'patissons':

and this one is garlic:

After this visit we had lunch on a sunlit terrace - we've been having Summer in Belgium during April. Labelga from Leafy Cooking had invited us over; you can see one of the delicious dishes she prepared that day on her blog.

After that we went to the Halle forest. At a very specific moment this becomes very spectacular with a carpet of bluebells. As you can see in the pics, we went at exactly the right moment.


Our next stop was a landmark in Brussels: the ice cream maker Zizi. One of my favourite spots.
We finished with a bottle of champagne, an appropriate ending for a day like this...

Parsnip and sweet potato soup and other soups

I love soup and I was inspired by this combination of vegetables in labelga's post on March 6.
My basic method for soup is: fry chopped vegetables for a few min in oil or butter, add boiling water, bring to the boil. Then lower the heat and let the soup simmer for about 10 min. Not longer, unless the vegetables are not cooked yet. Then mix it with a hand mixer.
This is the method of my mother's housekeeper. She used butter. I usually use olive oil - or sunflower oil when I use Asian spices - but butter tastes nice once in a while. I remember her endives (witloof) soup, delicious! The trick in this recipe is not to boil the soup for very long, so the vegetables keep their flavour.
When my vegetables are about to go off, I often throw them into a soup.

Sweet potato and parsnip soup



1 small onion
2 medium parsnips, peeled and diced
1 big sweet potato, peeled and diced
some leftover lettuce
1 dried small chilli pepper, chopped finely
1/2 tsp ground cumin
vegetable stock
1 tsp butter

Heat the butter and fry the onion and chilli pepper in it on low to medium heat. After 1-2 min add parsnips and sweet potato and cumin. After a few more min add the lettuce and let this shrink a bit. Then add boiling water, stock and salt. Bring to the boil then lower the heat and let the soup simmer for about 10 min. Mix it with a hand mixer.

I served the soup with sour cream and chopped parsley.

Pumpkin, endives and red pepper soup

This was a combination I once made at a friend's with her leftover vegetables. It turned out really well.
I used these ingredients:

1 small pumpkin, peeled and chopped
2 endives, washed and chopped
1/2 red pepper, chopped
2 onions, peeled and chopped
2 small potatoes, peeled and chopped
1 tsp sugar
2 bay leaves
"herbes de Provence"
olive oil
vegetable stock
pepper & salt

Broccoli and fennel soup

This was another successful combination.

1 onion
1 sprig of broccoli
1 fennel
olive oil
fennel seeds

Fennel, sweet potato and oats

Today I bought sweet potato and fennel in a Turkish shop. These are two vegetables which I really love, just like pumpkin. I made a fennel tzimmes, inspired by Claudia Roden's carrot tzimmes, and a sweet potato mash, based on Claudia Roden's ajlouk de potiron.
I was wondering what to have with this and then I remembered one of my grandfather's recipes with oat, so I decided to try that. My grandfather loved to cook, especially desserts, and he wrote up his recipes in a notebook. After his death, my grandmother gave me his notebook and I've tried out many of his delicious recipes.

This is what my dinner looked like:


Fennel tzimmes

Fry the fennel in butter or oil for a few min. on medium heat. Keep stirring. Add boiling water until the fennel is half covered. Add salt, pepper and fennel seeds. Let it boil, then lower the heat and let it simmer for 30 min. At the end, you can leave the lid off to let the liquid evaporate.

Sweet potato mash (ajlouk)

Peel and chop the sweet potato. Steam it for about 10 min. until it's soft.
Mash it with a fork.
Then season with olive oil, lemon juice, salt, chilli paste, cumin seeds, chopped parsley or coriander. You can also add a little crushed garlic and some ground coriander.
You can use all or just a few of these seasonings in the quantities you like.
Claudia Roden has a recipe with pumpkin and another one with courgette. You can use any vegetable that mashes easily.
Serve on toast or just as a side dish.

Labelga made me discover the ajlouk recipe, on a beautiful September evening. We made three different ajlouks: from carrots, sweet potato and courgette. We had them on her terrace outside. She is also a big Claudia Roden's adept. A long time ago I gave her 'The book of Jewish food' as a birthday present and she was very enthusiastic about it. I only got it for myself a few years later.

Oat cake

Serves 1-2

Rinse 2 tbsp of oatmeal in water, then add 1 egg and a pinch of salt and mix with a fork.
Heat a little butter in a small pan and pour the mixture in the pan. Fry on low heat until golden brown on one side, then turn over and fry the other side.


Today I also went to an Arabian shop and bought lots of delicious pastries.