Alright people. I don’t like pasta carbonara (specifically speaking all the ones I have tried to far). Oprah thinks she’s all that and Tom Cruise is batshit crazy. However, I’ll be damned if I don’t give this recipe a try:

Tom Cruise’s Spaghetti Carbonara, makes 4 servings

Ingredients:

1/2 inch olive oil (for frying pan)
2 cloves minced garlic
1 chopped onion
8 to 12 thick slices Italian bacon
4 eggs
2 packages spaghetti
2 cups grated Parmesan cheese

Directions:

In a frying pan, combine 1/2 inch of olive oil, 2 cloves of minced garlic, one chopped onion and the Italian bacon cut into small squares. Let simmer for about a half-hour, being careful not to let the oil get to a boiling point.

In a bowl, beat 4 eggs with lots of salt and fresh ground pepper.

Bring a pan of salted water to a boil. Cook both packages of spaghetti until al dente, drain and immediately add egg mixture to pasta. The eggs are actually cooked by the pasta. (Make sure the eggs are thoroughly cooked before proceeding.) Stir the egg mixture until it is well mixed. Pour in the mixture from the frying pan and stir. Finish with the Parmesan cheese and serve!

… as written on Oprah.com.

I’ll report back after I’ve tried it out in the not-so-distant-future.

More like 3 minute awesomecake, amirite? This one is for that special little craving you sometimes may get, the kind of craving that will have you gnawing on the sofa at the end of the night if you don’t get your num nums. Don’t look at me like you don’t know what I’m talking about. Yeah, you.

You’ll need…

• 4 tablespoons of flour
• 4 tablespoons of sugar
• 1½-2 tablespoons of cocoa powder
• 1 egg
• 3 tablespoons of milk
• 3 tablespoons of oil

And how do you make it, you ask me. Well… Mix the flour, sugar and cocoa in a big, microwave oven safe mug. Add the egg, milk, and oil. Mix until the mixture is smooth and pop the mug with its contents into the microwave oven and blast that brownie at maximum power for three – that’s 3 – minutes. Let the brownie cool down and om nom nom away!

Mug in image from Iittala’s Taika series.

Mix all the dry ingredients (instant mashed potatoes, wheat flour, baking powder). Add the margarine and pinch the dough into an even mix. Lastly add the water and knead the dough until firm and even.

Spread the dough onto the bottom and edges of a pie dish (about 30 centimeters in diameter) and let the crust stay in the fridge while you prepare the filling.

Slice the mozzarella, cut the cherry tomatoes in half, and chop the basil. Place onto the crust.

Mix the cream, milk, eggs, grated cheese, salt, and pepper in a bowl and pour the mix on top of the mozzarella, cherry tomatoes and basil.

Bake the pie at about 200° C for about 40 minutes. Let the pie cool slightly (for about 15 minutes) in room temperature before serving.

I’m on a total pie frenzy at the moment, and whoever reads my blog is hopefully  happy to get their hands on the recipes. I’m continuing on the curd trend, but the filling is still very different this time.

The crust is the same as for my Blueberry Curd Pie, in other words: 100 g butter or margarine, ¾ dl sugar, 1 egg,  2½ dl wheat flour, and 1 tsp baking powder. Mix it all up, flatten out into your pie dish and place it in the fridge while you mix the filling.

Filling:

• 250 g curd
• 2 dl cream
• 3 eggs
• Finely grated zest of 1 lemon
• ½ dl lemon juice
• ¾ dl sugar
• 2 teaspoons vanilla sugar

Mix all the ingredients in a bowl and pour the filling into the pie dish (onto the crust). Warm the oven to 200° and bake the pie for approx. 25 minutes. Let the pie cool down entirely before you add the peaches and sugar glazing.

You’ll need about 250 g canned peach slices or halves/enough to cover the surface of the pie. Make sure the peaches are drained before you place them onto the pie. Boil about 1½ dl water and stir ¾ dl jelly sugar into the water. Let the mixture cool just a bit and pour as much as needed evenly on top of the peaches with a spoon and let the pie cool down again.

Best served cold.

I really do. I haven’t made one of my own in a while though. Usually I’d just throw some strawberries, a banana, perhaps some canned peaches, fruit juice and yogurt in there and mix it up, and yes, it would be delicious. I’ve found a new favorite at the store though, namely Chiquita Smoothies. They are however pretty expensive, so it got me thinking…

The motto is “Just fruit in a bottle”. Seems simple enough, I should be able to “just put fruit in a bottle” (or a glass, I guess) all by myself and for alot less money, right? But then I start thinking “but surely I can never make them as delicious as the Chiquita smoothies!”. But you know what? The recipes actually seem to be posted on the Chiquita website. Summa sumarum, if Chiquita actually isn’t full of bullcrap and their smoothies really are “just fruit in a bottle” and in addition composed exactly like their recipes online I should be able to make the exact same smoothies at home for alot less money.

Here are the Chiquita recipes, as written on their homepage:

Strawberry-Banana: Light and Lovely 6 crushed strawberries ½ pureed banana 2½ pressed apples 1 squeezed orange	Pineapple-Banana: Perfectly Sweet ¼ pureed pineapple ¾ pureed banana 1½ squeezed orange 1 drop of lemon juice
Raspberry-Pomegranate: Sensual and Satisfying 1/8 crushed Pomegranate 12 crushed raspberries ¾ pureed banana ½ squeezed orange 25 pressed white grapes 1 drop of lemon juice	Blackberry-Raspberry-Yangmei: Sweet and Sour 91 crushed blackcurrants 14 crushed blackberries 5 ½ crushed raspberries ½ pureed Yangmei ½ pureed banana 1 ½ crushed strawberries 19 pressed white grapes
Coconut-Mango: Indulgent, Rich Taste 1 pureed mango coconut milk ½ pureed banana 2 ½ squeezed apples 12 pressed white grapes	Mango-Passion fruit: Fresh and Stimulating ⅓ pureed mango 1½ pureed passion fruits ½ pureed banana 3 pressed apples 1 squeezed orange

Now I’ll just need to figure out how to for example press an apple, or where the hell to find Chinese Yangmei… berries?

One of my long time favorites, not too sweet yet deliciously velvety and refreshing. A typical Finnish dessert in some aspect, as one if it’s main features is a dairy product, in this case curd (rahka in Finnish, or kvarg in Swedish). Funny thing is I don’t even like blueberries, but this pie makes them taste like little bits of heaven.

Crust:

For a very basic, semi-sweet crust you’ll need 100 g butter or margarine, ¾ dl sugar, 1 egg,  2½ dl wheat flour, and 1 tsp baking powder.

Mix the butter/margarine and sugar, add the egg, then the flour and baking powder. Place the crust evenly into your pie dish, presto! Baking is really no rocket science, I wonder why some find it so challenging. Anyway, moving on…

Filling:

• 200 g blueberries (fresh or frozen)
• 1 dl milk
• 2 dl curd
• ½ dl sugar
• 1 egg
• 1-2 tsp vanilla sugar

Place the blueberries onto the crust. Mix the milk, curd, sugar, egg, and vanilla sugar in a separate bowl and pour the mix on top of the blueberries on the crust.

Place the pie into a oven heated to 200° C and bake it for approx. 25-30 minutes.

This bread has alot of taste in it and works as a snack, a compliment to a meal, breakfast, or really at any other meal occasion you can think of.

Ingredients:

5 dl milk, 30 g fresh yeast, ¾ dl pesto, 2 dl wheat germs, 6 dl full grain wheat flour, 100 g grated cheese, about 1 dl sun dried tomatoes, 2 cloves of garlic and ½ dl oil (eg. rape seed oil or olive oil).

Warm the milk to about 37° C, add the yeast and stir. Add the pesto, wheat germs, and flour and mix into a smooth dough. Chop the sun dried tomatoes, press the garlic and add into the dough together with the grated cheese (of your choice) and oil. Spread the dough even onto a baking paper covered baking tin. Let the dough rise for about 20 minutes while you warm the oven to 200° C. Bake the bread until the surface gains a golden brown color (about 20 minutes).

Cut the bread into squares and enjoy!

Due to a recent interest in how vegan cooking works I decided to try something different, in other words vegan banana muffins with walnuts and chocolate chips!

You’ll need the following:

• 3 bananas
• 2,5 dl wheat flour
• 2,5 dl full grain wheat flour
• 1 dl brown sugar
• ½ tsp of salt
• 3 tsp of baking powder
• 3,5 dl of vanilla flavored soy milk
• ½ dl oil
• 1 dl wheat germs
• Walnuts and (dark) chocolate (chips)

Start off by mashing the bananas. As this is a vegan recipe you won’t use any eggs and the banana will function as the binding ingredient. Mix the flour, sugar, salt, and baking powder in a separate bowl. Add the soy milk (I used Go Green’s Vanilla Soy Drink). Since it’s vanilla flavored you won’t have to use any vanilla sugar. Add the oil. I used rapeseed oil, but you can just as well use for example olive oil (which of course has its own distinct flavor). Add the wheat germs, it gives the muffins a rich taste and is an excellent source for eg. Vitamin E, folic acid, magnesium, essential fatty acids, fiber and protein. Finally add the mashed bananas. Chop the walnuts and chocolate, unless you have bought the already chopped version, and add into the mix. If you’re in Finland, like me, you can for example use Panda‘s dark chocolate, which is a great vegan alternative.

You should preferably use a muffin tin. Make sure you fill up each cup properly; these muffins will of course rise, but less than regular muffins that contain eggs. Heat the oven to about 175° and bake the muffins for 30–40 minutes.

A very simple bread with a light yet tasty filling (also suitable for vegans ^_–). You’ll need the following:

25 g yeast (fresh), 2,5 dl water, 6,5 dl wheat flour, 1 dl sun dried tomatoes, 2-3 cloves of garlic, 0,5 tsp salt and 1,5 tblsp olive oil. Olive oil and sesame seeds for garnishing.

Crumble the yeast into a bowl, add lukewarm water, mix the yeast and water and then add the flour. Knead the dough into a firm ball and let it rise until the dough has nearly doubled in size (30-40 minutes).

While you wait for the dough to rise make the filling. Chop about a deciliter of sun dried tomatoes and add the pressed garlic. Add salt and the olive oil and mix the filling well.

When the dough has risen cut it into two parts. Roll out each half into a square and divide the filling equally between the halves. Triple fold each half and cut the dough into triangular shapes and place onto a baking tin.

Heat your oven to 225°C. Let the pockets rise for about 20 minutes while the oven warms up. Before you put the pockets into the oven brush them with olive oil and garnish the pockets with sesame seeds. After 20-25 minutes in the oven your garlic and sun dried tomato pockets are done, enjoy!

Fresh garlic and sun dried tomato pockets, yum!

Delicious Cinnamon Rolls

What better things to do in the middle of the night than bake a batch of delicious cinnamon rolls and possibly drive sleeping neighbors to the brink of insanity by the mouth watering scent slowly spreading through the corridors…

Here’s the recipe, very easy but quite time consuming:

5 dl milk, 1-2 eggs, 2 dl sugar, 1 tsp salt, 50 g yeast (fresh), about 1,5 l wheat flour and 200 g margarine.

Warm up the milk to body temperature (37°C). Crumble the yeast into a bowl. Add sugar, salt and the egg(s). Add the milk and stir until the sugar and salt have melted. Add the flour little by little. Finally add the margarine and work it into the dough. Let the dough rise in a warm and draft-free place (eg. inside a microwave oven) until it has nearly doubled in size. Create your rolls and allow them to rise a bit on the baking tin. Brush the rolls with a beaten egg and bake them in a oven at 225°C until the buns get a golden brown color.

Too tired to think, but I still need to find the energy to put most of the rolls into the freezer. These babies will bring my taste buds joy for months!