After-Party Breakfast Smoothies

Yesterday we have borrowed a blender.

I am planning to get a blender of my own someday, but somehow in all my moves, I have left my old and none-too-great blender behind, and never gotten around to buying the much-coveted (and more pricey) variety with a low glass bowl and a more powerful motor.  But one does not look a borrowed blender in the motor, so to paraphrase.  And after yesternight’s excesses, and considering the unused fruit left in fridge, the morning called for smoothies.  Well, coffee too, but every morning calls for coffee, and today was no apocalyptically different in that regard.

So, here is the leftover-fruit-and-whatever ‘recipe’ (and by all means, use whatever fruit you’ve got so long as it doesn’t clash with each other too badly in your view – sniffing the two together in your hands may give you an idea of whether that’s a danger), which was compounded on the spot and turned out absolutely, lusciously silky and gorgeously scented:

• About 100g fresh strawberries, stems removed
• 1 medium honey mango (mine was bought from a local street stall, as they are in season now), cut off pit, with peel removed
• 4 small ice cubes
• 2 hugely heaping tablespoons of 10% fat yogurt (Turkish, Greek, whatever you can get – we had Turkish)
• 1.5 – 2 teaspoons of honey.  We used Drottningholm Linden honey (beware, link in Swedish), which is naturally runny (most honey sold in Sweden is unprocessed and set)

The how-to is summed up in one line:

Toss all into blender.  Push low speed till ice is crushed, then high speed for a short while.  Pour into glasses.  Slurp.  It’s the slurping that’s important!

Strawberry Fields (Not Forever, Just For The Summer!)

Strawberries are in season.

It is, in my not at all humble opinion, the only right time of year to eat them – whenever they are in season where/near where you live, that is.   Although the ones shipped from far away can still look pretty in mid-winter, they sadly tend to have no aroma, and with strawberries, aroma is everything.  If they don’t smell good, they won’t taste good, since they have very little natural sugar, and, deconstructed, are essentially just some fiber, water, red pigment, a few vitamins and their utterly heavenly scent.

Now, to be honest, I am perfectly happy to eat them raw out of the box they came in.  Or chopped and splashed with cream.  Or with whipped cream if I have a spray can of that or can be bothered to whip it (though all right, it takes a couple of minutes max with an electric mixer!), but cream can be too cloying when it is hot and sunny out, and so one must come up with a solution.  For me, this is it.  It hardly takes longer to make than whipping the cream (well, you do need to let it freeze for a few hours, but that is no effort on your part unless your fridge runs off a hand crank!), and it is beyond worth the minimal effort (and the wait).

I won’t even begin to pretend that this is either low fat, low sugar or low calorie.  It’s none of those things, and it’s certainly not to be counted as one of your portions of fruit or veg a day.  No, this is sheer and utter indulgence, in all of its silky, creamy glory, and I am unapologetic for it.  Some things in life are not eaten for their health potential, but for the joy of them, and in that sense, I suppose this is rather substantially contributing to one’s mental well-being, but I’d be the last person to prescribe a 1L tub of ice cream to anyone as a depression treatment.  Eat this shamelessly, happily, as a celebration of summer and all the good things the world brings us to eat, or don’t eat it at all.

The basic ice cream recipe used here is based – loosely and with modifications – on Nigella Lawson’s no-churn ice cream recipes.  It is adjusted for using 40% whipping cream (she uses English double cream which is 48% fat, but you cannot get double cream here in Sweden unless you bother with a specialty store).  It can, in my view, stand being made with any none-too-acid fruit such as apricots, peaches, sweet mango, or possibly an aromatic pear.  I plan to experiment more as the summer goes by and all those come into their seasons.  And I do know this will work just as well with any sort of berries – raspberries or blueberries (wild if you can be bothered to pick!), and possibly blackberries as well (those tend to be more tart, but this does have enough sugar to compensate).  I haven’t tried making it with sea buckthorn or cloudberries (not a seasonal thought, but you can buy those here frozen – and they are hard to find fresh anywhere and anytime), but the thought has occurred to me now, and it is not easily dismissed.  Anyway, the strawberry heaven pictured above is simple and easy to make.

What you need:   (Yield ~ 1.3L of ice cream)

• A working freezer.  One that goes to -18°C or below is advantageous here.
• 1 – 2L worth of plastic tubs with airtight lids.  I used an empty Lindahls Mejeri Turkish yoghurt bucket and a smaller plastic tub I had around.
• 500ml of 40% fat whipping cream, chilled
• 150-175g (3dl) powdered sugar
• 1dl (2 hugely heaping tablespoons) Turkish or Greek yoghurt.  I imagine the new Russian would work as well, so long as it’s 10% fat or over, and no less!
• 2 teaspoons vanilla sugar.  I use Dr. Oetker real vanilla one, but I guess vanillin-based one would also work (if maybe not quite as well)
• 200-300g fresh, aromatic strawberries.

Here is what you do:

• Blitz strawberries and vanilla sugar in a food processor.  If yours is large enough, add the powdered sugar and mix, otherwise tip into a bowl and whisk in powdered sugar.
• Add yoghurt and whisk to combine.  Set aside.
• Whip cream in a large mixing bowl until it forms soft peaks.  Slowly tip in strawberry-yoghurt mixture and continue whipping until the mixture is uniformly colored (in case of strawberries it turns out a lovely delicate pink) and stands up in fairly stiff waves.
• Scrape into your tubs and freeze for 3-5 hours or until you are ready to eat it.

You can set the ice cream out of freezer (into fridge) for 15-25 min to take the worst of the chill off before serving, or just attack it with more gusto out the bucket the way I do.  Either way, it’s strawberry-cream heaven, and in my very humility-deficient opinion, one of the best things about the start of summer.

For Hangovers And Otherwise – Baked Artichoke Dip

Although March is here,  and it is technically (or at least according to the theoretical calendar) a spring month, the snow outside remains untouched by melt (or not enough to matter, and it all froze up last night again anyway!), and so my mood for warm winter food continues – in the next instance with an utterly fantastic American-Italian dish of somewhat murky origins:  Artichoke Dip.

- presented in my new favorite Chasseur mini-cocottes

The reason I call its origins murky is because although the ingredients used are very traditionally Italian, I have only ever encountered this dish in the United States, and in all my searches I have only ever seen it categorized under “American Food” (which incidentally confirms my understanding of where it comes from).  However, if you know better, please do feel free to correct me.  In any case, to me, artichoke dip is American food done right, rather than the general European view of American food as = McDonalds, which I, incidentally, don’t even consider food short of a state of biological starvation.  In which case it’s a toss-up between that and finding some possibly edible reed roots to gnaw.

This, however, is no McDonalds and no tough roots, and is in fact wonderfully delicious, despite this particular version being vegetarian – a fault easily remedied by adding crumbled bacon or some cooked and chopped prawns, crabmeat or crab sticks to the mix.  It can also work great with some spinach – just thaw some chopped spinach, squeeze the water out, and toss in along with artichokes.  On top of being lovely on any other occasion, this is amazing after having had a bit to drink the day before – and one doesn’t really  need the excuse of a real hangover (neither T nor I had one after last weekend’s parties) to have an excuse to make a stomach-settling hangover, excuse me, Sunday brunch.

In addition to being good to eat, and very, very easy to make, this has the benefit of being very low in carbohydrates and high in fibre (for a dip), and therefore also of negligibly low GI index (for those concerned), and suitable for diabetics.  In fact, I am surprised this isn’t more popular in Europe.  It should be.  It certainly is with me (T tends to make happy-male noises whenever I make it, and then puts it away with a heartwarming gusto).

So, what gives?

• 1 standard sized can of artichoke hearts in water – drained and with the water squeezed out
• ~ 2dl Turkish yogurt (the 10% fat version).  Greek may be substituted.
• 2 cups (3-4dl) loosely packed (not compacted) shredded cheese – I use a mix of whatever is in the fridge and parmesan in a proportion of 3 : 1
• 1 teaspoon salt
• 3-5 large garlic cloves (For me – you can use less.  Or more, if you are brave.)
• ~ 20g (a few small pats) of butter, salted or unsalted does not matter here
• 1 chili pepper, seeded (unless green in which case I don’t bother beyond washing and cutting tail off)
• 1 teaspoon dried or 1 tablespoon dried oregano or thyme, or 1 teaspoon Herbes de Provence mix
• Freshly ground black pepper to taste

How to:

• Preheat oven to 175-180°C.
• Put garlic, salt and chili in the food processor.  Blitz until finely minced.
• Add artichokes (half if using a mini-chopper, all if yours is large), blitz till chopped.  Flop into bowl.  Repeat with remaining artichokes if using the mini-chopper.
• Add yogurt, oregano (or other dried or fresh herbs) and black pepper.  Mix thoroughly.
• Add 2/3 of the cheese.  Mix until combined.  The mixture should now resemble grey-green lumpy thick batter (rather unattractive to be honest)
• Place a small piece of butter into each individual casserole or several around the bottom of a larger baking dish.
• Spoon the dip out into whatever you want to bake it in (on top of said butter) and top with remaining cheese.
• Bake in preheated oven for about 25 minutes or until the dip is melted together and the cheese on top is browned.

Can be served with crudites, corn chips, toasted bread pieces, or just a fork.  I like the fork.  It, along with a personal cocotte (so that I don’t have to – gods forbid! – share), is my ultimate way to greedily devour this.  Curled up on sofa with a throw in my lap and a glass of moderately dry white wine.  Yes.