On Snow, Parsnips and SHF

How fitting that my 100th post is about one of the most perfect days I've had in a long time! Last Sunday I went to the mountains in my friends new camper van. After an early start we arrived in Lauterbrunnen, took the gondela up and walked to Mürren. This is why I moved to Switzerland!

The weather was perfect, sunshine, blue skies and the most amazing snow I've ever seen! About 70 cm deep and covered with a layer of crystals several cm big, they were like little Christmas trees. We made a beautiful walk, played in the snow, built mini snowmen and ate lunch in the sunshine.



When it comes to walking food, I'm just not one for sandwiches. I always find that by the time you get to eat it its squashed, cold and often tasteless. Therefore, I prefer home baked lunches, preferably with nuts and cheese for lots of flavour and energy. For this walk I used parsnips as they are back in season! I developed quite a liking for this root vegetable whilst living in Scotland. Before that I'd never even seen a parsnip as they are very hard to come by. However, this year the local supermarket has started selling them as an "ancient vegetable" so we'll hopefully be eating a lot more of them. I know parsnips mostly as a savoury vegetable but they also go well with sweet (think honey roasted) flavours and I'd heard that they can also be used in cakes, like carrots, but that this somehow fell out of fashion after the WWII.

I adapted this recipe (a firm favourite for summer walks) as I wanted to make a savoury and a sweet version to take along and use some of the walnuts from my parents garden. They were a great success. For the savoury I used gruyere, walnuts and fresh herbs (rosemary, sage and thyme), whereas the sweet ones had raisins, nuts, nutmeg and ginger. Both yummy and with lots of energy to keep me going on the walk, hopefully the season will be good, there will be many trips and I can make them loads. This post my entry for this months sugar high friday - The Beta Carotene Harvest - hosted by Definitely not Martha



Sweet or Savoury Parsnip Muffins (makes 6)

1 cup flour
1/3 cup buckwheat flour
1 Tbsp baking powder
3 eggs
2 parsnip - grated
1 tbsp creme fraiche
1/2 cup vegetable oil

Sweet
60g raisins
60g walnuts - chopped
1 tsp cinnamon
1/2 tsp ground ginger

Savoury
60g gruyere - grated
60g walnuts - chopped
2 tbsp fresh herbs
salt and pepper to taste

Heat the over to 180°C, in a large bowl, mix the creme fraiche, oil and eggs. Then stir in the flour and grated parsnip. Finally, add the extra fillings and the spices. Or at this point you can divide the mix in two and make both (make sure to halve the amounts given above). Pour the mixture into buttered molds and top with either raisins or walnuts. Cook for 30 min or until a needle comes out clean. Leave to cool and enjoy!

Minty Goodness

Another blog party, another great theme! For this edition Stephanie chose minty goodness which was very timely as the mint on my balcony is growing madly. I'm going through a bit of an Middle Eastern food phase at the moment and mint seemed to fit into that seamlessly. For the snack, I threw together these little chickpea, aubergine and pomegranate fritters topped with minty quark. Easy to make, easy to bake and very tasty with the warm nutty flavors of the chick pea flour, aubergine and zatar contrasted by the fresh and zingy mint and garlic. I also like the grainy texture of the quark which is very sturdy so stays well on top of the fritters. To accompany these, I mixed some little Arabic G&Ts by adding mint syrup (made with some leftover sugar from this recipe) and pomegranate molasses (my new favorite cooking ingredient).

For the fritters (makes 25-30)
Mix 200g chickpea flower, 1 1/2 tbsp oil, 1 grated medium aubergine, 1 tbsp zatar and seeds from 1 pomegranate (keep a few aside for garnish and the drink). The dough should be a little bit sticky but not too thin. Heat some oil in a pan and dollop little balls in there. Fry for a few minutes either side. In the mean time combine 4 tbsp quark, 1 1/2 tbsp chopped fresh mint and 1-2 chopped garlic cloves. Put a little bit on each fritter

For the drink
Melt 50 g of sugar with 25 ml water. Use either mint sugar or add some twigs whilst simmering the syrup. Leave to cool, then mix with equal quantities Hendricks Gin, tonic and pomegranate molasses. Pour into small glasses and add some pomegranate seeds and small mint leaves as garnish.

A herby Irish breakfast

As I went a bit overboard with planting seeds this year, we have a huge excess of fresh herbs (I know...not a problem) so we've been eating lots of tomato, mozzarella and fresh basil salads, Thai basil stir fries and Japanese sisho with lots of stuff. At the same time we're clearing out our freezer and there was a huge supply of Clonakilty Blackpudding in there (what can you do with an Irish boyfriend but I've grown to love the stuff too). So on Saturday when the weather was looking decidly dreary we had herby potato pancakes with blackpudding for breakfast in preparation for our trip to the green isle next week.

I love potato pancakes! I'd never had them before I moved to Scotland but by the time I left I was totally addicted. Potato cakes with bacon and maple syrup, with sausages, with jam or just with plain old butter. They are all that is stodgy and wonderful in the world and make you feel all warm and happy inside.

Just take your left over potatoes (or often I boil some specially) add salt and pepper and in this case a large handful of fresh rosemary, thyme, sage and chives. Then add flour until it all holds together and if you're really indulging some sour cream or creme fraiche. Fry in a medium hot pan for about 5 min each side and you're in comfort breakfast heaven!