Ricotta cake with marmalade

We woke up yesterday morning to a strangely nippy house. When I went down to the kitchen, I realised our boiler was flashing the F28 code, which means it's broken. 

Trying to get to the British Gas customer service is a feat in itself, everything is annoyingly automated, and you cannot get to talk to a real person. The earliest we could book for someone to come and look at the boiler was Tuesday. 

My husband kept calling, and finally managed to get hold of someone. They promised to come today.

Well, it's almost 5pm, and no sight of any engineer. And now that my husband called them again to ask what time the engineer might be coming, apparently they didn't book us in at all.
And the house in the meantime is getting colder and colder. I know that people live in igloos and all that, but it's a pain not to have the heating or hot water. The floor is church-cold on the ground floor, I can feel my feet turning into icicles, and that's me earing two pairs of socks and slippers.

I've been having endless cups of tea and coffee to keep myself warm, ironing (did a lot of ironing today), and baking too.

Yesterday's bake was a variation of the ricotta cake recipe given to me by my husband's aunt Giuseppina. It's a classic Italian cake, which is very tasty.

I had a jar of Duerr's Half Sugar Seville Orange marmalade from the latest Degustabox. My guys prefer jams to marmalade, and I don't eat it that often either. I decided to use some of the marmalade in the ricotta cake, and it worked really well.

Ricotta cake with marmalade
Ingredients:
zest of 1 lemon
3 medium eggs
180g caster sugar
3tbsp marmalade (+ 2tbsp for drizzle) (optional)
200g ricotta
300g self-raising flour
1tsp baking powder
50g Italian mixed peel (optional)
2tbsp lemon juice

Zest an orange in a medium sized mixing bowl. Beat in the eggs with caster sugar and marmalade. Add the ricotta, sift in the flour and baking powder. Leave about 1tbsp of flour, and dust it over the peel, then add the peel to the cake batter.
The cake batter is quite thick. Spoon it into a well-oiled bundt cake tin. Place the tin in the oven preheated to 180C. Bake for about 45 minutes. Check readiness with a wooden toothpick.
Once the cake is cooked, take it out of the tin. Mix 2tbsp marmalade with 2tbps lemon juice and spread over the cake.
Eat warm, or cold. It tastes good, with a cup of tea or coffee.

If you're not a fan of peel, swap it for raisins or pine nuts. A few years ago, I baked this cake with the addition of a savoury note from Grana Padano.

New foodie discoveries - Swedish edition

My fascination with Swedish food started many years ago, when I was reading Astrid Lindgren's books as a child. A few mentions of the Swedish recipes which sounded to me so delightfully exotic, made me want to try them all.
Of course, my Mum cooked the most delicious meatballs, but for some reason Freken Bok's kötbullar ( FB is a grumpy housekeeper in Karlson on the roof series) sounded much more appealing.

I am not a fan of food (or designer) trends, so all that hygge business by-passed me. You couldn't totally escape it, as every magazine, and many newly published books were shouting Hygge! Hygge! then after it faded away, there was another unpronounced Scandi trend. And then there was a craze for Swedish lagom...
Thanks goodness, it seems to have blown over as well.

And while I am probably the most untrendy blogger, by ignoring all the suggested food swings, I do enjoy trying new recipes and foods.

Last year when getting through the piles of newspapers, deciding what to recycle, I came across a promotional page for Ocado, offering a free delivery for a year. It sounded good, I've never shopped in Ocado before and decided to give it a go.
Browsing the online shop, I discovered the Swedish isle, and the rest is history.

The list of Swedish products below is quite random, there is no system, these are just the foods and drinks I bought and tried. I didn't buy them all in one go, but added one or two items at a time.

Ekströms Vår Klassika Blåbärs Soppa Originalet
I always wanted to try a Swedish bilberry soup, but for some reason never actually made it, though you can find recipes online easily. This is not a soup as we know it in the UK. It resembles strongly a sweet drink which we call a kissel in Russia, and it's made of berries or fruit with a little bit of starch like potato flour or corn starch.

It's a light soup/drink, with 50kcal and 11g of sugar per 100g.
This is a classic Swedish dish, which you eat cold or warm. In the hot weather it's a lovely treat, eaten straight from the fridge.

Bilberries are hard to find in the UK, not sure why they are not cultivated as widely as blueberries. They are similar in taste to blueberries, but bilberries are smaller in size and have more vitamins. I've only seen dried bilberries in the shops, and never fresh ones.
Back to our soup: it is tasty, and I will definitely buy it again.

Abba Swedish Herring Marinated with dill will appeal to pickled herring fans.
Ingredients include herring pieces, sugar, onion, salt, vinegar, dill, dill extract.
Certified sustainable seafood MSC.
Catch areas: Norwegian sea, North sea.
It's tasty with a plain potato salad with lots of soured cream and fresh dill, or on a rye bread, buttered liberally.

The marinade is quite sweet and not as sharp as some of the British marinades for herring you can buy at the supermarket delis.

Ahlgrens Bilar sour candy
These strange-shaped candy pieces (are they supposed to be mice? teeth with roots?) might be quite iconic in Sweden, but I don't think I'd be buying them again.
So sour, it's a bit of a sensory overload.
Nutritional information: 352kcal per 100g, quite a few E-numbers (E334, E270, E141, E120).

The first time I've tried a product from Felix was a couple of years ago, when Degustabox included one of their products in their food box. It was a jar of Felix sweet pickled gherkins, which I loved, and have been buying quite often.
Sweet pickled gherkins are delicious flavourful pickles. They are made, using a traditional recipe with vinegar, sugar and spices.
Add them to any savoury dish, for example, a Swedish potato salad.

Since then I have come  across more foodie delights from Felix.
Felix Blåbär (Wild blueberry jam) is a Swedish delicacy. It's a delicious jam, which is wonderful on toasted bread, or spooned into a thick Greek yogurt.
Nutritional information: 170kcal and 39g of sugar per 100g
Top marks!

And if I thought that the blueberry jam is delicious, then I was in for a bigger treat with Felix Lingon (wild lingonberry jam). This is a pure heaven in a jar.
This delightful condiment is a popular ingredient in the Swedish cuisine. Felix Jams call it "a must-have in every Swedish household".
It is sweet, with a tart note. You can have it in both sweet and savoury dishes. Fabulous with thick natural yogurt, topped up with granola, or just spooned over a dish of vanilla ice cream, it makes a tasty dessert.
It goes perfectly well as a sauce for meatballs. In fact, the Swedish meatballs with lingonberry jam is a classic. For the most satisfying comfort food add a big heap of mashed potatoes, gravy and pickled gherkins. What a treat!

I buy it in Ocado, but I've also seen in delis.
Nutritional information: 190kcal and 44g of sugar per 100g.

And one more sweet treat from Felix -
Felix Hjortron (wild cloudberry) jam.
It has a lot of seeds, so if you only eat seedless jams, then don't try it.

Cloudberries grow in the cold climate in the northern parts of Scandinavia.
They are popular in Russia, and apparently, the cloudberry kvas and flavoured water were favoured by the Russian tsars.
They make a delicious jam, which is great on warm waffles, smothered on scones or in ice cream.

This jam turns a steak or quorn steak sandwich into a feast.

All Felix preserves are available on Amazon at ridiculously astronomical prices. If you want to try any of them, visit the local delis or buy in Ocado, which often has offers for these products.

If you're assembling a smorgasbord, you might want to add a dish of a beet salad to your selection.
ScandiKitchen Scandinavian Beetroot Salad is a creamy beet dish. It's a mix of sweet and tart flavours.
Ingredients: Beetroot, rapeseed oil, sugar, egg yolk, vinegar, onion, beetroot juice.
Nutritional info: 240kcal and 12g sugar per 100g

It tastes good on a slice of rye bread or crispbreads (may I suggest Peter's Yard sourdough crispbreads? Though technically not Swedish, as they are produced in the UK, they were inspired by the Swedish cuisine, and are some of the best crispbreads which you can buy here. They are my top favourite - served with any cheese, fresh grapes or apples and a glass of wine (optional)).

Talking of crispbreads, Leksands Knäcke is baked following a traditional family recipe, and is a great allrounder.
It has a mild rye flavour, which is a great base for any toppings.

I bought it in Ocado, when it was on offer a while ago. What I didn't realise is that these crispbreads are ginormous. I expected them to be the size of a small plate, but these are huge, so you'd have to break them into pieces.
They are similar to Ryvita in taste and texture.

Nygårda Julmust is what I would call a Swedish reply to Coca-cola or Pepsi. It's a carbonated soft drink.
In my childhood we had a similar drink in Russia called Baikal. I don't think it exists any longer.
The original Swedish recipe goes back to 1910.
40kcal per 100ml

My elder son who loves Pepsi and Diet Coke wasn't so keen on the Swedish soft drink. It does have an acquired taste, but it was fun to try it for Christmas.

Arla Filmjölk is a Swedish style yogurt or soured milk. Ocado jokingly calls it a breakfast favourite since the Viking times.
Serve it in a glass, or pour over muesli or cereal.

It's a thick dairy drink, a bit like a mix between soured cream and kefir.

And finally, Rekorderlig. This cider brand is very popular and doesn't need any introductions.

Rekorderlig Botanicals, a sweet Swedish cider, comes in a variety of fruity flavours - Rhubarb, lemon and mint; Peach and basil & Grapefruit and rosemary.

Rhubarb, lemon and mint has a distinct citrussy taste, well-balanced with note of mint and tartness of rhubarb. Great over ice, with a fresh mint leaf and a squeeze of lime.

Peach and basil is a sweeter cider, with a beautiful peach fragrance and a herbal note of basil.

Grapefruit and rosemary is another citrus-herb combination, well-balanced and delicious.

If you plan eating al fresco over the Easter weekend, this cider will be a special treat for any cider fan.

I could have written a longer post, but decided to pick a dozen of Swedish foods and drinks, which have caught my attention.

What Swedish foods or drinks would you recommend to try?

P.S. This post is not endorsed by any above mentioned brand.

Sloe gin plum jam

We have two huge old plum trees in the garden, they blossom beautifully in spring, but all the fruit is way up too high to reach, even with a ladder. When the blue plums fall down on the path through the garden, it's usually the slugs who get to them first.
We also have a younger plum tree, a different variety, which produces sweet pink plums.
Last year many plums were ruined by the squirrel who comes to raid our hazelnuts. She also bites off the plums and just throws them on the ground.
I can see why they are called tree rats. Just look at this cute thug.

I did manage to pick about a kilo and a half of plums last week. We ate half of the juicy sweet plums, and the rest were turned into a sloe gin plum jam.
I like to add a bit of alcohol to preserves. I'm always tempted by the jars of strawberry prosecco jam or raspberry Cointreau preserve, or whisky marmalade, which typically appear in shops as gifts before Christmas. I like to give and receive them as gifts.

Sloe gin plum jam
Ingredients:
750g plums (stones removed)
750g preserving sugar
50g sloe gin
a blob of butter

Place the halved stoned plums in the medium sized pan, pour the sloe gin over the plums. Add the sugar, bring to boil, stirring all the time until the sugar dissolved. Lower the heat and simmer the plums for 10 minutes.
Bring to boil again, boil rapidly for 10 minutes, stirring regularly and skimming the scum.
Turn off the heat, add a blob of butter.
Let it rest for 10 minutes before ladling into sterilised jars.

In this recipe I used Gordon's sloe gin, but any sloe gin would do. You can't actually taste the alcohol in jam, it gives a lovely depth of flavour.

If you like this recipe, you might also like a recipe for Plum, sloe and vanilla jam.

Which preserves are you making this time of the year?

Curd cheese cake with buttercream frosting and jam

It's a contradiction - you wait and wait for holidays, but when they come, you find them as stressful as school days. This doesn't mean that I'm looking forward to back to school, early mornings and dash to the school.
In the last few days my husband was away on a conference or giving talks, whatever, I have lost track of his academic shenanigans. That meant, I had to cope with my guys on my own.
On Tuesday, our friend Jen took my boys and me by car to the garden centre. Both boys love going there and seemed very happy and relaxed.
I don't dare to venture out of the house with the boys on my own, as Sash is too quick for me now. We joke that he could easily win any sprint race. And so we stayed at home yesterday and today, which made both guys grumpy with me.
When I'm feeling stressed, I bake. I rummaged in the fridge and kitchen shelves, and found a container of curd cheese as well as the remains of the damson jam, which I bought for using in the Easter lamb recipe.

I have baked a curd cheese cake on many occasions, typically as a plain bundt cake, with just a dusting of icing sugar. This time I baked it in a standard spring cake tin, and added buttercream frosting and jam inside.

Curd cheese cake
Ingredients:
zest of  1 orange, grated
3 eggs
200g caster sugar
200g curd cheese
1tsp baking powder
300g self-raising flour
100g butter, melted
1tsp vanilla bean paste
For buttercream frosting:
100g softened butter + icing sugar, enough to make a sweet frosting
jam of your choice (I used damson jam)

Grate the zest of 1 orange in a deep mixing bowl.
Beat in the eggs with the caster sugar, add curd cheese, baking powder, flour, vanilla bean paste and melted butter and mix well.
The cake batter is quite thick. Spoon it carefully in a well oiled cake tin. Put the cake tin in an oven preheated to 180C for 40+ minutes (depending on the size of the cake tin). Check with a wooden toothpick if it's ready. You might need to lower the temperature and bake it for another 10 minutes, until the skewer comes clean.
Once cooled, slice in half. Spread one half with buttercream frosting, and jam on the other half. Sandwich two halves together.
Sprinkle some icing sugar on the top.
Serve with tea or coffee. It will keep well for a couple of days, wrapped in foil.

Since I used the remains of the jam in this recipe, I'm adding this post to #KitchenClearout linky hosted by Cheryl from Madhouse Family Reviews.

Easter lamb with juniper and rosemary in damson and sloe gin sauce

Classic FM channel has been on most of this weekend, as I'm trying to catch most of the Hall of Fame 2017. While I was making a cup of mint tea for myself after a late-ish Easter lunch, Prokofiev's Romeo and Juliet was announced as moving 32 places down to no.101.
This is one of my Hall of Fame votes. Every year I change two other votes, but Prokofiev's Dance of the Knights holds a special place in my heart.
It reminds me of seeing Romeo and Juliet ballet in my home town. It was and still is one of my most favourite ballets. I think I saw it first when I was in high school, and I promptly fell in love with the ballet dancer who performed the part of Tybalt. He was a very good dancer, and was soon poached by one of Moscow theatres. That was a long time ago, and his name now escapes me.
In case you are curious, the other two votes from me were for Masquerade Suite by Aram Khachaturian (no.218 this year), and The Gadfly by Shostakovich, which appeared this evening at no.81 933 places up). I was quite torn whether to choose The Gadfly or The Jazz Suite no.2.

Our Easter started very early, as Sasha got up at some ungodly hour, when it was still dark. I fell back into an uneasy slumber, and in the meantime he wandered downstairs and raided the locked cupboard with sweets.
Eddie wanted to go to the Easter service, and came back loaded with more chocolate eggs and Easter books.
I dyed a few token eggs to put on a table as a centrepiece.
When Eddie came home from the church, he asked me: Mummy, are you cooking your tights? - It's true, I was wrapping up eggs with herbs inside the pieces of old (washed) tights. I cooked them in the boiling water with the food colouring. The pattern is not very clear, as the eggs were brown to start with.
I'm not sure why most of the eggs that you see in the shops are brown (or blue, if you buy local breed eggs), and never white. When we were kids, most eggs were white, and easy to decorate for Easter.

This is a pattern from mint leaves.

While Eddie went to the church with his Dad, I started cooking lamb. I have bookmarked recipe on Waitrose site. I don't often cook lamb, but the recipe for Juniper and rosemary lamb with damson and sloe gin sauce sounded very tasty. I'm glad I tried it, it was delicious, and I'm definitely going to cook it again, when we have guests for dinner.
I have slightly adapted it, but mostly followed the Waitrose recipe. Since I cooked just for our family, I used half a leg at 1.1kg weight.

Easter lamb with juniper and rosemary in damson and sloe gin sauce
Ingredients:
2 rosemary sprigs
2tsp sea salt
2tsp demerara sugar
2 cloves of garlic
1tsp butter spread like Lurpak
2tbsp olive oil + more
10 juniper berries
lamb, half leg (1.1kg)
1 red onion, thinly sliced
for the gravy:
2tbsp damson jam
sloe gin, about 100ml ( I used more than Waitrose's suggestion of 2tbsp)

Remove the leaves from the rosemary stalks, put into a bowl with garlic, salt, sugar, juniper berries, butter spread and olive oil. They suggest crushing the rosemary with a pestle. I used a handblender to blitz it all together. Definitely add some olive oil to make a spreadable consistency.
Rub the marinade all over the lamb and sit it on the thinly sliced onion in a roasting dish. Drizzle some olive oil over the onion too. Let it sit for half an hour.
Preheat the oven to 200C. Place the roasting dish in the oven for 10 minutes, then cook the lamb as you like it - 8 minutes per 100g of weight if you like it well done, or 6 minutes per 100g if you like it pink. Turn it once over, and occasionally baste with the lamb juice.
Once cooked, take the lamb out of the oven, wrap in foil and let it rest for half an hour. To keep it warm, put a clean towel over the foil.
For the damson sauce, tip the roasting tin to collect all the juices in a small pan, add the damson jam and sloe gin. Using a little whisk, break the jam, to achieve the right consistency. Reduce the sauce.
Serve the lamb with the damson gravy, and roast potatoes and carrots.

I also put a jar of mint jelly and redcurrant jelly on the table. I did buy fresh mint to make my own mint sauce, but was running out of time, and The Bay Tree mint jelly is lovely.
If you want to cook the same dish, I used Tiptree Damson jam and Gordon's Sloe Gin.

The Hall of Fame continues tomorrow, and do I dare to hope that the Lark Ascending will topple over. I would be pleased with any other piece of music getting to no.1 just to make it descend.

Tuna stir fry with exotic mushrooms

We don't always eat fish on Fridays. Whenever I cook fish, my dear husband mumbles "Why do we eat fish so often?" The younger men in my family are as obstinate: Sash would only eat fish pate as in tuna pate sandwiches, Eddie is always looking forward to fish and chips meals at school on Fridays, but apparently I serve the "wrong" kind of fish. Sometimes, I wonder: why do I even bother?
I buy tuna steaks maybe once or twice a month, especially when they are on offer. They are delicious with mushrooms.

Tuna stir fry with exotic mushrooms
Ingredients:
2 Yellowfish tuna steaks
2tbsp black garlic ketchup
2tbsp dark soy sauce
smoked sea salt
1tsp cyder vinegar
5tbsp sesame oil
1 carrot
1tbsp chilli-flavoured oil
200g mixed exotic mushrooms (oyster, shiitake, maitake)
whole wheat noodles

First slice each steak into 3-4 strips. Marinade tuna for at least an hour in a mix of dark soy sauce, black garlic ketchup, smoked sea salt, cyder vinegar and 2tbsp sesame oil. You can substitute black garlic ketchup for a finely chopped clove of garlic.
Peel and slice a carrot. Heat up 1tbsp of sesame oil and fry carrot for about 4-5 minutes, add the tuna and more oil. Cook the fish for about 2 minutes on each side. Add mushrooms and cook for another 2-3 minutes. Serve with hot whole wheat noodles.

In this recipe I used Maldon smoked sea salt. I'm very fond of Maldon sea salt, and regularly buy the original variety. I also often make my own flavoured sea salt, by mixing it with all kinds of dried herbs.
Smoked sea salt flakes are gently smoked over oak to add a rich, sophisticated flavour to any dish.
It was part of the latest Degustabox food box, and I was most excited about trying it.
It's an excellent product, which adds a unique smokiness to cooked meals.

Sea bass with prawns and black garlic ketchup

You would have thought that with over a hundred cook books at home, I would be more organised with the meal planning.
I admire people who plan their dinner menus a week in advance. Though I often have a shopping list with me with ingredients to buy for that evening, there are days when I have no clue as to what I might serve for dinner. I wander around the shop, looking at the ingredients, trying to find inspiration.
Last Friday I stopped by the deli fish counter in Waitrose (they have 20% off promotion each Friday) and decided to buy two sea bass fillets.

Sea bass with prawns and black garlic ketchup
Ingredients:
2 sea bass fillets
3tbsp olive oil
1 medium carrot
a handful of baby tomatoes
a squeeze of lemon juice
3tbsp black garlic ketchup
fresh parsley, chopped
Peel and slice a carrot, and place in the oiled roasting dish. Place the fish fillets on top, scatter the tomatoes around the dish. Spread black garlic ketchup over the fish and squeeze a bit of lemon juice over. Cook in the oven at 180C for about 20+ minutes. Add the prawns in the last five minutes of cooking.
Serve hot, with a bit of fresh parsley sprinkled on the top.

In this recipe I used a Black Garlic Ketchup, an innovative product from Hawkshead Relish. The flavour of black garlic is created with baking whole, fresh garlic bulbs for 40 days at a very low temperature creating an extraordinary flavour.
"Combining the pureed garlic cloves by hand with fresh tomatoes, olive oil & Anglesey sea salt this ketchup sauce is the ultimate addition to cooked meats, tartlets, potato wedges, roast veg, shell fish, stews and glazes".

Image credits: Hawkshead Relish

Maria Whitehead, co-owner of Hawkshead Relish, says: "The flavour of black garlic is exquisite & relatively new to the British palate, although seen on some adventurous menus, we wanted to bring this tremendous innovation to the public in a way that it can be easily appreciated & enjoyed! We've made it in a way that the unadventurous will just love as a dynamic dip for chips, to those who will delight in its versatility in adding luscious flavour in cooking & preparation".
Handmade with optimum quality ingredients & completely natural without any artificial flavouring, colouring or additives, free from gluten & nuts as well as suitable for vegetarians.
It is rich, smooth, sweet, almost treacle-like in appearance and consistency, with a good garlicky punch.

This excellent condiment could be added as an ingredient to a whole variety of dishes.
For example, yesterday I cooked a one-pan chicken and vegetable dish. I have sliced two sweet peppers, a big courgette and drizzled them with the olive oil, before placing a chicken breast joint on top. Drizzle more olive oil over the chicken, season with a bit of salt and pour a mix of 2tbsp of maple syrup, a good squeeze of lemon juice and 2tbsp black garlic ketchup. Cook at 180C for 40+ minutes until the chicken is cooked through. Add more black garlic ketchup on top in the last 10 minutes of cooking. Serve hot with crusty bread.

Have you tried this innovative ketchup?

Disclosure: I received a bottle of ketchup for the purposes of testing and reviewing. All opinions are our own.