We use Palle’s mom’s recipe as it is so easy to recall. So easy that it’s sometimes hard to remember and begs to be mod’ed. Erm.

It’s: 1L yogurt, 1L buttermilk. That makes 2L of cow stuff. Then the double of chicken stuff, ie. 4 egg yolks. Preferable without salmonella. Then 6 spoonfuls of sugar. And finally at least 1 spoonful of vanilla. You could go with less, like 1 tea-spoonful, vanilla if you’d approach the real mom recipe. The easiness is in the relation 2:4:6, if you notice. Now stir. Then eat with so called kammerjunker (can be seen in the above picture) — preferable on a sunny day.

This is an update to the Rugbrød post [1]. By adding 3/2 dL of sunflower seeds when mixing in the rye flour etc on the second day makes nice sunflower seed rugbrød (solskikke rugbrød, da). Below is a picture of how it looks.

[1] http://lillesvin.net/archives/178

Or rye bread, if you prefer. [0] A week or two ago I’ve made my first rugbrød using real wet sourdough. The sourdough I got of Jakob together with baking directions - both pictured below.

As a nerveus learner I followed the directions as close as I could. Made half a portion. Below is pictured the sourdough resting and the result.

It was yummy. And quite sour. With luck I can keep this sourdough for a long while. I can’t wait to experiment with different kinds of rugbrød.

A summery of the directions in English is, for half a portion, this: Mix the wet sourdough in 1/2 L cold water. Then mix in 4 tea spoons of salt, 3.5 dL chunky grains of rye (knækkede rugkerne, anyone?) and a good 2 dL wheat flour. The wheat flour is there to make the bread firm and stick together. Then 3.5 dL rye flour. Rest under cling film for a whole day (not in the fridge though).

The next day, first take a sample of the sourdough for the next time. Then mix in the same measure of rye flour, some dark sweet beer (hvidtøl, da) and a spoon full (dark) syrup. Smear the form(s) with grease (butter or margarine, not oil), pour the dough into the form(s), cover with cling film and let it rest for another three hours. Then bake for 3/2 hours at something just less then 200 degrees. For lower heat, bake longer. When done, eject the bread from the forms, wrap them in a tea towel and let them rest till not hot. If nice, then eat.

[0] http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Rugbr%C3%B8d,
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Rye_bread

Baking bread is something, I think, everyone does on a regular basis. As such it is extremely common. But everyone does it different. And one of the wonders of baking your own bread is not only is it different from the bread being made next door, it is also different from the last bread you made, using mush the same method. They are all unique small pieces of everyday art.

I normally make a bread that is quite wet. Mainly since then it so easy to make. It takes a couple of minutes to prepare and the cleaning is done quick: I make it as wet as I can still just mix the ingredients in a bowl with a fork. Properly that’s also the reason it was the kind that got me stated.

I instantly fell in love with bread baking. It carries so many nice properties. It’s for everyone, it’s a big part of our daily life as we (I do at least) eat it all the time, it’s simple, it’s DIY, it’s krafty and stimulates creativity, it’s smells and taste good. Heck, it’s all most as if fresh baked bread can make any day good — for a while at least.

This one is different. To pre-cut it I had to make the dough more firm, hence less wet. A price I were willing to pay — even though it was not for a pizza — as I wanted to try it out. I know it is simple, but I was quite happy with the result. This one is made out of flour, watter, yeast, sugar (or was it apple gel), olive oil, salt, fromage frais, cardamom and… that’s it I think. No (update), it also contained chunky oatmeal.

A nice side effect to braking the bread rolls like lumps off was that they were so high that it made sense to cut them into three slices. I can’t foresee the implications three-parting a roll can have to the families where they fight over the upper or lower part, but I reckon will freak ‘em in some way or another.

I’ve long been wondering how to make good a bean salad. It’s not that i haven’t had any good bean salad ever. I’ve had plenty, but never seamed to be able to redo them. Mostly the good yummy bean salads have been relying on two things; 1) a well thought out combination of the stuff in the salad to got with the beans and 2) a really yummy dressing.

With respect to the first issue. It’s not that hard, I think, to come up with nice things too add to the beans. And something has to be added, since while beans, like for instance kidney beans, are really yummy, they don’t top the foods single chart. - They need company to do what they do best.

Hence the second issue is my problem. I really do not make good dressings. Hence i don’t make good bean salads.

The other day though, I think, I made a slight cracked in the ice. What I did was kind of combining 1) and 2) and served the salad with basil pancakes. This is what it looked like:

First the pancakes. Flour, water, mortared fresh basils, olive oil and salt was steered together. Obviously fired on hot pan.

The bean salad. Rugula (I know it so yesteryear) with kidney beans on top was put in a bowl. Squeezed a lemon over it. The beans was soaked over night and boiled plain — that is only with salt and no herbs.

In the mean while spring onion, fresh chili and bell pepper [0] was cooked in the oven with salt, freshly grind black pepper and plenty of olive oil for as long as possible at low heat (ca. 100 degrees celsius). To shorten the wait increase the heat.

This was the “trick” that combined 1) and 2) to add nice stuff and get a dressing in one go. This was added on top of the beans, while making very sure to get all the yummy grease out as-well. Ready to serve vegan mid day meal.