Mirza Ghasemi (Persian Aubergine, Tomato & Egg)

Sunday afternoon I spent dogsitting.  It was sunny, we went to the park, we played in the terrace, we napped on the sofa - everyone needs some dog therapy.  It was such an uplifting day where I allowed myself to do absolutely nothing.  I had brought my laptop with the intention of doing some work but I just went 5 hours straight without doing anything.  I was at my friend's place who lives with three chefs and thus the house has an impressive cookbook collection.  That's where I found this recipe. Yea, 5 hours of sitting in the sun, playing with the dogs and reading cookbooks - more Sundays should be like that.

Vanilla Raspberry Jam

I'll be honest, jam has never excited me.  I never opted for jam on my toast, or in my croissants, or as a filling in any other pastry.  Meh, I always preferred nutella and peanut butter or just pure butter with some sugar and cinnamon.  However, I love making jam, especially in the winter.  I love hovering over a stove and stirring continuously in a slow regular motion.  The steam rising up to your face and fogging up the windows, the scent sweetening the kitchen -- I mean it's like the equivalent of going to the spa for me.   

 Raspberry jam's great if you have no patience for what I just said.  I think this altogether took 20 minutes max.  I just make them for other people as gifts now.

Homemade Baked Beans On Toast

Heinz baked beans.

With any dodgy breakfast-fry-up, it's the one thing you're guaranteed to be good.  The eggs will taste of rubber, the bacon will be dry, the mushrooms will be greasy, but you know that those baked beans will be alright. 

 I'm a foreigner and I find it fascinating that when British people talk of "proper baked beans" they mean the Heinz baked beans.  Not homemade, not some gourmet version sold by some small independent business, no, no, it's Heinz.  It's a staple in most people's households, isn't it?  And you wouldn't dream of any restaurant using anything else.

Mung Bean Hummus

I grew up with mung beans being something sweet.  Mashed with lots of sugar and fat as a filling in pastries or powdered down and turned into cakes, they're very popular in China.  Oh and mung bean popsicles are fantastic.  I realized, however, that it is unfortunately only an acquired taste.  See, I love sharing food.  I love introducing people to foods they've never had before and sharing everything that's on my plate.  So when foreign friends come to visit in China, I make them try all sorts of weird and wonderful things and I've learned that mung bean popsicles are not well-received by everyone.  What a shame. 

How to: Candied Ginger

Today was a day of successes and failures.  Successes: candied ginger and tomato sauce.  Failures: burnt ginger gooseberry jam and eating too much mediocre tiramisu.  The latter two left me kind of sad.  However, rather than dwelling on the failures in life, we should celebrate the successes, and we need to celebrate these candied ginger pieces.

 They're so easy to make.  My mom had bought a pack of candied ginger and I got annoyed - I hate buying things that can be made at home.  That's also why I get annoyed when my mother buys jam! And that's why I tried making jam today but okay I've burnt jam a couple of times already.  I just forget about it until I smell the burnt sugar.

Saffron Aubergine & Yoghurt Dip (Borani-e Bademjan)

If you were to die tomorrow, to be hung or shot or electrocuted on a chair, what would you ask for today as your last meal?  I've thought this through, and I can tell you with great confidence that I would just love a meze/tapas/antipasti feast.  Just dips, cured meats, cold cuts, cheeses, pates, pickles, excellent bread, excellent olive oil and a bottle of red wine.  Left to myself eating with my hands outdoors on the grass as a picnic (f they'd allow me).  I don't like it when people ask me what my favorite meal is, that I find difficult to answer, but this would undoubtedly be my last meal.

 So I said in my last post that there will be a series of saffron recipes, and here is #2.  This recipe is directly from Saveur, and it's kiiiind of like a baba ganoush, but no tahini, and it's with yoghurt.  Plus some caramelized onions and garlic, chopped onions and saffron.  I know, it's like baba ganoush with a royal makeover.   I made this last night, photographed it this morning and so ate it as part of my breakfast along with some pita.  Good stuff, the taste still lingers in my mouth.

Pear and Saffron Jam

There was a box of sad, bruised pears on the ground at my local green grocer's.  They were about to be chucked out and so I decided to bring them back to life by turning them into jam.

 I've always found cooking to be therapeutic, but sometimes it's hard to push myself to cook on a bad day.  It's all such an effort: so much chopping, so much washing, so many ingredients, so many steps, and then I just end up sulking in bed as I think about how my one and only passion is a chore. 

Hazelnut and Thyme Pesto

This is almost the complete opposite of the traditional Genovese pesto with basil and pine nuts.  It's the basil that, when ground in abundance, makes any sauce fresh and fragrant.  Genovese pesto tastes and looks of summer and vitality.  Not the ones you get in jars that's lying somewhere on the color spectrum between cheap green tea and coffee-stained napkins , but the homemade ones that look of a bright green garden in the sun.  

This is winter. This is up in the mountains hovering over the fire with a mug of hot chocolate.  It's earthy and it's comforting.  

Right now that's what I'm craving.  Comfort.  I want to be curled up on the couch and feel calm and warm and relaxed and serene and just.. still. 

Homemade Mustard

You know those people that you initially dislike but then grow to love? I like to describe those people as mustard.  Mustard, wine, coffee, blue cheese -- those foods that needs time to appreciate.  They're not easy flavors for children to like -- bit too harsh for those delicate little palates. 

I used to love those cheap hot dogs with questionable meat in malls.  I remember the condiment section with the bright yellow bottles and the bright red bottles.  I'd slather those bad boys with ketchup, and despite hating mustard, I'd always try just a tiny little bit of it.  Just the tiniest dollop of it on one end, enough to see but not enough to taste.  I don't know why, I think I wanted to like it.  Unfortunately my love for mustard only came about much later on.  For the longest time, my experience with mustard was limited to the American yellow mustard, and I thought that that was all that there was.  Then one day my father introduced me to wholegrain mustard, and it wasn't exactly love at first taste, but it was the first mustard experience that didn't make me grimace in disgust.

Best of 2013

And the year's drawing to a close.  I've been reading "Best of 2013"'s everywhere, from food news to celebrity moments to advances in technology.  So I've decided to share Happy Belly's highlights in 2013 - a combination of viewers' favorites and mine. 

Best breakfast
It was difficult to choose the best breakfast, because I have a ridiculous number of breakfast recipes.  But I had to choose this oatmeal over any other pancakes and eggs because.. it's just love and comfort in a bowl.  It's the perfect thing to have over and over again for a whole month.  It's cumbersome and time-consuming, yes, that is why I shamefully admit that I still make oatmeal in the microwave sometimes.  However, as I'm on holiday right now, I've been making my porridge according to this recipe every morning.


Best Dessert
This Hazelnut-Praline Dacquoise was popular.   Indeed, it took me a whole morning to make it and look how pretty.  Two nut based sponge cakes with a rich creamy center.  Despite all the sugar and butter in this dish, it was beautifully light. 















 Best Vegetable
Broccoli with Tahini 
Steamed vegetables can be boring if you don't know how to dress them.  

Miso Ricotta & Roasted Tomato Crostini

I'm Chinese and Italian, yet while I've always been intrigued by the idea of fusion, this was a practice rarely carried out in my household.  Italian food had to stay pure - there was no room for Asian influences.  And with Chinese food, my mother was not as strict, but I suppose she just stuck with traditional recipes -- with the exception of adding olive oil to everything. 

See, I grew up with really black and white ideas about certain ingredients.  Ricotta and mascarpone were ingredients in Italian cuisine.  Soy sauce and sesame oil were ingredients in Chinese cuisine.  Those were clearly separated in our kitchen and consequently in my mind.  Then, coming to the UK really opened my eyes to a whole new culinary world, ironically enough. 

You can say what you want about British cuisine.  It went through a horrific stage back in the 70's all the way to the late 90's.  Hell, maybe longer than that.  Yes, the Brits had it bad for awhile. Appalling, in fact.  Thank god I never lived through those periods, but there are still places in the UK where that food culture still lingers, unfortunately.  But you know what, right now, the UK is so imaginative with food.  It is truly a melting pot of cultures and that is seen through the foods.  I love British cookery programs because they have the most amazing things.  They take fusion to a whole new level.  And you know what, it's difficult with fusion, it's difficult to break boundaries and mix things up, and for that, I respect you, Britain. 

Goat's Cheese and EVO Oil Pumpkin Butter Crostini

AND IT'S HAPPY BELLY'S 2-YEAR BIRTHDAY! 

If it was a child it'd be able to talk! 2 years! I don't know much about children and development, so I don't know what other things 2-year olds begin to do, but they talk around that age right?  Although I started talking really late, like at 3...

Anyway.

Unfortunately there's no cake.  I meant to have a birthday party but I'm too busy... However, fear not, I'm planning on a belated birthday party with a fancy cake. 

Cannellini Bean Salad with Salsa Verde

Oh i'm so sorry for the lack of posts.  All will return to normal in September when I go back to uni.  Well, for the first two weeks no because I won't have a kitchen as I'll be sleeping at my friends' because my rent doesn't start until the 15th.  But I'll make an effort to update more regularly!
 
Don't you just hate it when you buy a pack of herbs for a recipe, you use 3 leaves and you're left with the rest rotting in your fridge? A week later, you decide to garnish a soup with some parsley and you see that what was once beautifully vibrant and green, is now a flaccid yellow.

I've bought pots of herbs several times, but their lifetime seems to be shorter than the packs I put in the fridge.  I never know when to water them and if it's too much.  Plus I live in Scotland where would they get enough sunlight?

But I've learned.  I hate throwing food away, and I've learned that every time I buy a pack of herbs, I end up making a salsa verde of some sort.

 See, it's essentially just a bunch of herbs and some olive oil and other spices.  Put a clove of garlic, some anchovies, capers, or even bread crumbs.  I put in some sun-dried tomatoes.   This is a great sauce for a number of things, you can dress any normal vegetables or beans or salads with this.  You could even spread it on bread or put it in a sandwich.

Honey-Sweetened Peach Jam

I don't think I was ever big on jam.  Thinking back to my childhood, I don't think I ever really had jam on toast for breakfast, it was more nutella on toast for me.  Similarly, in Italy we have our version of croissants, and you can find them stuffed with nutella, custard, jam or plain, and I always opted for either the nutella one or the custard one (or they have the ones with both nutella and custard sometimes).   I remember my grandmother making her own jam though.  Going through her fridge I'd find numerous jars of brightly colored flesh with a date roughly scribbled on it.  I don't remember if I've ever tried her jams.

Last night I was alone and I had the urge to make jam.  I found this recipe on Food52 and it's really good --  I'm spreading this stuff on my toast as I'm typing right now.  Nutella on toast is just getting a bit heavy for breakfast at this age.

Citrussy Olive Tapenade

I'm now the girl in the office that makes all kinds of dips and spreads.

So despite being in Berlin, all my colleagues are Italian, and there's nothing I hate more than cooking for Italians.  Italians are so...conservative. I'm sure you know.  It has to be done just this one way, the way their mother does it.  No changes, no creativity, they want authenticity.  So forget trying to cook them anything remotely Italian at work.  Therefore I make spreads.  I've made my guacamole, hummus and last Saturday I made this tapenade for them, and they liked it.  See, don't make pasta for Italians, make something totally not Italian and they'll try it.

Plus I don't have much in my kitchen and I borrowed a food processor from the office so it's one of the few things I can make. 
 

 This is a..more refreshing tapenade because of all the citrus notes.  Lots of lemon zest, lots of orange zest, and not so much garlic and anchovy fillets. 

Oven-Dried Tomatoes

Summers in Southern Italy as a child.  I would look down my grandmother's balcony to watch her brother fan away the flies that swarmed over the tomatoes.  Thinly sliced tomatoes orderly arranged in a single layer on a rack, drenched in salt and slowly soaking in the scorching sun.

I never got to see the final product or remember his name really.  These tomatoes dried in the oven would probably never taste the same as those - it lacks the Italian sun, and the love and sweat in the effort of fanning away the flies, but hey these are pretty damn good.

You can even cure them afterwards! See here. 

How to: Homemade Vanilla Extract

I have decided - at the beginning of the next academic year I'm going to make many of these homemade condiment things, and then give them away as gifts later on.  This requires a couple of weeks to..develop the flavor, and my cured sun-dried tomatoes as well, and same with flavored oils and salts.  I can also give away nut butters, like almond butter, or jams, like this orange and rosemary marmalade.

Anyway, homemade vanilla extract.  I don't know if this is actually more cost-efficient.  Normally I buy this vanilla extract which costs £5.

Classic Hummus

See how pretty this is?  This is so bad, I didn't actually make this - but I did help make it.  This was ages ago at a cookery class I was helping out at.  It was a Lebanese cookery class and I just loved this hummus recipe.  Everyone's got a different hummus recipe, I used to make it with just chickpeas, lemon juice, garlic and olive oil.  My friend makes it with yoghurt, some add hot sauce, some add spices, but oh this is quite nice.  Tahini's key.  Don't get rid of the tahini.

I was looking over my photos to see what I could post about because it's been days.  It's exam season and I just don't have time to come back home to cook a meal, I live too far away from the library! This is not budget-friendly because I've been eating out for all my meals.  I did make a cake last night, but I wasn't completely satisfied, and I will master this chocolate coconut cake before I post a recipe of it - I hope this tells you something about the recipes I do post.

Pumpkin Seed Butter

This may be my new favorite thing.

So you know how I make my own peanut butter, almond butter, coconut butter and whatnot? These spreads are my best friends on a vegan diet.  Well, they're my best friends normally as well, but anyway. I like to experiment with these butters and as I had pumpkin seeds I went for pumpkin seed butter and oh.my.gawd.  It's sensational.  Absolutely sensational.

Za'atar Spiced Butter Bean Hummus & Masterchef

Yes, I'm spicing up my vegan diet.  I love love love Middle Eastern food.

Are you keeping up with British Masterchef?  Do you watch any Masterchef?  I remember when I discovered British Masterchef three years ago - now there's Australian Masterchef, Italian Masterchef, Chinese Masterchef - crazy!  But they are all a bit different from each other.  I love Australian Masterchef and British Masterchef.  In Australian Masterchef everyone's just so nice.  In the British one it's professional and all about food.  The American one is more of a reality show with a lot of b*tching and drama.  Not a fan at all.  Plus, never many exciting foods. 

British and Australian are the way to go.