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Thursday, October 26, 2017

Hazelnut Tea Cakes (sponsored)


Autumn baking I am back! 

When you cross your neighbours in the elevator and they see you packed with baking ingredients and they say 'Oh are you finally baking again? I've missed the smell of freshly baked goods'. Well dear neighbour, if you're reading this, I may tell you that Christmas is in less than 2 months and there will be loads of cookies and treats. So watch out!

Summer was truly busy and I know I did not spoil you with many recipes. All my friends decided to get married, so I was travelling from Luxembourg to the Netherlands to Serbia to finally end the Wedding Season in Zürich. There was definitely not enough time for me to test and develop new recipes. Now my wallet is empty and I decided to stay home for a while. So be prepared, I will pass my weekends in the kitchen again. This week I had a revival of my childhood memory:  hazelnut cakes. At the time, this cake was a true winner at kids birthday parties. 

Several years later, when I was not a kid anymore, I tried to bake the recipe on my own. Not concentrated at all, I transformed this rather dry Luxembourgish classic into a moist teacake. So how did I do this? Basically I added too much butter to the batter, I didn't want to throw away some small amount of milk that would have been left behind in my fridge and I forgot to buy vanilla sugar and hereby opted for freshly ground vanilla. 


For 8 tea cakes you need:
125g butter
200g sugar
6 eggs
125g ground roasted hazelnuts
2 tbsp rum
135 ml milk
2 tsp vanilla extract or 1 fresh vanilla bean
125g flour
1 tsp baking powder

All the ingredients for this recipe can be purchased on the Auchan Drive Website


Preheat the oven to 180°

In a bowl, whisk together the butter and sugar until well combined. Separate the egg yolks from the egg whites and add them to the batter. Then add the ground hazelnuts and mix until you get an even dough. Add the sugar and baking powder, then de milk. Now add the rum and the vanilla bean, then the flour. When the batter is almost ready, whisk the egg whites in a separate bowl until firm. Stir in the beaten egg whites and the dough is ready. 

Pour the batter into the little tea cake pans and bake for 25 to 30 minutes.

Enjoy!!!!

Are you planning on making this recipe? Or have you already tried it?
Then show me your creations on Instagram: @passionmeetscreativity  I'm looking forward to your comments & suggestions :)


Sunday, October 1, 2017

Mango Curry (sponsored)


When I got interested in plant-based nutrition several years ago, this was the first recipe I developed to integrate in my daily cooking routine. I am not a vegan, and I do not plan becoming one, but I am very interested in what nutriments you can get from different ingredients. When I did a lot of research I found loads of different recipes, and this is when the plant-based cooking adventure started. 

I was done with al l the varieties of ratatouille normal cookbooks would suggest, so I got deeper into the topic. I observed that over the last years, some of my friends were interested in the same topics, and this is how we exchanged on the topic. We exchanged combinations, ingredients etc. Today, I possess a lot of plant-based cookbooks, and I try many different recipes on a regular basis. The best thing about is that you cannot really screw up recipes. And with different herbs and grains, you can transform basic recipes very quickly. 

I cooked this very recipe the first time I hosted a vegan dinner party, for people that were actually not vegan. They all really loved it, and even today, two years later, when I mention the recipe, they still remember how delicious it was. 

For 4 bowls you need:
2 teaspoons coconut oil
1 chopped onion
1 zucchini
1 yellow bell pepper
280g green beans
3 minced garlic cloves
2 tsp minced fresh ginger
2tbsp red curry paste
500 ml coconut milk
1 tbsp soy sauce
1 ripe mango
1 tbsp lime juice

All the ingredients for this recipes can be purchased on the Aucnan Drive website. 

****

In a large soup pot hear the oil over a medium heat. Chop the onion, add it to the pot and sauté until lightly golden.  Now add the green beans, the zucchini and bell pepper and cook the vegetables until they start to become tender. Add the garlic, ginger and curry paste and stir until well combined. Finally pour in the soy sauce and coconut milk and turn everything to a gentle simmer.

Once the pot is simmering, add the mango. Reduce the heat and cook this al together until the mango almost falls apart. Now turn off the heat, add some lime juice and stir once again. Now you can serve the mango curry. 

In my opinion it tastes best with brown rice. 

Enjoy!!!!

Are you planning on making this recipe? Or have you already tried it?
Then show me your creations on Instagram: @passionmeetscreativity  I'm looking forward to your comments & suggestions :)


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