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Sunday, February 19, 2017

Aparagus and pea bagel (sponsored)


This green bagel is a rollercoaster of spring tastes. 

I was so surprised when first testing the recipe. I am really trying to respect the seasons on the blog. But sometimes you just can't handle your appetite for certain ingredients and then I am also making exceptions. Though spring is just around the corner and I was looking to develop a seasonal hit. The recipe includes asparagus and green peas, whose season will start in a bit. 

So what makes this bagel so amazing? Well.. let me tell you. It's the layer of mint and cashew pesto, which is the first layer and gives the whole recipe a lot of freshness. Then the smashed peas add a little sweetness and the asparagus some extra crunch. The scrambled feta rounds the whole thing up and ensures a smooth transition of tastes. 


For two bagel halves you'll need:

1 bagel
75g green peas
1tbsp olive oil
50g feta
12 thin asparagus spears
25g mint leaves
75g feta
50g cashew nuts
50ml lemon juice
60ml olive oil

All the ingredients for the recipe can be purchased on the Auchan Drive website


Place the mint, feta, cashews, lemon juice, salt and pepper into a food processor. Blend for a minute, if necessary scrape dow sides. Now add the olive oil and blend again until well-combined. 

In a large frying pan heat some olive oil on a medium-high heat. Add the asparagus spears and sauté for around 5 minutes. Season with salt and pepper. While the asparagus are cooling down toast the bagels and cook the peas. 

Now you can prepare the bagel halves. Spread 2 tablespoons of pesto onto each half. Then evenly spread the smashed peas on the bagels. Now place the lukewarm asparagus spears on top of the bagel. 

Crumble the feta and sprinkle on both bagel halves. Season pepper.

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 :)


Saturday, February 18, 2017

Cashew Ginger Energy Balls


Having a busy life can be very challenging at times, especially when it comes to healthy nutrition. Between work, fitness goals, blogging and social life there is unfortunately not always a lot of time for decent grocery shopping or meal prepping. 

As today is a calm day and I decided to do a little inventory of my pantry and my whole food shelf. I have got loads of grains and seeds, which I should integrate more often into my daily meals. So as there were left some cashews and Medjool dates, I decided to make some energy bars or balls. From my last cocktail night there were still some limes left, which I decided to use to add a little freshness to my energy balls. 


All the goodness from Medjool dates, cashew nuts, chia seeds and ginger is united in this recipe. They give you a real boost on busy days and also occur to be a perfect pre-workout snack. 

Usually  when I am working, I start getting tired around 7 o'clock and sometimes tend to skip the gym. But when I eat a pair of my homemade energy bites, I feel really energised and my motivation to hit the gym increases considerably. Ok, I guess when my coach reads this, he will ask me to produce another 1000 balls to get my butt to the gym a little more often. But there's little chance he reads this blog post anyways. 


For around 18 energy balls you'll need:

150g cashew nuts
50g pumpkin seeds
240g Medjool dates
juice of one lime
2 tsp ground ginger


Place the cashews, pumpkin and chia seeds into a food processor and pulse several times until the nuts and seeds are crushed. Add the dates, blend, then add the lime juice and ground ginger. Blend again until the mixture become nice and sticky.

Roll the mix into equally sized balls. In order for the balls to set well, place then into the freezer for about an hour. Then put them into an airtight container and store in the fridge. 

Enjoy!!






Saturday, February 11, 2017

Cranberry Pistachio Sausage Rolls


Game day, Christmas, Summer Party, Movie Night… to only name a few occasions for which you can prepare these little bad boys. 

For the last Christmas Eve I was in charge of the aperitivo. I was trying to make something really tasty which wouldn't fill people up too much, as the food prepared by my dad was heaven. At the supermarkets you can find loads of little canapés that are usually made out of puff pastry. So indeed, I wanted to prepare something that includes puff pastry as well. 

I heard that the British had this famous little thing called sausage roll. Not too much of a fan of a purely meaty canapé, especially as most of them are made out of really greasy meat, I was trying something on my own. I've seen canapés with nuts or with dried fruits, so I thought I would just bring all of the not meaty flavorful elements together. And I have to say, my family just loved it!!!


For around 80 sausage rolls you'll need:
6 sheets puff pastry
1 read onion
2 garlic cloves
550g lean minced pork
2 Grany Smith apples (grated)
50g pistachios
50g dried cranberries
2 tbsp wholegrain mustard
1 tbsp apple cider vinegar
1 tbsp chopped flat leaf parsley
1 egg
1 tbsp milk
1 tbsp olive oil
2 tbsp sesame seeds
salt & pepper


Preheat the oven to 180°

Heat the olive oil in a large frying pan before you add the onion and a pinch of salt. Sauté for around 5 minutes. Then add the garlic and continue for another 5 minutes. Remove the frying pan and let completely cool.

In a large bowl mix the pork meat, pistachios, cranberries, grated apple, vinegar and parley as well as the onion until well-combined. Season with salt and a generous amount of black pepper and mix again. 

Cut each pastry sheet into three roughly 8cm large and 5 cm wide strips. In a small bowl, combine the milk and egg with a fork.  Align the rectangles in a row and place 1tsp of stuffing on one side of each of them. Roll up to enclose the filling, then brush some egg mixture along the side to seal. Repeat until all the stuffing is used up.

Place the mini sausage rolls onto a tray lined with baking paper. Coat each sausage roll generously with the remaining egg mixture and sprinkle with sesame seeds.

Bake the sausage rolls for 30-40 minutes depending on your oven until golden brown and crispy. When ready, take them out of the oven and serve hot. 




Wednesday, February 1, 2017

Homemade Mini Pizzas (sponsored)


Say it with pizza or not at all! 

They say that human taste evolves over the years. When hearing that sentence, I usually think of more sophisticated things than pizza. I never really liked pizza. I found it a bit boring and when going to Italian restaurants I usually chose some fancy pasta recipes. But 2016 was the year when my taste buds suddenly changed their sense of taste and I actually started to like pizza. So what did the switch result from? Difficult to say… but…one of my colleagues seems to be a little pizza addict. Over the year, she was regularly talking about that famous place in the eastern part of Luxembourg where she would enjoy the best pizza of the Grand Duchy. When hearing her talk about pizza all the time, I thought come on, give it a try. And bam! I liked it. So I went from 1 pizza when having no choice every couple of years,  to 3-4 pizzas in only one. 


Obviously now I realized what I have missed out on all these years. So I faced the challenge to develop my own recipe and I have to admit that I'm very happy about the result. I was looking for a spicy and a herbal juicy version, that's why I came up with the two recipes hereunder.

As you may see, for the upcoming love birds festivities I made little pizza hearts. Well yes… say it with pizza! I'm not much of a fan of the commercial offers in stores for Valentine's day, but preparing some cheesy (ha! yes loads of cheese please!) treats for diner is totally OK. 


For around 10 mini pizzas you need:

dough
150g flour
a large pinch of sea salt
1 tsp good quality olive oil
100ml lukewarm water
2tbsp cold water
12g fresh yeast

***

topping
100g tomato sauce
a handful of cherry tomatoes
75g grated mozzarella
5 basil leaves
olive oil
100g spicy chorizo
120g black olives

All the ingredients for the recipe can be found on the Auchan Drive website.


Preheat the oven to 200°

Pour the lukewarm water into a small glass. Add the yeast and stir vigorously until you can no longer discern the yeast.

In the bowl of a stand mixer with the dough hook attached, mix the flour, salt, olive oil, yeast water as well as the two tbsp cold water on low. Turn the speed up to med-low and mix for about 5 minutes until the dough forms into a ball. Once done, knead the dough firmly with your hands for ten seconds, then wrap it into a damp towel and put it in a warm ware to let it double in size about one hour.

Unroll pizza dough and cut out heart shapes until the dough is used up. You can also use a heart-shaped pancake ring.  Then place the dough hearts on a baking sheet. Fill center with tomato sauce. Top with chorizo & chopped olives or halved cherry tomatoes and chopped basil. Finally add the grated mozzarella on all of the pizzas.

Bake for around 15 minutes until the crust gets golden brown.

Enjoy!!!

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