food

For weeks, K. has been asking me to check if they already sell Emma Leppermann plums at the market. These are his favourites, and also some of the best-loved plums in Estonia - juicy, flavoursome, sweet & tangy, large and pretty, round and yellow-pink (see picture here ). (The cultivar was developed by a German gardener W. Leppermann back in 1897, and he named the tree after his wife; if you read Danish, then you can read more here and here :) Last Saturday morning we headed to the market again to stock up on various fruit and vegetables. We were due to visit my parents afterwards, and knowing that their garden has a lot to offer - my mum's got a really green thumb - I asked my mum what any good daughter would: ' Mom, we're coming over for a cup of coffee later. Have you got anything in the garden for us? ' She said she's got some plums and two 'zucchinis'. I made a mental note of that (some plums, two supersized marrows ), and headed to the market, wh...

Me, my cool apron and my buggert recipe notes. My adventures as a Daring Baker continue. So far I've made Jewish Purist's Bagels , and a fancy Strawberry Mirror Cake . This month another multi-layered challenge was chosen by the hosts Veronica and Patricia - Eric Kayser 's Milk Chocolate and Caramel Tart . Chocolate and caramel go really well together, as far as I'm concerned, so I was pleased with the choice. I enjoyed making this cake. The chocolate hazelnut shortbread pastry worked like a dream, and tasted heavenly. The caramel (I used the 'dry method') was easy to make, and set nicely during baking (I cooked it for 25 minutes instead of recommended 15, following advice from fellow bakers). My troubles only started when making the milk chocolate mousse . I managed to churn the first batch of whipping cream into butter (well, it was another hot summer day, so I wasn't really surprised). K. kindly - and very quickly - brought another packet of cream f...

Indeed. Who would have thought that the Reigning Queen of Braai , Jeanne of Cook Sister , would choose a meatless barbecue for the 8th round of Waiter, there is something in my ... foodblogging event? But meatless she chose, and I'm happy to oblige. Although we're by no means vegetarian, we don't eat much meat in our house. If faced with a rich meaty stew and a slightly lighter vegetable stew, we'd most likely opt for the later.. I decided to roast some onions. My logic was following: if my vegetable dish was to have any chances against all the roasted, grilled and barbecued meat at the braai or grilliõhtu , then it needed to be strong and bold and flavoursome. A combination of roasted onions and my current favourite blue cheese (yes, I am still raving about the Finnish Valio Aura blue cheese ), and some potent herbs - thyme and savoury - would be surely shining. The onions ( the white ones are famous local Peipsi sibulad or from the traditional onion-growing areas...

There are a couple of grocery staples that we as 'average' Estonians would most certainly pick up on our typical supermarket trip. Some rye bread (unless I'm baking my own), a carton of milk, some yogurt for breakfast and curd cheese for baking, a bag or two of sour cream. And a bunch of bananas. Yep. More often than not, K. and I throw a bunch of bananas into our shopping basket, as they're a useful standby if hunger pangs hit. Of course, now being late summer, we've got the first of local summer apples - Suislepp , Valge Klaar, Sõstraroosa - that are much better for that purpose. But I guess we're creatures of habit, so occasionally - and absent-mindedly - bananas still appear in our shopping basket and on our countertop, only to wilt there slowly while we're eating apples and plums that are in season just now.. That's exactly what happened last week, and that's why I was baking a banana bread in the heat of the summer. The recipe is from my favou...

Cubed and seasoned squash/marrow, ready for roasting. My mum doesn't get the concept of zucchini/courgettes. She's convinced that bigger is better, so while I was happily harvesting beautiful slim zucchini from my container garden, she was waiting until her zucchini were 'the right size'. 'Right size' in this case means totally overgrown, about 1,5-2 kilograms a piece. No amount of explanation and talking ( Mom, these are supposed to be eaten when they're still young and tender, they're not your usual pumpkin/squash!!! ) seems to help. When my dad popped by last weekend to bring us a large bag of my favourite summer apples - Valge Klaar and Suislepp , and some beautiful yellow flowers (all from my mum's garden), he also brought us a huge and overgrown squash/marrow. Way too large for something as delicate as zucchini carpaccio , so I had to come up with something else. Luckily I bumped into this recipe over at the fun The Great Big Vegetable Chall...

I need to thank one lovely foodblogger for inadvertedly introducing me to Höganäs Keramik last November in Denmark, and another dear foodblogger for buying it for me in Sweden, taking it to Finland and shipping it to me in Estonia (what a pan-Nordic affair!!), where I finally got hold of it today. Waiting 9 months for it was definitely worth it..

UPDATE 1.9.2007 : You can read Johanna's round-up here ! My dear blog friend Johanna is hosting the latest round of Sugar High Friday, and the theme is local specialities . There are plenty of typical Estonian cakes and desserts I could write about, but considering that I have recently posted kama promotion packs* to some lovely bloggers across the world, I thought it would be appropriate to give the recipients some tips for using that funny Estonian roasted meal mixture consisting of boiled, roasted and ground peas, rye, barley and wheat . I've written thoroughly about kama here , and shared recipes for kama mousse with season's berries , and boozy kama & mascarpone truffles before. I think it's time to move on and give you the recipe for the authentic way of eating kama. Well, semi-authentic. Adding sugar to kama is a 20th century thing. The really 'authentic' way of eating kama would be without sugar and accompanied with bread and salted sprats, or...

I've always had a soft spot for Sag Aloo , the Indian spinach & potato dish. I'm not even sure if it's a proper Indian dish, as I haven't found it in any Indian cookbooks I've looked at, but it is served in most Indian restaurants in Scotland and I always ordered it. Few months ago my friend Nenya brought me a cookbook as a present, because it had a recipe for sag aloo inside, and I was happy. Then there was a recipe here and here . I was even happier. But when I finally felt the time was right for making my first sag aloo, there was no spinach in the house. I did have a large bunch of beet greens, however, leftovers from making the Potato & Beetroot Pie . And thus a new dish was born :) Potatoes & Beetroot Greens with Indian Spices Serves 2 as a main dish 2 Tbsp oil 1 tsp mustard seeds 1 tsp coriander seeds, slightly crushed 1 tsp cumin seeds, slightly crushed 2 onions, chopped 1 garlic clove, chopped 1 tsp finely chopped ginger 0.5-1 tsp chilli flakes...

A fortnight ago, Ximena and I and our respective partners J. and K., went to a bog where we picked various forest berries , including lots of lingonberries. The Latin name of lingonberries is Vaccinium viris-idaea, thus belonging to the same family with blueberries ( Vaccinium Cyanococcus ), bilberries ( Vaccinium myrtillus ) and bog bilberries ( Vaccinium uliginosum ). They're a great source of vitamin C, and have been appreciated by Northeners for that reason for a long time. Lingonberries can be used to make apple pies and cheesecakes , rye bread and cream pudding , and a number of other desserts. Lingonberries are also great for making jam. Lingonberry jam - at least the version here - has many uses. It can be used as a typical jam on pancakes, toast, breakfast porridge. But it's not overly sweet, and lingonberries yield this am a rather tart quality. Therefore it can be also used as a chutney to accompany grilled sausages or black pudding during Christmas. Apple and lin...

When you move to a new country and learn a new language, the locals inevitably present you with various tongue-twisters. Something difficult and tricky, so they could have a laugh when you say that. In Estonia, foreigners are often asked to say ' Jüriöö ülestõus' - scarily confusing when you look at the words ( what's with all those dots and tildes and long vowels and diphthongs? ), but not so difficult to pronounce, actually, as long as you know how each of the letters is to sound. Jüriöö ülestõus, by the way, means St George's night uprising - something that happened way back in 1343 here in Estonia. In Denmark, they've got a much trickier tongue twister: rødgrød med fløde - a name of a lovely Danish red berry pudding with cream. That, let me tell you, is much more difficult to pronounce than 'Jüriöö ülestõus'. I know, as I spent a year in Denmark as an exchange student in 1992-1993 and was asked to say those three words more than once. And the term is no...

Click on the photo to enlarge! Here's a picture of some forest berries in their natural habitat. Starting from the top left corner: blue 'dusty' berries are bog bilberries ( Vaccinium uliginosum ). The blue shiny - and shy (see how it's hiding behind the green leaves?) - berry on the top right is a bilberry ( Vaccinium myrtillus ). The red berries are lingonberries ( Vaccinium vitis-idaea ) , and the bright yellow one is a cloudberry ( Rubus chamaemorus ), of course. I'm sorry to report that wild strawberries ( Fragaria vesca L ) had already left the stage by the time we took the picture, and that cranberries ( Vaccinium Oxycoccus ) were yet to turn red, and in any case stubbornly grew few meters from the above spot, so they didn't fit into the picture.. * Before Ximena came to Estonia , I promised to take her to pick wild mushrooms and forest berries. The above photo is taken about 10 days ago on our joint forageing trip. I think she - and her hubby J. -...

Pancakes by K, bilberry syrup by Pille We eat lots of pancakes in our house , and we eat them regularly. Every Sunday morning*, K. wakes up before I do, goes to the kitchen and makes us some pancakes. Sometimes he makes thin, crepe-like pancakes, sometimes thick, smaller drop-cakes. They're all wonderful, and I feel very spoilt during those leisurely weekend breakfasts ;) Pancakes, of course, need a little something to accompany them. Maybe a spoonful of summery wild strawberry jam , or much more 'adult' rhubarb jam with ginger . Perhaps some honey-coloured cloudberry jam , plum & vanilla jam or blueberry/bilberry jam ? There are other, non-jammy, options - a scoop of ever-so-slightly-melted vanilla ice cream comes to mind. Or a zigzag of chocolate sauce . Or a generous drizzle of this bilberry syrup that I found on this Finnish recipe site . The choice is all yours.. Blueberry/bilberry syrup ( Mustikasiirup ) Makes about 1 litres 1 litre blueberries/bilberries 700 m...

Those of you who read Ximena 's blog, Lobstersquad (and you all should, because it's brilliant!), already know that 1) she's the talented illustrator behind my new banner , 2) she has some great tips for cooking sausages , 3) she's holidaying in Estonia at the moment , and 4) she knows her gazpacho . So much so that earlier this summer she gave her dear readers an all-encompassing in-depth virtual flash-course in gazpacho-making, introducing us to the do's and dont's ( Gazpacho 101 ), the basic recipe ( Gazpacho 101.2 ), variations on the latter and allowed garnishes ( Gazpacho 101.3 ), and last, but not least, a recipe for El gazpacho de Escolástica , or the best gazpacho in the world ( Gazpacho 101.4 ). Last weekend, after a day of forageing the forest for wild mushrooms and forest berries , we stocked up on tomatoes in one of the local supermarkets. I'm extremely relieved to note that Ximena totally approved of the tomatoes available, as I was a b...

Bog bilberry ( Vaccinium uliginosum , sinikas or 'blue' berry in Estonian) is a close relative of bilberry ( Vaccinium myrtillus L. , mustikas or 'black' berry in Estonian) and high-bush blueberry ( Vaccinium Cyanococcus or V. corymbosum , kännasmustikas e. kultuurmustikas in Estonian). The first two can be distinguished by looking at their stems (brown for bog bilberries and green for bilberries) or leaves (blue-green for bog bilberries, green for bilberries) and by biting into the fruit (bog bilberries have a pinkish flesh, bilberries are blackish-purple throughout, blueberries are whitish-green inside). Also, the bog bilberry fruit is slightly oblong in shape, whereas bilberries are round, and blueberries round, but much larger than the first two. Just so you'd know.. I made bog bilberry muffins, and took them along to my sister's and my two nephews' joint birthday party last Sunday. You cannot really see that from the picture, but I baked the muf...

It's hot here in Estonia. I'm sure Estonia feels still cool enough for Ximena & J. who last weekend arrived here up in the North hoping to escape the Spanish summer heat (they're currently holidaying on Saaremaa, a beautiful island off the west coast). But I'm having real difficulties with the temperatures around +30 Celsius and constant sunshine. So much so that I've opted to stay and work from home for a few days. You see, the beach is just 5 minutes away, so I can always hop on my bike, cycle to the beach and dip into the waves to cool the body and clear the mind. Alternatively, I can have yet another scoop of ice cream. I made a second batch of David Lebovitz's wonderfully tasting and amazingly simple Vietnamese coffee ice cream this afternoon - if you haven't tried that one (and like your coffee with milk & sugar), then I strongly suggest you pick up a can of sweetened condensed milk next time you're at the supermarket! But here's a ...

UPDATE 18.8.2007 This post was mentioned on the Swedish-language site Matfeber , together with my photo! In my previous beetroot post one of the readers, Lydia, enquired about the use of raw beetroot. All my beetroot recipes so far on this blog have been using either boiled or roasted beetroot (the two are interchangeable in most recipes). Lydia's comment, however, reminded me of a Nigella Lawson recipe I had tried - and enjoyed - few years ago, so I looked it up again. The recipe is from her book Forever Summer , and makes a delightful summery salad. Feel free to use more mustard seeds and a lot more fresh herbs, as these only enhance the flavour of the salad. The salad was still very enjoyable - and thank you, Lydia, for making be look up this recipe again!! Raw Beetroot Salad with Dill and Mustardseeds ( Peedisalat sinepiseemnete ja tilliga ) Source: Forever Summer by Nigella Lawson 500 grams raw beetroot 1 lemon 2 Tbsp extra virgin olive oil 6 Tbsp fresh dill, chopped 2 Tbsp m...

There is obviously a good reason for stepping up as a first guest blogger: current recipe is inspired of In Search of Perfection by Heston Blumenthal, a challenging macho cookbook waiting for the boys’ egos to be satisfied. Browsing through the 20-plus step recipes Pille decided that it is not her style. Therefore it takes a guest blogger for Blumenthal to be featured here on Nami-Nami. I noticed Jersey milk ice cream recipe in the book right away as it included dry ice as a freezing component (see here ; note step 2 of the recipe: 'Put on safety gloves and protective goggles and open the packet of dry ice':). Carbon dioxide ice at -78.5 C is a familiar substance to me from constructing a cloud chamber for tracking cosmic particles, a well-known experiment in particle physics. Dry ice is mainly of industrial use and it can be bought only during working hours and from the industrial gas company situated far outside the city. While I was waiting for a moment to go and fetch it,...

Up here in Estonia, I'm busy preparing for the long, dark and cold Nordic winter by trying to preserve some of this gorgeous, light & sunny summer. I've made a litre of wild strawberry fridge jam (and a small jar of wild raspberry jam ), three different types of cherry preserves , and K has made some apricot jam . Oh, and I made this gorgeously red redcurrant jelly . We did make few jars of ginger & rhubarb jam , using Moominmamma's recipe , but we have already eaten those. Here's what we stored away about a fortnight ago: Cloudberry Jam ( Murakamoos ) A honey-coloured cloudberry jam. This is not actually made by me, but sent us by K's mum, who is busy in Lalli picking those golden berries these days. And we're helping her to eat them :) Anyway, here's a recipe for preserving all those cloudberries you've been picking this summer: 1 kg cloudberries 400-500 grams sugar Clean the cloudberries (i.e. remove any loose leaves), then layer in a saucep...