Ingredient: bread

No-Knead Bread

(faux-sourdough for dummies)

In 2006 Mark Bittman, food writer for the New York Times, revolutionized home-bread-baking by introducing No-Knead Bread. Actually he just shared the recipe invented by a New York baker, Jim Lahey. No-Knead bread was a fool-proof miraculous loaf that tasted and looked much better than any other home-baked bread, as well as many of the fancy stuff at your local bakery. Super easy to make, it needed no kneading and no attention whatsoever, only a few minutes of action plus some waiting.

One and a half years later, my favourite food blogger, Kenji Lopez-Alt of Serious Eats (at the time writer at Food Illustrated) perfected the recipe adding a faux-sourdough touch to it. He did it by substituting part of the water with some white vinegar and beer, you now, to give the bread that tang and complex yeasty flavour. Well it worked perfectly. I’ve done this recipe so many times, and it never fails. It is quite important to use a cast-iron pot (enameled or bare is the same) to achieve an optimal rise and a crunchy crust, but if you don’t have it, the bread will be still very good using the oven as usual.

Special Equipment

  • cast- iron pot
  • a flexible spatula
Created with Sketch. About 20 hours, 15 minutes active time Created with Sketch. One 500gr loaf

Ingredients

  • 430 grflour (both all- porpous or bread flour will work)
  • 1 grdry yeast (or 1/4 teaspoon)
  • 8 grsalt (or 1 full teaspoon)
  • for the regular version
  • 345 grwater
  • for the faux-sourdough
  • 85 grlager beer
  • 15 grwhite vinegar
  • 245 grwater

Directions

The process is quite long but easy: I usually mix the ingredients before I go to bed, and bake it the next day after work.  The dough is gonna be quite loose (85% hydration) and therefore a bit difficult to handle, but there’s not much handling involved really. Here we go:

  1. Mix flour (430 gr), yeast (1 gr) and salt (8gr) in a large bowl. Mix it well.
  2. Add the water (345 gr), or if you are doing the foux-sourdough: water (245gr.) + beer (85gr) + white vinegar (15 gr), and mix it with a spoon, just the time it takes for all the flour to be sucked in the liquids, about 20/25 seconds. Cover it tight with plastic foil and leave it to rest at room temperature for about 15/18 hours.
  3. After the time has passed (it’s probably gonna be the next day), the mix is going to be quite bubbly. With the help of a flexible spatula, pour it on a well floured working surface, sprinkle some extra flour on top, and possibly with the help of a scraper, fold the dough on itself a couple of times, 20 seconds in total. Put it back in a very well floured bowl, cover it again and let it rest for 2 more hours. We’re almost there.
  4. After one and a half hour set the oven to 230°, place the dutch-oven on the lower shelf of the oven, and let it heat up for 30 minutes: it needs to be HOT. If you don’t have a dutch-oven, jump to n. 7
  5. When the 2 hours have passed and the cast-iron is hot, take out the dutch-oven being very careful, place it on your stove-top, open it quickly, and with the help of the flexible spatula just pour the dough into the pot. You don’t have to worry about how it goes in, if it looks all smashed up or ugly: it’s gonna work! (Alternative, less messy method: place a sheet of baking-paper on the table, pour the dough onto said paper, and picking it by the four angles, gently lower it into the pot)
  6. 30 minutes at 230° with the dutch oven’s lid on. Another 15 minutes without the lid. Et voilà.
  7. For no dutch-oven baking: just heat up the oven tray on the lower rack instead of the cast-iron pot. When the 2 hours have passed, place a sheet of baking-paper on the table, pour the dough onto said paper, lift it by the four corners, and place it on the hot oven plate. Bake it for 45 minutes at 230°, covering the bread with some aluminum foil for the first 30 minutes to avoid to burn the top.

Black Bean and Portabello Burgers

(lean, mean, bean-machine)

These ones are real companions in our household. When I don’t quite know what to make, I often think: “Eeh, I’ll just do some black bean burgers”. They’re good with oven baked potatoes and bearnaise sauce. They’re great with mashed potatoes and roasted garlic and mushroom sauce (as in the pictures). They’re really good as just… hamburger burgers as well actually.

The black beans, combined with the umami heavy confit onion and portobello mushrooms, give them a really rich and deep taste. Using bread is really good for consistency and the cheese is… well cheese is pretty great.

I like using soy as it together with the rest gives some meaty tones, but I get that that might not be for everyone (to make it more like meat I mean). But from this base-recipe you can basically do whatever. Fresh herbs, chili, spices, you go wild!

Created with Sketch. 1.5 hours Created with Sketch. 6

Ingredients

  • 760 gof black beans (boiled and in liquid, weight including the liquid)
  • 2 (or 3) portabello mushrooms
  • 4 eggs (a bit depending on the size)
  • 100 gcheese (e.g. Gouda cheese)
  • 2 small carrots (80 g)
  • 1.5 yellow onions
  • 3 slices of bread
  • Some tomato puré, mustard, soy sauce, salt and pepper
  • 75 gbutter
  • 3 dloil (rapeseed)

Directions

  1. Start by making the confit onion (which is onion boiled for a long time in oil). Chop the onion (1 yellow onion) into sizes of about 1/4 onion rings. Heat up oil enough to cover the onions (3 dl) to low/medium temperature and let the onion simmer in the oil for about 30 minutes.
  2. While the onion is cooking, chop the portobello mushrooms and put them in a pan with a generous amount of butter (50g), on medium heat. After ca 5 minutes, take the heat down to low, add salt, pepper and the tomato puré (1 tablespoon) and mustard (1 tablespoon). Stir and leave on low heat for 20-30 minutes (turn the mushrooms over now and again).
  3. Tear the bread into small pieces (3 slices in pieces about 1 cm x 1 cm), crack the eggs (4) and stir the eggs and the torn bread together.
  4. Sift away the fluid from the beans and put them in a bowl. Finely chop 1/2 yellow onion, finely grate a carrot (and squeeze out some of the the juice) and mix both in with the beans. Mix together with whatever but not with an immersion blender or mixer. Take a fork or something and stir until some beans have become squished but some are still whole-ish.
  5. Grate the cheese (100 g) and put it in to the mix. Sift away the oil from the confit onion and add the onion and the fried mushrooms.
  6. Now, the trick is to get the texture just right, by adding bread crumbs and/or flour/ potato flour. You should be able to form semi-firm, semi-sticky balls from the mix, but if there’s too much flour/bread/bread crumbs, the burgers get too dry when cooked. Personally, I more often make the mistake of making the mix to firm so try to err on the side of a looser, stickier mixture. More breadcrumbs can always be added in later. When I did these ones I didn’t use any breadcrumbs (or flour) other than the coating (see list item 9).
  7. Use salt, pepper and soy until the mix is to your taste. I usually put a bit of vinegar in the mix, but then again: I fucking love vinegar.
  8. So now the base mixture is done. If you have the time, let it set in the fridge for an hour or so.
  9. Make balls from the mixture and cover them in bread crumbs. Heat up the remaining butter (25 g) and some rapeseed oil to medium-high heat in a pan. Put the balls in the pan and gently push down on them with a spatula. If the consistency is right they should flatten easily (they should flatten slightly but not all the way under their own weight). Fry for about 5 minutes on each side. And you’re done!


These are best about five minutes off the stove, when they’ve settled a bit (become a bit firmer) but are still warm. Fry them the last thing you do before serving up the food.

Chanterelle toast

(second breakfast?)

Sometimes, things are just too easy. It’s fall, it’s mushroom season and the goodiest most wonderful mushroom toast is so simple to make, it’s… well it’s ridiculous.

Cream, mushrooms, some soy and a nice piece of bread.

We’ve always picked a lot of mushroom in my family. Chanterelles of different kinds, Porcini, maybe even the odd Russula? Through the years I’ve had different favorites for this recipe. The Yellowfoot is spicier and a bit more intense. Porcini is softer and more “forrest-y”. I really like Black chanterelle which also look incredibly cool. The one I make most often though, is the one with Yellow or Golden chanterelle, but you can’t really go wrong with any of them (pictures below sometimes show Yellowfoot and sometimes Yellow chanterelle).

Created with Sketch. 15-20 min Created with Sketch. Enough for 5-6 toasts

Ingredients

  • 5 slicesof bread
  • 150 gmushroom
  • 200 gcream (2 dl)
  • 25 gbutter
  • 8 gChinese soy (use 5-10 ml depending on taste)
  • 0.5 cloveof garlic
  • A squeeze of lemon
  • Some salt and pepper
  • Some cheese for garnish

Directions

This is the best part because there’s really nothing to this recipe at all. It’s so so simple.

Firstly let me just note that it’s a bit difficult to give a good weight estimate for chanterelles. Depending on the water content 150 g can be almost nothing (a couple of big mushrooms) or quite a lot. Look at the pictures below to get a gauge of what I used.

  1. Clean the mushroom. If they’re not very dirty, just brush them off. Otherwise rinse them with water. Some people say this is bad, I have no idea why. Maybe they confuse it with shrimp? Mushroom is a liiiiittle bit like the shellfish of the forrest?
  2. Chop the mushroom and fry them in butter on medium/high heat. Fry them until they sizzle, then we’ve gotten rid of all the excess water.
  3. Add finely chopped garlic and fry for another minute or two. Use as much as you want but I’d recommend about 1/3 of a clove. This is not supposed to be real garlic-y but rather just give some depth.
  4. Pour over the cream and add the soy. Again, add soy to your preference. I’d say 5 g (1 teaspoon/ 5 ml) is on the low end and 15 g (1 tablespoon/ 15 ml) is on the high end for me, meaning 15 g will give you quite a sharp taste of soy. I prefer to be at 5-10 g.
  5. When the consistency is a bit more sauce-y then you want it, take the pan of the heat, add a squeeze of lemon, some pepper and salt (if you think it needs the salt). Then let it rest off the heat for 5 minutes.
  6. Toast the slices of bread in a toaster or in the oven.
  7. Put the mushroom “stew” on the toasted bread slices, garnish with cheese and you’re done! Maybe give them 5 minutes in the oven on grill, but this is very optional.

For me, this is one of these dishes that are just the tastiest ever. There’s a bit of childhood nostalgia in that for sure. As I said, we really are a mushroom picking family and chanterelle toast was always the go-to thing after a walk in the forrest.

However, that’s not all. The combination of chanterelle, cream, soy and a hint of garlic and lemon is really something. And as a bonus it’s really nice to go mushroom picking.

Enjoy!

Swedish Meatballs

(originally from Turkey or something of course)

We’re not getting around the most Swedish of the Swedish foods right? Nope. As a Swede I don’t have that strong of a bond to meatballs. I mean, they’re pretty great and all but I eat them on holidays like Christmas and sometimes I make’em at home (but really, it’s quite rare). I think my most common interaction with the little suckers is when I spend time with my girlfriend’s nephews because listen: “Mamma Scans köttbullar” is the bleeding bedrock of any household that includes kids. Back in the day I ate those type of meatballs as well (not that much though). They weren’t that great really. Lately though, I personally think they (“Mamma Scans”) have improved somewhat. But whatever, let’s get on with it.

In my opinion, Swedish meatballs should be made with quite a lot of onion, some sweetness and above all have a really smooth taste. The smoothness comes from a mix of cream/milk, egg and bread of different types. Some recipes use potato (grated, either boiled or raw) which plays a similar role. A friend told me that his grandpa, who in his family is the often challenged but ever undisputed champion of meatballing, put potato purée in his. Not mashed potato, potato purée, the finished product. Top marks for ambition and originality (btw: I imagine that’s a pretty good idea actually).

Anyway, here’s how I make mine.

Ingredients

  • 500 gof minced meat. Use a mix of pork and beef. 70/30 or 60/40 beef/pork is good.
  • 1.5 yellow onions
  • 1 egg
  • 50 gmilk
  • 50 gcream
  • 1 sliceof white bread
  • 15 gbreadcrumbs (preferably the Asian variety "Panko")
  • 50 gbutter
  • 7 gof vinegar
  • 7 gof sweet mustard (can be substituted for the Swedish speciality "pickled sprats", most famously used in the holiday dish "Jansons Frestelse")
  • Some salt, white pepper and sugar (just a sprinkle of sugar)
  • Some allspice (if you like that sorta thing)

Directions

  1. Chop one onion roughly and fry them on medium to low heat in a pan with half the butter until golden.
  2. While the onion in the pan is frying, grate or finely chop the remaining half onion.
  3. Tear the bread into small pieces.
  4. Put everything in a bowl, including the fried onion with the residual butter from the pan. Mix with your hands or with a fork.
  5. If the mixture seems too loose/wet you can add some more bread crumbs but be careful to not make the mixture too firm.
  6. Taste and adjust with salt/pepper/sugar/vinegar.
  7. Roll the mixture into balls with a diameter of about 3 cm.
  8. Fry ’em on medium heat in a healthy amount of butter (the other half of the 50 grams) and some oil.

 

It’s all a bit confusing as a Swede – the talk about Swedish meatballs. But, it’s really good, especially with some killer mashed potatoes, chanterelle sauce and lingonberries or maybe pickled cucumbers. Mmmmm. So make ’em for gods sake. What could go wrong?