Welcome to the berry full Summer month of July

Welcome to July - the second Summer month

July is second month during the Summer season, where the daily speed is slowing down due to Summer vacation both at school as well as at work. The time it takes to drive to work in the morning is significant reduced, meaning I can sleep longer in the morning :-)

I have started to harvest potatoes and tomatoes from my little kitchen garden. I also have to water all my pots with flowers, potatoes and tomatoes every evening, as it is not raining a lot in my part of Denmark.

You can here in beginning of July still manage to find blooming elder flowers. Otherwise it is time to harvest raspberries, strawberries, red currant and black currant. I have raspberries in my own little garden, and here in the first week of July I am "renting" a strawberry bed from a rowing friend on vacation :-)

As inspiration I will share the following recipes with you.

Blackcurrant rum just after mixing the ingredients

Blackcurrant rum - Ribena saft (cordial) for grown ups !!!

Or you could start your very own rumtopf using fresh fruit as they get ready

Raspberry jam with rosemary

And of cause you should try to make your very own ultimate strawberry cake

Burger at Fur Strand Hotel

One the second evening of our stay at Fur we decided to eat again at Fur Strand Hotel, as the other alternatives on the small island of Fur did not more interesting. We had also spend 7-8 hours riding on bikes around on the island, so my good girl friend from Copenhagen and I need something easy.

This evening we went for the burger choice, which was a burger made of 180 g minced beef meat garnished with cheese, bacon, tomato, cucumber, salad leafs, red onions and ketchup served in a great tasting bun spread with some type of mayonnaise. As company to the burger was served small baked potatoes and spiced mayonnaise dressing.

It was a very tasty burger, where the beef was fried, so it was not to red on the inside without loosing it´s juiciness.

The burger costed 140 DKK, and I will give this burger meal four stars for it´s great taste.

We were eating this evening meal in a smaller living room of the inn, so next to the dining table was placed a sofa set, so afterwards we simply moved from the dining table to sofas, where we were coffee and tea. Here we went spend the rest of evening writing postcards and readings books. Excellent idea having such sofa groups located in the dining area.

Dinner at Fur Strand Hotel

Yesterday evening I returned from a lovely stay on the small island of Fur located in the middle of Limfjorden. Here I spend two days at Fur Strand Hotel, which had been purchased as a sweet deal  incl one 3-course dinner back in Autumn 2013 for an excellent price of 1300 DKK for two persons. However, both the booking calendar of the hotel and the calendars of two busy working women meant, that the stay first took place two working days last week.
This was actually a perfect timing for us, as we went where during Midsummer time just before Summer vacation hit Denmark !!!! The weather was excellent, sunshine from very early morning to very late evening, so perfect weather for riding bikes around the island of Fur as well dozing in a hammock or on a sandy beach while reading a good book.

As starter we good a small salad of salmon in a dressing with cream cheese and some green stuff of some kind and one big scrimp served together with some excellent bread and butter.

The main course was grilled pork chop

with potatoes, carrot puree and vegetable saute served with new potatoes. The pork meat was very tasteful and quiet good.

The dessert was a panna cotta served together with passion fruit sauce, freeze-dried raspberry and a fresh strawberry.

Normally I always have a caving for more panna cotta, when served as a much smaller portion else where. However, this time the amount was very much over the top. The portion had the size of 250 ml dairy whipping cream. And the combination of quiet acidic passion fruit sauce and sweet panna cotta was not the best combination.

The service was excellent. So all in all I will four stars for this dinner.

Cookies with rhubarb and white chocolate

Rhubarb and white chocolate in a match made in heaven :-)

However, I was not too happy about the dough consistency of these cookies with oat flakes, rhubarb and white chocolate, as I found the dough to be too moist/wet. Therefore I decided to use this recipe on liquorice cookies with cranberries, as it is more firm in consistency, making myself a new portion of cookies with rhubarb and white chocolate. Hopefully you will enjoy these cookies just as much !

Cookies with rhubarb and white chocolate:

• 250 g (cake) wheat flour
• ½ teaspoon baking powder
• 1/4 teaspoon salt
• 190 g cold butter - diced in small squares
• 250 g sugar
• 1 egg
• 100 g rhubarb - chopped in a length of 3-4 mm
• 100 g white chocolate - finely chopped

1. Sieve the wheat flour and baking powder in the mixing bowl. Add in the salt and butter squares.
2. Mix on KitchenAid using the K-spade on speed 3-4, until the butter has disappeared into the cookie dough.
3. Add in the sugar and egg. Mix until the cookie dough just gathers. Over mixing will give cookies with less crispness.
4. Add in the rhubarb and white chocolate pieces, mix until evenly distributed.
5. Divide the dough into 2 portions of 400 g each.
6. Roll the cookie dough into longer strings. Cover each cookie string in baking paper.
7. Place the cookies dough cold, either in the refrigerator or freezer.
8. Heat the (conventional) oven to 200'C
9. Cut the firm cookie dough into slices of 1 cm.
10. Place the cookies on a baking tray covered with baking paper.
11. Bake the cookies in the upper part of the oven at 200'C for 12-15 minutes.
12. Cool down the cookies, before storing them in airtight containers.

Cold potato salad with fresh herbs

For another monthly blogging challenge called "Cooking with herbs" hosted by Linzi Barrow from Lancashire Food and Linzi Karen has selected fresh herbs has been selected as theme for June 2014

For this challenge I have selected cold potato salad, where all the vegetable ingredients actually have been harvested in my very own little kitchen garden, which is living in various pots. The potatoes are growing in potato pots, the cherry tomatoes is growing in a big green ceramic pot, while parsley and chives are growing in some smaller green ceramic pots.

You can either boil the potatoes, which you need for this potato salad or you can use any left-over potatoes from your evening meal. While the potatoes are as fresh as they are now with a very tiny skin, I boil the potatoes with the skin after a good clean.

Cold potato salad with fresh herbs: - 1 serving

• 4-5 boiled potatoes - sliced
• 2-3 tablespoons of fresh cheese/fromage frais
• 1 teaspoon mustard
• 1 tablespoon fresh parsley - chopped
• 1 tablespoon fresh chives - chopped
• salt & pepper
• 2 cherry tomatoes - slided - optional

1. Mix the potato salad dressing together from fresh cheese, mustard, fresh parsley and fresh chives.
2. Season with salt and pepper.
3. Mix the potato slices into the dressing part.
4. Let the potato salad stand cold in the refrigerator for minimum ½ hour or night over.
5. Served cold together with some meatballs or sausages.

Cookies with oat flakes, rhubarb and white chocolate

My garden is full of rhubarb, so I have to come up with new ides, how use these rhubarb. I took the inspiration from this recipe on cookies with ginger and white chocolate, replacing the ginger with freshly picked rhubarb, while maintaining the white chocolate.

Rhubarb and white chocolate is a fantastic classic combination, where the fresh fruitiness goes hand in hand with the sweetness of white chocolate.

Consider to make an extra portion, which you can use a very personalised hostess gift, so a dear person of yours can bake their own home-made cookies. You can easily freeze down this cookie dough.

The only objection I have against this cookie recipe is, that the cookies very easy floates, so I planning to make a new version, where the cookie dough is less floating during baking. I will keep you posted on my progress.

Cookies with oat flakes, rhubarb and white chocolate:

• 125 g butter - soft
• 120 g sugar
• 1 egg
• 120 g (cake) flour
• 30 g oat flakes
• ½ teaspoon baking powder 
• 1/4 teaspoon salt
• ½ teaspoon vanilla sugar 
• 100 g white chocolate - roughly chopped
• 100 g rhubarb - cut into size of 1 cm

1. Whip the soft butter and sugar together for 2-3 minutes.
2. Add the egg into the butter-egg mass and whip again.
3. Add flour, oat flakes, baking powder, vanilla sugar and salt into the cookie dough.
4. Cut the white chocolate into smaller pieces and stir them and rhubarb into the cookie dough.
5. Roll the cookie dough to a height of 5 cm.
6. Wrap the cookie dough in cling film or baking paper.
7. Let the cookie dough rest in the refrigerator for minimum 1 hour or night over or place it in the freezer for ½ hour.
8. Heat the oven (conventional oven) to 200'C.
9. Cut the cookie roll into pieces of 1 cm and place those on a baking tray covered with baking paper.
10. Bake the cookies in the middle of the oven for approx 10-12 minutes at 200'C.
11. Cool down before storing the cookies in airtight containers 

Grain bread a la Lékué

I am getting more and more acquainted with my new Lékué bread form, which I got as one of the birthday gifts from my rowing friends, as I keep trying out the various recipes from the small recipe booklet, which came along with the bread form.

This time it is a grain bread recipe, which I tried in my new kitchen equipment.

It is possible to use the bowl shape of the Lékué bread from as a kneading form for hand kneading. However, ever since my trustworthy kitchen helper has moved in, I am using my KitchenAid for all my bread kneading.

Another time I will use all the amount of seeds for roasting, as they basic are falling off the bread, when you take it out the bread form. Less than half the seeds are needed.

Grain bread: - 1 bread

• 250 g wheat flour
• 165 g water
• 6 g salt
• 5 g yeast
• 10 g pumpkin seed
• 10 g linseed
• 10 g sunflower seed
• 6 g Nigella seed
• 6 g white poppy seed
• 6 g blue poppy seed

For the bread surface:

• 10 g pumpkin seed
• 10 g linseed
• 10 g sunflower seed
• 6 g Nigella seed
• 6 g white poppy seed
• 6 g blue poppy seed

1. Start by roasting the seeds for the surface in the oven for 180'C for 5 minutes.
2. Cool down the roasted seeds. 
3. Moisten the seeds with water and place them in the refrigerator, until they should be used on the surface of the bread.
4. Weigh all the ingredients into the mixing bowl. 
5. Knead everything together on the Kitchen Aid using speed 2 for 4-6 minutes.
6. Put the bread dough into the Lékué bread form for raising at room temperature for 2 hours. Cover the bread form with a tea towel.
7. Cover the surface of the bread with the roasted seeds.
8. Let the bread dough raise at room temperature for another 30 minutes in a closed bread form.
9. Place the bread dough in the closed Lékué bread form in a closed oven without heat over a bowl full of boiling water for another 30 minutes of raising.
10. Remove the dough from the oven. Heat up the (conventional) oven to 200'C.
11. Bake the dough in a closed Lékué bread form in the lower part of the oven for 30 minutes at 200'C.
12. Cool down the bread on a oven grid.