FoodBlogSwap: American Pancakes

The FoodBlogSwap is a swap between bloggers from the Netherlands. This month I had to pick something from the blog Mammatje van Alles, which is a blog about mommyhood. The blog of course also has a lot of recipes. I had 3 recipes in my pre selection, but I decided to go back to basics and choose for American Pancakes. I have a lot of pancake and fritter recipes on the blog, but I seem to skip the basic recipes. The original recipe had blueberries in them but Nick doesn't like them, so we went all natural. Sadly the pancakes that we made aren't as thick as the original either. That is just our skill I guess. We need more practice. The taste was delicious though and that is all that matters in the end.

American Pancakes:

- 250 gr wheat flour
- 250 gr wheat meal
- 700 ml milk
- 6 eggs
- 1 tsp salt

Separate the eggs. Clean a bowl with a paper towel and some lemon juice. Beat the egg whites stiff until they have peaks. In another bowl mix the flour, meal and salt. Add the egg yolk and milk. Stir through. Lastly add the egg whites carefully in 4 parts. Heat some oil in a frying pan. Bake small pancakes golden brown on both sides. 

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Bento for week 12 and Japanese Sweet Potato Muffins

Soooo yeah... remember last week's bento post where I said I was ill but would try to post...? Well... I have been ill most of the week, still went to school... you get my point. So today I will share a recipe with the bento post that I wanted to share last week, but couldn't. I will try to post something Easter related tomorrow. No promises though ;) But I did a;ready write and schedule the Food Blog Swap for March, so there is something to look forward too. The recipe for the sweet potato muffins comes from Mama Loli.

I will only post one bento this week. This is the one I took to school with me. Nick's were the same for two days and the last day he just took muffins and bread with him. In the bento there are some leftover beans in tomato sauce, Greek style, that we had for dinner. Some Kisir, Japanese Sweet Potato Muffins, cheese cubes and hot chocolate Pocky sticks.

Japanese Sweet Potato Muffins: (makes about 12-16)
- 200 gr sweet potato (about 1 medium)
- 115 gr unsalted butter
- 135 gr sugar
- 2 large eggs
- 250 gr cake flour
- 0.25 cup milk
- 2 tsp honey
- 1 tsp baking powder

Pre heat the oven to 180 degrees. Grease your muffin tin, but I use silicone ones so it isn't needed. Peel and cube the sweet potatoes (they should be sugar cube size) and boil them for about 5 minutes. Mix butter and sugar in a large bowl. Add the eggs one by one in the mixture. Do not add more egg until the previous egg is mixed in the batter. Stir in the honey.
Mix the flour with the baking powder. Add half of the flour mixture and half of the milk with the rest of the batter. Mix well. Then add the rest of the flour and milk. Mix once more.
Scoop the batter into the muffin tin and top each muffins with sweet potato cubes.
Bake for 25-30 minutes. The muffins are done when a toothpick comes out clean.

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Comfort Food: Pesto Ricotta Risotto

Last weekend I wanted to make risotto again. It was too long ago since we ate it, so I went through my risotto map on Pinterest to see if there was a new recipe that I wanted to try. I found this pesto Ricotta Risotto on Lekker en Simpel. It is by no means healthy because it hardly contains veggies, but it was so good! And sometimes you just have to treat yourself to something comforting. The recipe was for 2, so we doubled it to eat for two days. This risotto holds up really well the next day and isn't dry at all.

Pesto Ricotta Risotto: (serves 4)
- 300 gr risotto rice
- 2 litre vegetable broth
- 1 small onion, minced
- 25 gr butter
- about 5-6 tbsp green pesto (but adjust to your own taste)
- 4 tbsp ricotta
- 2 cloves of garlic, minced
- 2 hands Parmesan cheese

First make your vegetable broth. I just put on the water in a water boiler and stir in the broth cubes.
Let the butter melt in a large pan. Bake the onion and garlic for about 3 minutes. Then add the rice. Make sure you stir well so the rice is coated with a layer of butter all over. Bake for 1-2 minutes until the rice becomes translucent. Then add about 2-3 large spoons of broth so the rice is under water. Keep the heat on medium-low and stir until the rice has absorbed all the broth. Repeat until the rice is soft. This will be around 20-25 minutes. Stir regularly and never leave your risotto alone. Remove the pan from the heat and stir in pesto and ricotta. Make sure you taste. You don't want the pesto to taste too strong. Lastly stir in the Parmesan cheese.

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Typical Dutch: Mashpot Blote Billen in het Gras

This is a recipe that I loved to eat as a child and still have on the menu now. It is a mashpot with white beans and green beans. In the Netherlands we call this naked bums in the grass mashpot. I am sure you can understand why ;) Mostly when we make mashpot we use milk and butter, but in this mashpot I always use some creme fraiche. Because it just gives it a little extra flavour. The recipe is really easy and because you don't have to cook any fresh veggies, it is a quick mashpot too.

Mashpot Blote Billen in het Gras: (serves 2-3)
- 500 gr potatoes
- 1 jar (680 gr) white beans and cut green beans combination or about 350 gr of each
- 125 ml creme fraiche
- pinch of salt and pepper

Peel, cut and boil the potatoes. Rinse the beans in a colander. Then put them in a bowl and warm them in the microwave just before the potatoes are done. Drain them in the collander onces more, or else you will get too much fluids in your mashpot. Drain the potatoes and make a mash of them with the creme fraiche. Stir the beans through the mash and season with some salt and pepper.
We served them with some cheese sticks. But you can serve them with vegetarian sausages too.

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Baking Love: Apple Speculaas Cake

Spring is supposed to start, but it still feels very wintery over here. So that is why I decided to share some wintery recipes with you this week for those last cold days. First there is a Dutch twist on an apple cake with speculaas. A spice mixture that we mostly use in winter time. If you can't find that, you can use a gingerbread mixture instead. We made this cake last week and it was a great success. The recipe for this easy and tasty cake come from Laura's Bakery.

Apple Speculaas Cake:
- 200 gr butter
- 200 gr sugar
- 8 gr vanilla sugar
- 4 eggs
- 200 gr self rising flour
- pinch of salt
- 2 large apples
- 4 tsp speculaas spices

Pre heat the oven to 175 degrees. Beat the butter, together with both sugars until they are creamy. Add the eggs 1 by 1 and beat until they are incorporated in the batter. Sift the flour, salt and speculaas spices into the bowl with the wet ingredients and mix until you have an airy batter. Peel and cube the apples, coat them with a bit of flour and scoop them into the batter. Stir well. Line a cake tin with baking paper. Pour the batter into the cake tin. Bake in the oven for about 1 hour. The cake is done when a toothpick comes out clean.

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Bento for week 9

This was a bit of a weird week. While we had it all planned bento wise, I got sick on Wednesday night and therefore Nick and I both slept badly. So in the morning he forget to make his soup bento. The thing with a thermos bento is, that you have to make it in the morning, but Nick totally forgot and ended up at work with no lunch at all, but with a cake that he baked that night before ;)
Tuesday's and Wednesday's bento were the same, so only one bento this week. But I will share a recipe to go with it.

Sorry for the bad quality picture. I wasn't able to make one and Nick's camera isn't so good as you can see. Anyway: In the bento are some leftover noodles from dinner. Cucumber and tomato fritters, which I will share below. In the lid there are 2 small Milka candy bars.

Tomato Fritters: (makes 8 fritters)
- 2 eggs
- 3 - 4 tomatoes (about 1.5 cup chopped)
- 1 tbsp tomato paste
- 0.25 cup feta, crumbled
- 4.5 tbsp flour
- dash of salt and pepper
- some other herbs that taste good with tomatoes, like basil or oregano
- olive oil

Whisk the eggs. Remove the seeds from the tomatoes and squeeze out the extra juices. Otherwise the batter will become too fluid. Chop them and add them to the eggs together with the tomato paste. Stir. Add the feta and stir again. Then add the flour and stir once more. You may need a bit more flour depending on how fluid your batter is at this point. It should be a little bit thicker than a cake batter. Lastly add in salt, pepper and herbs. Stir once more.

Heat some olive oil in a pan. Drop the batter with a spoon in the pan and fry until lightly golden brown (about 30-60 seconds), then flip and bake the other side. Let them cool a bit on paper towels to get rid of the extra oil. They taste great warm and cold.

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On a Budget: Greek Tomato Rice

This rice dish is so tasty that I am craving it while typing this post. We made it twice, once for dinner and last week for the bento. This is a dish that tastes good, warm or on room temperature. While for lunch this is for sure more expensive than just making a sandwich, it is a good budget option for your evening meal. The recipe I got from Flair at Home, but I adapted it to vegetarian.

Greek Tomato Rice: (serves 2, or 4 for lunch)

- 150 gr rice
- half a leek, in small pieces
- 330 ml tomato frito
- 250 ml vegetable broth
- 1 spring onion, in rings
- 2 bell peppers, in cubes
- feta
- 1 tsp paprika
- 1 tsp parsley
- pinch of pepper
- pinch of garlic powder

Heat some olive oil in a pan and bake the leek, spring onion and bell pepper for 3-4 minutes. Add rice, broth and frito, mix well. Let this simmer for about 20 minutes until the moist is vaporized. Stir occasionally. Add the spices about half way. Crumble some feta and stir through the dish before serving. 

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FoodBlogSwap: Turkish Spinach Cake

It is almost the end of the month and that means it is time for another FoodBlogSwap! This time I got to cook from Gewoon Lekker Koken. Or cook, I should say bake. Because Nick and I choose to make the Turkish Spinach cake. We love the Turkish kitchen and this is something that we never made before. It seemed interesting too. I figured it would be something like carrot cake. By that I mean that the carrots are in there but you can't taste them. It turned out I was right. Nick did most of the work on this cake. We changed it around a bit too, because Nick doesn't like the cherry pie topping, we left that out and we also put some cream cheese in the topping. I like that with carrot cake too and it seemed like a good idea. The cake did turn out great, so please don't be afraid to try it. Our cake looks a bit messy because we used the left over crumbles from cutting the cake on top and we always use parchment paper in our cake tin. It doesn't look that great, but it is very easy. You just lift the cake up with the paper and your cake tin stays clean.

Turkish Spinach Cake:
- 250 gr frozen spinach, defrosted
- 250 gr flour
- 200 gr sugar
- 150 gr sunflower oil
- 3 eggs
- 1 sachet (16 gr) baking powder
- 1 sachet (8 gr) vanilla sugar
- 1 tbsp lemon  juice
- pinch of salt

- 200 ml whipped cream
- about 50 gr cream cheese
- 1 sachet (8 gr) vanilla sugar
- 1 sachet (12 gr) klop-fix (makes your whipped cream more firm)

Pre heat the oven to 180 degrees. Line a sheet of parchment paper in a cake tin. Pout the oil with the spinach and puree this with a handheld blender. Mix eggs with both the sugars in a bowl until airy and creamy, about 10 minutes. Add the spinach with the lemon juice and mix through. Lastly sift the flour, baking powder and salt. Mix until the dry ingredients are incorporated. Bake in the oven for about 45 minutes. The cake is done when a toothpick comes out clean. Let the cake cool down.

For the filling we mix the whipped cream with vanilla sugar and the klop-fix. When the whipped cream is stiff, add the cream cheese and stir through. With a bread knife cut the top of the cake so it gets nice and even. Crumble those pieces and safe for later. Then cut the cake in half lengthwise. Spread the cake open and smear a layer of whipped cream on the cake with a big knife. Lay the top half back on the bottom half and spread the rest of the cream on top. Crumble the rest of the cake over it. Place the cake in the fridge to cool for at least 2 hours.

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Typical Dutch: Carrot Cake with Speculaas Spices

I made this bundt cake a few weeks ago because we had some carrots leftover. And what better to do than make carrot cake? This cake has a Dutch twist because there are speculaas spices in there which give this cake a wintery warm taste. You could use all spice blend if you can't get speculaas spices. I wanted to share this recipe before we head onto spring, which won't be very long. I am sure it will even taste great then, but I know that I stray away from wintery flavors naturally when spring hits. The original recipe comes from Over Eten. Nick took most of this cake to his work, and they loved it there.

Carrot Cake with Speculaas Spices:
- 240 ml sunflower oil
- 125 gr cane sugar
- 125 gr castor sugar
- 4 eggs
- 240 gr selfrising flour
- 280 gr carrots, grated
- 2 tbsp speculaas spices
- 1 tbsp cinnamon
- pinch of salt
- 50 gr pecan or walnuts

Pre heat the oven to 170 degrees. Make sure you grease the bundt pan unless you have a silicone one like we do. Mix oil, sugar and eggs first. Then sift the selfrising flour above the bowl with the salt, speculaas spices and cinnamon. Mix on low speed until you have a smooth batter. Then add in the carrots and nuts. Stir through the batter with a wooden spoon. Pour the batter in the bundt pan and bake in the oven for about 55 minutes. The cake is done when a toothpick comes out clean. Make sure the cake has cooled before removing the bundt pan.

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Bento for week 6

This week has been pretty okay. Now that Nick is healthy again and I am getting used to the schedule things go more smoothly. Monday is still mostly our day to cook for the rest of the week, and last week we baked muffins. Some for this week but I also put some in the freezer to use in future weeks. I didn't have much of a bento stash anymore so I am working on that.

In the first and 2nd bento of the week there are some spinach and ricotta muffins and spaghetti with vegan sauce, that I shared earlier this week. In the lid are the last of the green tea panda cookies I had.

The Thursday bento often is the odd one out. There is curry madras with rice and some sandwiches with curried chicken salad. Nick doesn't often have meat in his bent. But I had tuna salad for myself and he doesn't like that.

I will share the recipe for the ricotta spinach muffins with this post. The next time I will not use the cupcake liners because the muffins stick to them greatly which is a real shame.

Ricotta Spinach Muffins: (makes 16)
- 400 gr cottage cheese (huttenkase)
- 300 gr spinach (fresh or frozen)
- 250 ml milk
- 3 eggs
- 450 gr flour
- 4 tsp baking powder
- some dates, chopped (sun dried tomatoes would also taste good)

Pre heat the oven to 180 degrees. Cut the spinach finely. But when using frozen just squeeze out as many fluids as you can. Mix spinach, cottage cheese, eggs, milk and dates. Mix everything together. Then sift and add the flour and baking powder and scoop this through. Place the batter into the muffin pan. Bake them for about 20-25 minutes in the oven.

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Valentine: Marshmallow Brownie Cupcakes

While I didn't make anything special for valentine this year myself, I found a fitting recipe in my backlog that I want to share today. I finally found a jar of marshmallow fluff in the Dutch stores and I just had to bake something with it. The fluff is really the ultimate sticky goodness, haha. This recipe is pretty decadent, but that is only fitting for valentines day right ;) I got my inspiration from Recipe For Perfection. But she only provided half a recipe, referring to 1 recipe of brownie batter. So I used the batter from the Oreo Brownie recipe, because that was pretty basic but I omitted the oreos and replaced that with the fluff. This worked out really well.

Marshmallow Brownie Cupcakes: (makes about 12)
- 165 gr unsalted butter
- 200 gr milk chocolate, chopped
- 4 eggs
- 165 gr light brown castor sugar
- 3 tbsp flour
- 1 tbsp cocoa powder
- 1 jar of marshmallow fluff

Pre heat the oven to 180 degrees. Line the muffin pan with cupcake liners. Melt the butter in a pan and remove from the heat. Add the chocolate and stir until the chocolate melted and the butter and chocolate form a nice mixture. Let it cool down to 37 degrees. We don't have a thermometer but you can check, because your body temperature is about the same. So carefully check with a clean finger and if it is about the same, it is all good :)

Beat the eggs until they are tripled in size. Add the sugar gradually while you keep mixing until combined. Then carefully combine with the chocolate mixture and stir this together until smooth. Do not use your mixer anymore. Stir in the flour and cocoa powder carefully until combined.

Now scoop in each muffin hole some of the brownie batter to cover the bottoms. Then spoon about one tablespoon of fluff on top of that. Lastly cover the fluff with more brownie batter. They will expand greatly so do not overfill the cups. No more then 3/4. Bake for about 25 minutes. They are done when a toothpick comes out with a few moist crumbs but no wet batter.
Leave them cool for about 15 minutes.

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Best Breakfast: Peanut Butter Granola

I hardly ever have breakfast with sandwiches any more, which is the norm in Dutch culture. Ever since I switched to granola with vanilla yoghurt in the morning, my digestion has been better in general. But because eating the same granola over and over gets boring as well, I tend to make the same one only two times in a row, and then try something new. While this isn't the most healthy one I posted, it is the easiest one and the most low budget one so far. For a lot of granola recipes I go to a speciality shop so I can weigh the exact amount of nuts and seeds that I need so I am not over paying because nuts and seeds are kinda expensive. For this recipe I don't have to go to the speciality shop, so it is really easy if I don't have much time for the extra trip.

Peanut Butter Granola: (Makes about 5 cups)
- 5 cups oats (about 450 gr)
- 0.5 cup peanut butter, maybe a bit more
- 0.5 cup honey
- 1 tsp vanilla extract
- some chocolate pieces to taste (dark or milk)

Pre heat the oven to 140 degrees. Put the oats in a large bowl. Combine the peanut butter and honey and place it for about 45 seconds in the microwave until the peanut butter starts to melt. Add in the vanilla and stir through. Cover the oats with the mixture. Now you decide if it needs some more peanut butter. It depends if you can get everything covered.

Place the granola on a baking tray covered with parchment paper. Make sure that the granola is in a single layer. I always have to bake mine in two batches. Bake for about 20 minutes. Then stir and bake for about 10-15 minutes longer. Let it cool completely before adding the pieces of chocolate.

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Bento for week 4 and 5

Two weeks ago Nick had the flu. He lost his voice and when working at a help desk, you kinda need that ;) But the day before he would go to work, I did make a bento. I didn't share it last week, because a post with only one bento in it is a bit of a waste, so I shared a recipe instead and combined it with this week.

This bento is a bit different from usual, as it has a dish that needs to be heated. But Nick has access to a microwave at work, so if it comes to that, it isn't a problem. It was some leftover cheesy potato oven dish. In the other tier there is kisir, a Turkish bulgur salad. In the lid there is custard Toppo.

This is the bento of this week. There is a Turkish style omelet, which I will share the recipe of below. The panda cookies were in the lid, but Nick choose to photograph it this way. In the other tier there is curry madras with rice. I won't share a recipe of that one, because I just used a store bought package, which had the veggies for it.

For the 3rd day I didn't do a bento this week. But we made some hummus with sundried tomatoes and we had that on bread.

In the Turkish style omelet I use a Turkish white cheese that I bought in a speciality store. But you can substitute feta, if you want. It does make a difference in taste because the Turkish cheese is creamier. The recipe I use comes from My Mixed Kitchen.

Omelet with Turkish Cheese (serves 4)
- 6 eggs
- 100 gr Turkish white cheese
- a handful fresh parsley, dill and / or fresh chives

Mash the cheese a bit with a fork and cut the herbs. Mix them together. Add the eggs with a tiny bit of water and beat them into a creamy mixture.

Melt a bit of butter in a tiny skillet. Pour half of the egg mixture in. On medium heat let the egg cook slowly. The top of the omelet shouldn't be fluid any more but may be a bit wobbly in the middle. Make sure the bottom doesn't get too dark. Turn the omelet and let the other side bake shortly.
Bake another omelet with the rest of the mixture. The serving size is half an omelet.

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Slow Cooker: Creamy Tortellini Soup

So while I mostly try to blog the recipes that go with the bento, I didn't want to keep this recipe from you that we made on x-mas while some friends were here. I have to say that this is one of the best dishes that I made with my slow cooker so far. But I guess it isn't the healthiest soup you can make. But sometimes you just have to spoil yourself right? The original recipe is from Cooking Classy.

Creamy Tortellini Soup: (serves 6, 3.5L slow cooker)
- 3 medium carrots, diced
- 1 large yellow onion, minced
- 5 cloves of garlic, minced
- 2 tbsp olive oil
- 3 cans whole tomatoes, 800 gr each
- 950 ml vegetable broth
- 1/3 cup fresh basil, chopped
- 450 gr cheese tortellini
- 2 bay leaves
- 1 tbsp sugar
- salt and pepper
- 0.75 cup Parmesan grated cheese

Heat olive oil in a large skillet. Add carrots and onion and saute 3 - 4 minutes then add garlic and saute 1 minute longer. Pour the mixture into the slow cooker along with tomatoes, vegetable broth, basil, bay leaves and sugar. Stir and season with salt and pepper to taste. Cover slow cooker and cook on low for 6 hours or on high for 3.5 hours. Remove the bay leaves then puree the soup. Don't do this in your slow cooker! It might damage the pan. If the soup is too thick just add 0.5 cup more water. Transfer the soup back to the slow cooker and stir in tortellini, cover and cook on high 15 minutes longer. Reduce heat to warm, stir in heavy cream. Serve topped with parmesan cheese and fresh basil.

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Imbolc: Condensed Milk Cake

Today it is Imbolc and as always I try to share a related recipe for the feast. Milk is the main ingredient that is used for Imbolc cooking. So today I share a very basic cake, but with condensed milk. The cake has no added sugar, but of course the condensed milk is used as a sweetener here. The taste was a bit between a cake and a cheesecake so that is nice. But this cake doesn't keep that well and tastes best on the same day. The recipe is from Dr. Ola's Kitchen.  I am sorry for the weird color that the cake seems to have. The days here has been really gloomy and the daylight lamp I use sometimes does weird things to the pictures.

Condensed Milk Cake:
- 400 ml can condensed, sweetened milk
- 4 eggs
- 150 gr flour
- 0.5 tsp baking powder
- 50 gr melted butter + 1 tbsp for brushing the spring form

Pre heat the oven to 170 degrees. Grease the sides of your spring form and lay some parchment paper on the bottom. Anywhere between 18-22 cm spring form is fine for this cake.
Mix all the ingredients together with an electric mixer until smooth and pour them in to the spring form. Bake in a pre heated oven between 40 and 60 minutes. Use the toothpick test to see if it is done.

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Bento Bites: Caprese Bread

Last week I wanted something that would taste nice in combination with the soup I always buy at school. So I thought of a savory bread. We made this bread once before in the summer, but I haven't gotten around to blog it. Luckily I do keep track of things I made in the past and loved. We served this bread with some herbal cheese spread on top and it tasted great with the soup. The recipe comes from Will Cook For Smiles.

Caprese Bread
- 1.25 cup all purpose flour
- 1 cup white bread flour
- 2 tsp baking powder
- 0.5 tsp baking soda
- 1.25 tsp salt
- 115 gr mozzarella cheese, cubed
- 2 tbsp fresh basil, chopped
- 0.3 cup sundried tomatoes, chopped
- 2 eggs
- 2.5 tbsp olive oil
- 1.25 cups buttermilk

Pre heat the oven to 180 degrees. Line a rectangular cake tin with parchment paper. In a large bowl mix the first 5 ingredients. Then add the mozzarella, tomatoes and basil to the dry mix. In another bowl mix the wet ingredients. Pour the wet ingredients into the dry ones and mix with a wooden spoon until you ha ve a sticky dough. Transfer the dough to the cake tin and spread evenly. Bake for about 40-45 minutes. If a toothpick comes out clean from the center, the bread is done.

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Bento Bites: Carrot Feta Fritters

For a slow cooker tomato tortellini soup we needed one carrot. But Nick actually bought a whole bag of them, which I found in the fridge a few days later. So it was time for some carrot recipes. Now I have to be honest and say I am not really a fan of carrots much. So a bunch of them went into a carrot cake and the rest in these fritters. Both recipes have the advantage that you don't really taste the carrot. And these fritters are soooo good. Because of the spice combination and the feta I have to say that these might be the best fritters we ever made ;) They would also be great with sweet potato I think. The original recipe comes from Gezond Eten Magazine. We made them as a weekend lunch, but they held really well in the bento too and they taste great both hot and cold.

Carrot Feta Fritters: (serves 3)
- 4 carrots, grated
- 120 gr feta, crumbled
- 2 tsp pesto
- 0.5 tsp chili powder
- 0.5 smoked paprika
- 0.5 tsp cumin
- 30 gr cornstrach
- 2 eggs
- 1 tbsp olive oil
- salt and pepper

Mix everything together except for eggs and oil. Use salt and pepper to taste. Then beat the eggs and add to the mixture. Mix well. Form patties with your hands about a tbsp big. Bake the fritters in oil, 2-3 minutes per side until they are browning.

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Bento Bites: Spring Onion and Cheese Muffins

We don't do as much savoury baking as we used to, but sometimes we still try a new recipe for muffins. I think this will change now that we are back on track with bento making. I made this recipe twice already. One time in September for our lunch at home and once last week for the bento. I love the taste of these because there cheese with herbs used in the recipe. Not the creamy kind, but just a hard cheese that has a mixture of herbs in it. The cheese you choose largely determines the flavour. So use a good brand of cheese with a nice combination of spices in it. The original recipe comes from Excellent Eten.

Spring Onion Cheese Muffins (makes 16)
- 200 gr self rising flour
- 2 eggs
- 200 ml milk
- 8 tbsp olive oil
- 200 gr good quality cheese with herbs, grated
- 6 spring onions, in thin rings
- salt and pepper

Pre heat the oven to 200 degrees. Mix eggs, milk, oil and add the self rising flour after that. Mix again until you have a smooth batter. Stir in the spring onions and cheese. Add salt and pepper to taste if needed. It depends on the saltiness of the cheese. Scoop the batter in the muffin tins and bake for about 35 minutes.

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Luxury Lunch: Turkish Potato Salad

Potato salads have the image of being unhealthy because of all the mayonnaise involved. Since last year I have been dipping into the Turkish kitchen and on one of the blogs I follow was this recipe for Turkish Potato Salad with yoghurt. I tried it for the bento this week and both Nick and I loved it. It holds up well but is best at room temperature and not directly from the fridge. The recipe is from Mijn Mixed Kitchen and this is my go to blog for Turkish recipes. The original recipe also uses dill, but dill is one of the herbs that we doesn't use often and it just wilts away, so we left it out.

Turkish Potato Salad: (serves 4)
- 5 medium potatoes
- 3 spring onions
- 1 piece of cucumber
- Turkish yoghurt

Peel and cube the potatoes and boil them. Cut the spring onions and bake them shortly in some olive oil. Remove the core from the cucumber and cut it. Make sure your cucumber is drained well. You don't want a soggy salad. Mix everything together and add 2 tbsp Turkish yoghurt to cover everything. Maybe some more is needed. Cover your salad and leave it in the fridge for at least 2 hours before serving. But serve the salad at room temperature. The salad keeps for 2 days in the fridge.

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Slow Cooker: Red Cabbage Mashpot

One of the first things I tried in my slow cookers was making mashpot. It would be ideal if I could make his typical Dutch winter food in the Slow Cooker. I used a recipe from the Dutch Slow Cooker Facebook group for red cabbage, which I adapted to a mashpot recipe. Because me made this twice already, it was time to blog the recipe. Please so excuses the pictures. Mashpot doesn't photograph well in the best of circumstances, but in the winter light it is impossible to shoot appealing pictures. Unless I am going to eat at noon, which I am not planning to do any time soon.

Red Cabbage Mashpot: (serves 3)
- 3 large potatoes
- half a red cabbage
- 2 tbsp brown sugar
- 2 apples
- 4 bay leaves
- pepper
- dash of vinegar
- cube of butter
- 4 slices gingerbread
- some milk

Peel and cube the potatoes, shred the cabbage and peel, core and cube the apple. Put everything in the slow cooker except for the gingerbread and the milk. Pour water in until everything is just under water. Cook is for 6-7 hours on low. In the last 2-3 hours lay the slices of gingerbread on top of the cabbage.
Drain everything in a colander and remove the bay leaves. Add some milk and mash everything together.

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