All-About-The-Sauce-Potato-Casserole

Over the past week I've collected some photographs of what I've made, but it's kind of hard to decide what to post next for you. Right now there was the choice between....hmm...should I tell you? No, I won't so it will still be a surprise in case I decide to write about the other things as well ;-)

Today you're seeing something that is a really great winter dish that doesn't require any fancy summer-ish ingredients.

This is it!

In this case it is a potato-broccoli casserole, but in fact it's all about the sauce. Over time my Mum and I have had several versions of this dish with potatoes plus several varying vegetables. Without the sauce, though the dish wouldn't be as good as it is. I had this with my housemate during the week and the thing she said to me was that the sauce was really nice (was this a British understatement for "great"? - I'd hope so), so this must be the key factor.

vegetables
350 g	potatoes
250 g	broccoli
sauce
1	onion
20 g	butter
about 4 tbsp = 35 g	millet flour (you can make that in any blender from millet grains)
125 g	cashew milk (grind 15 g cashew nuts and blend again with 110 g water)
250 g	vegetable stock
	salt
	pepper
1/4 tsp	paprika powder (sweet if possible)
	nutmeg

1. First of all, cut the potatoes (unpeeled) into halves if they're big or leave them whole if they are small. Make sure that all pieces are relatively evenly sized. Cut the broccoli roughly in smaller florets. You can use the stems as well. You don't need to make them as small as you want to eat them though, it's less fiddly if you do that after steaming,
2. Place all vegetables in a steaming basker or a metal sieve and steam over boiling water for about 15 minutes or until as soft as you like it. In the meantime prepare the sauce.
3. Prepare cashew milk, vegetable stock and millet flour.
4. Finely chop the onion. Gently heat butter in a small pot and fry the onion in the butter. When fried, add vegetable stock and cashew milk. Bring to a boil. With a fork whisk in millet flour. Over low heat cook for a bit and keep stirring. The mixture should thicken up and get creamy after a short while. If it doesn't add some more flour. Season with spices to your liking.
5. When potatoes and broccoli are tender, cut potatoes in slices and the broccoli into bite-sized pieces. Grease a small casserole dish with butter and first put in potato slices and then the broccoli pieces on top. Evenly distribute the sauce on top.
6. Bake at 250 °C (or as hot as your oven goes) for about 20 minutes until the top is slightly browned.

Instead of millet flour you could also use regular flour, but millet flour makes the sauce have a nicer looking yellow colour.

You could vary this by for example adding some fried mushroom (this adds a dirty pan, though) or by  cooking potato slices and zucchini in a bit of vegetable stock. I recommend you try it as written and then you'll be able to make up your mind as to what vegetables go well with the sauce until maybe I've made the other varieties of the dish as well ;-)

Ah, by the way I've added a print button to the blog! When you open a specific post (not the home-site, but by clicking on the title of the post) you can now find it under the post and can optimise each page to the way you'd like to print it! In case you ever want to print something which I sincerely hope :-)

Coconutty Raisin Granola or Flapjacks

Today I've got housemate-approved recipe for you. Since they specifically asked if this was going to be on the blog I'm sure that you all will enjoy it as well!

In fact I had left it to cool on the counter when I left in the morning and when I came back the first thing I heard was that I was lucky there was still something left. Which is .... well, on the one hand I'd be happy to have some left for me, of course, but it is also so nice to hear that it seems to have turned out alright!!!

As you've probably seen from the title this is a granola or flapjack recipe. You can make anything you like out of it.
Personally I like to break this into chunks which I can one-by-one nibble while having hot chocolate and talking on the phone or watching some of my favourite German TV crime stories. And it's so much faster and easier to make than any cookies which you'd have to form or use a cookie cutter for. Even though I have to admit that cookie cutting is really fun for me. But sometimes ... okay, maybe rather often, I just don't feel like I have time for relaxed cookie cutting, but just need to keep up the supply of baked goodies to brighten up cold winter days. Maybe you can identify with that ;-)

In any case this is what you'll need:

	about 20*30 cm baking tray
100 g	rolled oats
60 g	raisins
50 g	sunflower seeds
50 g	whole wheat flour
40 g	desiccated coconut
1/2 tsp	cinnamon
1 pinch	salt
4 tbsp	liquid honey
4 tbsp	coconut oil, soft
OR	sunflower oil
OR	olive oil
OR	melted butter
3 tbsp	water

• Line a baking tray with baking foil or baking paper.
• Mix all dry ingredients. That is oats, raisins, sunflower seeds, flour, coconut, cinnamon and salt.
• Add honey, your oil of choice or butter (I have not yet tried butter, but I think it should work with butter!) and water.
• Mix very well with a spoon or with your hands.
• Pour mixture onto the tray and spread out so that the mixture has a thickness of about 1 cm and is tightly packed.
• Bake at 150°C for about 25 minutes until slightly browned. Let the granola cool on the tray until completely cool. Don't remove any earlier, as then you will end up with crumbs. When completely cool the mixture will have firmed up slightly (it won't be as sticky as a granola bar from a shop, though!).
• My preferred method is to break it up into large chunks and to store these in a cookie tin. You can break them into any size you want.

• If you want to cut them, cut them while hot, but otherwise don't move until cooled. The third option is to place them in cookie-ish shapes on the tray in the first place.

Feel free to double the batch so that you actually get to eat some of it! ;-)

Let me know if you tried it!

Very Green and Creamy Broccoli Sauce With Pasta

During this past week I've thought of so many things that I could put on my blog for you, but each time something was not quite right.

There was the Grape-and-Onion-Focaccia Bread I made for a vegan potluck-dinner this week, but actually I had not changed much in the recipe and you can find the (really good!!!) recipe on boxofspice. I can only recommend that, so have a look over there :-)
Second, I made a curry, but the cabbage in it did definitely not any bonus points to its taste...
Last night I roasted rutabaga/swede for the first time ever in my life and had that with some chickpeas, but that really was the very first stage of testing something and it needs some more goes. But I've got some ideas there! Some greens, orange zest and a dressing... hmmm!
This morning I made my favourite banana rolls, but they didn't seem 100% right to me even though they usually are great. So far, though, I've only eaten some crumbs (don't ever use greaseproof paper when you run out of baking paper - better go to the shop and get some...) and have frozen the rolls for lunches. So I haven't really tested the batch yet.

But that's the way it is - no trials, no fun ;-)

Today, though, I had broccoli sauce with pasta for dinner and it actually turned out the way I liked it to so that I can safely tell you how I made it.

This sauce makes broccoli taste so much better than any steamed broccoli you often get as a side dish. The mint gives it a fresh tang which fits in so well and the colour is simply amazing!

As I like pasta with a lot of sauce it was more sauce with pasta than the other way around, but feel free to adjust the ratio if you feel differently!

I blended the sauce in a high-speed blender - otherwise I recommend blending the cashew nuts before adding any other ingredients. Alternatively you could use cashew nut butter instead.
Nutritional yeast you can get in a health shop. I use it, because it has a slightly cheesy flavour, which I think is very nice! If you cannot find it and don't mind cheese you might like to use a small bit of parmesan (I haven't tried that, though!).

pasta with broccoli sauce

for 1	for 2	for 4	servings of pasta (about 130 g each)
			mint, to taste
3/4 cup (ca. 130 g)	1 ½ cups (ca. 260 g)	3 cups (ca. 520 g)	broccoli, florets or pieces, stems can also be used
1/8 tsp	¼ tsp	½ tsp	salt
3*	6*	12*	pepper (turns of the grinder)
5-6	10-12	20-24	cashew nuts
1- 1 ½ tsp	2-3 tsp	4-6 tsp	nutritional yeast
¾ - 1 tsp	1 ½ - 2 tsp	3 – 4 tsp	lemon juice, to taste, start with less
			olive oil (a small bit)
¼ tbsp	½ tbsp	1 tbsp	butter
1	2	4	garlic cloves

• Steam the broccoli until soft (about 14 minutes). If you don't have a steaming basket you can use a metal colander/sieve and a matching pot with lid.
• Heat butter on low heat in a small pot and sauté garlic until fragrant. Do not leave it unattended! It takes only about 2 minutes and it burns very easily!
• While the broccoli cooks, put all other ingredients, including the garlic and butter, into a blender (see note above about cashew nuts).
• When the broccoli is soft, retain the steaming liquid. Add broccoli and a bit of liquid to the blender.
• Blend until very smooth. Adjust amount of liquid and seasonings to taste.
• Cook pasta, drain and mix with the sauce.

This sauce also freezes well.

I would love to hear how you like it!