It is a very simple dish, ready within 10 minutes. And with side of rice, couscous or pasta makes very satisfying meal. Works with salmon, but probably not too fatty white fish is best for this recipe.
Ingredients:
Cod, haddock or flounder – 2-3 pieces (for 2 people)
1 clove of garlic
Spinach 1 cup
White wine 1/4 cup
Heavy cream – 1/2 cup
Directions:
Add about 1 tbsp of olive oil onto the skillet and put on medium low heat
Add finely chopped clove of garlic and fry for about a minute
Add spinach, mix with garlic, cook together till spinach wilted ( about 1-2 minutes)
Pour wine, let it reduce a little ( another minute or two)
Add heavy cream, salt and pepper, mix well altogether. Taste for seasoning and adjust as needed
Place your fish on top of the source, reduce heat and cover skillet with the lid.
Cook for 5-7 minutes, depending on the thickness of the fish pieces (flounder will certainly be ready in 4-5 minutes, while cod may take 7 minutes.). The source and the steam under the lid will cook the fish.
Pilav (Plov) – simple and delicious.
It’s a meal in a pan – one grand main dish, no sides needed. Feeds a crowd and can be served in a pan, makes a great centerpiece.
Ingredients:
Lamb ~ 1-1.5 lbs
1 big yellow onion
Carrots – 1-1.5 lbs
Rice parboiled is better, but jasmine or baldo rice will work: 2.5 – 3 cups. It is shorter grain than basmati and cooks longer.
Head of garlic (at least, 2 is better)
Salt, pepper, cumin, coriander, chili pepper, thyme
Directions:
Cut lamb into half inch pieces, remove extra fat, but keep some.
Finely chop onion
Carrots have to be cut, not grated to retain it’s juice. I used food processor this time, but regretted it.
Use big heavy pan (dutch oven is the best). Pour 2-3 tbsp light olive oil into the pan.
Start frying onions. If you have extra time it’s better to start with frying your meat, getting it seared, then removing from a pan and then fry onions. But to make it simpler…
When onion is golden brown add meat, mix to combine and keep frying on high heat to get it seared, stirring occasionally. Spice your meat.
When meat is seared and browned (it should actually be cooked, pieces are small) add carrots, mix with meat and onion, keep frying all together for 3-5 minutes.
Rinse rice with cold water, add to the pan, mix with onion and vegetables
Pour cold water over rice, bring it to a boil on high heat, check the sauce for salt and spices and adjust as needed.
Reduce the heat to very low, cover your pan with the lid.
In about 5-7 minutes when rice absorbs water place full head of garlic (or two) inside the rice.
In about 10 minutes start checking rice for being cooked. Turn the heat off when rice is fully cooked.
Pumpkin Gnocchi
Ingredients:
Roasted butternut squash puree – 2-3 tbsp
Farmer cheese (tvorog) – 1.2 lbs
1 egg (can be 2 if small)
Flour – 4 tbsp
Salt 1/3 tsp
Butter – 2 tbsp for garnish + sage leaves
Directions:
Place all the ingredients into a bowl and mix really well with spoon forming sticky dough
Put the dough on well floured board, flour your hands too.
It should be sticky, but workable, there is no need to kneed it, but you should be able to form about an inch wide log with your hands
Cut the log into small pieces
Put pot with water on medium to high heat, add 1 tsp of salt and bring to a boil. Do not reduce the heat!
Place several dumplings into boiling water, don’t overcrowd the pot.
Boil the dumplings for 2 minutes
Remove from the pot with a skimmer spoon
Melt butter in a small pan, add couple of sage leaves (or dry sage), pour over gnocchi
Serve hot
Cheese Gnocchi (lazy vareniki)
It was one of my favorite breakfasts, called lazy vareniki. Vareniki (similar to pirogi, but with thiner pastry) are Russian or Ukranian dumplings made with potato or ricotta cheese filling. So instead of making a dough, rolling it, cutting, preparing a filling, forming every dumpling you just put everything together in one bowl, mix it, divide into little pillows and boil. Lazy! And done within 5 minutes!
It should be done with tvorog, but if you don’t have it I found that farmers cheese is not a bad option for this dish (don’t use store bought ricotta, it’s too watery).
Ingredients (for 1 serving):
Tvorog or farmer’s cheese – 1/4 lbs (100 gr)
1 egg
Flour – 3 tbsp
Pinch of salt
Directions:
Place all the ingredients into a bowl and mix really well with spoon forming sticky dough
Put the dough on well floured board, flour your hands too.
It should be sticky, but workable, there is no need to kneed it, but you should be able to form about an inch wide log with your hands
Cut the log into small pieces
Put pot with water on medium to high heat, add 1 tsp of salt and bring to a boil. Do not reduce the heat!
Place several dumplings into boiling water, don’t overcrowd the pot.
Boil the dumplings for 2 minutes
Remove from the pot with a skimmer spoon
Garnish with melted butter or sour cream and sprinkle with sugar if you want to make it sweet
Serve hot or warm
Zucchini Flowers Tempura
Cut fresh “male” flowers, the ones with long stems. Don’t worry – very few of them can pollinate lots of female flowers, so you don’t put your zucchini harvest in danger.
Ingredients
flour – 2 tbsp
baking powder 1/4 tsp
sparkling water – 1/3 cup
grape seed oil -2-3 tbsp
Directions:
Mix flour with the baking powder and start adding your sparkling water gradually stirring constantly to avoid lumps.
Heat the oil in the pan, dip each flower and every sage leaf into the batter and put into the hot oil
Fry about 2 min on each side till golden brown
Sprinkle with salt
You can add some sage leaves to the bouquet, applying the same tempura treatment to them:
Simple stuffed cabbage
First thing first – got to have a cabbage. The size doesn’t matter, but if it’s it medium or big – much easier to cut it in 4 pieces, remove the core, and keep just bigger leaves, the small ones is impossible to stuff so you can take them out and use for salad or something else. Put your whole small cabbage or leaves into a pot , add some cold water, 1 tbsp of salt and put over medium heat. Let it boil for just 5 min, fish it out and let it cool. The stuffing is
Ingredients:
Medium size cabbage
Ground beef/chicken/turkey – 1 lb
1 small onion
1 egg
Rice – 3 tbsp
Directions:
Prepare the filling
Fry finely chopped onion in a frying pan with 1 tbsp of vegetable oil
Place ground beef, fried onions, rice and egg into a big bowl
Add salt, pepper, rice, other herbs of your choice and/or red pepper flakes
Mix all to combine using your hand or a big fork
Make the rolls
Separate cooked cabbage leaves, place about 1 tbsp of filling on each leaf and wrap the rolls. You can also stuff some sweet peppers if you have an extra filling.
Add about 1 cup of water (or use the water from boiling cabbage) into a big pot or dutch oven.
Bring it to a boil, add 1 tbsp of salt, 1 tsp of pepper, a can of diced tomatoes (or some other tomato sauce and/or paste)
Reduce heat to low, and place the cabbage rolls into a pot with the boiling sauce
Simmer for about an hour
Taste the sauce for salt and adjust to your taste.
Serve hot, garnish with parsley/cilantro/chives
Zucchini Gratin
Unusual, delicious, decadent zucchini dish, great for family lunch/brunch, dinner side dish, or party buffet
It does require some preparation, but it absolutely melts in your mouth. The cheeses and spices/herbs are flexible, so are the proportions, use the ones you have and/or like and as many zucchini as you have, adding spinach is an option too.
Ingredients:
3-4 middle size zucchini
2 tbsp butter
2 tbsp flour
1 cup whole milk
2 tbsp olive oil
1 -1.5 cup shredded cheese
Directions:
Wash and peel zucchini (or summer squash)
Cut into pieces (if you use food processor) to fit into the food processor. Skip it if you use a hand grater. Shred zucchini using food processor or grate using hand grater.
Put shredded (grated) zucchini into a pan, add 4-5 cups of cold water, 1tbsp salt and put on high heat.
Bring to a boil and let it boil for about 3-5 min.
Drain through a sieve and wait till all water is drained.
Make Bechamel sauce:
Melt 2 tbsp butter on low-med heat, add 2 tbsp flour. Fry flour in a butter stirring constantly, gradually add milk, keep stirring to avoid lumps till the sauce start thickening. Once the sauce thickens – take it off the heat and let it cool a little.
In a big bowl combine drained zucchini, grated cheese (I used provolone and fontina), it can be gruyere, parmigiano, manchego or a combination of the above, even cheddar. Season with 1 tsp salt, half tsp of pepper, you can add nutmeg, dry garlic, dry oregano or any other herb you like.
Oil deep baking dish. Pour zucchini mixture into a dish and put into a preheated to 375°F oven for 50-60 min (or till it’s golden). Take a small taste 15 min before it’s cooked and add salt/pepper if needed.
Serve hot or warm and you can reheat the leftovers
Можно добавить сухой чеснок, орегано, мускатный орех.
Russian cutletts
It’s not meatballs, not burgers, not meatloaf. These crispy and fluffy meat pillows are called cutletts in Russian.
The ingredients, the proportions and even directions vary wildly,I don’t think I ever made 2 identical batches. You can mix and match the meats – beef, pork, lamb, veal, chicken, turkey. The best result is usually with the combination of beef and pork, or beef and lamb, even a sausage without casing can be added to juice up beef. To make them fluffy you can add breadcrumbs or stale bread soaked in milk or water, number of eggs can be different. Adding fried onion instead of raw is always better. Different herbs, spices, condiments you put inside may turn your cutletts to different directions – make them Italian, Spanish, Moroccan, or Asian oriented, it’s your choice.
For the best result you can grind your ingredients yourself using meat grinder, not blender, it doesn’t have to be pureed. But using ground meat is absolutely fine, the rest of the ingredients can be finely chopped or ground with a box grinder.
Ingredients:
Ground beef (plus pork or lamb) 1 + 1 lbs
Onion 1 medium or half of a big onion (can be red or white)
3 Eggs
Breadcrumbs or bread soaked in milk – 2-3 tbsp
Very important secret ingredient I learned from my aunt – small piece of a tart apple (granny smith), can be replace with the small piece of cabbage, or zucchini. You will not feel it there, but it makes the cutlets juicy.
Salt 1 tsp, be careful with the salt if you put any sauce inside.
Pepper 1/2 tsp
Directions (with ground meats):
In a big bowl
Grind or finely chop onion
Grind a piece of apple
Put ground meats
Add eggs, breadcrumbs,
Add a dash of Worcestershire sauce and/or a tablespoon of any barbeque sauce or a teaspoon of any condiment you like
About a teaspoon of salt, half a teaspoon of pepper, fresh thyme
Mix everything to combine with your hand
Shape your cutlets (these amounts made 8-9 cutlets)
Heat a pan with some neutral oil
Fry the cutlets on both sides on a medium high heat in batches about 3-4 minutes per side
Put all cutlets back to the pan, sprinkle with lots of chopped parsley/cilantro/dill or other herbs
Finish in the 325 F oven or cover with a lid and turn the heat to very low for 15-20 minutes
Serve warm or hot with any side of your choice – mashed potatoes, pasta, rice, green salad.
Carrot Soffritto Marinated Fish
Very easy way to transform somewhat plain boring white fish like cod or haddock into delicious colorful dish with a spice level adjustable to your taste. Served cold or room temperature, you can take it to work for lunch, serve at brunch buffet or as a dinner appetizer
Ingredients:
White fish (cod, haddock, flounder) – 2 lbs
Shallot (or small onion) – 1
Carrots – 1-1.5 lbs
Tomato sauce – 2 tbsp (you can use fresh a couple of tomatoes, ketchup, some spicy sauce you have or like, and or tomato paste)
Directions:
Place your fish into a casserole dish, sprinkle with olive oil, season with salt and pepper ( you can also sprinkle some lemon juice)
Bake in 375 °F oven for about 30 min till fully cooked.
Finely chop shallot (or onion), grind carrots (with manual grinder or in a food processor)
Add 3 tbsp light olive oil or some other neutral oil into a heavy pan
Start roasting shallot on a medium heat till it is translucent, then add shredded carrots. You might need to add some oil
Roast your vegetables till golden color, the add your tomatoes or tomato sauce/paste, season with salt, pepper, add some red pepper flakes if you want to make it spicy.
Reduce the heat to low, add 1 or 2 bay leaves, cover your pan with a lid and simmer till your sofrito is fully cooked and soft.
Split cooked fish into small pieces with a fork.
Load the sofrito on top of the fish, better to do it while it’s still hot or at least warm so that the taste of vegetables penetrates the fish
Sprinkle with good olive oil.
Let it cool down on counter top and put in the fridge for several hours. Sofrito will “marinate” the fish, adding it a color and spice
Serve cold.
Buckwheat
Buy roasted, but not too dark, I usually buy 2 cups packages that are sold in a Russian store, but you can find it in every health store now.
Ingredients:
Roasted buckwheat – 2 cups
Olive oil – 1 tbsp (optional)
Boiling water – 3 cups
Salt – 1 tbsp
Instructions:
Rinse and drain the grains
Place the grain into a heavy pan on a medium high
Add salt and olive oil (if you choose it)
Roast (dry) the grain, stirring constantly for about 5 minutes
Add boiling water, reduce the heat to very low, cover with a lid and let it sit for about 20-25 minutes.
Turn the heat off and let it rest for 5 -10 minutes.
The grain will absorb all the water and will be fully cooked.
If you want to add roasted vegetables you can do it by starting with roasting the vegetables, then adding the grains, roasting it all together, then pouring boiling water.
Or you can have the kasha ready and mix it with your choice of vegetables, source or gravy.
