Monthly Archives: November 2012

Wine soup with croutons

November 29, 2012 By in Uncategorized Leave a comment

Alto Adige/Sudtirol is a beautiful part of Italy. Before WWI it belonged to Austria, so when you start exploring the area you may think you are in Austria not in Italy. The main language is German, except in government establishments. All signs are written in both languages.

Food also has a strong influence of Austrian, German, and central European cuisine; fantastic apple strudel, barley soup, rye bread, sauerkraut, ect.

I have to admit I am a big fan of that type of food. It may sound a bit heavy, but there is something about that simple, homey food especially in wintertime.

In my next couple of posts I will prepare some of the recipes from this region.

For this post I have chosen wine soup. This is a mountainous area, very rich in beautiful vineyards and great wine. For this recipe egg yolk is commonly used as a soup thickener, but I decided to use a little bit of cornstarch. Cornstarch is just another way to thicken the soup. When choosing the white wine try to choose a dry one of very good quality.

Wine soup

serves 4

  • 1 small onion, finely chopped
  • 500ml beef stock / 2 cups
  • 100ml vino (Pinot blank, or other good quality dry white vino) /  1/2 cup
  • 100ml single cream / 1/2 cup
  • 1 tablespoon of cornstarch
  • water

Melt the butter in a saucepan, add the onion and on a low heat sweat the onion until very soft. Don’t allow the onion to brown.

Add the stock, vino and cream.

Bring it slowly to boil.

In a small bowl put the cornstarch and slowly add the cold water until you don’t get a thin paste.

Slowly, keep adding the cornstarch paste to the soup until soup thickens.

 

Croutons

 

  • 4 slices of white bread, 1cm (1/2 in) thick
  • 1 teaspoon of dry seasoning, like oregano, tarragon
  • 30g of batter

 

Preheat the oven to 180C/350F.

Cut the crust from the bread.

Mix the melted butter and herbs in a small bowl.

Brush the melted butter and herbs mixture on both sides of the bread.

Cook about 10 min. Turn over the bread slices. Cook for another 5 min.

Take the toasted slices of bread out of the oven and cool on a wire rack.

Cut the toasted bread into cubes.

Souffle omelette with quince jelly

November 5, 2012 By in Breakfast and brunch Leave a comment

Late autumn and winter is quince season; fresh quince is a hard fruit with a sour and astringent taste, so it can’t be eaten raw like an apple or a pear.

It is also a fruit that sets jelly and jams well because it has a high concentration of pectin. Quince can be roasted, baked or poached with sugar, becoming bright red in colour.

It is delicious with meats such as lamb and pork. In Persian cuisine it is used in casseroles or stuffed with meat.

One of my favorite quince products is Membrillo, commonly used in Spain and some Latin American countries. It is hard , dark red jelly which goes great with Manchego cheese.

For breakfast I will make a souffle omlet pared with some quince jelly, I bought from my favorute local shop.

 

Souffle omelette with quince jelly

serves 2

  • 2 eggs
  • 1 teaspoon sugar
  • 1/4 teaspoon vanilla extract
  • 10g butter
  • powder sugar (for decoration)
  • 2 tablespoons quince jelly
  • 2 tablespoons of walnuts, crushed

 

Preheat the oven to 180C /350F.

Separate the eggs.

In a bowl, beat the egg whites until stiff.

Put the egg butter into pan and melt it over the yolk mixture, and than carefully fold in the rest of the whites.

Cook the omelet for 1-2 minutes or until light golden brown underneath.

Put the oven on the medium shelf for 5-6 minutes.

Carefully spread the jam and fold, then with a spatula transfer on a plate and sprinkle with a powder sugar.

Quince sauce

  • 280g quince / or one quince fruit
  • 55g sugar
  • 3 tablespoons of water

Peel and cut the quince into cubes.

Put th cubed quince in a pan together with sugar and water.

Bring to boil, then lower the heat and simmer for about 15 – 20 min or until tender.Sieve the quince and reserve. Return the liquid into the pot.

Bring the liquid to a boil for 1 minute, until it thickens, then pour over the reserved quince. Let it cool.

Put the fruit into a blender and blend until smooth.