Mooncakes

Mooncakes are traditional Chinese cakes eaten during the Mid-Autumn festival (also called Moon festival). This year Moon festival was celebrated on September 25th because it is believed that the moon is supposed to be fullest on this day.

And it is reason enough to celebrate it with you family and of course some mooncakes. This year I was lucky enough to experience Moon festival here in China.

Mooncakes are made in traditional molds and on the top of each one it says what they are filled with. Filling is surrounded by thin dough made of wheat flour. I bought a box of moon cakes that had 12 pieces with 6 different fillings.

Up from the left: coconut, red bean, mung bean
Down from the left: lotus, papaya, nuts and kernels

They are soft cakes, sweet but definitely not too sweet. One of the goals during my stay here in China is to find a good moon cake recipe and to buy moon cake-molds. Which is not quite simple as it sounds, as most Chinese people around here are buying moon cakes already done. My Chinese friend told me that today you can even buy a European version of the moon cake. I kindly asked her what was exactly a European version of the moon cake, and she said: Moon cake filled with chocolate!

As soon as she said it I got a picture and I loved it! But then a true European woke up in me and said: “Moon cakes with Nutella”. I do not know if you would be able to call them moon cakes anymore but I am sure they would do an excellent cake.

I general I think people should dare to mess with traditional cakes a bit more. I would prefer a re-invented traditional cake than a copy of a cake. The Sacher cake is probably the most copied one and at the same time the worst copied cake of them all. Probably because Austrians are not willing to share the recipe but in any case I am tired of seeing all Sacher-copies.

Here in Shanghai I have seen:”Tiramisu with Green Tea”. I have not tried it yet but I love the idea. It is Tiramisu but the name let you know that you should not expect the traditional one. More of that please and let the world know!

Guacamole with pomegranate

This is my favourite guacamole recipe: guacamole with pomegranate. The deliciously fresh taste of avocados and lime is accompanied by pomegranate and its wonderful crunchiness and sweetness, love it. Just make sure that the pomegranate you use is sweet, as a sour pomegranate and lime can make it too sour.

Guacamole can be varied with corn, different chili peppers, nuts, watermelon etc., but it always has the same base with avocados, lime, onion and cilantro. And it never ever, I repeat, never ever contains cream or any kind of diary product. That is, if you want the original Mexican version called Guacamole.

The chips, called “totopos” in Mexico, are made of tortillas that are dried in the oven or fried in the oil until crunchy.

Guacamole with pomegranate
3 avocados
1 smal onion
some chili serrano
3 tbsp pomegranate
1 tbsp lime juice
2 tbsp chopped cilantro
some salt

Mash avocados and lime juice with a fork. Add the rest of the ingredients and mix. Done!

Almond paste "muffins"

These sweet little “muffins” are one of my favourite treats. But they are not really muffins, the shape reminds of muffins but that would be it. These are maid with almond paste and barely any flour. My favourite one is with orange flavour. It is also typical version from the west coast in Sweden where I live. Not that almonds or oranges grow on the west coast :-), or else where in Sweden.

I was actually planning to post this recipe for SHF-going local, but despite they are west-coast they are really not west-coast. In general there are not many sweet local-specialities in Sweden like in rest of the Europe. Here everything is kind of national and international, I guess a bit like IKEA. Anyway, here comes the recipe.


Almond paste "muffins"
10 pieces
200 g almond paste
100 g butter at room temperature
2 eggs
1,5 tbsp flour
½ tsp baking powder
1 tsp freshly grated orange zest

1 dl icing sugar
1-2 tsp water
3 tbsp candid orange zest

Butter and flour the muffin moulds. You should use the smallest cups you have, mine hold 1 dl of liquid.

Grate the almond past and add the butter. Mix everything until smooth and fluffy. Add eggs one at the time. Stir in the flour mixed with baking powder and orange zest. Fill the cups, a bit more than half and bake at 180 C for about 15 minutes. Let cool for some minutes and take them out of the cups. Let cool completely. When cold frost them with the mixture of powder sugar, water and candid orange zest.

Browniebabe

Browniebabe is a wonderful food-blog event founded and hosted by Myriam at Once upon a tart. A babe who can bake an ultimate brownie of the month will get the honour to be a “Browniebabe of the month”.

As the month is August I thought I wanted to bake a summer inspired brownie. Recently I made Cocadas and having Caribbean on my mind I decided that coconut should definitely be one of the ingredients in my brownie.

And for some reason whenever I think of Caribbean I also think of this drink called Coco-Loco. A wonderful coconut-pineapple cocktail, similar to piña colada but better, so you can imagine. So to my recipe I added fresh pineapple as well. And what can I say….. Brownie+August+summer+Caribbean+Coco-Loco = Browniebabe of the month

Coco-Loco Brownie
300 g dark chocolate (at least 65%)
200 g butter
180 g sugar
4 eggs
200 g flour

150 g fresh coconut
1 dl water
0,5 dl sugar
150 g fresh pineapple
2,5 dl milk
1,5 dl sugar
2 tsp corn starch


Start with the Coco-Loco batter. Shred coconut finely. Put 100 g shredded coconut in a saucepan together with 1 dl water and 0,5 dl sugar. Cook for about 30 minutes on a low high-heat until coconut gets transparent and water is gone. In the meantime, cut pineapple in small pieces, the smaller the better. Squeeze out all juice and mix with the cooked coconut.

In another saucepan put 2,5 dl milk and 1,5 dl sugar and cook on a medium high-heat for about 30 minutes. The mixture needs to get thick, a bit thicker than condensed milk. Pour into the coconut-pineapple mixture, add corn starch and blend well. Set aside.

Now make the brownie dough. Melt chocolate and butter together over bain marie. Whip sugar and eggs; add melted chocolate and butter, blend well. Add flour and blend until incorporated.

Pour the batter into a buttered and floured pan (I use cacao instead of flour). The pan should be 20x30 cm. Take a small spoon and “dot” the brownie with small amounts of coco-loco mixture. Bake in preheated oven 200 C for about 20 minutes. When done, let cool and put in the fridge over the night. I really think all chocolate cakes taste better the next day.

Next day roast 50g of shredded coconut, cut the brownie into small pieces, role the sides in the roasted coconut…delicious delicious, simply delicious.

Berry pudding

 
As the berry season is at its peak I needed a new berry recipe. I found couple of different recipes for the ”Summer pudding” on BBCs Good Food but I really didn’t follow any of them. I just got an idea how it should be and then I made 3 individual puddings. Next time I think I will add a vanilla bean and instead of bread loaf use brioche.


 


Berry pudding
500 g different berries (I had blackberries, red currants, blueberries, strawberries and bilberries, on the picture)
½ dl water
as much sugar as u like
3 slices white bread (one day old)
3 tea cups (mine hold 2,5 dl and have 4 cm in diameter)


Put sugar and water in a pot and cook on medium high until sugar is dissolved. Add strawberries and blueberries and cook on a low heat for 2-3 minutes. Add the rest of the berries and cook for another 2 minutes. Set aside to cool down a bit.

Line the tea cups with cling film, leaving an overhang. Cut the crusts of the bread and cut out a circle of each slice. The circle should be big enough to cover the base of the tea cups. When you have 3 circles cut the rest of the bread into smaller cubes.
Put some of the berry juice in a separate bowl. Dip the bread circles in this juice and place on the bottom of the tea cup. Cover with a bit of berries. Now dip the bread-cubes in the juice, they do not need to be soaked completely and fill the cups mixing berries and bread-cubes. Cover with cling film and put something a bit heavy on the top. I had a 100 g tuna can on the top of each cup. Let chill in the fridge for about 4 hours. Invert on a plate and serve with some more fresh berries and maybe some whipped cream.

Amedei chocolate

“Chocolate is a concept. An exotic aspiration of beauty and flavour, embodying the bitterness and darkness of sin, with the sweet captivation of seduction. Chocolate is a subtle form of the inaccessibility of perfection, the flavour of sensual beauty that only intelligence can contemplate, elevating it…”
Cecilia and Alessio Tessieri
(founders of Amedei)

This week I got this "Amedei" chocolate box from my boyfriend, thank you babe! Is the first time I try this brand and I am loving it. This particular box “La Selezioni” has 5 different bars, each bar containing 12 pieces.

One of the bars is "Porcelana" which is made with the finest cacao bean of them all, criollo. Amedei makes about 20 000 Porcelana bars every year and each bar gets a handwritten number on the back. I got the lucky number 03179.

The main advantage of criollo is that it tastes aromatic and not bitter despite the high percentage of cacao, 70% in this case.

By the way, my name is Mila and I am chocoholic…absolutely and unconditionally chocolate lover!

Blueberries and Bilberries...I had no idea

Last week when I made Conchas I discovered that there are blueberries and bilberries. All this time I thought they were the same berry, one just being a bit bigger. But was I wrong.

I realized that one of the biggest contributors to this confusion were their names in English and Swedish. Blueberry is sometimes called “blueberry” and sometimes “American blueberry” in Swedish. And bilberry is also called “blueberry” in Swedish. So you can understand where all this confusion starts.

Bilberries are very Swedish; they grow all over the forests, mostly in the north of the country. And they are very loved and appreciated berries. Sometimes I think that they were probably the first thing that started growing here in the North after all ice melted zillion years ago. And blueberries are imported, meaning more expensive, meaning less popular. You can find them in the stores sold in very small packages among all exotic fruits.

But last week I bought both, blueberries and bilberries. I thought that blueberries would fit better for conchas just because they looked more firm and would be easier to incorporate into the dough (and I was right).

So was I surprised when I saw that blueberries are actually white inside and taste differently? Oh, yes I was. I felt like I was living in a lie all these years :-) just because someone messed it up linguistically.

However, I like both, blueberries and bilberries. Blueberries are meaty and have this pleasant sweet perfume. And bilberries taste forest, in a good way. Bellow you can see the difference, blueberries to the left and bilberries to the right.

Anyway, I still want to know who messed up the linguistic part. How can blueberries and bilberries have the same name in Swedish? Do tell if you know.

Chicken cashew nuggets

This is a recipe from one of the Swedish chefs that has her own TV-show, Leila Lindholm. Her shows are huge inspiration. I adapted this recipe by coating the chicken with some pesto and later following her recipe. What I like the most is that you do not have to fry the nuggets, oven does the work with almost no oil. We like.

Chicken cashew nuggets
Adapted from Leila Lindholm
200 g boneless chicken thighs
2 tbs pesto
1/2 dl flour
1 egg
200 g cashew nuts
salt


Preheat the oven to 200 C. Cut the chicken thighs in 3-4 pieces and rub pesto all over it. Add some salt if you like. Put in the fridge while you are preparing the rest.

Chop cashew nuts finely. I didn’t have patience so I chopped them coarsely, didn’t look as nice but it tastes the same, that is delicious. Take out 3 deep plates, put flour in one, egg in second one, whisk the egg and in the third plate put chopped cashew nuts.

Oil a sheet or aluminium foil on a sheet. Dip the nuggets first in the flour, then in the egg and last in the cashew nuts. Put on the sheet and bake for about 15-20 minutes.

Spätzle

Spätzle are eaten in all German speaking countries around Alps. They are kind of pasta from Alps, very easy to make and very delicious. My favourite version is Käsespätzle, which is Spätzle with cheese (käse=cheese). They are typical comfort food eaten in the winter, and as the summer refuses to come to Sweden I thought it was time for some comfort food.

Spätzle are very easy to make as long as you have a Spätzle-maker that looks like this:

I bought mine in Austria a couple of years ago. It reminds of a grater with big holes and you keep it over the sauce-pot with simmering water and “grind” the dough so that small pieces fall in water and cook for a couple of minutes.

Käsespätzle
serves 2
250 g flour
3 eggs
a bit of nutmeg
2 pinches of salt
200 g grated cheese; I used Gruyère
40 g butter
2 onions

Mix flour, eggs, salt and nutmeg. Mix with wooden spoon until everything is very well blended and the dough starts making some big bubbles. The dough has to be smooth but not too much runny; it should be sluggish and soft. Sepending on how big your eggs are you might need to add some cold water. Let the dough rest for 20 minutes.

In the mean time cut onions in rings, melt the butter on the low heat and fry onions until dark golden. When done take out of the pan but save the pan with the butter.

In a large pot bring water to boil, add salt and reduce the heat so that water simmers. Use your Spätzle-maker or with a help of a knife and a cutting board make Spätzle. Boil for 2 minutes or until they float. When cooked put in the pan where the onions have been previously fried and mix. Add grated cheese and mix until the cheese has melted a bit. Serve with fried onions on the top! Mahlzeit!

Bread Baking Day #2 Conchas with Blueberries

This is my entry for "Bread Baking Day" event that is hosted by Columbus Foodie. The theme is bread with fruit and I decided to make Mexican sweet bread called Conchas.

Concha means shell, as the pattern on the top of the buns reminds of the clam shell and it is a bit crunchy as well. I really like how sweet they look, you instantly know that you will not get disappointed by their taste. Usually they are plane sweet bread with a touch of Mexican cinnamon but I decided to put some blueberries and cardamom inside, and it was a hit.

Conchas
15 g fresh yeast
0.5 dl warm milk
1/2 tsp freshly ground cardamom
5 tbs sugar
1 egg
2 egg yolks
pinch of salt
60 g butter at room temperature
about 4 - 4,5 dl bread flour 
some 100 gr of blueberries

50 g butter
50 g icing sugar
50 g flour

Put the yeast in a bowl and pour warm milk over it. Stir until the yeast has dissolved. Add cardamom, eggs, egg yolks, sugar, salt and flour. When all combined, add butter and kneed until you have a smooth dough. It is a very sticky dough at the beginning but it does come together. Kneed for about 10 minutes before you add any extra flour. When I was done my dough was weighting 560 grams. 

Let rise for about 2 hours or until double in size. 15 minutes before the proofing is done make the topping for conchas. Mix butter and icing sugar very well. Add flour and mix until smooth. Divide in 14 pieces, 10-11 grams each.

Divide the dough for conchas in 14 pieces as well, about 40 grams each and carefully incorporate a bit of blueberries in each bun. Make round balls of all 14 pieces, put on a baking sheet and press each bun down so that it is a little bit flattened.
Now take the topping-dough and make it flat in your palm and as big as each bun. The topping should cover the whole surface of a bun. With the back of a knife make shell pattern. Let rise for 1, 5 hours and bake in preheated oven, 200C for about 10 minutes.

Italian tuna balls

I think this is the best recipe for tuna in a can. It’s brilliant. I used tuna in water instead of tuna in oil; I drained it and added some lemon olive oil, it worked great.

SHF #33 Tropical Paradise

This is my entry for this month’s “Sugar High Friday” that is hosted by Mary at Alpineberry. The theme is “Tropical Paradise”, a perfect theme for the summer, i.e. for those who have summer now. Well in Sweden we are supposed to have summer but it just hasn’t arrived yet. I wonder if it ever will this year. So, to make these tropical coconut sweets was a perfect way to escape the rain and to dream away.

I chose to make a typical Mexican candy called Cocada. Cocada is made of fresh coconut and lots of sugar. It is chewy, very moist and you could say it's a sweet candy with Caribbean written all over it.

Cocada
225 g fresh shredded coconut (doesn’t work with coconut in a bag)
3,5 dl sugar
2 dl water
5 dl milk
1/2 vanilla bean
3 egg yolks
food colouring (optional)


Put coconut, 1,5 dl sugar and water into a sauce pan and cook over medium high-heat for 30-40 minutes. Coconut needs to get transparent with no water in the pan.

In another sauce pan put milk, the rest of the sugar and vanilla bean and while stirring constantly cook over medium-high heat for 30-40 minutes. The mixture needs to get a bit thicker and reduced. Add coconut mixture and mix well. Set aside to cool down a bit.

Preheat the oven to 200 C. Beat the yolks, add them to the coconut mixture and cook over low-heat for a couple of minutes. If you would like to colour the mixture divide the batter here and colour it. Butter a baking pan and pour the batter into it. It should be 1 cm thick. Bake on 200 degrees for 15-20 minutes. When done, let it cool down and then cut into small pieces.

Smoked mussels with tomatoe and ginger sauce

This is my entry for a monthly Swedish event called “Cyberkocken” (Cyberchef). Every month four ingredients are chosen by the blogger who is hosting the event and you are supposed to make a dish that includes all those four ingredients. This month ingredients were given by Anne at "Anne’s food" and they were: mussels, ginger, cilantro and something smoked.

I immediately knew that I want to make a dish with smoked mussels, as I really like them a lot. The only mussels I like more are scallops. But given the ingredients smoked mussels were perfect.

After some looking through my recipes I figured out that I want to wrap them in phyllo dough and make a dipping sauce as well. In a Lufthansa magazine from last summer I found a wonderful tomato and ginger sauce.


Smoked mussels with tomatoe and ginger sauce 
100 g mussels
some cilantro
2 tbsp melted butter
3-4 sheets phyllo dough

4 tomatoes
½ fresh ginger
1 chopped onion
1 chopped garlic glove
juice from one orange
a bit of chili
olive oil

Fry tomatoes and onion for about 5 minutes. Add garlic, ginger and orange juice. Cook for another 5-10 minutes. Add some chili, salt and pepper. Let it cool.

Mix mussels with cilantro. Melt 1 tbsp butter. Take one sheet of phyllo dough and spread the melted butter over it. Put another phyllo sheet over it and cut in squares. I got 12 squares from one sheet.

Put a bit of the sauce on a square and put the mussel on the top. Role it like a spring role. Do the same with the rest of the mussels /squares and when done spread some melted butter on the top. Bake on 200˚C until they get golden, 10-15 minuter.

What’s left of the sauce I mixed and used as a dip sauce.

Zucchini

Zucchini is really one of my favourite vegetables. No matter how you prepare it, it always tastes delicious. And there are tons of ways to prepare zucchini; I use it quite often, as you will discover here on the blog.

However breaded zucchini is one of my favourite things to eat for a late weekend breakfast. And honestly I could eat it every day; sometimes I do that. Mostly when I run short of those 2 late-breakfast-days a week, then I make it as a side dish for dinner or lunch. And no, I never get tired of it. Especially since I discovered amaranth and now sometimes use it instead of breadcrumbs…variation we like after all.

When it comes to preparing breadcrumbs and amaranth covered zucchini I prepare them in two different ways. Breadcrumbs need oil and frying so I fry breaded zucchini in olive oil as usual.
But when it comes to amaranth covered zucchini I bake it for 10 minutes in the oven on a very lightly oiled foil. I do that because when frying amaranth it absorbs oil very easily and can get a bit burned in taste, so I prefer to bake it in the oven.


Breadcrumbs/amaranth covered zucchini  
serves 2
1 medium zucchini
some salt
1 egg
2 tbs milk
salt and pepper
approx. 0.5 dl of flour
approx. 3 dl of breadcrumbs or popped amaranth
olive oil

Peal zucchini and cut it in 2-3 pieces of the same size. Slice each piece in 0.5cm thick slices, sprinkle some salt over and let them rest for 15 minutes so that excess water comes out.

In the meantime prepare 3 deep plates. In the first one put the flour. In the second one beat the egg, add milk, salt and pepper. And in the third one put breadcrumbs or popped amaranth.

Dip each slice of zucchini first in the flour, then in the egg and last in the breadcrumbs or amaranth. Zucchini covered with breadcrumbs is fried in some olive oil and zucchini covered with amaranth is baked in the oven on a lightly oiled foil, on 200˚C for about 10 minutes. Turn them around after 5 minutes.

C&C - Chai and Cookies

I haven’t been to India….yet….but India has found a way to me. Chai is Indian spiced milk tea and it is the most amazing milk tea made of black tea and different spices like cardamom, anis, cloves…sugar and milk. There are many ways of preparing Chai but after trying for some time I got the spice combination I like the most. And on a chocolate-craving day Chai Hot Chocolate is a perfect rescue.

And what goes better with Chai if not cookies. I made cookies called “dreams” in Swedish. And as I was into spices already I also added my precious cacao-beans I bought on a farmers market in Mexico. And “dreams” turned into “dreams with wonderful touch of true chocolate taste”…so I called them “true dreams”.

These cookies are made with baker's ammonia and that is the only way to get the "dream" texture that makes them so distinguishable from all other cookies. 

I will be enjoying my Cookies and Chai Hot Chocolate while checking all wonderful recipes of this month’s “Waiter there’s something in my…” round-up.


Chai Hot Chocolate
serves 2
5 dl milk
3 cinnamon sticks (all together15 cm)
1/2 tbs green cardamom pods
½ teaspoon black pepper
2 pinches ground ginger (2 ml)
2 pinches crashed anise seeds (2 ml)
1 pinch ground cloves (1 ml)
1 tbs Darjeeling black tea
70g dark chocolate

In a saucepan mix milk and spices and heat to a simmer. Let it simmer for 10 minutes. Remove from the heat and let it steep for another 15 minutes. Heat it up to the boiling point and add tea, let steep for 5 minutes.
Chop chocolate finely, take the tea out of the milk and add chocolate to the milk, whisk until smooth. Return to the stove and heat until desired temperature.

True Dream Cookies
100g butter
2,5 dl sugar
2 tsp vanilla sugar
1 dl corn oil
1 tsp baker's ammonia
4,5 dl four
1,5 dl cacao nibs

Preheat oven to 150˚C. Mix butter, sugar and vanilla sugar for 2-3 minutes. Add the oil gradually. Mix together flour, baking soda and cacao nibs and add it to the butter mixture. When everything is mixed make about 50 balls (3 cm in diameter), flatten them a bit and place them on a parchment paper. Bake cookies for 20 minutes and when they are done place them on a wire rack until they get cold.

Waiter, there’s something in my…Mexican Stuffed Sweet Peppers

It is my first WTSIM (Waiter, There’s Something In My…) and I am so glad that I found a great recipe to contribute with. I chose a recipe that is called Stuffed Sweet Chili Peppers.

I used red and yellow Sweet Pointed Peppers and they were stuffed with a mixture of ground meat, vegetables, cooking banana, almonds and raisins. Usually stuffing that includes ground meat has rice as well and it is not one of my favourites, so this recipe was an excellent alternative. The only thing I will change next time is peppers, I will only use yellow ones, felt like they fit more than the red ones.


Mexican stuffed sweet peppers 
Adapted from "Cosina Mexicana"
4 sweet peppers
100 ml (60 g) of flour
3 eggs
oil for frying

1 small onion
2 garlic cloves
2 tomatoes
1 medium boiled potato
200 g of ground meat
2 tbs of chopped olives
2 tbs of chopped almonds
2 tbs of chopped raisins
1/2 cooking banana
salt and pepper
some oregano

To prepare: peal potato and cook it until it gets medium boiled. Cut banana in four pieces and fry it in a bit of oil until it gets golden. When potato and banana are done cut them in small pieces and set aside. Wash and clean peppers, take out the seeds and membranes. I usually cut a T in the pepper and take out the seeds and membranes with a small spoon.

To make stuffing: Cut onion and garlic and fry them in some oil without them getting color. Add tomatoes and potato and after 5 minutes add the meat. Cook for another 20 minutes and add the rest of ingredients. Cook for 5 minutes more and when it's done stuff the peppers. Let rest while preparing the frying batter.

Beat the egg whites until stiff peaks form. Add yolks, flour and a pinch of salt. Blend carefully until everything is mixed well.

Heat the oil to medium hot. As I like my peppers to be a bit crunchy I used just a bit more oil than when you fry eggs. But if you like peppers to be soft you can always finish them in the oven after frying. Frying is just to make the batter nice and golden.
Take stuffed peppers and turn them around in the flour until covered. Dip in the egg batter and fry until they get golden. Put them to drip off the excess oil on kitchen paper. Bon appétit!

Amaranth

Yet another Mexican obsession of mine…amaranth! This tiny seed is more than perfect. Amaranth has been used by ancient Aztecs and is still used in Mexico. Most commonly candy bars called "Alegría" are made of it. But amaranth can be used in many, many other ways: you can make porridge, you can make flour of it, you can pop it and make sweets or add to your cereal, you can cook it just as you cook quinoa…

For all these reasons I am really fascinated by this little grain and as a plus it is also ultra healthy, gluten-free, vegan, heart-friendly, just name it. And the best thing ever, I can buy it in my local supermarket here in Sweden.

As I first tried Amaranth in an amaranth-chocolate bar I will also start my amaranth-recipe series with it. It is very easy to make it, hardest part being popping amaranth. As the seed is very tiny (poppy seed tiny) is very easy to burn it. It is almost like popping popcorn but without oil, so make sure you have a lid ready.

What I do is the following: first I heat a 15 cm saucepan, it needs to be very hot, and add no more than 1 tablespoon of amaranth. Pop them, shaking the pan all the time, for about 5 seconds, lift from the stove and let finish popping.
The one on the left on the picture above is amaranth that has not been popped and the one in the right is popped one.

Amaranth chocolate bars
100gr chocolate (white, milk, dark)
10 tablespoons popped amaranth (or as much as you like, but not to much as the chocolate needs to hold it together)

Melt chocolate, let it cool a bit, it should not be hot when you stir in amaranth. Stir in amaranth, mix well and shape as you want. Let chill and is ready to serve!

Budapest role and strawberries

Budapest role is a wonderful cake that is very popular here in Sweden. The traditional version is made of soft meringue-cake and filled with whipped cream and mandarin/tangerine. It tastes lovely. But as the Spanish strawberry season has reached Sweden I decided to make a Budapest role with a touch of Spain, strawberries that is.
 
I made the basic meringue-cake, filled it with strawberry mousse and strawberries and named it Madrid role...had to give some credit to those strawberries for tasting strawberries despite the long journey to the North. In any case I am looking forward to the Swedish strawberry season which is getting closer and closer (mid June)…

I made strawberry mousse that takes slightly more time to make as it needs to be in the fridge over night. It always turns out great so I stick to the technique.

Madrid role
6 egg-whites
300 ml (250 g) of sugar
1 tbsp of lemon juice
2 tbs of cornstarch
100 g almond flakes

500 g strawberries
2 tbs lime juice
100 g white chocolate
300 ml cream
4 g of gelatine (2 leaves)

To make mousse: purée 250gr strawberries in a blender and add one tablespoon of lime juice, set aside. Put the gelatine in cold water for 10 minutes. Chop chocolate and put in a big bowl. Heat 150ml cream up to the boiling point and pure over the chocolate, stir until blended. Add the soft gelatine sheets, blend until gelatine melts. Add strawberry purée and the rest of the cream. Cover with plastic foil and put in the fridge over night.

Next day start with the meringue-cake: preheat oven to 140˚C. Grease lightly parchment paper and dust with flour. Whip egg whites until soft peaks. Add 250 ml of sugar gradually and whip until stiff peaks form. Mix the rest of the sugar with cornstarch and add to the meringue. Mix in the lemon juice. Fill a pastry bag with meringue. Pipe lines on the parchment paper, the cake should be 30x30cm. Sprinkle with almond flakes and bake for 1 hour.

In the meantime prepare another sheet of parchment paper which you sprinkle with caster sugar. I also used sugar sprinkles with strawberry taste. When the cake is done, let it cool for about 10 minutes, invert it on the ready parchment paper and peel of the parchment paper where the cake baked on. Let it cool.

Cut the rest of the strawberries in smaller pieces and add one table spoon of lime juice, set aside. Take the strawberry mousse out of the fridge and whip it until the stiff peaks form, fold in the strawberries.

When the cake is cold spread the mousse over it. Role the cake to form a log and refrigerate for at least 2 hours.