Beaver Tails in Ottawa

Beavers Tail is a fried dough pastry that resembles beaver's tail. It comes with large variety of toppings, one on the left is with apple and one on the right is with maple syrup and maple butter. Very delicious!

New chocolate from Yogi Tea!

Yogi Tea has started making chocolate! I have tried their Cinnamon Spice and Mexican Spice chocolates and they are so good. Although Cinnamon Spice was tasting more like the traditional Mexican drinking chocolate than the Mexican Spice chocolate it self. But I did enjoy both very much so!

Champurrado

Champurrado is another Mexican drink made with cacao beans that is really amazing. The difference from the Mexican hot chocolate is that ground corn is used to thicken it up (the same corn flour used to make tortillas) and it is not as sweet as the hot chocolate. If you have Mexican chocolate discs you can easily make champurrado by adding some corn flour until you have slightly thick chocolate.

However, last time we were in Mexico I picked up a bag of champurrado mix by a brand Kekua. The ingredients are: corn, sugar, cacao, cinnamon and soy lecithin. You add 3 tbsp of this mix to a cup of milk or water, boil it, froth it, done.

I really like this mix, it is perfectly sweet and thick, they just could have added a bit more of the cinnamon.

Favorite bakery in Munich

Hofpfisterei is my favourite bakery here in Munich. They make amazing breads, sweet breads, danishes, cookies...just name it. All bread is organic sourdough and they have so many variates. My favourite  bread is called '1331', a blend of rye and wheat. But to be honest I love them all.

And their poppy seed streusel and hazelnut-braid, oh my oh my, addiction for ever and ever.

Mexican drinking chocolate

Never return from Mexico without chocolate. I live by this wise rule. These are Mexican drinking chocolates I got when we were on the visit last time. Two are bought in a supermarket, one at the market and one at the airport. I liked three of them, but the fourth one (the largest disk) not so much as it was too sweet.

And I finally bought the traditional chocolate whisk, molinillo. The Mexican hot chocolate has to have a thick froth on the top (has to) and molinillo, together with some elbow grease, makes a wonderful froth...

...and it is a beautiful piece of wooden art as well.

Maypole

Ebersberg is a small town in Bavaria, about 30 kilometers south of Munich, and on the 1st of May the inhabitants of this small town gather to erect the Maypole (Maibaum in German). The tradition goes way back in time and if you are in this part of the world 1st of May it is definitely a great experience.

This maypole was about 30 meters tall and it was erected by some 30 men with a help of a forklift. It took them a bit more than an hour to put the pole on the place and another hour to decorate the pole with shields that represent the crafts and industry of the town.

And everything was observed by huge crowed sitting in the beer garden, chatting about how the work is advancing, enjoying beer, sausages, sauerkraut and cakes (loved it). Long live traditions like this one!

Made in Sweden

These chocolate truffles are very Swedish. They are handmade in Sweden and filling is made with cloudberry. Cloudberry is a berry that likes the very North of the Northern Hemisphere and for that reason it can be found in the woods in Nordic countries. Have you ever tried Finnish Cloudberry liquor? Super sweet and super delicious!

Pan de higo

Pan de higo, or fig bread is another Spanish delicacy that is made with dried figs, almonds and anise. It is a tasty winter snack that is very easily made at home.

I have not tried to make it at home yet, but I think blending dried figs with some ground almonds, anise seeds, or even better anise liquor gives the same result. And rolling the fig mixture into small balls, adorning with an almond and serving with the goat cheese would give cute and fancy winter appetizer.

Manchego and quince

This is another tapas (small Spanish "snack", usually eaten before dinner) we got to try in Spain. It is Spanish Manchego cheese that is eaten with a sweet paste made of quince. We brought with us two huge pieces of each and I cannot get enough of it.

The cheese is made of sheep´s milk, it is mild in flavour and it is a wonderful companion to the quince paste. In general I just love everything about quince, and this combination has become my new quince favourite.

I also want to try the combination of quince cooked in syrup and Manchego, could be something. The fall and first quince are soon here and I believe I will give it a try.

Currywurst

Currywurst is German national dish from Berlin. It is basically pork sausage that is fried in oil, sliced and served with curry-tomato sauce and curry powder. On the side you can find either french fries or bread roll, ketchup and/or mayonnaise.

It is so popular in the entire country that it is ranked top 5 favourite dish of the German. Bavaria might be kingdom of the sausages but Berlin currywurst is the Queen of them all.

Currywurst turns 60 this years and as the birthday present in August it is getting its own museum, Currywurst museum. I do not know if I would visit the museum but a currywurst when in Berlin is a must!

Thyme chocolate

Chocolate and thyme, I never thought that this combination could be so delicious. And addition of flax seeds, which are rich in omega 3, makes this chocolate a nice new addition to the ever expanding world of chocolate.

White Stilton

It looks like a cheesecake but it is not. It is a piece of English white Stilton cheese dotted with cranberries. I love it. It is creamy but at the same time it crumbles easily, the taste is mild and cranberries are slightly sweet. And on a piece of your favourite cracker it becomes a true English delicacy.

Crackers

45 crackers, 5x5 cm

1 dl kamut flour

3 tbsp buckwheat flour

1 tbsp olive oil

pinch of salt
4 tbsp of water

fresh or dried oregano, thyme, rosemary...

2 tsp poppy seeds (or sesame, caraway, fennel, coriander seeds...)

Preheat oven to 200 C. Mix the flours with salt, add oil and water (herbs if using) and kneed until you have smooth dough. Roll into a square 35x35 cm. Cut into smaller squares, 5x5 cm, brush lightly with water, sprinkle the seeds, transfer the crackers on a baking sheet and bake until golden, about 10 minutes.

Drinking chocolate from Schwarzwald (Black Forest)

Schwarzwald is a low-mountain range situated in the southwestern part of Germany. It is probably one of the most famous parts of Germany thanks to its beautiful nature and quite few very famous products that come from Schwarzwald:

Cuckoo clocks...once I had a neighbour who was in a bad mood when the hour struck and the bird started cuckooing. The bird never cuckooed again.

Kirschwasser....brandy made of cherries, 42% cherry brandy that is.

Black Forest cake...cherries, chocolate, whipped cream and cherry brandy, d e l i c i o u s!

Black Forest ham. This is my favourite smoked ham. If you ask me it is so much better than prosciutto and serrano.




Rottweiler dog breed is named after a small town in Schwarzwald called Rottweil.

If I now go back to the cherry brandy. What do you get if you add some chocolate and a spoon? You get drinking chocolate from Schwarzwald.

This very creative drinking chocolate is made by Schwarzwälder Genusswerkstatt , roughly translated to "Indulgence workshop of Black Forest".
It comes with a spoon, a capsule filled with cherry brandy and a huge cube of chocolate (58%). All you need is to put it in the hot milk, wait until chocolate melts, squeeze out the brandy and you got your own drinking chocolate from the Black Forest...I like a lot!

Goat vs. goat

There is only one thing I like about goats, their milk. But otherwise I dislike goats, they are strange creatures...they can run fast, some have horns, they can jump very high...all that puts them in my category of "unpredictable animals to stay away from". As a child I was very afraid of them, and today I just like their milk.

These days there are many diary products made of goat milk, especially many cheeses and spreads. However goat milk is also used to make sweets. One I have mentioned before, Cajeta, the Mexican caramel spread made of goat milk. I like it a lot, goat milk taste is very strong but caramel is there too, mmmmm

New favourite is goat milk chocolate! The one I tried is organic and made in Austria. The texture and color is exactly like cow milk chocolate, but taste is goat milk. It is not strong in taste as Cajeta, there is only a mild goat milk taste at the end. Goatlicious!

Green tea cake and Olympics

Olympics have started! We enjoyed the opening ceremony with this wonderful green tea cake....delicious, delicious, delicious! The cake is filled with one layer of whipped cream & fruits and one layer with whipped cream & red beans.

Dim sum

Dim sum is one of the Chinese cuisines and it represents food that comes in small portions, usually served in small bamboo steamers. Dim sum cuisine is the part of Cantonese cuisine (Hong-Kong, Macau and southern part of mainland China). So when in Hong-Kong we went to a typical dim-sum restaurant and it was a great new experience.

After we got our table a waitress came, served us jasmine tea, gave us a sheet of paper with our table number, we made drink order and then we waited for the dum sum-lady with a trolley.

There were 3 different dim sum trolleys and they were frequently passing buy. So to order, you just stop the lady with the trolley and point or say which dishes you would like to have. We never saw a menu in English and we never asked for one, so all dishes we tried were chosen completely randomly. And random was great!

Steamed shrimp dumplings


Baked pork buns - these buns have savory pork filling but on the top they are glazed with sugar. It was a little but unusual but at the same time delicious.




Steamed lotus leaf with rice and pork filling

Rice noodle rolls filled with pork and served with some kind of sweet soy sauce.

Fried dumplings

Bean and chickpea jelly dessert








Coconut jelly

Moon cake season

Mid-autumn festival is mid September this year but already now many shops have started selling moon cakes. I passed by one of the tea houses here in Shanghai and saw that they are selling moon cakes made with tea. Moon cake with green filling is made with mint tea and the other one is made with rose tea. They tasted quite good, felt a bit lighter than the traditional moon cakes.

Chinese style icecream

Forget about cream and eggs, Chinese style icecream is all about ice. A pile of shaved ice is covered with different type of fruits, jelly, red beans, mung beans and it is sweetened with condensed milk. I guess condensed milk has been added lately as it is not a Chinese ingredient. Sometimes icecreams come with a soy milk jelly on the top.

I like Chinese style icecream, it is refreshing and works perfectly for hot summer days in Shanghai. I think it would be a nice addition to all cold desserts in the western part of the World as well. Western types of icecreams have found their way to China, Häagen-Dazs has stores all over the city and not to mention all other brands. Lets see if Chinese style icecream ever reaches the west.

Shanghai breakfast

Shanghai breakfast is definitely the best part of Shanghai cuisine. And probably the reason why Shanghai people are as fit as they are. Few things Shanghai people eat for breakfast:

Pan fried shengjian dumplings are sold on every corner in the mornings and when you see them freshly made you cannot pass by without having a couple.
Dumplings are filled with pork and stock. Stock has previously been cooked until it reaches jelly stage, then cut into pieces and used in the filling. Later on when dumplings are pan fried, stock melts and dumplings become the most wonderful dumplings on this planet Earth, mmmmmm....

Pao fan, or rice congee is eaten as breakfast dish. Rice is boiled in water and later stock and vegetables are added. Very simple and delicious. But being western this dish was eaten on VERY late-breakfast weekends. I can handle milk-rice in the early mornings but that's about it when it comes to rice and mornings.

Soy milk and green tea. Green tea drinking doesn't stop at breakfast. Most of the people carry a bottle of green tea with them all day long.