German Cream of Chanterelle Soup: Pfifferlingrahmsuppe

Fall is Pfifferling (chanterelle) season. They're all over the farmer's markets in glorious colour and ridiculously low prices. They're also all over the menus about town -- amongst them, pasta with chanterelles, spätzle with chanterelles, salads with warm chanterelle dressing, chanterelle toasts, schnitzel with chanterelles (a slightly fancier version of the old standby Jägerschnitzel) and of course, chanterelle soup.

I was inspired to make this one after having a really excellent version at Zum Goldstein, here in Mainz. I fully expect to eat a lot more chanterelles before the season winds down.

I've now made two versions of this soup - the first one partially thickened with potato, which is a common recipe in these parts, and the second thickened with a bit of flour and use of a stick-blender. The first one was too potato-forward for my taste - it obscured the delicate mushroom fragrance and flavour. The second one was beautiful. Nothing but rich, creamy mushroom goodness.

German Cream of Chanterelle Soup: Pfifferlingrahmsuppe

Serves 3 - 4

300 grams fresh chanterelles, cleaned and chopped
1/2 small yellow onion, finely chopped
2 cloves garlic, finely chopped
2 tablespoons unsalted butter
3 sprigs fresh thyme
1/4 teaspoon ground white pepper
1/8 teaspoon celery salt
2 tablespoons brandy
2 tablespoons unbleached flour
300 - 400 mL vegetable broth, at room temperature
300 mL whole milk
100 mL whipping cream

Clean the mushrooms really thoroughly, and slice a few for garnish, chopping the rest roughly.

Melt half the butter in a medium-large soup pot and fry up a few of the nicest looking slices of mushroom until dark golden. Put aside to use as garnish. Add the rest of the butter, melt it, then add the onion and garlic. Cook and stir until translucent, then add the chopped mushrooms, fresh thyme sprigs, celery salt, and white pepper. Cook and stir until the liquid boils off and the mushrooms are tender but starting to catch on the bottom of the pot. Deglaze with the brandy, and scrape the bottom if necessary. Add the milk and stir, and bring the temperature up to a bare simmer.

Shake together the water (cold, or at room temperature) with the flour until it makes a smooth slurry. Add the slurry to the soup, stirring it through and continuing to stir as it heats and thickens. Continue to cook the soup on the lowest setting, with the soup bubbling a tiny bit, stirring frequently for about 20 minutes or until the taste of raw flour is gone, and the soup is thick. Add the cream, and stir through again.

Remove from the heat, remove the now-naked thyme stems, and puree the soup with a stick blender until smooth and golden. Taste and adjust for salt if necessary. If the soup is too thick, thin it with a little extra water or vegetable broth. Ladle the soup into bowls and top with the reserved fried mushrooms and an extra bit of fresh thyme, if you have it. I placed a tiny raft of toast under the fried mushrooms to keep from them sinking into the soup, but it's of course not entirely necessary.

For those who aren't vegetarians, I can also recommend the local way of serving this - instead of fried mushrooms, sear small cubes of blood sausage and use that as a garnish. The salty, meaty, soft texture of the sausage goes perfectly with the soup.

Looking for more chanterelle recipes? Check out my post from last year for Chanterelle Risotto.

Moroccan Chicken with Olives and Preserved Lemon: Djaj M'qualli bi Zeitoun

Chicken, lemon, and olives are a delicious culinary trinity that appear together in many iterations from many cultures, especially those around the Mediterranean Sea. If you've tried my sure-fire dinner classic Chicken Sahara, you'll find a version particularly adapted to the North American manner of cooking. If you look into the dish's roots, though, you'll find one of its fascinating grandparents in Djaj M'qualli (transliterations of which also vary quite wildly).

This is a traditional Moroccan dish, with a complex harmony of flavours and a really impressive use of onions. The recipe classically also uses a chicken liver in the sauce, which I wasn't able to arrange despite having had chicken livers the night before, but I'd really like to do it that way next time. Unlike Chicken Sahara, or many of the chicken-lemon-olive tagine recipes out there, this is, as you can see, something of an almost dry dish - the sauce reduces to a thick gravy that drapes over the chicken rather than providing a pool for it to swim in. This recipe was adapted minimally from Fleur d'Oranger, Masala & Co.

One more thing: If you made Preserved Lemons back in January? This is a terrific use for them!

Moroccan Chicken with Olives and Preserved Lemon

Serves 4

4 chicken leg quarters, whole, skin on
3 medium yellow onions, finely chopped
2 cloves of garlic, crushed
1 chicken liver (optional)
1 cup Moroccan purple or green olives
1/2 preserved lemon (or several pieces, seeds removed)
1 tablespoon soft or melted butter
1/2 teaspoon coarse salt
1/2 teaspoon freshly ground black pepper
1/2 teaspoon ground white pepper
1 teaspoon ground ginger
1/2 teaspoon ground cumin
1/2 teaspoon ground cayenne
1/2 teaspoon ground paprika
pinch of saffron threads, lightly warmed in a dry skillet
Water, as needed

For extra juicy chicken, brine it for four hours or so before proceeding.

Rinse and dry the chicken pieces. Combine the butter and the spices (except the saffron) into a spice paste, and massage all of the chicken parts thoroughly with the mixture. Lay the chicken pieces skin-side up in a single layer in a large skillet, and sprinkle the finely chopped onions and crushed garlic in between the pieces. Add enough fresh cool water to come half-way up the chicken. Turn the heat on high, and bring the water up to a simmer. Reduce the heat to the minimum, cover, and let the chicken simmer very gently until tender, about an hour.

Preheat the oven to 220C/425F.

Remove the lid from the skillet and use tongs to remove the chicken pieces to a baking sheet (I used a pizza pan). Place the chicken, uncovered in the oven and roast for 10-15 minutes or until golden brown.

While the chicken browns and crisps, turn the heat up to high under the onion/water mixture and start stirring and scraping the mixture, reducing the water and cooking down the onion down to a thick mass. Add the chicken liver now, if using, grating it into the sauce as it cooks. Continue to cook and stir as it reduces. Add the olives, and add the saffron now, too (rub it between your fingers over the pan to crush the threads). Slice away and reserve the peels of the preserved lemon and add the middle parts to the gravy. Continue to cook and stir as the sauce thickens up until it is a thick gravy.

Remove the browned chicken from the oven and arrange on a platter. Spoon the gravy (called a deghmira), including the olives, over the chicken. Thinly slice the preserved lemon peels and decorate the chicken with the resultant strips.

Serve with warm bread and a salad or two.

The lucky person who got to take leftovers to work the next day reported that the sauce was even better on the second day, so it might well be worth making this ahead, especially if you're having guests to dinner.

Gingered Plum Crisp

Apple Crisp is one of my favourite homemade desserts. It's good enough to serve to company, yet still relaxed enough for any casual supper. Even better, if there is any leftover, you can easily enjoy it the next day for breakfast. Fruit, oats, right? Practically health food.

This is not Apple Crisp, of course, but it follows the same principles of preparation: pile your fruit into a baking dish, sprinkle with sugar, add a crumbly layer of oat streusel, and bake. The biggest difference between this and my Apple Crisp, in fact, aside from the use of plums instead of apples, is the spicing. Oh, and this one's vegan. Don't worry, though, you can always replace the coconut oil with butter, if that's how you roll. The coconut oil gives it a delicately tropical note that is very pleasant with the ginger and the plums. You could also accentuate that aspect by adding a tablespoon of grated unsweetened coconut to the oat mixture.

I made one larger baking dish (16-centimetre round baking dish, not pictured), and these two little gem-sized (perfect for bento, might I add) to take to work to share with a colleague. I forgot to take any pictures of the larger one, but here are the little bitty ones.

Gingered Plum Crisp

Fruit Layer
500 grams prune plums
1 tablespoon raw sugar
1 inch fresh ginger root, coarsley grated

Crisp Layer
1/2 cup all-purpose flour
1/2 cup rolled oats
1/2 cup raw sugar
1/4 teaspoon kosher salt
1 teaspoon ground ginger
1/2 teaspoon ground coriander seed
3 tablespoons solid-state coconut oil

Wash the plums and slice them in halves to remove the pits. Chop them into small bite-sized chunks (not too small, or they will lose too much texture). Toss with sugar and ginger, and put them evenly into an baking dish. They should come up about three quarters of the height of the dish. If you are using silicone cup moulds, put them on a tray or inside another baking dish for stability. Fill them 3/4 high, too.

In a medium mixing bowl, combine the dry ingredients of the topping with a fork. Add the coconut oil last, and stir very thoroughly with a fork or pastry blender to ensure that the oat mixture gets thoroughly coated. There should be very little dry and no floury-looking bits, so keep stirring until it all comes together. If you absolutely have to, add another tablespoon of oil (you shouldn't need to). If you press a bit of the topping between your fingers, it should clump together in a crumbly sort of way.

Scrape the topping out of the bowl onto the fruit. Spread it out to evenly cover all of the plums, and press lightly with your fingers to help create a surface-crust when it bakes. Don't press too hard, or you'll compact the topping and it will be a bit tough. Note that you can fill your dish right up to the edge, since it will "settle" a little as it bakes. If your plums are very juicy, they might bubble up a bit over top of the oat mixture in places. This is fine, if not quite as tidy looking.

Bake uncovered at 375 F/190 C for 40 minutes (25 for the little ones), or until the topping has taken on a dark golden hue and has sunk down in the dish slightly. It might be a bit darker on the edges - that's okay. Allow to cool at least a few minutes before serving (but it is plenty delicious at room temperature, or chilled, too). Serve on its own, or with a topping of your choice. Whipped coconut milk, perhaps?


Adorable, aren't they? Just perfect for dessert, breakfast, bento, or a tea-time treat.

Oyakodon: Japanese Chicken & Egg Rice Bowl

Oyakodon, or "parent-child rice bowl" (in reference to the use of both chicken and egg in the same dish) is a beloved Japanese comfort food. It is simple food, quickly and easily prepared, packed with protein and satisfaction. It is also cooked without any additional fat, which means it doesn't taste or feel heavy.

It can be a wetter or drier dish, but in all the different oyakodon I've eaten over the years, the biggest point of variation that I've encountered is the amount of onions used. But, like many recipes that are based on loose formulae, you can really make your own decision about the relative levels of pretty much all of the ingredients, so once you know the basic formula and general ingredients, you can make it however you like. I like a moderate amount of onions and I add fresh ginger to mine, which isn't exactly canon, but goes beautifully.

This dish can also be halved for a simple supper for one.

Oyakodon

2 servings

2 cups hot, cooked Japanese rice

1 uncooked chicken breast or 2 chicken thighs
1 small-to-medium yellow onion
3 coins of fresh ginger
2 eggs, lightly beaten
1-2 tablespoons less-sodium Japanese soy sauce
1 tablespoon mirin
2 tablespoons sake
1/2 teaspoon sugar
1 cup vegetable stock (you can also use dashi, kombu stock)
1 green onion
Togarashi pepper blend, to taste

Peel and halve the yellow onion, and slice thinly lengthwise. Stack the ginger coins, and slice them into thin slivers. Clean the green onion, and slice it thinly on a steep angle. Slice the chicken breast horizontally into two filets, and slice those crosswise into strips.

In a shallow skillet over moderate heat, heat the stock with the sugar, mirin, saki, and soy sauce. Add the sliced yellow onion and the ginger slices, and push them down into the broth. Once the onions are translucent and a little of the broth has cooked down, add the chicken strips, and push them down into the broth. Cook the chicken for about five to seven minutes or until just cooked through.

Add the beaten eggs in a thin stream, pouring them evenly around the chicken in the skillet, pop the lid on for about 30 seconds until the eggs are just set, during which time you can divide the rice between two bowls. Using a large serving spoon, slide the chicken, onions, and eggs out of the skillet overtop the rice. Pour a little or a lot of the broth around the edges of the bowl to bring extra flavour to the rice.

Top each bowl with green onion and a sprinkle of Togarashi, and serve (I also added some toasted sesame seeds).

Traditionally, the egg is added at the very last minute (into the individual bowls, even), and cooked solely by the heat of the broth, chicken and rice, but I prefer to let the eggs set a bit more. If you're not sure how safe your eggs are to consume raw, definitely cook them through.

Biscuit Brats

Germany doesn't seem to have much in the way of sausage rolls, despite their willingness to incorporate sausages into almost every other part of the cuisine. There are various bread-y Stangen ("rods" or "poles") which might contain a more wiener-style sausage as a sort of topping, and the less common Geflügel Rolle ("Poultry Roll"), which actually comes closest, I guess, while also managing to be completely different.

Normally when I make sausage rolls, I use puff pastry. While that is definitely an option here - either housemade rough-puff or purchased from the refrigerator section of the supermarket, I wanted something that I could knock together at a moment's notice without a trip to the store. Since I frequently have some bratwurst on hand, and almost always have the necessary components for making biscuits, I found it logical to combine them. These are the results of my first foray.

I note that I started with wide, uncooked bratwurst, but I would either switch to narrower sausages or pre-cook them next time to avoid oven-time past the point of the biscuit being cooked, to avoid any toughening of the exterior.

Biscuit Brats

500 grams fresh bratwurst
2 cups all purpose flour
4 teaspoons baking powder
1/2 teaspoon coarse salt (eg. Kosher or sea salt)
1/2 teaspoon cream of tartar
1 teaspoon sugar
1/3 cup butter
3/4 cup milk

Preheat the oven to 220 C/ 450 F.

Take a sharp knife and run it down the length of each sausage, slicing just through the casing. Carefully peel the cases away and discard. The sausages should retain their shape and integrity. If you're going to precook the sausages (probably a good idea if you're using thick ones), you can do it now, by sautéing them gently over medium heat until barely cooked through. Put them aside to cool while you make the biscuit dough.

In a medium mixing bowl, sift together the dry ingredients - to be fair, I don't really sift, I aerate them with a whisk, but do whichever pleases you most. Using a pastry-blender or a fork (and a lot of patience), cut in the butter until the mixture is crumbly and the little lumps of fat are about corn-kernel sized.

Create a well in the middle of the mixture and pour the milk in all at once. Hold the bowl steady and, using a fork, stir rapidly and briefly until the dough comes together in a ragged mass. Quickly dump it out onto a clean counter, and knead very lightly and briefly until all the flour is incorporated. You may need to add a little extra flour, but probably not. Go cautiously - too much flour makes tough biscuits.

Pat out the dough into a rectangle, and then roll with a rolling pin or bottle to get a dough that is about a centimetre thick. Lay one of the sausages along the edge to mark the length, and slice the dough accordingly. Roll the sausage along the dough to see where to cut it to make an exact cylinder of biscuit dough to surround the sausage. Cut the dough, and either use it as a template for the other sausages, or repeat with each sausage. If you have any leftover dough, you can simply cut it into rough biscuit shapes, and cook them alongside.

Lay the sausages in the middle of the squares of biscuit dough. If you want to get fancy and add some additional seasonings - a bit of curry powder, or cayenne, perhaps? - sprinkle it over the sausages now. Wrap the dough carefully around each sausage, pressing the seam gently to make sure it doesn't separate while cooking.



(You can see which one has cayenne, here)

Place the rolls on an ungreased cookie-sheet and bake for 15 minutes (may need 10 min longer if starting with large, raw sausages), or until they have gotten tall and golden. Serve with a bit of mustard, or ketchup (regular or curry) if that's your thing.

These are very filling, and make an excellent lunchbox item.

Curried Spaghetti with Prawns

This dish is essentially a hybrid other recipes, which came together as I was fondly recollecting the kind of curried pasta that was always on the menu of a certain kind of casual Canadian-Italian restaurant in the late 1980s. That said, this one owes most of its technique to Nigella Lawson's Lone Linguine with White Truffle Oil, although my proposed serving size is smaller than hers by half. So by all means, go ahead and add a couple of slices of your favourite garlic toast.

You could also use fresh spinach in place of the arugula, of course, but I like the peppery bite of the arugula against the richness of the sauce. A glass of Pinot Grigio goes remarkably well with this, too, if you're so inclined.

It's really fast to make. Basically, in just the amount of time it takes to boil the water, cook the pasta, and toss it all together, dinner is ready. Perfect weeknight fare.

You can use whatever kind of curry powder you like, or blend your own. I’ve used a hot Indian curry powder, but Madras would be nice, or even a Caribbean curry blend.

Curried Spaghetti with Prawns

Serves 2

112 grams spaghetti
1 egg, beaten
3 tablespoons whipping cream
3 tablespoons grated parmesan cheese
1/4 tsp curry powder
1 1/2 tablespoon unsalted butter, divided
225 grams raw prawns or large shrimp, deshelled
1 1/2 cups arugula

Set a pot of water (for pasta) to boil over medium-high heat.

For the prawns, rinse them well under cool water and let defrost in a bowl of cool water until they regain their flexibility. Drain thoroughly, and pat dry with a paper towel (they should not go into the skillet wet).

Salt the now-boiling water and add the pasta. Cook al dente or to taste. That's about 10 minutes for the spaghetti I have at hand, but check your packaging. If you're serving garlic bread, make sure it's already underway by this point.

While the pasta cooks, whisk together the egg, cream, Parmesan, and curry powder in a small mixing bowl. If your curry powder is salt-free, you may wish to add a pinch of sea salt.

Wash the arugula and shake off excess water; no need to spin it dry.

Just before the pasta is ready, heat a large skillet over high heat, and add a tablespoon of the butter, swirling until it foams out and the pan is thoroughly hot. Note: Don’t put all the prawns in the skillet at once, or they will steam, not sauté. Add half the prawns to start, scattered around the pan, then wait a few seconds before adding the rest. Sauté the drained and dried prawns briefly over high heat until just opaque, and then lay the arugula overtop to wilt. Turn off the heat under the skillet.

When the pasta is ready, remove 1/2 cup of the pasta cooking water and reserve (you won’t need all of it, though). I use a glass measuring cup to do this, but a clean mug will do. Drain the rest of the water.

Add the drained pasta to the skillet, on top of the arugula, and then add the remaining half-tablespoon of butter. Toss well with a pasta fork and a spatula, or a couple of forks.

Add about a tablespoon of the reserved, hot pasta-water to the egg mixture, and whisk it well. Then add the egg mixture to the skillet all at once, and stir and toss until that the pasta becomes lightly coated with the sauce, and the sauce becomes smooth (because the Parmesan will have melted, and the egg thickened). This takes only a couple of minutes, max. Taste to see if it needs any salt and adjust as needed. It is important to do this off the heat, or you will end up with scrambled eggs instead of a silky sauce. Still tasty, but *shrugs* not quite as good texturally.

Transfer to plates or bowls and serve immediately.