Pesto

 

Pesto is so simple and quick to do, and tastes a lot better than that ready-made stuff :-)
Makes about 3 Tbsp. Pesto to spread on meat or bread. For pesto to put on pasta, you'll have to at least quadruple the ingredients!

Preparation: You'll only need: A small pan A hand blender A dish for the hand blender
Ingredients (for 2 persons) Around half a bunch of Basil (in plucked leaves around 20 to 25 g) 8 g pine nuts 2 cloves of garlic 25 mL good olive oil 20 g finely grated parmesan cheese A pinch of good salt
Preparation Toast 8 g pine nuts in pan until dark brown. Set aside. Pluck 20 to 25 g basil leaves, rinse them. Roughly chop 2 cloves of garlic. Finely grate 20 g parmesan cheese. Measure 25 ml good olive oil, set aside in small dish. Put all ingredients into the dish for the hand blender (at first only around 2/3 of the oil) and purée. Take care that nothing gets stuck on the blender (like the cheese), check consistency (maybe add in small steps some of the remaining olive oil). The end result should be a fine, not too liquid mass, where you can't see oil on its own (otherwise you used too much oil).

White Wine Cream Sauce

Preparation You'll need: A small pot A hand blender
Ingredients (for 2 persons) 1 shallot (chopped, 20 g) 1-2 cloves of garlic 30 g butter 150 mL dry white wine If you want, you could also use 100 mL white wine and 50 mL Noilly Prat 50 mL veal stock 100 mL whipping cream Alternatively: 100 g Crème Fraîche Salt and pepper
Peel the shallot and garlic and finely dice them. Melt 20 g butter in pot (put the remaining 10 g back into the fridge). Sauté 20 g shallot and garlic. Deglaze with white wine (Noilly Prat), add 50 mL veal stock and 100 mL whipping cream (or Crème Fraîche). Season to taste with salt and coarsely ground black pepper. Reduce the sauce to one third (can take up to 10 minutes), remove from heat. Froth with hand blender, add 10 g cooled butter, mix again.

Goes well with Ravioli or with veal...

Lángos

 

 

Attention! The garlic cream should rest in the fridge for at least 1 hour, better 3 to 4 hours.
The dough also takes about 1 to 1.5 hours.

Preparation You'll need: A large pan A bowl for the garlic cream
Ingredients (for 2 persons) 250 g flour In Hungary, where Lángos comes from, are two ways to do Lángos, either with plain wheat flour or a mix of wheat flour and potatoes. Just leave the potatoes out, if you don't like that. 100 g Kartoffeln (2 small ones) 25 g yeast 1 TL salt 30 ml milk 70 ml water ca. ½ TL icing sugar Lots of sunflower oil (roughly half a litre or ca. 1½ cm high in the pan) 100-125 g sour cream 100-125 g heavy sour cream 4 cloves of garlic some ground pepper 100 g Emmentaler cheese Some additional topping, e. g.: Cooked ham and chili flakes, bacon or similar (ca. 75 g) Onions, chives or parsley or sweet (certainly then without garlic cream) with sugar, Nutella, marmalade or apple sauce My recipe is here with cooked ham, since that's the way I like it most.
Preparation of the garlic cream Put 100 g sour cream and 100 g heavy sour cream into a bowl, stir well. Chop or press 4 cloves of garic, add to the cream Season with salt and pepper. Put in the fridge for at least 1 hour.
The dough Cook the potatoes (unpeeled) until they are soft. In the meantime continue with the rest. Shortly heat up 70 mL water and 30 mL milk in microwave until lukewarm (not too hot, yeast doesn't like high temps). Boil the small potatoes in salted water, in the meantime continue with the rest. Put 250 g flour in a large bowl, make a dent in the middle, and sprinkle 25 g yeast into it, plus ½ tsp. of icing sugar. Add some of the milk water and mix well. Set the sponge on the side at a warm place (best would be the oven at 35 to 40℃) for 10 to 15 minutes. In the meantime, check the potatoes. As soon as they are soft, let them cool a little in cold water, then peel them and mash them well with a fork. When the pre-dough has had its 15 minutes, add 1 teaspoon of salt, a large portion of the remaining milk water and the mashed potatoes and knead into a smooth dough. Attention: No matter how dry the dough seems, first let the machine knead it for 5 minutes. Then(!) check whether milk water is still needed (not before, because the potatoes need some time before they release their water into the dough). Add the rest of the milk water in small steps if necessary. The dough should be soft and smooth. Cover with a damp cloth and put back in the oven for 30-60 minutes.
Fry the Lángos and add the toppings Cover your hands with a small amount of oil and separate the dough into two pieces. Flatten them out into an oval/rectangular shape. They should be around half a centimetre thick, with the rim being thicker than the centre part. Fry in not too hot sunflower oil (to turn I use kitchen tongs), check the under side from time to time, so it doesn't get too dark. In the meantime you could cut the ham into small pieces or grate the cheese. As soon as both sides have the desired colour, take the Lángos out and place them for a short time on kitchen paper. Spread generously with garlic cream, sprinkle with chilli flakes if required, add ham or whatever else you want, finally the grated cheese. Serve quickly so that they are still a bit crispy.

Salmon in aluminium foil

 

Something quick... If you get deep-frozen salmon and take it out of the freezer one day in advance, put it into the fridge to thaw slowly for better taste. The rest should be done in half an hour.
If you want, you can also cook 2 to 3 small potatoes per person.

Ingredients (for 2 persons) 2 salmon fillets, each around 200 g 2 to 3 spring onions (only onion and stem, not the green leaves) 2-3 cloves of garlic 10 to 12 good black olives with kernel (Ligurian or Greek Kalamata) 1 lemon (if someone likes to squeeze lemon juice on the salmon) 1 organic orange (for zest) Basil (at least half a bunch) 250 g cherry tomatoes

Preparation Pierce the olives with a fork. Chop the garlic, zest an orange for 1 tsp. Remove the green leaves from the spring onions and cut the onion and stem small. Rinse the salmon fillets and dab them dry with kitchen paper. Pick 2 handful of basil leaves and rinse them. Preheat oven at 200℃. Spread aluminium foil (around 50 cm long), pour around 2 Tbsp. good olive oil in the middle and spread out a bit. Place the fillets in the middle, then put zest, spring onions, garlic, olives, cherry tomatoes and half of the basil on top. Season with fleur de sel and pepper. Turn foil from all sides and close very tight. Bake for 20 minutes on ove (middle rack, convection). In the meantime, if you want, cook the potatoes. After 20 minutes place the fillets with the veggies on plates, add the rest of the basil leaves. Put lemon (in halves) and fleur de sel on the table.