Sushi Sunday - I could make this a habit. Lazyish day with long walks with the dog, Toy Story 3 on DVD and making sushi. Or Andy making and me taking pictures. Sundays are more or less the only days he has time to cook at home, so I let him. We hadn't made sushi together before so it was about time
Speedy sushi making
I got the ingredients yesterday from Hakaniemi, we made two different fillings; raw salmon & avocado and tuna with cucumber. We also made a salad from fresh spinach, raw salmon and avocado with a dressing from sesame oil, soy sauce, lemon juice, ginger, garlic and honey, as well as sesame seeds.
Rollin'!
We had miso soup as a starter, super easy, just boil the kettle and add hot water to a sachet of stuff that looks like mud! Would've been nice to add tofu but since we didn't have any I made it extra seaweedy with this sea salad stuff. It's a mixture of dried seafoods and you can use it in salads or soups. I got it from the organic food shop Ekolo in Hakaniemi.
Miso soup Moomin mugs
With the meal we had a piccolo bottle of Pommery POP rose Champagne. The bubbles complimented the fattiness of the salmon, avocado and Japanese mayonaisse, it was a good match. Shame it was just a piccolo...
After a Sunday like this it almost doesn't feel too bad to get back to studies tomorrow, it's just that waking up at 6:30 was never my favourite thing. Let's hope that I'll still find time to cook and blog after the everyday life begins again. Bye bye holidays!
Salmon, avocado and spinach salad with sesame dressing
While I have been well aware about overfishing and problems related, I was still shocked when I watched The End of The Line - Imagine a World Without Fish documentary on tv tonight. In a nutshell, if we keep fishing and consuming fish in the present way, the seas will run out of wild fish by 2050. Now, that's soon to me.
As a foodie, fish has been my favourite food for the past five years. I love seafood of all kinds, tuna, salmon, swordfish, fish and chips, mussels and prawns. I choose not to eat meat because I don't approve of the mass producing industry. How have I been able to close my eyes from the fishing industry? It was a selfish deed to start eating fish again - it is healthy for me.
The film really stopped me, and made me rethink what I buy. I've known to avoid cod, since it's nearly disappeared from the seas already. But I didn't know about bluefin tuna being overfished so badly. What is in those tins of tuna I buy? I avoid the cheapest stuff - they taste bad, and it's pretty obvious they can't be sustainable.
Also what is happening is that the big food producers are fishing in the seas of the developing countries - hence taking away the resources from the local fishermen and endagering their livelihood. Just so we westerners can get our food cheap as hell.
You'd think it's safe to eat farmed fish. Whaa whaa, incorrect! What do farmed fish eat? Wild fish, small white fish. A staggering amount of the caught wild fish is actually eaten by fish, not people. Problem is, we will fish away all the wild fish so it will be impossible to farm more fish. One solution given in the film was to eat small fish - anchovies, mackerel and herring. Lucky for us in Finland, herring comes in various forms, and Andy is definately doing his bit with the anchovies - he loves that stuff.
I am determined to change my ways and really pay attention to what I buy. I hope more people will do as well, since according to the program, there is still hope and we can affect the future of the seas. I am feeling quite emotional at the moment about this but I am happy that I have opened my eyes. How much attention do you pay to the fish that you buy?
Visit the website here , watch the movie. Think about it, and do what you can. Discussion please!
...some recipes with spices that just need blogging!
Have been occupied with studies, work, cold (weatherwise and healthwise) and just an all round lack of motivation. Tonight's meal will not be blogged, ever ; it was a very politically incorrect pizza made from a base of a Mexican tortilla. Have to say it was deliciously thin and crispy without a trace of sogginess, for once being able to not go overboard with the toppings, opting for a simple margherita. But I just could not face any Italian reading about a tortilla pizza. Although I do have an Italian friend who tells me it's ok to have french fries on pizza... Hmmm.
While eating the horrendously delicious cheesy pizza I enjoyed watching Julie and Julia, which all the other food bloggers have all most likely gone to see in the cinema ages ago. I loved the characters and the two stories intertwining, and really it was a nice movie to watch after a day of writing uni reports in a cold. A feel good movie. Also inspiring if you're writing a blog and have kind of forgotten to post anything for a while. Naturally I share many of the feelings of Julie about blogging but I have very different aspirations from those of hers regarding to blogging. The movie is based on a true story a few years back from now, and five years ago food blogging was still a new thing. Getting people to read your blog was probably a lot easier. I definately feel like a drop in the ocean and feel like no-one is reading this. Feel free to introduce yourself if you are!
To the recipes, then. I have a couple of dishes that Andy cooked a couple of weeks ago. It seems that recently I haven't really been cooking much, it has mostly been Andy. He cooks better, I write better, so I guess it kind of works. Although he cooks better than I write, I guess. Both recipes have spices so if you have a cold like we do, these will open up your sinuses for sure.
Thai Fishcakes Recipe from Olive magazine, February 2010. Original recipe used prawns but we had some bland frozen white fish lying around so used that. Swap for something else if you like!
Serves two
Ginger, 1 tsp, finely grated Fresh Coriander, handfull, chopped Shallot,1, finely sliced Red chilli,1, seeded and diced White fish, 400g Lime, zested Fish sauce, 1 tbsp Oil
Put ginger, coriander, chilli and shallot in a food processor and blend until fine. Add rest of the ingredients and mix until chunky. Season with black pepper and form into six flat cakes. Place on baking paper, brush both sides with a little bit of vegetable oil. Grill in the oven at 200 degrees for 3 minutes on each side.
Serve with a salad, rice or noodles if you like. We also had a way too hot chilli sauce, won't be posting that!
Pineapple with Star Anise and Cinnamon Caramel a la Andy
Brown granulated sugar, 100 g Pineapple, fresh or tinned, in slices, 200g Star anise, 2 Ground cinnamon, 1/2 tsp Unsalted butter, 20 g Dark rum, to taste... depends how much you like alcohol. We had 5 cl or so.
Vanilla ice cream to serve
Make the caramel by putting sugar in a frying pan on high heat. Don't stir. When it gets to a light caramel colour, add the spices and the pineapple. Once the caramel is darker and coats the pineapple, add the butter. Once butter is melted, add the rum and cook for a minute or so until the alcohol of the rum has evaporated. Serve with your favourite vanilla ice cream!
Today we had a lovely friend visiting us and we enjoyed a long long dinner of nibbles for a starter, Rainbow trout for a main and olive oil-chocolate fondants for dessert. We also played with my new Canon eos 450d camera and between courses we rocked some serious(ly scary) singstar. Who says Mondays are boring?
Nibbles consisted of olives, hoummus, macadamia nuts and crackers with G&T for aperitif. I love hoummus and it's a piece of cake to make ; blitz together a tin of drained chickpeas, garlic (I had enough to make sure no vampires will ever approach Helsinki), juice of a lime or lemon, salt and olive oil. Too easy mate! (You should also use tahini but we didn't have any. )
I also made a carrot and walnut loaf, which was also easy and very tasty indeed. Will post the recipe at some later point. Promise! Rainbow trout was a bargain at the supermarket costing less than 5 euros for the whole bugger. Andy first washed the trout, then skilfully (ehem) filleted it and removed the bones. He placed the fish in an oven proof dish and rubbed home-made macadamia-pesto all over the two fillets. It was cooked in 200 degrees for around 15 minutes, until cooked. We served it with a rocket, tomato and onion salad.
Macadamia Pesto
1 dl Olive Oil Two small handfull of Basil One small handfull of Rocket One small handfull of Parsley 1-2 Garlic cloves Dozen whole Macadamias 2 tbsp Grated Parmesan Salt & Pepper
Blitz all ingredients to a paste in a blender. Our choice of wine was Yalumba Viognier 2008 from Eden Valley in South Australia. Viognier is a great alternative to Chardonnay, the usual option for fatty fish. There was only subtle flavour of oak, with floral aromas and exotic fruit both on the nose and palate. It was quite full bodied but had enough acidity to balance the fattiness of the fish. A beautifully balanced and richly flavoured wine.
Dessert was divine, olive oil chocolate fondants served with rhubarb compote and Vanilla ice cream, but we'll save the recipe for that for later.
On Saturday morning we took some shopping bags, hopped on the bus and headed to Hakaniemi Food Market . It was very busy, as you would expect, since there aren't that many food markets in Helsinki, and so it is probably the best place to go to for all your top ingredients. The downstairs is dedicated to food and there you can for example find the fishmongers, butchers, delicatessens, cheese shops, bakeries, fruit and veg stalls and a fantastic soup kitchen. This place makes you wish you never had to shop at a supermarket again. Upstairs you can find clothing, crafts and such. I especially like the Epäonnistunut tyttö (Failed girl) stall with quirky accesories.
So we had our minds set on preparing a whole fish for dinner but we we're open minded on the choice of the fish. Töölön Kala oy seemed to have the best choice on whole fish so we had a little chat with the jolly guys behind the counter and ended up catching a bream, scaled and gutted for us. The whole fish cost less than 5 euros so you can call it a bargain!
We also got a fantastic bread loaf from the bakery, some beans and fennel from the organic stall Satumarja, olives and artichoke from Maustekeidas and some cheese from the Lentävä Lehmä, but more about that later.
Olives, artichoke and bread for a starter
Whole Roasted Bream with Lemon, Herbs and Fennel, served with Butter Beans
We chose to use Bream for the dish because we hadn't used it before and also because it was very cheap at 7 euros per kilo. The taste of the fish was good but we did not realize that the fish is quite boney, with some y-shaped bones that are difficult to take off. Therefore we recommend some other fish for this recipe, such as rainbow trout or sea bass, if available. Serves 2
Whole Bream or other suitable fish, ask your fishmonger to de-scale and gut the fish for you Thyme, few sprigs Cinnamon Basil, few sprigs Zest and juice of one lemon One clove of Garlic, finely chopped Pinch of red chili paste Fennel fronds Salt and pepper Olive oil, 5 tbsp
To stuff the fish Half a fennel, sliced Half a lemon, sliced
On the side Butter beans, 400 g can Zest and juice of half a lemon One clove of garlic Seasoning Half a fresh red chili Olive oil, 2 tbsp
Preheat oven to 200 degrees celsius. Wipe the fish, make five cuts on each side in the flesh. Place in an ovenproof dish. Chop the herbs and mix all the other ingredients to make a paste. Rub the paste on the fish and stuff it with the lemon and fennel. Place in the middle of the hot oven and cook for around 20 minutes.
Drain and rinse the butter beans. Warm the oil in a pan on medium heat. Cook chili and garlic from one to two minutes, without colouring the garlic. Add the beans, cook until hot. Add lemon juice and zest. Season to taste. We also had some salad with romaine lettuce, fennel and sprout with our fish.
Wine Match
White-fleshed fish is quite mild , and when you serve it like this in herbs and a lot of lemon juice,an aromatic dry wine will complement it well. Sauvignon blanc is perfect with herbacious green aromas and acidity, that will match the flavours of the dish. Yet, it won't overpower the subtle taste of the fish.
Best examples of Sauvignon blanc come from Malborough in New Zealand and Sancerre in France. Those can be a bit pricey though so we chose another Loire valley Sauvignon from Touraine, from Alko for under ten euros. It proved to be a delicious match with our fish!
