Posts tagged cardamon

Swedish Cinnamon and Cardamon Buns

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ovely Stockholm. Sweden must have been the longest standing contender on my ‘must-visit’ destinations list. Without even having stepped foot in this glorious country I had already fallen in love with the culture, people, lifestyle and not to mention the food. Ah the food. Rye bread, salmon, cray fish and beetroot. Dill and cardamon and cinnamon. Dreamy matcha and cardamon lattes and high champagnes kisses. And some of the most fantastic restaurants in Europe. Stockholm’s foodie scene was therefore a must see and it certainly lived up to expectations. With only a short whistle wind tour in two days this certainly warrants another visit not only as I am still to sample the hay smoked creations of Ekstedt….thats for next time.

The beautiful water-hugged city cleared our lungs and wooed us with its romance. Exploring the old town of Gamla Stan was by far the most enjoyable delight. Lunching like kings at ‘Kryp In’ (which I highly recommend) tucked secretly down a cobbled side street in the old town before fast forwarding to the future to the Gondelen in Sodermalm which in summer has the best sun kissed terrace and high city views in town. However, with a crisp chill in the air, we enjoyed our sparkling champagne in the warmer, gorgeous and hipster-filled bar overlooking the city before gliding through the restaurant to the ‘Kitchen’ area, an informal and casual bistro like setting, where we were immersed in the action. The food was perfect and the wine….strong.

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fter the effects of the ‘strong’ wine, after a slow morning we had a day of touring the city, sadly in the persistent rain. However, warming cardamon lattes and cinnamon buns soon warmed our souls at the quaint and authentic Vetekatten in Kungsgatan. But dinner was by far the highlight of the day. New modern Nordic cuisine with excitement, imagination and most importantly, flavour. ‘The Flying Elk‘ was the perfect gastropub to warm our bodies and dry our sodden feet. An amazing menu starting with a delicate and ‘jump-up-and-down-on-your-seat’ tasty carrot and foie gras macaroon with creamed corn and cress. This I did not share. You would not have either. This was followed welcomingly with an aurora salmon salad with vanilla marinated crayfish meddled with sweet yellow carrots among a bowl of fennel, lemon verbena salad, orange and almonds. This menu was an absolute highlight. And with the Flying Elk book perched on the neighbouring window sill the entire evening, it isn’t a surprise I left with one in hand. Slight technical hurdle is the Swedish dialogue and no copy yet in English translation….but we’ll get over that.

With the sun in full power on our final day, we ventured to the island of Djurgarden, a stone throw and hop over the bridge from the old town. A beautiful island. Tree lined cycle paths hugged the river but we chose to amble in the crisp sun on foot, past the joggers, boating site-seers and keen cyclists. We rested our weary feet and an true Swedish hidden gem. Rosengard Tradgard, and organic cafe and garden centre set in following fields and orchards. We quenched our thirst with homemade teas, juices and lemonade. Organic produce and home baked spiced breads littered the shops and entertained our senses. A true delight which I can only compare to the delights of the infamous ‘Petersham Nurseries‘ in Richmond for ambiance, intention and style. Being on the island was 10 minutes escape from the city into peace. Even if it meant being dragged there on foot….

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But one of the highlights in Sweden. Cinnamon. Finally a country that appreciates this festive spice just as much as me. With cinnamon buns and fresh OJ for breakfast it was time to recreate the scene at home once back on UK soil to sooth the post holiday blues.

Makes about 15 (adapted from Jamie Oliver)

  • 7g dried yeast
  • 250ml almond milk/whole milk
  • 60ml boiling water
  • 50g demerara sugar
  • 1/2 tsp salt
  • 400g plain flour
  • 1/2 tsp ground cardamon
  • 4 tbsp oil
  • 1 egg, beaten
  • Pearl sugar (optional)

Filling

  • 75g softened butter
  • 25g dark brown soft sugar
  • 50g demerara sugar
  • 1 tbsp ground cinnamon
  • Pinch salt
  1. Combine the water and milk and stir in the yeast. Set aside.
  2. In a large bowl, mix the sugar, salt, flour and ground cardamon.
  3. Make a well in the centre and stir in the warmed yeast mixture and the oil. Mix until combined before getting your hands in and bringing together into a dough.
  4. Tip onto a floured surface and knead the dough together until you have a smooth springy dough. This should take about 10 minutes. Oil the bowl and place the dough inside. Cover with a tea towel or cling film and leave to rest and prove in a warmish place for about an hour until doubled in size.
  5. Meanwhile make the filling. combine the ingredients until you have a really soft spreadable paste.
  6. Once the dough is risen, roll it out on a floured surface to a 35cm x 35cm square. Spread over the cinnamon butter filling evenly.
  7. Fold the dough into thirds like a business letter and roll into a rough rectangle (20cm x 35cm)
  8. Cut the dough into 20cm long strips about 2-3cm wide. Take strip and twist it as seen below.
  9. Now for the tricky bit – the knot! I found this link very useful as it contains a video and is where I have based my recipe on with a few adaptations. (Basically, grab one end and coil around your hand twice. Then over the top and coil and tuck the loose end at the bottom. As I said, the video helps!)
  10. Place the shaped buns onto a lined baking tray and preheat the oven to 180°C.
  11. Leave the buns to rise again until doubled in size for about 30-40 minutes.
  12. Brush with a little beaten egg if you like and to be really authentic, sprinkle with pearl sugar or almonds.
  13. Bake for about 15-18 minutes until golden.

Jess - Cinnamon

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Indian Fish

You can use any fish here. I made this with a generous plumpy salmon on Mother’s Day, a clean mango ribbon salad, coriander lime chickpeas and Peshwari naan. However, sea bass this evening served with pistachio, coriander and cinnamon raisin rice and greens was equally as delicious and adoring. Both with this creamy, cooling cardamon laden, lime spiked yoghurt splashed slap-handedly over the spicy garam marsala crust is enough to satisfy even the most adoring Indian take-out stalker.

Serves 2

  • 2 x salmon or seabass fillets
  • 1 tbsp garam masala
  • 1 tbsp olive oil
  • 150g natural yoghurt
  • Juice and zest 1 lime
  • 1 tsp ground cardamon
  1. Mix together the garam masala and oil in a bowl and coat the fish fillets with your hands. Set aside in the fridge to marinade for 2 hours or so
  2. Meanwhile, mix together the yoghurt, lime zest and juice and the cardamon. Season and taste.
  3. If using salmon, preheat the oven to 200°C. When ready to cook, bring a frying pan up to a high heat. Add 1tbsp of olive oil.
  4. When hot, add the fish skin side down and hold down to prevent the skin curling up.
  5. Fry for 2 minutes until eh skin is lovely and crisp. If using sea bass, fry until just cooked and turn onto the flesh side to finish cooking for the final minute (about 3 minutes cooking in total). If using salmon, fry until the skin is crisp and then place in the hot oven for about 7 minutes depending on their size. If they are thick fillets (2inch or so) allow this time. If thinner (1cm or so) allow about 5 minutes, Do not overcook!
  6. Serve the spicy, warm and soft fish fillets with a spoonful of creamy yoghurt and scattering of fresh coriander leaf.

Banana and Cardamon Loaf

 

This is my go-to banana loaf recipe for when those bruising and sweetly turning bananas are slowing deteriorating in the fruit bowl, unaware of their potential. This loaf is easy to knock out and can be kept for a while in the cake tin. Here I’ve added the beautifully pungent ground cardamon but this can be left out or substituted.

I love banana loaf as its one of those ‘cakes’ that is less restricted by Paul and Mary’s dreaded ‘science’ of baking. This recipe for example only has one egg in the entire mixture but still manages to set with a lovely rich texture. The recipe is therefore hugely open to adaptation and I change mine practically every time. Try these little additions which I’ve done in the past:

  • Ground cardamon, cinnamon or ginger
  • Replace hazelnuts for your classic walnut
  • Add chunks of chocolate chips
  • Add a handful or desiccated coconut
  • Add a decadent molten layer of peanut butter/salted caramel/Nutella inside
  • Top the mixture with a crumble mixture before baking
  • Soak the bananas in rum for a bit…

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Makes 1 loaf (Taken from Delia Smith’s ‘All in one Banana Loaf’ with a few adaptations)

  • 75g butter, softened
  • 110g caster sugar
  • 1 large egg, beaten
  •  225g plain flour
  • 2 tsp baking powder
  • 1 tsp ground cardamon (or other spice of choice)
  • 4 ripe bananas, mashed
  • 70g hazelnuts, toasted and chopped roughly.
  • Handful demerara sugar
  1. Preheat the oven to 180°C and line a loaf tin with parchment.
  2. Place the butter, sugar and egg in a food processor and combine (or use an electric hand whisk)
  3. Sieve over the flour, spices and baking powder and combine (don’t worry if it looks dry!)
  4. Add the bananas to the processor and combine until you have a smooth and creamy batter.
  5. Stir through the nuts (or any chocolate chips, coconuts additions etc)
  6. Pour into the loaf tin and sprinkle generously with the demerara sugar (or crumble) to create a nice crunchy topping. (If adding a layer of peanut butter/caramel etc, add half the batter to the tin, dot with the chosen filling and then spoon on the remaining batter to cover before baking)
  7. Bake for 50-55 minutes until cooked.
  8. Leave to cool in the tin before removing and slicing

Gorgeous sliced, toasted and layered with cinnamon butter

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Spice Roasted Sweet Potato Soup, Lime-cardamon Yoghurt, Coconut Flatbread

 

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Some relaxing blogging always starts the weekend off well. After a long week, it was nice to slow down and take my time over lunch instead of dashing home from work and being caped in my apron and up to my eyes in ingredients before I could even take off my coat! I love to constantly use different flavours and it really is the easiest thing to inspire a standard recipe by adding a few flavourful touches. If you haven’t got a stocked pantry of store cupboard ingredients then I highly recommend investing in a few essentials to be at hand and add to your cooking (see here). My store cupboard is by no means complete…storage space and budget don’t allow my dream pantry so for now I stick to the most useful ingredients.

This warming soup is smooth, creamy and cinnamon scented. Sweet potatoes have natural sweetness which goes really well with cinnamon and ingredients like maple syrup so the lime and cardamon yoghurt is a lovely fresh addition to top it off. Coconut flatbreads (just because) are heavenly.

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Serves 4

Soup

  • 800g sweet potato, peeled, chopped into chunks
  • 2-3 garlic cloves
  • 1 tsp ground cinnamon
  • 1 tsp cumin seeds
  • 1 onion, chopped finely
  • 2 pints of good, hot chicken or vegetable stock

Lime Cardamon Yoghurt

  • 150g plain natural yoghurt
  • ½ lime – zest and juice
  • Few mint/coriander leaves
  • 3-4 cardamon pods

Coconut Flatbreads

  • 15g dessicated coconut
  • 75-80ml coconut milk/water
  • 125g flour
  • Salt and pepper
  1. Preheat the oven to 200°C. Peel and chop you sweet potatoes into chunky pieces and add to a large roasting tray. Throw in your garlic cloves, whole and unpeeled.
  2. Drizzle with a couple of generous tablespoons of olive oil or sunflower oil and scatter over the cumin seeds, cinnamon and some generous seasoning. Mix until coated in the spices and roast for 30 minutes. Toss half way through cooking.
  3. Meanwhile, sweat and soften the onion in a little oil in a saucepan over the hob and prepare your stock.
  4. Make the flatbreads by combining the flour, seasoning and coconut in a large bowl. Add in your liquid and mix with a fork until combined. Bring together to form a smooth dough, adding a little more liquid if needed. Knead for a few minutes and then set aside to rest.
  5. For the yoghurt, combine in a bowl with the lime juice, zest, finely chopped mint and some salt and pepper. Bash the cardamon pods to remove the seeds inside. Grind these as fine as you can in a pestle and mortar and add to the yoghurt. Stir to combine then set aside.
  6. Once the potatoes are ready remove from the oven and pick out the garlic cloves. Add the potatoes to the sweating onion. Squeeze the roasted and sweet garlic pulp from their skins and add with the potatoes.
  7. Add the stock and simmer for 5-10 minutes until the flavours are combined and the potatoes are really tender.
  8. Puree with a hand blender until silky and smooth. Add a little more stock to thin the soup if you like.
  9. Keep warm while you cook the flatbreads. Heat a frying pan over a high heat. Divide the dough into four equal pieces and roll each out thinly on a floured surface. Fry each in a the dry hot pan for a few minutes each side until a lightly charred and they begin to puff up slightly.
  10. Serve warm immediately (or keep warm in the oven) with a generous warming bowl of spiced soup drizzled with the fresh yoghurt.

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