Spätzle (German Egg Noodle)

Ingredients:
3 Cups of Flour
4-5 Eggs
1/2 Cup of Water
1 Tbs EVOO
1 tsp Salt

Mix Salt and Flour together in a mixing bowl.  Add Eggs and oil and beat very well.  Add water to mixture.  If you like a less dense noodle add some more water.

Boil a very large pot of well salted water.  Press the dough through the back of a cheese grater, a potato ricer or even a slotted hotel pan.  I have an actual spätzle press, therefor I usually use that.  The Spätzle press is similar to a potato ricer.
Boil noodles for about 3 minutes or until they float.  Fish out with a spider and drain throughly.  I would recommend using a colander with a deep plate under it to collect all the water.

Spätzle is such a versatile noodle it can be fried, topped with cheese, used to make macaroni and cheese, and is great in soups.  I recommend making it and serving with lentil soup.  Spätzle always tastes great because it's always fresh.  Fresh is best for all food and recipes, however this is a very noticeable difference.  The longest part of making these noodles it literally waiting for the water to boil.

Spätzle is impressive to dinner guests because most likely they have never had it.  If they have, they would be impressed with the fact you made your own noodles rather than buying them.  I feel like noodles are a waste of money except for the pure convenience and shelf stableness of dried noodles.  I suppose those two reasons are enough to buy dried every time... but making your own noodles are really fun and cheap.
Mission of the week: make some homemade pasta!  If you're on a time crunch make spätzle!  You're literally minutes away from a great side dish.

Lentil Soup

Lentil Soup

2 Cups Dried Lentils
1 Medium Onion chopped
2 Carrots chopped
2 Celery Stalks chopped
2 Bay leaves
2 Quarts water
salt and pepper to taste


Combine all ingredients in a large pot and bring to a boil.  Reduce to a simmer and continue cooking for 35 minutes or until lentils are tender.  Fish bay leaves out before serving.
This soup is great by itself or you can serve it with some fresh Spätzle.

The first time I had lentil soup I was an exchange student in Germany.  I hadn't even heard of lentils so I wasn't sure what I was expected.  At that time I had a very small culinary horizon...  Lentils were a big deal.  Anyway, lentils were like split peas to me which meant that they were delicious.  I love split pea soup, I'll have to make that soon so I can write about it.
Have you ever tried something new and then became hooked on making it or ordering it at a restaurant?

Cinnamon Rolls

Cinnamon Rolls

For the Dough:
1/2 Cup Sugar
1/4 Cup Instant Mashed Potatoes
1 1/2 Cups Warm milk
1/2 Cup warm water
2 Tbs Active Dry Yeast
1/2 Cup Butter (1 stick softened)
4 Eggs
1 tsp Salt
~6 Cups of All Purpose Flour

For the Filling:
1/2 Cup of Butter (1 Stick, softened)
1 Cup of Sugar
2 Tbs Ground Cinnamon

In a mixing bowl, you can use a mixer or some elbow grease, add warm water, warm milk, sugar, instant mash, and yeast.  Mix well and let set for about 10 minutes for yeast to bloom. To mixture add butter, eggs and salt, mix well to beat eggs.  Add 2 cups of the flour and mix until smooth.  Add 2 more cups and repeat.  Add 1 more cup of flour and move mixture to a floured surface to knead in the remaining cup of flour.  You might not need to remaining cup depending on humidity or maybe you do.  Knead dough until very smooth and no longer sticky, it should be tacky about the same as a post-it note.
Put dough on a plate and let rise for about an hour or until dough has doubled.  Spray dough with a light coating of non stick spray to keep from drying out.

Roll out dough after an hour in a rectangular shape.  Mix all the filling ingredients in a bowl and smear all over rolled dough except for 1 inch from the edge on one of the long edges.  Now roll the dough starting from the opposite for the side you left clean of filling.  You should have a nice dough snake now.  Cut the dough about 3 fingers wide and put into a greased 9x13 pan.  You should be able to fit about a dozen in the pan.  If you have more, grease another pan and keep going.

Preheat your oven to 350 degrees F.  Your dough should rise again in the amount of time it takes for your oven to heat.  Bake for about 12 minutes, really no more than 15 minutes otherwise they will be over done.

Remove from oven and Enjoy!
You might scald your mouth eating the first one because you won't be able to wait for them to cool because they smell so good.  :)



Story about Cinnamon Rolls
A few years ago I worked at a retirement home.  During a series of events I became in charge of making cinnamon rolls for Saturday Breakfast.  Cinnamon rolls on Saturday was a 20 tradition at the home and recently loosing a chef made it so there would be no rolls on Saturday morning.  END OF THE WORLD SCENARIO, according to the residents.  Since I was manager I felt that it was my responsibility to bake them some.
More back story... I have been making cinnamon rolls with my grandma since I was able to see over the counter.  I love cinnamon rolls, but I especially love hers.  During the fall and winter we would bake some about once a month. It was a great treat.  When I came to college and starting cooking for myself I kept up the cinnamon roll tradition and would make them for friends and family.  One year cinnamon rolls were my holiday gift to people which was a great hit.
When the cinnamon roll making duty opened up at the retirement home I had cinnamon roll experience.  After I made my first batch, the residents knew something was up.  There was a new chef in town.  I didn't make them quite every Saturday, but pretty close.  They would also complain when I didn't make them because they could tell the difference.  Now, that I no longer work there, I've heard that they are sad that I'm no longer making them because they enjoyed them so much.  That's why I wanted to share this recipe so you too at home can experience the happiness of these cinnamon rolls. How have cinnamon rolls affected your life?

Fluffy White Bread

Ingredients 

1 Cup warm water

2 Tablespoons sugar

3 teaspoons yeast

1 teaspoon salt

1/4 Cup oil (EVOO)

3 Cups Flour

Directions

Bloom yeast in bread maker pan in the warm water and sugar for 10 minutes.  The yeast should be bubbly and foamy. Add the rest of the ingredients and put the pan in the bread maker.  Use the the Basic White Bread setting.  This makes a 1.5 pound loaf so program the appropriate settings for your bread maker.  After about 3 hours let the bread cool completely before slicing and enjoy :)

This bread recipe is seriously amazing and super cheap and easy.  I've found that I'm spending almost nothing on fresh bread every day and I love it.  Surprisingly, I almost took my bread maker back after I bought it because none of my bread what turning out and it was making me very upset. I baked about 8 loaves of bread in the machine following the directions exactly.  I was using the instructional booklet that came with the machine and I couldn't figure out what the deal was.  I finally looked online and did a little research.  I found a great recipe online and a ton of people said that they tried the recipe and loved it.  They even thanked the poster for enlightening them to this recipe.  I tried it and I changed me.  SOOOO GOOOOOD :D I use this bread recipe for everything.  I through a handful of garlic cloves in during the last kneading cycle and it made fantastic garlic bread.  

So, I'm really cheap... I keep everything I can to use it later.  I freeze my peels and ends of vegetables so I can make stock from it along with all my bones and carcases from animals that I prepare.  This has turned out well for having some very rich stocks which turned into amazing soups.  Along with that frugalness I save all my bread ends.  Now that I make a loaf of bread every day, there is no way that my husband and I can eat all that bread, every though we would like to.  Also, quality bread goes stale after a day... once I realized this I vowed to never buy bread from the store again unless it's from a bakery. I digress. I have been saving the end pieces of the bread I've been baking and slicing it up into squares and toasting them in the over until they are bone dry.  Once cooled I put them in a freezer bag and pop them into the freezer for a later date.

I made an early Thanksgiving dinner about 2 weeks ago. I think the shining star of my meal was my 100% homemade dressing.  I used the leftover bread pieces, stock that I had made with leftover chicken and vegetable pieces, I chopped all the fresh vegetables and seasoned it with herbs from my garden. I guess I didn't churn my own butter, but I think that's a little over zealous. Anyway, the dressing was a hit.  I really think it was the quality of the bread I used.  

This bread really lends itself well for a variety of things.  It makes amazing french toast and tops off soup very well.  I really enjoy it and I hope you do too!

Schwabian Cream Cheese Cake

Ingredients

• 1 (8 ounce) package cream cheese
• 1 1/2 cups butter
• 3 cups white sugar
• 6 eggs
• 3 cups all-purpose flour
• 2 teaspoons baking powder 
• 8 ounces semi-sweet chocolate (6 oz roughly chopped and 2 oz shaved)
• 4 ounces chopped hazelnuts
• 1 can tart pie cherries
• 
  
• Directions
• 
  
• Preheat oven to 325 degrees F grease and flour a 10 inch round pan.
• In a large bowl, cream butter and cream cheese until smooth adding sugar gradually and beat until fluffy.
• Add eggs one at a time, beating until smooth with each addition. Add the flour and baking powder and mix well.  Add chopped hazelnuts and 2 ounces of shaved chocolate, lightly mix until batter looks peppered.
• Pour into a 10 inch round pan. Sprinkle can of drained tart pie cherries on top before baking.  Bake at 325 degrees F for 1 hour and 15 minutes. Check for doneness at 1 hour.
• Once cake is removed from oven and completely cooled, prepare a double boiler for remaining 6 oz of chocolate.  Drizzle melted chocolate over entire cake, however entire coverage of cake is not important.

This cake recipe is a variation of a cake that my German exchange mother would make.  When I was 18, I was a German exchange student.  First, my family hosted a girl at our house for a month and then in the summer I went to Germany for a month and stayed with her family.  This experience was very informative and opened up my mind different cultures.  I could talk about that forever, but I'll stick to the cake for now.

In Germany, German Chocolate cake is NOT like it is here in the USA. Here, German C.C. is chocolate cake mix with pecan and coconut frosting that looks like sick.  Gross! Real German chocolate cake is a white cake similar to pound cake with shaved chocolate, chopped hazelnuts and cherries with melted chocolate on top.  It's really nice and I love the contrast of flavors and textures that real German chocolate cake has.  

When I would make this cake for people here in the US I would say that I'm making German chocolate cake and how good it is and blah, blah, blah... People would be like, I don't like that kind of cake, or I don't like coconut.  I would have to explain the different between US and GER cakes... So I started calling the recipe that I have Schwabian Chocolate Cake because I lived in Schwabia when I was on exchange.  To make the original recipe that I had just follow the directions above and leave out the cream cheese and add another stick of butter.

I developed this recipe with the cream cheese because I want to submit it to Philadelphia and try to win a recipe contest. Wish me luck :) 

Freedom Onion Soup

The recipe for Freedom Onion Soup:

1 large Yellow Onion
1 large Red Onion
half a stick of butter (quarter cup)
a few Tablespoons of olive oil
Kosher Salt
Fresh Cracked Black Pepper to taste
1 tsp Red Pepper Flakes
1 qt. Beef Stock or Beef Broth
half cup of Red Wine (Cheap bottle of Pinot Nior or Zinfindal)
4 slices of white artisan bread toasted and bone dry
8 slices of Swiss Cheese
4 slices of Provolone Cheese

Slice Onions thinly and put into a large heavy bottom pot with butter and olive oil.  Sprinkle a generous amount of kosher salt over the onions to help them sweat out most of their moisture. Add black pepper and red pepper flakes.  Cook onions until caramelized, this should take about 35-45 minutes.  Start with med high heat and then turn the heat down once the onions start to break down well.  Remember to stir often. This step should not be rushed because the onions can burn which would make them bitter.
Now is a good time to take your bread slices and pop them into a 250 degree oven for about 20 minutes.  The toasts need to be bone dry so they don't break apart in the soup.
Once the onions reach a desirable level of caramelization, deglaze the pot with a half a cup of red wine.  Cook for a couple minutes to allow the onions to absorb most of the wine.
The toasts should be out of the oven by now.
Now add the full quart of Beef Stock to the onions.  Taste the soup after the mixture has reached a simmer.  If it is too salty, add some water, probably about a cup.  If it's seasoned well enough for your liking, leave it alone.
Let the soup simmer for about 10 minutes so all those flavors have time to marry.
Take the soup off of the heat and ladle into bowls.  I like shallow cereal bowls so that the toast floats nicely.
Put bowls onto a cookie sheet so there are no spills in the oven.  Top each soup with a toast and 2 slices of swiss cheese and 1 slice of provolone cheese.  Make sure some of the cheese is touching the edge of the bowl so it gets nice and crispy.  Turn your broiler on in the oven and place soups into oven.  Broil soup for about 2 minutes or until the cheese is nice a bubbly with light brown spots.
Wait about 5 minutes before serving.
Enjoy! :)



I really love French onion soup because it really sticks to your ribs and it's super cheap to make.  When you serve this to guests they really feel like they are getting a super fancy meal.  I made this soup for some friends and they didn't really want to eat it because it didn't sound very good to them, and they only had it at mediocre restaurants.  After I force fed them my French onion soup, they have changed their tune and pretty much request it weekly.
I got my French Onion Soup passion in New York City.  I had been watching Food Network like an addict and they had recently done a show about french onion soup and it sounded really good.  Of course I ate my way through New York while I was there.  I would stop at every street vendor that had a long line and would order whatever I saw people walking away with, because they live there, they must know what is good. I would share my portion with my husband to both save money and to ensure that I would have enough room for food again when we inevitably would stop at another street vendor cart in a few blocks.  I ate SO much pizza, but never enough, hot dogs, cheese steaks, pretzels, beagles with schmear, falafel, any kind of skewer... I was only there for 3 days... anyway back to soup...
The reason for the journey to the Big Apple was to perform in Carnegie Hall with my college wind ensemble. I play Trombone and I use to be pretty good at it.  Between our warm up and performance at Carnegie we had about an hour and a half off.  Of course that means eat something, so I don't throw up from nervousness. There was a little Deli across the street called Carnegie Deli, which interested me.  I looked over the entire menu and wanted everything on it.  I knew I was going to eat dinner in a few hours, so I didn't want to eat too much.  I remembered the french onion soup show on food network so I ordered that.  I thought if I was going to have French onion soup anywhere, it needed to be here.  I also had some bad experiences with French onion soups at mediocre restaurants, but felt that it was my duty to try it again.  It was a good life choice.  I ordered the soup, it came in a cute bowl on a plate.  There was crispy cheese dripping down the sides.  I was in heaven!
The soup really helped me calm down before the performance and I've felt that this soup is my form of good luck.  I performed well.  I only thing I remember from that day is the amazing sound in Carnegie Hall and the French Onion soup at Carnegie Deli.
Cheers

Rock Lobster Salad

What you're going to need:
3 pounds yukon gold potatoes diced at 1/2 inch cubes
1 small red onion finely chopped
3 Tbs cilantro finely chopped
3 cloves garlic minced
3 Tbs horseradish kosher fancy style
3 Tbs brown mustard
1 cup low fat sour cream
4 green onions thinly sliced
8 package imitation lobster pieces
2 Tbs apple cider vinegar
salt and black pepper to taste

Peel and dice potatoes and boil for about 10 minutes until tender, but still hold their shape, we're making salad not mashed potatoes here.  Meanwhile, roughly chop lobster bits and place a large bowl.  Continue chopping all remaining ingredients and mix in bowl.  It's probably been about 10 minutes by now... drain potatoes and let them cool for a few minutes before adding to the rest of the ingredients.  Enjoy warm or park in fridge for at least 2 hours and enjoy it cold.