It has been a while since my last post. Been very busy living life!
To be honest, I am posting a lot on Instagram. Just a few pictures, a short story, done! I post a lot of food pictures, because I love cooking. There are so many great recipes to make. And I found on Instagram a lot of people who also love to cook😍! One of my favorite groups is the #rainydaybitescookbookclub! Cooking from a different cookbook every month, and 2 challenges each month.
One of my favorite chefs is Yotam Ottolenghi. I got Plenty more from my mom. It is a cookbook with just vegetarian recipes, and my husband is a vegetarian. I really liked this cookbook, but a lot of recipes had a lot of ingredients. So I made just a few recipes. The one I made the most, was the Kerrie Laksa, a dish from Asia. It smells like Thailand in the house when I make this dish😋😄! And we love Thailand❤️!
After that I bought Plenty, also a vegetarian cookbook, again great recipes with a lot of ingredients! And when you have to buy a lot of ingredients, you don’t know if you like the dish, so are you ever going to use them again? What I like about Instagram is to see recipes I have not made yet for some reason, and if somebody really likes one of those recipes, I want to try and make the recipe too. This way I made a few recipes I never would have thought about making them myself.
For example a recipe with sobanoodles, fried eggplant and mango. A combination I never would have thought about before I saw it on Instagram. Love this one! I can make the salad a day before if I want to. Made it already a lot of times, and everybody loves it too! One of my friends told me (a meat lover) that she really loved it, and didn’t miss the meat in this dish😉.
My next cookbook was Simple, and now I am even more in love with Ottolenghi! What a great cookbook! Simple recipes, telling you exactly how long you can make the dish before serving, what you can prepare up front, so you don’t have a lot of work left in the kitchen when your guests have arrived. Short lists of ingredients. Just 10 things you need for his cooking, besides the normal things like oil, garlic, onions, chilies etc.
Funny is that when I started cooking his recipes I had to go to a Turkish supermarket to find pomegranate molasses, tahini, sumac and za’atar. Now I can find it just in my local supermarket. We love the Middle Eastern flavors😋!
In the beginning I had to explain who Ottolenghi was, but now more people are cooking his recipes. And when we have friends over for dinner, I always make a lot of his recipes. Now together with recipes of Sabrina Ghayour, but that will be another story!
I have a few favorite recipes from Simple, but I still need to try a few. I only make the vegetarian dishes, never tried a meat, chicken or fish dish, because I think it is a lot of work for a meal for just one person. I have a few favorites, like the tomato carpaccio, the omelet with harissa and manchego cheese, the Thai sticky rice (using jasmine or basmati rice now, because the sticky rice ruined my pan🤪) burrata with grilled grapes (I use cherry tomatoes, because I don’t like grapes), the baked potatoes with sumac, etc. etc…
There are so many great recipes, not just from his cookbooks, but also in Feast from the Guardian. He writes columns with great recipes. And I got some recipes from his cookbooks Jerusalem and Nopi.
The one I love the most from Nopi is the burrata orange dish! The picture is from when I couldn’t find burrata so I used buffalo mozzarella instead. Making the dressing was not so difficult but it is very sticky, because of the honey. But great taste!
As you all know, there are some Ottolenghi Restaurants in London😉! So I wanted to go to London to eat in one of his restaurants. And last November we went to London, and had dinner in Ottolenghi Spitalfields, because this one was close by to our hotel. It was great! I felt so happy eating here😄😋!
They have a small shop too, where you can buy herbs, cookies, and cakes. We had some lovely cakes with our coffee and tea. Make sure you have room enough in your belly after dinner, because the cakes are absolutely fantastic!
Last June we went back to London to celebrate the fact that we have been a couple for 30 years😍! And we went back to Spitalfields. Because they cook with the produce of the season, the menu is different every time you go there. In spring time you have different food than in wintertime😉! The food was again delicious😋!
And to finish the weekend, we went back for breakfast on Sunday. I wanted to eat shakshuka in his restaurant. I know I can make it myself, but why If someone else can do it for you! My husband had a Dutch baby, a kind of pancake thing. Funny part is we don’t eat Dutch babies here in Holland, and before a few months ago, I didn’t even know what a Dutch baby was😂!
So now you all know why I am a big fan of cooking recipes from Ottolenghi. He changed my way of cooking, just using some different spices and herbs to food I already use in my kitchen a lot. And using a lot of fresh herbs, instead of dry herbs. And mixing ingredients together I never would have thought about before, and that they would go together so well!
So if you never made a recipe from Ottolenghi, maybe you want to try one now. And If you are already a fan, then you know exactly what I am talking about😄.
Happy cooking!
rinaschoof 