Wheat flour tortillas

Today I'm making wheat flour tortillas, which will make a lovely base for this week's Mexican themed meal. Earlier this week I've already made salsa, guacamole and refried beans and now it's tortilla's turn.

It's easy to buy tortillas but it's almost as easy to make them. The dough is quite basic and the frying itself is a dream!

Ingredients

This recipe makes about 6 tortillas.

400g wheat flour

2tsp baking powder

175ml water

2tbsp soft butter

Pinch of salt

Mix the flour with the baking powder and salt. Add the soft butter or margarine and pinch it among the dough. Then add the water and knead it all to a firm and even dough.

Let the dough rise for about 30 minutes. Then roll it out thinly with a rolling pin to frying pan sized tortillas.

Fry them in a dry pan (no added oil) at moderate heat until brown spots appear on the surface. Turn them over in order to fry the other side and they're done.

These can be combined with a whole range of vegetables but tomorrow my combination shall be revealed and my Mexican experiments will then come to an end until the next time.

Your VegHog

Refried beans

You might already have noticed that this week is Mexican themed with The VegHog. Today I'm making refried beans, which are a great and filling addition to any vegetarian Mexican meal.

Ingredients

1 cup dried red kidney beans

1 onion

2 garlic cloves

A few tablespoons of vegetable stock

Ground coriander

Pepper

Salt

Oil

Soak the beans overnight if you're using dried beans. On the next day then boil them until fully cooked. First boil them heavily for about 15 minutes and then boil them further at lower heat for about an hour. When the beans are cooked mash them. I keep also the bean skins but if you prefer you can press the mash through a colander if you want a smoother consistency.

Chop the onion and garlic and fry them lightly in oil. Then add the beans to the pan. Fry at low heat for about 20 minutes occasionally stirring. Add a little vegetable stock to make the mixture smoother. Season with salt, pepper and ground coriander.

Your VegHog

Guacamole

Day two of the Mexican week and time to make a classic sauce and a popular dip: Guacamole. There are several variations of this sauce and I made mine with lime and tomato. Guacamole will add a nice flavour and colour to our dish at the end of this week.

Ingredients

2 avocados

1 tomato

1 lime

1 small onion

1 garlic clove

Salt

Peel the avocados and chop them into small cubes. Also chop the tomato, onion and garlic. 

Mix the ingredients together and season with salt a lime juice. 

Depending on your preference you can either leave the avocado pieces chunky or puree the sauce. This time I pureed mine but it is quite nice when you have larger avocado bits as well.

Add sour cream to the sauce selection with the guacamole and yesterday's tomato and grilled pepper salsa.

Your VegHog

Tomato and grilled pepper salsa

This week we're going Mexican and every day I'm going to post a different stage to a vegetarian Mexican meal and the end product should be ”Homemade tortillas with char-grilled vegetables, refried beans and sauces”. Obviously it'll only be a humble hog style feast but with nice homemade tortillas and sauces. I decided to split the posts for a week as there were quite many stages preparing this meal and of course each component can be combined with other meals as well.

Today we'll start with a simple tomato and grilled pepper salsa. It can be combined with many dishes and eaten warm or cold.

Ingredients

250 g cherry tomatoes

1 red pepper

1 onion

2 garlic cloves

1-2 red chili

Oil

Pepper

Salt

Char-grill the pepper and roast the tomatoes in the oven brushed with oil. 

Chop the onion, garlic and chili and fry them in oil for a moment. 

Mix everything together, season with salt and pepper and puree to a sauce.

Easy! And tomorrow we'll continue with making another sauce.

Stay hungry!

Your VegHog

Radish and leek summer soup

Now this is what I call healthy food, at least this soup looks like it. It's green, it's vegan and it's low fat. The radishes in my balcony box grew a bit out of control and I had to get creative again, so I made this nice and light soup for a summery lunch.

Ingredients

1 leek

4 radishes with leaves

2 cloves of garlic

Vegetable stock

Olive oil

Cress

Salt

Pepper

Wash the vegetables and chop them. Heat oil in a pan and quickly fry the chopped leek and garlic. Prepare a vegetable stock and add it to the pan. Then add the chopped radishes and radish leaves. Let simmer for about 20 minutes and then season and puree the soup.

Enjoy if you dare to make this greenness!

Your VegHog

Karjalanpiirakat – Karelian pies

It's The VegHog's 100^th blog post and time to celebrate with an old family recipe, a traditional Finnish dish and one of my all time favourites: Karelian pies. These are pasties with a thin rye crust and a rice filling that is similar to salty pudding rice. Karelian pies are normally eaten as a snack between meals but they are extremely filling. Quite often butter or egg butter mix specifically made for the pasties is spread on them. I have tried them with cheese or soft cheese as well and they were very good but just plain butter is the winner for me personally.

The pasties are quite hard work and making them requires patience but it's very rewarding in the end, so please don't be intimidated by the work load. My grandmother always used to make loads of these pies and I loved it. She taught me how to make them and gave me her recipe (I've altered it here slightly so I'm not giving away family secrets). Unfortunately I can't make them as well as she did but it's nice to try anyway! Please try them and tell me what you think!

For the rye crust:

3 dl wheat flour

2 dl rye flour

2-3 dl lukewarm water and milk mix

1 tsp yeast

1 tsp salt

1 tbsp vegetable oil

Melted butter for brushing

For the rice filling:

3 dl pudding rice

4 dl milk

2 tsp salt

Butter or margarine

Water for boiling

Start by making the rice for the filling as it takes a while. First boil the rice in double the volume of water until all the water is absorbed. Then add the butter, salt and milk and let it simmer under the lid at low heat until the rice is tender and a firm porridge is produced. Add more milk during the simmering if needed. Stir often and ideally use a heavy non-stick cast iron pot as the porridge likes to burn easily on the bottom. The simmering stage takes about 45-60 minutes. Let the porridge cool down before filling the crusts.

Then make the dough for the crust. First mix the dry ingredients and then add the lukewarm milk and water mix and the oil and knead. You can make the fluid more milky or more watery depending on your taste. Add more fluid or flour if needed. Knead a firm dough, which will be a little bit similar to a pizza dough. Let it rise under a tea towel for about one hour.

Then take small portions of the dough and roll it out thinly with a rolling pin. Cut the dough into small (about 15 cm long) slightly oval circles. You can use a lid or a bowl of suitable size as cutting help.

Take about two table spoons of the porridge and spread it to the middle by leaving about 2 cm edges without filling. Then make the distinct wavy closing (see photos). Fold the edges over and pinch them starting from the middle and moving towards the ends.

Bake the pies at 225C for about 15-20 minutes until the crust is baked and they are nicely browned. Brush them with melted butter.

They can be served instantly or saved for later. They can be eaten cold as well but I think they are nicest when freshly baked.

Thanks for staying hungry for 100 posts and hopefully many more will follow!

Your VegHog

Cider battered smoke flavoured cheese and asparagus

A cider batter is a fine thing to coat cheese or vegetables with as it gives them such a lovely flavour! This recipe makes loads of batter, so feel free to use less ingredients if you don't want to fry so much and do try this also with other vegetables! However we are quickly approaching the end of the asparagus season and it's nice to make many different asparagus dishes. The battered cheese is brilliant on its own as well.

Ingredients:

Smoke flavoured Cheddar (I used 185g Applewood smoke flavoured Cheddar)

Asparagus

Vegetable oil for frying

Potato flour for coating

For the batter:

150g flour

250ml cider (I used Wyld Wood organic cider, see here)

Pinch of salt

Prepare the cheese and asparagus: cut the cheese into suitable bits, wash the asparagus and cut the hard bottom parts off.

Then make the batter by beating the ingredients together into an even paste. If it's too fluid add more flour. The batter should be fairly thick in order to stick properly to the cheese and veg.

I shallow-fried these in a pan but it should be quite easy to make in a deep-fryer. Heat a generous amount oil in a non-stick pan. Roll the cheese bits and asparagus first in plain potato flour by trying to cover them allover. This is important especially with the cheese that the content would be sealed well inside and melted cheese won't run out into your pan. Then roll them in the batter and fry until golden brown. The frying should be long enough to cook the asparagus soft.

Serve as a side dish or a starter and enjoy the flavours and the crispiness!

Your VegHog