Pepper tarte tatin

I love the whimsical concept of tarte tatin with its upside-down baking. The moment when you turn the tart after baking is a very exciting one. I wasn't so familiar with savoury tarte tatins before but they certainly are not to be ignored. This one is a particularly sweet yet savoury tart and it's my own recipe. It's fairly quick to make as the ready made puff pastry is a great help.

Ingredients

320g puff pastry

4 yellow and orange peppers

1 shallot

1 garlic clove

50g butter

1-2tbsp sugar

1tsp salt

Basil leaves

Method

Quarter the peppers and chop the shallot and garlic.

Heat the butter in a pan and fry the peppers, shallot and garlic in the butter until the peppers are fairly soft. Season them with salt and towards the end add the sugar and caramelise it a bit.

Grease a cake tin by brushing some of the sugary butter from the pan into the tin. Place the basil leaves in there and then the peppers with the presentable side down. Place them in a way that would please the eye once the tart is done. Pour the rest of the frying pan contents on them and put the ready made puff pastry on the top. Press it carefully into the corners of the cake tin.

Bake at 180C for about 30 minutes. When the tarte comes from the oven, carefully flip it upside down and serve warm.

Enjoy!

Your VegHog

Vegetarian food café Morgenstedet in Christiania

Morgenstedet is an ecological vegetarian food place in Christiania, which is an area within the beautiful Danish capital Copenhagen. Freetown Christiania was founded in 1971 as an autonomous neighbourhood and a commune for about 850 residents through squatting in old military barracks.

I visited Christiania recently and it's an interesting place to say the least, but what I was most thrilled about was the good quality, no nonsense and cheap (for Copenhagen's standards) veggie food that they served at Morgenstedet. On that day they offered three main course options: Chili sin carne, Pea soup and Burrito, and I believe that they actually aim to offer two main dishes and a soup every day (closed on Mondays). I chose the Chili sin carne, which was a large and tasty tofu, romanesco, mixed bean and other vegetable chili served with rice. You could have chosen a side salad, bread or desserts as well.

The plates are filled instantly at the counter, so even with some queueing the food is quickly received. The ambience for eating is very chilled although the place was quite busy when I was there. There is a cozy inside eating area and a garden. The staff speak English like pretty much everywhere in Denmark, but isn't it just more fun trying to speak Danish!

See you soon!

Your VegHog

 

Posted with Blogsy

Beck's beer mix drinks

I'm trying to write something about beer again today as apparently that is what Germany does to me.

Beck's is a well known pilsner brand from Bremen, Germany but in recent years the Beck's brewery has also developed several nice beer mix drinks. I went to Bremen on my hogholiday* and sampled several of these flavours. I didn't know all of them before but they all are refreshing summer drinks and some are low on alcohol at 2,5%, which means that some serious sampling can be made.

*Follow my holiday in August 2013 on Twitter @TheVegHog #hogholiday and please tweet me if you feel like it!

There are such flavours as Green Lemon, Twisted Orange, Summer Holunder, Lime and many more. I like all of those variations very much and you can taste both the beer and the extra flavour in them.

One of my favourite spots in Bremen for enjoying one of these beer mix drinks is Beck's Bistro right in the centre of the city. They offer a few tasty vegetarian meals as well and have a large beergarden in the summer.

I would also very much recommend another beer from the Beck's brewery, Haake-Beck, which is produced as a regional pilsner for Bremen.

This windmill is also a great place for drinking in Bremen.

Happy beer tastings!

Your VegHog

Char-grilled vegetable nachos

Nachos are just a snack, I hear you cry? Certainly not in The VegHog's kitchen! These nachos form a full meal and are covered with succulent char-grilled vegetables and beans and are swimming in cheese. I just adore this dish and it's just the perfect thing for sharing during a cozy film night.

A bag of nachos

3 peppers

1 aubergine

500g canned black beans

Coriander

Grated mozzarella

2 red onions

3 garlic cloves

200g tomatoes

Salt

Black pepper

Olive oil

Vegetable oil

Make the salsa first. This time I only made a plain old tomato and onion salsa as a dip, but check out my guacamole recipe as well, if you want to have it with these nachos. Sour cream is also always a good addition to this dish.

Chop the onions and garlic. Heat some olive oil in a saucepan and add the tomatoes. Let them simmer under the lid until they become saucy. Add ½ of the chopped onions and ½ of the garlic to the pan and let it simmer further. Season with salt and pepper. Once everything is cooked puree the salsa and let it chill.

Heat some oil in a pan and fry the other ½ of the onions and ½ of the garlic. Then add the black beans and let simmer at moderate heat for about 15 minutes. Remember to stir occasionally. Season the beans with coriander and with some pepper if you like.

Slice the aubergine and cut the peppers in half. Heat a grill pan and brush vegetable oil on it. Char-grill the aubergine and pepper slices until they have grilling marks and are getting soft.

Put the nachos into a heat resistant oven dish. Then put the beans on them, the grilled vegetables and finally the cheese. Warm it up in the oven at 180C for about 10 minutes until the cheese has melted.

Enjoy some great nacho moments!

Your VegHog

Sun-dried tomato bread

I found this fabulous bread recipe online and it instantly got me into baking. It’s a Sun-dried tomato bread by Shaun Rankin and you can find the original recipe through this link.

I followed the recipe pretty closely, only all the mixing and kneading was done by hand and the sun-dried tomatoes I used were a bit chunkier. I also baked my bread in a silicone baking dish.

My bread might not have looked as gorgeous as the original but I was very happy with the result. Both the texture and the taste were very nice. I’m surely going to bake this bread again and maybe even play around with the recipe slightly.

Happy baking moments!

Your VegHog

Orange salad with poppy and basil vinaigrette

My summer salad series continues with this mixed salad with a fruity twist. This can be a lunch salad or a side dish and it's incredibly quick to make.

For the salad:

2 oranges

Mixed salad leaves

3 salad onions

Pumpkin seeds

For the vinaigrette:

Basil leaves

Poppy seeds

Olive oil

Balsamic vinegar

Salt

Black pepper

Peel the oranges and cut out wedges without the skins. Chop the salad onions and place all salad ingredients into a bowl.

Mix the vinaigrette. I normally put mine into a small sealable container in order to be able to shake it properly. Pour the vinaigrette on the salad and serve fresh.

Your VegHog

Kölsch – Beer from Köln

Kölsch is the beer from Köln (Cologne) in Germany and there are around 26 Kölsch variations. If you are ever going to Köln you won't be able to avoid Kölsch as it's everywhere and a very big part of the local culture. It's also hard and in some places frowned upon, to order a different beer in a pub. The VegHog used to live in Köln, so it has had the opportunity to taste this beer plenty, and now it has returned for a visit to its one time home. 

 

Kölsch is a hoppy pale beer mostly served in 0,2 liter glasses. Even though it's a small glass, the beer lasts surprisingly long. Sometimes in various party scenarios you might be challenged to empty your glass at one go, but normally you would enjoy it slowly. All German beers are brewed according to the Reinheitsgebot, also known as the German Beer Purity Law, which means that any German beer can only contain three ingredients, nothing more: water, barley and hops.

I probably like Früh and Gaffel the most, but any Kölsch is pretty good.

 

The local Kölsch waiters are called the Köbes and if you're not used to their communication style, they might strike you as rude. They might offer you some banter and jokes and speak in a strong local dialect.

Vegetarians have to be careful here as vegetarian food is not very popular in the traditional Brauhäuser and you might want to make other eating plans. The Germans like to add Speck into many dishes.

I can only recommend a visit to Köln, it's a lovely little ”village” as the locals call their city.