Upside down brussels sprout pizza

It's time to start thinking about Christmas food, as it's soon December. I want to test a few center piece candidates before deciding the dishes for our vegetarian Christmas feast, and I think that it's nice to sample different seasonal food in this pre-Christmas period. So in this spirit I made a seasonal upside down brussels sprout pizza. The crust is a seedy thick crust and the toppings are potatoes, slow cooked onions and brussels sprouts with sage and other spices. I topped the pizza or pie with sea buckthorn and cranberries to add a splash of colour and they also added a nice flavour contrast. I think that this dish could be nice at the Christmas table. I just love sprouts and good ones have started appearing at the market, also the ones in the stalks. I need to make more sprout dishes in the near future, but here is this recipe first.

Upside down brussels sprout pizza

Ingredients

Dough

200 g wheat flour

1/2 cup seed mix

2 tbsp dry yeast

1 tsp salt

150 ml lukewarm water

3 tbsp vegetable oil

Filling

1 onion

1 garlic clove

5-6 small potatoes

8-10 brussels sprouts

Vegetable oil for frying

2 tbsp vegan butter

1 tsp Cabbage Karma spice mix

1 tsp sea salt

½ tsp ground black pepper

Fresh sage leaves

Sea buckthorn and cranberries for decoration

Method

Mix and knead the dough ingredients and let it rise for about one hour.

In the meanwhile prepare the other ingredients. Cook the potatoes and slice them. Steam the brussels sprouts and cut them to halves. Slice the onion and chop the garlic finely and slow cook them in oil.

Add the potatoes and brussels sprouts to the onions and spice the mix. I used Cabbage Karma spice mix that is a blend consisting of coriander seeds infused in orange oil with fennel seeds, sumac, black pepper and lemon thyme. I also added sea salt, ground black pepper and fresh sage leaves.

Arrange the vegetables in the pan. Use the same pan for frying and baking in the oven. I put the brussels sprouts on the bottom (meaning that they will be on top of the pizza once turned around), then the potatoes followed by the onions. Then place the dough on top. Hand stretch it over the vegetables and bake the pizza at 200 C for about 20 minutes. When it's done, turn it around on a plate and enjoy! 

I'm sharing this recipe with the last edition of Eat Your Greens hosted by Shaheen from Allotment 2 Kitchen and co-hosted by me. Sadly this event will come to an end after this month, but you still have time to share your green recipe with us! It would be nice to get plenty of green recipes for the last round up. There are more details about the rules here.

Your VegHog

Busy weekday salad

Well, I would've been very surprised, if this week hadn't been a busy one again. It seems that's the way these days. It's good to keep busy on the other hand, as the time goes by quickly, but then again, there isn't much time for anything other than work. Colourful and crunchy salads are just perfect for such busy work weeks. When there isn't much time or strength for cooking in the evenings, a salad is an easy option to put together. I also like their uplifting colourfulness.

For this salad I spiralised kohlrabi and mixed it with gem lettuce, chickpeas, pomegranate seeds and carrots. It had a real seasonal feel to it and it was so nice to crunch away at work the next day as well. I've been lucky finding a few kohlrabi, but probably not for very long anymore. It looks so quaint before peeled and spiralised.

I've also been making more vegan salads lately, as I have noticed that when pulses and nuts are added, there's certainly no need for adding any cheese to the salad.

Okay, this was my small post for today. Enjoy your week further!

Your VegHog

Roasted new potatoes with shaven asparagus

This is a really simple seasonal dish. I had to try the shaven asparagus stripes, as I keep seeing them in so many current recipes. It wasn't bad at all, and it was curious not to cook the asparagus for a change. So basically I just combined here roasted new potatoes with lightly lemony asparagus. I could see this is a side dish in upcoming Midsummer celebrations. What do you think?

Here is what ingredients I used and how I made this dish:

500 g new potatoes

1 tsp olive oil

½ tsp salt

¼ tsp smoked paprika

250 g green asparagus

½ lemon's juice

1 tsp olive oil

Brush the new potatoes with olive oil and sprinkle salt and smoked paprika on the top. Roast in the oven until done.

Shave thin stripes from asparagus with a peeling knife and dress them with lemon juice and olive oil. Let infuse in the fridge while the potatoes roast.

Serve the potatoes and asparagus together.

Your VegHog

Gingerbread woodland animals diorama

Gingerbread cookies always belong to Christmas, but this year I wanted to make something different. Instead of plain cookies or a gingerbread house, I made a small woodland animal diorama. In my plans it was much more spectacular than how it actually turned out, but never mind, I was happy with it. Maybe next year I can spend more time with such a project, as it was great fun! It reminded me a little bit of the huge horse head gingerbread cookies that I used to bake for my horse and pony friends at Christmas – those were the days! Have you made any creative work with gingerbread?

So, this is a photo post of my creation. The woodland animals are mainly hedgehogs of course, but if you look very closely, you might spot one or the other different species as well.

Spelt and cider rolls

I have made these cider rolls a few times before, but never posted the recipe. Now I thought that these could also be nice for the Christmas season. How about serving them to your Christmas guests?

I used the organic Black Fox cider for these rolls, but any dry British style cider will work well in this recipe and will add a lovely flavour. I have previously posted a review of the Black Fox cider here. 

And here's now my cider roll recipe, powered by spelt flour, of course. If you don't have any spelt flour, don't hesitate to use wheat flour as it also works in these. I got 10 medium sized rolls with this recipe.

Ingredients

3 dl dry cider

7 dl spelt flour

1 tbsp dry yeast

1 tsp salt

1 tbsp sugar

25 g butter

Method

Melt the butter and set it to side.

Heat the cider lukewarm and dissolve the dry yeast to the cider.

Add the flour, salt and sugar and mix it all into an even dough. You can mix the dough with a spatula as it is quite soft, so no hand kneading needed.

Add the melted butter and mix a little more.

Let the dough rise covered for about one hour at room temperature.

Shape rolls from the dough and let them rise for further 30 minutes on a baking tray.

Pre-heat the oven to 220C.

Brush the surfaces of the rolls with water and bake them for about 10-15 minutes. You can also add various seeds or cheese on the top.

Serve them freshly baked with butter and cheese, and maybe even a glass of cool cider on the side as there will be something left over in the bottle.

Your VegHog

Stuffed yellow courgette with chanterelles

I have once again found such beautiful ingredients here in Finland, so I had to start cooking. This dish really contains the taste of the season. I stuffed a yellow courgette with a chanterelle, new onion and pearled spelt mix, and I think that everyone quite liked it. Here are the instructions.

Ingredients for the stuffed courgette:

1 large yellow courgette

100 g chanterelles

1 new onion of the season

1 dl pearled spelt

150 g grated emmental

1 vegetable stock cube

1 tbsp vegetable oil

1/2 tsp ground black pepper

Method

Cook the pearled spelt in water with an added vegetable stock cube until tender. This takes about 15 minutes.

Chop the onion finely and cook it in vegetable oil until soft.

Cut the courgette in half lengthwise and carve two hollow boats from it, save the pulp from the inside. Then quickly cook the halves in a pan in little vegetable oil so that they get a bit warmed on each side.

Add the courgette pulp into the onion pan, and then also add the finely chopped chanterelles. Cook the mix for a few minutes and then add the cooked spelt (where any excess water has been removed from) and half of the grated emmental into the pan. Season with ground black pepper. I didn't add any extra salt as the stock cube already made the spelt quite salty and the cheese adds a certain saltiness as well.

Fill the courgette boats with the spelt and chanterelle mix and sprinkle the rest of the cheese on the top.

Bake them in the oven at 200C for about 20 minutes until the crust is crisp and the courgettes have cooked, but still have a certain bite to them.

You can serve some sauteed chanterelles on the side like I did. Just cook them in butter with chopped onion for a few minutes and maybe add some salt and pepper.

I also served pettuleipä with this dish (wartime bread, where part of the flour has been replaced by ground tree bark) that I bought at the 18th century market in Isokyrö. It was plenty chewy, but actually tasted a little of pine.

So, that's the dish, I hope you enjoyed this post! See you soon!

Your VegHog

 

Harlequin squash and new potato soup

Would you like to make a vegan soup for a change? I certainly would, once again... This is a super easy recipe, so there are no excuses for not making this.

The star of this soup is one single harlequin squash, and new potatoes make a good company for it indeed. As my regular reader you might know that I recently detected the harlequin squash, found it to be lovely and now constantly want to make dishes with it. So here we go!

Ingredients

1 harlequin squash

300g new potatoes

1 large onion

2 garlic cloves

2 salad onions

Vegetable stock powder

Lemon and pepper bread crumbs

Vegetable oil

Black pepper

Salt

Method

Cut the new potatoes in half, or in several smaller pieces in case they are a bit larger. Cut the harlequin squash into small cubes. Be careful when making the first cuts as the squash can be tough.

Then chop the onion, garlic and salad onions. Prepare the vegetable stock.

Heat oil in a saucepan and fry the onion and garlic briefly. Add the potatoes and fry them for a few minutes. Then also add the squash and most of the chopped salad onions, save some of them as garnish.

Add the vegetable stock and let it all simmer under a lid for about 20 minutes. Stir occasionally.

Season with salt and pepper once the potatoes and the squash are cooked soft. Then puree the soup.

Garnish with salad onions and lemon and pepper bread crumbs, then serve the soup with some nice bread. I paired the soup this time with this artisan crispbread.

Enjoy!

Your VegHog

Chanterelle risotto

Chanterelles are in season and they are in fact my favourite mushrooms. Therefore I made this tasty risotto and I can only recommend it. It's also already September and I like autumn food (soups, squashes, mushrooms...), so in the near future I will be sharing some delicious autumnal recipes with you. 

Ingredients

2 cups arborio rice

1l fresh chanterelles

1 small red pepper

1 onion

1 cloveless garlic (This was a novelty for me but I detected it in a Finnish supermarket and found it to be brilliant, you could also use 2 regular garlic cloves instead)

1l vegetable stock

1dl dry Riesling (Riesling is one of my favourite white wines and it's so nice with chanterelles)

Grated emmental cheese (Red-label emmental is great for this dish, it has matured for about 6 months and is strong and aromatic)

50g butter

Vegetable oil

Fresh parsley

Black pepper

Nettle salt (Himalayan pink crystal salt with dried nettles)

Method

Clean the chanterelles up. Lightly sauté them in butter for only about 3 minutes and set them to side. They will be added to the risotto later.

Chop the onion, garlic and pepper and fry them in vegetable oil for about 5 minutes. Add some butter and the rice. Make a white wine addition once the rice is translucent. Let the wine evaporate and make a vegetable stock addition. Now let it all simmer until the rice is cooked al dente. Stir the risotto often and add more vegetable stock when the previous addition has evaporated. Add about 1dl of grated emmental.

Towards the end add the chanterelles to the pan and season with parsley, pepper and salt. Add more butter or cheese if needed. Let it simmer for a few minutes more and then serve with some nice fresh summer salad and a glass of Riesling.

Stay hungry!

Your VegHog