Bigos

Although I didn't make this bigos myself. Pawels mother made ​​it. It is delicious so I give you a recipe :) 

Indridients:

• 1 kg sauerkraut
• glass of dried mashrooms
• 200 g smoked bacon
• 500 g sausage (good one)
• 1 large onion
• 2 tbsp. of  tomato paste or ketchupu
• bay leaf
• allspice
• 3/4 glass of red, dry wine (option)

Cook mashrooms in a little water and than chop it. Pour boiling water to cabbage and cook for about 30 minutes, than drain. Bacon, sausage and onion fry on a soucepan. Add cabbage and mashrooms. Cook for about 5-10 minutes. Add tomato paste or ketchup, mix and fry again about 5 minutes stirring frequently. Season with pepper, pour the water remaining after boiling mushrooms, add bay leaf and allspice. Cook until most of the water evaporate.
Now you can do two things:
- you can put everything into casserole and put it to the oven for about 20 minutes or add wine and simmer over a low heat.

Cheescake

Cheescake

One of my favourite cakes. There is always a cheescake in my family home for Christmas, and to be honest I can't imagine Christmas Eve without it :) 
From my childhood I remember all this Christmas scents - vanilla, cheescake and tangerines. I loved to sneak into the dining room to fry delicacies and watch what was lying under the Christmas tree. In our tradition Santa Claus is coming to our homes during the night from 23 to 24 December and christmas presents is laying all day under the tree. It was a huge torture, but a great exercise of willpower.

Ingridients:

• 1 kg white cheese (twarog)
• 6 eggs
• 300 g icing powder sugar
• 2 tbsp. of vanilla sugar
• 1 pack of vanilla pudding
• a half of glass of raisins

meringue topping

• 4 egg white
• 1/2 glass of icing powder sugar
• vanilla

Separate the whites from the yolks. Mix together the egg yolks, cheese, icing powder, vanilla pudding and vanilla sugar. Beat egg whites until it become stiff and gently combine with the rest. Transfer the mixture into pre-buttered and sprinkled with bread crumbs form. Coat the raisins with flour and gently combine with the dough.

Egg whites for the  meringue topping beat to stiff. The foam apply on top of the cake.

The whole put into the preheated to 180 C degreesoven and bake about 1 hour.

Surimi salad with peas

Surimi salad with peas

I do not know who invent this recipe. This salad are always made by my sister and I know recipe from her. It's simple to do and tasty.

Ingredients:

- crab sticks (surimi) 2 packs
- 1 can of peas
- fresh arugula
- mayonnaise - I always use Winiary (best Polish mayonnaise)
- pepper (freshly ground)



I share Surimi (crab sticks) to strands, add peas, chopped arugula, then mix with mayonnaise and season with pepper. I do not use salt, but if you like it you can add it. 

Pierogi with cabbage and mushrooms

I love pierogi (polish dumplings), all kinds of pierogi! And that's why Christmas is so amazing! You can eat and eat, and no one would look at you with disappointment when you take another serving (a thousand one).
Pierogi with cabbage and mushrooms are something incredibly delicious!

Ingredients:

dough (app. 60 pieces):

•  3 glasses of flour
• 1 glass of boiling water
• 1-2 egss
• salt

filling:

• 60 g dried mushrooms
• 600 g sauerkraut
• 1 large onion
• 2,5 glasses og boiling water
• salt, pepper
• olive oil

In a  saucepan fry chopped onion, add chopped cabbage and mushrooms (pre-cooked and chopped). Fry everything few minutes, then pour boiling water. Cover and cook on low heat until water evaporate.

Knead the dough, divide it into two portions, cover with a napkin. Roll the dough out thinly. Cut the circles with a glass or mag. At the center of each disc place stuffing, fold and merges the edges.

Throw pierogi into boiling, salted water. When the pierogi rise to the surface, cook for 2-3 minutes.

I serve them with fried onions or bacon.

Dried fruits compote

I'm not a big fun of this beverage but Pawel likes it, so it is being cooked now :) It smells nice! I think that everything depends on the plums, these one which I used this time were not smoked - and this compote not repel me. Maybe I will drink one glass?

Ingredients:
apples, dried 200 g or 4 fresh
pears, dried 150 g
peaches, dried 150 g
plums, dried 100 g
handful of raisins
1 bag of vanilia sugar (7,5 g)
5 cloves
1 tp. cinnamon
juice from 1/2 of lemon
3/4 glass of sugar (I use demerara)
3 l of water

We put all of ingredients to a pot and cook it for about 45 minutes.

Christmas...

Christmas is coming...

It's 6 days to Chrtistmas Eve!

X-mas check list:

- Christmas tree                                               √

- X-mas decorations                                        √

- Christmas Eve menu                                     √

So much to do! I think I have enough time!

This will be my first x-mas far from family home. Our friends are going to come to our house. When I start to cook my part of x-mas menu (I hope it will be delicious) I will post recipes and photos. But now I wish all of you great x-mas shopping and easy preparation to christmas.
I like this time of the year - home starts smell and attire oneself for Christmas. On the other hand it is really exhaustive time.

Like always before christmas I have to see 'Love actually' - this is my x-mas habit :)

Dibba, Oman 17 Dec 2011

Dibba - Oman

Winter in Emirates is beautiful, and temperature encouraged to go for trips. We went to Oman. There are beautiful mountains near the Omani - Emirati border. And I love mountains!!!