Home made plum butter

This recipe is very easy, but little bit time consuming (about 4 hours). On the other hand this technology doesn’t require such a work as the classical one (6 hours or the whole night plums stirring in a copper pot…) and the result is great!

Ingredients:

5kg ripe Italian or damson plums (but in the end it doesn’t matter, it is possible to make plum butter from any kind of plums… but classic is classic).
1 cup sugar
1 tbsp ground cinnamon
10 pieces clove
(and event. couple of star anise)

Directions :

1. Washed, halved and pitted plums put into a big roasting pan (best non-adhesive).
 
2. Add sugar and spices to taste and bake in oven 180°C (350°F) for 4 hours.

3. After 2 hours check the roasting process and mix everything with hand mixer till the mash is homogenous.

4. During the next 2 hours check regularly and stir with wooden spoon. Place hot plum butter into hot sterilized jars, leaving 1/4" headspace. Cover with hot sterilized lids and rings. Process in a water bath for 10 minutes. Remove to counter and allow to cool before storing in a cool, dry, dark place. If you don't process in a water bath, the butter can be kept refrigerated for up to 5 weeks or frozen for up to one year.
 

Home made pot cheese (classic curd)

This recipe I got from my friend Klara from Vancouver and I did some technological changes in it to achieve best yield and quality of pot cheese (I’m able to prepare from 4L of milk about 1kg of pot cheese). Its preparation is quite simple and easy. The base for pot cheese is sour milk, but what is very important – milk has to be fermented by ambient (room) temperature and not in a fridge, because it would become bitter taste.

Ingredients:

4L milk (3,25%)
2 tbsp vinegar
4 tbsp sour cream

Directions:

1. Pour milk from a jar into a big pot, add vinegar and sour cream and stir well. Cover with clean cloth (to protect milk from dust or small insect).
2. Process of milk fermentation is done in 2 days (you will see small loupes). In this moment heat the liquid to approx. 45°C (the best way how to measure the temperature is you forefinger – if the feeling is really hot, but you can still stir with the finger – that is the right temperature) and pour this thick liquid into a big strainer (lined with cheese cloth) over a pot (to catch whey – it is great source of vitamins - B1, B2, B5, B6, B9, B12, H, C, E and minerals – magnesium, phosphorus, calcium, potassium, natrium and zinc; can be stored in glass jars in the fridge and use internal or external).
 
3. Let the mixture drain away over night.
  
4. Pot cheese can be store in a glass dose in the fridge.

Pot roast on caraway with mushrooms and bacon

Ingredients:

4 nice piece of beef steaks (best is bottom round)
1/2 tsp salt, pepper, milled caraway seeds, Spanish paprika
some mustard
1 onion (chopped)
3 cloves garlic (chopped)
6 pieces bacon (cut in pieces)
1/4 cup dry or fresh mushrooms
1/4 cup vegetable oil
2 cups of beef broth (or water)
1 tbsp flour (or starch)
1/2 cup water
 

Directions:

1. The steaks can be bisect (it shouldn’t be thicker than 1/2 in or 1cm).
 
2. Beet the pieces nicely.
 
3. Add salt, pepper and caraway seeds and spread a little bit with mustard.

4. Marinate overnight (or at least for couple of hours) in a small bowl covered with couple of tablespoons of vegetable oil in the fridge.
 
5. In the pan roast the pieces of bacon and add chopped onion and garlic let slightly caramelize (10 minutes).
 
6. On the other frying pan roast fast the marinated steaks from both sides (2minutes).

7. Add about 1 tbsp of Spanish paprika into the onion-garlic-bacon mixture and let slightly roast to become nice paprika smell (1minute). Not to overheat paprika, otherwise it became bitter.

8. Add the mushrooms (if they are dry, let them soak for about an hour in the warm water).

9. Add 2 cups of beef broth or water, cover and pressure cook for 20 minutes (or regular cook) till the meat is tender.

10. Take the meat out of sauce and thicken the sauce with mixture of flour (or starch) and water.

11. Pot roast taste best the second day. After cooking is done, let it cool down and place them into the fridge over night. Next day, warm up, serve with mashed potatoes, rice or dumplings – depends on taste. Don’t forget pour over lot of sauce!

Spanish birds (beef roll)

Ingredients: 2 nice piece of beef (best is bottom round)

salt, pepper, milled caraway seeds, mustard

6 pieces bacon

1 hard boiled egg

1 pickle

white sewing thread

Ingredients for the filling: 250g ground beef

1 egg

1 crushed garlic

½ tsp salt, pepper, milled caraway seeds, majoram

pinch of nutmeg

Directions:

1. First of all prepare the filling: mix ground beef (can be of course as well ground pork or mixture pork/beef) with egg, spices and garlic. I’m recommending mixing with hands (not only with spoon)) and at least for 10 minutes – the texture becomes nice, sooth and very homogenous.

2. The cuts can be bisect (it shouldn’t be thicker than 1/2 in or 1cm.

3. Beet the cuts.

4. Add salt, pepper and caraway seeds.

5. Spread a little bit with mustard.

6. Place the bacon strips on the top.

7. Spread the mixture of ground beef.

8. Place 1/2 egg and 1/2 pickles in the first third of each cut.

9. Roll up.

10. Wrap fairly a white sewing thread around.

11. Bake in a small roasting pan aprox. an hour at 180°C (350°F).

12. The Spanish birds are best in the second day. After roasting is done, let them cool down and place them into the fridge over night. Next day, warm up, serve with mashed potatoes, rice or dumplings – depends on taste. Don’t forget pour over the rolls tasty dripping!

Marinated beef with cream sauce and Bavarian potato dumplings

Ingredients (marinade) I. :

2kg beef for roasting (sirloin, roast, blade or neck, but it can be pork or rabbit as well) – taste depending
2 carrots
1 root parsley or parsnip
piece of root celery
2 bay leafs
10 balls allspice
20 balls pepper (black, red, white or mix – taste depending)
4 tbsp sugar
1/2 cup vinegar (marinade has to have a pleasant sweet-sour taste)
1 tsp salt
2 litres water

Directions I.:

1. Shred the veggies and mix all ingredients in a pot; boil for 10 min and let cool down for the ambient (room temperature).

2. Put the meat to the marinade, cover with a lid and marinate in the fridge at least for 3 days.

Ingredients (roasting) II.:

Marinated meat from step 1 incl. the marinade.

Directions II.:

1. Pour about 1/2 off from the marinade (leave it for the following baste by roasting).
2. Add meat, veggies and marinade to the roasting pan.
 
3. Roast the meat about 2,5 hours (depending on meat type and taste), check and baste periodically.
4. When the meat is ready, take it out, leave it about 20min cool down on the plank and then slice. Dripping with veggies will be use as a base for the sauce.

 

Ingredients (sauce) III.:

Dripping and veggies from the previous step
1 cup cream
1 tbsp flour (or starch)

Directions III.:

1. Dripping and veggies strain through a strainer.

2. Pulping the veggies through strainer with spoon until the rest is dry.

3. Stir flour (or starch) into cream.

4. Stir heat the sauce, add the cream mixture and cook for 3 minutes and put the pot aside.

 

Ingredients (Bavarian potato dumplings) IV.:

1kg raw peeled potatoes
300g boiled peeled potatoes
1/2 cup hot milk
pinch of salt
crumbs or crutons

Directions IV.:

1.Shred raw potatoes into the bow with cloth.

2. Wring the liquid out (potatoes have to be almost dry).

3. Keep the liquid and strain from the top (leave the bottom part with starch).

4. Shred the boilde potatoes as well.

5. Mix shreded raw and boiled potatoes, starch (from step 3), hot milk and salt in a bowl.

6. With a wet hand shape dumplings, place the crumbs or crutons into the middle.

7. Insert dumplings into the boiling water, turn the heat on minimum and simmer for 20 minutes.
 
8. Pour the sauce over the meat on the plate and add dumplings.