Tagliatelle with mushrooms and gorgonzola in the oven

This was my improvisation for lunch today. It came out perfect!

Ingredients (x2):
1 clove of garlic
160 g table mushrooms
200 g tagliatelle
olive oil
½ dl cream
some milk
basil
salvia
black pepper
salt
80 g gorgonzola cheese

Preparation:
Cook the tagliatelle in lightly salted water. While the pasta is cooking, start preparing the sauce. Cut half of the mushrooms into pieces of approximately 1,5 cm in diameter. Put the other half of the mushrooms into a mixer. Pour a bit of olive oil on the mushrooms that are going to be mixed and add a bit of salvia and basil. Mix until all the mushrooms have stopped looking like mushrooms.

On a pan, heat the chopped clove of garlic with olive oil and let it gain a more golden colour. Add the mushrooms cubes on the pan and fry them on high heat for about 6 minutes. Then add the other half of the mushrooms that you mixed with the mixer, the "paté". Add salt and black pepper. Keep on frying for at least 5 more minutes. Then significantly lower the heat and pour the cream on the pan accompanied with a bit of milk. Let the sauce cook while mixing it for most of the time.

When the tagliatelle are ready, pour the water off them. Add the sauce into the pan with tagliatelle and mix them well together. Check that the amount of spices is right. Pour the dish into an oven plate. Cut pieces of the gorgonzola and place them over the whole surface of the pasta.

Bake the dish in the oven at 180'c for some 7 minutes.

Rosolli

This mix of vegetables, called rosolli, belongs to the Finnish Christmas as tightly as ham.
It is usually combined with other Christmas food.
Some people like to prepare a creamy sauce for rosolli but I prefer to skip that.

Ingredients (x2):
1 beetroot or two if smaller
some white vinegar
1 big carrot
1-2 cooked potatoes
1 pickled cucumber
½ red onion
½ apple
a pinch of black pepper

Preparation:
Cut the vegetables into cubes. Put the cubed beetroot, apple and red onion into a glass and pour some vinegar on them, and mix. After a while pour the vinegar off.
Lay the vegetables on a plate separately or, alternatively, mix them together (in that case the beetroot will colour the whole rosolli red).
Dust some black pepper over the vegetables.

Fusilli with tomato&soy sauce, roasted pine nuts and minced rucola

I prepared this for lunch yesterday and it really made my day!

Ingredients (x2):
160 g fusilli
70 g grinded soy
1 small onion
1 clove garlic
2 tomatoes
1 tablespoon white winegar
50 g pine nuts
30 g fresh rucola
salt
pepper
olive oil
parmesan cheese

Preparation:

Roast the pine nuts on a frying pan if they are not readily roasted.

Chop the garlic and the onion finely. Peel the tomatoes and remove their insides, and then cut them into cubes. Pour some olive oil on a pan and add the garlic. Heat it on relatively high heat until the garlic has gained some colour, and then add the onion. Remember to mix. Soon after lower the heat a bit and add the grinded soy and the winegar, and dust some salt and pepper on it. Mix the soy frequently and let it gain a bit darker colour. Next, add the cubes of tomatoes on the pan. Keep a medium heat and mix the sauce in 5-7 minutes every once in a while.

Cook the fusilli in salted water.

Rinse the rucola and stuff it into a mixer. Add a bit of olive oil and a pinch of salt. Mince the rucola with the mixer.

Pour the water off the pasta. Mix the soy&tomato sauce and pine nuts with the pasta and then (separately) add the minced rucola. Turn the pasta around a bit so that the rucola spreads more evenly. Add grated parmesan cheese on top.

Tunaballs

Here's a really nice Saturday lunch recipe for tunafish balls. I tend to eat them with potatoes and a lemon-ish sauce.

Ingredients (x3-4):
2 cans of tunafish
1 small onion
250 g bread
2 eggs
3 tablespoons of olive oil
bread crumbs
salt
pepper
more olive oil for frying

Preparation:
Open the cans of tuna and press the water off the tunafish. Put the tuna into a bowl. Tear the bread into small pieces with your hands and mix it together with the tuna. Add into the mix the eggs, olive oil, salt, pepper and the finely chopped onion. Mix well. Add some bread crumbs if the dough is still too soft to handle. Spread bread crumbs on the working surface and start to form balls out of the dough with your hands. Roll the balls in bread crumbs.

At the end fry the balls in olive oil until they have gained a bit of colour. Serve them warm.

Pipe rigate with tomatoes from the oven and rucola

This is a very easy-to-prepare dish. It will always come out good, unless you add too much (sea) salt, like I once did and made my boyfriend's heart go too fast... Only a few ingredients and a fresh, warm taste.

Ingredients (x2):
175 g pipe rigate or another short pasta
2 big or 3 medium-sized tomatoes
2 cloves garlic
1 onion
olive oil
black pepper
salt
1 bundle of rucola
parmesan cheese

Preparation:
Chop the garlic and onion. Cut the tomatoes into slices in shape of a half moon. Lay these tomato slices on each other in domino-like rows on an oven plate. Add the chopped onion and garlic all along these rows on top of the tomatoes. Grind black pepper on top and dust some salt. Pour a bit of olive oil throughout the rows of tomato. Put the oven plate into the oven and bake it for 30 minutes on 180 c degrees. Meanwhile cook the pasta in salted water and rinse the rucola. Pour the water off the pasta when it is al dente. When the tomatoes have been baked, take them out of the oven and mix them with the pasta and add the rucola into the mix. Serve the dish with grated or sliced parmesan cheese.

Soup of beans, leek and potato

Ingredients (x2):
400g green beans
1 small onion
1 clove garlic
1 leek
1 big potato
500ml chicken bouillon
1,5 tablespoons olive oil
salt
(croutons or bread)

Preparation:
Chop the onion and garlic and cut the washed leek into rings. Cook these ingredients in a pan with olive oil and add the beans. Cook this mix of vegetables on low heat for 10-15 minutes. Peel the potato and cut it into cubes. Prepare the bouillon by letting a bouillon cube dissolve in water. Add the potato cubes to the rest of the vegetables and pour the bouillon on top. Cook the soup covered, on low heat, for one hour. When an hour has passed, take your immersion blender and give the soup a puré-like composition with it. Add salt according to your taste. Serve the soup with croutons or bread.


The recipe of the bread pictured above can be found here.

Mushroom fusilli

I have usually been doing this dish with tagliatelle, but due to my boyriend's kitchen experiments of one evening, I didn't have tagliatelle left anymore and I opted for fusilli. It was a good choice (these fusilli here are by a Dutch brand and their shape reminds me more or less of worms ;) I have made this with different kinds of mushrooms. Make sure your mushrooms are not poisonous!

Ingredients (x2):
180g tagliatelle, fusilli or another pasta
2 cloves garlic
300 g mushrooms
olive oil
cream (if you want it lighter, use milk instead)
a tiny bit of peperoncino
salt
pepper
parsley (fresh or dried, but preferably fresh)

Preparation:
Start boiling the pasta in abundant salted water. Chop one of the garlic cloves and cut half of the mushrooms into small pieces. Add the chopped galic clove on a pan and heat it, and soon after add the mushrooms you preciously cut into pieces. Fry the garlic and mushrooms for 5 minutes and add the spices (except the parsley) on the pan. During or after this pour the remaining garlic clove and remaining mushrooms together with the parsley into the mixer, and add a bit of olive oil. Mix these ingredients fine with the mixer in order to obtain a puré. Add this puré to the pan where the pieces of mushrooms are. Fry for a for more minutes. At the end add the cream or milk and lower then heat to below medium. Mix the sauce and take a few minutes of time until the sauce becomes more creamy. Pour the water off the pasta and mix it with the sauce. Serve with parmesan cheese.