Tag Archives: Feta

100 Days Project, Breakfast, Recipes

Day 52 – Open Face Egg Sandwich with Roasted Chillies

Day52

Well . . . when you make fresh bread the day before, than a sandwich of some sort is almost a necessity.

I am a big fan of breakfast sandwiches, piling up layers of tasty ingredients on top of a slice of bread and topping it with some an egg or two. I found this recipe for an open face fried egg sandwich with Roasted Chilies and thought it would be a perfect match for the bread I made for my Day 51: Chipotle and Scallion Buttermilk Bread post.

Fried egg sandwiches have been around since at least the early 1900s, and believed to originally come from England. In 1910, a New York Times article describes the oddity of seeing actors on horror film set eating fried egg sandwiches dressed as “deathlike phantoms”. As an alternative to meat because of the war rationing, the first fast food fried egg sandwiches were introduced, by a manager at a St. Louis White Castle, during WWII .  While many WWII soldiers returned home with the taste for this kind of meal, since fried egg sandwiches called “Banjos” were popular with the troops in the trenches. Here is a piece of “saucy” trivia for you Herbivores . . . food writer Gael Greene wrote about her brief romantic encounter with Elvis Presley, and that a fried egg sandwich was his favorite post-coital snack.

I served this sandwich with the last of the Slow Cooked BBQ Baked Beans from my Day 44 post, which made a perfect Sunday late morning breakfast.

Open Face Egg Sandwich with Roasted Chillies

from: Fork, Spoon, and Knife

INGREDIENTS

  • 1 slice of bread
  • butter
  • 1 egg
  • adobe sauce
  • 4-6 poblano or other medium heat peppers.
  • feta cheese, crumbled
  • 1 green onion/spring onion, chopped
  • sea salt and cracked pepper, to taste

Melt butter in a pan, and fry the bread in the butter.

Transfer the toast to a plate, and spread it with a thin layer of adobo sauce.

Slice the poblano peppers, and put them on a roasting pan under the grill until they get a bit black. Layer the roasted chillies over the adobo sauce.

Put more butter in the pan and wait for it to melt, before cracking the egg into it. Fry the egg until the clear has gone white and the yolk is not too over cooked. Layer the egg on top of the adobo sauce and the roasted chillies.

Sprinkle with the crumbled feta, green onion, cracked black pepper, and sea salt.

ENJOY!!

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100 Days Project, Dairy Free, Gluten Free, Mains, Vegan

Day 46 – Pomegranate Glazed Eggplant with Tempeh

Day46

I was going through my recipe books with a friend, and she was utterly surprised to find out that I just happened to have pomegranate molasses for this recipe already in my pantry. My cheeky response was  . . . “doesn’t everybody?”

Seriously though, I had bought the pomegranate molasses ages ago for a particular recipe I ended up not liking very much, and have been looking for an opportunity to use it ever since.  Hence my excitement at finding the Pomegranate Glazed Eggplant with Tempeh recipe in Heidi Swanson’s “Super Natural Every Day” cookbook.

Pomegranate is one of those flavors that it so unusual, just the right mix of sweet and tart. It is a fruit that has been cultivated in the Middle East since ancient times, and has been mentioned in many ancient texts including the Old Testament. Pomegranates are used in cooking, baking, juices, smoothies and alcoholic beverages, such as martinis and wine, and can give you up to 12% of your daily required intake of vitamin C. You can usually find pomegranate molasses at a middle eastern shop, or sometimes at your local natural food type store.

Tempeh, is a kind of patty made of highly nutritious fermented soybeans. To learn more about the this food you can read my Day 18 – Teriyaki Tempeh Bowl post.

This recipe is Vegan, gluten and dairy free, if you leave off the feta. I served it over a bed of couscous made with currants, green/spring onions, and dry roasted pistachio nuts, but realistically it would go well with almost any grain or pulse: rice, wild rice, Israeli couscous, bulger, quinoa, etc . . .

Pomegranate Glazed Eggplant with Tempeh

SERVES: 4

INGREDIENTS

  • 1 long thin Asian eggplant (about 225 g or 8 ounce), cut into 25mm or 1 inch chunks
  • 255 grams or 8 ounces tempeh, cut into 10 mm or 1/2 inch cubes
  • 1 cup peeled and diced winter squash, pumpkin, sweet potato, or kumara
  • grated zest of 1 small lemon
  • 1 teaspoon fine grain, sea salt
  • 3 medium cloves of garlic, smashed
  • 1/2 teaspoon red pepper flakes
  • 1/3 cup pomegranate molasses
  • 1/3 olive oil
  • 1/3 cup fresh coriander/cilantro, chopped
  • 1/4 cup crumbled feta or ricotta

Preheat the oven to 180 C or 350 F, with the rack int he middle of the oven.

In a large bowl combine the cubed, eggplant, tempeh, and squash.

Prepare the glaze by sprinkling the salt over the smashed garlic, and then turning the garlic into a paste, either in a mortar and pestle or by  continuously chopping and smashing the garlic with the flat of your knife. Combine the garlic paste in a small bowl with the chili flakes and pomegranate molasses. Whisk in the olive oil.

Then drizzle 3/4 of the glaze over the ingredients in the large bowl. Toss well and transfer them to a rimmed baking sheet trying to arrange the ingredient sin a single layer.

Bake for 45-60 minutes until the eggplant and squash are soft and starting to caramelize. About 35 minutes into baking give the ingredients a good toss on the pan.

Once out of the oven drizzle with the remaining glaze, and sprinkle with the feta and fresh coriander/cilantro.

Serve warm with couscous or your grain of choice.

ENJOY!!

 

 

 

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100 Days Project, Baking, Mains, pastry, Recipes

Day 40 – Puff Pastry Pockets

Day40

The right music always adds to the cooking experience . . .

I received in the mail today the new  Fleur Jack CD, who is a Kiwi singer/song writer and friend currently living in The States.  I stuck the CD in my computer, put it on repeat, and danced my way (wine glass in hand) through this recipe for Puff Pastry Pockets, originally from the Baking Makes Things Better blog.

This was the perfect simple recipe for the end of a work day, that used up many of the ingredients I had around the house. The recipe called for filling the puff pastry with feta, pesto, and sundried tomato, but I added spinach and spring onion/green onion into the mix. There are countless other variation you could do on this as well, to help clean out your refrigerator. I can imagine roast pumpkin, potato, kumara, red peppers, capers, carrot, mushrooms, onion, lentils or other beans, chickpeas, and other kinds of cheese all being great alternatives to the filling I chose.

Puff pastry is not something I have ever tried making myself, although it is on the bucket list. Making puff pastry from scratch is a time consuming delicate process that can very easily go wrong, and it is an ingredient readily available in the freezer section of most super markets. As a vegetarian you have to be careful though, as most pre-made versions use lard or other animal fats. In New Zealand, New Way brand puff pastry is the only one that is vegetarian friendly, and even has the New Zealand Vegetarian Society stamp of approval.

Puff Pastry Pockets

adapted from: Baking Makes Things Better

MAKES: 4 pockets

INGREDIENTS

  • 2 square sheets of pre-made puff pastry
  • 200g or 7 ounces feta cheese, crumbled
  • 2 tablespoons pesto
  • 4 large sundried tomatoes, chopped
  • 1 packed cup of baby spinach
  • 1 green onion/spring onion
  • 1 egg, lightly beaten
  • Black pepper for seasoning

Preheat the oven to 200 C of 400 F, use the fan bake setting if you have one.

Brush a baking sheet with olive oil.

Cut each of the pastry squares in half.

In a medium bowl mix together the feta, pesto, sun-dried tomato, spinach, green onion, plus a sprinkling of black pepper.

Divide the feta mixture between the four pieces of pastry, and hen fold over the pastry to encase the filling. Press down on the edges with a fork to seal the
filing in. They should look like giant ravioli.

Brush the tops with the egg then bake for 20 minutes until golden.

Serve, while warm, with a simple side salad, or these will also make a great lunch for the next day.

ENJOY!!

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100 Days Project, Gluten Free, Party Food, Recipes, Snacks

Day 36 – Feta & Pesto Stuffed Peppadew Peppers

Day36

Make your own tapas . . .

I first had feta stuffed Peppadews at a friend’s wedding and I have been hooked on these little sweet and slightly spicy treats ever since, but this is the first time I have ever made them myself. Normally, they can be found in the deli section of the supermarket, where you pay a ridiculous price for the convenience of having someone else stuff a little square of feta into the Peppadew for you because you can not be bothered to take the time and do it yourself.  No more . . . I will henceforth be making my own feta stuffed Peppadews with the Herbivore twist of adding a small dallop of pesto at the bottom of the pepper before stuffing it with feta.

Just like Kleenex or Hoover, Peppadew is actually a brand name for a certain type of sweet piquanté peppers originally grown in South Africa. The pepper is processed for removal of the seeds and reduction of the spiciness of the pepper to more tolerable levels. It is then pickled and bottled. The flavor of a Peppadew is sweet with a slight briney spice.

Feta & Pesto Stuffed Peppadew Peppers

INGREDIENTS

  • 1 bottle Peppadew peppers
  • 1 package feta cheese
  • 1 tub of pesto or make your own fresh

Drain the brine from the jar of peppers.

Cut the feta cheese into small squares.

Using a teaspoon, place a small amount of pesto at the bottom of the Peppadew and then stuff it with the small block of feta. Do not worry of some of the pesto gushes out around the edges. Continue the same process with each pepper until you have finished the bottle, or alternatively run out of either pesto or cheese.

ENJOY!!

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