Cooking with Okko and Jochen

Maple Pork Belly with Chinese Spices

2008-02-10T19:49:00.000+01:00

I'm still stuffed from this one. But it contains a combination of maple syrup and pork, which, as a former quasi-Canadian, I think is about the best thing in the world and have to share right away. Maple and pork are especially good if the porc bits are actually bacon... Mmhhh bacon. Others agree but I digress.

Combine about quarter cup of maple syrup and soy sauce each in an oven-proof casserole with a lid.
Add a tablespoon of five-spice, a teaspoon of ground star anise, two cloves of garlic (chopped) and a good dash of chili powder.
Cut ca. 1kg of pork belly into bite size strips, add to mixture, mix everything well.
Cover and place in oven at 180C for about an hour, remove.
Heat vegetable oil with a few dashes of sesame oil in a pan. Fry bits of porc until crisp.

Serves 3-4. Serve over choice of noodles (e.g. Udon), rice & vegetables (e.g. fried mushrooms, spring onions) with strained porc jus from casserole.

Green Curry Soup

2008-01-31T18:51:00.000+01:00

For an evening of dinner and movies at home with some vegetarian friends of ours, I made a quick and impromptu green curry soup. Initially I thought I'd make the standard green curry and rice with whatever vegetables we had around, but due to a lack of proper rice (only had short grain) I decided on making a big soup instead, serving it with Udon noodles.

Boil udon noodles for four, set aside.
Peel, thinly slice one large carrot.
Quarter a medium onion.
Cut into chunks a handful of mushrooms.
Heat olive, a good spoonful of green curry paste and a dash of sesame oil in a large pot. Add vegetables in the above order in 1-2 minute intervals.
When mushrooms start to let liquid, add 6 bowls of water and a spoonful of vegetable soup mix. Let everything boil for 5-10 minutes
Add a can of coconut milk
Cut two red or yellow peppers into small pieces, add to soup.
Remove stems from three twigs of kai lan (Chinese broccoli), also add to soup.
Let simmer another 2-3 minutes, then add the udon noodles. Serve with lime zest and more coconut milk, if too spicy.

Nice things to add that I didn't have around: Thai basil, lemon grass, lime leaves. Certainly works with shrimp or chicken as a meaty variant.

Moorish Rabbit Stew

2007-12-29T13:48:00.000+01:00

Now that Christmas is done and over with and the pounds are on, it's time to turn back and reflect before shaking off the pfefferkuchen-blues in New Year's frenzy.
So, before looking forward and sweating some of it back off, there are two recipes from this holiday season I thought were worth sharing. Here's the first.

Moorish Rabbit Stew with Saffron & Couscous

One rabbit (2kg) in pieces, no giblets
1kg of white onions, in thick slices
0.3g of saffron
1/4l of white wine
150g of raisins
Salt & pepper to taste
Olive oil
Buttered Couscous for four

Stir saffron into wine. Preheat oven to 150C. Heat oil on stove top in oven-proof casserole. Fry pieces of rabbit in oil to sear, season with salt and pepper, set aside. Fry onions in same oil over low heat until glassy and soft. Remove half the onions, add the rabbit and then re-add the onion and pour in the wine. Place covered in oven for 20 minutes, add raisins and keep in oven another 20-25 minutes or until done. Serve with couscous.

Rabbit was graciously supplied by Matthias. Thanks mate!

Berlin City, French Food

2007-11-05T21:38:00.000+01:00

Long time no post. Due to the fact that I returned to Berlin, switched job several times, started up a company, will marry next week and wait for my second boy to see the light of day, I think it's OK to have a little rest.

Nevertheless, some weeks ago, I had a nice evening with Guylaine, Matthias and Okko with several (no figures!) bottle of wine and some food, which I had the honour to prepare. For convenience, I will publish just a dinner overview and will post the recipes on request.

Starter
Celery remolade

Main
Daube Provencale
Gratin dauphinois

Dessert
Creme brulee

Here are some pictures:

Chorizo Cheese Tortilla

2007-08-24T11:43:00.000+02:00

We just returned from an annual family vacation in Denmark, during which all family members take turns cooking. It's normally a gain-five-pounds deal, though this year ten is more close to reality. On my day I prepared various tapas, including a simple tortilla:

Dice and boil 5 large potatoes.
Dice one red paprika, an onion and a tomato, fry in an oven-proof pan in some olive oil over medium heat for 5 minutes.
Chop 300g of chorizo sausage into chunks and add to pan, fry another 5 minutes, browning evenly.
Add diced potatoes.
Whisk 5 eggs, season with salt, pepper, paprika and pour into pan. Lift at the edge occasionally to let the egg mixture run underneath.
When eggs set, grate a layer of Mahon or Parmesan cheese over everything and put into preheated oven for 15 minutes.

Serve hot, warm or cold in slices.
I also prepared some yummy marinated green olives. Will post here if I recall the recipe.

Scrambled Eggs & Truffle Brekkie Sandwich

2007-07-06T12:35:00.000+02:00

Having moved home to Germany recently after an extended period of time (eight years) in the Angle-Saxon world, the food I typical eat for breakfast nowadays (when it doesn't have to be quick) changed quite drastically from warm toast-eggs-and-bacon-based dishes to something more along the line of whole bread, cold cuts and jams ('continental', if you will.)
Today however, perhaps because of the drinks last night, I was craving a good old greasy spoon egg dish (sorry Jochen, Oxtail Soup wasn't gonna cut it). I decided to give this one a little twist with some truffle-olive oil I made last week. The truffles in it I had rescued from a white truffle honey, which I brought back from Italy a little while ago (the honey was awful, but the oil is nice and fragrant.)

Heat butter in a pan and crack 3 eggs into it
Stir the eggs lightly, season with salt, pepper and Tuscan herbs, reduce heat
Continue cooking, folding the eggs occasionally, for about 2-3 minutes until eggs are cooked but still nice and runny
Toast two slices of white toast bread, butter and drizzle lightly(!) with truffle oil
Arrange slices tomato and prosciutto or Serrano ham on the toast
Place half the scrambled eggs on each slice of toast

There. For breakfast it doesn't get much simpler, but the egg, prosciutto, tomato and truffle flavor was divine.

Quick Tomato Pasta

2007-06-26T10:59:00.000+02:00

Working mainly from home these days, quick lunches and dinners made of leftovers and random ingredients in the fridge are a blessing. This one had me finish some cooked spaghetti, an open cup of crême fraiche and some red pesto before spoiling. Nothing fancy, but satisfying.

Fry 6 halfed cherry tomatoes, face down in some olive oil for 2-3 minutes
Add a handful of sundried tomatoes, some oregano and a tablespoon of red pesto, leftover cooked spaghetti, some water if necessary, let simmer
Turn off heat, stir in a spoonful of crême fraiche, salt pepper, serve with shaved or shredded parmesan

Duck Breasts in Creamy Mustard-Lingonberry Sauce

2007-06-08T16:13:00.000+02:00

Sorry if this is quite similar to a recent recipe. I liked the creamy mustardseed combination over butter spätzle, so I thought I'd give it another whirl with the duckbreasts - a meat I love but that I've grown rather tired off in its common manifestations.
The trick here is to keep the meat really moist and tender. It's going to cook, but only just since it will be stripped of its fat (sacriledge!) and will dry easily.

2 white onions, very finely diced
6 white mushrooms, very finely diced
1 duck breasts, trimmed off all fat and cut in very thin slices (most of it comes off without any implements, but for about 1 cm has to be removed with a sharp knife)
1 cup of cream
1 leaf of laurel
2 tablespoons of ground mustardseeds
2 tablespoons of lingonberry jam or preserve, available at IKEA ;).
salt, pepper, butter, olive oil

Fry white onions in butter and olive oil until glassy, then add mushrooms until they let water, add laurel leaf, mustardseeds, season with salt and pepper. Reduce and lower heat. Place slices of duck on top of everything in the pan, add the cream. Let simmer for about 5 minutes until the meat has just browned enough to be eaten (do not overcook).
Serve over butter spätzle

Chicken in Tomatoes with Thyme

2007-04-21T23:13:00.000+02:00

This is a beautiful little French recipe - simple and tasty. Falls in the low-effort, tastiness-ensues category.
Ingredients:

150g of bacon cubes
5 small onions, finely cut
1 clove of garlic, mashed
4 chicken legs, drumsticks separated from thighs.
1kg of tomatoes, cubed
2tblsp of thyme
1 leaf of laurel
2 baguettes

Fry the bacon bits until crisp in a pot that holds all ingredients. Add onions and garlic until glassy and fragrant. Add chicken pieces, season and brown. Add tomatoes, thyme, laurel. Boil partially covered for 45 minutes to one hour. Serve with baguette.
If you don't mind the fat, you can add butter and olive oil at the beginning.

Last Fondue of the year

2007-04-09T21:01:00.000+02:00

OK, today has been the very last opportunity to chase away wintertime and I think we did it the right way.
I met Liam this morning for a short hiking tour from Pfäffikon to Einsiedeln, where we saw the black Madonna and ate a rather bad Bratwurst. On the right, you may see the result.

Anyway, it didn't hurt us so much, since we both knew, what's waiting at home: the last fondue of the year. Of course we all know, there are some strange people up there in the western part of Switzerland, who eat fondue the whole year, but I simply refuse to talk to them.
I know, there is a lot of mythology around fondue. Since I'm german, I believe in rationality and as a result my advice for the best fondue ever is quite simple: only trust in really good cheese. Here is the recipe I use:

Ingredients for four persons

200g Gruyere, 200g Appenzeller, 200g Bündner Bergkäse, 200g Freiburger Vacherin gross grated
400ml vine for fondue (dry, high acidity). If you are in Switzerland, buy the special fondue wine, but never (!) try to drink it
6 or more cloves of garlic
4 tsp. cornstarch
1 tsp. fresh lemon juice
Kirsch
Pepper and nutmeg
Enough white bread in small pieces

There is nothing magical in dressing a fondue: Peel garlic, robout the Caquelon with one of them, throw all garlic, the cheese, the vine, the cornstarch and the juice into the Caquelon and boil everything up. Take care to stir a lot. When it bubles, put in some Kirsch, pepper and nutmeg. The decision on how much Kirsch to use, depends on your mood. When I began preparing fondue, I preferred to take a lot of Kirsch, but now, I just use one small jigger.

When the fondue is too fluid, mix some Kirsch with some more cornstarch and mix it into the cheese. But beware of taking too much cornstarch. If you are satisfied, be sure to serve quickly on a prepared rechaud.

If everything goes well, you will have lucky guests as you may see on the foto on the left.
Remember: a good fondue has only good cheese in it. If you are lucky and live in Zürich, try out the Chäslädeli in the Zollikerstrasse.

Honey

2007-03-30T09:56:00.000+02:00

Talking about food journalism... Inspired by an article in the NY Times last year about single-flower varieties of honey, I started on a quest of finding my favourite. Berlin is blessed with some really neat weekly markets, some featuring exotic varieties of honey, so finding material wasn't too difficult.
The problem with this enterprise was, however, that honey is rarely sold in samplers or small quantities. Making purchases for the sake of a real grand-scale objective cross-variety comparison would have cost me an arm and a leg. Also, you buy some and you're stuck with it and the less you like it, the longer it stays with you.
None-the-less, given some time, I have managed to sample some pretty nifty ones. Here's my recent list:

Ulmo - Chile. A truly unique and incredibly fragant honey. Elusive, tasting somewhat like liquorice.
Leatherwood - Tasmania. Fragrant, woody, earthy. Almost overpowering, so use sparingly.
Thyme - New Zealand. One of a few varieties that reminded of the raw material. Unique but limited usage because of distinctive flavour.
Chestnut - Italy. Like thyme, reminds of the related produce. Also hard to use due to distinct flavour. Dark, not very sweet, even slightly bitter, so a good alternative for the less sweet-toothed consumer.
Acacia - Hungary. A great standard single-flower honey due to its ubiquity, at least in Europe. Fragrant, flowery
Orange-Blossom - California. Cf. thyme and chestnut. Tea-lover's favourite, but too sweet and flowery for cooking, spreading or pure consumtion.

There are people who swear by honey for a variety of reasons, including its medicinal and anti-septic qualities, or because they prefer mead over beer. Maybe the anti-septic qualities can cancel out the sugar, preventing tooth-rot. It's a known anti-oxidant, it enhances calcium absorbtion, it's anti-allergenic and a preservative. Hair treatment, over-weight, cancer, you name it.
What are other people's favourites?

In the News...

2007-03-26T13:47:00.000+02:00

One sometimes wonders why it is that, in the age of food-blogging and specialty magazines, major daily newpapers continue to maintain wine and dine sections. After all, how can a single organization lay claim to unbiased reporting about the Middle-East alongside the latest in decanting technologies.

While elsewhere reductionism seems to be the modus operandi, most major papers seem to resist, and often excell. Excellent examples are the New York Times and L.A. Times food section, but hardly any paper seems to do without one.

My answer as to why is, in short, that for the rest of us, food collumns often represent a vehicle for otherwise unattainable experiences, saving us some serious time and money.

This includes, for example, vicariously being tossed out of Michelin decorated restaurants and cooking with your favourite 2003 crand cru wines, just to see if it really is any better than cooking with those cheap ones that you (well I) keep around just for that purpose.

In that light, here's a quick food journalism redux for this week:

a rather interesting article (in German) at FAZ online, concerning civility and etiquette at highly decorated restaurants.
from the New York Times, a definite answer to the question whether to "Never cook with a wine you wouldn’t drink."
what it is like, being taught by the best.

Fillet of Beef in Creamy Grape-Mustard Sauce with Paté

2007-03-25T20:02:00.000+02:00

Here's a fantastic meal my uncle prepared about three weeks ago. This really struck a note with me, so I thought I'd record it here.

Ingredients:
A small onion - chopped, about half a dozen button mushrooms - quartered, one fillet of beef - sliced very thinly, some flour for coating, lots of butter, 250ml of cream, a cup of grapes - halved, one tablespoon of ground mustard seeds, 150g of cranberry paté.
Preparation:

Melt butter in a pan, fry chopped onions and mushrooms. Meanwhile, melt more butter separately to coat fillet slices. Turn slices in butter, then flour. Add to pan when onions are glassy, brown on both sides.
Turn heat to low. Puree the halved grapes, strain, add grape juice with mustard seeds to pan.
Add cream, let simmer for about 5 minutes.
Add paté, mix in well with a spoon or fork. Let everything simmer for another 5 minutes.
Season, serve over butter spätzle.

As in all good cooking, I find the properties of this meal are not the sum of its parts.

Knorr Oxtail Soup

2007-03-24T22:30:00.001+01:00

Whenever I feel sick or have a hangover, there's nothing better than package soup. Personally, I prefer Knorr Oxtail for its unbeaten consistency and colour.

My soup career started, when my father introduced me "Rennfahrersuppe" [racing driver soup]. Probably, this is the first hot thing I was ever able to cook myself. Even today, I'm always curious about what happens, when you open the paper bag, pour the powder into the water and turn on the cooker. Apropos: there are two questions, which I woud like to ask:

Some soups require to be poured in cold, others into hot water. Why?
In former times, the racing driver soup used to be shipped in small boxes, which I prefer. Why did they all switch to bags. Why?

Bratwurst

2007-03-23T22:50:00.000+01:00

I don't know, how much time [valuable] I spent with discussions about the best Bratwurst ever. I do not think, that I found the answer to the question which seems to span all cultural gaps. But! I found Vorderer Sternen, which satisfies my demand on high quality wurst and sharp mustard. Whenever you have the chance to get there, take it! Even the chancellor would like it.

Tomato Sauce

2007-03-23T22:00:00.000+01:00

OK, since this is going to be my first blog entry ever, I will also start with the very first recipe, which brought me into my cooking career and which serves as a joker, whenever there are children around: the amazing, original, simple tomato sauce.

Ingredients

900g fresh, ripe tomatos (blanched, for special cases) or 500g tomatos in conserve (the usual case)
75g butter
1 onion (peeled, cut in half)
Salt
500g Pasta (Spaghetti, Penne or Rigatoni)
Parmiginao Reggiano

Preperation

Put tomatos, butter, onion and salt in a pot and let it cook on slight flame for 45 minutes minimum until the fat is seperating. Sometimes you will have to stir a little bit.
Throw away the onion and mix with pasta. Serve with Parmesan.

That's it. Truth is always simple. This is a homage to Marcella Hazan, the godmother of Italian cooking.

Cold-Poached Fish Fillets

2007-03-23T15:26:00.000+01:00

I've posted a variation of this before elsewhere, but I like the cold-poaching technique, so I thought I'd repost here.
Cold-poaching involves pouring boiling (or nearly boiling) liquid over fish and letting it cool to room temperature. It works best with lean, white, flaky fish. I used Flathead, which worked quite nicely. For liquid, fish stock is recommended, but I used a quick home-made broth of green tea, fennel and chili. I served this with home-made tartar sauce and fennel-mashed-potatoes.

Place fish fillets in a ceramic or porcelain dish. Remove stalks, dill twigs from one large bulb of fennel. Set aside twigs and bulb. Bring one cup of water to boil per fish fillet. Add fennel stalks, a few dashes of chili flakes, herb to taste (thyme, mint, rosemary), some lemon zest. Add a bag of green tea for 2-3 minutes but remove. Strain liquid and pour over fish, cover and let stand until at room temperature.
Chop rest of fennel, coat well in olive oil, place in oven dish, sprinkle with a few pinches of rock salt, cover and bake at 180C for about 45 minutes. Remove cover for about 10 minutes or until crisp and caramelized.
Boil a handful of quartered potatoes for the mash. When soft, drain water, mix in a spoonful of butter, a half cup of milk, one extremely finely-chopped small onion, a clove of minced garlic, rosemary and thyme. Mix in the roasted fennel and stirr to desired consistency. (Hint: Leaving the peel on adds texture to mashed potatoes, but not everyone likes this.)
For the tartar sauce, mince one clove of garlic, finely chop one small onion, cut 2-3 inches of zest from a fresh and clean lemon, finely chop the twigs from the bulb of fennel. Mix all together, season, and stir into 4-5 tablespoons of mayonaise.
Serve everything once fish has reached room temperature.

Fish prepared in this fashion has an extremely soft and slightly flaky texture. The lower cooking temperature also brings out very different flavours than that found in fish served hot. You do not need to smother it in tartar sauce, but the lemon and dill made for nice addition to the flavours developped in cold poaching. Broth can be kept frozen and used in cooking later on.

Welcome

2007-03-23T13:33:00.000+01:00

Hello All,

This is the official Cooking with Okko & Jochen Welcome Message. You are invited to visit this place as often as you like to follow our musings about the world of food and drink. Here we will periodically post our culinary findings, insights and experimentation - and remember: the more you visit, the more we will write.

We are, among other things, two hobby cooks - cosmopolite masters of disaster on the stove, oven or barbeque. We take ourselves not too seriously, but we know what we like and hope to share that which we like (and sometimes don't) with you.

With that, a great big cheer to what will hopefully become a productive place of for all things palatable.