Blue potato and garlic confit with smoked mackerel mousse

Blue potatoes make a great potato confit. A few farmers at my local Saturday morning farmers´market are selling blue potatoes. Occasionally red flesh potatoes can be found. There are a couple of varieties of blue potatoes, the more frequent (I wanted to say common, but blue potatoes are not really common, are they) one sold here is called Blauer St Gallener or sometimes St. Gallerli, whereby the "-li" ending denotes the diminutive form in Swiss German. And the diminutive is spot on because the tubers are generally small. Just right for cooking potato confit.

Potato confit, simply put, is cooking potatoes in fat or oil at low temperature. Seasoning with fresh herbs and garlic adds the extra flavour and best of all while the potatoes are cooking in the oven the smells coming from the kitchen are tickling the senses in anticipation of a great meal.

Small Blaue St Gallerli with rosemary and garlic ready for potato confit

Blue Potato Confit
Ingredients for 2-3 portions:
1 kg small blue potatoes, thoroughly washed, unpeeled
2 garlic bulbs
fresh rosmary
4dl olive oil
sea salt

A confidently generous amount of garlic recommended

Heat the oven to 175 degrees Celsius / 350 F
1. Place the rosemary sprigs and potatoes into an oven form. I prefer 2 smaller forms instead of one larger form to keep the oil level high and potatoes compactly together.
2. Cut the bottom of the garlic bulb off and spread the cloves between the potatoes.
3. Cook the potatoes in the oven for ca. 1 hour until soft.
4. To serve cut a cross on one side of the potato and press the potato together slightly to "open" it.
5. Remove the garlic from the skins and serve too. The garlic confit has a slightly sweet taste.
6. Season with sea salt.

I keep the oil, now fragrant with garlic and rosemary, and use it later for cooking. For example it gives an extra flavour to risotto.

 

Smoked Mackerel Mousse
This is a simple way to prepare a smooth mackerel mousse or spread that can be used on a sandwich or as an accompaniment to the succulent potato confit.

Ingredients:
1 smoked mackerel, ca. 300g
1 tbsp capers, finely chopped
3-4 tbsp sour cream
chives, finely chopped

1. Carefully clean the mackerel from skin and bones. Place the fish into a bowl and mix with a fork to prepare a smooth consistency.
2. Add the chopped capers to the fish.
3. Combine the sour cream with mackerel and capers into a smooth mousse.
4. Serve with chives.

Winter: White swede (rutabaga) and celeriac soup with or without fish

White swede (rutabaga) and celeriac soup

Almost all food magazines I leafed through today at the kiosk dedicate a section on soups as the perfect winter food. Rightly so, however I doubt if anyone would really sit outside, read a book and enjoy a bowl of soup in winter in the northern hemisphere anywhere above the 47° N latitude like a beautiful photo was suggesting in one of these magazines.

I was waiting to board a flight around 4pm in early January in Helsinki and was looking out of the airport window. This was the time just before the evening darkness fell. My view through the frame was the dark blue sky, bordering black, a tick darker wall of forest on the horizon at the edge of the tarmac, a lonely yellow lamp not reaching past the gate, no other building in sight. The pressing "kaamos" (polar night, also referred to as winter tiredness) was only interrupted by an occasional plane rolling in to its gate somewhere. It was dark.

In the north where the darkness rules many months paradoxically the start of winter on the 21st December is actually the first step to the light again. That step is noticable already in the first days of January when the day is just a few minutes longer and life takes on a more optimistic note even if just psychologically. Most of the cold is still ahead....

Time for a bowl of soup with two winter vegetables: white fleshed swede and celeriac.
Swede is known as rutabaga in North America. If you are sensitive to the slightly bitter taste of swede then in the combination with the sweet note of celeriac that bitterness is not felt at all.

White swede (rutabaga) and celeriac soup
Ingredients (2 portions)
1 celeriac
1 white swede
bay leaf
5-6 grains of allspice
2 leaves of leek
800 ml vegetable stock

2 tablespoons sour cream or crème fraîche

a small bunch of cress
salt and black or cayenne pepper

400g bream, cod or salmon, cut into 2cm cubes
2 tablespoons (rape seed) oil

White fleshed swede (rutabaga), celeriac, leek, bay leaf, allspice

Cut the celeriac and swede into small cubes and place in a pan together with a bay leaf, grains of allspice, leek and add the stock. Cook for about 10 minutes until the vegetables are soft.
Remove from heat and take out the bay leaf, allspice and leek. Using a blender or hand mixer purée into a soup. Season with salt and pepper and mix in the cream.

Briefly fry the fish

Heat the oil in a pan and fry the fish for 3-4 minutes turning sides.

Serve the soup with chopped cress and portion the fish directly at serving.
Also tastes great without the fish as a vegetarian option.

Cream of swede and celeriac with fish

Carrot soup with courgette and salmon

Carrot soup with courgette (zucchini) and salmon

It finally hit my brain when I was walking around the farmers´market that the summer is gone. All signs were there: quince had appeared on some counters, the choice of tomatoes had more than halved, winter cabbages like cavalo negro and kale were on sale, at one stand I heard the saleswoman explain to a puzzled customer that "the season for basil is over"....How did it happen that the basil season totally passed this year before I had stocked up with fresh pesto? Oh well, the supermarket sells basil all year round and that will get me through winter ...probably at the cost of a higher carbon footprint.

Quince, an autumn and winter fruit

The shoppers were trying to fit under the roofs of the stands with their umbrellas and apologising to the other dripping customers. It was pouring for hours and the amount of daylight stayed below 5 on a scale of 10 the whole day.  I was looking forward to a lazy afternoon in front of the telly and the 5-DVD set of a Danish thriller I borrowed from my friend last weekend.

Kale, only available in autumn and winter at the market

At that dismal, sort of Wagnerian Melancholia market I was thinking Soup! Something bright and orange. I had bought 2 kilos of bio carrots at a good deal earlier in the week. Perfect starting point for my new favourite soup of this autumn. A bowl of carrot soup with courgette and salmon is a low fat but belly filling option for lunch or supper for the days when you just wish for a soup that you can bite into. I am a great fan of smooth cream soups, but equally on other days the soup just needs to be a bit more solid.

And a little fat must be. I am glad that fat helps me to get the vitamin A out of the carrots into my body but more importantly the small golden shiny bubbles that glisten on the surface act like a promise of a great meal and produce zillion of happy hormones before I have even taken a bite. The soup is ready in about half an hour. I can manage that after a long working day and still have a freshly made great tasing meal.

Carrot Soup with courgette (zucchini) and salmon
Ingredients for 2

500g carrots, cut into cubes
0.5l stock (or water + 1 cube bouillon)
1 whole yellow peperoncini or a chilli pod
0.5 tsp fresh ginger, grated
1 medium courgette, cut into cubes
250g fresh salmon, cut in 2 cm cubes
2-3 tbsp fresh cream

Bring the water to boil, add the bouillon, carrots, peperoncini and grated ginger. Cook on medium heat until the carrots are soft. Take a few table spoons of carrots out and put aside for later. Remove the peperoncini. Purée the carrots. Taste for salt and spice. Add the courgette cubes and cook for a couple of minutes. Then add the salmon and cream. Continue cooking on low -medium heat for a few minutes. Be careful not to cook too long as the salmon will become chewy and courgette too soft.

If you don´t have fresh fish, try frozen white fish filet. Cut into cubes and add to the carrot purée before the courgette but still be caucious not to over cook the fish. Adding the frozen fish would cool down the soup, so bringing it to boil and then adding the courgette for a few minutes more on the heat would be about right.

Carrot-courgette & fresh salmon soup

Related posts:
Caldo Verde, an autumn soup
Buying carrots

Fresh herbs series: Lemon Thyme

At farmers market: Plenty of herbs to choose for balcony gardens

Lemon thyme, one of the over 100 thyme varieties

Parsley, sage, rosemary and thyme… and lemon thyme are a few of the herbs that are growing on my balcony this season. I decided to grow my own herbs again for three reasons. Firstly, sometimes when I buy a bunch of herbs I don’t use it all and they wilt and go to waste. Now I can take just as much as necessary. Secondly, it is cheaper and thirdly, the urge of touching a rosemary leaf or a basil leaf or rub a little thyme spring between your fingers and then smell...know that feeling? Besides the colours are equally worth looking at.

I am a bit concerned about how long I can keep them totally healthy because I have seen a couple of small flies on the soil coupled with a slight fear from the past experience that the herbs may get infected by a grey layer of mould or something. But so far so good, the herbs are growing and I am snapping the basil or parsley or today - the lemon thyme.

Lemon Thyme, Zitronenthümian, sidruntüümian, (Lat.Thymus citriodorus)

The lemon thyme not just smells but also tastes a lot like lemon. And because of that it goes well with fish or chicken or other dishes that call for lemon and thyme. I used the lemon thyme to give flavour to poached salmon by placing one swig at the bottom and one swig on top of each portion of salmon with some sea salt and wrapped the salmon individually in the alu foil. Too much thyme will suffocate the taste of the fish, so better not overdo it. The trick is to keep the water just simmering, not to boil and to simmer ca 10-15 minutes to keep the salmon soft. Too much or too long cooking turns the salmon hard and it loses the moist succulence. Drizzle with olive oil and a few drops of lemon or lime juice and serve with some vegetables or fresh salad. (More poached salmon ideas here.)

Poached salmon with a touch of lemon thyme

Thyme and lemon thyme can also be used for herbal infusion tea. Thyme is said to have healing qualities against respiratory sufferings.

I took 3 sprigs per mug of boiling water and let it infuse for ca 10 minutes. Sweeten with some honey if you like sweet drinks, but the lemon thyme has already a strong citrus taste and can be very well enjoyed just simply like that.

Lemon thyme herbal tea

Changes in the food world across two centuries and "kilupirukad" (small salty oily fish pastries)

There are fundamental changes happening in every area of life at a fast pace. The changes around the food and eating burst emotions left and right like a metronome. We find things that never existed before, that are genius and on the other hand see things that make perfect sense disappear or nonsense flourish. Here is a short list of observations that I have lived through or experience at this very moment.

End of the last century: Estonia
Few cookbooks
Every household had at least one handwritten recipe notebook
Simple food… still my favourite
Eaters were much closer to food production (neighbours helping neighbours at potato harvest, own food grown on allotments)
Less packaged food, often food was weighed in the shop according to your order, often packed in paper, very little plastic packaging
People carried a shopping bag, plastic bags were expensive and even not available

Less allergies
Less food regulatory laws (I used to walk by a bread factory that had its windows open to the street, the smell coming out was heaven. Loaves of bread used to be sold unpacked in shops. Nobody died of dysentery coming from the bread they had bought that wasn’t individually packed)
Less E-ingredients, the big money wasn´t in the food research
Shorter life expectancy
A lot of food was very local

Recycling of milk bottles, cream and mayo jars, other bottles (there wasn’t much other packaging to recycle)
Deficit of exotic fruit, coffee, other ingredients (eg to cook a Thai curry at home in 1990 was unthinkable)

Home made jams was a common way of preserving

Estonians loved “Tallinna kilu”, small oily fish spiced and preserved in cans (see photo)

Tallinna kilud have stood the test of time

21^st century: Estonia, Switzerland, Europe
More packaged foods
Fashionable to take a plastic bag each time – fortunately this trend is reversing
Less knowledge about where food is grown or how –  fewer children have seen, let alone touched, an animal whose produce they eat, TV programs showing children guessing how peas, cabbage, brussel sprouts etc grow… a tragic comedy
Better agriculture
New varieties of produce are higher yielding and stay fresh longer (sometimes at the expense of smell or taste)

Hydroponicly grown strawberries flown across Europe in March
More allergies
People live longer (combined with progress in medicine)
Long aisles of ready made meals

Food wasting increases massively

Smart mobile phones – internet saves the work of writing down the ingredient list
Food magazines have a booklet with shopping list for ingredients
Thousands of food blogs
El Bulli, Heston Blumenthal, molecular cuisine
Nordic chefs winning the French culinary competitions
Frozen food, big freezers at home allow storing fresh food, great to have fresh berries from your own garden in winter

Celebrities´cookbooks

Celebrity chefs acting on TV People talk about food miles, local, seasonal food
Estonians love “Tallinna kilu”, small oily fish spiced and preserved in cans. “Tallinna kilu” is awarded “Recognised Estonian Taste” Award in 2001, 2003, 2008.

The fillets of "kilu", little anchovies type oily fish, is canned with salt and spices

Go figure what will happen in the future. On one hand there are propelling new techniques, the unimaginable has become a reality, on the other hand the old common sense of eating what the nature provides with the farmers´ wisdom and the mothers´ common sense of eating a variety of foods is fighting for existence while the blasts of new diets of the month in the media feature one or the other “magic” ingredient or nutritional nebula.

For sure the changes and the extremes will continue. In one way or the other the world will keep a balance.

Future: the world
People live even longer
Genetically modified food will feed the billions
People will migrate for water, flee the famine
Better (=less) usage of water in agriculture
Better fertilisers
Globalisation - more imports of non-local ingredients, fruits and veg
More eating seasonal produce – the sustainability mentality will continue
Growing vegetables vertically, on small space (eg on roofs), on hydroponics
Food blogs will stay for a while
Recipes on Internet, printed books will become rare
Cooking lessons - part of survival education at schools
More people can afford a fridge

Households producing energy, connected to the grid, kitchen appliances using less energy
Asia going through the bad western diet fashion of more fat and sugar as more business is done in Asia and people demand/can afford new, more expensive ingredients

Fast food and slow food revolution

Estonians will love “Tallinna kilu”, small oily fish spiced and preserved in cans

Kilupirukad: small oily fish pastries or empanadas

These pastries or small pies are made with small oily fish that we Estonians call “kilu”. They resemble canned anchovies. Both are quite salty, however “kilu” are softer than the anchovies and mostly canned as whole fish. One can also buy fillets, if you don’t want to spend time cleaning the fish off the heads and backbones.

Ingredients:

Puff pastry (ca 25x 40 cm)

12 fillets of “kilu” or anchovies

12 leaves of parsley

4 boiled eggs, cut in quarters

1 egg, beaten

Fold "kilu" or anchovis fillets with egg in puff pastry. Add dill or parsley for taste.

Heat the oven to 200°C.

Take a sheet of puff pastry and cut it into squares of 10 x 10 cm. place a fillet of fish, a leaf of parsley or some chopped dill, a quarter of a boiled egg in the middle and fold the diagonal edges across. Brush each pie with some beaten egg.

Cook in the oven for 20 minutes until golden.

Golden fish pies: Estonian Kilupirukad

Red Snapper on Wild Garlic (Ramsons) Risotto

Wild garlic - a leafy spring herb

The spring started this week. The proof of it is all the fresh greens in the market as well as the buds on the trees and birds collecting small branches from my balcony to make nests.

Spring is here when the ramsons, aka bear’s garlic, arrive on the farmers´ market.

The ramsons make a refreshing pesto, a welcome competition to the traditional basil. A heap of flavour together with a prominent garlic taste all in one.

Dandellion

I am glad to see that there are greens that I don’t really know so well. More discoveries are awaiting if I get up early enough. This is how empty the market already is at 11:30.

Vegetable market in March

 

Ingredients for 2 portions

Ramsons Risotto:

50g ramsons leaves, the white ends removed

0.5dl olive oil

A pinch of sea salt or fleure de sel

3 tablespoons olive oil

1 medium small onion, finely chopped

1 dl of white wine or prosecco

4 good handfuls of carnaroli rice

0.5l vegetable bouillon

25g cold butter

Red snapper:

300g red snapper fillet

Salt, pepper

A little oil for the pan

Ramsons for the pesto

In a food processor or with a hand mixer crush the ramsons together with a pinch of salt and the olive oil into a pesto paste. Set aside for later.

Keep the hot bouillon at hand. Rinse the fish and dry it with the kitchen paper. Season the fish with salt and pepper and cut the filet into desired size pieces, more or less equal in size to ensure it cooks evenly. Set aside. Heat the oven to 130ºC.

Heat the oil in the risotto pan and cook the onion until a bit glassy. Add the rice and heat further. Splash the white wine or prosecco generously on the rice and let it evaporate. Slowly start adding some bouillon, not too much at a time. Stir with a wooden spoon. When the liquid reduces add some more bouillon and keep stirring frequently. When the risotto is almost done add the ramsons pesto, stir and cook until the rice is al dente.

Heat the grill pan with a little oil. Place the fish on the pan and cook for a couple of minutes on each side. Put the pan in the oven for 5 minutes.

Finish off the risotto by stirring cold butter into the risotto to make it creamy. When serving the risotto with fish I don’t add any parmesan.

Remove the fish from the oven and serve hot.

Bear´s (wild) garlic risotto and red snapper

Ceviche variation - Estonian marinated oily fish (Est. marineeritud räim)

A lot of people in the world like ceviche, a marinated fish or seafood dish known from Central and South America. Yumm! Humm! ...they say, munching on fish or prawn that has been soaking in lemon or lime juice spiced with locally popular chilli and cilantro. Very nice!
People on the northern side of the globe invented the same cooking technique with their locally popular spices. A special Estonian delicacy is marinated little oily fish. Since limes or lemons don't grow locally vinegar is used instead.

Marinate the small oily fish overnight

Ingredients
500g cleaned raw small oily fish ( raw anchovy, sprat, small sardine)
0.5 - 0.75 teaspoon salt
a 3 finger pinch sugar
1 dl apple or white wine vinegar
1dl  water
black pepper, crushed
allspice, crushed
1 small onion, sliced in rings

2 tablespoons rape seed oil

Layer the fish tightly side by side in a bowl or a small plastic container. Sprinkle with pepper and allspice in between the layers and add a few slices of onion. Repeat layering.
Mix the vinegar, water, salt and sugar and spread on the fish. Press the fish down a little and cover with a lid or plastic foil and leave overnight in the fridge.
On the next day, drain the fish from the vinegar marinade. Drizzle oil on top of the fish.

(Est. Marineeritud räim)

Serve with dark rye bread for the authentic northern taste.
In summer serve with new potatoes with butter and chopped fresh dill.

Travelling Emotional Food

People have always travelled for food. Just think of the Great Famine that happened in Ireland  when the country’s potato crop was destroyed by potato blight disease and many people left to make a new living in America between 1845-52. Nowadays, in the more developed world, people travel for food on purpose for pleasure, to find new experiences, new tastes, learn about foreign cuisines. Many food blogs are created by people travelling and reporting their food adventures, TV programs are produced every year in many languages about food and travel.

My writing today about the emotional food that travels was sparked when I was reflecting about what I have seen my international colleagues and friends living abroad bring back to Switzerland from their trips to their home countries. I can say that over the years of my observations the popular items that people miss and bring from their home country to give them comfort, provide a home feeling in a foreign surrounding are actually quite basic: bread, sweets, beans, tea, cheese, tortillas, rice, more special items include chorizo or blood sausage. The tea in Switzerland is very weak and people who like black tea with milk must bring it from home or find an Asian food shop locally to stock up if they don’t want to drink a vague almost transparent brownish liquid pretending to enjoy a cup of tea. On top of the list of the South American sweets is a local basic like dulce de leche (Spanish). Some exchange students from Uruguay had packed at least 3 or more liters of it for their stay in Estonia. The locally available sweet condensed milk when boiled becomes a similar caramel sort of thing is clearly not the same. My Brasilian colleagues bring doce de leite (Portuguese) from their trips home. Also peanut based sweets from Brasil are very popular items to which I would add my own halvaa from Estonia. 

Another group of products are spices and sauces. Chiles and spicy sauces from Mexico, my elementary item of a certain type of Mayonnaise that always has space in my suitcase, occasionally Estonian mustard, sometimes flavour mixes that one used to like at home. A certain Chinese spice mix that a friend could not find in Switzerland, he had to bring from the UK. I also bring jams made out of Estonian berries, I have even brought green onions as I can’t find such ones here. Plus Estonian bread, either my Mom’s or my sister’s self-made bread or something new from the huge choice of breads from the country’s many bread makers.

Of course there is plenty of bread, sweets, or other food for that matter, here in Switzerland. It is just that special connection one has built with some foods and ingredients since childhood or simply grown to like them so much that the more or less similar substitute products in the foreign country fill the stomach but are incapable of satisfying the real craving. That little piece of dark brown rye bread with some butter and at best times with the Tallinna kilu (sort of spicy anchovies filet, but not quite) creates an emotional connection and a feeling of happiness thousands of kilometres away even if for just 10 minutes.

Now, it may seem that there is more import than export. Not true.

I can say that there is equally heavy traffic of food going out of Switzerland. Every time I go to Estonia I get a shopping list of things to buy and pack. Again the foods are not always specialty foods, rather simple basics like a certain cream cheese, a red pesto, tortellini, Allgäuer cheese. Since I have been making the Brasilian pão de queijo in my household and introduced my family in Estonia to it, the sour manioc flour travels with me. Not available to buy locally.

There is another type of food traffic developing slowly as the world globalizes and global sourcing through friends or international colleagues becomes possible. For example, I have a great supply of goiabada, the guava marmalade from Brasil. I have already got to know some different types of it. Or Arbuequina olive oil from my colleagues in Spain. The recent additions are a tamarind sauce and red chiles from Mexico and romesco sauce from Cataluña. Even if I don’t travel to these countries, I can still get to know them through food.

I must confess that I have travelled just for food. I once took a holiday and travelled back to Luxemburg mostly just because to visit a rather small casual restaurant that had basically only king prawns cooked in oven with lots of garlic on the menu. The guests were happily breathing in an intoxicatingly strong garlic air and all tables were eating prawns and more prawns and more garlic. Unfortunately I know where the restaurant is (I hope it is still there), but I don’t remember the name. I guess I have to go back and look what it is called...

Here is a recipe of a substitute dish for the Estonian räim, a small fish that is bigger than anchovies, but smaller than sardine or perhaps the size of the small sardine. I can buy Italian sardines here and occasionally make the very traditional “Estonian” fried small fish.

Fried and marinated sardines as a substitute to Estonian räim

Remove the bones from the fish. Put some salt and black pepper on the filets, turn the fish in flour, then in the egg mixture. Fry in a pan with some oil for a few minutes. The fish is great just fried, so I eat if warm. Another way is to marinate the fried filets in a mixture of sliced onion, vinegar, sugar, salt, some tomato sauce or ketchup and a little water and eat the next day.

Gravlax with lemon and dill

Dill (Fr. aneth) is a very popular northern herb. In Estonia it is traditionally used with fish, especially oily fish like salmon or trout, crab and almost inseparably with new potatoes. In the more southern countries dill becomes a rarity. In Switzerland one can still find it in the supermarket every day, but in the restaurants it is very rarely used. One of my favourite or perhaps the favourite restaurant in Bern Mille Sens is the only place that has managed to surprise me in the most positive sense with its use of dill.

Back to gravlax.

In this blog you can find some instructions how to make your own gravlax in one big piece - see under "Fish".

I am a great fan of gravlax and generally of raw fish. For more variety I made it in a different way and was very pleased with the result. Instead of curing the fish in one piece I cut the raw fish into slices and then added the marinade. After some curing time the salmon with all its good omega 3 and 6 fatty acids is ready to be served with bread or with boiled new potatoes and some butter. It is an indulgent weekend brunch dish to be enjoyed withour any rush.

It does not take a lot time and is cheaper than buying the cured fish. It is very simple to make and the taste can be varied by adding different ingredients. Next time, why not with either lime, orange, capers, horseradish, onion and/or mustard?

Ingredients:

250g raw salmon

Zest of 0.5 lemon

Juice of 0.5 lemon

0.5 teaspoons sugar

1 teaspoon sea salt flakes

Dill, chopped thinly

Cut the raw salmon into slices as thick as you prefer.

Wash the lemon. Peel off or grate off the yellow skin and chop very thinly.

In a bowl mix the juice of half the lemon, sugar, salt and the chopped or grated lemon zest.

Marinate the salmon with lemon juice

Gravlax - Dill gives the salmon a delicious northen taste

Put one layer of salmon slices into a bigger bowl or plate, sprinkle with some marinade and chopped dill. Repeat in layers until finished. Put the last dill on the top layer. Cover with aluminium foil and leave to marinate for 12 hours.

Poached salmon with green asparagus risotto

You need (for 3):

500-600g raw salmon (150-200g per person)

2 bay leaves

1-2 celery stems

2 teaspoons salt or 

1l of vegetable broth

A knob of butter or 3 table spoons olive oil

1 onion, finely chopped

300g Carnaroli rice (I measure 80-100g or ca. 2 palmfuls per person)

A generous splash of white wine

1l vegetable broth, hot

300g green asparagus, hard bottom ends removed (ca 2 cm)

50g parmesan, freshly grated

40g cold butter

Put the fish in a pan with the vegetable broth or enough cold water to cover it fully. If you use the water add bay leaves, celery stems and salt and bring the water to simmer at medium heat. When small bubbles start, reduce the heat to low and barely simmer the fish for 20 min.

Heat the butter or olive oil in a thick bottom pan, add the onion and cook for a couple of minutes till the onion turns glassy. Add the rice to the onions and stir until rice heats up. Splash in the wine and let it evaporate fully.

Add hot broth to the rice ladle by ladle, letting the liquid evaporate before adding the next ladle.

Cut off the top „flowery“ ends of the asparagus and cut the stems into 1-2cm long pieces. When the rice has become softer but is still very al dente (after 10min) add the asparagus stems to the pan and add more broth to finish the risotto.

In the meanwhile cook the top ends of the asparagus in a little butter in a separate pan and let them get a slight brown „crust“. Keep separately.

Finish the risotto when the rice is softer with still al dente bite and the asparagus is cooked but still crunchy by vigorously whisking in the parmesan and cold butter cubes with a wooden spoon.

Leave the parmesan out if you don´t like the cheese with the fish, but do add the butter at the end.

Cold tomato soup with poached salmon mousse

Spicy cool lunch on a hot summer day. 

Makes 3.

For the soup take:

1 kg tomatoes

1 small shalotte or red onion

0.5 salad cucumber

1 stem of green celery

3 cloves of garlic confit or 1 small fresh clove

Extra virgin olive oil

A small pinch of chilli powder

Salt

Finely chopped fresh parsley to garnish

Cut crosses on both ends of tomatoes and place them in hot water for a minute. De-skin and de-seed the tomatoes. Cut into smaller pieces.

Peel and cut the cucumber, if it has big seeds, cut them out too. Cut the celery into small pieces.

Finely chop the onion and garlic if you are using the fresh garlic.

Purée everything in a food processor, blender or with a mixer.

Add salt, chilli powder and olive oil and mix. Taste. Finetune if need anything else.

For the salmon mousse take:

200g of raw salmon

1-2 green celery stems

1-2 bay leaves

Salt

100g mascarpone

2 tablespoons fresh cream (25% or 35% fat)

Put the piece of salmon in a pan with enough cold water to cover the fish well. Add the bay leaves, celery and 1-2 teaspoons of sea salt and bring to simmer. Turn the heat to low and barely simmer the fish for 15-20minutes or a little longer if it is a thick piece of fish (but no longer than 30 min)

Let it cool down, then press the fish into a mass with a fork. In a bowl, preferably with high sides, mix the fish with mascarpone, season with salt and pepper. Using the mixer mix for a minute till the mass becomes lighter and fluffier. Add fresh cream and mix for 1 minute.

Serve the soup with the salmon mousse and garnish with chopped fresh parsley. Drizzle a few drops of extra virgin olive oil.

Eat with toast bread or make crisp bread in the oven from thinly slices bread, drizzle a little olive oil on the bread and cook in the overn of 190C for 10 minutes till crisp.

The idea of combining tomato soup with salmon arose from me misunderstanding a menu and I thank Margus, a cooking aficionado in Estonia, for that.

Gravlax: salt cured salmon

Salmon, seasalt and some sugar...try with a little black pepper too

I like gravlax, raw salmon cured with salt. Instead of buying a few slices in a shop it is really easy to make your own. Basically all you need is a piece of raw salmon and salt.

200g salmon with skin

4-6 teaspoons of coarse sea salt

If you wish try some variations:

Add a little sugar for a smoother taste

Add some chopped dill (aneto) or

Grind some black pepper for a spicier taste

Rinse the piece of fish under cold water. Dry up with a piece of kitchen paper.

Take a big enough piece of aluminium foil in which you can wrap the fish.

Spread 2 spoonfuls of sea salt on the foil, place the fish on the salt on foil and cover the fish from the top with salt, a little sugar, dill or pepper.

The salt does not have to cover all the fish in a thick layer, I prefer to spread the salt loosely and sprinkle just a little sugar. Not overdoing with salt leaves the fish juicier.

Leave to cure overnight or for 24 hours. Before eating depending on the amount of salt you used you may need to rinse the fish very briefly with cold water to get rid of the excess salt.

Especially if you want to make salmon tartar or just like to cut a little thiker slices than normally available it is worth curing your own salmon.