Peanut Butter and Honey Granola

The heat is on! My exams started. The written ones are over already. Oral exams start next week... four more to go! It is an intense time. I keep telling people that there are four things I couldn't live without at the moment: coffee, ovomaltine, chocolate and, of course, peanut butter ;-) Still having my daily peanut butter sandwich for breakfast and lately, I discovered something truly great: Peanut Butter Granola! Fellow addicts, here comes one for you! Enjoy!

Recipe:
(from: The Kitchn)

This is the original recipe. I changed the composition slightly since I did not have everything at home when I decided to try the recipe. Of course, you can also leave out certain seeds and substitute them with others. Just create your granola as you like it.

3 cups rolled oats
2 cups shelled roasted peanuts
1 cup pumpkin seeds
1 cup wheat germ
1 1/4 teaspoon salt
1/2 teaspoon ground cinnamon
1 teaspoon ground ginger
1/2 cup honey
1/2 cup brown sugar
1 cup peanut butter, smooth or chunky
1 1/2 teaspoons vanilla
2/3 cup vegetable or olive oil
3/4 cup chopped dried dates

Heat the oven to 160°C. Line a large baking sheet with parchment paper. In a large bowl, combine oats, peanuts, pumpkin seeds, wheat germ, salt, cinnamon, and ginger.

In a small saucepan, mix the honey and brown sugar. Bring to a simmer over medium heat, stirring constantly. Turn off the heat and stir in the peanut butter and vanilla until smooth. Pour over the oat mixture. Pour in the oil, and stir thoroughly. The mixture will be chunky and rough.

Spread the oat mixture evenly on the prepared baking sheet and bake for 40 minutes, stirring twice while baking. Transfer the granola to a large bowl and add the dates, tossing to combine.

 

Blueberry Muffins

I've had a craving for muffins lately. So I decided to make some. I went for the good old classic: Blueberry Muffins. I couldn't get enought of the crumbles... Had to stop myself from picking them off the muffin tops :-)

Recipe:
(from: Leila Lindholm - Piece of Cake)

100g butter
200ml milk
grated zest of 1 lemon
2 eggs
120g sugar
1tsp vanilla sugar
240g flour
2tsp baking powder
1 pinch of salt
350g fresh or frozen blueberries

crumbles:
75g cold butter
60g rolled oats
60g flour
80g sugar

Preheat the oven to 200°C. Line a muffin tray with paper cases.

Melt butter, add milk and lemon zest. Beat eggs, sugar and vanilla sugar until foamy. Mix egg batter with milk batter. Mix flour, baking powder and salt and mix with the liquid batter. Add blueberries. Fill your mixture into thepaper cases.

For the crumbles: Cut butter into pieces and combine with the rolled oats, flour and sugar. Spread the crumble onto the muffins.

Bake for about 20 minutes.

Pasta alla Norma

I haven't posted a savoury recipe for some time now. It's not that I don't cook, it's just that most of the time I don't have the patience to photograph my freshly cooked meals when I'm hungry :-) This is one of my all-time favourite pasta recipes! The sauce goes perfectly with a big helping of ricotta... and I love to serve it with grated pecorino cheese instead of parmesan.

Recipe:
(from: Jamie Oliver - Jamie's Italy, a German version for instance here)

2 big aubergines
1tblsp dried oregano
1tsp chili flakes
2 garlic cloves
1 big bunch of basil (stalks chopped for the sauce)
1tblsp white wine vinegar
400g tinned tomatoes
olive oil
salt
pepper
150g ricotta
spaghetti or other pasta

Divide aubergines lengthwise into 4 quarters and cut into slices (about 1cm thick, like fingers). Heat olive oil in a heavy frying pan and put about half the eggplant slices into it together with the oregano. Roast until golden brown, then let drain on kitchen paper. Do the same with the other half.
Roast the eggplant slices together with the garlic, chili and the chopped basil stalks. Pour in the white wine vinegar, then the tomatoes. Season your sauce with salt and pepper and let it simmer for about 15 minutes.
Cook the pasta in salt water.
Before serving, add the basil leaves to the sauce. Mix the sauce with the pasta. Spoon some ricotta onto each serving.

Poppy Seed and Cherry Cake

Finals are approaching and I'm spending most of my time in the library at my desk surrounded by piles of books - not cookbooks unfortunately ;-) I might not post as regularly as usual over the next two months, but keep checking my blog from time to time. There's got to be a little time for cake or cookies :-) Here comes an easy one... for all of you who like poppy seeds as much as I do.

Recipe:
(in German www.wildeisen.ch)

Butter and flour for the springform pan
500g fresh cherries or 350g drained canned cherries
100g soft butter
120g icing sugar
1 sachet vanilla sugar
4 eggs
50g ground almonds
1 teaspoon baking powder
150g flour
150g poppy seeds
2dl milk

Butter and flour a 26cm diameter springform pan and put in the refridgerator. Preheat the oven to 180°C.

Wash and pit the cherries (I used cherries from the glass). Beat butter, icing sugar and vanilla sugar. Add one egg after the other. Mix almonds, baking powder, flour and poppy seeds. Add tho the butter-egg mixture alternating with the milk. Fill your batter into the prepared springform pan. Scatter the cherries over your batter und put in the oven. Bake for about 35-40 minutes. Let cool and serve dusted with icing sugar.

(I halved the recipe above and baked the cake in a 18cm diameter springform pan, baking time remained the same, check with a wooden skewer if the cake is done)

Saffron Biscotti

I'm still in a "cookie-mood". Be cautious! These saffron biscotti seem so harmless, but they are highly addictive!

Recipe:
(From: Leila Lindholm - Piece of Cake)

100g butter
1 sachet of saffron (0.1g)
2 eggs
120g sugar
300g flour
1.5tsp baking powder
100g peeled whole almonds

Preheat the oven to 175°C.

Melt butter in a pan together with the saffron. Then, in a bowl, beat together with the eggs. Mix the dry ingredients together with the almonds in another bowl. Combine the dry ingredients with the egg-butter-mixture. Form three half-round thin loafs and put on a tray lined with parchment paper. Bake in the middle of the oven for about 25 minutes. Then, take them out of the oven and reduce the temperature to 125°C. Cut each loaf into about 1cm thick slices and put those back onto the tray. Bake for another 15 minutes.

White Chocolate Chip and Lavender Cookies

I was in the mood for cookies last week. Those were a present for someone who's having a pretty stressful time at the moment. Lavender is supposed to have a relaxing effect. A glass of milk and some cookies always help, I thought...

Recipe:
(adapted from: Leila Lindholm - Piece of Cake)

125g soft butter
80g brown sugar
1 egg
90g flour
15g rolled oats
1/2 tsp baking powder
1/4 tsp salt
100g white chocolate
about 1 tbsp fresh or dried lavender buds

Beat butter and sugar. Then add the egg and beat until creamy. Mix flour, rolled oats, baking powder and salt and add to your batter. Roughly chop chocolate and, together with the lavender buds, add to the batter. Form a roll of about 5cm diameter out of your dough and put in the freezer for about 30 minutes.

Preheat the oven to 180°C and line a baking tray with parchment paper. Take the dough out of the freezer, cut into about 1cm thick slices and put onto the tray. Bake in the middle of the oven for about ten minutes.

Chocolate Chip Cookies with Lime

I got another cookie recipe for you. No peanut butter included this time :-) But there is something about the combination of chocolate and lime. This cookie recipe can be variated in many ways. You could try orange or lemon zest, coconut flakes, white or milk chocolate... whatever you feel like! Also, the dough might be prepared well in advance. Just leave it in the freezer until you want to use it.

Recipe:
(from: Leila Lindholm - Piece of Cake)

125g soft butter
80g brown sugar
1 egg
90g flour
15g rolled oats
1/2 tsp baking powder
1/4 tsp salt
100g dark chocolate
grated zest of one lime

Beat butter and sugar. Then add the egg and beat until creamy. Mix flour, rolled oats, baking powder and salt and add to your batter. Roughly chop chocolate and, together with the lime zest, add to the batter. Form a roll of about 5cm diameter out of your dough and put in the freezer for about 30 minutes.

Preheat the oven to 180°C and line a baking tray with parchment paper. Take the dough out of the freezer, cut into about 1cm thick slices and put onto the tray. Bake in the middle of the oven for about ten minutes.

Peanut Butter Brownies

Brownies are just great... I love the smile on people's faces when I tell them that I brought along brownies. I made a batch this weekend for some friends from the English Seminar - it's a good thing most of the people there share my fondness for peanut butter... ;-) and since they have to listen to me raving about it all the time (because, as you know from this post, that's just what peanut butter addicts do), I thought I might as well bake them something with peanut butter in it.

Recipe:

100g dark chocolate
125g soft butter
250g sugar
1 tsp vanilla extract/1 sachet vanilla sugar
2 large eggs, lightly beaten
80g flour
2 tblsp cocoa powder
100g roasted and salted peanuts
50g chopped dark chocolate/chocolate chips
about 10 tsp peanut butter

Preheat the oven to 180°C. Line a brownie tin (about 18x23 cm) with parchment paper.

Break the chocolate into pieces and melt in a bowl over a hot water bath. Let cool slightly. Put butter in a large bowl and beat with the hand mixer until smooth and creamy. Add sugar and vanilla extract and beat until well combined. Slowly add eggs and chocolate and beat well. Sift flour and cocoa powder into this batter, mix well. Then add the peanuts and the chocolate chips. Fill the batter into your prepared tin. Spread the peanut butter onto the batter with a teaspoon and run a fork through this batter so that you get a bit of a marble effect.

Bake the brownies in the middle of the oven for about 25-30 minutes. Check whether they are done with a wooden skewer. Let the brownies cool down in the tin, then cut into pieces.

Ginger Chocolate Chip Pound Cake

I have a thing for ginger, also for glacé ginger, which I think adds the extra something to this cake. When I saw this recipe, I knew this must be my kind of cake. And it even exceeded my expectations it was so good! This cake immediately made it to my favourites-list. It's also delicious when it is still slightly warm... best eaten with some extra cream cheese... perfection...

Recipe:
(from here)

100g unsalted butter, melted
200g caster sugar
125g full-fat cream cheese
3 medium eggs
1 tsp vanilla extract/or vanilla sugar
50g ground almonds
1 tsp ground ginger
75g chopped glacé ginger
125g dark chocolate, chopped into small chunks
200g plain flour
2 tsp baking powder

Preheat oven to 180°C. Line the base and sides of a small, 17cm-long loaf tin or similar with nonstick baking paper, allowing the paper to pop up a few centimetres above the top of the tin.

Mix together the butter and caster sugar until smooth. While the butter mixture is still warm, beat in the cream cheese until any lumps vanish, then beat in the eggs one at a time, until light.

One by one, add the vanilla, almonds, ground and glacé ginger, beating well after each addition, then stir in the chocolate chips. Sift the flour and baking powder, then stir evenly though the cake mixture. Bake for 60-70 minutes, or until a skewer inserted into the centre pulls out with only a few crumbs stuck to it.

Leave to cool for a few minutes, remove from the tin but leave in the paper, and place on a wire rack to cool.

Light Cheesecake with Redcurrants

As promised - as a contrast to the last post ;-) - here comes the cake I made two weeks ago as a dessert for two good friends of mine. It is fairly light and makes a really nice summer dessert - you don't even have to turn on the oven. I was very pleased with this cake. It looks so pretty with the redcurrants on top.

Recipe:
(from Saisonküche, Juni 2011)

100g petits beurres
50g butter
6 sheets gelatine
2 eggs
1 lemon
350g low fat curd cheese
60g sugar
0.5dl water
125g redcurrants

Line a 18cm springform pan with parchment paper. Put the petits beurres in a plastic bag and beat them with a rolling pin until they are crumbled. Melt the butter. Mix butter and crumbles and press this onto the bottom of the springform pan. Put in the refridgerator. Soak gelatine in cold water.

Separate the eggs. Grate the lemon zest. Mix the zest and the lemon juice with curd, sugar and egg yolks. Take the gelatine out of the water and squeeze it well. Then, in a small saucepan, heat the gelatine in the water until it dissolves. Mix a little of the curd batter with the gelatine. Then, mix this well with the whole curd batter. Beat the egg whites until stiff and fold into the curd batter. Pour your batter into the springform pan and spread the redcurrants onto this. Put in the refridgerator for at least 3 hours for the cake to get firm.