Tag Archives: baking

Sunday Breakfast: Syrniki with fresh blackcurrants

Syrniki are Russian cottage cheese pancakes, that are made thick and have a roundish shape. I love having them on breakfast, topped with a sweet condensed milk and some fresh or frozen berries. I already posted the recipe once (click here), today recipe is similar to the previous one but with a delightful touch: these syrniki were prepared by my mum during my summer holidays in Russia. 🙂 My suggestion was to add a special ingredient – fresh blackcurrants, which were picked up that day in parent’s garden. So, we mixed in lots of fresh and juicy blackcurrants. Blackcurrants have enough natural sweetness, and we didn’t put sugar at all.

If you haven’t still made syrniki you should immediately go to your kitchen and cook them! Really! They are so delicious, plus cottage cheese contains lots of calcium, which is great for bones.

Syrniki with fresh blackcurrants

Servings: 4-5
Difficulty: easy
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If using frozen blackcurrants do not defreeze them, add straight from the freezer.

Ingredients

600-700g tvorog/cottage cheese (I used 0% fat)

2 medium eggs

2-3 tbsp white sugar (or as much as you like), I didn’t put sugar this time

150-170g fresh blackcurrants

100g plain flour

icing sugar, for garnish, optional

some fresh blackcurrants, sour cream/sweet condensed milk, for serving

Method

In a large mixing bowl, mix cottage cheese with a folk. Add eggs and sugar if using, stir to combine.
Sift the flour into cottage cheese mixture, mix to combine. If the mixture is too wet, add a bit more flour.
Sprinkle fresh blackcurrants with flour, carefully fold into cottage cheese mixture.
Sprinkle working surface with flour. Take a tablespoon of the mixture and shape flat patties (approx 6cm diameter).
Arrange syrniki on a greased baking sheet. Bake in preheated 200C oven for 30 minutes or until golden.
You can also fry them. For that, in a large frying pan heat sunflower oil, add syrniki and fry for 2 minutes on each site.
Sprinkle with icing sugar, if desired. Serve warm with sour cream or sweet condensed milk and berries on side.

Enjoy!

Knyshy

One day I was watching numerous foody videos.. among those millions just one stuck in my head. Russian cook (don’t know his name) made small pies with potato filling, which he called knyshy. Pirogki with potato mash are one of my favourite, they always bring back memories about parents’ home ..kitchen, my mother is making pies, me and my sister are impatiently sitting and waiting while pirogki are baking in the oven.. Sweet time!

The difference between these pies and regular Russian pirogki is in the dough and shape, first ones are round, second are oval and usually made from yeast dough. I browse the Internet, and found not much information about these little pies. According to different sources, knyshy belong whether to old-Russian or Belarusian cuisine. In 19th century knyshy were widely-eaten pies among middle-class people, and the most popular filling was buckwheat kasha with fried onion and bacon.

It took me some time to shape them and make look like small barrels filled with tasty potato mash instead of rum (or whatever you imagine when hear barrel), but knyshy turned out beautifully and puffy, so they definitely worth all the hard work.

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Knyshy - little pies with potato filling

Servings: 16 pies
Difficulty: moderate
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Ingredients

Dough:

1 egg

120ml sunflower oil

120ml warm water

1 tsp vinegar

400g plain flour

1/2 tsp salt

1 tsp baking powder

Filling:

600-700g potatoes

1 large onion, chopped

1 tbsp oil+ 1 tsp butter for frying

1 tbsp butter

some chopped dill, optional

salt, pepper to taste

Egg wash

1 egg, beaten

Method

In a bowl whisk egg with oil, water and vinegar.
Sift flour with salt and baking powder into another large bowl.
Pour the egg mixture into the bowl with flour. Mix all ingredients together, cover the bowl with plastic wrap and leave to rest for 40 minutes.
Meanwhile, prepare the filling. In a frying pan heat oil with butter, add onion and fry until lightly golden. Clean and peel potatoes, cut into medium chunks and boil until ready, drain. Using a potato masher blend butter into potatoes until soft. Mix in fried onion and dill, if using. Season with salt and pepper to taste.
Divide the dough into two parts. On a lightly floured surface roll out one part into 30x40cm rectangle. Spread half of the filling near the edge of the longest rectangle side. Make the roll. Cut the roll into 8 pieces: 5cm width each.* Carefully seal the ‘hole’ on one side, shaping into a roundish form (like a small barrel), place pie sealed side down on a lined and greased baking sheet. Repeat with all pies.
Brush all pies with egg wash. Bake in preheated 190C oven for 40 minutes.

*You may cut the roll into smaller pieces to get more but small-sized pies.

Enjoy!

The duo cake

Cheesecake or chocolate cake? This cake is perfect for those who can not choose! I called it ‘the duo cake’ because it combines both the chocolate cake and cheesecake. It turned out great from the first attempt, moreover this cake is so delicious, smooth chocolate part shades nicely into the cheesy-one. The cake has amazing aroma of dark chocolate, sweet vanilla and sunny orange. I hope you will give it a try! 🙂

The duo cake

Servings: 8-10
Time: 2hr 30mins
Difficulty: easy
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All ingredients should be at room temperature.

For the recipe I used 20cm square cake tin, but round tin is also can be used.

Ingredients

Cheesecake part

500g cream cheese (Philadelphia)

70g white sugar

1 tbsp cornflour

1 egg

50ml double cream (30%), optional

1 tsp vanilla exctract

zest of one orange

Chocolate part

160g flour

40g cacao powder (unsweetened)

1/2 tsp baking powder

1/2 tsp baking soda

1/3 tsp salt

100g brown sugar (or white sugar)

2 eggs

70g butter, melted

200g sour cream

Top
1-2 tbsp chopped dark chocolate (70-75% cacao)

orange zest

Preparation method

In a large mixing bowl, beat cream cheese with sugar and cornflour, mix in egg until just combine, then fold in cream if using. Add vanilla and orange zest.
In another bowl, sift flour and cocoa powder, add salt, baking powder and soda.
In a bowl, beat eggs with brown sugar. Mix in melted butter and sour cream.
Pour egg mixture into flour, combine but don’t overmix.
Line 20cm square baking tin. Pour in chocolate mixture. Then pour cheesecake mixture onto the top of chocolate one. Sprinckle with chopped chocolate and orange zest.
Bake in preheated 180C oven for 45-50 minutes.
Let the cake cool complitely, then cut into squres.
I served mine with cranberries, their sourness suits well with the cake.

Enjoy!

Adapted from Godiva.com

Wheel bread with herbs

August 17, 2015
milkandbun
32 comments
baking, bread, cooking, DIY, easy bread, food, food photo, food photography, food styling, herb bread, homemade bread, midweek meal, photo, recipe, sun-dried tomatoes bread, wheel bread

I believe almost everyone loves freshly-baked bread. I bet you can easily imagine its irresistible aroma right now in the air.. 😉 If you have ever tried to make your own bread, you may know that it’s a complex and work-intensive process, especially if you’re making a starter for the dough. The fermentation takes up to 4 days, and you need to keep an eye on the starter and feed it almost like a baby. So, not everybody has a patience or simply time to make it, and for those mankind created yeast! Using yeast makes our lives easier (at least for me); such dough doesn’t take all that much time, and you only need a few ingredients to make a simple bread. And definitely homemade bread is tastier that a store-bought one.

It wasn’t complicated at all to make this beautiful wheel bread. Actually, it reminds me more a pie without a filling, but I absolutely love its texture (because of corn flour) and awesome herb-y smell!

I recommend consuming it the same day it’s made.

Ingredients for 6-8 Servings

Dough:

8-9g instant yeast

2 tsp white sugar

200g corn flour

300g plain flour

1 tsp salt

320ml warm water

Filling:

3 clove garlic, minced

2 tbsp chopped fresh basil

1 tsp chopped fresh rosemary

5-6 sun-dried tomatoes, chopped

2 tbsp olive oil

salt, freshly ground pepper to taste

Method

In a cup, put yeast and sugar, add some warm water, stir, cover and keep for 10 minutes.
In a large bowl, sift flours, add salt. Then stir in the yeast. Slowly add all warm water and knead the dough. Place the dough on a table and knead it, then put back into bowl, cover with plascti wrap or towel and leave to rise for 40-60 minutes.
For the fiiling, in a small bowl combine all ingredients.
On a lightly floured surface kneed the dough lightly. Roll out into 5-6mm thick circle, cut into 5-6cm width strips. Spread the fiiling on the dough. Then arrange all strips into ‘a rose’ (on a lined baking sheet), starting from the smallest strip, continue rolling other strips around it.
Bake in preheated oven 190C for 25-30 minutes.
Allow it to cool slightly on a wire cooling rack. Serve with a glass of milk or cup of tea.

Enjoy!

Adapted from here

WhiteCurrant tart

Hello-hello! I love summer because it’s berry season! May be not that summer when the outside temperature is +40C or even 50C.. Hope you are having the same great summer as I do this time in Russia: lots of organic berries, vegetables and greens, amazing weather, long walks and talks with friends. But sometimes the weather plays a joke: in the morning can be so cold that you need a thick jacket, later so hot – you need a dress instead of jacket, and so on..

Talking about summer berries, currants is super common and one of the popular type of berry in Russia. I’m sure many of you tried redcurrants or seen it in supermarkets, or tried a dessert garnished with it. Here, there are three types of currants: black, red and white. They differ from one another not only in their color; blackcurrant is the sweetest one, red is tender and sour, and whitecurrant is sweet-and-sour with lots of seeds. And I guess, the white one is less-known, so I’ve been determined to make something tasty with these beautiful berries. Here, they are usually eaten as is or they make compotes (cold drink), jams. I made shortcrust pastry with tvorog (cottage cheese), filled with tender tvorog filling (yes, again cottage cheeese! I love it!) and scattered whitecurrants over the top. Yummy!

So, how is your summer going on? 🙂

WhiteCurrant tart

Servings: 6-8
Time: 2hr
Difficulty: easy
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The recipe calls for whitecurrants, which are usually uncommon, so use redcurrants or any berries that you can get.

If you’re using frozen berries, don’t defreeze it.

I used 22cm baking tin.

Ingredients

Pastry

200g flour

100g butter, cut into small cubes

100g tvorog/cottage cheese (I used 0% fat)

1 egg

Filling

3 eggs

70-100g sugar or fructose (depends on your taste)

300-350g sour cream (20-30% fat)

100g tvorog/cottage cheese (I used 0% fat)

1 tsp vanilla sugar/extract

450-500g whitecurrants

Preparation method

To make the pastry, place flour, butter in a large bowl (or in the food processor) and mix to get breadcrumbs. Mix in tvorog. Add egg and mix until just comes together. Shape into a disc, cover with plastic wrap and place in the fridge for 30 minutes.
Roll the pastry on a lightly floured table to form a round. Grease the baking tin and lightly dust with flour. Arrange pastry into the baking tin. Place in the fridge to cool while you’re preparing the filling.
Preheat oven to 180C.
In a bowl, whisk eggs with sugar. Beat in sour cream. Add cottage cheese and vanilla, whisk to combine.
Take the pastry out the fridge, pour in filling. Scatter over berries.
Bake for 35-40 minutes. Leave to cool in the baking tin, then carefully remove from the tin and serve.

Enjoy!