My Brother's Spaghetti All'Arrabiata - fresh from the garden...



A little while ago, I posted my uncle's version of Linguine All'Arrabiata. This seems to be a popular dish as now, I am posting a more traditional version from my brother. He used fresh tomatoes, onions, garlic and chilis from our parents' garden. He made this dish as we both were visiting our parents. It was a pleasure to see him prepare this delicious meal and be able to blog about it :) It was a nice family meal.

Ingredients:

  • 2 tablespoons oil
  • 2 small onions - finely diced
  • 5 tablespoons red bell pepper - finely diced
  • 5 tablespoons carotts - finely diced
  • 1-3 chilis (to taste) - finely diced
  • 6 cloves garlic - minced
  • 3 big tomatoes - peeled and chopped
  • 1-2 tablespoons balsamic vinegar
  • 1 tablespoon tomatopaste
  • 300 ml tomato sauce
  • salt, pepper to taste
  • 2-3 ladles of pasta water
  • 1 cup small "currant" tomatoes
  • fresh parsley - chopped
  • 500 spaghetti 
  • 500g parmigiano-reggiano cheese - grated
  • white bread loaf

 

Preparation:

  1. Start to boil the water for the spaghetti. Add the spaghetti when water boils. Do not drain the spaghetti when done, keep the water!
  2. Heat the oil in a frying pan. Add onions, bell pepper and carrots and saute till onions are translucent. Add the chilis and the garlic. Fry for another minute. Keep stiring and be cautious to not burn the garlic. 
  3. In the meantime, boil some water, add the tomatoes for 1-2 minutes. Take them out and you should be able to peel them. Chop in big chunks. Add the chopped tomatoes to the pan and heat up for a couple of minutes. Add the vineagar and the tomatopaste and cook for another  2 minutes. Now, fill up the pan with the tomato sauce, stir and bring to a simmer. Add salt and pepper to taste. Let cook for 5 minutes.
  4. Add 2-3 laddles of the pasta water. It will thicken the pasta sauce. At last, add the small currant tomatoes. They look like cocktail tomatoes, but have a distinct flavor. You can also subsitute cocktail tomatoes. Let cook till the tomatoes pop open. Add the parsley.
  5. Drain the spaghetti, add to the sauce and mix. Heat up for another minute.
  6. Serve the following way: Add a layer of parmesan on the bottom of the plate. Add the spaghetti and top it of with another layer of parmesan. Sprinkle with freshly grounded black pepper. Serve with slices of white soft bread.















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Poğaça - Turkish breakfast rolls


My Turkish work-colleague showed me a little bit of her culture. I had so much fun baking with her those traditional little pasties, called Poça or Poğaça. They are very common in Turkey, Hungary and the Balkans. I read that it typically is a breakfast dish in Turkey, I myself rather ate them as an appetizer. They were delicious.

They come in a varitey of shapes and fillings. We used a cheese filling, but they can also come with ground beef or potato. They can look like little round pasty balls where the dough is closed and the opening hidden on the bottom, half moon crescents that are closed on the side (like we did), or shuttle like forms with the opening on top where the cheese is visible and oozing out.

Ingredients:

Dough:
  • 2 eggs
  • 800 mg flour
  • 1 - 1 1/2 cups milk (maybe a little more)
  • 1/2 teaspoon salt
  • 1/4 teaspoon sugar 
  • 1/2 teaspoon dry-yeast (or baking powder)
  • 1 cup oil (or 200g butter)
  • 1 egg yolk 
  •  optional: sesame seeds
Filling:
  • 300 g feta cheese
  • 1 tablespoon parsley (chopped)
  • pepper, paprika (to taste)

Preparation:

  1. Prepare the dough. In a large mixing bowl, start with the flour. Add the milk, eggs, salt, sugar and yeast and mix with your hands (optionally you can also use a blender). Add the oil. Knead till you have a firm dough. If too dry you might need to add a little more milk, if too sticky you will need to add a little more flour. Form the dough into a big ball. Cover the bowl with a towel. Let the dough rest for about 20 min in a warm place, it will increase in size.
  2. Prepare the filling in the meantime. Crumble up the feta cheese in a bowl. Add the parsley, pepper and paprika to taste.
  3. Form and fill the pasties: There are different ways to form those pasties. The most common one is probably to form little walnut sized balls out of the dough, flatten them by hand, fill them and close the sides, so that you have a little ball. However, we took a slightly different approach this time. We formed the entire dough into 3 medium sized balls. Then, we rolled them all out, took a small round glass and cut out little circles. We put a tablespoon of filling on one half of the circles, pulled the other half over it, folded it so that the ends came together. We pinched the sides closed. Now we had small half moon formed pasties (instead of pastie balls). 
  4. Place all the pasties on a baking rack. Whisk the egg yolk. Use the egg wash and brush over the filled pasties. Sprinkle with sesame seeds. Let rest for another 20 min before baking.
  5. Bake the pasties in a preheated oven at 175 degree celsius for about 15min till golden brown.
Note: You can also add some plain yoghurt to the dough and reduce the milk. If you want a real fluffy pastie, add some mineral water (or soda water). And instead of the feta cheese you can use ground beef as a filling. 






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