Spaghetti with spinach pesto and soft boiled eggs – Or an absolutely Un-Christmas dish at Christmas time

Just to continue with the lunacy I have started…

Spaghetti with spinach pesto and soft boiled eggs

- 400 g spaghetti

- salt

- 4 soft boiled eggs

- lamb’s lettuce

- salted almonds, roughly chopped

- sheep’s-milk cheese, grated

For the pesto:

- 130 g spinach, chopped

- 3 cloves garlic, grated

- 120 g salted almond, toasted

- 80 g sheep’s-milk cheese

- 80 ml olive oil

- nutmeg

- salt and freshly ground pepper

Preparation:

1. Cook the spaghetti.

2. Blend the ingredients of the pesto in a food processor, then mix the pesto with the spaghetti.

3. Serve the pasta with the yolks of the soft boiled eggs, the salad, the salted almonds and the cheese.

Lecsó ravioli – In case we are already bored with plain lecsó

In case we are already bored with lecsó which one can never be bored with, although it is still lecsó.

(Lecsó is a traditional Hungarian thick vegetable ragout, it is very popular during the summer. More details.)

Lecsó ravioli

Ingredients:

For the ravioli:

- 400 g flour for pasta

- ½ tsp. salt

- 4 eggs

- 150 g sausage, cut into thin slices

For the lecsó sauce:

- 100 g smoked bacon, cut into cubes

- 2 onions, sliced

- ½ tsp. ground paprika

- 1000 g pepper (preferably Hungarian wax pepper), sliced

- 500 g tomato, peeled, cut into pieces and seeded

- 3 eggs

For serving:

- fermented cucumbers

Preparation:

1. Pour the flour into a bowl and mix it with the salt. Make a well in the centre and crack the eggs into it. By moving the fingers in circles mix the eggs with the flour gradually. Knead the dough until smooth. Wrap the dough in cling film and put it in the fridge for half an hour. Roll the dough with pasta machine until thin, then make pieces of ravioli by putting a slice of sausage in each of them. Cook the ravioli in salted, hot water for three minutes.

2. For the lecsó sauce melt the fat of the bacon, and then fry the pieces of bacon until crispy and browned. Remove them from the pan.

3. On the bacon fat fry the onion slices. Stir in the ground paprika and fry it for some seconds with the onion. Add the pepper, tomatoes and the crispy, browned pieces of the bacon. Cook the ragout for 20-30 minutes over moderate heat, stirring it occasionally. Remove from the stove, if it is ready.

4. Mix the eggs in a bowl, and then gradually incorporate some tablespoons of hot lecsó ragout to the eggs, mixing it carefully after each addition. Pour this mixture to the lecsó ragout. Stir it for 1-2 minutes until it thickens. Blend the sauce with an immersion blender.

5. Mix the ravioli with the lecsó sauce and serve it with fermented cucumbers.

Wild garlic tagliatelle with roasted garlic cream and spring onions

The dish was inspired by the pasta topped with various types of cheese. First I wanted to add both garlics and the onion to the sauce, but then I thought that it might be more interesting if we can taste them in various roles and textures: spicy in the pasta, creamy in the sauce and crunchy on the top.

Wild garlic tagliatelle with roasted garlic cream and spring onions

Ingredients:

For the wild garlic tagliatelle:

- 250 g flour for pasta

- 1 egg

- 50 g wild garlic (puréed with 80 ml water)

- salt

For the roasted garlic cream:

- 3 bulbs garlic (baked in the skin)

- 30 ml heavy cream

- 15 ml dry white wine

- salt, pepper

Topping:

- 8 spring onions (chopped)

- freshly ground pepper

Preparation:

1. Knead the dough for the pasta. Using a pasta maker, form and cut the tagliatelle. Cook the pasta in salted water for a few minutes (cc. 2 minutes).
2. Boil the white wine until the alcohol evaporates (cc. 2 minutes). Then purée the ingredients of the roasted garlic sauce with an immersion blender until smooth and creamy.
3. Mix the pasta with the sauce, and sprinkle it with lots of pepper and spring onion on the top.

Thai chicken & mango stir-fry – let’s stir & fry

This is a typical stir-fry dish with an oriental flavour, with chicken, rice noodles, soy sauce and mango, which makes it even more interesting. A nice friend of mine has already tried my recipe, she added some grated garlic as well – it is always such a strange feeling when somebody tries my recipes, even eats them and then also leaves a comment for me -  anyway, adding some garlic was a very good idea. Next time I would also do it this way.

And if you are interested in photography (in my simple way), please take a moment to look at my new blog: Someway thru a lens

Thai chicken & mango stir-fry

- 400 g chicken breast (sliced)

- 5 tbsp. olive oil

- 4 tbsp. sesame seeds

- 2 + 1/2 tbsp. honey

- 1 big carrot (julienned)

- 80 g rice noodles

- 2 tbsp. sesame oil

- juice of ½ lime

- 2 tbsp. soy sauce

- 1 small mango (julienned)

- salt, pepper

Preparation:

1. Mix 2 tbsp. olive oil with the chicken and the sesame seeds, then fry it on 1 tbsp. oil in two instalments until golden brown. In the last minute of the frying add 1 tbsp. honey to both portions. Remove the chicken from the pan and wipe out the remaining honey from it to prevent burning.

2. On the remaining oil fry the carrot in a way that it would stay crunchy in the middle.

3. Put the rice noodles in hot salty (but not boiling) water for 2 minutes. When they are ready, mix them immediately with the sesame oil.

4. Mix all the ingredients.