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.

Sugar pea “gnocchi” with cream cheese and chive – or let’s cut out pasta also for lunch

Those having no children please stop your ears, because now “such” a story is coming, but I am going to be quick. The dish was prepared because it had already become boring to cut out duck-shaped or Santa-shaped scones for lunch, because it’s fun… I mean the cutting of the dough and such stuff.

I spared you and took no photos of the otherwise hardly recognizable rabbit-shaped “gnocchi” – I’m sure all of you having no children would have left my blog immediately. (Just between ourselves, I was also unable to recognize the “rabbits” after cooking them.)

The dough is a bit tighter than that of the gnocchi and I used sugar peas instead of potatoes; they are a good match with the soft cream cheese flavoured with garlic and with the sour lemon zest.

Sugar pea “gnocchi” with cream cheese and chive

- 450 g sugar peas (without pods)

- 1 tbsp. butter

- 200 g flour

- 250 g ricotta

- 1 onion (finely chopped)

- a pinch of nutmeg (freshly grated)

- salt

- pepper

For the topping:

- 150 g cream cheese

- 1 big clove of garlic (grated)

- 300 g sour cream

- salt

- pepper

Decoration:

- fresh chive (finely chopped)

- lemon zest (grated)

Preparation:

1. Fry the onion and the sugar peas on the butter until soft, then blend them with an immersion blender. With all the other ingredients, knead soft dough, and then cut out round pieces with a round cutter. Cook them in salted hot water within a few minutes.

2. Mix the cream cheese with the other ingredients and spread it on the top of the “gnocchi.”

3. Decorate the dish with chive and lemon zest.

Wild garlic pesto & mushroom risotto with lemon-flavoured breadcrumbs – And the sudden rescue

There are things that match together so nicely, but they do not grow in the same season: like mushrooms and wild garlic. (All right, nowadays everything is grown in every season – very much true for the cultivated champignon – but it just sounded good put in this way.)

This recipe was created because I suddenly needed a handful of cherries urgently (for the summer issue of a food magazine) and in early spring I couldn’t find any. But then a nice friend of mine rescued me. I prepared this dish for her.

Wild garlic pesto & mushroom risotto with lemon-flavoured breadcrumbs

For the risotto:

- 2 tbsp. olive oil

- 1 tbsp. butter

- 1 onion (finely chopped)

- 2 cloves of garlic (finely chopped)

- 400 g risotto rice

- 200 ml dry white wine

- 140 ml vegetable stock

- 70 g butter

- 45 gr grated parmesan

- salt, pepper

Wild garlic pesto:

- 150 g walnut (roasted)

- 75 g wild garlic

- cc. 100 ml olive oil (an amount that makes the pesto creamy)

- 50 g parmesan

- salt, pepper

For the mushroom part:

- 1 tbsp. butter

- 1 tbsp. olive oil

- 1 onion

- 500 g mushrooms

- fress thyme

- nutmeg (freshly grated)

- 25 ml dry white wine

- salt, pepper

Lemon-flavoured breadcrumbs

- 250 g dry white bread (without crust)

- 6 tbsp. olive oil

- 1 lemon’s zest (grated)

Preparation:

1. Fry the onion and the garlic on the olive oil and the butter. Add the risotto rice and fry it for a minute stirring continuously. Add the white wine and stir until the rice absorbs the wine. Add gradually the hot vegetable stock to the rice: add only a ladleful at a time and then wait until the rice absorbs it, then add the next, and so on. Finally add the last ladle of vegetable stock, then mix the butter and the parmesan immediately in the risotto.
2. Blend together the ingredients of the wild garlic pesto with an immersion blender. (It doesn’t need to be completely homogeneous; you can leave small pieces in the pesto.)
3. Fry the onion on the mixture of olive oil and butter (salt it). Add the mushrooms, salt, pepper and season them, then fry them. (First they will let off some liquid, then you can fry them.) Add the wine and wait until it completely evaporates while stirring continuously for a minute.
4. Crush the bread and fry it on the oil. Flavour the breadcrumbs with the lemon’s zest.