Nutella Filo Pie with Pistachios

We prepare a lot of filo pies in Bulgaria. Filo pie with cheese, eggs and yogurt is one of the traditional Bulgarian dishes served on the New Year's Eve, but also all throughout the year. Filo pie with spinach, filo pie with leek, filo pie with shredded pumpkin (obligatory dish for the Christmas eve), zucchini filo pie - we are a nation of filo pie lovers. But recently I found another recipe in one of my favorite blogs - Dulces Bocados , which is absolutely tasty and can be prepared in less than an hour (with baking time included). 

Does it have a lot of calories? Yes. Is it worth it? Yes, yes, yes.

Pasta Bolognese

With the first cold raindrops falling outside and the first tree leaves turning their color into yellow I’ve started thinking about something nourishing and warm. Sauce Bolognese. This typical Italian sauce, known throughout the world, has become a kind of generic name for minced meat and tomato sauce, but most of the families, especially outside Italy, prepare it according to their taste without being aware of the ingredients in the original recipe. The taste of the original Bolognese sauce should be kind of creamy and this is because of the milk, which mellows the acidity of the tomatoes and is a staple ingredient of the authentic recipe. The sauce requires simmering for some hours in order to develop its rich and hearty taste. The combination of sautéed onion, celery and carrots, called in Italian soffritto is also important. According to people from Bologna, this sauce tastes best served with fresh pasta like tagliatelle or fettucine.

Zucchini phyllo pie

My mother-in-law is the best cook I know. She is not a professional chef, but she knows such increadible recipes and she respects food so much, that she can turn every single ingredient into something absolutely delicious. This is one of her masterpieces. Zucchini phyllo pie - it is a sweet phyllo dough pie, which holds the fresh taste of yound early-summer zucchinis. Two weeks ago when I spent a spent a week with her in her country house she prepared for me her soft zucchini phyllo pie and I took some pictures of her during work. Here is the recipe she is famous for.

Beer roasted chicken

I was a really fastidious child. 

Eating was the worst time during my days - I still remember how painful it was to have a slice of bread with lots of butter and cheese for breakfast and how long it took me to eat it. But I just had to eat it if I wanted to go to the beach after that. 

Lunches were even worse - all the soups and stews, especially during trhe summer months made my life really hard.

And there was only one meal which I was craving for. The beer roasted chicken was the most official dish in my menu and all the days we had beer roasted chicken (not more than two or three times a year) were like feast for me. I still remember the smell which filled the kitchen and how unpatient I was during the roasting time. This chicken had moist and juicy inside and crisp skin. This is the simple and easy recipe of my mother.

Cheese sticks

These cheese sticks are irresistible. Their salty taste is welcome on the table with a bowl of soup, with a glas of beer or inbetween two spoons of sweet dessert. Recently I hosted a ladies' party with lots of sweet treats and I was looking for something which will act as the coffee beans in the perfume shops, something which cleans the previous tastes and gives vent to another ones. I made these sticks. 

One portion at first. 

Second portion after I ate the whole first batch still hot. 

Believe it or not, these sticks became the stars of the party. 

The recipe is from one of my very favorite blogs - Alexandra cooks. 

Usually the first time I prepare somebody else's recipe, I follow the amounts of ingredients strictly and next time I adjust them to my taste. This time there is no need of such adjustments - these sticks are perfect, so I recommend you to follow the exact amounts of the ingredients, as follows:

The best chocolate cookies - rich and chewy

This recipe is for devoted chocolate lovers - you feel the taste of chocolate in your mouth minutes after you have swallowed the last bite. It is not for people who prefer sweet desserts and the mild taste of milk chocolate - cookies get slightly bitter. The main reason I do them again and again is because the chocolate inside them is soft and remains melted even the day after they are prepared. Recipe is from here and it is for 8 cookies. The original has chocolate chips as an ingredient, but I prefer to make these cookies with chopped chocolate because chocolate chips tend to keep their shape while baking and I want to obtain a more homogenous velvety texture. These cookies are perfect for making ice cream sandwiches.

If you prefer crunchy cookies with emphasis on the butter as a taste, I can recommend you the Crunchy buttery cookies. 

Crunchy buttery cookies with chocolate chunks

These cookies are crunchy. And buttery. And salty. And all this makes the chocolate even more obvious and tasty. The recipe yields 8 cookies and this is the place I saw it.

Peach tart with fresh peaches and apricot jam

The recipe for this tart is from Marco Canora's book Salt to taste. This is one of the best cookbooks I have. The Italian-style recipes represent home cooking at its best, but the thing I like most about this book is that it sounds like a bunch of advices how to do everything in the best possible way. 
This tart is light, fruity and very fresh.

My favorite sour cherry cake

The last sour cherries of the season. I picked them from our sour cherry tree, trying not to eat too many. I needed two cups for the sour cherry cake. My favourite sour cherry cake, the one my mother-in-low prepares. She knows I love it and so does everybody else in our family. Half of the tray is for me, the others share the other half. 

Sour cherry cake with buttermilk

Sour cherries are one of my favourite fruits. Probably that is one of the reasons I spent the other day around the stove trying two different recipes for sour cherry cake. This is the first one I would like to tell you about. It is based on the recipe for buttermilk blueberry cake I saw in one of my absolute favorite blogs. It does not look very attempting, but it is. You can feel the butter and the crust is crunchy. 

Mussels saganaki (μύδια σαγανάκι)

Everytime I want to feel the taste of the sea, I buy blue mussels. I love to scrub and clean their dark blue shells, to check for broken ones, to put the good ones into the pot. I like the smell of my kitchen in the short 10-20 minutes of preparation and long hours after that. And I always enjoy sipping their juices from the shells and feel their salty broth as a juicy message from the sea. I know, female mussels are orange, male mussels are light yellow. Their colors match perfectly the red of tomato sauce and the white of Feta cheese. But this is not the main reason I prepare often mussels saganaki. The taste of this dish is unforgettable. Along with garides saganaki, this is a very popular dish in the fish restaurants of Northern Greece. And also in my home. As with many other dishes, I increase the spicyness by adding lots of hot peppers and chili flakes, but you can adjust it according to your taste. 

Asparagus with Feta cheese: green for my eyes and soul

I love asparagus. It fills my eyes with green and makes me feel spring with all my senses. And this is one of my favorite asparagus dishes, proper for the light diet-intended evenings. With a glas of white wine. Or two. Or... it's up to you.

Garlic Knots: green for my eyes and soul

Kissing is important part of life. So is garlic. But they both are not compatible. Along with onion and cigarettes, I find garlic one of the worst kiss-enemies. That is why it is a good idea to decide what is more important on a certain day. I usually prefer kissing, that is why despite loving the pungent taste of garlic I serve it rarely on my table. But there are some days and some recipes I could not resist. On such days I prepare my favorite garlic knots. Since the day I saw the recipe here, I was sure they were worth it. And they did not disappoint me a bit. Of course you can omit the garlic part of the coating and pour only hot butter and parsley. I tried it, but it is not the same. 

Tarte Tatin

'I burnt the apples!', she exclaimed. And that is how a long story began. Because this happened more than 100 years ago. And she was one of the two sisters Tatin. Probably nobody would know her name except of the few hunters and travelers who stayed at the hotel, owned by her and her sister, about 100 km south of Paris. But there were some clients in the restaurant at the hotel who were waiting for the apple tarts they had ordered. And she, who was responsible for the kitchen things, had to do something. What exactly was her mistake - probably nobody will ever know. Was she tired, distracted by something or just absent-minded? We will never know. But she lacked of time and she had to do something with the caramelized apples she had in the pan. So she put the tart pastry onto the apples, baked the cake and turned it upside down. Little bit frustrated, little bit nervous she served the upside-down apple tart to the clients. What was their reaction? They were fascinated and wanted more. Because the caramelized apples tasted far better than the ones used in the classical apple tart. 
How did the story continue? A man from French restaurant Maxim's heard about this little treasure and wanted to know the key to it. He found a way to take the recipe and that is how Tarte Tatin, named after the above mentioned lady, became part of Maxim's menu and made its official entrance to the golden culinary pages of the world. 
That is how a mistake turned into something appreciated all over the world. I like this idea very much. Not so exaggerating like turning lemons into lemonade but I suppose, sometimes there is opportunity even in the worst situations. In fact, being involved into the situation makes you some kind of blind to all the possibilities around. But they still exist.
I rarely admit I have made a mistake. But now I 'burned my apples'. Literally and figuratively. And I have to decide what to do with the 'pastry', with the 'clients' and how the story should continue. In other words, I should decide what my future steps should be. 
The things which are obvious in the pictures are that I am a little bit angry. And anxious. And that is why I was thinking I should not publish this post. But this is my place. And the tart is still tasty. So here is the recipe, taken from a book about the French cooking.

The best chocolate muffins

I spent some time recently to try different chocolate muffin recipes. Main requirements to the chocolate muffin - it should be soft, it should have a lot of butter as an ingredient, I want to feel the chocolate with all my senses. This is the first recipe which meets the criteria - that's why I call these muffins the best chocolate muffins. Yes, I know, tastes differ, but believe me, it is a good and easy recipe. Two little tips: Take care not to overmix the batter; use a flexible spatula to gently fold ingredients together. Take care also not to overbake the muffins - they should remain soft in the middle. 

Chocolate biscuit cake and the joy to have a grown-up daughter

Do you know how Violet made my weekend sweet and nice? With a sweet surprise - she prepared chocolate biscuit cakes we both enjoyed both weekend-mornings with our coffees. It is soo good to have a grown-up daughter - she is like a good friend to me, she understands my feelings, my monthly mood swings, she is a good shopping adviser. And also a great kitchen girl. 
This is the source she used for preparing the cake (called in Bulgarian sweet salami because of its shape).
So I had my first piece of chocolate biscuit cake as a surprise on Saturday morning and there is no sweet salami home yet. And I should admit, men at home don't like such treats. But we both shared two cakes with lots of coffee cups, without blaming ourselfs. This sweet salami is rich, very rich, but it is so tasty. And who cares about calories if they give you such satisfaction.
Violet has a birthday today - she is getting sixteen. 

Happy Sweet sixteen, V. I am so happy to have you in my life. Love you so much.