Oatmeal cookies

A natural post to follow my weight loss goals is of course a cookie recipe! These are not for your everyday diet, but might be nice for special occasions, such as birthday parties or Christmas (which is what I made these for).

This recipe is not mine, but one I've inherited from my mom's aunt Joanne in Canada. They are the best cookies I've tasted by far, and as oatmeal is a large part of the ingredients they are a bit filling as well (so maybe you manage with just one...).

The very first time I made these were when I was hoping to make a good "pre-impression" on my inlaws. I sent a box of cookies with my then boy friend for Christmas (before I had really met any of them) and voila, we got married this fall! Furthermore, my mother in law has asked for a batch of these cookies for Christmas ever since - so do try out these lovelies.

This year I made them in my Kenwood cooking Chef, and it's the first time I made them with help from a machine. Man, it makes a difference! This dough is tough to mix together by hand, but absolutely no stress with a kitchen machine.


Just add
1 cup of butter, diced

1 cup brown sugar

1 cup refined sugar

2 stirred eggs

2 table spoons of water

Vanilla seeds from one stem

1,5 cups of flour

1 tea spoon of baking soda

1 tea spoon of salt

3 cups of oatmeal


to the machine and mix together.

When everything is mixed, add one cup of chocolate chips or walnuts (I use both).

For non-american readers, one cup translates to 2,36 dl...But I just eyeballed it and they turn out yummy nevertheless.

Put the dough on a sheet of plastic, and wrap the plastic around the dough and shape into a sausage. Freeze for a minimum of a half hour, but not until frozen. This will make it easier to form the cookies.

After the dough has become semi-hard cut the sausage into 5-7 mm wide slices and lay on a baking tray. This batch yields ca 36 cookies. Bake for 7-8 minutes at 200 degrees Celsius. 

The cookies keep well in a sealed container (such as a cookie jar) and should freeze OK, though I have not tried this. The dough can be kept in the freezer without any problems.

Enjoy (but not too often)!

Kind regards,
Dalana

Tapas and a show

A few weeks ago I and some colleagues had a get-together with some food and a cabaret  show with students from the school we are alumni from, the Norwegian school of economics (NHH). As my flat is only a two minute walk to the venue (yep, lived here when I studied at NHH) the little pre-party was here. And with me being me, I went for the spanish favorite, tapas.

In this entry I would like to show how i make some of the items on the meny. 

The full menu: 

• Baguette with warm chevré
• Bacon dates
• Chorizo
• Spicy meat balls in tomato saus
• Cream-steamed muzzles
• Spring rolls (yes I know, not technically even closely spanish)
• Spanish potato omelett
• Ratatouille

Considering we are only 4 persons (pluss my boy friend who is really looking forward to the left overs) I do believe we will be stuffed at the end!

The dish I will focus on this time are the spring rolls and the spicy meat balls, since these dishes are the more difficult ones, although easily manageable for anyone really, with a bit of practice. 

Spring roll away

First step is to make the stuffing which in my rolls consists of ground beef, carrots, leek, onion, cabbage, all finely chopped. 

Then you fry the vegetables up with the ground beef until the meat is cooked through. Add salt, pepper,  cumin, and a dash of chilly powder. If you want spicy spring rolls you can add chilly paste as well, this goes well with ground chicken meat. In my recipe the vegetables account for roughly 2/3 and the meat 1/3. I used 800 grams of meat this time, and that yielded 46 spring rolls. The pastry used for the spring rolls can be found in most grocery stores which are specialized towards the asian cuisine. I use the type where the sheets are 20*20 cm, and one package contains 40 sheets. The left overs from package no 2 are now in my freezer waiting for the next time I make spring rolls.

Next you find a comfy spot, because now you will be rolling rolls for a while. I prefer setting up a little work station, with the stack of spring roll flakes, the stuffing and some egg white close at hand. The egg white is to seal the different parts of the pastry to each other.

 Add a good spoon full to the bottom corner.

 Fold the bottom corner in and dab egg white on the three other corners and fold the two corners in.

Roll the package up and voila, a spring roll. After you have used up all the stuffing you heat up ca 1 liter of oil in a suitable pan. The oil is the right temperature when the oil bubbles around your prongs and you can start adding the spring rolls. Be sure that the oil is neither too hot nor too cold throughout the stir frying. Flip the rolls over after a few minutes, when the rolls have as much color as you wish. 

When the rolls go cold the get soggy, but don't worry, it's just to heat them in the oven and they will go crispy again. So, just store them in your freezer until you fancy a roll or five again. Enjoy!

Spicy meat balls

Here is an other ground meat based recipe. The ingredients in addition to 400 grams of meat are crushed rusk (crisp whole wheat biscuit, kavring in Norwegian),  one egg, salt, pepper, chilly powder, cumin, paprika powder, chilly paste, and of course a couple of cloves of garlic. Mix it all together.
Next you prepare a dish with flour with salt, pepper, cumin, chilli powder and paprika powder mixed in. Use a spoon and make a ball in out of the beef, cover them in completely in flour and set aside. Warm a pan with some butter and fry the meat balls so the are nice and brown, but not fully cooked through. The will finish cooking in a tomato sauce. 


In the tomato sauce which I use with these meat balls I have onion, green sweet pepper and garlic which a fry in a pan with some oil until they are glossy. I then add canned tomatoes and white wine and let this simmer with the meat balls for a half hour or so, adding wine when needed. Flavor the sauce with salt and pepper and serve. Bon appetite!