After a Cooking Class

Lemon~Yogurt Cake

Here I am, feeling rejuvenated after giving a cooking class today. I can be tired, overwhelmed with day-to-day responsibilities but when I start cooking and sharing my food with others I forget everything else. A great feeling of satisfaction, happiness, creativity and a sense that I am able to connect with more people through my cooking fills me up and helps me forget everything else!

I gave a demo class on winter recipes from Cyprus. I made bulgur soup with fresh vegetables and herbs such as marjoram, cumin and cinnamon, potato, artichoke and olive stew, stuffed onions and a lemon~yogurt cake for dessert. Today, I chose recipes that I could use seasonal ingredients.

Once again I got lots of questions about the Mediterranean diet. Basically, the questions were all around the theme of what is the Mediterranean diet or what constitutes this special diet. I shared with the class that when I talk about the Mediterranean diet I refer to olive oil, yogurt, fresh vegetables consumption and eating seasonal. This is how I grew up. A lot of people still eat like this back home but sadly a lot of people have also succumbed to the fast food diet.

I grew up eating based on the seasonal produces and not what was selling in the grocery stores. For instance I never ate eggplant other than during the summer and ate strawberries only in May and June. Eating seasonal one can avoid the extra hormones and chemicals which are used to grow vegetables. I know that there are organic farms growing certain vegetables which are out of the season but no matter what I find these vegetables not as tasty as they are when they are actually in season.

My dad with his fruit trees; he taught me to eat lots of fresh fruit and vegetables by the season

I am sharing with you the easy recipe of making the delicious yogurt~lemon cake one of my favorite cakes since it has two of my favorite ingredients – lemon and yogurt! ... and I am happy to say that for the first year I was able to get lemons from my tree in my back yard! I had 4 other lemon trees die before I was able to have a nice healthy tree! I can't wait till the day I can make my own lemonade from my own lemons.

 

It’s a light and moist cake that’s delicious with coffee, tea or on its own. In my house it lasts only for two days so I don’t even have to refrigerate it! It’s such an easy cake to make that you can easily stay away from the cake mixes out of the box which take the same amount of time to put together and they don’t taste as good as this cake!

1 ½ cups sugar

¾ cup unsalted butter

4 eggs

1 cup Greek style plain yogurt

2 cups white unbleached flour

3 teaspoons baking powder

2 tablespoons lemon zest

For the Top

½ cup powdered sugar

Beat the eggs well until fluffy and set aside. In another deep bowl mix the butter with the sugar. Beat well and then start adding the eggs slowly. Add the yogurt and then start adding all the remaining dry ingredients; baking powder, and flour except for the lemon zest. Beat well. Add enough flour so that the batter is thick enough but it does not stick to the spoon.

Lastly, add the lemon zest.

Bake in a round baking pan at 350 F degrees for about 35 to 40 minutes – time might vary according to the oven temperatures.

Insert a toothpick to check if it is fully baked. The toothpick should come out completely dry.

Remove the cake from the pan after it cools off a bit.

Sprinkle with powdered sugar.

Serve at room temperature.

It is served with tea or coffee

May be stored outside the refrigerator for 2-3 days

I hope you share with friends and family.

Please post any questions or comments you might have.

Till next time ....

Litsa

Chickpeas with Spinach – Ρεβυθια με Σπαναχι

Chickpeas with spinach and tomatoes doesn’t sound very exotic to some food enthusiasts but it’s definitely a delicious meal to me. It was one of my favorite dishes growing-up.

It’s nutritious, healthy and tasty! In Cyprus, it’s quite common to serve different kind of beans as main dishes. This is one of them.

Chickpeas are probably the most nutritious type of beans and so is spinach in the vegetable arena! What a dynamic combination in this dish. :-)

It’s an easy dish to make after you cook the chickpeas and you take the shells off. You can leave the shells on but they will be lighter on the stomach if you do. I can definitely assure you of that.

  

2 cups dry chickpeas

2 teaspoons baking soda

1 cup chopped tomatoes

3 teaspoons tomato paste

1 bunch fresh spinach or 5 cups chopped spinach

¾ cup olive oil

½ cup chopped yellow onion

5 cups of water

Salt

Pepper

Place the chickpeas in a bowl with 2 teaspoons of baking soda and enough water to cover them completely. Let them soak overnight or for about 8 hours. By the following morning they will double in size.

Drain the water.  Let some cold water run through them.

Spread them out on a clean cloth kitchen towel. Cover them with a second towel. Start rolling an empty bottle over them or a pastry rolling pin. Press down hard so the chickpeas crack. Once they are cracked it is easy to peel the shells off.

Place a deep saucepan on high heat. add the onions and half of the olive oil. Sauté until the onions are soft. Add the chickpeas and stir a few times. Add the 5 cups of water.

Let them come to a boil.  Reduce the heat to medium low. Add the tomatoes, tomato paste, salt, pepper and remaining olive oil.

Wash the spinach in cold water. Cut the stems off. Get rid of any excess water with paper towels.

Let the chickpeas cook for about an hour. Add the spinach.

Add some warm water if needed to cover the chickpeas completely.

Stir well and let them cook for another 30 minutes or until the chickpeas are tender and they can easily be split with a fork. By the time the chickpeas are fully cooked, the sauce should have also thickened up.

Serves 4-6

You can definitely use canned chickpeas for this recipe but you are compromising on the taste of the dish if you do.

Serve this dish with some sardines or herring on the side, black olives and bread.

 You can easily keep this in the refrigerator for a few days if it’s not consumed right on the first day!

Every taste has a story to me. The story that comes to me right now related to this dish is that the food that I craved the most while I was hospitalized years ago was actually this dish. Once I started getting better and could eat anything my mom asked me what I craved so she could cook it for me and bring it to the hospital – I said chickpeas with spinach. When I said that I could see the surprise even in my mom’s face that out of all the foods I chose beans! 

To me a meal can be delicious even if it consists only of a couple of ingredients and it’s easy to prepare. I firmly believe that it’s the combination of ingredients that makes something taste good or bad. Some of you can definitely tell me that sardines taste bad. I will say not to me but it all comes down to personal taste.

Enjoy making this dish perhaps with some of your own variations to suit your own personal taste.

And enjoy sharing it with your friends and family.

Και καλη ορεξη – good appetite.

Till next time, stay well!

Litsa

Soupa Yiouvarlakia – Σουπα Γιουβαρλακια

Since I have started fighting the flu during the past 5 days, the only thing I have been craving for it’s comfort food. Comfort food to me is rich, hot and creamy. So I decided to make one more comfort soup (following my trahana soup) to soothe my sore throat. My daughter’s favorite soup – soupa yiouvarlakia - σουπα γιουβαρλακια - as we call it in Greek. This soup is hot, rich and creamy! It’s a soup with meatballs in egg lemon broth – avgolemono - αυγολεμονο.

Agvolemono sauce is used in other soups as well as other dishes. Number of lemons and or eggs used may vary and there is no right or wrong. It’s all a personal taste. My mom for instance likes her egg-lemon sauce really creamy so she adds more eggs; it’s not very healthy but it tastes really good. Intentionally, I have cut down on the number of eggs I use.

Luckily, I had some ground beef in the freezer that I recently bought.  The ground beef I had bought had very little fat because I bought it at the local international store. I usually pick a nice lean piece of beef and I have the butcher grind it for me. I used it tonight for my soup and the result was excellent.

Till this day my father advises me to go to the local butcher and choose my own meat instead of buying it at the supermarket already ground and packaged. He says - you have to see what you are getting! :-).

It’s an easy and delicious soup that makes adults as well as children quite happy.

1 pound ground beef or lamb

1 cup long grain rice

1/3 cup chopped flat leaf parsley

1/3 finely chopped or grated onion

5 tablespoons olive oil

2 quarts chicken stock

Salt

Pepper

1 dash ground nutmeg

3 eggs

1 lemon

For the Top

Finely chopped flat leaf parsley

In a bowl mix the ground beef or lamb, half of the rice, grated onion, finely chopped parsley, 3 tablespoons of olive oil, nutmeg, salt and pepper. Form small balls of 2 inches diameter.

You will be able to make approximately 20 meatballs.

In a deep saucepan add the chicken stock, and the remaining olive oil. Cover with a lid. On high heat let it come to a boil.

Remove from the heat. Add the remaining rice and then start adding the meatballs into the pot. Place back on medium-low heat and let the soup cook for approximately 30 - 40 minutes or until the rice in the meatballs is fluffy and soft. While cooking have it covered with a lid.

In a separate bowl beat the eggs well until fluffy. Gradually add the lemon juice.

Mix well. You need to temper the egg and lemon juice mixture.

With a small ladle add some hot juice from the soup into the egg and lemon mixture and whisk well. Repeat this step a few times until the temperature of the eggs is about the same as the temperature of the soup. You are doing this because you don’t want the eggs to curdle.

Once the egg and lemon mixture is hot, add into the soup with the meatballs and stir well for about a minute or two.

Serve immediately after sprinkling some chopped parsley on top.

Serve hot.

Serves 4-6