Date-Nut Balls

This is something I make only on Pesach. It's from the Teimot Mishpacha magazine. It's a nice snack for in-between meals, although sadly it's a bit of work, but it doesn't make that many...

Date-Nut Balls

About 30 dates, I used a bag and a half. Medjool is the best.
1 cup chopped walnuts
Coconut flakes.

Check dates and remove pits. Put in food processor and add nuts. Grind to a semi-paste.
Chill in fridge or freezer and roll balls. Roll in coconut and enjoy!

Tilapia in Vegetable Sauce

This is a very easy fish recipe, and you can probably use different kinds of fish, I just use tilapia because it comes in individual packages, which is very comfortable if you want to make a little bit.

In this case I just used two fish, because my sister was coming over for Shabbos with her family.

Tilapia in Vegetable Sauce

1 onion
1 yellow bell pepper
1 tomato
1 garlic clove
black pepper
paprika
salt
lemon juice
2 tilapia fillets

Slice the onion in rings, and the bell peper and tomato in strips. Dice the garlic or crush it. Add it to a pot with some oil, add spices and lemon juice to taste and saute a little while.

Add tilapias and cook for about 20-30 minutes, until done.
Let it cool off a bit, take out the tilapias and take off the skin. Cut in small pieces and put back in pot with vegetables.

Shepherd's Pie Pockets

These are like burekas, just with shepherd's pie in them. I made them for Shabbos night, but as there is no sauce or liquid you can heat them up Shabbos morning too. Or have them during the week. They are really good!

I put the two fillings next to each other, but next time I'll put them on top of each other, so that you eat them together and not just one by one.

Shepherd's Pie Pockets:

Puff pastry

Meat filling:

1 onion

1 Garlic clove

Ground meat

Salt, pepper, paprika, cumin to taste

Tomato paste - not a lot

Sweet chili sauce

Potato filling:

Potatoes

Salt

Mustard

Cook potatoes in a pot of salted water. When done, drain but save some water for mashing. Mash and add water to desired consistency. Add mustard.

Saute onion and garlic. Add ground meat and cook. Add spices, chili sauce and tomato paste. You want to add enough so that it sticks together but not turn it into spaghetti sauce. Cook until all the meat is done.

Roll our puff pastry and cut into squares. Mine were pretty large but not huge. 

Put some of both fillings in the middle and fold over the corners. Close well. 

Bake at 175 for about 30-40 minutes, until browned. 

Meatloaf, Potato Kugel, Couscous with Creole Sauce

Tonight was a frozen dinner of meatloaf, potato kugel and couscous with Creole sauce.

Nothing very exciting. But it was tasty.

Madagascar Zucchini Skillet and Jagacida

Today I made two recipes that I have never made before. I had some extra zucchinis and decided to look for a vegetarian recipe. And Google brought me to this site! I used it a long time ago, totally forgot about it. I  love that it has recipes for a lot of different countries.

I am posting a screenshot of the recipes, as I didn't actually change anything except the quantity.

http://www.ivu.org/recipes/african/madagascar.html

http://www.ivu.org/recipes/african/jagacida.html

It was very good. The zucchini skillet was very garlicky as my husband didn't remove all of the garlic right away, at least I think that's why. I liked it but it's not for everyone.

BBQ Chicken, Mexican Orzo and Potato Kugel

Today I took out one of the frozen dinners.

On the menu was potato kugel, Mexican orzo and BBQ chicken.

BBQ Chicken:

This was really easy. I just cut an onion into rings and put them in a baking dish, arranged chicken drumsticks, thighs and breast on top, and poured sauce on top.

Sauce: ketchup, water, soy sauce chili sauce garlic powder, cumin, salt and pepper, all to taste.

The Mexican orzo was based on Simple Mexican Rice.

Mexican Orzo:

In a small saucepan saute a chopped onion and minced garlic clove until onion is translucent. Add about a tsp paprika and a tsp cumin and cook 30 seconds. 

Add 1 cup ozro, 1 cup water or broth and 1/4 cup tomato paste.

Bring to a boil, pour into oven dish and bake on 175C about 20 minutes, until liquid is absorbed.

Let rest 5 minutes before serving.

Shabbos Food

And it is Shabbos again. Time flies.

This Shabbos I had a guest who couldn't have fat for health reasons, so I had to make everything as fat-free as possible. I have been through the same situation, so I knew what to do, but it was still pretty hard.

Salads:
As always I made a bunch of salads, 2 of them like last week, and a few more.

Pictured here, Roasted Garlic and Onion Dip, Matbucha and Babaganoush.

I got the dip recipe from a friend.

Roasted Garlic and Onion Dip:

2 large onions, peeled and quartered

1 tbsp olive oil

1/2 tsp salt

1 whole head garlic

1/3 cup mayonnaise

1 tbsp lemon juice

1/8 tsp pepper

Preheat oven to 200C

Place onion in a large bowl. Drizzle with oil. Wrap whole garlic head (unpeeled) in foil. 

Place onion and foil wrapped garlic on a baking sheet. Bake for 1 hour. Cool 10 min. 

Separate garlic cloves and squeeze garlic pulp out of each clove. Discard the skins. Combine with onion, salt, mayonnaise, lemon juice and pepper in food processor. Mix well and chill until serving. 

I used low calorie mayonnaise and it was still very good.

I also made just a vegetable salad and potato salad, both with an interesting dressing.
The dressing of the veggie salad (left) I got from a Mishpacha Magazine a very very long time ago and never tried, so decided to do it, my husband loved it! Especially on challah with herbed cream cheese.
The potato salad is also from Mishpacha, Family First Magazine, a more recent one. That I made a few times and it is very popular.

Green Garlic and Dill Dressing:

5 sprigs of dill
2 garlic cloves, minced
1 large cucumber, cut up
2 tbsp vinegar
½ tsp salt
½ cup oil

Combine all the ingredients, except for half the oil. Mix in a blender and then slowly add the rest of the oil until it thickens.
Serve chilled. Pour over chopped vegetables.



Dijon-Dill Potato Salad:

1/2 red onion or regular onion
3/4 cup mayonnaise
2 stalks of celery, diced
1 tsp salt
1/2 tsp
2 tsp mustard
3 tbsp chopped fresh dill
2 tbsp lemon juice

Mix all ingredients well and pour over boiled potatoes.


For the main meal I made oven baked schnitzel and stuffed butternut squash.
I ate the butternut squash in the restaurant where my sister was the cook. When she was let go I asked her for the recipe. Her recipe was pretty fancy, with pine nuts and craisins and baharat (a spice), but I didn't have all that stuff so I adapted it to what I had.
The schnitzel was my idea, to make it low fat because it isn't fried, which is mainly because I hate standing next to the stove for so long and because I have this weird thing where I cook chicken to death to make sure there is no salmonella.

Stuffed Butternut Squash:

(Ingredients are mostly to taste)

1 onion, chopped thinly
1 zucchini, grated
1 carrot, grated
1 stalk celery, sliced
Soy sauce
Silan - date syrup
Black pepper
Cinnamon
Pinch of cloves
Pinch of nutmeg
Pinch of cumin
Sunflower seeds, peeled, unsalted, unroasted (I get mine in the local health food store)
Raisins
1 butternut squash, sliced in 2 lengthwise and emptied of pits and stuff.

Saute onion until soft. Add celery, cook a little, add carrot and zucchini. Add some water to cook down. Add rest of ingredients except butternut squash. Cook until done.
Put butternut squash in an oven dish with some water on the bottom. Mix (olive) oil with some salt and pepper. Brush on cut side of butternut squash. Bake in the oven on 200C for 30 minutes.
Take butternut squash out of the oven. Let cool a bit and then scoop out some of the flesh. You can add this to the veggie mix or just eat it, it's delicious!
Put filling in squash. Serve hot or cold, whole or sliced. Enjoy!

This was the original:

Oven Baked Schnitzel:

On one plate mix golden matza meal and crushed corn flakes and sweet paprika (or use regular matza meal, or breadcrumbs).

On the second plate 2 egg-whites mixed wit some cold water. 

Take your sliced or flattened chicken breast and dip both sides into egg, then into crumbs. 

Arrange in baking dish and bake at 175C for 45-60 minutes, until done (It could be that your oven is better than mine and you need less time).

For dessert I made raspberry jelly with fruits and baked apples. 

Raspberry Jelly:

Cut up apple and pineapple (or banana) into chunks and put into intended bowls/cups/molds.

Prepare jelly according to package instructions and pour over fruit. Let it 'jellify' in the fridge and enjoy!

Baked Apples:

This is based on the Surprise Apples recipe in Tamar Ansh's book 'A Taste of Tradition'.

Peel and core apples. I just do as many as fit into my baking dish. They should fit snugly.
Mix some sweet red wine with raisins, cinnamon and a bit of brown sugar. You can use dates also, then it comes out more a paste.
Fill holes with wine mixture. Cover the dish and bake at 175 for an hour.
As you can see the apples can collapse after a long time, but that doesn't take away from the taste.


Shabbos morning I made egg rolls out of filo dough which I baked. The egg roll idea is from Teimot magazine (I didn't follow it exactly because of missing ingredients and fat restrictions) and the dipping sauce from Allrecipes.com.

Egg rolls:

I just sauteed sliced onion, pepper and zucchini, added salt and honey (you can use date syrup). Drain.
Folded each filo sheet in half, cut it in two, brush with oil and put filling at one side, and roll up (pics from original magazine below). Brush tops with oil and bake at 180C for about 15 minutes.
I didn't brush with oil either times, but I used the drips from the sauteed vegetables on top.

Dipping Sauce:

2 tbsp soy sauce
1/2 tbsp vinegar
a bit of oil
1 tsp ground ginger
1/2 tsp garlic powder
1/2 tsp onion powder

Mix well.
I didn't follow the recipe exactly, as the reviews said it was very vinegary and salty. And also I only had about 2 tbsp of soy sauce anyway. My husband thought it was salty, and on the first bite I agreed. but it goes well with the egg rolls.