Bon Appetit – Scandelights

Recipe: Beef and Ginger Stir-fry with Rice and Sesame Broccoli

Published on January 31, 2020 by HannaLeave a comment

This recipe is so easy to make that I managed it when I was tired and shaky and almost wished I had ordered a takeaway. But it doesn’t take long to make at all, and tastes so good it just can’t compare to a takeaway.

It’s full of flavour and feels silky and light although you’re eating steak. It’s so delicious it has become one of my new favourite recipes – especially suitable for Friday nights in when we want something fast but delicious enough to celebrate the end of a work week and this fits the bill perfectly.

Beef and Ginger Stir-fry with Rice and Sesame Broccoli, serves 4

Adapted from Bon Appétit’s recipe.

ca 450 g skirt steak (I used bavette which worked really well)

1 tsp sugar

1 tsp toasted sesame oil

1 tsp + 1 tbsp soy sauce

1 tsp salt + more

1 tbsp vegetable oil

1 medium sweet onion, sliced

7cm ginger, peeled, very thinly sliced

ground black pepper

80 ml water

3 tbsp butter, cut into pieces

1 tbsp fresh lemon juice

To serve:

cooked rice

Cut the steak into large strips. Toss in a bowl with sugar, sesame oil, 1 tsp soy sauce, and 1 tsp salt to coat and let sit 20 minutes.

Heat up oil in a frying pan on high heat and let it coat the bottom of the pan. The oil should be shimmering and you should see some wisps of smoke—if it’s not hot enough, the meat will steam instead of getting deeply browned.

Add the steak to the pan in an even layer and cook, undisturbed, until brown around the edges, about 2 minutes. Turn steak over and add onion, ginger, lots of pepper, and the water. Cook, tossing often, until onion is just tender and ginger is softened, about 2 minutes.

Remove from heat and add butter, lemon juice, and remaining 1 tbsp soy sauce. Toss until butter is melted and coats the steak. Taste and season with more salt if needed.

Divide rice among bowls and top with beef stir-fry and serve with sesame broccoli.

Sesame broccoli, serves 4

2 packets tenderstem broccoli (approx 300 g)

2 tbsp toasted sesame oil rostad sesamolja

4 tsp sesame seeds

1/2-1 lemon or lime, the juice

salt and pepper

Trim the dry ends of the broccoli. Place in a large frying pan and almost cover with boiling water. Add salt and cook for about a minute on high heat. Drain and return to the hot pan. Add sesame oil and squeeze with lemon. Toss and add sesame seeds and season. Serve alongside the rice and beef stir-fry.

Recipe: blueberry galette

Published on October 17, 2018October 17, 2018 by HannaLeave a comment

My last day in Sweden for the summer was a Sunday in August and instead of just making it a travel day (i.e. boring!) I invited by best friend and her family to the summer house for a nice lunch with me and my parents.

As a group we get on so well and you wouldn’t think we weren’t all the same age! I love it and as it’s also stress-free inviting people over who you know so well it was the perfect ending to my two+ weeks in Sweden.

As my best friend and her husband has a baby who now walks on her own but then was desperate to master the walking we decided against a sit down starter. Instead we had some cheese straws and wine standing up chatting and running after the little one. For the main course we had arctic char with boiled potatoes, vegetables and a sauce with lumpfish roe. Very traditionally Swedish!

And for pudding I made this blueberry galette! It was an instant hit (Emma, bestie, sorry it’s taking me so long to write this up – but here you finally have the recipe!), although my dad would have liked it a little bit sweeter. I, on the other hand, like the fact that it’s not too sweet as you can really taste the freshness of the blueberries this way, and it doesn’t feel all that indulgent serving it with ice cream, but pouring cream or lightly whipped cream would work well too.

Blueberry galette, serves 4-6

Adapted from Bon Appetit’s recipe

Dough:
205 g (385 ml) plain flour
2 tsp caster sugar
115 g chilled salted butter, cut into pieces

Filling:
350 g blueberries, fresh or frozen
1 tbsp potato flour (or cornstarch)
1 ½ tsp fresh lemon juice
60 ml caster sugar, plus more for sprinkling
2 tbsp milk or cream

Mix flour and sugar in a bowl. Add the softened butter and either work with your fingers until you have a sandy consistency or pulse in a food processor until you reach that sandy texture.

Add 4 tbsp cold water and mix into a dough. Add another tbsp if needed until the dough has formed. Shape into a disc, cover with cling and chill for an hour.

Preheat oven to 190°C. Toss blueberries, potato flour, lemon juice and caster sugar in a large bowl.

Roll out dough on a lightly floured surface until 30 cm diameter. Carefully transfer the rolled out dough to a parchment-lined baking tray. Mound blueberries in the middle of the of the galette, leaving 5 cm as a border. Fold the edges over, overlapping slightly. Brush dough with milk/cream and sprinkle generously with caster sugar.

Bake until the crust is dark golden brown and the filling is bubbling, 45–50 minutes. Leave to cool before serving.

Recipe: wild garlic fritters

Published on June 5, 2018June 5, 2018 by Hanna1 Comment

Wild garlic season is almost over now, but luckily there were a few leaves left when I was in Sweden last and I used them wisely by trying a completely new recipe!

As you may know by now, I love fritters and have a few recipes on the blog already, but when I saw this recipe in Bon Appetit I couldn’t resist trying it. Wild garlic is my favourite flavour in spring (together with asparagus and rhubarb) as it’s less pungent than garlic. It seems fresher somehow. But it also reminds me of my childhood, of going for walks in the woods and sensing that onion-y smell when they were first in season, and later spotting the pretty white flowers.

The fritters turned out really well, even though I tweaked the recipe a bit, and both my parents gave them the thumbs up. I thought the fritters needed a sidekick and served my parmesan crème alongside them. Yum!

Wild garlic fritters, serves 4 as a starter

Adapted from Bon Appetit’s recipe.

a bunch of wild garlic, approx 8 cm in diameter

135 g plain flour

120 g potato flour or rice flour

1 tsp baking powder

1 tsp sugar

1 tsp salt

100-200 ml sparkling water

approx 200-300 ml vegetable oil for frying

lemon wedges to serve

Rinse the wild garlic and pat dry with kitchen towel. Remove the coarse part of the stems. Cut into 1 cm long pieces and put to the side.

Mix flour, potato flour, baking powder, sugar and salt in a mixing bowl. Add the sparkling water until you have a batter that isn’t too thick or too thin. Add the wild garlic and mix well.

Pour the oil into a high-sided frying pan until it is about 1 cm deep. Heat on medium-high heat until warm enough for deep-frying (it’s ready when a small piece of bread comes out golden).

Add spoonfuls of the batter to the hot pan and fry until gold first one one side and then the other. Drain on kitchen towel. Serve with lemon wedges and parmesan crème.

Recipe: slow-cooked salmon with fennel, lemon and chilli

Published on February 20, 2017 by HannaLeave a comment

Salmon. Probably the most popular fish in Sweden, but not my first choice to be honest. I blame all the baked (over-cooked) salmon fillets when I was at Uni for that. Although I love the oily fish raw, cured and cold-smoked. And, after trying this recipe, like this; baked in a very low oven and still raw in the middle.

Slow-roasted salmon with fennel, lemon and chilli, serves 6

Adapted from Bon Appetit’s recipe.

1/2 fennel, thinly sliced

1 lemon, thinly sliced

1 red or green chili, sliced

4 sprigs dill + more for serving

salt and black pepper

900 g salmon fillet without skin

olive oil

Pre-heat the oven to 135C. Pour a little oil into a baking dish. Place fennel, lemon, chilli and till in the dish and place the salmon on top. Add plenty of salt and pepper and drizzle with oil. Bake in the oven for 20-25 minutes or longer if you want it cooked through.

Shred the fish into smaller pieces. Remove the dill (and substitute with fresh dill) and serve with the baked vegetables. I also had new potatoes and a cold sauce with lumpfish roe with mine.

Recipe: Sloe gin spritz

Published on February 14, 2017 by Hanna1 Comment

Happy Valentine’s day, dear readers!

It seems like the perfect day to share this sloe gin spritz recipe with you. Don’t we all need a drink on Valentine’s day?! Either to celebrate or commiserate?

I made sloe gin last year (very British, I know!) using this method and wanted to use it in a drink a little more exciting than a sloe gin & t, so I was very pleased to find this sloe gin spritz recipe in an issue of Bon Appetit.

Sloe gin, 70 cl

1 bottle (70 cl) gin

500 g ripe sloe berries (pick them after the first frost)

Simple syrup:

100 ml caster sugar

100 ml water

Freeze the berries. Defrost and mix with the gin in a large jar/bottle. Seal the jar and keep in a dark place for 3 months. Shake/stir it once a week or so.

After three months, sieve the mixture and remove the berries. Bring the simple syrup to the boil and let it cool. Add syrup to the gin after taste. Done!

Sloe gin spritzer, per glass

Adapted from Bon Appetit’s recept.

4 parts prosecco

1 part sloe gin, either homemade or bought

soda water

Mix prosecco and sloe gin in a glass (with or without ice). Fill up with soda water. Decorate with frozen raspberries or a sprig of mint. B

Aubergine parmesan with mozzarella

Published on October 9, 2013 by Hanna2 Comments

This lovely recipe is courtesy of the October edition of my latest obsession; the American food magazine Bon Appetit which I read religiously on my iPad every month.

I am slightly obsessed with aubergine – as you can see in the archives. I just like the soft texture and mellowness you get when they’re roasted and how well they pair with cheese (another of my obsessions).

This dish is more or less a non-layered Parmigiana di Melanzane and I must say I prefer it this way. The aubergine is firmer in these bigger pieces and therefore less floppy and the whole dish requires less sauce so the flavours are more distinct. The finished dish just has a little more finesse and is worthy as starring as the main course at any dinner party.

Eggplant parmesan with mozzarella, 4 portioner

Adapted from Bon Appetit’s recipe.

olive oil

4 garlic cloves

1 tbsp tomato purée

1 tin (400 g) crushed tomatoes (or whole)

2 medium aubergines

4 sprigs oregano (I used dried)

150 ml fresh breadcrumbs

250 g buffalo mozzarella

ca 40 g grated parmesan

Pre-heat the oven to 200 C. Using a vegetable peeler, remove skin from rounded side of each eggplant half, leaving a 1 cm strip of skin around the cut edges. Oil an edged baking sheet and place the aubergines cut side down. Drizzle with more oil, add salt, pepper and oregano as well as three whole garlic cloves. Cover with tin foil and bake until soft, 40-45 minutes.

In the meantime, make the tomato sauce: Add one clove of grated garlic to a non-stick saucepan on medium heat. Stir for a minute or so, add the tomato purée followed by the tinned tomatoes and a splash of water. Bring to a boil, reduce heat, and simmer, partially covered, until slightly thickened, 15–20 minutes. Season and set tomato sauce aside.

Toss breadcrumbs with oil. Transfer eggplants, oregano, and garlic to two large shallow baking dishes (or simply use the same one), placing eggplants cut side up. Top eggplants with tomato sauce and mozzarella, then sprinkle with breadcrumbs and Parmesan. Bake until mozzarella is bubbling and breadcrumbs are golden, 25–30 minutes.

Serve immediately with a green salad and nice bread.