Photo with permission of the Nordic Bakery and Miisa Mink

I make no secret of the fact that I am a huge fan of the Nordic Bakery and I am delighted to have some Nordic festive recipes by Miisa Mink to share with you over the next few days.

Firstly these delicious looking dark rye canapés, the rye crisps are for sale at the bakery, and make the perfect vehicle for dippy canapé fillings!

Recipe: Dark Rye Chip Canapés

The recipes make topping for 2 – 3 bags of Nordic Bakery Dark Rye Chips.

Green Hummus

1 small onion, chopped
1 tbsp olive oil, for frying
5 tbsp olive oil
3 tbsp tahini
1 – 2 gloves of garlic, finely chopped
2 tbsp lemon juice
250 g frozen peas, defrosted in room temperature
½ tsp sea salt
freshly ground black pepper
(2 tbsp water)
7 g fresh mint leaves, finely chopped

Heat up the olive oil and fry onion gently to soften.

Measure olive oil, tahini, lemon juice and half of the peas into a food processor or blender. Mix well. Add remaining peas gradually and mix well. Season with salt and pepper. If you use blender you may need to add water to soften the mixture to blend well.

Fill dark rye chips just before serving and garnish with chopped mint.

Smoked salmon spread

100 g smoked salmon, roughly chopped
80 ml cream fraiche
3 tbsp Philadephia cheese (or other soft cheese)
½ tsp Dijon mustard
7 g dill, finely chopped
freshly ground black pepper

Mix all ingredients in a small bowl and leave into the fridge for 2 hours or until you are ready to fill the chips. Fill the chips just before serving.

Spicy Carrot Rings

3 thick carrots (approx 120g each)
45g caster sugar
50 ml cider vinegar
150 ml water
1 tbsp honey
3 whole cloves
10 whole allspice
100 ml mayonnaise
½ red onion, finely chopped
5 g flat leaf parsley

Peel carrots. Cut them lengthwise thinly (1 mm). I use cheese slicer for this.

Put sugar, vinegar, water, honey, cloves and allspice into a saucepan and bring to boil. Let simmer for 2 minutes then add the carrot slices. Make sure slices are not sticking together and all carrot slices are well covered with liquid. Bring once more to boil and then take off the heat. Set aside with the lid on. The slices will cook al dente in the cooling liquid. Once liquid is cooled down you can put the saucepan into the fridge over night, carrots will marinate in the spicy liquid.

Fill the dark rye chips just before serving. Drain carrot slices. Spoon a little bit of mayonnaise onto a chip, then roll the carrot into a swirl. Finally garnish with chopped red onion and parsley.

Thank you to Miisa for letting my reproduce her recipes.  If you like this I thoroughly recommend the Nordic Bakery Cookbook.

Come back later in the week for two more recipes.

Nutty Granola Muffins

It is a fair bet that when I am sent new products to review, I will, if at all possible, attempt to make muffins using said product.     The Jordans  Super Nutty Granola was no exception.

The granola is good stuff, crunchy, not too clumpy, and absolutely packed with enough nuts to delight several families of squirrels.  I like Jordans as a brand, they use British oats which are “conservation grade” where the farmers are paid a premium to keep 10% of their land as nature friendly habitats.

Nutty Granola Muffins

Recipe: Nutty Granola Muffins

Makes 6

“Dry” Ingredients
4 ½ oz plain flour
1 ½ oz  sugar
4oz Nutty Granola – I used Jordans
1tsp baking powder
pinch salt

“Wet” Ingredients
4oz milk (soy or dairy)
2oz  sunflower oil
1 tsp honey
Dash vanilla essence

Some more granola

Method
Whisk the oil, milk and honey mixture with a fork.   Mix the dry ingredients.  Add the wet ingredients to the dry and fold together (the batter should be lumpy and mixing should take no more than 15 folds).  Dollop the mixture into your usual muffin pan, sprinkle each muffin with a little more granola.   Bake at GM5/190C/375F  for 20 – 25 mins until risen.

Click for a printable recipe Nutty Granola Muffins

Jordan’s Super Nutty Granola is available from Waitrose, Tesco and Asda stores nationwide at an RRP of £3.99

Thank you to Jordans for my review sample.

Yesterday I reviewed the excellent Nordic Bakery Cookbook and promised to share a recipe, so here you are.

I loved this bake, the addition of the berries makes it not too sweet and the oats lower the glycemic load and add texture. Serve as it is for tea, or with whipped cream or custard for a pudding.

I made it with cranberries and blackcurrants that I found in the freezer. Incidently I learnt yesterday not to give cranberries to anyone taking warfarin, they stop it working properly.

Recipe: Oatbake with Berries

(from the Nordic Bakery Cookbook)

Ingredients

100g rolled (porridge) oats
300 ml hot milk
100g unsalted butter (softened at room temperature)
60g caster sugar
50ml runny honey
1tsp vanilla extract
1 egg, lightly beaten
1 tsp baking powder
120g plain flour
150g blueberries
150g raspberries

Icing sugar for dusting

a 900g loaf tin, greased

Preheat the oven to 180C/Gas 4

Put the oats and hot milk in a mixing bowl and set aside for a few minutes to allow the oats to absorb most of the milk and to cool down slightly.

Put the butter and sugar in a separate bowl and cream with a wooden spoon or hand held electric whisk until pale and fluffy. Stir in the honey and vanilla extract. Gradually add the egg, a little at a time, beating well after each addition.

Sift the baking powder and flour together, then fold into the butter mixture. Drain any remaining liquid from the oats, then stir into the mixing bowl.

Pour the mixture into the prepared loaf tin and sprinkle the blueberries and raspberries evenly on top.

Bake in the preheated oven for 50 – 60 minutes, until a skewer inserted into the centre comes out clean. Leave to rest in the tin for 10 minutes before turning out onto a wire rack to cool. Dust with a little icing sugar before serving.

Recipe reproduced with permission from Ryland Peters & Small

If you have any questions with any of the recipes in the book, you can go and ask them on the Nordic Bakery Cookbook facebook page.

Come back tomorrow for a chance to win a copy of this fantastic book.

I love my local food co-op and am proud to support it, as it provides access to cheap and accessible fruit and vegetables to those that might not otherwise be able to afford them, but I have to confess that I sometimes inwardly curse at the presence of yet another bl**dy swede in the vegetable bag.

These chips are delicious, sticky and caramelized.  I served them with dips of ketchup, BBQ sauce and mayo.   Unlike potatoes, swede counts towards your five a day; although current thinking encourages eating a larger amount of fruit and vegetables for maximum health benefits.  I parboiled my swede to save on baking time,  I suspect the finished chips would be crisper if you only roasted them.  The only difficult part of this recipe is cutting up the fairly solid swede, you will need both a good knife and some strength.

This is another contribution to my series of easy, economical and healthy recipes of what to do with the contents of the co-op “boxes” for the Food Co-ops and Buying Groups project run by Sustain – also part of the Making Local Food Work programme funded by the Big Lottery.

Sticky Mustardy Swede Chips (serves 4)

1 medium swede – peeled and cut into chips
1 dsp honey (or maple syrup or agave nectar if you do not eat honey)
1  heaped dsp grain mustard
good glug of olive oil
salt & pepper to taste

Boil the swede chips for about 5 to 8 minutes until starting to soften.   Meanwhile heat the oven to 200C / 400F / GM6, add the oil to a baking tray a pop in the oven.   Drain the swede, add the honey and mustard to the hot (and empty) saucepan and give a quick stir, add the par boiled swede chips and give a good shake to coat them in the honey and mustard mix.    Put into the hot baking tray and return to the oven.   Roast for about 30 minutes turning 2 or 3 times.

Serve with dips or as a side in place of potato wedges or chips

Fresh fruit and a hot sauce are perfect for those dull and damp summer evenings, when you want a hot pudding but also want to pretend to be healthy. This quick and easy pudding can be cooked in just a few minutes is very good for using up odd bits of fruit that are starting to turn – nectarines, bananas and apples would all work.

I used “stone clinger” peaches – those peaches that are overripe on the outside and still hard in the middle.

Ingredients (serves 2)

1oz butter
1oz soft light brown sugar
1tbs honey
Peaches, apples, nectarines, bananas or other fruit. 2 pieces per person is perfect.

Put the butter, sugar and honey into a saucepan (to save time and washing up just use a wooden spoon to approximately measure the honey) and heat on a medium heat stirring from time to time. Meanwhile cut the fruit into segments ready to add to the sauce.

When the sauce has thickened and is golden and bubbling add the fruit, stir for a minute until heated through.

Serve straight away, either by itself or with cream or ice cream.