Duvel

Composed salad of hot smoked salmon, potatoes, green asparagus, soft boiled eggs and wild ramp quark ...

Last year I spend 10 days traveling Kyushu. In Kumamoto, horse meat reigns supreme, and specialized restaurants offer full courses of „basashi“ or raw horse meat. It is delicious and comes in a surprising amount of different cuts. Because horse muscle stores significant amounts of glycogen, a „fast“ kill of the animal leads to sweet tasting muscular meat. It is usually enjoyed with a special soy sauce, nixed with grated ginger and garlic.

When this happened I was working for my company in one of our regional headquarters in Brussels. Horse meat is very popular in Belgium, and I had several excellent dishes made from horse. My (local) colleagues were surprised to learn in the course of investigation that IKEA had mixed a certain percentage of horse into their Köttbullar (meat balls). They could not understand why someone would taint the precious horse meat with beef or pork ... The night of the conversation they took me to a local place in Waterloo to enjoy horse tartar, accompanied by a Duvel - outstanding !

Sunday night = pizza night (you knew this already). Last week I made an extra pizza for the neighbors boy, today I had three orders more ... am happy to report that my output gets very consistent. Ham & Mozzarella Mushrooms, Mozzarella & Jamon Serrano Mushrooms, Olives, Mozzarella & Jamon Serrano Mushrooms, Salami & Mozzarella Olives, Salami & Mozzarella Fresh cheese, Lamb filet & Mint (for me) Obligatory crumb shot ... With my improvised cooling rack I can at least present the nice bottom spotting ... Enjoyed together with the original Peter Pan movie 🤗

As part of my usual weekend exercise, a pizza baked with dotted fresh goat cheese, then topped with thinly sliced pink grilled lamb filet and sprinkled with fresh mint ...

BBQ tonight (as it is still nicely warm, strange for April in Germany): Rabbit, lamb fillets, pork collar ... Pasta salad Couscous Grilled onions (Commercial) herb-butter stuffed baguette Whiskey highball !

Chopped up a rabbit and rubbed it with salt, pepper, garlic and rosemary for tonight’s BBQ. Normally no lunch (to prepare for the feast at night), but as a treat for the cook I had the rabbit liver, flash fried in butter and olive oil, on a toasted slice of baguette ...

Matjes, with potatoes, quark and onions ...

That is a thing of beauty !

It has been quite a while that I made chili con carne, most likely because noone in my family cares for it except me. Made a “child friendly” version (why ?), then added Sriracha and chipotle to my portion - which ended up to be the whole pot ... Need to make this more often 🤗

Belated Easter dinner: Raclette ! Not much to explain ... cooked & cured meats, cheeses, condiments and a “build you own dish” approach. Yum !

A well-rounded breakfast ... Freshly “cut” Tête de Moine is a thing if beauty (and pretty tasty, too) !

I requested that next time bunny delivers something like that he’ll bring it already assembled 😉

My Easter weekend consisted of (almost) finishing a dry wall in the cellar and building up a huge trampoline, that the Easter bunny brought to my 6yo (seems Easter bunny is on steroids if he can carry that thing alone). So, I was in no mood for preparing a huge Easter dinner (and couldn’t have lifted my arms either). Luckily, family was happy with some quick Japanese comfort food nonetheless ... Yakisoba (red cabbage, carrot, onion, bbq leftovers & shrimps) Gyoza (curtesy of Ajinomoto) Happy Easter everyone 🐣

@Chris Hennes: Your crust structure looks interesting - there is no distinct cornicione (in the sense of stronger inflated dough). I know this style from several places here in Germany and always thought of it as a more “even” cooking style to avoid char. Is that what you aim for ? Do you roll out your crust instead of stretching ?

This is the point where the carnivore me fights with the little, persistent responsible me (that usually is so easily suppressed by expensive, imported whiskey from Japan): how do you make a tasty black bean-quinoa-sweet potato patty ?!

Come on, you know the rule ...

Does it come skin on ? I’d probably riff off a porchetta, open the collar up, score crosswise, rub with fennel, rosemary, garlic, chili, salt. Roll up, tie into a fat sausage and SV. Dry surface in the fridge for some hours ( w/ skin on, otherwise coat in seasoned starch) and deep fry ...

Tonight we had - you may have guessed it - BBQ again. And I have to admit that while originally we used the electric grill because I still haven’t bought a German gas bottle adapter for my Hong Kong gas grill, it is kind of convenient to have it just next to you on the table ... Tonight: chicken wings, Nürnberger, pork collar and Raclette cheese-stuffed pork “meatballs” ... Two kinds of tomato salads on one plate... Oven-roasted potatoes. Money shot on the meatball ... Becks ! And dessert ... Aaaaand dessert #2 🤗 - Happy Easter !

It feels like a Sunday, soooo ... Pizza & movie night, featuring Ghibli’s “Arietty” and ... Salami & mushroom Olive & ham

That looks interesting - care to elaborate ?

Forth day in a row BBQ in the garden... Chicken wings, marinated pork collar, Nürnberger sausages and lamb fillet ... Homemade herb & garlic butter Leftover red cabbage salad for me ... Salad nicoise for the rest of the family ... Lye bread roll with herb butter (Aldi) ... Beer of the day 😉 I foresee the BBQ streak to continue for a while - yummy !

As per popular demand: another round of BBQ (electric Ersatz version): Marinated pork collar, chicken tenders and sausage “snails” ... Accompanied by a greek salad ... Red cabbage salad ... And some herb butter-stuffed sour dough baguette (from Aldi - very good) ... Washed down with a spring edition beer !

May I suggest a Catalan preparation ? Chop the rabbit up in a few pieces, salt & pepper lightly dredge in flour and fry in hot olive oil until golden. Remove, add some garlic & onion. Fry until slightly colored, then add some chopped mushrooms (any will do), and - ideally - some dried ones as well. Add some Brandy and white wine. Return the rabbit, cover in aluminum foil and put into moderately hot oven to braise for 1.5h. Adjust seasoning and serve ...

Gas bottles have been sold out for a while. Luckily, I have this old (and pretty weak) electric grill that under these circumstances does perform well. First “BBQ” this year, with pleasant temperatures permitting: “Italian” potato salad with dried tomatoes and basil ... Green asparagus & feta frittata ... Mozzarella di buffala with the fixings ... Thüringer sausage and skewers of marinated turkey leg ... All enjoyed with a whiskey highball ! With the moon shining upon a locked down neighborhood...