Goat's cheese, spinach and lingonberry salad

Nothing special this time, just a mixed salad of random leftovers I could find my fridge: lettuce and spinach, chevre, two kinds of cherry tomatoes, avocado, and topped with lingonberries, olive oil, salt, pepper and a small splash of balsamic. Voilà, leftover dinner salad.

Mushroom lasagne

The other day my friend Maria generously gave me half a kilo of funnel chantrelles she picked. I saw it as another opportunity to - that's right - tackle another Plenty recipe. I went for the mushroom lasagne prepared with no less than four different cheeses: ricotta, Gruyère, mozzarella and Parmesan. It's the first time I've done lasagne from a recipe, or this elaborately, making my own béchamel sauce too, which was so easy that I don't understand why I didn't make it myself before. I made half a portion, which was still enough for at least 3 people. And like Ottolenghi suggested, I enjoyed it with green salad, with avocados and cherry tomatoes. Finally, one more big thank you to Maria. I am so happy to have such lovely and thoughtful friends!

Plenty project: Tomato party

The ankle is still out of action but after yesterday's pumpkin success, I'm back in action on the foodie front. Today I made the simple, easy, fresh and delicious "Tomato party" recipe from Ottolenghi. Half of the tomatoes are roasted in the oven with olive oil, brown sugar, balsamic vinegar, salt and pepper, then thrown in with couscous, cherry tomatoes of all colours, tarragon, mint, oregano, garlic and more olive oil, salt and pepper. Too easy. I think I need to send Yotam some fanmail. How would he like Finnish salmiakki, I wonder?

Plenty project: Crusted pumpkin wedges with soured cream

A busy week coupled with a sprained ankle limiting by ability to tour food shops has kept my cooking quite tame this past week. This weekend I did however try a new recipe from Plenty. Because it's the season for them, I did a pumpkin recipe before it's too late. A pumpkin is sliced into thin wedges, then topped with olive oil and a thick coat composed of a mix of parmesan, white bread crumbs, garlic, parsley, thyme, lemon zest and salt, then tossed into the oven for a half an hour. Served with soured cream, mixed with dill, salt and pepper. I have to admit that this has been my least favourite Plenty food. I've spoiled myself rotten, to be honest, since this was very tasty, but didn't incite the same overwhelming feelings of gluttony as the others I've tried. Maybe it was the soured cream? I think it was a little unnecessary, a little too rich. I tried some of the lefovers later and the pumpkin wedges, in my opinion, tasted much better at room temperature than warm out of the oven. Anyway, thank you Yotam for a lovely autumn dinner.

NEXT DAY UPDATE: I had the leftovers for dinner tonight. Oh. my. god. They were heavenly. I take back all the doubts expressed above. I am so making these again before pumpkin season ends!

Plenty project: Sweet potato wedges with lemongrass crème fraîche

Part 3/3 of Saturday's dinner: Ottolenghi's Sweet potato wedges with lemongrass crème fraîche. These were divine. The sweet potatoes in Finland are almost always enormous, so they roasted, drizzled with olive oil and sprinkled salt, and cumin, for about an hour in the oven rather than O's 30 minutes. Divine! The lemongrass crème fraîche was really the pièce de resistance. Try resisting crème fresh mixed with lemongrass, lime zest and juice, fresh root ginger and salt. (Side note: My crème fraîche mysteriously vanished somewhere between Stockmann and my kitchen, so I used quark instead, and it came out great.)

So in sum, you can imagine that after stuffing our faces with sweet potato wedges, mushroom omlette and quinoa salad, we needed a a bit of a breather. But we both concurred that it was quite a feast :)

Tonight another friend is coming over to make hummus with ful. Welcome friends! My kitchen awaits your excellent company and famished appetites.

Salla's black trumpet and porcini omlette

My friend Salla brought over some wild mushrooms - porcini and black trumpets - she picked in the country and made us an omlette to go with Ottolenghi's other treats. She fried the mushrooms with a red onion, chopped, and whipped the eggs together with some quark and parsley. Wonderfully autumnful! And topped with fresh parsley for a spark of freshness. Kiitos, Salla!

Plenty project: Avocado, quinoa and broad bean salad

Last night my friend and I had a feast. We made Ottolenghi's avocado, quinoa and broad bean salad, as well as his sweet potato wedges with lemongrass crème fraiche, and my friend's own wild mushroom omlette. Here's the first of them, the salad. And may I begin by saying that this is incredibly delicious and healthy. 20% of the calories in quinoa come from protein alone -- that's just as much as meat, but without all the fat and cholesterol. Great start. Throw the in Vitamin C of the juice of 2 lemons, all the vitamins and nutrients and good fats of an avocado, Vitamin A and protein from the broad beans, the antioxidants, minerals and fibres of the radishes, and garlic -- well, that's a classic goodie. Not only was this healthy and divinely tasty, but it was also beautiful, thanks also to the red basil. It was really easy to make, and leaves you feeling full, but light and energetic. Ottolenghi recommends it for brunch, served with good bread.

Quark with strawberries and muesli

Berry season is well over in Finland by now. The time has come to dig into the summer's yield of berries in my freezer. For the last couple of mornings I've bought quark and blitzed it with melted strawberries until it looks like all-bubblegum pink as below. Then I pile some self-made muesli, or Alara's organic muesli (which I've done lately due to laziness), mix and enjoy it all over the morning paper.

Slow roasted tomatoes

I picked off this recipe from Gwyenth Paltrow's GOOP site. I make it whenever I find cherry tomatoes on the vine for a decent price. Though any vine-ripened tomatoes will do, cherry tomatoes are just a wee bit sweeter. In addition to halved tomatoes, all you need is olive oil, salt, pepper, and about 3 hours of doing something around the house while the tomatoes ripen in the oven (at 130-150C). The tomatoes are ready when the skin has curled well at the edges and the tomatoes have lost a good deal of their volume. I've enjoyed them as Gwyneth does, with mozzarella and fresh basil, but I've also had them with pasta and tossed them into salads. Most of this batch will be enriching my pitta bread lunches this week, accompanied by avocado, cucumber, lettuce and homemade hummus.

Plenty project: Mushroom and herb polenta

To my delight, my friend Mira bought Ottolenghi's Plenty after reading my blog and hearing praise about the book from another friend. Last week we made a Plenty cooking date - the first of many to come, I hope! Mushroom season has arrived in Finland, and Mira had some freshly picked chantrelle mushrooms. I had polenta (courtesy of my wonderful neighbours who brought it straight from Italy) and joining forces, we decided to make the Mushroom and herb polenta recipe. It was heavenly! To my surprise, Mira had even managed to find Taleggio at Stockmann's Herkku food halls. The outcome was hearty and delicious. Especially when a little cooler, the parmesan-butter-rosemary flavoured polenta plus the herbs in the mushrooms really stood out, as did the Taleggio cheese. I'll definitely be making this again come winter, when one longs for a heavier and cosier yet replenishing meal. Thanks also goes out to Mira's partner Valtteri for his excellent skills in polenta stirring!

Sweet potato and carrot soup

A simple soup that I picked out of a magazine last spring. Too easy. Just boil 1kg of sweet potato and 3 carrots all in chunks in a litre of water with a cute of vegetable stock until they are soft. Then puree it all and flavour with 1/2 teaspoon of ground giner, 1 teaspoon of curry and 1/2 teaspoon of salt. Garnish with parsley. Non-vegans can add a dollop of sour cream on top too. I tend to toast some Finnish archipelago bread and dip it into the soup. Spicey bread for spicey soup.

My brother's demon pasta

The other night I was exhausted and short on time so my brother volunteered to make a pasta for dinner. When I arrived, there was a splendorous smell in the air. Not only had he made food, but also a much loved starter: fried halloumi, now served with sliced plum cherry tomatoes and basil. I don't know why but the basil leaves a bizarrely great after taste reminiscent of gingerbread...

After enjoying the halloumi (as fresh off the pan as possible, before it goes all rubbery - I hate that!) were having spaghetti with red pesto, red onions, green and black olives, and cherry tomatoes, with grated parmesan on top. A quick demon mix of things he found in the fridge.

Plenty project: Burnt aubergine with tahini

I've been glancing at page 122 with longing since I made Lentils with grilled aubergine. The aubergine for Burnt aubergine with tahini is prepared in the same way: the aubergine is held directly over the flame of the gas cooker and turned around until it is totally deflated and the skin is burnt all over. After that the smokey-smelling flesh is scooped out and left to drain. This time we mix in water, tahini, pomegranate molasses (which I couldn't find and replaced with a 1:1 ration of lemon juice and honey), garlic, salt and pepper, parsley, cucumbers, cherry tomatoes, and garnished with extra virgin olive oil, pepper and pomegranate seeds.

It was the first time a seeded a pomegranate so I turned to YouTube for some help. I found a fantastic video of a Persian woman using her aunt's method for seeding a pomegranate. Unlike all the other videos featuring an awful mess and splashings of water in a bowl, this woman works her magic by making some shallow slits into the pomegranate shell. It was very easy and worked well even for a beginner like me.