Garlic Bread

Inspired by Shefali, I have started to make garlic bread at home finally. Shri misses the frozen kind we used to buy in HongKong from Delifrance, which one could just toast/grill at home with delicious results.

Here is the way I have been making it recently, which he as well as the girls like quite a lot.

Now if I could only remember to pull it out of the oven in time, instead of letting it go from being just the right crispness to bordering-on-burnt each time …

Garlic Bread

One fresh baguette, sliced in to 1inch (or a little more)  wide pieces

Butter (about 5-7 teaspoons for this much baguette, though more would be definitely nicer)

1 large pod of garlic, grated

salt (just a little, say 1/2 a tsp or even less, as the accent should be predominantly of the herbs)

3/4 tsp of dried oregano flakes (vary this as you like)

1/2 tsp each of dried basil and thyme flakes (vary this too as you like)

Mix the garlic and seasoning in to the butter and leave it for a little while so that all the flavors are well-absorbed.

Spread a little butter on each side of the baguette pieces, then grill these at 200 degrees C in the middle of the oven for a few minutes on each side till they are done.

Et voila ! That is so simple, I wonder why I never tried it before – so a big thanks to Shefali for the inspiration.

I must try not to make it too often though – this is a very indulgent experience, with all that butter  🙂

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Potato and Feta cheese cakes

I made soup for dinner two days ago and fortunately there is enough left for another meal for the four of us. So tonight, I am going to make only these potato and feta patties/cakes, to go with the soup. We’ll pick up some nice walnut bread from the boulangerie when we walk back from school, and that will round off the meal nicely.

The good thing about this recipe is that the mixture keeps well for at least a day, in the fridge, so if there is some left over, I can make a few patties for the girls’ gouter for tomorrow evening.

Potato and Feta cheese cakes

500 gms potatoes

100 gms feta cheese, drained

1 egg, lightly mixed in a small bowl to combine the white portion and the yolk

2 tsp of thyme ( I use the bottled kind)

1 tbsp of lime juice

2 small onions, chopped very fine

salt and black pepper to taste

all-purpose flour

sunflower oil (enough to shallow-fry the patties)

Cook the potatoes in the microwave( I prefer to do it this way rather than pressure cooking because the latter method leaves the potatoes with some water inside, making the final mix prone to sogginess)  till they are soft.

When they have cooled, peel and then mash them in a large mixing bowl. Now mix in the feta cheese (well-crumbled), the onions, the egg, the salt, the pepper, the thyme, and the lime juice.

Mix everything thoroughly, cover the bowl with cling film, and leave it in the fridge for an hour or two.

To make the patties, divide the mixture in to equal sized balls, flatten them between your palms in to 1cm high discs. Coat each lightly in all-purpose flour , then fry them in moderately hot oil in a skillet/shallow frying pan till they are nicely browned and crisp on both sides.

These patties need gentle handling because the cheese makes them quite soft and therefore prone to crumbling.

The original recipe, which I found in a cookbook for vegetarian food from different parts of the world (it is written in French and that has been great for expanding my vocabulary of French culinary terms), calls for fresh thyme and spring onions. But since I never seem to have those two ingredients at hand, I invariably end up using bottled thyme and regular onions, and the patties taste great anyway. The girls just adore them – they don’t seem to care that they contain feta, a cheese that they wouldn’t go near in it’s original form!