cutting – Beary Strong

Fish Pie

For comfort food aFISHionados.

Austria is beautiful: I love my new home country and I never regret moving here long time ago. The quality of life is gorgeous and the quality of food too: a high variety of regional veggies, game meat, poultry, fantastic dairy products… But there is one thing that Austria lacks: fish. Well, you can get it, but you have to pay quite a lot for decent quality. No wonder that every time Stefan and I are travelling somewhere, we crave for fish like mad: seafood, sushi, salmon, smoked fish, it doesn’t matter, we eat it all. Having a fishmonger near to our Airbnb during our last summer escape in Edinburgh was a blessing though. I always wanted to do a fish pie and finally got the chance to create this simple yet comforting dish.

Chinese Sweet And Sour Chicken

With fermented black beans for an umami laden twist.

I think the chinese sweet and sour chicken we know is as chinese as chicken tikka masala is indian: not at all! Despite it’s lack of authenticity, it’s still a delicioius dish. I added a special ingredient to make things more interesting and nudge it a little more back to China.

Bolognese Beef

A comforting italian inspired stew.

Sometimes it’s hard to believe that a few simple ingredients result in such an incredible flavour. But the smell of beef slowly bubbling away in tomatoes, garlic and rosemary already gives a hint of the awesomeness that is cooking up. Patience is the most important ingredient here, but totally worth it, so don’t rush anything. You will be rewarded big times!

Mustard And Mushroom Chicken

Comforting, creamy, umami.

The rich umami flavour of shii-take mushrooms, soft, almost sweet leeks and a creamy, mild mustard sauce. I was suspicous that I could manage to make a recipe thats fits my tight calorie allotment, but it was surprisingly easy to realise. And very quick to cook up too in a huge bulk that will have you covered with leftofters for the next week. You are welcome!

Stuffed Paprika

Comforting and diet friendly.

I’m not sure why stuffing minced meat into a paprika completely transforms both ingredients, but it does. A delicious smell wafting through your home will be a welcome byproduct of this comfort food classic. And it is even super diet friendly! Note on the side: Alexa -our official recipe guinea-pig- tested the stuffed paprika and did like them. She was quite sad that the recipe would not appear on the blog until now. So what are you waiting for, give it a try!

Ruby Red Rhubarb Compote

An easy recipe turning a childhood nightmare into something delicious.

Rhubarb has always been one of the few things I refused to eat. In my kindergarden I was forced to eat the sour, tangy, completely overcooked mensa rhubarb compote full of stringy bits. This horrid dish was my early childhood nightmare. But now I am over it and I love rhubarb, especially in the following diet friendly dessert. Let me explain how I fell in love with rhubarb in my sweet and sour recipe.

Paprika Chicken

A Viennese classic made cut-friendly.

Paprika Hendl (“Hendl” is Austrian slang for chicken) is a typical Viennese dish rich in, not surprisingly, paprika, the dried and ground red bell peppers that were so popular due to the Austro-Hungarian empire. And paprika is still very popular, in certain parts of Austria you don’t have salt and pepper on the table, there is salt and paprika. Normally there are loads of fatty sour cream in this dish, making it not exactly a weightloss friendly dish, but I changed things up a little and it works beautifully. Give it a try! Continue reading “Paprika Chicken”