Apple chocolate mouse cake
Pretty colour, flavor contrast and much lighter texture, super easy to make.
2 eggs
60gm sugar
big pinch of salt
500gm Greek yogurt
2 tbsp cocoa powder
1 tbsp cornstarch
4 apples
1. Whisk eggs with sugar and salt, then mix in yogurt, cocoa powder and cornstarch, pour into baking dish.
2. Peel and thinly slice apple, keep in stacks. Push stack to stagger and arrange on top of batter, fill the surface.
3. Bake at 150˚C until set, around 40 minutes.
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| Apple cake |
Learned this presentation from a German friend, and she learned it from her mother, a beautiful looking cake.
1. Cut apple into thin slices, keep as stacks.
thinly sliced apple in stacks
2. Make a cake batter and pour into baking dish, spread out the stack of apple and place one after another as circular pattern on cake mix, filling the whole surface. Thinner slices will be easier to make a more rounded pattern.
Apple cake, before baking
3. Bake as usual for the cake until golden.
Cauliflower kale fish bake
The 1.2kg Brill is too much for 2 for one meal, half was left behind to make another dish. Normally fish bake is with potato puree on top, I modify to cauliflower kale mixture, prefer to eat more vegetables.
1. Break up cooked fish (or fresh one) into chunks, season with salt, pepper and rice wine, place at the bottom of baking dish.
Cauliflower kale fish bake
2. Cut cauliflower into 1cm cubes, kale into pieces, season with salt, pepper, nutmeg and curry powder, mix in 1/2 cup coconut milk and thicken with a tbsp cornstarch, put on top of fish, with more kale lower down.
3. Bake at 180˚C until cooked, around 40 minutes.
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| Black sesame chocolate spread |
Black sesame is nutritious and good to eat it regularly, like at breakfast. I made a spread mixing black sesame puree with Cocomus (puree of whole coconut), which make the black sesame less bitter more rounded and solidify to a spreadable texture.
This morning I tried mixing black sesame puree with melted dark chocolate (1.5 :1), sort of variation of Nutella, but without the excessive sweetness, delicious.
Continue to have good quality good size squid every week.
shallow fried squid
Tried shallow fry with some breadcrumbs, fine but too oily.
stir-fry squid with caramelised onion
Much prefer to caramelise onion first, add squid and some chili, ginger, stir-fry to cook through, season with soy sauce.
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| 1.2kg brill |
There is no good size turbot for a few weeks, hence ordered a 1.2kg Brill instead. First time to try such big size Brill, same cooking method as turbot, the flesh is less moist, turbot is better.
1.2kg brill
1. Season Brill with salt for half a day.
2. Bake at 200˚C for 12 minutes, rest with door ajar for another 5 minutes.
Fermented Chinese cabbage, in beetroot sauerkraut juice
Not really kimchi as I use very little chili, just want to enjoy eating more fermented food, and this Chinese cabbage grown in the local organic farm, is always more tasty fermented than fresh.
1. Cut Chinese cabbage, red bell pepper, ginger, chili into strips, season with around 1% it's weight in salt, mix well and will soften gradually. Add juice from sauerkraut (optional) for faster result.
2. Press tight in a container, leave at cool room temperature for at least 3 days. Eat raw, or quick cooked in broth/noodle.
Quite an experience to watch over skype UK based Medical Herbalist Lucy Jones's consultation with someone suffering from Tinnitus. Took 1 hr 40 minutes, very detail questions on medical history, current problems Tinnitus plus others, diet, lifestyle, mental and physical conditions etc.
Discuss her observations, possible roots of problems, suggestion of what body systems to improve and why, recommends dietary adjustment, and herbs that can help, not just for Tinnitus, but all health problems.
No guarantee that it can work, nor fast response, but well explained and very convincing, make you feel motivated to try.
https://www.myrobalanclinic.com/
khol rabi carrot and chili pickle
Locally grown outdoor khol rabi and carrot are ready to harvest finally in October, take a long time to grow in this weather. However, compare with what I had grown before in sunny hot France, they are really sweet and crunchy, can be eaten as snacks.
Soy miso and chickpea miso (before fermentation)
I have nearly finished the miso made last year and it is the time to make new ones to ferment during the cold winter months. This time I used soy bean and also chickpea, which is equally nutritious and would like to see the difference in taste and aroma.
fermented rice
1. Make fermented rice a day before.
1. Soak beans overnight, cook until soft, I used a tsp of baking soda to add alkalinity to the cooking water for a good result.
cooked soy bean 
cooked chickpea
2. Blend softened beans with minimum of cooking liquid.
3. Mix beans puree with fermented rice in the ratio of 1 part bean to 1/2 part rice, to form a soft but not too wet mixture, add 5% its weight of fine salt.
meshed chickpea mixed with fermented rice
4. Spoon into jar with minimum air pockets to 2/3 full, place in a dark cool place for 6 months minimum.
Calendula oil
Calendula petals
Calendula is a beautiful, cheerful flower, easy to grow, produce a lot of flowers throughout summer. I keep the dried petal in olive oil for a couple of months, to extract the medicinal ingredient.
Calendula
Calendula oil is very effective in relieving skin rash, or no-see-um bites, cold sore in the beginning stage etc, from both personal experience and friends who used it.
I have been making oat biscuits throughout summer, well appreciated savory snack. Recently found this The Merry Mill, a small family owned business in Ireland. They grow organic oat, mill to flour, or flatten to flakes without steaming the grain first like commercial brands. They claims that this method retains more nutrients.
Multiseeds oat biscuit
I used their oat to make the biscuit, of course it is impossible to taste the extra nutrients, but I do need to adjust the recipe, in reducing water, to form the dough, seems the oat flakes are much less floury, easy to form a dough.
500gm Merry Mill oat flakes
30gm sugar
10 gm salt
300gm boiling water
200gm peanut butter
1/2 cup mix seeds (sesame, chia, flax, caraway etc)
1/2 tsp baking powder
1. Pour boiling water into oat flakes, sugar and salt, mix well.
2. Add remaining ingredients, form into a dough. Make thin biscuits, flatten in the palm one by one, or roll thin and cut out rounds.
3. Bake at 180˚C until golden and dry, around 50 minutes, turn over halfway.
Ballina
Ballina
Towns with a river running through is always pretty, this one in particular, because the river is wide, with a beautiful arched stone bridge and a 17th century canal next to it, both in good condition.
Ballina 
Ballina
There is active boating activities on both plus walking path along. The town was built on a gentle slope, is not polluted with modern buildings, there is a marina, hotel, an ancient cathedral, a couple of good restaurants and cafes, supermarket and organic shop... a lot of style in a little town.
Apple with crumble pudding
Crumble is normally cooked fruit below and crumble mix on top, I find crumble too heavy after a meal and created this mix, super fast to make and well liked. A way to use up cooking apples fast during a good year.
4 cooking apples
50gm sugar
pinch of salt
1 tbsp cinnamon
a big handful of walnuts
a cup of oat flakes
Apple with crumble pudding
1. Peel and cut apples into roughly 1cm cubes, mix in walnuts broken into pieces and the rest ingredients.
2. Bake at 170˚C until soft, around 40 minutes.
Autumn mackerel 
Autumn mackerel
The season for oily good size mackerel has started, received these 2 mackerels at more than half kg each. Cut into 2 halves, one with bone, season with salt, leave on a rack to dry in the fridge for at least a day. Different, and for me better, texture and more intense flavor, than cooked fresh.
Turbo grill at 200˚C until golden, around 10 minutes.
Line caught squid continue to be wonderful, this time cut into noodles and stir-fried....
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| squid noodle stir-fry |
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| Apple pudding |
I call this apple pudding and not apple cake, because this one is long slow cooked with lots of apple, feels closer to traditional English pudding than modern cake, my interpretation.
This pudding is moist and has a good strong green apple taste, prefer it more than a cake.
4 large green cooking apples
juice and zest of one lemon
60gm sugar, pinch of salt
1tbsp cinnamon powder
3 eggs
100gm almond powder
30gm four (used oat flour here)
1tsp baking powder
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| Apple pudding |
1. Peel and grate green apples, mix with lemon juice, zest, sugar and salt.
2. Whisk eggs, add almond powder, flour, baking powder, mix well. Add apple mixture, mix well again.
3. Pour into baking dish (metal tin better), bake at 160˚C until cooked, around an hour.
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| Razor clam in mild chili sauce |
This week's seafood delivery has razor clam, from Connemara, North West Ireland, new seasonal item. Decent medium size, tasty with firm texture.
1. Cover razor clam in salted water with a half a table spoon of coarse whole wheat flour and half of ground almond, to feed them so that they will release the sand in their stomach, for half a day.
2. Place on baking dish, cook with turbo grill at 200˚C for 6 minutes, or longer if you prefer a more cooked tougher texture.
live Connemara razor clam
3. Serve at such. Or make a sauce, sweat celery (or onion), bell pepper and chili pepper until fragrant, season with soy sauce and rice wine, pour on top of cooked razor clam.
turbo grilled razor clam
Also ordered line caught squid, the size seems to be bigger every week, but still very tender. Cut the body into 'noodle', now getting thick with these bigger squid. Season with salt and olive oil, cook in a little rice wine, until cooked outside and raw inside, delicious.
squid 'noodle'
Ordered a lamb leg from the organic farm, I cut it up into portions for a few meals, some steaks for quick searing, and the lower part with the bone for slow cooking. This is actually my favorite part of a lamb leg, because it is full of delicious gelatinous tendons.
slow baked lamb lower leg
1. Season with salt and pepper for a day.
2. Place in baking dish surrounded by root vegetables like carrot and turnip.
3. Bake at 200˚C for 15 minutes to warm up, then lower to 110˚C for 1.5 hours.
