Culinary Recipes on yozy//NET

Caesar Salad

Wed, 27 Dec 2023 01:03:59 +0100

Years ago there was this iPad app called “The Best Ceasar”, some bloke thought it was a good idea to make one whole app just about one recipe… he was right. The app is long gone but here is the gist of the recipe as far as I remember it.

Dressing

Ingredients

Anchovies
Garlic
Worcestershire Sauce
Red Wine Vinegar
Olive Oil
Parmesan Cheese
Salt
Pepper

Preparation

Smash the anchovies in a bowl into a fine paste.
Press in 3 cloves of garlic.
Add a dash of olive oil (depending on how oily your anchovies are).
Add a table spoon of Worcestershire sauce.
Add a table spoon of red wine vinegar.
Add salt and pepper to taste.
Mix it all together.
Add in parmesan to obtain a thick-ish dressing.

Croutons

Ingredients

Bread
Olive Oil
Garlic

Preparation

My current go-to recipe is to:

Press garlic into a bowl of olive oil.
Baste bread slices with the garlic oil.
Put the slices in an oven until crispy.
Cut the toasted bread into croutons.

Chicken

Ingredients

Chicken Breast
Salt
Pepper
Olive Oil

Preparation

If the chicken breast is thicker than about 15mm, cut it in half (to make it thinner).

Pre-heat the oven to 200ºC (or 180 with fan on).
Salt and pepper the chicken.
Put some olive oil in a pan and heat it at high temperature.
Sear the chicken on all sides until golden on the outside.
Put the chicken in the oven, cook until the inner temperature is a bit under 75ºC.
Dice the chicken.

Serving

Wash and dry (as much as you can) a couple of heads of romaine lettuce. Add the dressing and toss it properly. Mix in the chicken and croutons, toss it again, sprinkle with more grated parmesan.

Carrot Spice Muffins

Sat, 08 May 2021 17:09:24 +0200

I’ve been trying baking lately but making a large cake badly and then eating it isn’t much fun. Here is a recipe for a great muffin instead:

Ingredients

I’m using espresso cups for measurement, these doses are for four small muffins. Multiply as necessary.

One and half cup of plain wheat flour
One cup of brown sugar
One cup of grated carrots
About 25g of unsalted butter, softened at room temperature
A spoonful of apple sauce
One teaspoon of cake spices—this one in particular is a mix of dried orange, cassia, ginger, nutmeg and caraway from M&S
One large egg (separate yolk from white)
One teaspoon of baking powder

Preparation

Start by mixing the dry ingredients (flour, sugar, spices and baking powder) together.

Add butter, apple sauce, and egg yolk. Mix thoroughly together until you have a consistent batter.

Whip up the egg whites into snow.

Progressively add the snow into the batter, carefully mixing them together.

Pour the mix into small muffin forms.

Cooking

Preheat the oven to 180°C. Bake for 20 minutes at 180ºC (with convection on).

Satay Eggplant

Sun, 26 Apr 2020 08:00:00 +0200

After a long time a quick one.

This is a recipe for a nice and flavourful eggplant. It is quite fat and also salty so it’s best eaten along with plain white rice.

The Ingredients

We will need these:

One eggplant
Few (4-5) cloves of garlic
A small onion
Dried garlic
Black pepper (or a mixture of pepper)
Salt (optional)
Oil
Soy sauce
Sesame oil
Rice wine
Satay sauce

Preparation

The best taste is achieved when the eggplant is marinated for a couple of hours.

Hacking and slashing

Dice the eggplant into pieces of around 2-3 cm in size.
Mince the garlic.
Cut the onion into small dice. (This can be done a bit later).

Pouring and shaking

Mix the eggplant and the minced garlic.
Add pepper.
Add dried garlic.
Optionally add salt, this really depends on how salty your soy sauce already is.
Add satay sauce.
Mix it all a bit.

Add oil, about 3-4 table spoons. Eggplant is like a sponge so it will soak it up pretty fast.
Add the sesame oil, give the bottle a good shake, 10-15 drops at least.
Add the soy sauce to taste.
Add one cap of rice wine.

Culinary pro tip! Put plastic wrap over your bowl, put a plate over that. Then lift the bowl and shake the hell out of it.

This will make the ingredients mix very nicely.

Put the mixture in the fridge for about 2 hours.

Cooking

Put some oil in a pan, add the diced onions and cook them until transparent.

Add in the prepared mixture and cook first on high, then on medium heat until the sauce becomes soupy and sticky.

Serve with rice.

Augmented sausages

Fri, 21 Jun 2013 23:05:34 +0000

My sausages are augmented

As I came home, craving for some chowder, I was wondering what to cook. I wanted to finish some meat from earlier in my fridge but had to make decisions. Do I cook sausages, or do I grill some bacon?

Finally I have decided to do both.

With a bit of cayenne and cheese you got yourself a good healthy dinner. Oh, and for vitamins grill it in some pig fat.

Ultimate student food - Tomato Bacon Pasta

Sun, 12 May 2013 16:31:35 +0000

This time I will share a recipe to what is probably the first thing I have cooked and required more tools than a can opener.

This meal is dead simple and the greatest thing is that you can cook it without even having any precious condiments, such as salt or oil (but it helps).

Ingredients

Here are the ingredients you will need. As it is designed to be cheap, there are very few of them. If you live in France you may notice that everything comes from Intermarché’s store brands.

Smoked bacon
Emmental cheese
Half an onion
Tomato sauce (thick)
Pasta
Bonus: salt and oil

Cooking

Dice the onions.

For the sauce put some oil (if you have any) to a frying pan, heat it and then add onions. Stir until they are somewhat cooked (become glass-like). If you are cooking without oil keep an eye on them and stir a lot so you do not burn them.

Once the onions are good add the bacon. Stir until it becomes opaque. At this point the bacon will probably release quite a lot of juicy grease. Depending on how fat you are and want to be you can throw some of the grease away.

After this add a can of the tomato puree. Pro tip: in order to not lose the precious sauce, pour water into the can and stir. Then pour the tomatoey water into your sauce, it will make it more smooth.

Cook the pasta.

Nota-bene on cooking pasta (skip if you know how to do it)

For one person use about this much spaghetti:

Step by step guide to edible pasta:

Boil water
Put salt to water if you want salted pasta, serves no other purpose
Put pasta into boiling water
Wait as many minutes as written on the package and then one more
If the water spills out of the pan give zero fucks
Get pasta out, serve immediately

Serving

Put the pasta on a plate, cover with cheese. Put the sauce on top.

If you are wondering why my torti from the photo magically transformed to spaghetti then know that I only had a new pack of torti in the kitchen. Also this works with any pasta, of course.

Fried noodles with pork

Thu, 22 Nov 2012 14:01:08 +0000

More food from my production. Tested, eaten and tasty. This food does not require much ingredients and should be pretty quick to prepare (if you are good at multitasking then about 20 minutes)

Ingredients

As always, we will have to do some shopping before cooking anything. Depending on what you already have you can get this for about 6€ for two doses. So go and get these:

Some mushrooms
Some shiitake mushrooms
A piece of leek
Half a carrot
Half an onion
Several slices of garlic
Soy sauce
Cornstarch
Salt
Black pepper
Chinese noodles
Pork (can be some other meat)

Preparation of ingredients

Before cooking comes washing and cutting

Wash the mushrooms and cut them into quarters or similar
Cut the shiitake mushrooms into slices (wash them too)
Cut the leek and carrots into long thin bars
Cut the onion into dices
Crush one piece of garlic and cut the rest into small pieces
Cut the meat into french-fries like pieces (salt it)
- Dip the meat in soy sauce and wrap it in cornstarch

Cooking

First stage

First we will cook the mushrooms. Put the crushed piece of garlic into salted water (not much just enough to have the mushrooms covered) and make it boil. Then add mushrooms (both) and cook for about three minutes.

At the same time put some oil onto a frying pan, heat it and add sliced garlic. When it turns brownish add the meat and fry it for a while. Add pepper. When the crust from cornstarch appears add mushrooms and some water (use the mushroomy water). After a while add carrots and leek. Cook for several minutes stirring all the time. Add some more water from mushrooms from time to time. At the same time (this is when multitasking comes handy) make the noodles (for cooking method refer to the package)

Second stage

Put some oil into a wok and add onions. Put noodles into the wok add soy sauce and fry them for a while (mix them well). After a while add the meat and some more water. Cook for several minutes.

Final stage

Eat.

Suggestion of presentation:

Smelly spread

Tue, 20 Nov 2012 00:06:06 +0000

Why smelly? Because your breath after eating this will be comparable to that of a thousand years old dragon. But it is well worth it. The recipe is dead simple as well.

Ingredients

Sardines in oil (any oil as long as it is not motor oil)
Butter
Onions

Preparation

Simple as promised: Just put the fish into a bowl, add a few slices of butter and the diced onions. Then furiously mix the thing until it vaguely looks like something spreadable on a bread. Job’s done!

And yet …

Making the spread is simple, the difficult part is to serve it right and arrange the plate so it will have some bling to it. I did not try this time, but somedays I’ll update this with some better presentation.

Shanghai Heat

Mon, 19 Nov 2012 02:47:46 +0000

More noodles! Why ?, you might ask, well because everyone loves noodles. And mushrooms, we will be seeing lots of those in just a few moments. So, put on your white hat and start making a list of things to buy.

Ingredients

OK, be prepared to raid the nearest Asian shop because this meal needs several special ingredients. As always, here’s a picture of what we’ll need :

Chicken escalopes
Mushrooms - Agaricus
Shiitake mushrooms
More shrooms - Pleurotus
Auricularia auricula-judae or “black curly Chinese mushrooms” (I actually mix two kinds of them)
Green and red bell pepper
Chilly pepper, also both red and green
Onions
Garlic
Butter (salted butter for the win)
Corn starch
Black pepper
Spices - coriander, caraway, cumin, cinnamon, paprika …
Salt
Soy sauce
Shanghai noodles
Green-tea soba noodles

Preparation

Got everything? Good! Preparation of the ingredients is pretty simple and shouldn’t take more than twenty minutes.

Clean the chicken and slice it to small pieces. Add the spice mix and cover it in a thin layer of corn starch. I usually just put a soup spoonful of it on it and mix it with hands.
Wash the mushrooms and slice them.
If the black mushrooms are too huge, crush them before washing them.
Wash, clean and cut the bell peppers into cubes.
Wash the chilly peppers and cut them into roundels.
Cut the onion into halves. Dice one of the halves and cut the other to several smaller parts.
Crush one piece of garlic and dice the rest.

Cooking

Everything’s done ? Excellent, now we can start doing some cooking.

Shrooms

Pour some water into a bucket … err a cooking pot. Not too much of it though. Just enough that when you put all the mushrooms into it it will cover them all. Don’t put them in it just yet though. Put some butter and one crushed clove of garlic in there first, don’t forget to add salt. Let it boil and put all the mushrooms inside afterwards. Wait for about 2 minutes.

Vegetables

Once the mushrooms are half cooked pour more water into the pot and add all the vegetables - bell pepper, chilly and half of the onion (the one cut into bigger cubes). Add some black pepper as well. Cook until it’s cooked (duh).

Meat

Once the vegetables are cooking, you can begin to prepare the meat. Put the diced garlic and onions onto a frying pan with a bit of oil. Make them fry for a while and then put the meat into the pan and add some soy sauce.

After a few minutes, when the meat is fried, add the contents of the cooking pot into the wok. Do keep at least a half of the water in the pot, we will use that later. Lower down the heat under the wok.

Noodles

We will be using a mix of Shanghai noodles and green-tea flavoured noodles, but any noodles will go. Add more water to the cooking pot, let it boil again and cook the noodles inside (refer yourself to the package, cooking time may (and will) vary). Once the noodles are cooked, you are ready to serve.

Final word

Finally a meal that not only tastes, but also looks good. When making this one, don’t hesitate to experiment. Personally I like to add some baby-corn, bamboo and especially some chilly sauce

How to make Uncle Ben's chili sauce not suck

Sat, 06 Oct 2012 20:14:15 +0000

When Leader Price discontinued my preferred chili sauce I was angry and very sad. Oddly enough, Intermarché did the same and removed chili from their selection of Claude Léger sauces. Obviously there is no market for chili in France. What is done is done and we, cheap chili lovers, are now stuck with the Uncle Ben’s crap.

But let us not fall into despair, there is a way to save this non-perishable canned (bottled?) food franchise. The recipe is extremely simple, take a bottle of Uncle Ben’s chili sauce, add in a can of tomato paste and an appropriate amount of Sriracha sauce. And, voilà, ready to cook and serve. Preferably with bacon and rice.

Duck gizzard salad, the Yoz-way

Wed, 04 Jul 2012 09:25:55 +0000

Since the last recipe was for a burger, let us make something healthier. Like a salad. However let us make it tasty as well, like by adding a pint of fat.

Ingredients

Mesclun
Duck gizzards
Tomatoes
Västerbottensost (Swedish cheese)
Cashew nuts
Salt
Pepper

Preparation of ingredients

Wash the salad, dice the tomatoes (wash them first, eh). Dice the cheese.

If your duck needs to be heated in bain-marie do so. Cut the meat to smaller pieces (keep the fat).

Cooking

Heat a frying pan. Use the fat from the duck to grease it. Throw the duck and cashew nuts in. Salt, pepper and stir for a bit.

Take a salad bowl and throw everything in. Mix vigorously.

Afterword

Making salad is easy. Just take anything you have in the fridge and throw it into a bowl. The more colors the better.

The almighty Yozburger

Mon, 25 Jun 2012 11:48:52 +0000

Hunger strikes again! And best remedy for hunger is food! And best food is… burgers!

Ingredients

Possibilities are endless but decisions have to be made. Usually I put this into a burger, but feel free to add whatever you like.

Hamburger bun (big one)
Beef burger
Bacon
Cheddar cheese
Egg
Tomato
Onion
Lettuce (or Chinese cabbage)
Salt
Pepper
Brown sugar
Pork fat

Preparation of ingredients

Slice the onion to stripes. Slice tomatoes to circular slices. Cut the lettuce to smaller leaves.

Cooking

Start of by melting the fat on a pan. Put the bacon in and pour brown sugar over it to make candied bacon.

Remove the bacon, salt and pepper the burger and put it on the pan (use the same pan for everything). When the steak is almost done (rare) put the onions and tomato and lettuce in. Also start frying the egg (and salt it a bit). It is important to cook the onions, lettuce and tomato in the same oil as the bacon and the burger. If you do not have enough place to put everything into the pan then cook what you must after you have removed the burger.

Start assembling the burger. From bottom I usually do : bun, cheese, onions, tomato, burger, cheese, onions, tomato, lettuce, egg, bun. Refer to the diagram for more precise information.

Secret knack : after I finish assembling the burger, just before putting the egg in I pour all of the oil from the pan into the burger. This serves as the best sauce you will ever have and this way you will avoid using unhealthy sauces like ketchup or mayo.

Final word

No words are necessary, just look at the beauty!

Carbonara Supercharge

Sat, 12 May 2012 18:50:23 +0000

When you are dying of hunger you need to swallow something with a lot of calories of all sorts (just in case), and you need to do it fast. This is a ten minute recipe for delicious pasta with enough fat to give you a minor heart-attack.

Today we are cooking a spinoff of spaghetti (or whatever, all pasta tastes the same) carbonara.

Ingredients

You should always have these around in your house anyways, but maybe you will have to add 10 minutes for shopping

Pasta (I use spaghetti or penne)
Sliced bacon
Liquid cream (or any other, actually)
Parmesan cheese
Emmental cheese
Canned sliced mushrooms
Egg
Onion
Bonus: White Wine

Preparation of ingredients

Nada. Well, open the can of mushrooms at least. Oh, and dice the onion.

Cooking

Depending on your pasta you will have to start cooking it at some random moment during the cooking of the sauce. Or you can just cook it after sauce is ready, it can wait, the pasta can not.

Start by frying the onions in a pan. Once they are ready put in the bacon. Cook until the bacon changes colour and add sliced mushrooms. Cook for like a minute and then add some cream. Afterwards add some cheese (either or both), not too much, and cook until it disolves. If you are rich enough add a spoonful or two of white wine into the mix now. Repeat the previous step until you think you have enough cheese in the mix. Cook for a bit. Now put in the egg and stirr furiously.

Voilà! Dinner is ready.

Beijing Soup

Tue, 07 Feb 2012 02:24:27 +0000

I’ve been searching for this recipe for quite a long time. Finally I got hold of it thanks to my brother. And due to popular demand here is the recipe complete for one of the best soups out there. So… without further delays.

Ingredients

One whole chicken
Shiitake mushrooms (dried)
Black mushrooms (dried)
A carrot
Bamboo sprouts
Two eggs
Soy sauce
Rice vinegar
Sambala sauce
Tapioca starch
Salt
Whole black pepper
Chicken bouillon cube

Preparation of ingredients

Hint : I recommend reading the whole recipe first as some of the steps can be done at the same time.

It is best to begin by dipping the mushrooms in warm water (shiitake and black mushrooms separately) as it takes about 30 minutes for them to soak well. The longer the better. After they have soaked cut the shiitake to small pieces.

Cut off the legs and breasts of the chicken, put them aside we will not be needing them for this meal.

Clean the carrot and cut it to small pieces. Cut the bamboo sprouts as well.

Crack the two eggs into a bowl and scramble them.

Cooking

Heat about 1.5L of water, salt it, put in a dozen of grains of the whole pepper and put the chicken inside. Cook for about 45 minutes.

Take the chicken out and put the bouillon cube as well as the mushrooms (both), carrots and bamboo sprouts inside.

Cut off all of the meat from the bones of the chicken and put it back into the soup (the meat, not the bones).

Cook for about ten minutes, then add two table spoons of vinegar, three table spoons of soy sauce and two spoonfuls of Sambal sauce (or more, if you wish the soup to be more spicy).

Cook for another 10 minutes, afterwards add in the eggs and stir well. Finally prepare two spoons of tapioca starch in a bowl - add a bit of water and mix until all of the starch has diluted. Then add the mix to the soup. Cook for about 10 minutes and you are done.

Afterword

The soup is to be eaten very hot. If you do not have chicken you can use more bouillon cubes instead (still, it is much better with real meat).