Potato leek soup with a twist

Ingredients:

1) 2 cloves of garlic

2) 2 potatoes

3) 3 leeks

4) 1/2 cup of Spanish olive oil (Extra Virgin from Andalucía)

5) Salt

6) Serrano ham and manchego cheese pieces to garnish

Preparation:

Put a little bit of olive oil in a pot and fry the garlic cloves until brown. Add the leeks and potatoes and cook them golden. Add 2 liters of water and simmer for 45 minutes. Put the mixture in a blender and blend it with 1/4 cup of olive oil. Season with salt and serve it in bowls garnished with Ibérico or Serrano (Jabugo) ham and Manchego cheese from Spain.

Enjoy with good company and a glass of Albariño white wine from Galicia ;)

P.S.: Thanks José Andrés for your constant inspiration!

Gazpacho soup revisited

Gazpacho is the "piece de resistance" of Andalousian cuisine, so I like to try different recipes of it, in order to find interesting nuances. Yesterday I followed these useful recipes:

http://cadiz.cosasdecome.es/receta/gazpacho-clasico/

https://www.elcorteingles.es/aptc/recetas/gazpacho-andaluz-tradicional/


Ingredients:

1) 2 kilos of ripe tomatoes (in my version I only used 2.5 pounds, which is about 5 to 7 tomatoes in the vine). The key is that the tomatoes have to be well ripe and red, juicy, preferrably organic.

2) 1 green bell pepper, without the stem or the seeds.

3) 1 cucumber (if it's too big, use just half), peeled roughly. The point is not to peel it perfectly well, so a little dark green provides a tad bitterness.

4) 1 clove of garlic, preferrably organic. It is the core of the gazpacho, so use a good one, medium size, and peel it before chopping and putting in the blender. The punch of the garlic flavor reinforcing the tomato and vegetable blend is a winner.

5) A big slice of country bread, preferrably from the day before, soaked in water.

6) Spanish extra virgin olive oil. I used 150 mililiters; it could be even better if you use 200 to 250 mililiters, you decide. The amount of vinegar is a third or a quarter of that.

7) Sherry vinegar from Jerez, Spain. I used 50 mililiters.

8) Spanish sea salt.

9) Half a teaspoon of cumin.

10) Half a liter of spring water. Do not use tap water. In gourmet soups it is of the utmost importance to only use quality spring water.

Preparation:

I placed at the bottom of the blender the olive oil, then I chopped and poured all the solid ingredients, taking the stem out of the tomatoes, the cucumber, and the pepper. Then I added the garlic, salt, cumin, the bread, and the vinegar. I poured half a liter of water and blended it all for 5 to 10 minutes. Then I sifted the blended gazpacho with a colander or strainer and put the container glass in the refrigerator for 5 hours.

Serving:

Ready to serve as a soup in a plate so you eat it with a tablespoon (with garnishing in the bowl of bits of cucumber, boiled egg slices and ibérico or serrano ham, or bacon), or even in a glass, as if it were a glass of vegetable juice. This healthy Spanish gazpacho certainly is the best cold soup in the world to refresh yourself in the heat of the summer. Enjoy!

Classic Cafe Mocha

The black chocolate provides sweetness and balance to the coffee.

Ingredients: - 2% skim milk
                    - 1 piece of black chocolate
                    - 1 teaspoon of brown sugar
                    - 1 teaspoon of instant coffee

I heat the milk in a cup in the microwave for 1 minute and 30 seconds. Immediately l drop in 1 piece of black Belgium Cote d'Or chocolate and start stirring vigorously. Then l add 1 teaspoon of brown sugar and 1 teaspoon of Colombian instant coffee La Colombiana, and keep stirring to mix it all very well, and serve it ready to enjoy!

2 new yummy dishes

Lentils with chard

The Pursuit of Yummy Food is back!

Last Monday I cooked this excellent recipe I got from the famous Spanish cook Carlos Arguiñano:

https://www.hogarmania.com/cocina/recetas/legumbres/201410/lentejas-acelgas-26362.html

I started boiling 300 grams of lentils in a pot of hot water, and added salt, 1 leek and 1 carrot that I had chopped before. Once boiled for 30 minutes I took the leek and carrot and blended them with the hand blender, and added back to the lentils pot and added powder parsley.
Then I peeled and chopped a potato and 2 carrots, and 4 chard leaves, and boiled them all in salty water for 20 minutes. Later I added it all to the pot with the lentils.
In a separate pan I fried 3 sliced cloves of garlic, and then a chopped tomato and added half a spoon of cayenne pepper and parsley.
Finally I poured this last mix in the lentils pot and stirred it all, then I just served the yummy Chard lentil soup.

The result was simple yet nothing short of impressive: a vegetarian/vegan soup with enough substance and spice to not miss any meat in there. It will not be the last time that I cook this healthy lentil soup. ¡Que aproveche!

Broccoli with Bechamel and Spaghetti Sauce

http://www.hogarutil.com/cocina/recetas/ensaladas-verduras/201110/brocoli-bechamel-queso-12199.html

Here I roughly translated the recipe from the Spanish TV:

Ingredients:

- 2 or 3 broccolis
- 125 grams of emmental cheese
- 50 grams of flour
- 50 grams of Irish butter
- 1/2 liter of milk
- Water
- Salt
- Nutmeg
- Parsley
- HEB Spaghetti sauce with onion, garlic, olive oil and basil

Wash the broccolis and boil them in a pan with water and a pinch of salt for 6 minutes. Rinse them and cut them into smaller branches. Set them aside on a plate.
To make the cheese bechamel sauce, heat the butter in a pan and once it melts, add the flour, cooking it a little bit. Pour the milk on it little by little while stirring it all with a stick. Add the shredded emmental cheese, a pinc of nutmeg and a pinch of salt. Mix it all very well until it thickens and set it aside.
Set the spaghetti sauce on a platter, then lay the broccolis and pour the bechamel sauce over it. Cook it au gratin in the oven for a while at 350 Farenheit. Serve it decorated with a little bit of parsley.

Easy to make, healthy and delicious, what else can you ask for?