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Summer Day Elderflower Drink

~ Ann & Chris Demant ~ Leave a comment

Almost every sunday we meet with a couple of friend to have dinner and watch a movie (or rather sleep while the movie is running ;-)).

Today it has been quite warm here in Denmark and all four of us was quite tired from yesterday: Ditte was out dancing with some friends, the boys were here drinking and I was at Roskilde Festival listening to Metallica, and what a splendid experience!!! It was without doubt the best concert I have been to for many years, so I’ll definitely going to see them next time the visit Denmark (or some nearby country)!

Well, as I wrote above, we were quite wasted, so I decided to make an easy refreshment to start the evening. It only takes a few minutes to make and it tastes delicious and refreshing. The elderflower cordial in this recipe is homemade and contains both ginger and chili, which makes it less sweet than regular elderflower cordial. But if you don’t have the patience (4-5 days) to make your own, a bought one from the local super market is just as good. Just make sure that you buy good quality product 🙂

 

Ingredients (6-7 glasses)

1 bottle white wine

1 cup elderflower cordial

10 ice cubes

1 lime

5 mint leaves

 

Slice the lime and the mint leaves and add them to a pitcher together with the rest of the ingredients and stir well with a spoon to combine. In this version I have used pineapple mint, but you can use any kind of mint or even leave it out you don’t have anything or don’t like it.

Serve on a warm summer day 🙂

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Bon Appétit!

Ingredients (6-7 glasses)

1 bottle white wine

2.5 elderflower cordial

10 ice cubes

1 lime

5 mint leaves

 

Spicy Elderflower Cordial and Syrup

~ Ann & Chris Demant ~ Leave a comment

I few days ago I was out walk with my mom and a friend of mine. We went to walk my friends moms dog, but we ended up going on an elderflower hunt instead 😀

We went to an area where there in our childhood was a playground, but unfortunately (for the kids living there now) the area is now overgrown with  nettles, ground elder, brambles and elderflowers. There had been some elderflower pickers before us, so we had to go home to get a garden cultivator so that we could get the top flowers. In a short while we had picked more than 50 elderflower heads and were ready to walk the now very impatient dog 😀

The elderflower season in Denmark is normally in May/June, but due to the cold weather we have had this spring, you might still be lucky to find some during the next few weeks 🙂

 

Ingredients

30 – 40 elderflower heads

3 organic lemons, sliced

4 inches ginger root, peeled and sliced

2 red chilies, sliced

4 cups cane sugar

2 tbsp. citric acid

6 cups water

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Heat the water until it begins to boil. Carefully remove all the small insects and other not-elderflower-objects from the elderflowers heads, but DON’T rinse! Rinsing them will remove the pollen from the flowers, and the end-result will be less tasteful!

Place all ingredients, except water, in a heat proof bowl and cover it with the boiling water. Stir to combine and dissolve the sugar.

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Cover the bowl with a lid or plastic wrap and fridge for 3-4 days, stirring occasionally (at least once a day).

Filter the juice through some tightly woven fabric and into cleaned bottles or ice cube bags if you want some for the freezer. If bottled, keep cool for up to 4 weeks.

This portion makes 6 cups of elderflower cordial, but I have chosen only to bottle 4 cups, and make syrup from the remaining 2 cups.

Use for lemonade (1 cup elderflower cordial to 4 cups cold water, 10 ice cubes and 1 sliced organic lemon) or do as me – make elderflower cupcakes  (recipe will follow) 🙂

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Elderflower Syrup (1 cup)

2 cups elderflower cordial

 

Heat up the elderflower cordial at low-medium heat in a saucepan. Stir occasionally and let cook until reduced properly. It is up to you, what you think is ‘properly’, but i have reduced it down to 1 cup. You can easily reduce i more, but be careful that it doesn’t burn.

Use for Elderflower Latte, as a syrup for aged cheese, as a cocktail syrup or as an ingredient to you summer cupcakes.

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Bon Appétit!

Ingredients (elderflower cordial)

30 – 40 elderflower heads

3 organic lemons, sliced

10 cm ginger root, peeled and sliced

2 red chilies, sliced

10 dl cane sugar

2 tbsp. citric acid

1.5 liter water

 

Elderflower Syrup (1 cup)

5 dl elderflower cordial

 

Simple Danish Summer Lunch

~ Ann & Chris Demant ~ Leave a comment

When having a vegetable garden, one always looks forward to digging up the first new potatoes and picking the first sun ripened tomatoes 😀 Every year we try to plan it, so that we can have the first potatoes in late May, but as the spring weather in Scandinavian are quite varying with both rain, freezing weather and snow it can be difficult to plan anything 😦 So this year we had to wait until mid-June before we could dig up small, yellow gold nuggets 😀 But, but, but it was definitely worth the waiting!

When it comes to the tomatoes, it is still to early to pick our own, so these are bought on the local farmers market. In Odense where we live, we have farmers market twice a week, wednesday and saturday between 7.00 am to 1.00 pm. There we can buy vegetables, herbs, fruit, cheese, seafood and flowers, all fresh and delicious 😀

Last note before giving you the ‘recipe’ for this easy lunch, is that the rye bread is home made from sourdough, rye flour, kernels, dark beer, salt and sunflower seeds. It takes approximately 24 hour to make a rye bread from beginning to end, but it so much better than what you can buy in the super market. Sooner or later we will give you our rye bread recipe too 🙂

 

Ingredients (2 servings)

2 slices whole-grain rye bread

2 potatoes, cooked and cooled

2 sun ripened tomatoes

2 small radishes, finely chopped

1 tbsp. chives, chopped

Basil

Mayonaise

Salt & pepper

 

Divide the two rye bread slices in half, and place on two plates. Slice the cooked and cooled potatoes and the tomatoes into 1/2-inch slices and place on the bread like shown on the pictures below.

Add a thin stripe of mayo on top of both potatoes and tomatoes.

Top of the tomatoes with basil and season with salt and pepper.

Spread out the chopped radishes and chives on top of the potatoes and season with salt and pepper as well.

To make it traditional Danish you can serve it with a cold snaps shot, but be careful – people tend to get crazy ideas when drinking snaps 😉

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Bon Appétit!

Guess what it is… GIVE-AWAY!

~ Ann & Chris Demant ~ 7 Comments

The first give-away from Food on Demant is going to be a ‘guess what this is’ give-away 😀

During the years we have developed a number of kitchen tools to help ease the cooking. Below you can see two pictures of tools which we recently developed. As you’ll have to guess what the tools are for, we can “unfortunately” not reveal anything about the purpose of these two tools, but we look forward to hear what you think it is for 😀

To participate in the give-away, you’ll have to leave a comment with what you think the tools are for. The give-away will run until sunday (May 19th) where there will be a random draw between all comments 🙂

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As we have readers/followers from all over the world, the give-away will have to be something that can be send by post. Therefore we have decided that the give-away is going to be 4 plates of Amedei Chocolate. Chocolate from Amedei is not just chocolate – it is definitely the world’s best chocolate 🙂 We could tell about the delicious taste, its creaminess, aroma etc., but the best way to get to know it, is to taste it – so leave a comment and participate in the competition 😀

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Feel free to spread the word to your friends and other bloggers, so they will get the change to taste this fabulous chocolate too 🙂 We hope to get a lot of comments and we look forward to spreading the taste of quality chocolate to one of you 🙂

Chris & Ann 🙂

 

THE GIVE AWAY IS NOW OVER AND WE ARE READY TO REVEAL WHAT THE TOOLS ARE FOR 🙂

First of all, we want to thank you for your contribution in the contest. You have come with some quite interesting suggestions for the use of the two tools and a few of you have got it right 😀

As you can see o the pictures below, the large round tool is a Chili Cheese Rack while the small long tool is used for getting the stem and seeds out of the chilies!

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As promised we made a random draw between all comments, and the winner is comment no. 6, so congratulation to Susanne 😀 Would you please send and e-mail to foodondemant@gmail.com with your address and your chocolate preferences?

Once again, thank you for participating in our give away 🙂

Creamy Tomato Soup and Grilled Cheese Sandwich

~ Ann & Chris Demant ~ 1 Comment

We are in the middle of March and the calendar show spring – so what the F..K is happening with snow outside our windows? We had planned an easter vacation outside on the terrace with a cold beer and some damn good barbecue….

Of cause we can still fire up in the grill, but it would definitely be more fun if we could stay outside for more than 30 minutes without getting to look like a snowman!

This creamy tomato soup is a favorite of ours on a cold and snowy (normally) winter day. It is quick and easy to prepare and taste is just amazing 🙂

If you are not that fond of chilies, you can leave them out or just add a bit at a time. Regarding the grilled cheese sandwich, it is a first choice as a supplement for the soup, but a good French baguette is also good if you will save some calories from the cheese (we don’t believe in low-fat food – instead we try to go the gym as often as possible :-D).

 

Ingredients (4 servings)

1/2 gallon canned tomatoes

2 tbsp. tomato paste

1 1/2 onion, chopped

3 garlic cloves, chopped

2-3 red chilies, chopped

1 tsp. dried oregano

1 tsp. dried thyme

1/2 tsp. dried rosemary

1 tbsp. butter

1/2 cup cream

Salt

Pepper

 

8 pieces sandwich bread

4 slices cheddar cheese

1 tbsp. butter

 

Sauté the chopped onions, garlic, chilies and dried herbes in 1 tbsp. melted butter, for 3-5 minutes.

Add the canned tomatoes together with  tomato paste. Stir until combined and let cook at medium-low heat for approximately one hour.

Add cream and blend it all into a smooth and creamy mass. Season with salt and pepper. Let rest while making the grilled cheese sandwiches.

Spread one side of the bread with butter. Add one slice of cheese on the un-buttered side of every second bread slice. Top with remaining bread  – the buttered side out. Grill 2-3 minutes on each side. Serve with the slightly cooled tomato soup.

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Bon Appétit!

 

Ingredients (4 servings)

5 tomato cans

2 tbsp. tomato paste

1 1/2 onion, chopped

3 garlic cloves, chopped

2-3 red chilies, chopped

1 tsp. dried oregano

1 tsp. dried thyme

1/2 tsp. dried rosemary

1 tbsp. butter

1.25 dl cream

Salt

Pepper

8 pieces sandwich bread

4 slices cheddar cheese

1 tbsp. butter

Italian Seasoning

~ Ann & Chris Demant ~ Leave a comment

This Italian seasoning is a favorite of ours, when we cook lamb. It is also good for chicken and pork meat.

Ingredients

2 tbsp. dried oregano

2 tbsp. dried basil

2 tbsp. dried rosemary

2 tbsp. dried thyme

2 tbsp. coarse salt

2 tbsp. steak pepper

2 tbsp. chili flakes

Combine all ingredients in a bowl and mix well. Store in an airtight contain at room temperature.

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Bon Appétit!

Pork Chops with Sweet & Sour Peppers

~ Ann & Chris Demant ~ 4 Comments

Once again we forgot al about time and suddenly it was dinnertime. We are not that good at eating at the same time every night, and most often we use several hours in the kitchen, experimenting and having fun cooking.

Today has been nothing like that. Chris has been working late followed by an hour or two on his other hobby (designing and producing furnitures in metal and old wood), while I (Ann) has been in bed due to neck pains from an old whiplash.

As we had forgotten al about time, we decided to make something easy and quick but still delicious. It took less than 25 minutes (including prepping) and tasted fabulous 🙂

 

Ingredients (4 servings)

Pork chops

4 pork chops

4 cloves garlic, roughly chopped

1 handful thyme stems

1 tbsp. butter

Salt

Pepper

 

Sweet & Sour Peppers

1 tbsp. olive olie

2 red peppers

2 yellow peppers

2 red onions

1 jalapeños

1 cup edamamme beans

1 lime, juice and zest

2 tbsp. sugar

1/2 cup red wine vinegar

Salt

Pepper

 

Begin with prepping the vegetables. Remove the seeds from the peppers and cut them lengthwise. Then cut the onions and the jalapeño into thin slices. We are both chili lovers so we rarely remove the seeds and stems from the chilies, but if you like it more mild, you can remove it (or leave out the jalapeño).

Add olive olie to a frying pan and heat. Then add the peppers, onions, jalapeños and edamamme beans and sauté for 2-3 minutes. Add sugar and sir to combine. When the peppers get a glazed surface add the red wine vinegar and juice and zest from the lemon. Season with salt and pepper. Turn down the heat and let simmer for about 10 minutes or until all the fluid had thickened.

While the sweet and sour peppers are simmering you can make the pork chops. Season the pork chops with salt and pepper. Heat a frying pan and add butter, garlic and thyme. When the butter begins get brown and smell like nuts, add the pork chops and fry for about 4 minutes before turning it. Fry 4 minutes on the other side too, while pouring some of butter over the top. This will give the meat a love nutty taste on the surface and prevent it from drying out in the frying process.

Arrange the sweet and sour pepper mix on a plate and top with a delicious and juicy pork chop and serve with bread or rice.

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Bon Appétit!

 

Ingredients (4 servings)

Pork chops

4 pork chops

4 cloves garlic, roughly chopped

1 handful thyme stems

1 tbsp. butter

Salt

Pepper

 

Sweet & Sour Peppers

1 tbsp. olive olie

2 red peppers

2 yellow peppers

2 red onions

1 jalapeños

1 cup edamamme beans

1 lime, juice and zest

2 tbsp. sugar

1.25 dl red wine vinegar

Salt

Pepper