Half an Hour Crows Nest

My mother always used to make us this when we were at home. I always loved it especially when she fried the bread extra crispy. Now my kids love it too. They can't get used to the name because its just too out there to be comparing a yummy breakfast dish to a crows nest! You can really cook it in less than half an hour depending on how much you are making. In this particular case I made it with a day old baguette that had to be gotten rid of. I happened to make it for lunch because I needed something quick and my kids don't eat much for lunch right now.

Preparation time: 30 min. Serves 4 (as a side dish)

Ingredients:

8	Eggs
8 cups	Cubed, stale (at least not fresh!) bread
1/3 cup	Milk
1/4 cup	Oil
	Salt and pepper

Method:

Put a large skillet or frying pan on the stove on high heat. For best results use a cast iron pan. If you use any non- non-stick pan you will be fine. With a non-stick you will not get the bread to be as golden brown and crunchy and you also run the risk of ruining the surface of your non-stick pan. Eggs tend to have this nasty way of ruining the non-stick surface.

While your pan is heating up cube, or dice, your bread. Around 1.5 cm cubes are good.

Once the pan is hot add the oil and then the diced bread. Toss them in the oil so that all the pieces of bread get some oil. If the bread does not have oil on it it won't become crunchy and golden brown. You can always add some more oil if it doesn't seem to be enough. I think I might have added a bit more (my memory says a quarter cup more but its not very reliable!). Then fry them until golden brown. They need to be stirred every now and then to make sure they brown evenly and depending on your cooker and pan you might need to reduce the heat to medium to prevent it from burning.

While the bread is frying beat the eggs together with the milk, salt and pepper.

Once the bread is golden brown pour the egg mixture over the bread and mix until all the egg is cooked. Remove from the heat and serve immediately. Definitely best hot!

As you can see, not all of my bread was golden brown. It doesn't have to be all golden brown because that would take you forever and a whole heap of oil!
And here is the finished product which was devoured within a few minutes!!

Oh and I tried sprinkling it with Parmesan cheese (that's the white stuff you see on the side) but the kids did not like it although they do love Parmesan cheese and find it an absolute treat to be able to eat it by itself.

American Pancakes

My I think it is time for a new post, don't you? Some thing yummy for the cold weather that has just hit us. Last Wednesday I was sitting on the balcony enjoying a cup of tea and a cookie and this Wednesday I pulled out all my winter gear to beat the 0 degree temperatures.

Pancakes... the American kind. Piles and piles of hot pancakes along side some yummy toppings. Nothing to beat our unhealthy favourite of Nutella, bananas and whipped cream!

Preparation time: 25 min. Serves 2 (aprox. 8 pancakes)

Ingredients:

1	Egg
1 cup	Milk
1 oz (30 g)	Butter, melted
1 cup (150 g)	Flour
1 tbsp.	Sugar
1 tbsp.	Baking powder
1/2 tsp.	Salt

Method:

Pancakes are easy to make and there are all kinds of variations. Every country seems to have their own. I never used to eat American pancakes until I made them myself. I should credit this recipe to someone but I don't know where I pulled it from. Most definitely off the internet! If this is yours let me know.

The first thing you need to do is melt the butter. I melt mine in the microwave a bit at a time. The main point is that the butter does not get too hot. If it does it will cook the egg and the batter will not be smooth. So I cut it up into pieces and put it in for 30 seconds. I then take it out and stir it (if it is possible) and then put it back in for another 20 seconds. I repeat this until I have some liquid butter.

Now you can do this the easy way and take all your ingredients and put them in a food processor or a liquidizer. You could also use an electric mixer. But this time I decided to do it the old fashioned way with a mixing bowl and a wooden spoon. So if you are glutton for punishment or you just enjoy yourself in the kitchen read on. Otherwise mix everything together and jump to *.

Add all the dry ingredients into a large bowl and make a well in the middle into which you can pour the melted butter. The quantities in the pictures might seem a bit more than in the recipe. This is because I have to make twice the recipe to feed my family of four.

Then add in the eggs.

Now you have to do the age old thing and work in the fluid stuff into the flour by starting in the middle and mixing the flour slowly in with your wooden spoon. It looks something like this:

As you see one can't mix everything in because the batter gets to thick. At this point you have to start to slowly add the milk. Add a bit at a time and slowly incorporate all the flour. Once you have a sticky mess give it a good mix with the wooden spoon to get rid of any lumps. 

Then work on incorporating the rest of the milk. If you end up getting some lumps give it a beat with a hand whisk.

* And now it is ready to fry. 

I have special pancake pans. They are really cheap non-stick pans that I bought from Ikea a long time ago. Totally worth it because I can make 3 pancakes simultaneously.

Although the pans are non-stick they still need a bit of oil. I apply this to the pan using a paper towel. I put a bit of oil in a saucer, take 1/2 a sheet of paper kitchen towel, fold the towel about 3 times into half, dip it in the oil and then rub it on the pan. My pans I heat on medium heat but have to adjust them up and down depending on the size of the burner and the strength. 

Take about one soup ladel of mixture and put it into the frying pan (once the frying pan is hot of course) and swish it around until the mixture covers the bottom of the pan. Make sure your pan is not on the heat while you swish it around else you won't get very thin pancakes. Of course if you want real thick pancakes you should probably put more batter than one soup ladel full. Then put your pancake on the heat and let it sit. I can't tell you how long to wait before you flip it because it is always different but you can tell from what the pancake looks like.

Look at the pancake in the picture below. You can see that it has bubbles on it that are popped. On the left hand side the pancake is "dried out" and on the right hand side, although it is shiny, the batter is set. This is a perfect time to flip your pancake. It should come off really easily. Use a spatula to flip it or do it the old fashioned way by throwing it in the air. Throwing it in the air and catching it gains a lot of respect from your kids. It's like in the pancake fairy tale!

Once you have flipped the pancake it does not take long to cook. Remember the top side was almost already cooked. Probably it takes about 30 seconds but you can peek underneath with the help of your spatula to see if it is the done. No need for it to brown on the bottom all you want is for it to be cooked through.

Pile them up high on a plate. This will also help keep the first ones warm while you are making the rest.

And then serve them with what ever tickles your fancy. Jam, honey, marmite (yes, thats my little ones favourite!), fruit or the more traditional maple syrup and whipped butter. Oh and I should not forget my mothers favourite pancake topping ... sugar with lemon juice.

Before I had a smart phone I hosted brunch for some friends and made these pancakes but much smaller. They looked really cool stacked up. Shame I don't have a picture.

Home-made Granola

My husband eats muesli almost every morning for breakfast. Unfortunately the kids and I don't touch it. "Unfortunately" because it is extremely good for you but I just can't swallow it and prefer my overly sugared, easily digestible, cereals instead. There is one thing we all eat and that is granola. Unfortunately (again) it is difficult to get good granola here in Germany. When you can get it, it has one of the following problems: it contains desiccated coconut (yuck!), it contains chocolate chunks (not for breakfast, no way!) or it is extremely expensive. So once we moved to Germany I had to start making granola at home. I haven't made it recently and I don't know why because it is very simple to make. But the muesli ran out yesterday and my hubby needs his fiber. [If you are wondering what happened today, well it was a public holiday so we had toast and fried eggs instead of cereal!]

So I made some this afternoon and figured I would share the recipe. Now I didn't come up with this recipe myself. The initial version was copied from a website and I no longer know which one so I can't cite it. But I think I've changed the recipe enough that it would be okay to post it again.

Ingredients:

1 1/2 cups (300 g)	Brown Sugar
1/2 cup (150 ml)	Water
2 tsp	Vanilla Extract
1 tsp	Salt
8 cups (800 g)	Oats
1 cup	Sunflower Seeds
300 g	Sliced Almonds
200 g	Dried Cranberries

Method:

Set your fan oven to 120°C (conventional oven around 140°C / 280°F)

First mix together the brown sugar, water, vanilla and salt in a microwavable bowl. Some times I don't have brown sugar, or am frankly too stingy to pay the price for it. So instead I use white sugar with a teaspoon of "Goldsaft" which is something like molasses. You can use any type of syrup to make your sugar brown. If you are in Sri Lanka you could use coconut treacle, for example.

Stir a bit to combine and then put the bowl in the microwave and heat for 3 minutes. (Alternatively you could do this on a stove top.)

While the mixture is heating measure out the oats, sunflower seeds and the almonds, put them in a large mixing bowl and combine. In actual fact it does not matter what type of nuts you use. I could imagine that cashew nuts would taste wonderful as probably would peanuts. It's all a matter of taste and availability. This time I didn't have the usual sliced almonds but instead I had chopped almonds and some walnuts so that is what will be in our granola. You also don't have to worry too much about how much you put it. It is really all a matter of taste.

Carefully take your bowl out of the microwave and stir until all the sugar etc. is dissolved.

Then pour it over your oat nut mixture and mix till well combined.

Then spread the oats equally onto two baking trays lined with parchment paper. You can skip the parchment paper if you like, you will just have more to clean up. I don't think the oats will stick to your baking sheet. Make sure everything is evenly spread so that you ensure that your granola is crunchy

and stick it in the oven for about 45 minutes. After 45 minutes take out the trays, one at a time, and mix (turn) the granola so that it gets evenly  baked. Bake for a further 45 until crisp.

While the granola is baking chop the cranberries because they are a bit too big. Again like the nuts you can use any type of dried fruits for the granola. I had a half finished bag of cranberries and one of raisins so that is what went in today.

Once the granola is done, mix in the dried fruit and it is ready to eat. I can't tell you how long it keeps, we finish it within a week but I'm guessing you can keep it longer :)