Besos de novia (Bride's kisses)

How do the bride's kisses taste?If you don't know the answer you must eat this dessert. It is really good. 

This desserts are typical from Murcia, a spanish region, and they have this name because they usually are made for weddings. I found this recipe when I was searching something to do with a lot of carrots I have in my fridge. So if you don't know what to do with a lot of carrots make like me, and taste this dish. 

Besos de novia (Bride's kisses):

Ingredients for 4 persons

Carrots          500gr.

Egg              2unid.

Flour               250gr.

Baking powder         1packet

Sugar             150gr.

Cinnamon powder

Peel the carrots and cook them in boil water until they are tender, approximately 15 minutes. Put them out  and blend them to obtain a homogeneous mass, without grumes. Then beat the eggs and add them to the mass. Add  the flour, the baking powder and the sugar too. Mix all.

Put abundant oil in a frying pan. When it is very warm, take the mass with a spoon and with other spoon push it to the oill. Fry it approximately a minute for every side. Then put them out of the oil and put them in a plate with kitchen paper in order to dry them.

In a bowl put on sugar and cinnamon, a teaspoon of cinnamon for every two of sugar. With this coat the balls and ... eat them. This desert must be eaten warm, cold it isn't so good. So if you see that they are going to left over, take the mass before fry it and put it on the freezer.

Si quieres ver esta receta en español pincha aquí.

Sushi: maki and nigiri

I'm going to tell you how to make two types of sushi: the typical roll, called Maki and the one that is a "ball" of rice with fish above, called Nigiri. I tell you first how to prepare the rice and then how to do the both types of sushi.

Rice:
Japanese rice or rice of thick grain 250gr
Water  400ml, you will need more to wash the rice.
Vinegar of rice or a substitute 2 tablespoon.

It is important to wash well the rice to eliminate as much starch as possible. For that, put the rice under cold water until the water doesn't get white. Then put the rice in abundant water and leave it to rest during 10 minutes. In this point drain the rice and then put it in a ladle with 400ml of water, the water must not be warm. Put it in the fire and when the water starts boiling cover it and turn off the fire, or put it minimum if it is of gas. Leave this way during 10 minutes.

Extract it of the ladle and set it to cool in a not metallic tray. It must not get  wet once done. When the rice get cold, add the both spoonfuls of vinegar and move well. The rice is ready to prepare the sushi.

Maki:

Algae Nori 3 leaves
Rice prepared before
Filling,  I have used raw tuna, 2 small sticks of crab, half a cucumber and half an avocado.

The algae must be roasted. 90 % from those who sell already comes this way.

To do the maki  is needed a small mat that allows us to roll it well, if we don't have any we can use a rag or a film. I advise you to put to the small mat film above since it takes the smell of the algae. Place the small mat perpendicular to the table. Puts on an algae on it and then, in a bit more of 2/3, put on the rice.

A tip: the rice sticks very much, so if you are going to work with the hands, wet them before.

In the center of the rice place the filling you have chosen and then to start rolling them from below. To end press well in order that the algae sticks and the maki remains sealed. We cut the cylinder of the thickness that we want.

Nigiri:

Rice prepared before
 Seasoning to put above: raw fish (salmon, tuna, eel ...), octopus, shrimps... I have used salmon of which they sell already cut in slices

The nigiri is easier to prepare. Simply wet your hands to work with the rice. Take a spoonful of rice and, with the hand, press it up to obtaining a species of rectangle / cylinder. Then put a chunk of raw cut fish very slim or whatever you have decided to put. And it is ready.


Vinegar for rice:
25ml of white vinegar of apple, wine, fruits .... but that it must be white.
 25ml of water
 2 spoonfuls of white sugar.
Mix everything until the water is dissolved and it is already. Easy!!!

The sushi is eaten with wasabi and soy sauce.

Para ver esta receta en español pincha aquí



Cinnamon Rolls

Today recipe needs some time to be made because the mass should rest until the yeast has acted. There are other recipes that use the baking powder, which does not need to rest. But I prefer this one because is the original one.

Ingredients:
The units come in cups, every cup has 200ml.

MASS
 Strong flour/bread flour  5 cups
 Sugar white 1/2cup
 Milk             1cup
 Eggs            2unids
 Butter / margarine 1/3cup
 Salt               1 teaspoon
 Dried yeast   8gr

FILLING 
Butter / margarine       1/3cup

Brown sugar      1cup
Ground cinnamon       5tablespoon
           

Beat the eggs and put them in a big bowl.  Melt the butter, warm the milk and add all the ingredients of the mass in the bowl. Knead all the ingredients up to obtaining a homogeneous mass, like bread mass. If we see that it is necessary add more flour. Leave the mass ferments until it doubles its size, more or less an hour, depending on the temperature of the kitchen, the ideal temperature it is 25º-28ºC. If the temperature is not the suitable one there is a trick: preheat the oven at 40ºC. Then put the mass inside and turn off the oven. Leave the mass there 20-30minutes.

All this process can be simplified if we have a bread machine. Put all the ingredients of the mass in the bread machine remembering that the milk must be warmed and the butter melted. Select the program just to knead the mass. I have the Clatronic BBA 3364 and the program is 8. It spends, in the whole process, 1hour 30minutes.

Once we have the mass ready,  flour the surface where we are going to work. Extend the mass of rectangular form until it has an approximate size of 45x55cm.

 

Extend the butter for the whole mass. If we see that it is not enough we can use more.

In a bowl mix the cinnamon and the brown sugar. Spreads them over the butter. As before, there is no problem in using more if we see that we do not have for the whole mass.

 

Roll up the mass and cut it. The size must be one or two cm, depending on the size that we want them. Cut them with a good knife in order not to squash the mass. I have used a knife of bread.

Preheat the oven to 180ºC. While we put in a tray oven paper and put the rolls in it. They must be separated enough because they grow very much. Put them to the oven during approximately 20 minutes (the time depends according to the oven, the first time that you make them, take care to see the time that they spend on be ready).

These are the original Cinnamon rolls!!! They can be eaten alone, but if you want it is possible to put on them chocolate toppins or glazed,  or everything you want.