Cookies With Dates

We have started to count down for 2010. Everyone has been thinking of the good and bad points of the leaving year these days. When you turn on the TV, you see several programs on the events of 2009 and all people have wishes for the new year.

How was 2009 for my part? I was planning to create this blog at this time last year(2008). After discussing several things of the blog with hubby (thanks a million my dear for your help), we released Give Recipe in the first weeks of 2009. I remember how excited I got when I received the first comment. Now there are over 2000 comments in my blog, but I still get excited by a new one. Thank you everyone for commenting on my posts, I appreciate them much. The number of the posts is 153 with this one, and Give Recipe’s character has been getting more and more clear through these posts. At the beginning I wasn’t aware of how big the place of Give Recipe in my life would be, but I’ve realized before long that there isn’t a single day I don’t think of it. Also, I’ve had the chance of learning about the world of food blogs since the starting of Give Recipe. I have many blogger friends and I’ve learnt lots of new dishes from them so far. As I’m working as a teacher, I’ve been so busy with my students and school works for some months. That’s why I can’t find enough time to follow my favorite food blogs and commenting on them every time. But I’m trying to visit them whenever I have some time. I’m looking forward to Winter break to have more time to catch up what my friends are doing in their blogs.

The other nice event for me in 2009 was the birth of my niece, the cutest baby around the world. I love her so much that my eyes get full of tears whenever I look at her photo. I wish her all the best.

To say a sweet goodbye to 2009, I made these cookies with date. The best thing I love in them is the orange flavor. The cubes of orange zest are like little gifts hidden in the cookies.

Happy new year to everyone!

Hurmalı Kurabiye
Ingredients (8 or 10 servings)
For the dough:
-    2 cups flour
-    ½ cup ground pistachio
-    ½ cup confectioner’s sugar
-    1 tbsp vanilla
-    1 tbsp baking powder
-    1 egg white
-    125g butter, at room temperature and chopped in cubes
For the filling mixture:
-    1 orange zest, sliced in cubes
-    2tbsp orange juice
-    20 dates
-    3 tbsp ground hazelnut
-    2 tbsp hot water

For the filling mixture, remove the seeds of dates and wait them in hot water for some minutes so that they can be chopped easier.

Put the dates into a mini chopper, add hot water and orange juice and chop them. If it’s still so dry, add a little more hot water and mix together until combined well. Add hazelnut and orange zest cubes in this mixture.

Sift the flour on the counter. Add vanilla, pistachio, baking powder and confectioner’s sugar on it.  In the middle of the flour, toss the butter cubes and eg white. Knead this mixture well until it’s not sticky and soft enough.

Lay the baking sheet on an oven tray.

Preheat the oven at 170C.

Take walnut sized pieces from the dough, flatten them out, put enough filling mixture in them and roll them in your hands. Place the cookies on the baking sheet. Bake them for 20 minutes and take out from oven. Let them cold.

You can keep these in jars for a week. Put some orange zest slices in the jar if you like. It gives a fresh smell to the cookies.

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Rosehip Tea

Rosehip is a herbal miracle that I learnt from dad. He is one of those who hates using medicine and prefers herbal remedy instead. He always says that the nature always serves us what we need. I was so surprised as a child by dad’s knowledge on some herbs when we had a walk around the village where he spent his childhood. When passing along some wild bushes, he would stop, pick a few small fruits, rub them on his clothes to remove the dust and throw one into his mouth and give the rest to me. I didn’t have any single idea what I was eating then as we wouldn’t see such fruits at the markets or bazaars (we still don’t see many of them). They were incredibly fresh and they made me feel like I was in a different world (most probably because I would watch “Alice in Wonderland” then). How was it possible that he knew so much about these interesting fruits or herbs? He said that in his childhood, the children of that village would gather and go exploring on the mountains. As there were no computer games in their time, they would create their own games then. Their games would generally contain the things they could find in forests on mountains. They would invent a game from the twigs of bushes or trees, from dandelions or even from pine cones. And while playing in the forest, dad says that they would never feel hungry as they would snack various wild fruits they came across. In this way, they would learn what fruit was edible by experimenting. Sounds like a real learning in nature, doesn’t it?

Rosehip was one of the wild fruits they would see so often in the forest. And they would fill their pockets with rosehips whenever they saw it as they knew how healthy it was. When they empty their pockets at home, their mom would make either rosehip tea or rosehip marmalade.

Being aware of the benefits of rosehip, dad has turned it into a usual tea for us by making it often. Therefore, the word ‘rosehip’ doesn’t remind us of a disease unlike many people who identify this fruit with the flu. Of course, it’s known as one of the best herbal remedies against the flu and it strengthens immune system, but at the same time it’s a great drink with a sourish flavor. In Winter you can drink it hot, and it makes a perfect cold drink in Summer. Even when dried, it doesn’t lose the vitamins it contains. Experts say that it is a stock of vitamin C, about 40 times more than citrus fruits.

It’s so easy to make the rosehip tea, and you will need a teapot to brew the tea.

Kusburnu Cayi

Ingredients
-    A handful rosehip (about 10 pods)
-    5 or 6 cups of water
-    Honey

Pour the water in the teapot. Throw the rosehips into it. Put its lid on. Heat it over medium heat for about 5 minutes. When it starts to boil, bring it to the lowest heat and keep boiling for about 10 minutes. Then take it from fire. Let it rest for about 5 minutes. Then, pour it to cups and sweeten it with a little honey.

If you would like to drink it cold, pour all into a jug, mix it with honey or sugar and wait it in refrigerator until cold.

If you want to make it just for 2 servings (just like I did yesterday), decrease the given measurements. I used a coffeepot and pour 2 small cups of water in it and 5 rosehip pods were enough.

As a Winter drink (sorry for the photo, the batteries of my camera was about to end).

As a Summer drink

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Tutmac Soup

While shopping in our local bazaar last week, I saw a woman selling some traditional soup ingredients on a very small stand in front of her. You may wonder what I mean with soup ingredients. Hee, women prepare some soup ingredients and keep them for Winter. They are like the healthy and delicious version of industrially-made soups. Some of these ingredients were varieties of noodle like dough pieces; some of them are in strips, some are in tiny squares. In addition, there were also the varieties of tarhana, which is a sun dried soup ingredient mainly containing several grounded vegetables and yogurt. All these were in plastic bags of 1 kg. You know I love talking to such ladies in bazaar, I assume that they know a lot of things about cooking, so I never miss the chance of talking to them in bazaar. That lady didn’t look like a usual bazaar seller, she was different as she wasn’t calling customers, she was just sitting behind her small stand and waiting for foodies interested in traditional soups. She said that she herself made all these soup ingredients, which means a plus for me. These ingredients are all unique as ou can’t find them at supermarkets. They don’t have a company product version, so such ladies are like great treasures if you don’t have time to prepare the ingredients yourself. Among all the ingredients on her stand, these teeny weeny squares took my attention. They were just like the ones mom used to make. It was surprising for me to see it in the bazaar miles away from my hometown. The lady’s recipe for this soup was different from mom’s, but I prefered to make it in mom’s style as I was sure it would take me to my childhood.

When she was younger, mom used to make our own bread like phyllo sheets and they would meet our monthly bread need. We wouldn’t buy bread loaves then. And whenever there was some piece of dough left, she would make these tiny squares from it. I mean she wouldn’t prepare the dough just for making the squares, but made these just after finishing rolling the phyllo sheets. The soup made of these squares are called Tutmac Soup or Kesme Soup.

The procedure to make these tumac squares is almost the same with Thimble Soup(Yüksük Corbasi), so you can check the recipe for the dough here. The only difference is that you will cut the squares even smaller and you will not stuff them with anything. After cutting them, dry them in a preheated oven over 170C for about 15-20 minutes. Then put them in jars and you can keep them for months. Whenever you want to make a traditional soup for your guests, you can make tutmac soup with these squares.

Tutmac Corbasi
Ingredients
- 1 cup green lentil
- ½ cup tutmac squares
- 5 or 6 cups water
- ½ lemon, squeezed
- 1 tbsp pepper paste (or 2 tbsp tomato paste)
- 1 onion, chopped
- 3 cloves garlic, sliced
- 2 tbsp butter
- 1 tbsp dried mint
- Salt to taste

Boil the green lentils until tender and drain to get rid of its black water. Pour 5 cups of water in a pot, add lentils and bring it to boil. When it boils, add the squares and boil until they get soft (about 10-15 minutes). Pour the lemon juice. Take it from fire.

Melt the butter in a pan, saute the onions and garlic in it. Put pepper paste and dried mint, mix until combined. Pour this mixture in the pot, sprinkle some salt, stir and bring it to boil.

If you like, you can drizzle some yogurt on it.

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Zucchini Fritters

There are several vegetables used to make fritters, but zucchini is the most prefered one in Turkish cuisine. There are several reasons why Turkish women generally use zucchini for fritters. First, it  helps digestion system of body. You don’t feel bloated when you eat fritters made of zucchini. There is another reason for Turkish moms to favour zucchini while making fritters. You know moms always wish their children eat all vegetables and zucchini is one of the vegetables that children hardly love to eat.   However, I can’t think of a child who refuses these small and cute fritters. Knowing this, clever moms make fritters to make their children love this light vegetable. As this is not a main dish, moms generally make these as a snack before dinner time when their children come back from school.

Also, zucchini fritters enrich friend meetings in the afternoon. Turkish women try to serve various snacks when they invite some friends. Some of these snacks are a kind of borek, stuffed grapevine leaves, kisir, potato salad, lentil balls, cigarette borek, etc. And zucchini fritters are one of these snacks that is served to guests on a plate with some sliced tomatoes and cucumbers.

The last reason to prefer zucchini for fritters is that Turkish women want to put leftover zucchinis in use. When making stuffed zucchini, they carve their inside out and they don’t use these in stuffing mixture. As they don’t want to waste these, they generally put them in a plastic bag and keep in refrigerator for the following day. They make fritters from these at breakfast or as a snack for their children. So if you stuff zucchinis, do not throw their insides away.

Kabak Mucver

Ingredients
-    2 zucchinis
-    1 cup crumbled feta cheese
-    2 eggs
-    8 tbsp flour
-    Half bunch of parsley
-    Half bunch of fresh dill
-    1 tbsp baking powder
-    1 tsp salt
-    1 tsp black pepper
-    ½ cup vegetable oil to fry

Grate the zucchinis and squeeze their juice with your hands.

Beat the eggs in a large bowl. Add cheese and whisk.

Mince the parsley and dill. Put them in the egg mixture.

Finally, add flour, baking powder, salt and black pepper and mix them all until combined.

Heat the oil in a skillet. Take a little mixture with a tablespoon and throw it in the pan. Put as many pieces as your pan contains. When one side is fried (in about a minute), flap the other side. When both sides are fried, take the fritters and put them on a paper towel to get rid of the excessive oil.

Alternatively, you can cook them in oven instead of frying if you want it without oil. You will just place the fritter mixture with a tablespoon on a baking sheet in an oven tray and cook them at 180C for about 30 minutes until golden.

Serve these fritters with some greens or sliced tomatoes and cucumbers.

Healthy Vegetables

An eggplant, a carrot, a green pepper and a zucchini are close friends in the same neighborhood. They love to spend time together; they go swimming, play tennis, and have a morning walk together. In fact, the zucchini is the one who encourages them to have such an active life. Unlike the other vegetables, who love to mess around at home, the zucchini always try to be active to be fit. She always reminds her friends that they are vegetables, which means they must do exercise to stay healthy. She always tries different methods to persuade the other vegetables to exercise. This time she takes her friends to a dance club and maybe because of the lively music or the lovely costumes, they all enjoyed to be there. The zucchini thinks that she eventually finds the best way for her friends to exercise as they all promise to attend the club regularly.(drawing by mom)

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Tags: fritters, mucver, snacks, zucchini