Belgian wafles

Brussels is located in the northern half of Belgium just above the main language border which separates the Flemish-speaking northern region and the French-speaking southern region of Belgium. The country is bordered by four countries: France, the Netherlands, Germany and Luxembourg and has a coast facing the North Sea across from the United Kingdom. Due to the country’s central location, Brussels’ transport infrastructure is highly developed and the city is easily reachable by air, train, bus, car and even ferry.

Eating out is one of the pleasures of visiting Brussels but you need to know where to eat otherwise you will fall into tourist traps. Just because a place is crowded doesn’t mean the food and beverages are good. Know where the locals go to be treated with first class service and some really enjoyable fare. Brussels people love good food, good beers and a relaxing atmosphere. If this sounds like you then you’ll fit right into the dining scene.

Waffles are a dough-based cake that is cooked on a waffle iron with different shapes to give them their distinctive shape, design and indentations. Different varieties of waffles are eaten around the world; in Belgium, the Netherlands, Scandinavia, the United States and Hong Kong.

Belgian waffles are made with thick wads of dough grilled on a heating iron to make deep, square-shaped indentations. The smell of freshly-made Belgian waffles is always wafting from the corner shops or snack food vans to attract anyone to sample some. Some home recipe variations will use baking powder instead of the yeast as a leavener, or both baking powder and yeast. Using baking powder is faster, though the tang from the yeast will be missing: some people say they prefer using baking powder because they don't like the tang.

There are two types of waffles which you will see being sold on the streets, in restaurants and casual snack shops of Brussels.

Brussels Waffles
One is Brussels Waffles (Gaufre de Bruxelles), made from batter leavened with beaten eggs. It is served with powdered sugar or chocolate.

Liège Waffles
The waffles from Liege are also widely sold in Brussels. They are popular on snack food vans and corner shops in metro stations. Liege waffles are slightly oval shaped with sugar baked into the waffle dough making them slightly chewy and very sweet.


Some history,

In 1958, at the World Fair in Belgium, a man named Walter Cleyman sold waffles within the World's Fair compound area. He served them topped with whipped cream and fresh fruit, and dusted with icing sugar. Previously, Americans had only experienced waffles with syrup on them. Cleyman sold around 400,000 waffles at the fair that year.

Cleyman won a place to sell his waffles again at the 1962 World's Fair in Seattle. To help him, he brought over from Belgium his wife, his two daughters, and his gas-powered waffle irons. He opened two waffle stands: one on Boulevards of the World, the other near the International Fountain. One was actually a large restaurant, on a corner, built in the style of a Belgian or Dutch building. 

http://www.cooksinfo.com

Pumpkin soup with apple

Ingredients 6 servings:

1 tablespoon vegetable oil
1/2 onion
1 clove garlic
2 teaspoons grated ginger
1 small hot chili pepper
2 small or medium-size apples
500 g pumpkin (fresh)
1/3 teaspoon cinnamon
Salt and pepper
about 1.25 liters vegetable stock
freshly ground pepper
gorgonzola or Roquefort or other blue cheese with a mold

Preparation:

Heat the oil in a larger pot with a thick bottom, add the onion and fry it. Then add the grated garlic, grated ginger and halved, pitted chili. Fry for a minute.

Add peeled, cored free and diced apples. Cook stirring occasionally for about 4 - 5 minutes.

Now add cut into pieces the baked pumpkin*. Season with salt, pepper, cinnamon and bring to a boil.

Pour the stock in such an amount that reached 2 cm above the level of the vegetables. Bring to a boil, cover and simmer for about 10 minutes on a smaller heat until the pumpkin is tender. Blend to a smooth puree, if necessary, by adding more of boiling stock.

Serve such a small amount of crumbled gorgonzola cheese with the bread.

* How to bake a pumpkin: about 2 kg pumpkin, washed and cut into about 6 parts, remove the seeds. Place on a baking tray skin-side down and place in oven preheated to 200C. Bake for about 1 hour, or until the pumpkin is tender (a fork can easily be embedded deep into the flesh). Bore the flesh with a spoon of roasted pumpkin and mix the blender to a smooth puree . Measure out the required amount.

Pumpkin time - Pumpkin Spice Latte

Goodbye flip-flops and lemonade… hello hoodies and pumpkin spice!

The sweet, creamy flavours of cinnamon and nutmeg make Pumpkin Spice just right for automn crisper days and cooler nights. Now we can have Pumpkin Spice Coffee at home, recipe below.

One of the ingridients is pumpkin.
Pumpkin Spice Latte
Ingredients 2 servings:

4 tablespoons Pumpkin-spiced syrup (recipe below)
2 double espresso
250 ml milk
whipped cream
blend of spices: grated nutmeg, ground ginger powder, cinnamon, vanilla sugar

Preparation:

Prepare Pumpkin-spicy syrup (recipe below). Brew a cup of coffee and ad froth milk. The cups of hot coffee poured syrup (after 2 tablespoons), stir and pour (from above) hot frothed milk. Garnish with whipped cream and sprinkle with spices.

Pumpkin-spicy syrup, about 180 ml:

1/2 cup water
1 tsp ginger powder
1 teaspoon of cinnamon powder
1 teaspoon grated nutmeg
1 teaspoon vanilla extract or 1 tablespoon vanilla sugar
1/3 cup sweetened condensed milk (can be natural or caramel-flavored
1/4 cup roasted pumpkin puree


Preparation:

Heat the water in a pan, then add the spices: ginger, cinnamon and nutmeg and vanilla.

Bring to a boil, reduce heat to low and cook for 5 minutes, set aside from the heat and leave for 15 minutes.

Add to the pan condensed milk and stir until dissolved (if necessary can be heated).

Add roasted pumpkin puree and mix or blend. The syrup is ready to use. Keep it in the refrigerator.

Enjoy!

Cuppa with Her Majesty

During the summer, at the end of your visit to the State Rooms, you can enjoy a moment of relaxation and refreshment in the Garden Café on the Palace’s West Terrace. The café serves a selection of light refreshments, including tea, coffee, sandwiches and delicious pastries, specially created for Buckingham Palace.

After 173 years of receiving royal guests, Buckingham Palace opened its own café. From July 2010, in the café you can have tea, scones, sandwiches, cakes, meringues and even seafood salads to the 400,000 people who will come wandering through her home.

The Garden Café, to give it its proper name, will be operated by royal caterers Chester Boyd, who do all the Queen's garden parties. But those who would expect nothing less than bone china will be in for a disappointment. The special-issue blue plates and cups marked "Garden Café, Buckingham Palace" are cardboard.

Nuala McGourty, director of retail at Buckingham Palace, said* "the café expects less recycling than in other coffee shops, as customers are likely to smuggle out their cups, plates and even trays as souvenirs. "But if someone would like to take a cup home, then we're very happy to offer them an unused one,".

*Londyn Evening Standard / Tourists enjoy the ultimate British taste as Buckingham Palace opens new café

fudge brownies

Ingredients
165g butter, plus extra for greasing
200g dark chocolate, grated or finely chopped
3 free-range eggs
2 free-range egg yolks
1 vanilla pod, seeds only (or alternatively 2 tsp vanilla extract)
165g soft light brown sugar
2 tbsp plain flour
1 tbsp cocoa powder
pinch salt
154g pack chocolate biscuits, such as Oreos, broken into quarters

Preparation method

Preheat the oven to 180C. Grease a 20cm/8in square baking tin with butter, then line with baking paper with the paper overlapping the sides a little.

Melt the butter in a pan over a medium heat. When the butter has melted, remove the pan from the heat and add the grated (or chopped) chocolate. Leave to stand for a few minutes, or until the chocolate melts, and then stir together. Alternatively, you can put the chocolate and butter in a bowl and melt in the microwave in 25-second blasts, stirring well each time.

Whisk the eggs, egg yolks and vanilla together in a large bowl until the eggs begin to get light and fluffy. Add the sugar in two additions, whisking between each. Pour it around the side of the egg mix so as not to knock out the air that has been whisked in. Keep whisking until the mixture becomes stiffer. Once the egg mixture is ready, pour the chocolate into it - again around the sides so as not to knock the air out.

Add the flour, cocoa powder, salt and a third of the biscuits and stir until fully combined, then pour the mixture into the prepared tin. Scatter the remaining biscuits over the top, pressing them in slightly. Bake on the middle shelf of the oven for 25–30 minutes. The middle should be very so slightly gooey. Leave the brownies to cool in the tin - the top will sink and crack a little.

Pull the brownies out using the overlapping paper and cut into squares.

Enjoy a taste of Spain - tapas

Tapas are a wide variety of appetizers, or snacks, in Spanish cuisine. They may be cold (such as mixed olives and cheese) or hot (such as chopitos, which are battered, fried baby squid). In select bars in Spain, tapas have evolved into an entire, and sometimes sophisticated, cuisine. In Spain, patrons of tapas can order many different tapas and combine them to make a full meal.

The serving of tapas is designed to encourage conversation because people are not so focused upon eating an entire meal that is set before them. Also, in some countries it is customary for diners to stand and move about while eating tapas.

El tapeo, the art of eating tapas, is a social occasion of which conversation forms as much an integral part as eating and drinking. A tapa and a drink are taken in one bar and then you pass on to another and so on until you are satiated. So you get to eat and drink well, solve the world’s problems and with all the walking burn off lots of calories!

Where to eat?

The Bar Giralda in Seville makes for a wonderful place to dine if you have been busy seeing the sights all day! Located right across the street from the Cathedral or the Alcazar, this is definitely the place to eat. The menus sport a great variety of tapas to choose from at a very reasonable price.

This bar occupies what was once the site of Moorish baths, with the columns and arches still being preserved. Even though the bar is very close to the Giralda after which it obviously takes its name, it is in no way a ‘tourist’ bar, although many tourists eat there. The list of tapas is immense with a recent count coming up with sixty-one! Included are calamares rellenos (stuffed squid), cola de toro (bull’s tail), agaucate con langostinos (avocado with king prawns), pastel de calabacín (courgette pie), jamon iberico (iberian ham), marge de pato sorbe championonese (duck marget on mushrooms slices.

Taste of Portugal- Cataplana Algarvia

For the Cataplana Algarvia

¼pt/½ cup extra virgin olive oil
1 medium cooked potato - peeled and sliced finely
½ small onion, sliced finely
1 clove of garlic, finely chopped
2 mackerel cutlets
4 small cuttlefish or squid - opened
½ lobster cut in half lengthways
4 green king prawns - shelled and deveined
4 live black mussels - cleaned
2 tbsp flat leaf parsley - torn
about 1pt/2 cups base stock

Preparation method

• To make the Lisbon paste, place the peppers into a hot char-gril panl and char all over.
• Place in a bowl and cover with cling film and set aside for 10 minutes.
• Remove the cling film, cut the peppers into quarters and remove the skin with a knife.
• Blend the peppers with garlic in a food processor to form a paste.
• Add the olive oil with the motor still running.
• Season, to taste, with salt.

• To make the base stock, heat the oil, onion, garlic and bay leaf over medium heat.
• Add the Lisbon paste and sauté.
• Add the anchovies and sauté for 1 minute.
• Add the tomatoes and cook for a further 3 minutes.
• Add wine, star anise and stock and cook a further 20 minutes.

To make the cataplana of seafood, heat a cataplana (a saucepan with tight fitting lid is a good substitute).
Fry the olive oil, onions, garlic, Lisbon paste and potatoes. Add the fish, mussels, lobster and a ladle of base stock. Close it and partly cook for 2 minutes.
Add the rest of the seafood, cover with the remaining stock and parsley, re-cover with the lid and cook for a further 4 minutes.

To serve, open the cataplana at the table to capture the aromas.

Bristol Harbour Festival

Bristol Harbour Festival is one of the UK's largest public festivals and a chance for the city to showcase its rich musical and performance roots. Over 250,000 festival fans head down to the 2 mile stretch along Bristol's waterfront to party, dance and relax. This year the festival took place from 26th - 28th July.

The festival gets off to a leisurely start on Friday afternoon when the markets open at around 2pm.

The stage on Queen Square comes to life at 5.30pm

On Saturday and Sunday all the stages are up and running by 12 noon. But it's always a good idea to arrive earlier and get your bearings! 

It's much easier to plan your day with the help of an official programme.

A churro, sometimes referred to as a Spanish doughnut, is a fried-dough pastry. Churros are popular in Spain, France, the Philippines, Portugal, Latin America (including Brazil and Spanish-speaking Caribbean islands) and the United States. There are two types of churros in Spain, one which is thin (and sometimes knotted) and the other which is long and thick (porra). They are both normally eaten for breakfast dipped in hot chocolate or café con leche.

The origin of churros is unclear. One theory is they were brought to Europe by the Portuguese. The Portuguese sailed for the Orient and, as they returned from Ming Dynasty China to Portugal, they brought along with them new culinary techniques, including modifying the dough for You tiao also known as Youzagwei in Southern China, for Portugal. However, they modified it by introducing a star design because they did not learn the Chinese skill of "pulling" the dough (the Chinese Emperor made it a capital crime to share knowledge with foreigners). As a result, churros are not "pulled" but rather extruded out through a star-shaped die.

Another theory is that the churro was made by Spanish shepherds, to substitute for fresh bakery goods. Churro paste was easy to make and fry in an open fire in the mountains, where shepherds spend most of their time.

Foodies Festival

Foodies Festival is back for another year at  beautiful Bristol Harbourside on July 12th, 13th and 14th 2013.

Amazing  Cake & Bake Theatre:

Flower infusions and botanical chocolates with Sciolti Chocolates and Chocolate Tastings with Coeur De Xocolat

David G-Haigh

David Greenwood-Haigh, a professional chocolatier has been working in the food industry for more than 35 years he did run our prezentations.

Good recipy you can find on his internet page http://www.coeurdexocolat.com/

Cocoa bean

David is a Master Chef member of the Craft Guild of Chefs. He has a lifelong love of food, and a creative passion and flair.  Trained as a chocolatier, David has also recently written his first book – a Haitian recipe book, and is now planning a chocolate book.

David joined Divine Chocolate in 2005 as a National Accounts Manager but also doubled as the Divine chocolatier providing inspiring chocolate workshops, which included chocolate and wine pairing, hands on chocolate truffle making sessions and chocolate tempering demonstrations.

David’s other passions include: Haiti, His Motorbike, His large collection of cookery books (many of them about Chocolate!), and Photography.

Cake & Bake Theatre:

Bakery hints and tips with Manisha.

It was time to tune in for this little taste of Middle England and find out why people in aprons cooking buns have caught the imagination of more than four million viewers each week.

The Great British Bake Off is a British television baking competition first shown by the BBC on 17 August 2010. The judges are cookery writer Mary Berry and professional baker Paul Hollywood. Mel Giedroyc & Sue Perkins have presented all three series of the programme. The competition selects from amongst its competitors the best amateur baker.

The Great British Bake Off

Manisha is a nursery teacher in Leicester during the day then cooks all the family meals for her father and brothers in the evenings. Her passion for baking began when her mum showed her how to make a Victoria sponge when she was little. Her strengths are classic English biscuits, cakes and pastry, but she also makes some Indian biscuits and cakes too.

Chefs theatre:

Martin Lauris Blunos (born 11 April 1960) is a British TV chef. Blunos earned twoMichelin Guide stars at his restaurant Lettonie, first in Bristol and then in Bath.

Martin Lauris Blunos

Michelin Stars Defined:
• One star: A very good restaurant in its category.
• Two stars: Excellent cooking and worth a detour. First class cuisine of its type.
• Three stars: Exceptional cuisine and worth a special journey. Often extremely expensive, and with an
extensive wine list.

Fresh coconut milk

BBQ arena, recipes with top chef Rob Kennedy

Food from pop-up restaurants

yume kitchen

GROMIT UNLEASHED IN BRISTOL

Aardman Animations has joined with  charity, Wallace&Gromit`s Grand Appeal, to present Gromit Unleashed, a ten-week-long public art. Trail that will see 80 five-foot-high sculptures of Gromit, unleashed into the city of Bristol and the surrounding area. 

From 1st July to 8th September, as you wander around city, you will find sculptures that have been individually designer and created by some of our best local artists.

You can pick up trail map with will help you to find your way around the Gromits. Overleaf, you`ll find a full list of all the Gromits that have been unleashed into Bristol- and beyond. Also you can pop one of official Gromit Unleased passport stops to collect six Gromit stamps.

As you discover Gromit around the city, you will also be able to walk Brunel`s iconic Clifton Suspension Bridge, relax on a boat trip around the Harbourside, see Bristol`s famous street art and even do a spot shopping.

After the trail, the next big event will be to auction.
On 3rd Octomber 2013, the sculptures will be auctioned to the highest bidders at the Gromit Unleashed Pavilion at The Mall, Cibbs Causeway, raising funds for Wallace&Gromit`s Grand Appeal, the Bristol Children’s Hospital Charity.

My Gromit`s

1. Newshound 

Bristol City Museum

2. TutanGromit

Bristol City Museum

3. Bushed

Royal West of England

4. Vincent van Gromit

Elton Road

5. Golden Gromit

Victoria Rooms

6. Sir Gromit of Bristol

St George`s Bristol

9.The Grommalo

Bristol Central Library

10.Steam Dog

At-Bristol

11.Astro Dog

Milenium Square

12.Fish Tales

Bristol Aquarium

13.Close Shave

Tourist Information Centre

14.Salty Sea Dog

The cascade steps

42.Watch Out Gromit!

M Shed

43.National Treasure

M Shed

45.Being Gromit Malkovich

Brunel`s ss Great Britain

46.Gromberry

The pumphouse

48.Sheepdog

The Mall Gardens

49.Dog Rose

Whiteladies Road

51.A Mandrill`s Best Friends

Bristol Zoo Gardens

52.Ship Shape&Bristol Fashion

Sion Hill

53.Fiesta

Avon Gorge Hotel

64.Blossom

The Downs

65.Zodiac

Arnolfini

66.Hound Dog

Arnolfini

67.It`s Kraken, Gromit!

The Downs

77.Bristol Bulldog

Bristol Airport