Bella Hyde, Author at Finding Feasts

Gruyer Stuffed Mushrooms

Stuffed Mushrooms with gruyer — Click on image for recipe

Each year, around November I ask myself the same old question…what the heck happened to the year? I mean it seems that one week I am packing up the Christmas tree, the next I am explaining to Imogen why Woolworths has Easter eggs out when we still have Christmas wrapping waiting to be recycled and shortly after it’s back to making Santa lists!

Regardless of how fast the year flies by I have to admit, I love the silly season. After 11 months of working your fingers to the bone there is a sense of relaxation, that care free attitude, happiness, drinks and parties and more drinks!

So with the cocktail and Christmas parties literally just around the corner (some of you have have gotten a head start) here is a divine finger food recipe that goes well with wine and or bubbles. Guryer stuffed mushrooms. Its dead easy to make and your guests will be lining up for more and more!

Got a favourite finger food recipe?

Wishing you a a fantastic silly season!

BellaLeave a comment

Polish Jam Doughnuts

1Paczki - Main Shot — Click on image for full recipe

Polish Paczki,in my opinion are the most divine Polish dessert ever made!

Attend any Polish cultural event and I guarantee you that these will be on the dessert menu! Light and fluffy, filled with jam and coated in sugar or icing, they literally walk off the plate.

Having already made Makowiec, Babka and Szarlotka, it was time to roll up the sleeves and try to make paczki, after all how hard could it be? It’s just sugar, butter, milk, yeast, plain flour, vanilla essence AND a small amount of the most potent vodka you can find, in Poland we call it Spirytus – which is 95% alcohol by volume…ekkk!

Adding the Spirytus to the dough prior to cooking assists in preventing the oil being absorbed into the dough. I had none of this and although I am sure that if I had called one of my Polish family friends that they would be able to tell me in an instance where I could get some but on this occasion I was happy to go without.

My attempt No. 1 = total utter failure! Although I used a new packet of dried yeast, my dough didn’t rise. I still attempted to deep fry the paczki but they were flat as a pancake and rock hard so into the bin they went.

A valuable lesson learnt: Always proof the yeast before baking. This will tell you if the yeast is still active. To proof your yeast you need to warm up the exact amount of liquid as the recipe asks for. Add the required amount of yeast, a pinch of salt, stir to combine, cover with a tea towel and set aside for a couple of minutes. If foam develops you have proof that your yeast is alive!

Attempt No.2, well the picture speaks for itself. And although these paczki were nothing near as yummy as the ones you can buy from a decent Polish deli, Blondie’s son loved them!

The second attempt ones were still a little dense and slightly on the dry side, so I can’t help but wonder if adding the Spirytis would have made them light and fluffy because less of the oil would have been absorbed during the deep frying process. I guess I will find out on attempt No.3!

If you would love to give these a try but prefer not to bake look up your local European Deli. Campbelltown in Western Sydney has these fresh most Saturday mornings but you have to be quick! They sell out as soon as they open their doors at 8 am!

Olka Polka Deli is located at Shop 4, 100 Queen Street Campbelltown NSW. Telephone (02) 4626 3726

I guarantee you will fall in love with these too!

Bella

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Pork meatballs w/ wild mushroom sauce

Finding Feasts - Pork Meatballs with Wild Mushroom Sauce — Click image for recipe

A few weeks ago Blondie and I teamed up with the awesome guys from Stockman’s Ridge wines for Orange’s annual Frost Fest festival. On the menu were their wines and our food inspired by this years mushroom picking season.

Blondie and I were very fortunate enough to get a private tour of the Stockman’s Ridge vineyard earlier on this year and what a beautiful vineyard it is! I highly recommend a visit to this beautiful part of the country.

Finding Feasts - Pork Meatballs with Wild Mushroom Sauce

When it comes to winter and food I am a sucker for anything that is hearty, saucy and cooked s-l-o-w-l-y so that the flavours can develop into a rich taste explosion with each mouthful I take.

I’ve grown up eating meatballs or as we call them in Poland, Klopsiki. My favourite ones are mum’s, of course! She makes them out of pork mince and no matter how hard I try, I can never recreate her yummy sauce but this time I have a secret weapon! FinSki’s wild mushroom powder.

So my dear reader…love meatballs? What’s your secret recipe addition to make these a hit!

Bella

Bella2 Comments

Pierogi with Smoked Slippery Jack Mushrooms

Finding Feasts - Pierogi — Click image for recipe

Pierogi, ahh just saying the word takes me back to my childhood.

Pierogi are synonymous with the Polish. My mother would make these every few weeks with different fillings. One of my favourite was a farm cheese filling with burnt butter and cinnamon sugar – a dessert style dish. My other favourite version was filled with Sauerkraut and Slippery Jack Mushrooms that we had picked in autumn during one of the many mushroom foraging tours I did with my parents and many other Polish families.

I loved biting into the fresh pasta to reveal the dark and rich mushroom filling. The Sauerkraut gives the pierogi a bit of zing as well.

Finding Feasts was recently very fortunate to be asked to take the gorgeous Lyndey Milan on a mushroom forage in Oberon for her upcoming Taste of Australia show which is due to air at the end of the year. Talking to her about all my past mushroom picking escapades with my family made me realise that I have been mushroom picking for a very long time! Since the early 1980′s! That is well over 30 years.

My dad recently came across this gorgeous picture of our family mushroom picking down the Southern Highlands, in 1983! I’m the one with the brown hair not looking at the camera and the gorgeous lady sitting in the picnic chair is my beautiful babcia (grandmother) who is no longer with us but was an avid mushroomer!

Pierogi can be made with various different fillings and once you start experimenting there is no limit to the fillings you can make.

Seeing as ’tis the wild mushroom picking season’ I thought I would share this very traditional recipe with you, however with a very FinSki’s twist on it. This recipe calls for smoked mushrooms and where do you get these I hear you ask? Why FinSki’s of course!

Blondie and I have been experimenting in the kitchen for about 2 years now. We have both tried our hand at smoked mushrooms. Drying the mushrooms elevates them to another level, it increases the flavour tenfold and these smoked mushroom and sauerkraut pierogi are full of wintery smokey flavour.

Enjoy!

Bella

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Slow Cooked Pork Ribs

FinSkis_Moorish Ribs Main — Click on image for recipe

These ribs are my adaptation of Gary Mehigan’s ribs from MasterChef – Season 2.

It’s fair to say that up until recently I hated pork. My family ate plenty of it when I was growing up but it was just one of those things that didn’t sit well with me.

I decided to give this recipe a go for one of our BBQ’s and OMG it was finger licking good. The ribs disappeared off the plate!

The fat cooked out and the meat just fell off the bone.

I have altered this recipe to a child friendly version but if your kids love chilli and ‘heat’ then I definitely suggest adding some chilli powder or flakes.

The lime juice is a gorgeous way to finish off the dish and it balances the sweetness very nicely.

Very mooooooreishhhhhh!

Bella

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Smoked Mushroom Bruschetta w/ Wild Cherry Brandy Sauce

Wild Musrhoom Bruschetta — Click on image for recipe

As simple as this dish looks, this bruschetta mix was a whole weekend’s labour of LOVE! Yes it took me a whole weekend to do!

Let me explain…the mushroom bruschetta mix you are looking at comprises of oyster, swiss brown and shiitake mushrooms. They have all been lightly smoked using hickory chips, dehydrated overnight and re-hydrated prior to cooking.

This isn’t your average bruschetta mix, it’s what I will call heaven on sourdough, if there ever was such a thing!

So why all the effort? Mushrooms are yummy on their own, however I wanted to experiment and take them to the next level. Ever since I was a little girl I remember that mum would slow dry her slippery jacks or saffron’s in the oven overnight, the house would be filled with the most amazing aroma, the drying process would accentuate the flavour of the mushroom giving them a much richer and deeper flavour. Did I just sound like Manu from the Continental Stock commercial???

I know I sound like I am bragging but my efforts paid off! I cannot begin to explain the taste sensation. Smoking the mushrooms gave them that meaty, hearty taste without the meat!

Ohhhh and the tiny drizzle of Walsh’s Homemade Wild Cherry Brandy sauce took it to another dimension, honestly out of this world!

It took a whole weekend to cook but ohhh so worth it!

With love from a self-professed mushroom addict…a.k.a Bella

PS…a huge thank you to the ABC’s The Cook & the Chef for providing inspiration and base ideas for this recipe.

BellaLeave a comment

Makowiec – Polish Poppy Seed Cake

Picking my first recipe for the blog was exciting, challenging and scary! It brought back very special memories of growing up.

When we moved to Australia, mum tried her best to keep a traditional Polish kitchen but it was always subject to seasonal produce and the Australian climate. Having a traditional Polish Christmas Eve dinner on the 24th of December was a little difficult in 35 degree heat! However, hats off to mum as she has done an amazing job keeping a Polish kitchen.

For my first blog I have attempted to make my very first Makowiec…Poppy Seed Cake. Makowiec is very popular with Poles especially during Easter and Christmas and delicious with a cup of coffee! It’s actually very rare to turn up to a Polish party and not have this cake on the menu!

The combination of poppy seeds and the yeasty cake gives it a lovely moist, crunchy like texture. The key to a successful poppy seed cake is to ensure that you mince the poppy seeds 3-4 times to ensure you get rid of the grittiness. Yes, it is a little labour intensive, however the taste is amazing… just ask Blondie.

Making the cake for the first time suddenly gave me an appreciation of the great care mum took with the yeast to ensure that it would rise. There were times when the dough would be wrapped in a warm blanket and put in a dark warm place, away from noise to make it grow. I remember how mum would whisper that noise would spoil the dough and it would not grow, I used to giggle at this theory.

On my 2nd attempt, when the dough failed I found myself suddenly applying all of mum’s old school techniques… no matter how strange they were!

My main tip for this cake is to use fresh yeast when possible, the results are much better…and yes, the whispering helps!

Bella

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