Puglia tomato friselle rusk bread - Traditional breakfast

I've always loved sliced tomatoes on toast, it was my pandemic breakfast of choice. Simply toast, a smear of mayo, sliced tomatoes with salt and pepper.... absolutely my favorite. Sort of a design of my own making, but maybe I saw it somewhere???

Getting to Puglia and waking up to the hotel breakfast on Day 1 was terrific.... cheese, meats, fruits (including one I've never seen, nespole- more on that later) and these yummy tomato toasts. 

Our host,  Elena, was telling us our choices for breakfasts.  She offered frisselle and described as tomato toast,  the said "5, maybe 6 would be right.... I think 6". I was a bit worried, then delighted, when I saw the plate and that they were small. In the photo,  you can see that there are 5... that's because I already put one on my plate and was tucking into a yummy bite. 

Here's my attempt at making it myself for the breakfast when we got to our VRBO a couple days later.

Our host had left us so many things as a welcome gift; fresh orecchiette pasta, jarred pomodoro tomato sauce, the frise (bread rusks), tomatoes, local olive oil, a fresh basil plant, fresh cheese and an assortment of fresh fruit.... oh, and local wine!

The top picture has small frise rusks and the second picture is the larger size. Both are great, but maybe the big ones take a bit more time to soften a bit.

Here's all we did:

12-16 large cherry tomatoes, cut into quarters or eighths

A bit of good olive oil, 2-3 tsp

A big bit of salt

Fresh basil, cut into slivers

A bit of pepper, if you like (and I do)

A couple teaspoons of water

*Some Frise Maltagliate... (dry, light "bagels, AKA "rusks" or bruschetta)

In a medium bowl, cut the tomatoes, drizzle with oil olive and salt. Add slivered basil and pepper.  Give a nice stir and get the 'rusks' ready to go on a plate. 

So our host, through interpretation through his 14 year old niece, told us to add a sprinkle of water. My hubby heard that I should sprinkle the dry bread with water, but I interpreted it to mean that I would add a bit of water to my tomato mixture. I actually think my hubby was right, but honestly, drizzling the rusks with a bit of watery tomato oil also works deliciously too.

Let the rusk sit and absorb the mixture while you get the rest of the breakfast ready to go.  We drank quite a lot of espresso in tiny cups while we prepared our breakfast.

The rusks are in the package behind the bottle of olive oil.  There were more gifts from our host in the fridge: cheese and orecchiette. What a nice gift to leave, everything you need to make yourself a dinner, a snack and a breakfast.

*to make these at home it would be easy to use bruschetta toasts, or leftover French bread toasted/ dried in the oven.  It's supposed to be hard and dry,  hence the sprinkle of water. 

On day one,  here's a photo of our view as we ate breakfast. Not a bad place to start your day. 

Cauliflower Fried Rice

A simple and healthy side dish, or even a main dish, if you like.

I start with raw cauliflower that is grated in the food processor, or by hand. Use the big grater attachment, you want some bigger pieces and not tiny bits.

First, get all your ingredients ready to go ahead of time, do not assemble as you go as you will end up with over cooked fried rice!

Serves about 4

Ingredients

• 2 tsp sesame oil
• 1-2 Tbsp vegetable oil
• 1-2 garlic cloves, minced
• 1/2 cup celery, small dice
• 1/2 cup carrots, small dic1/2 cup white onion, diced
• 2 eggs, well beaten
• 4 cups fresh cauliflower, grated
• 1/2 cup Ham, small dice (optional)
• 1/2 cup Bacon, diced (optional)
• 1/4 cup green onions, thinly sliced
• 1/2 cup frozen green peas, thawed
• 2-3 Tbsp soy sauce

Other optional items/substitutions

• 1/2 cup broccoli, very small florets
• 1/2 cup red bell pepper, diced small

Over medium high heat in a large non-stick skillet, add the sesame oil, vegetable oil and bacon (if using), use it to saute the celery, carrots and carrots until they start to soften a bit and the bacon is cooked, about 5 minutes.  Add the garlic and heat until just soft, about another 2-3 minutes. I add the well beaten eggs to the veggies and mix to 'scramble'.  You can make the scrambled eggs big or small by stirring more, it's up to you.  Add the raw cauli rice, the ham (if using) then the green onions and peas.  Stir to "fry" the mixture, and adjust seasoning with soy sauce.  You can add salt and pepper, if desired.

Try not to over cook the cauliflower rice, as it will start to lose moisture and make your fried rice soggy.

You can serve along side some grilled meat or fish, or even a Chinese stir fry.

Mahi Mahi with Feta Cream Sauce

Easiest dinner ever.

Feta is one of my favorite cheese, along with goat cheese!   This is a great easy way to fancy up some fish for a quick week night dinner.  We often have frozen fish in the freezer (thanks to Costco), and Mahi Mahi is one of our favorites.  This would also work for halibut, tilapia and even salmon.  It's quite possible that this would be great on chicken breasts too, but I haven't tried that yet.

Ingredients

Makes 2

• 2- 6 oz mahi mahi fillets
• 3 Tbsp mayonnaise (like Best Foods)
• 3 Tbsp of crumbled feta
• 1/4 tsp of dried dill
• 1/4 tsp of garlic powder
• 2 tsp lemon juice
• Fresh black pepper
• 1 tsp minced parsley (optional)

Preheat oven to 400 degrees

On a foil lined pan, coat with oil and place fish fillets on top.

Make mixture of the mayo, feta, dill, garlic, lemon juice, pepper and parsley.  Make sure to mix well and get most of the lumps out.

Cover the entire top of the fish with the mixture, put on the top rack of the oven and cook 10-12 minutes, depending on the thickness of your fish. Mine took 14 minutes but they were very thick filets.

Here they are after baking, some of the sauce fell off, but it still plated up nicely.

Here's another recipe that is something a bit similar, Baked Parmesan Salmon. Try that too!

Greek Green Lentil Salad

I had this salad years ago at a Greek restaurant in Vancouver BC (The Greek by Anatoli) and loved it so much. I am not sure if this is 100% the same, but this is what I dreamed up over the years thinking about it.  It has all my favorite flavors!

I finally made this for a party at my house for my birthday. Lots of friends and family came and brought other Greek goodies to share, so it wasn't too hard to host my own party.

I bought my green French lentils in bulk, they are my favorite! I think other lentils would work too.  I just simmer the lentils in water until they are tender, then drain and add them in.  They do tend to swell quite a bit, so be careful that you don't cook too many.  If you do (like I did), you can freeze them to add to soups, or toss with roasted veggies for a nice side dish.  You could even saute them with some butter and spices and make a nice 'bed' for a piece of grilled fish, chick or pork.

Serves 4-6

Ingredients:

• 1 cup green lentils, cooked and drained (cooled)
• 1 cup of cherry tomatoes
• 1 can of garbanzo beans, drained
• 2 cups of arugula (or spinach)
• 3/4 cup of feta, crumbled
• 2-3 Tbsp parmesan cheese
• Juice of one lemon
• Salt and Pepper to taste

Since I was prepping this ahead of time, I added everything to the bowl except the arugula and put it in the fridge.  When we were ready for dinner, it was easy to add the arugula and give everything a toss. I tasted to make sure the seasoning was right, and served it right away.

Here is it is all tossed and ready to serve. It lasted well on the buffet and there weren't any leftovers.

Since this was a Greek party for my birthday, I wanted to share our outfits and back drop.  In case  you're wondering why I am wearing pink star glasses... well, I have to admit it was actually a Mamma Mia Greek party.  We had a blast and it was a fun way to usher in my 60th year.  Singing and dancing until 3am almost killed me, hahaha, but a great time was had by all.

Colmar, France- Easy trip from Germany

I have always wanted to go to Colmar, a small quaint city near the border of Germany.  The Rhine river separates the two countries, and a quick trip over the bridge, you know in France.  The Alsace region of France, is a bit more like Germany in its cuisine and the looks of the buildings. Colmar is also known for a very important sculptor, Auguste Bartholdi, best known to us Americans for the creator of the statue of Liberty! 

 

Called the "Little Venice" of France, which I imagine is very annoying to the real Venetians, the only real thing in common to Venice is that it has a couple canals. It is nothing like Venice in real life.  However, I don't let the mere semantics of what people call it change what I liked about it.  It was quaint, it was fun, it was beautiful!  Remarkably, Colmar escaped any bombing damage from WW2.  To the right is a picture from my February visit on a sunny but cool day. It was perfect for catching the reflections of the buildings in the perfectly still waters of the canals. 

Going in the winter has its merits... it still had many visitors except nothing like it must look like in the middle of summer with busloads of tourists arriving from all points of the globe.  Many river cruised come down the Rhine, and Colmar is a very easy stop to access from the cruise ship.

At first, I thought that the city was very small and dare say it, a bit anti-climatic, but I kept meandering down seemingly deserted lanes to see what else I might discover.  The lanes kept opening up to bigger areas fille with more and more cuteness. 

So many beautiful metal scrollwork signs.  Here's one of the "Two brothers charcuterie" shop.   Below is one of the high streets, filled with tourist shops but also many local shops for people who obviously lived here.

I needed to get some lunch, so Googled "restaurants around me" to see what was recommended.  That's my usual trick for finding places that are enjoyed by tourists and locals alike.  I found a couple of great option, from a cute tea house to an expensive restaurant that might be offering more than I really wanted for lunch.  I had walked by this place a couple of times and it was so darn CUTE, and it had enough stars to reassure me that I would get a decent lunch.

My lunch was basic but exactly what sounded good!  The two table on either side of me seemed to have ordered the same thing, so I really like I chose well. It was basically a French flatbread 'pizza' with a white sauce, cheese, onions and ham!  A green salad (always weird in Europe with beets and corn...) was fresh and nice. Order a pichet (small pitcher) of local rose wine to add to your meal.  I thoroughly enjoyed my lunch.

I needed to drive back to Lake Constance in Germany (also called the Bodensee) where I was visiting for a business trip.  Coming back from France, I could easily have retraced my trip back to the East side of the lake, but decided instead on driving through Switzerland, visiting Lichtenstein for the first time, Austria and coming back to Germany (and the lake) from the south.  It took me five hours altogether, but I did visit 5 countries in 5 hours... not sure where else in Europe you are able to do that. I added Lichtenstein to my list of visited countries, so I'm now at 51 countries! Woo hoo.

I visited the castle below in Vaduz, which happens to be the home of the reigning prince of Lichtenstein.  You are not allowed to get close to this palace, as the guards are a bit aggressive to keep you away. It was fun to see the view though, with the Swiss mountains in the background. The castle from the below shows just how massive it is, it does look a bit smaller here.

It was an easy drive to Austria, and I had a great lunch in the city of Bergenz in Austria and truly had one of the best burgers of my life in a well regarded place called Weiss restaurant. A radler beer, pictured below, is a local German beer that it usually mixed with either Sprite or soda water for a low alcohol choice. Perfect for lunch when I still had some sightseeing and driving to do.

I highly recommend getting out and seeing the local area, even when you're traveling for business. I did go by myself, which is a different experience, but still a lot of fun. Get out there and do it!

Egg Bites- like Starbucks

 I love these little egg bites. I first had them at Starbucks, like so many of you.  The secret to making these is blending cottage cheese with the eggs!  Who knew?! Also, the cottage cheese somehow makes the egg bites more tender than normal baked eggs.

The cottage cheese has a lot of flavor (and salt), so you don't even need to season these, isn't that crazy?

You can make many variations, depending on what you like and what you have on hand.  For these, I used those mini pepperoni, minced jalapenos and mixed Mexican blend cheese.

Here's some other ideas you could create:

• Feta, green onion and bacon
• Mozzarella, tomatoes and basil
• Taco meat, cheese and onion
• Cheddar and chives
• Ham, bacon and jack cheese
• Cream cheese and smoked salmon

Ingredients:

• 8 large eggs
• 1 cup of cottage cheese
• add-ins of your choice... (see above)

Add one cup of cottage cheese to your blender, add in 8 large eggs and blend until not chunks of cottage cheese are noticeable.

Back at 375 for 20-25 minutes.

Note- I recommend a silicon muffin tin for this... it makes it much easier to get out. I use some spray Pam before adding the 'add ins" and then pour in the egg mixture. I fill about 7/8 full and bake.

Let cool and remove from the pan.

These egg bites last in the fridge about 4-5 days, I take two in my lunch almost every day. 

Easy to eat, taste good and lots of protein.

Here's some pictures of the steps: