Quick and Easy Recipes by Ella

Ingredients for two

• 1 kg. of pork thigh
• 500 g. of potatoes
• 1 cup with red wine
• 3 pieces from 1 garlic
• flour
• 1 tea spoon with sugar
• oregano (at your taste)
• 1 cup of tomato sauce
• olive oil
• salt
• pepper beans
• 2 laurel leaves

How To Cook It:

1. Slice (2 inches thick) and rap the meat. Salt it.
2. Take it through the flour, on each side.
3. Fry the slices in olive oil, at medium temperature, 3 min on each side.
4. Make the sauce:
   • Mix up: the olive oil with the garlic, the tomato sauce, the laurel leaves, the oregano, 3 spoons of water, the sugar and the pepper beans.
5. Pour it over the meat and put it in the oven for 10 min.
6. Take it out and pour 1 cup of wine.
7. Leave it in the oven for 20 min.
8. Boil the potatoes.
9. Blend them.
10. Add milk and salt.

Serve the steak with mashed potatoes. I’m sure you can find a creative mashed potatoes recipe, so the dish won’t be too boring.

I know several stuffed chicken breast recipes, so the choice was difficult on which one to publish today. Usually, chicken breast is known to be a bit difficult to swallow. This is probably the reason why cooks and housewives all over the world thought to make it more supportable and actually turned it into a great dish, by inventing the stuffed chicken breast.

Stuffed Chicken Ingredients

• 1 chicken
• pressed cheese (depends on the chicken size)
• leek (depends on the chicken size)
• 4 potatoes
• mushrooms
• eggs
• olive oil
• salt, pepper

How to cook stuffed chicken breast

1. Empty the chicken.
2. Cut the potatoes 1 inch thick.
3. Cut the leek small.
4. Grate the pressed cheese.
5. Scramble the eggs. Salt and pepper them.
6. Mix them up with the leek and the pressed cheese.
7. Stuff the chicken with the mixture.
8. Sew the chicken, up to the butt, leaving a small opening.
9. Put olive oil and water on a big tray.
10. Place the chicken in the middle of a tray; the potatoes and the mushrooms around.
11. Put the tray in the oven, at medium temperature for 20 min.
12. Take it out and sprinkle it with the oily water from the tray.
13. Repeat the operation every 10 min.
14. Leave it in the oven until is ready (depends on the chicken size).

This tasty meal can be served as an appetizer or as the main course, if so you wish. Put some pickles aside, as they go very well together with all chicken breast recipes, not only with this particular one.

There are many easy chicken recipes which can help us cook better and faster, for the happiness of those people we cook for, be them our kids, our husbands or our friends. When cooking chicken, one of the main advantages, compared to other types of meat, is that it gets done in a shorter time. Although I’m not a big fan of chicken breast (I’d rather take the legs and wings), I discovered that there are recipes which give a special flavor and make the meat taste much better. This chicken quinces recipe is one of my favorites. Children love it, too, I suppose that’s because of the caramel sauce.

Ingredients for two

• 600 g. of chicken chest
• 1 kg. of quinces
• ½ cup of sugar
• vegetable oil
• 1 teaspoon of flour
• 1 spoon of sour cream
• salt

Cooking Procedure

1. Cut the chicken chest in medium cubes. Salt it.
2. Fry them for 2 min. Add 1/2 cup with hot water and stir for 8 min.
3. Add the flour and make a white sauce with the cream.
4. Cut the quinces in medium cubes.
5. Fry them for 3 min. Add 2 spoons with hot water.
6. Continue to stir for 5 min.
7. Put the sugar on a pan with oil.
8. Make a caramel sauce.
9. Add the chicken chest with the white sauce and quinces.
10. Put it in the oven, at medium temperature, for 10 min.

Ingredients for two

• 750 g. of lamb meat
• 2 kg. of spinach
• 1 spoon with flour
• vegetable oil
• 2 onions
• tomato sauce
• ½ lemon
• salt, pepper

Cooking Procedure

1. Cut the spinach.
2. Boil it for 5 min.
3. Make sure you keep the remaining water.
4. Cut the lamb meat in medium pieces. Salt and pepper it.
5. Fry it, at medium temperature, for 5 min.
6. Add 2 cups from the remaining water and stir for 10 min.
7. Add the spinach and the tomato sauce.
8. Boil for 10 min.
9. Cut the onions small. Salt them.
10. Fry them for 2 min, than add 1 cup from the spinach remaining water.
11. Stir for 5 min.
12. Add flour and stir quickly. Add spoon by spoon of the remaining water, until you obtain a sauce.
13. Pour it over the lamb meat and the spinach.
14. Slice the lemon.
15. Place the slices on top of the food.

Ingredients for two

• 400 g. of potatoes
• 3 apples
• garlic
• ½ glass with vegetable oil
• ½ glass with water
• 1 spoon with vegetable concentrate
• salt, pepper

Preparation:

• Cut the potatoes in finger shape.
• Cut the apples in small cubes.
• Put all the ingredients in a teflon pan.
• Boil for 20 min.

Ingredients for two:

• 500 g. of chicken liver
• 400 g. of mushrooms
• 4 onions
• 2 oranges
• 2 bell peppers
• dill
• vegetable oil
• salt, pepper

Cooking Procedure

1. Boil the chicken liver for 10 min. and throw away the water.
2. Cut the mushrooms and boil them for 3 min.
3. Throw away the remaining water.
4. Cut small the onions, the oranges and the bell peppers. Salt and pepper them.
5. Fry them with the mushrooms, for 3 min.
6. Add 2 cups of hot water.
7. Stir for 10 min.
8. Cut the dill.
9. Add the liver and the dill.
10. Stir for 2 min.

Ingredients for two persons

• 800 g. turkey chest
• 160 dry plums
• 300 g. raisins
• savory
• 100 ml. white wine
• 1 cube chicken concentrate
• 1 kg. potatoes
• 80 g. butter
• 80 ml. milk
• 50 g. pressed cheese
• 1 orange for decoration

The sauce:

• 100 ml. cognac
• 200 ml. white wine
• 50 g. red onion
• 10 g. savory
• butter
• salt, pepper

Cooking Procedure

• Boil the potatoes and make mashed potatoes.
• Grate the pressed cheese and mix it up with the mashed potatoes.
• Boil the cube of chicken concentrate in 250 g. of water.
• Put the dry plums and the raisins in the soup and boil them until they swollen.
• Cut the turkey chest to obtain 4 big slices.
• Beat them on each side.
• Put the plums and the raisins on 2 slices of turkey chest and cover them with the other slices.
• Fix them with toothpicks. Add salt and pepper.
• Put them in the white wine, the chicken soup and the savory.
• Leave it in the oven, at medium temperature, for 15 min on each side.

The sauce:

• Cut the onion small.
• Mix it up with the white wine, the savory, the salt and the pepper.
• Leave it, at small temperature, for 2-3 min.
• Add the cognac and leave it for 1-2 min.
• Strain the sauce.

• Put the turkey chest over the sauce and leave it for 3 min., at medium temperature.
• Add the mashed potatoes and the butter.
• Put the food in the oven for 5 min.
• Decorate with the orange.

Ingredients for two persons

• 6 eggplants
• 500 g. of tomatoes
• 2 cucumbers
• 3 peppers
• vegetable oil
• olive oil
• salt, pepper

Cooking Procedure

1. Peel off the eggplants.
2. Slice and salt them. Leave it like this for 20 min.
3. Squeeze them. Throw away the liquid.
4. Fry the slices, in vegetable oil, 2 min on each side.
5. Cut the rest of the vegetables and add the olive oil, the salt and the pepper.

So many times, we hear recommendations such as “this chicken dish matches well with a dry, white wine”, or “you cannot serve red wine at fish”. Franky, I was never able to remember what matches what, so I usually ignore such things. Besides, I like only sweet, white wines, so my choice is very restrictive. I imagine each of us has a particular taste in the case of wine, like in the case of food: if you don’t like how eggplants taste, this is it!

But have you ever heard about tasteID? TasteID is a measure of how you like wines, and you can read more about it, and even take the tests yourself on the TasteVine website, which is in the same time a search engine for wines and a social networking place for wine lovers.

Registration is very easy and free, all you have to do is to supply a username, a password and an e-mail address, and you are brought directly to your profile page, which you can customize on the spot by indicating your white or red wine preferences: sweet, dry, fruity…

If you want to establish your tasteID, you’ll have to fill in some questionnaires about a series of wines chosen in such a way that you’ll find them easily on the market, and they won’t empty your wallet or your credit card. Chances are that you have already tasted those wines, as they are quite common: Cabernet Sauvignon, Merlot, Pinot Grigio, Pinot Noir, Riesling, Chardonnay etc.

After you rate one of the wines, you’ll be able to see the profiles of other people in the network who liked that particular wine, and you’ll be able to add them as friends, send them messages, or exchange opinions about your favorite wines.

The search engine returns wines that match your search string. For each item in the results, you have three options: to view more details, to review it, or to buy it online. Or you can read what other sites say about that wine. I tried to search “fish”, hoping I’ll get a list of wines that match with fish dishes, but I’ve got a list of wines which contain “Fish” in the name (maybe because the site seems to be quite young, and there are not many reviews in there yet).

If you want to learn about wine, you can study the wineries catalogue, which contains a lot of wine producers, with lists of their wines production by year. There is also the possibility to order online if you wish.

Briefly, I think I’ll use again my account I’ve created. This idea of bringing together wine lovers, in a social network, sounds good and I’m sure I’ll have the chance to improve my knowledge in this field.

Kindly brought to you by your friends at TasteVine.

Ingredients for two persons

• 4 eggplants
• 250 g. of bacon
• 1 red bell pepper
• 100 g. of mushrooms
• 100 g. of sour cream
• vegetable oil
• salt, pepper

Cooking procedure

1. Cut the eggplants in half, on length.
2. Take out the heart, leaving 1 inch from the eggplants.
3. Put the empty eggplants in the oven, at medium temperature, until you finish the rest of the preparations.
4. Cut the mushrooms in cubes. Salt and pepper them.
5. Fry them in vegetable oil, with 100 g. of water, for 10 min, at medium temperature.
6. Cut the eggplant’s heart, the red bell pepper in cubes. Salt them.
7. Put them on top of the mushrooms and add 100 g. of hot water.
8. Stir for 10 min.
9. Add the bacon cubed.
10. Fill up the empty eggplants with the mixture
11. Leave them in the oven, at medium temperature, for 20 min.
12. Put them on a plate and leave it for 5 min.
13. After that, add the sour cream.