DARK CHOCOLATE

Dark Chocolate Chewy Cookies

What you need:

• 2 eggs

• 10 pcs. dried dates, boiled

• 2 cups almond butter

• 1/2 cup dark chocolate chips

• 2 tablespoons water

• 2 teaspoons vanilla extract

• 1/2 teaspoons baking powder

• 1/4 teaspoon sea salt

Combine softened dates, water and sea salt in a food processor and pulse until coarsely ground. Add almond butter, vanilla extract and baking powder to the food processor and blend until smooth. Stir in (by hand) the chocolate chips. Form mixture into balls and arrange on greased baking sheets. Bake in a pre-heated oven (350F) for 8 to 10 minutes. Allow to cool for several minutes in a cooling rack before serving.

SWEET POTATO

 - One can of evaporated milk (12 fl oz)
 - One tablespoon of vanilla extract
 - A third of a teaspoon of nutmeg
 - One and a half teaspoons of cinnamon
 - Two and a half sticks of unsalted butter (about 1 cup and a quarter, or about 250 grams)
 - Three fourths of a cup of walnuts  

Preparation:
 - Cover the sweet potatoes in aluminum foil, and bake in the oven until they are soft (it takes about an hour). When done, remove the skins, and mash with a fork or with a hand mixer. Let the oven stay heated at 400F.
 - Separately, whisk the eggs, then add the vanilla extract, the cup of sugar, salt, and the evaporated milk. Add over the mashed sweet potatoes.
 - Melt two of the butter sticks in a pan, then combine with the sweet potatoes. Add the nutmeg and the cinnamon, and mix till uniform.
 - Take the baking pan where you will cook the dish. You still have half a stick of butter - use a bit of it to coat the pan. Following, add two-three spoons of flour to the pan, and distribute them uniformly (they'll stick to the butter). This will prevent the dessert from sticking to the pan.
 - Melt the remaining butter (after the coating is finished), and mix with the chopped walnuts, the flour, and the brown sugar.
 - Carefully place the sweet potato mixture in the pan, then top it with the walnuts crumbles as prepared at the previous step. Bake in the oven for 50-60 minutes.
 - Remove from the oven, let cool overnight, then store in the fridge. Serve cold.

Straeberry ICE CREAM

  

Ingredients:
 - Your (guests') favorite ice cream (I love the Häagen-Dazs Rum and Raisin, if you invite me over)
 - Delicious strawberries
 - Whipped cream
 - Chocolate syrup

Preparation:
 - Scoop the ice cream into the bowl, and add the sliced strawberries. As easy a preparation as you might ask for.

Presentation:
 - Top with whipped cream, and draw some diagonal lines with the chocolate syrup.

VEGETABLE SOUP

Ingredients:
 - Two yellow bell peppers
 - Two summer squashes
 - Two celery sticks
 - One yellow onion
 - One carrot
 - One parsnips
 - Five or six potatoes
 - One small celery root
 - One and a half pounds of chicken (preferably with skin and bones - legs, wings, backs)
 - Spices: salt, a tablespoon of black peppercorns, four or five bay leaves

Preparation:
 - Wash, clean and peel the vegetables. Place them alongside the chicken in a large pot.
 - Add one gallon of water, the black peppercorns and the bay leaves.
 - Bring to a boil, then reduce the heat to medium, cover, and continue cooking for an hour and a half.
 - Remove from heat.
 - Pick the vegetables and place them separately.
 - Pick the chicken pieces. Separate the meat and discard the bones and the skin.
 - Sift the soup through a cheesecloth, and discard the bay leaves and the peppercorns - they already added flavor to the soup.
 - Run the vegetables (minus the carrot) and the chicken meat through the blender (use some of the soup to get it going). Mash the carrots separately: similarly to my mom's original recipe, I like to see very small pieces of the carrot in the soup, and not really a puree of it (which would change the color of the soup).
 - Finally, mix the vegetables and chicken with the remaining soup. Add salt to taste.
 - Serve warm.

ROASTED CARROTS

Ingredients:
 - 1 pound of baby carrots (cut and peeled)
 - 1 head of garlic (mashed)
 - 1 cup of fresh dill or parsley (chopped)
 - Cooking oil
 - Spices: salt and pepper
 - [optional] 3 tablespoons of flour or baking powder

Preparation:
 - Bring water to a boil in a pot.  Add the baby carrots, and boil them for 7 minutes.
 - Remove the carrots, and place in a colander to discard extra water.  Leave there for 5-10 minutes.  Further rub them with a paper towel to remove extra water (it tends to be unruly and jumpy when in contact with the heated oil following soon).
 - Optional: if you want a nice crunchier crust, coat the baby carrots with flour or baking powder.
 - In a frying pan, heat some cooking oil (use high heat).
 - Carefully add the baby carrots, and fry for about 7 minutes.
 - Add the mashed garlic, the chopped dill or parsley, and the spices.  Fry for another 15-20 seconds.
 - Remove the baby carrots from the pan, and place them on a paper towel to help remove extra cooking oil.
 - Serve as soon as possible (or the crust might soften up).

ORANGE CAKE

Ingredients:
 - Four egg yellows
 - One cup of sugar
 - Two cups of heavy whipped cream
 - Five or six oranges
 - One lemon
 - One cup of milk
 - Two teaspoons of vanilla essence
 - Two packages of gelatin (7 grams each)
 - 150 grams of ladyfingers

Preparation:
 - To start, place a deep (preferably metal) bowl in the freezer: we need it cold to prepare the whipping cream.
 - If you're starting with whole eggs, then separate the yellows from the whites. We won't be using the whites for this recipe - feel free to use them to prepare a healthy omelette or another dessert (how about a Raspberry Foam?).
 - Whisk the yellows with the sugar, then mix with the milk and juices from a lemon and an orange until uniform. Place in a pot on medium heat, and bring to a boil while stirring frequently. The milk loves to bubble up and make a mess on the oven, so keep an eye on it.
 - Meanwhile, mix the gelatin in three tablespoons of water, and let stand for two or three minutes. Add a quarter of a cup of hot water, and mix thoroughly until all the gelatin has dissolved. Pour over the hot milk in the pot, and stir until uniform. Remove from heat, and let cool until it thickens. I usually place the pot in an ice water bath until it reaches room temperature, then transfer the pot to the fridge. We're looking for pudding-like consistency.
 - While the hot mixture is cooling off, you have time to whip the heavy cream. Remove the previously chilled bowl from the freezer. I use a mixer on high speed, and it takes less than 5 minutes to start seeing peaks forming. Add the vanilla essence, and mix until you can easily remove the whisk out of the cream and there is no dripping. Place the whipped cream in the fridge until it is needed. As a note, proper whipped cream could have also used three or four tablespoons of powdered sugar (added in at the same time as the vanilla). But we will combine the whipped cream with the milk mixture, which already has plenty of sugar, so we can skip on adding extra sugar to the whipped cream.
 - Once the milk mixture has reached a pudding-like consistency and the whipped cream is ready, we can go to the final steps of the preparation. We will use a large pot, and we will flip the cake upside down when firm; so whatever goes to the bottom of the pot will become to top of the cake. Coat the pot with a bit of oil, then stretch a layer of plastic foil all around: this will help us flip over the cake without any pieces sticking to the pot. Also, make sure the plastic foil extends past the top of the pot - this will help remove it once we flip the cake over.
 - Extract the juice from one orange and set separately. Feel free to add a splash or rum or amaretto to the orange juice, if you feel adventurous.
 - Peel and slice the remaining oranges, then place them on the bottom and along the side of the pot. This will bring beautiful fresh orange accents to the presentation (see photo above).
 - Once the previous step is ready, quickly combine the chilled milk mixture with the whipped cream. Place about half of it over the orange slices. Dip half of the lady fingers in orange juice, the place the over the cream close to one another. Gently press them in. Continue with another layer of cream, and one more of lady fingers (also dipped in orange juice). Make sure this final layer is pressed into the cream such that it is as flat as possible: remember that we will flip the cake over, and the cake might break if its bottom has ridges.
 - Cover the cake pot with a layer of plastic foil, and refrigerate overnight.

CHICKEN ROAST

Ingredients:
 - One chicken (about 3 pounds)
 - Six or seven medium-sized red potatoes
 - Two carrots
 - One onion
 - One squash (optional)
 - One red bell pepper (optional)
 - A bunch of parsley
 - One beer
 - Cooking oil
 - Spices: salt, ground pepper, cajun spices

Preparation:
 - Preheat the oven to 450F.
 - Meanwhile, peel and dice the potatoes and carrots. Boil them for about 10-15 minutes.
 - Coat a 2 inches deep baking tray with a bit of cooking oil. Add the boiled potatoes and the carrots. Peel and dice an onion, and add it in (I've been told more than once that the onion in this recipe was the best tasting onion the guests have ever tasted). Optionally, dice a squash and a red bell pepper, and add them as well. Gently mix the vegetables until they're equally distributed: you don't want a corner with bell peppers and another one with the carrots - it just does not look as good in the presentation. Add salt and pepper over the vegetables.
 - Generously coat the chicken with cajun spices (both inside and outside). Place in the baking tray, over the vegetables.
 - Pour a can of beer inside the chicken and over the vegetables. It would be great if the vegetables are covered in beer (particularly the onion), but make sure the liquid is not all the way to the top of the tray: there will be some extra juices from the chicken, and we don't want them to overflow the tray and mess up the oven. If is perfectly fine if you open a second bottle of beer, add those critical couple of teaspoonfuls over the recipe, then drink the rest. :)
 - Carefully seal with aluminum foil (helps keep the chicken moist), and cook for two hours in the oven at 450F. Drop the temperature to 400F, remove the aluminum foil, and cook for another hour and a half on the lowest rack. Check periodically - if the chicken skin starts turning too dark, brush it with the juices covering the vegetables, and place a sheet of aluminum foil over the chicken to preserve its color.
 - Remove from the oven. Serve hot or warm.