Coffee from fresh coffee beans!

Did you know that fresh coffee is green? I love coffee, I have to admit. Still I never knew that coffee is green? Did you know? Fresh coffee is green! I have never seen fresh coffee before. When I was little I grinded coffee and made it the old fashioned way in a kettle. My mother and grandmother taught me. It was long before I drunk myself. But I liked the big coffee grinder my grandmother had in her kitchen, Still the coffee beans we grinded were black! 

Now I have seen the fresh green coffee beans and didn´t know what I was looking at, even though I have been drinking coffee for more than 25 years. I have now tasted coffee from fresh coffee beans that I have roasted myself, grinded and made coffee from! It is such a difference in the taste, it is amazing!

I bought the coffee beans in a Eritrean shop in Stockholm. I even got a small pan to roast the beans and the Jebena to make the coffee in after it is grinded. In Eritrea drinking coffee is a whole ceremony. It is drunk with popcorn. So I made myself a coffee ceremony the Eritrean way. Well I drunk alone, and it is always a social event in Eritrea.

It is a long story to describe a real coffee ceremony, You can read more on these links.
www.ineedcoffee.com/coffee-cultures-eritrea-and-ethiopia/
www.ucl.ac.uk/atlas/tigrinya/coffee_ceremony.html

For me I roasted the coffee beans in the pan called a “menkeskesha”. I let them cool on a small woven mat and then grinded the beans in a small coffee grinder I have bought. It works to use a mixer as well. After grinding the coffee I filled water and coffee in my Jebena. This is a coffeepot made of clay. I put it on my electric stove. It works even if it is not the "right way". After the coffee has boiled I placed it on a special woven stand to let the coffee sink before I poured it. The coffee is poured into small cups with sugar. How much sugar depends on your taste. For me I normally drink coffee without sugar. And with the coffee the tradition is to eat popcorn. 

Himbasha

Himbasha is an Ethiopian and Eritrean celebration bread that is slightly sweet. It is often served at special occasions. But it is also eaten for ordinary days for breakfast, lunch or supper. It can be eaten with spreads or jam or with stews where you tear pieces of bread and dip in the stew or toppings.



Ingredients:
1, 1 kg (2 ½ lb) wheat flour
1 tbsp sugar (optional)
1 tbsp yeast
1 tsp salt
¼ cup oil
1 cup water

Directions:

Put yeast and sugar in mildly warm water (about a cup of water). Wait until it rises, 20-30 minutes, than mix all ingredients to make a dough, (just like a dough for a regular bread). Wait until it rises about 4 hours. Then bake it in an electric frying pan or in the oven on 200 celcius degrees for 20 minutes. This will make it flat and you can make any design on it before baking.

This bread is prepared in a number of varieties, however the most distinctive flavoring is ground cardamom seeds. Some put raisins in it or decorate with raisins. This is optional as well. For this size if you like add ½ cup raisins to the ingredients. I baked the bread in the oven, but if you want to bake it in a frying pan it works just as well. Just make sure you don´t have too hot frying pan and you should cover with a lid. You turn the bread over while you bake it this way until it is done.

Prickly Pear Jam

Ingredients:

4 cups of prickly pear fruit and juice (from about 30 fruits)

1/4 cup of lemon or lime juice

1/2 tsp ground ginger (optional)
5 cups of sugar

Directions:

This fruit is full of rock hard seeds inside. They are like small pebbles and you want to get them all out of your jam. With a sharp knife, cut off both ends of the fruit and cut it in half. Remove the skin. Scrape out the seeds with a spoon into a bowl. They are surrounded by juice that can be used in the jam. Once the fruit and seeds are separated, put the seeds in a strainer or in a cloth ( the type used for cooking sticky rice.) Squeeze out all the juice and fruit and you will have the seeds only left. Throw them away.

Heat prickly pear fruit and juice, lemon juice and sugar in a pot. Bring to a boil. Cook for 10 minutes stirring constantly. Skim off the foam. Put the fruit and juice in a food processor or mix with a mixer for a minute or two until smooth. This jam thickens as it cools, so it will seem pretty loose at this point.

Ladle into sterilized jars or freeze.

Injera

Injera is  an Ethiopian and Eritrean dish. It is like a large "pancake" served with different toppings. For my injera I have made Doro Wot (Chicken Stew), Misir Wot (Spice red lentil stew) and Shiro Wot (Ground Lentil and Chickpea Stew), and also with boiled eggs. The toppings are served on the Injera and you take small pieces of the injera with your hand and scoop up the toppings to eat,

Injera

Serves about 6

Ingredients:

3 1/2 cups teff flour
1 cup all purpose flour
1 1/2  tsp Instant dry yeast
4 1/2 cups water
1 tsp salt

1 cup water for boiling
Plus extra water for thinning to desired consistency

Directions:

Add Teff flour to a large mixing bowl. You’ll find Teff flour at health food stores or Ethiopian or Eritrean stores. You can use other flour instead as well. Stir in some all purpose flour. Then sprinkle in a sprinkling of yeast. Add some salt, for flavor.

Next, splash on the water – enough to make it almost runny, somewhat closer to crêpe batter than pancake batter. About 4 1/2 cups. Whisk together and let sit, covered, until bubbly 3-4 hours. Stir now and then. If you want sour injeras wait – a day or two.

After 3-4 hours or after 2 or 3 days…If you let it sit for 2-3 days pour off the blackish liquid that floated to the top of the mixture. If you don´t let it stand to be sour but only 3-4 hours you will not have this blackish liquid on top. 

Whisk the batter smooth again. Next, boil a cup of water. Ladle in a half cup of the batter and whisk continually until thick and the mixture resemble toffee pudding. Let cool until lukewarm and then whisk vigorously into the Teff batter. This cooked mixture gives the teff batter the structure needed for the air pockets to form in the finished pancake. Again, make sure the mixture is almost runny, between the consistency of crêpe batter and pancake batter. Add water if needed. Let the resulting mixture rest for about 30 minutes. Wait for the bubbles to form. Preheat the largest nonstick pan you have over medium heat.

Ladle the batter into the pan. Traditional Injera will be a foot and a half round! Swirl the batter around from outside to the inner to completely coat the pan with a thin layer. Cover loosely with a large piece of foil, or a lid – but leave the lid cracked so steam can escape. Cook until the surface of the Injera dries out and is full of little holes. Also, when ready, the edges will curl.

Carefully transfer the Injera to a towel to cool (it will stick to a plate when hot). How to transfer this widemouthed flatbread: some people use large round woven discs. Others use thin wooden peels. Once cooled, you can stack the Injera as needed.

If your injera doesn’t produce enough holes, boil some more batter with water – to help thicken it up. Wisk it in. Ladle with thick, spicy stews and tear off pieces of the injera to scoop up the stew.

TOPPING FOR THE INJERA

Doro Wot (Chicken Stew)

Ingredients:

8 skinless, bone-in chicken thighs (about 2 pounds)

Juice of 1 lemon

Kosher salt

4 large eggs, at room temperature

2 large yellow onions, finely diced (about 1 pound)

1 tablespoon minced garlic

1 tablespoon minced fresh ginger

1 tablespoon tomato paste

1/4 teaspoon freshly ground black pepper

1 1/4 cups chicken stock or low-sodium chicken broth

1/3 cup niter kibbeh

¼ cup berbere

Directions:

For the chicken stew: Put the chicken in a nonreactive bowl and toss with the lemon juice and 1 teaspoon salt. Let stand at room temperature for 30 minutes. 

While the chicken is marinating, prepare a bowl with ice water. Bring a medium saucepan of water to a boil and salt generously, making sure there is enough water to cover the eggs by 1 inch. Carefully add the eggs, bring back to a gentle boil and cook for 6 minutes. Transfer the eggs to the ice water, and shake or tap gently to crack the shells. Remove the eggs from the water and, when cool to the touch, peel. Set aside; do not refrigerate or they will not warm up in the sauce.

Put the onions in a large skillet over medium heat. Cook, stirring constantly, until golden, about 10 minutes, taking care not to burn them. You may need to reduce the heat as the onions dry out.

Increase the heat to medium high; add 1/3 cup of the niter kibbeh, 1/4 cup of the berbere, the garlic, ginger, tomato paste and black pepper, and cook, stirring, for 1 minute. Add the chicken stock and the chicken and bring to a simmer, cover, reduce the heat to low and cook at a gentle simmer until the chicken is very tender, about 40 minutes. Remove the lid, increase the heat to medium and simmer, stirring occasionally, until the liquid is reduced and the sauce is very thick, about 45 minutes, occasionally spooning the sauce over the chicken.

Remove the pan with the chicken from the heat and add the eggs, turning to coat them in the sauce. Cover the pan and let rest for 5 minutes.

Shiro Wot – (Ground Lentil and Chickpea Stew)

1/2 cup Shiro powder (can be bought in Ethiopian and Eritrean stores or on the internet)

1 small onion

2 cloves garlic

1/4 cup olive oil

1 tsp Berbere

2.5 cups water

Salt as needed

Finely chop onion and garlic and in a medium pot, sautee with olive oil for about 3-4 minutes. Add Berbere spice and a couple of tablespoons of water and simmer for about 4-5 minutes, stirring occasionally. Add the remaining water to the pot and carefully whisk in shiro powder a teaspoon at a time until completely combined. Let cook on low heat until it becomes thick but smooth – about 15 minutes. Salt to taste. Serve hot with Injera on the side.

Misir Wot – (Spicy Red Lentil Stew)

1.5 cups dry split red lentils

3-4 tablespoons olive oil

1 heaping tbsp Berbere spice

1 medium onion

3 cloves fresh garlic

2.5 cups water

1/2 can tomato paste (cans here in Canada are 156ml or 5.27 oz)

Salt as needed

Finely chop onion and garlic and sautee in medium sized pot with a few generous tablespoons of olive oil for about 4-5 minutes until onions are soft. Add in tomato paste and Berbere spice and stir until mixed thoroughly. If mixture is too thick, add about 1/4 cup of water. Cook mixture another 2-3 minutes stirring occasionally.

Place red lentils in a bowl and rinse thoroughly. Once rinsed, add 2.5 cups of fresh water to the bowl and add this to the onion and Berbere mixture. At medium heat, stirring occasionally, simmer until lentils are fully cooked – about 15 or 20 minutes. If mixture becomes dry before lentils are cooked, add small amounts of water to mixture until they are. (This is something I just learn to do by eye!). Once you know that they are fully cooked, stir in about 1/2 of warm water. Salt to taste. Serve hot with Injera on the side.

Niter Kibbeh (Spiced butter)

Ingredients:

1 pound unsalted butter

1 tablespoon chopped fresh ginger

1 teaspoon whole allspice berries

1 teaspoon fenugreek seeds

1 teaspoon dried oregano

1/2 teaspoon turmeric

6 black cardamom pods, crushed lightly with a knife blade

2 cloves garlic, coarsely chopped

1 small yellow onion, chopped

Directions:

For the niter kibbeh (spiced butter): Melt the butter in a small saucepan over medium-low heat, swirling occasionally. Stir in the ginger, allspice, fenugreek, oregano, turmeric, cardamom, garlic and onions and bring to a simmer. Simmer until the butter is clear and the milk solids remain on the bottom of the pan, about 30 minutes. Reduce the heat to low if the butter is boiling too quickly--if it burns it will taste bitter. To finish the niter kibbeh: Line a strainer with dampened cheesecloth. Skim the foam from the top of the butter and discard. Ladle the butter through the strainer, leaving behind the milk solids on the bottom of the pan. Store in a glass jar.

Berbere

Berbere mix can be bought in Ethiophian or Eritrean stores, even on the internet. However to mix your own Berbere you need:Berbere spice mix

Ingredients: 

1/3 cup New Mexico chile powder

1/4 cup paprika

2 teaspoons cayenne pepper

2 teaspoons ground ginger

2 teaspoons kosher salt

1/2 teaspoon garlic powder

1/2 teaspoon onion powder

1/4 teaspoon freshly grated nutmeg

2 teaspoons black cardamom seeds

2 teaspoons coriander seeds

2 teaspoons fenugreek seeds

1 teaspoon whole allspice

4 cloves

1 small stick cinnamon

Directions:

For the berbere (spice mix): Whisk together the chile powder, paprika, cayenne, ginger, salt, garlic powder, onion powder and nutmeg. Set aside. 

Put the cardamom, coriander, fenugreek, allspice, cloves and cinnamon in a small skillet and toast over medium-low heat, shaking the pan regularly, until fragrant, about 4 minutes. Cool slightly. 

Grind the toasted spices in a spice grinder to a fine powder. Add to the chile powder mixture and whisk to combine. Sift the spice mixture onto a piece of parchment paper, return to the bowl and whisk again. Return the pieces left in the sifter to the spice grinder and grind again as finely as possible; whisk into the spice mixture. Set aside. 

Lamb Stew under a Crisp Puff Pastry Lid

Lamb Stew under a Crisp Puff Pastry Lid

  

Ingredients

400g minced lamb or beef mince

1 tablespoon olive oil

2 tsp ground cumin

2 tsp ground coriander

1 teaspoon ground cinnamon

1 teaspoon salt

2 pinches of pepper

200 g of chopped tomatoes

1 dl water

Or a can of pasta sauce

400 g chickpeas or 1 can of cooked chickpeas

Pastry dough (homemade or use a bought roll chilled puff pastry, 250 g)

1 egg

Directions

Preheat the oven to 225 ° C.

Brown the ground meat in the oil in a frying pan. Season the mix with cumin, coriander, cinnamon, salt and pepper. Heat the chopped tomatoes to a sauce. Add the water. Or use a can of pasta sauce and let it simmer with the ground beef 3-4 minutes.

If using dried chick peas soak in a bowl of water over night. Boil for one hour. Drain and rinse and mix with the ground beef. If using canned chick peas, strain the juice out and add.

Place the mince mixture into a greased oven proof dish. Roll out the pastry and place over the mixture. Cut small incision in the dough with a sharp knife. Brush the surface with beaten egg.

Cook in the oven for about 25 minutes. Serve preferably with a fresh green salad.

This is a lamb stew or lamb pie under a crispy puff pastry lid. It is a lamb dish with a touch of oriental spices. Of course, you can use other kind of ground beef, for example from pork or cattle or vegetarian mince.


Homemade Pastry dough

Ingredients

4 dl wheat flour

1.25 dl water

2 tsp vinegar

200 g butter

Directions

It is important that all the ingredients are cold and have the same temperature. Pour most of the flour in a bowl. Add the water and vinegar and barely 1/4 of shortening. Work together to a dough. Shape it into a ball and let it rest for 15 minutes wrapped in plastic or aluminum foil in the fridge.

Cut a deep cross in the dough. Use a roller and roll the dough to form a square, about 20x20 cm.

Slice the shortening and add it evenly over the middle of the dough. Fold the dough so that the corners meet and form an envelope. Turn the dough up and down. Use the roller and roll or flatten the dough.

Flour the dough lightly on both sides to prevent from sticking to the work surface. The dough should be square, about 30x30 cm. Fold it in three parts in one direction. Flatten gently and fold it into three parts the other direction (i.e. in the 90 ° to the last fold.)

Let it rest in a cool place at least 15 minutes.

Roll the dough again to a somewhat larger square than last fold. Fold the dough three times in one direction and three in the other direction. Let it rest on again at least 15 minutes. Repeat rolling out and folding again.

Than roll the dough and place on top of the pie.  Brush the surface with the beaten egg.

Lamb Stew with a North African twist and Vegetables Baked in a Clay Pot

Lamb Stew with a North African twist and Vegetables Baked in a Clay Pot

Ingredients

500 gr lamb meat

2 green peppars

200 gr mushrooms

1 red onion

5 shallotts

4 cloves of garlic

200 gr butter

1 tsp salt

1 tsp pepper

2 tsp rosemary

1 ½ tsp cumin

½ tsp coriander

1 tbs sugar

1 tbs lemon juice

3 dl white wine

2 bay leaves

2 tsp thyme

8 figs

1 tbs honey

1 ½ tbs cinnamon

2 dl water

1 cube chickenbroth

Wait with adding for making the gravy

2 tbs cornstarch

3 dl cream

Directions

Cut the lamb meat into pieces. Fry the meat in 100 g butter and add salt and pepper and set aside.

Cut the paprika, mushrooms and onions into pieces. Fry the onions and garlic in 100 gr butter and set aside.

Mix the onions, figs, paprika, mushrooms and lamb meat in an ovenproof dish with a lid.

Add the spices and remaining ingredients, all except the cornstarch and the cream. Put the lid on. Place in the preheated oven and cook for 1 ½ hours. Oven temperature 150 Celsius degrees.

Take the dish out of the oven and strain the broth in a separate pot. Cool off and place in refrigerator.

When the broth is cold take off the fat that is on the top. Heat the broth and mix in the cornstarch until it thickens a bit for a nice sauce. Use more starch if you feel the sauce is too thin for your liking. Taste off to your own taste with adding more salt or pepper or spices and add the cream.

Pour the sauce over the lamb stew and let it cook a few minutes before serving. Serve with potato and vegetables baked in a claypot. 

Baked potatoes and vegetables in a Clay Pot

Ingredients

8 potatoes8 carrots

2 dl sugar snaps

2 dl okra 

Rosmary

Olivoil

Salt

Peppar

Directions

Cut the potatoes in slices. Cut the carrots in slices. Cut the ocra in slices. Leave the sugar snaps whole. Mix all in a bowl. Sprinkle with olive oil, salt, pepper and rosmary and mix well. Pour the mix in the prepared claypot and put the lid on and place in the oven.

Bake in the oven in a claypot with lid for 40 minutes at 225 Celsius Degrees

To prepare the Clay Pot before baking: Pour water in the claypot and let it sit for 30 minutes. Remove the water and pour in the vegetables and potatoe mix and place in the oven to bake.