Creamy pasta with salmon and cheese

When one needs something comforting, something quick and something tasty pasta comes in and works time after time. Pasta is one of my favourite things to eat, in any form and in any shape. If there was only one thing I could eat every day it would be pasta. At least that would make me have numerous options of what to do with it anyways. I wouldn't be bored in any case!

Today we had a bit of a time problem. My mum and I are watching The Missing, a series that's the result of a cooperation between the television networks of France, Belgium and Great Britain. Here it's broadcasted on Eén. I like it quite a lot but we don't get to see it on the regular scheduled times. My mum works nights so we watch it later when we have the time. 
Today we were watching the episode of Tuesday and we didn't pay attention to the time until our stomachs began to grumble and my sister was already eating chips and a kiwi to still her hunger ...
So we saw it was way past time to start cooking and I rushed to the kitchen halfway the episode (the end will be seen later tonight) to make some pasta. At least that wouldn't make us wait too much longer.

We had tagliatelle with a creamy sauce of Boursin (garlic and herbs), chives, spring onions, broccoli, mushrooms and smoked salmon. The pan was scraped clean and we all enjoyed it. 

This is an easy dish for any time. It can be made with other vegetables too, bell peppers and zuchini make it more of a summer's dish but mushrooms, broccoli and spring onions were the things in the fridge and they are great. 

Ingredients for 4 servings:
- 350 grams tagliatelle or any other pasta shape of your choice
- 6 large mushrooms
- half a head of broccoli
- 3 spring onions
- chives to taste (I used about 10 pieces from out garden)
- salt and pepper to taste
- milk as needed (about 200 ml in total but add)
- butter for frying
- 200 grams smoked salmon
- 150 grams of Boursin (garlic and herbs) or Philadelphia or any other brand with this kind of flavour combination

How to:
Put a big pot of water to a boil. In the meanwhile make the sauce.
Cut the mushrooms and the spring onions into small pieces/slices.
Take a big skillet and heat a knob of butter. Fry the mushrooms and spring onions in the skillet.

When browned and fragrant, add a splash of milk and some salt and pepper. Then add the cheese and let it melt into the sauce on low heat. Add more milk until you have a creamy yet runny sauce. Mix in the chopped chives and take off heat.

Cut the broccoli in large chunks.

When the water boils, add the tagliatelle and the broccoli. Let them boil together for about 8 minutes or to package instructions.
Cut up the salmon in small pieces and add them to the sauce. This is best when the sauce is slightly cooled so that the salmon doesn't get cooked along and gets tougher. Add salt and pepper if needed.

Check whether the broccoli is softened enough (let cook some minutes longer if needed, without the pasta so that the pasta is not mushy). Drain the pasta and the broccoli.

Add the pasta and the broccoli to the skillet with the sauce. Mix in so that the pasta gets covered all over and serve immediately.

Smakelijk!

Sandwiches for lunch

Busy times call for easy meals. On top of that, the weather is great so I'm craving salads and vegetables all the time. 

For lunch today, I made some very tasty and super easy sandwiches.

I took some white bread slices, cut them in half and put two halves at the time in the toaster. 
After they were just golden brown and crispy, I put some Passendale* cheese on top and finished the sandwich by adding slices of cooked beetroot and a little rocket. After putting the other half of the slice on top, I could indulge.

Nothing fancy, just soooo good. 

*Passendale cheese is a Belgian cheese variety that is kind of sweet in taste and it looks pretty as well with all the little holes everywhere. This is how it looks like:

This is a great combination in Summer I think. Nothing heavy on the stomach and healthy. It would've been much more healthy on a wholewheat bread slice but I didn't have the right kind available at home. 

Smakelijk!

Croque monsieur: our grilled cheese sandwich

I follow a number of food blogs and what struck me most this month are the numerous grilled cheese recipes. I gathered that April being the national grilled cheese month is huge in blog space. Now, as a citizen of Belgium, I cannot participate in it nor share this 'national'/American month dedicated to the love for cheesy sandwiches. 

thinly pressed croque monsieur, a salad (must)
and some curry ketchup

But that doesn't mean we don't know anything about grilled cheese at all. We in Belgium, however, do have our own terminology for these kind of sandwiches. They are all French in origin and even though most of us speak Dutch in Flanders, no one bothers to translate the terms. They are concepts. (In the Netherlands they call these tostis, they do translate the term as you see)
A few examples of classics in the grilled cheese category are:
- croque monsieur: a sandwich filled with cheese and cooked ham 
- croque madame: a sandwich filled with cheese and cooked ham with an egg (sunny side up) on top after toasting
- croque hawaï: a sandwich filled with cheese and cooked ham with in the middle a slice of pineapple
Sometimes we also add a pinch of cayenne or chili in between the slices of bread. To add a little kick and especially with the croque hawaï this is highly recommended!
And to serve we take some tomato ketchup or mayonaise (or a combination of the two: cocktail sauce) and a salad as a side. Great meal!
All of these are then toasted in a frying pan with some butter or a croque monsieur machine (my preferred method because lots less greasy!). In the machine, you can make the washing up also a lot easier by placing some parchment paper between the machine and the sandwich. The paper will prevent the cheese from burning onto the machine and the clean up no work at all.

The cheese is the commonly found cheese variety like Gouda (this is a Dutch type of cheese and is pronounced  with an 'OU' like in MOUSE, just saying dear English natives!) but this really is according to everyone's taste.
The bread most people use is white bread. Some use special toast bread (pre-packed rectangular loaves) but the best way is of course some good bread from the bakery. Whole wheat bread is not often used as it's not the classic way and it just gives another end result, a different taste. My way to make things a little healthier is taking some slices of a light version of whole wheat bread (half whole wheat). Dark brown varieties of bread definitely aren't favorites around here for grilling ...

You see they are all very basic. Of course we also eat other fillings but we tend to stick to our old time favourites. Talking about our family: when we think about using pesto, vegetables or different kinds of meat on a sandwich, we don't often use normal sliced bread. Because of the richer fillings, we make the whole thing more stylish by using at least a French loaf, a ciabatta or another kind of more elegant bread. For more unusual fillings we go for the more unusual breads as well. 

The logic behind this is that croques in general are very common basic ways to use up some bread. Ham and cheese are also things we as a bread-loving people, always have in the fridge. We don't see grilled cheese as special dish, just another way of eating our slices of bread (as we eat bread for breakfast and for lunch every day). Something hot as lunch is a good alternative from time to time. 
Other fillings are not always common cupboard/fridge items, we need to buy them specially and if we do this, we can just as well buy an specialty bread.  

I saw a few very tasty things the last few weeks. Grilled cheese month is being celebrated all around and these are some I would love to try: 

Roasted red pepper, aragula and mozzarella sandwich from Two Peas and Their Pod, with a salad of aragula, tomatoes and pine nuts, this would be wonderful. 

Goat cheese, kalamata olive tapenade and grilled pepper panini by Pinch of Yum, as a lover of goat cheese it is looking delicious!

Grilled chicken and roasted red pepper sandwich from Pioneer Woman, I wouldn't make this with as much butter but the combination of flavour attracts me

Fig, brie and apple grilled cheese, also from Two Peas and Their Pod, I think many would like this with a salad and some crushed walnuts. 

Smakelijk!