We just returned from a few days off that we spent in the beautiful Rhein Main area, and there will be a post about our culinary adventures around the Hessian uplands and Frankfurt on Main, soon. Today, it’s about vacation, too: Susanne of Magentratzerl has invited to celebrate her first blog anniversary with the beautiful blog event Urlaub auf dem Teller (which translates to „Vacation on my plate“) with recipes and stories about the best or the worst holiday food.

I have thought of many things that I could contribute and could not decide what to choose: Japadogs which I got to know only from far in Vancouver and want to try myself ever since (I will do so once I have figured out how to serve Sushi ingredients in a bun). Or Swiss Rösti? We had the best in the world at Pension Edelweiß upon Zermatt on 2.000 m altitude, facing majestic peaks. Norwegian brown cheese pralinés. Pain bagnat or or pissaladière which I had in Cannes and Nice as a teenager. The best paella that my Mom and me had in a tiny harbor pub on the Northern mountain coast of Majorca. Austrian bonce dumplings. And so on…

I decided for a plum & cinnamon compote with vanilla cream and a raspberry & curcuma crumble. Doesn’t sound like particular vacation treats, does it. But there’s a deeper holiday sense to it: During our Hessian trip we enjoyed local fruits that we picked directly from the trees and bushes, among them Zwetschgen (a special sort of plums) and wood raspberries (there’s nothing better in the whole world). Short before our departure, a good friend of mine returned from her journey to Zanzibar and brought along some wonderful spices, among them cinnamon bark just peeled off the tree before her eyes and fresh curcuma root. Isn’t that amazing? I would like to contribute the sweet treats combining long-distance journey and local vacation to Susannes event:

 

Here are my recipes

I usually cook and bake with ground cinnamon, and the different and far more complex taste of cinnamon barks is just amazing. The same with curcuma: the root looks most beautiful, its color is amazing and so is the deep and warm taste. But be careful with your hands: you will walk around with yellow finger tips for days if you don’t use household gloves like I first did…

 

Zwetschgen compote with vanilla cream

Clean 750 g of juicy Zwetschgen (plums), cut in half and take off the pits. Mix with 6 tbsp. of brown sugar and heat up. Before the fruits start boiling, add a tsp. of agar agar mixed with 2 tbsp. of water and add a good piece of cinnamon bark. Let cook for about two minutes, take off the cinnamon (you can wash, dray and re-use it) and fill in 10 jars of 160 ml each. Let cool down a bit.

Prepare the cream: Take a few tbsp. of milk from I liter full fat milk. Mix with 6 tbsp. of starch and put aside. Cut a vanilla bean into half, take off the pulp with a spoon or a knife and mix with the milk. Add 200 g sugar and the vanilla bean halves. Heat up the milk and add the starch mixture short before boiling. Stir well all the time and let get thicker – this will take about two minutes. Take off the vanilla bean halfs (you can wash, dry and re-use them), fill the pudding in a bowl and cover immediately with food-safe plastic wrap (this avoids a pudding skin).

Let cool down a bit and add 150 g plain joghurt. Mix well and fill the cream in the jars on top of the compote. Add a little brown sugar on top and close the jars with lids and clamps. Put in the fridge and serve in the jars. Will keep fresh for abut two days (as the content is not filled in and closed boiling hot).

 

Vegan raspberry crumble with curcuma

For four servings, take 600 g raspberries. Clean well and mix with 6 tbsp. of raw sugar and 1 tablespoon starch. Fill the fruits into four small tarte or paté dishes. Take 150 g whole spelt flour (sifted) and mix with 60 g raw cane sugar and 1 teaspoon of baking soda. Take 100 g soft margarine and mix with the flour; make crumbles with your fingertips. Peel 6 cm of a curcuma root and grate finely (take on those gloves before…). Add to the crumbles and mix well with a spoon. The curcuma will not be spread throughout the whole dough like this, but this is charming on the tongue later on – you have nice curcuma peaks here and there and not a homogenous taste. If you take ground curcuma, mix the spice with the meal before adding the other ingredients. I guess 1 tsp. will be enough.

Cover the fruit filling in the tarte dishes with the crumbles. Put into the preheated oven (190 °C) and bake for 25-30 minutes. Serve lukewarm and add a little sour cream if you like.

 

“Crumble-licious” at Driven Creativity Competition 2013

Talking about crumble: I mentioned in the headline already that there’s a little announcement to make today. We would like to share with you the beautiful news that our little crumble video Crumble-licious has been invited to the Driven Creativity Competition by G-Technology. We have been surprised and happy about the invitation – and we would be so very happy if you would like to rate our film. You can see and rate it here (you don’t need to register for this):

Crumble-licious at Driven Creativity Competition

Thank you very much!