How do you like red cabbage? Did you know it has cancer-preventing benefits? It is easily digested and acts like a soothing cloth for the stomach, helping with many gastrointestinal conditions, constipation or the very annoying irritable bowel syndrome. This beautiful purple leafy plant is filled with vitamin C and will give you 56% of your vitamin C only consuming 1 cup of it a day, so as a result your immune system is boosted by increasing the amount of white cells in your system in order to fight infections and other bacteria.

At the same time, a cup of red cabbage contains 33% of your daily intake of Vitamin A and 28% of Vitamin K, this last one will help you lowering your osteoporosis and cancer risks! This delicious red cabbage is well known as well for reducing inflammations and stopping the growth of cancerous cells by inhibiting certain enzymes while at the same time helps your body to recover and repair the damage caused by the carcinogens.

Now that we're all set knowing all the benefits this beautiful plant has to offer us, I will show you today a way to enjoy it! There are endless recipes and salads with red cabbage but today we are making steaks!

Ready?

☂ 1 medium red cabbage, sliced

☂ 1 tablespoon of olive oil per steak

☂ sea salt

☂ chilli powder

☂ paprika powder

☂ sesame seeds

☂ oregano

☂ fresh basil

☂ black pepper

1. Preheat your oven 200 Celsius degrees. Prepare a baking tray lining it up with baking paper.

2. Cut the fresh cabbage in slices. Arrange and fit in the baking tray.

3. Spread 1 tablespoon of oil per slice. Add the spices to all slices.

4. Bake for aprox. 15-20 minutes. Check on them so they don't burn.

Enjoy right away alone or with your organic ketchup or even a spinach-mushroom cream you can easily prepare (I might upload another recipe for this).

Isn't it delicious? Can you imagine this IN A VEGAN BURGER? I can! And so I will do today!

The other day I was talking to my friend (she happens to own a YouTube channel) and she recommended me a (vegan)vegetarian recipe, very easy and simple to make with basic ingredients and with a twist. So she asked me if I could do it and "review" it. Was a little bit of a struggle to get the sweet potatos because it seems people get crazy shopping food and supplies before the weekend so we didn't find any potatos at the local market but yesterday I made sure to have all ingredients and had this rolling today!

Gluten Free / Vegetarian / Vegan

☂ 150 g cherry tomatos cut in halves

☂ 250 g sweet potato (I used a fairly small one)

☂ 3 medium sized carrots

☂ 2 garlic cloves

☂ 1 white onion

☂ small piece of ginger

☂ 1,5 tablespoon olive oil (for frying)

☂ 1 teaspoon sweet paprika

☂ 1/2 teaspoon of mild smoked paprika (optional)

☂ 1/2 teaspoon salt

☂ 4 glasses of water

☂ Almonds, nuts to sprinkle, or, as I used leaf parsley, black pepper and smoked paprika

1. In a medium sized pan, fry the little cubes of onion until tender, add the minced garlic, and cherry tomatoes cut in halves. Roast well until fairly tender. Do not burn the garlic or onion because the taste might turn bitter.

2. Add the carrots and sweet potato cut in medium chunks (so they boil faster) alongside with the piece of ginger that you need to grate.

3. Add the paprika. Add 3 glasses of water and let boil covering the pan.

4. Once veggies are tender (you can try with a spoon), retire from heat, wait until it cools a little and get your blender and blend the soup until is completely creamy. Add salt according to your taste.

5. Serve warm with almonds and nuts on top or, as I did, with some fresh parsley, black pepper and paprika.

Enjoy!

This deliciousness has been the star at dinner today. I can't wait to make it again! Total success even for the skeptical! If you like goat cheese' intense flavour and the break of sweetness that the grapes give it, or, let's put it easier: If you're into cheese platters, make this.

✔︎ 1 portion of pizza dough (If you don't have your own, drop a comment below and I can share mine in the next post)

✔︎ Organic ketchup or tomato sauce (I also have a recipe for this, drop a comment to request) to spread

✔︎ 3 fine slices of cooked turkey or you can use some prosciutto

✔︎ grated cheese (I used low fat cheddar Oltermanni)

✔︎ 1 pack Chèvre cheese (goat cheese you best like) to sprinkle all over the dough

✔︎ 25 wine red grapes, seedless

✔︎ Fresh basil

✔︎ Olive oil to sprinkle

✔︎ Oregano

✔︎ Black pepper

1. Preheat your oven to 200 Celsius degrees.

2. Prepare a tray with baking paper.

3. Spread the dough on the tray and use your fingers to mold it.

4. Add your organic ketchup or tomato sauce for pizza, sprinkle pieces of slices of turkey or prosciutto all over the pizza dough. 

5. Add the grated cheddar cheese. Sprinkle the goat cheese all over the dough. Be generous because this is what it's going to give your pizza most of the flavour.

6. Take your grapes and wash them. Cut them horizontally in halves and add them to the dough slightly pushing them in the dough.

7. Sprinkle a little olive oil and some oregano.

8. Cut some fresh basil and add it.

9. Add a pinch of black pepper.

10. Bake for 15-20 minutes until borders are crusty and golden.

Enjoy!

Today's dinner was a traditional Hungarian gulyás I got done myself with some home-made easy dumplings. I haven't had this in a long while and as I was chatting with my mother she mentioned how I used to love the dumplings when I was a kid.

✔︎ 400 g beef cut in cubes
✔︎ 200 ml tomato sauce
✔︎ olive oil
✔︎ 2 onions
✔︎ salt
✔︎ black pepper
✔︎ sweet paprika
✔︎ pinch of smoked paprika
✔︎ 2 glasses of water

✔︎ 4 tablespoons of flour
✔︎ 1 egg
✔︎ pinch of salt
✔︎ 50 g butter (room temperature or quickly in the microwave - do not melt completely)

1. Cut the onion in little pieces, place a deep pan on your stove with some oil. Add the onion and close after add the meat that has been cut in cubes. Cook well and add water so the meat cooks throughly. Add tomato sauce (if it's too sour add a little sugar and salt), paprikas and black pepper. Add water again and cook for 15 minutes so the meat turns tender.
2. When ready, try the meat with a knife and see if the meat is tender enough. Retire from heat and set aside.
3. Boil some water in a pan with a pinch of salt. Meanwhile,...
4. In a bowl add the butter, egg and flour and mix well together.
5. With a teaspoon take pieces of the mix and drop in the boiling water. Do this with all the flour mixture.
6. Leave them boil for 10 minutes.
7. Retire from heat, strain the dumplings and add to the goulash stew. Mix together.

Enjoy! This is a really tasty dish from Medieval Hungary that has travelled Europe up and down, dishes like this are typical especially in Scandinavia and even Iberia (some resemblance dishes). They are usually enjoyed with a glass of an alcoholic beverage, in Hungary, with pálinka, for sure.

How the dumpling looks like inside. Delish!

Try it and let me know! Hashtag #helsinGEEK so I can see your delicious recreations!

Click the picture to read more >> It has been some time since the last update. This is going to be a recipe I've just came up with inspired by my last visit to the Swedish History Museum's exhibition "Meet The Vikings". I loved it there and I recommend you to everyone that wishes to see and know more about the Vikings. The exhibition is going on until 23rd of August and afterwards you will only be able to get a guided tour through the Viking side of the museum until 30th of August, so you better rush if you're visiting Sweden any time soon! You can check for more info here.

And going back to this simple yet filling dish! The story goes like this: I have way too many potatoes from the mökki! Needed to make something with them (well I still have some!) and decided to tender them and decide later what to do.

Started to put together pretty simple ingredients and here we have the result!

✔︎ Potatos

✔︎ Salt, pepper, parsley, satureja (optional, but gives a lot of flavor)

✔︎ Sunflower or Olive oil

✔︎ 3 glasses of water

✔︎ Cheese Cream (I've used this)

✔︎ Grated Cheese

✔︎ 250 g Chicken Breast

✔︎ 1 onion

1. Heat the pan with the oil. Wash and peal the potatos, place them in the pan and add the spices.

2. Add the water.

3. When the water gets absorbed, add the cream.

4. Add the grated cheese at the end of cooking so it melts in the pan with the potatos.

5. For the chicken, heat the pan and add the onion slices and leave until they get soft.

6. Add the chicken and spice simply with salt and pepper. Fry.

7. Put the dish together serving both of them. Add some fresh parsley for more taste.

Enjoy!

If you recreate this recipe, I would love to see the result! So make sure you hashtag me in Instagram #helsinGEEK