About the Soufflé

I have to admit, I am such a fan of sweets! I mean, not like ordinary sweets fans, but like… a chocoholic. Yes, that tells it all. Chocolate is one of my biggest weaknesses. I like it in so many forms, but my favorites are definitely the darker bitter ones, the ones that contain more than 70 % of cacao. I also love to bake things with chocolate. I have collected a massive source of chocolate cake recipes, and I am constantly on a quest to find the best chocolate cake in the world. So in case you have found one, please share your secret with me! So far I have tried several but none of them has exactly fulfilled me. My dream cake would be a mud cake like, very fudgy from the middle, but very dense at the same time. With deep flavor of chocolate. The closest I’ve gotten so far was with a Brazilian recipe that I found after eating one of the most divine pieces of chocolate cake at Sao Paulo Guarulhos airport a year back. That recipe I will also share with you as soon as I get to bake it again. Last time the cake disappeared so fast that I could not even take pics, haha!

As you see, when I get to talk about chocolate I never stop unless stopped. The aim of this post was not to talk about chocolate but something almost as divine. One week ago I got dinner guests when a friend couple was visiting. The theme of the food was Korean, but as I never really liked to have my desserts very light (like often in Asian cuisine they are) I decided to do something outside the theme. As my adventures with chocolate are well known for people that would have been a rather boring choice. So I ended up doing a Banoffee pie. A sweet, soft, creamy, delicious banoffee pie, that makes me drool even when thinking about it.

When you’re fixing a bit more challenging dinner a Banoffee pie is a perfect dessert as it requires very little work. Also my recipe for it couldn’t be more simple, here it comes!

Oh So Divine Banoffee Pie

300g assorted biscuits of your choice (I used some chocolate drop cookies with some non-frosted cupcakes I had forgotten in our freezer some time ago)

100g unsalted butter, melted

1 can (397g) condensed milk caramel, or one of just condensed milk

2-3 bananas, sliced (the not too ripe ones are the best for this)

200ml heavy whipping cream

100g dark chocolate

If you are using condensed milk and not ready caramel, start with the condensed milk. If you already have the caramel ready, skip this part. Bring water to boil in a preferably big saucepan. Remove the labels from your tin can of condensed milk and place the can as it is (do not open it) into the boiling water. Let simmer for about 3 to 3,5 hours, adding water into the pan if necessary. The can should stay under the water at all times, so more water might be needed.

Carefully remove the can from the water after the time is due and let cool in a cold water.

Line the bottom of an approx. 22cm springform pan with baking paper.

Prepare the biscuit base. Crush the bisquits in a large bowl until they’re small crumbs. You can use a potato masher, a steak hammer, a wine bottle or anything you have at hand. If you have a food processor to do the work, even better. You can also put the biscuits in a plastic bag and crush them with a rolling pin. All the means are okay for this!

Stir in the melted butter until the mixture is smooth and sticky. Press the mixture on the bottom of your springform pan and 3cm up the sides. Refridgerate for about one hour.

When the the biscuit base is firm, it’s time to fill the pie. Open the cooled can of condensed milk caramel (or the ready caramel) and pour it on the biscuit base. Top with sliced bananas. Whip the cream with an electric mixer until fluffy and thick foam. . The cream doesn’t need sugar as the pie contains other elements that are already very sweet. Spoon the whipped cream over the bananas, and don’t be too careful with this, the pie should have kind of a careless look.

Top with roughly chopped dark chocolate (or sifted cocoa powder). Enjoy immediately in good company, with sweet dessert wine and a clear conscience!

I rarely cook seafood. Actually too rarely, considering that I have lived almost all my life near the sea, in a beautiful city of Helsinki. I do love fish in general, and sometimes get inspired to try some new recipes with it, but other seafood has been for some reason more difficult to get my hands in to. A year back I was crossing the Baltic Sea from Helsinki to Stockholm and it was on a simple cruiseferry restaurant where I surprisingly got probably the best shrimp tails of my life. They were hot and spicy, served in a rich and tasty chili oil.  

Since then I have been craving for something like that. While surfing the web I never came across with a recipe quite like it, therefore I had to come up with my own. This is actually not exactly like those shrimps were, so I think it might still need some further development, haha! You can also use uncooked shrimp for this dish, and in that case remember to cook them longer, approximately 2 minutes on each side until nice and pink.

Here it goes, hope you enjoy!

Some like it hot shrimp with chili (serves 2)

400g cooked shrimp, size according to your taste (I used large tails and smaller ones)

70ml good olive oil

4-6 cloves garlic, crushed and roughly chopped

2 fresh red chilies, sliced (you can take out the seeds if you like, I did not)

2 heaping tablespoons tomato sauce (I used one that was spiced with only salt and black pepper)

juice of half a lemon (or more to taste)

3 tablespoons scallions, thinly sliced

2 teaspoons ground fresh chili paste, for example sambal oelek

salt & black pepper to taste

flat leaf parsley, for serving

crusty fresh bread for serving

Heat up the olive oil in a wok pan or a skillet. Add crushed garlic and sliced chilies and fry a few minutes, stirring constantly, until garlic and chili start softening. 

Add shrimp and fry for a minute. Stir in chili paste, tomato sauce and 2 tablespoons of thinly sliced scallions. Stir in the lemon juice and let simmer for a minute or two. Don’t overcook the shrimp unless you wanna have bubble gum for dinner! Add olive oil if it seems necessary.

Pour shrimp into a serving dish and sprinkle with rest of the scallions and some flat leaf parsley. 

Serve with crusty fresh bread. Actually spanish aioli might go well with this too!

Welcome to enter my brand new food blog! I have been maturing the idea of a blog for a longer time now, and finally, here it is.

I get inspired by food, very much so. I like to stimulate my senses with it. Another thing that strongly inspires me is cinema as a form of art. Especially important for me are the films of French new wave, directors like Jean-Luc Godard, Francois Truffaut, Éric Rohmer, Jaques Rivette and Alain Resnais. My ultimate girl crush is of course Anna Karina, who’s known as a muse of Godard, as well as the star of several Nouvelle Vague films. As maybe obvious when considering my love for French new wave, the inspiration for the title of this blog is taken from Nouvelle Vague too. One of my absolute favorites in this film genre is Jean-Luc Godard’s À Bout de Souffle (Breathless by its English title), starred by Jean-Paul Belmondo and Jean Seberg.

Besides being a place for myself to save the recipes that I have successfully (or not always so successfully) tried along the time, the purpose of this blog is to inspire and get inspired by other food (or film) lovers. After all, food is not only a source of nutrition, but a source of life in many other ways too. It’s nutrition for senses, for soul, for social interaction and gatherings. It’s succeeding, sometimes failing and learning. It’s something for relaxation, for your own time, or something for enjoying together. So feel free to comment, ask and share your ideas with me!

The only possible way to kick off this blog is with a recipe of soufflé, a lightweight French cake based on egg whites beaten to glossy meringue, typically baked in small size ramekins for a beautiful look. It’s a delicate form of art, this making of a soufflé and everyone who once tried it, knows how easily they fall flat. I succeeded pretty well this time, although my soufflés ended up being much smaller than in the original recipe.

The recipe was adapted from Martha Stewart. I added my own chocolaty twist with a ganache, the simple recipe of it can be found below.

Fluffy Chocolate Soufflés (6 small ones)

150g bittersweet chocolate (I prefer the ones containing at least 70 % of cocoa)

6 tablespoons sugar + some extra for baking dishes

250ml milk

5 large egg whites

3 large egg yolks

3 tablespoons all-purpose flour

Unsalted butter, for baking dishes

Confectioners’ sugar, for dusting

Preheat oven to 200 C. Butter your chosen baking dishes (this recipe is enough for approximately 6 of 150ml dishes, I made mine in small coffee cups) and coat with sugar.

Chop chocolate and melt it in a plastic/glass bowl in a microwave or placing the bowl over a pot of boiling water. Stir occasionally until smooth. Set aside and keep warm.

Heat up the milk in a saucepan but don’t let it boil. In a large bowl, using an electric mixer combine yolks and 4 tablespoons of sugar until light and fluffy. Mix in flour until well combined. Still mixing, slowly add half of the hot milk.

Add mixture to the saucepan with remaining milk. Bring to boil stirring constantly. Simmer for 2-3 minutes more, then add the melted chocolate. Transfer into a large bowl, cover with plastic wrap and keep warm.

In a bowl, beat egg whites using an electric mixer until the mixture forms soft peaks (approx. 5 minutes). In the original recipe it says to add a pinch of cream of tartar in this phase, but as I am unfamiliar with this product, I omitted it. Gradually add 2 remaining tablespoons of sugar and mix until stiff and shiny.

Gently spoon 1/4 of the egg whites into the chocolate mixture and stir until smooth. Add the rest of the whites and mix carefully. Spoon the batter into the baking dishes and bake for 12-15 minutes until the soufflés have risen slightly and become crusty. Don’t open the oven while baking.

Dust the soufflés with confectioners’ sugar and serve immediately with warm chocolate ganache.

Easy Chocolate Ganache

100ml heavy cream

100g semi-sweet chocolate

Chop chocolate in a small saucepan, pour in the cream and heat up until silky and smooth.