a tale of three hamburgers…

 

a couple of hamburgers by james thurber is one of my favourite short stories. have you ever read any thurber viewers or know of his writing? well if you are familiar with the secret life of walter mitty then thurber is responsible for that piece of fiction. it was even made into a movie, breathtaking scenery, iceland is and has been on my bucket list for some time.

i still have the copy of collected short stories where we had to read thurber for an english assignment. i forgot to return it and am kind of glad i did. every now and then i will read a couple of hamburgers again but today i bring you the tale of three hamburgers instead.

growing up in the west we had the fortune of living close to a wonderful fish and chip shop called jacks. it is still there today but the original owners have since long gone. however, my childhood connection has developed into lifelong friendships with two wonderful sisters who grew up there in a lovely, large family of six plus two makes eight.

when we were growing up it was a real treat to go to the fish and chip shop to buy two hamburgers. my dad would send one of us and we would begrudgingly walk the distance. but once there we were greeted by two familiar and friendly faces, husband and wife who worked together as a team. i would put in the order, two hamburgers with the lot and while they made the hamburgers which i knew to be delicious i would check out the pinball machine in the corner. if i was lucky someone would come in and put some money in and bring the jukebox to life. that jukebox remains today in my friends loungeroom as a long-time memory.

so once the hamburgers were done, whoever had been sent would walk home and then the torture began, lol. my dad would sit at the kitchen table and unwrap the white paper, then unwrap the first hamburger. my sister, brother and i would all sit at the kitchen table and watch my dad eat the first one. juicy meat, egg, lettuce, tomato, the aroma of hamburger penetrated our nostrils while we sat there like greedy seagulls waiting for a crumb. he would take his time, savouring every bite and we would sit there waiting to see if we would get an offering. i actually don’t know why my dad did that. i think it was just one of his games that he played to amuse himself. in hindsight considering the size of the hamburgers he was really never going to eat two anyway but as kids that never really occurred to us. then dad would get a knife and cut the burger into quarters and we would get one each and i have to say they were the best fish and chip hamburgers ever. we would devour our quarter while dad ate the last one and then we would be on our merry way. i have to admit i actually bought a hamburger with the lot last week ( minus the pineapple…no apologies there but pineapple does not belong in a hamburger) from my local take away while son number two was gifted a lamb yiros. it was delicious and inspired me to make my own.

hamburger number three. when i was a teenager i would catch the bus every saturday to the croatian nun’s convent in north adelaide. i was invited by a fellow croat from school to partake in embroidery classes (true story). i actually really had no interest in going but my lovie blackmailed me into going by enticing me...  you guessed it, a hamburger from jack’s fish shop on the way home. of course i was a sucker for that lure. and i have to say i did try viewers, i really did, well… for about three hamburgers worth. that was about all i could take. i just wasn’t cut out for it. for a start the nuns wouldn’t speak in english and i felt like a heathen as they were not impressed i didn’t know the lingo of the motherland. shame on me. my sewing skills were pretty rubbish, actually make that crapola and it didn’t help they were looking over my shoulder and hovering around me while the other girls could have embroidered their folk dancing costumes with their eyes closed but alas not me. i had to farewell ena begovich (of course her identity is a secret) much to her disappointment, because i quit and was not coming back. and after my third hamburger as much as i appreciated them, the lure had been exhausted and i failed gaining my certificate in obedient girls’ embroidery stage 1. so i went home, put some band aids on pricked fingers and played football in the streets with my brother instead. somehow, I don’t think the nuns would have approved but hey god's sisters were certainly not going to influece me.

the following recipes are one from me and one from lovie as these were the hamburgers she would make for us when we were growing up. add to that home-made lepinja, lettuce, tomato and mayo and there you have it. two variations of the burger folks, one you can make with turkey or chicken mince and the other with beef.

turkey veggie burgers

ingredients

500gms turkey or chicken mince, i used steggles which is 400gms

1 carrot grated

2 spring onions finely sliced

1 stalk of celery with leaves, if no leaves throw in a handful of parsley, very finely sliced

50 grams of cauliflower grated

2 cloves of garlic crushed

1 teaspoon of vegeta, 1 teaspoon of salt, 1/2 teaspoon of white pepper

1/2 cup of breadcrumbs

1 egg

method

1.sautee all veggies, garlic in some olive oil with 1 teaspoon of vegeta, 1 tspn of salt and ½ tspn of white pepper

2. add to mice, then add ½ cup of bread crumbs, (i used panko crumbs) and one egg, mix throroughly and shape into patties

3. fry in oil until browned nicely on both sides and then turn down heat, put lid on and cook for about 10 mins, then take lid off, cook for another 5 if needed.

Lovie’s hamburgers

Ingredients

500gms of beef mince

I medium onion very finely diced

2 cloves of crushed garlic

½ cup of breadcrumbs

1 egg

1 teaspoon of vegeta, 1 teaspoon of salt, ½ teaspoon of pepper

some fresh parsley finely chopped

method

1. sautee onions and garlic, vegeta, salt and pepper in some olive oil

2. add to mince and mix thoroughly

3. add breadcrumbs and egg, mix thoroughly, shape into patties

4. fry until nicely browned on both sides,  then turn heat down and cook until done

 

 

 

lepinja…the holy grail of balkan bread plus another childish confession

 

hey viewers this is my second attempt at making lepinja or in some circles known as somun bread, perfect for stews, cevap, dip it into something delicious, mop up some sauce. i have to admit, my first attempt looked reasonable but i  knew they really didn’t  hit the mark for soft yeasty pillows of yumminess. hvala to the gospodja who finally put me on the right track. i have canned the former recipe from chasing the mugaratz oops i mean chasing the donkey and instead used another one which i found on you tube by brigita husic which has over a million views. yep over a million and with that many it is bound to be a winner. i shall translate it  into english for you. lepinja za cevape kako ih ja pravim. ( lepinja for cevapcici and how i make them) even i myself being a hrvatski illiterate was overjoyed by the fact i could actually read this by myself. perhaps there is hope for me yet. (although having been in the homeland in 1990 i actually knew more than i thought and could get by, just ask mali sestra). however, this fact has caused me some embarrassment viewers. true my hrvatski is far from fluent even though i have heard it all my life. i blame this fact solely on my parents for believing that english was the gold standard which i suppose in those days it was. if i got a dollar for every time someone asked me where i came from then i would have a ton of money, nah, make that a shitload of money. but the truth is my mum came out to australia when she was 11 and my dad was a teenager and they met in adelaide. for croats they spoke exemplary english and were pretty liberal minded. i escaped the usual croatian boyfriend/go out for a year/get engaged/have a fancy croatian wedding where you pin rosemary on everyone and receive a fat wad of cash that went on a house deposit/one year later be with child/ stay at home and make endless pots of goulash/ clean the house until the only way you could enter it was with a pair of sunglasses.

nope that really never appealed to my tom boy inclinations which incidentally were more about the fact that as a girl i already knew things were not on an even playing field and i was having none of that. instead i spent my teenage years riding horses and working at the racetrack which was far more interesting than boys. i dodged the croatian suitors by refusing to dance with them and crushing their souls…well maybe that is a slight exaggeration (i actually do quite like dancing). at least one is happily married to the woman of his dreams so i couldn’t have been that bad, lol. i then got an education and spent half my life living in places other than adelaide. but hey look at me now folks, i should get wife of the year with my return to the kitchen and nothing like a new renovation to reinstate a passion for cleaning, lol. and for all things hrvatski, i do identify with my culture in some respects and really would prefer to have a second fluent language. but hey i think i could probably teach myself if i stick to brigita’s videos, no english there. i just lack confidence and feel anxious because people assume that i already speak the lingo. well i guess this is the point where i admit or should i say confess another childish crime. my mother affectionately known as lovie is getting to know all my terrible secrets and unfortunately bubba (my dad’s mum) is no longer with us so i can’t take my basket of lepinja over to her house (which incidentally was in sisak) as a peace offering and make amends.

should i even be admitting to this? well i actually had to speak to some students about using the word poo and bum in class the other day so here it goes… kids just find those words laughable and i guess naughty. so now i don’t feel so bad and i have to give bubba credit, she never dobbed us in. i suppose we could have used a far more colourful vocabulary gleaned from listening to papa joe lose his shit over something in his shed. but instead we took turns in saying...moj brat i sestra svaki dan seru u gaće ( i think you might be able to work this out for yourselves with the clues i provided). man she didn’t even flinch, we thought it was funny but of course it was just plain terrible and there i have confessed. srum te bilo to me. we definitely would have got the shiba big time for that. but i am making up for it today and atoning for another sin by baking this lepinja and creating another batch of cevaps; some of which will be delivered to my sister (in iso) and to lovie just because she has exceeded her limits of home cooked meals for us.

what i like about this recipe is that it goes through a triple rise process rather than one long one. it takes a couple of hours to make which is mainly waiting time and only 10 mins to bake. i have included the link for those who can speak the lingo and even if you don’t it is worthwhile watching what she does and just follow along. in fact i highly recommend you do that. watch the video first because her techniques are important.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=T3iu35sBPD0&ab_channel=ReceptiBrigitaHusic

 

ingredients

1 kg of OO flour

750ml lukewarm water

2 sachets of dry yeast

2 teaspoons of salt

50 ml of olive oil

1 teaspoon of sugar

another 50 ml of olive oil

sesame or poppy seeds

method

1.  place flour into a large mixing bowl

2.  pour about half a cup of the lukewarm water into another bowl, add yeast sachets, sugar and two tablespoons of flour from the first bowl. whisk and leave to froth and bubble for 15 mins

3.  make a well in the flour, add yeast mixture plus 50 ml of oil. gradually add water and mix. the dough will be sticky which is how it should be. follow the you tube video to watch brigita to see how she prepares the dough. mix by hand and then cover bowl with plastic and leave to double in size about 45 -60 mins

4.  pour the other 50ml of oil into dough and work dough with hands to aerate it

5.  place dough onto floured board and  using fingertips, knead very lightly and shape into a log, cut in half and then cut halves into four pieces for 8 large lepinjas or you can make smaller ones

6.  using fingers, push dough into itself and then pinch so it is closed and then pat bottom, place on board and repeat process until all are done. cover with tea towel and let rises for 30 mins

7.  place baking paper onto tray. take a ball of dough and stretch and press with fingertips to make a round. using the back edge of a knife, score the top, brush with water and sprinkle with seeds. cover and let it rise again for 20 mins. Turn oven on while waiting for third proofing.

8.  make sure oven is on maximum temperature. i have a function on my oven for baking, if not just be mindful a fan forced oven will usually cook these more quickly. place on middle rack of oven and cook for 8-10 mins until nicely browned. wrap in a tea towel. serve with cevaps or a stew or however you desire.

9.  i made 8 large lepinjas, which can be cut in half. next time i will make smaller ones. enjoy!

 

confessions of the goulash kid…

 

i have a confession to make, something that i have kept secret for nearly 50 years, OMG has it been that long? yes it has viewers, a little dark secret that brings just a touch of shame. in this blog post i am attempting to atone for my sins and if the recipes that i am testing in my kitchen are successful then perhaps the culinary gods have forgiven me.

growing up i had a very glamorous grandmother, just ask my longest time bestie anica who is the big sister i never had. true she was not your typical grandma, i think her star sign must have had something to do with it. (think lioness) and my mother named me after her but the anglo version. personally I would have preferred her version but unlike nanny as we affectionately called her (as she refused to be called bubba) i really am not cut from the same glamorous cloth.

nanny was a self-made business woman who owned her own home and business which she operated from the same premises. in keeping with the glamour theme, she was a hairdresser. and i spent many a childhood day with my siblings playing in the cellar and eavesdropping on conversations while inhaling perm solution. we would also steal ourselves a packet of juicyfruits from her chewing gum stand. once we even boldly flogged a ten pack of viscount cigarettes and attempted to smoke them down in the cellar, while choking profusely before stubbing them out.

but one of our favourite things was to play hide and seek with her german shepherd rinnie, who could find us in about 3 seconds flat. when she had a litter of puppies it was always the best time, watching them grow, cuddling them, playing with them. my sister managed to hide one in the back of the chevrolet which she called cindy but of course it went straight back to nanny’s the next day. later i was even given one to look after but he stayed at nanny’s place. i called him rex and he was the first thing i ever truly loved unconditionally. sadly when nanny died my parents gave him away. i was devastated beyond words and truly heartbroken. but i am veering off the goulash path, so let me just step back on.

well folks you are probably wondering what has all this got to do with goulash? a lot actually. nanny lived in a big house and she rented her spare rooms to the young croatian men who came to australia to begin a new life. astute woman, making more money while already making money. besides we helped them learn a bit of english and most were pretty good apart from one guy who seemed to take a dislike to us. obviously, he wasn’t a fan of kids and it probably didn’t help that we use to snoop around in their rooms while they were at work. but it was just a childish game folks. i don’t know what we were expecting to find (we did find a copy of velika gospodjas love paprikash, which i think was code for big ladies like cooking, however i can’t reveal what it was that was actually big, let’s just say they had interesting cooking attire) of course miroslav and yes i am keeping his identity a secret caught us and dobbed us in to nanny. and he demanded we be punished with the shiba which is a slavic form of torture in the form of a stick from the tree. we had to line up from oldest to youngest and cop a whack across the hand. of course miroslav was very satisfied with this punishment and laughed at our cries of pain, which incidentally were pretty fake; well just a bit.

from that day forth i have to admit i wasn’t his fan and although revenge crossed my mind, i am more of the opportunist type rather than a die-hard revenge seeker. you see miroslav thought of himself as a bit of a cook, well he seemed to think he was pretty good and would often cook for his other croat mates if he got back from work first. i know what you may be thinking and yes this is where my confession comes in. not being one to let a golden opportunity slip by, i just happened to notice he was making a big pot of goulash that was bubbling away on the kitchen stove. i used my best detective skills and hid behind the door watching him take a slurp before exiting. i really can’t explain what came over me folks. i stealthily, slipped in quietly, reached for the chilli powder and tipped the whole lot in before giving it a quick stir and slinking away. of course you can well imagine the drama it caused after a hard day’s work. miroslav piling on the goulash that was now inedible. i definitely cannot repeat the words i heard coming from the kitchen but let’s just say i for one felt a pang of satisfaction. but i was a kid, so lets just leave it at that. and i do feel remorseful for all that food going to waste. and there is no way I would do that again except maybe for crocodile dundee and his new bride…mwah ha ha ha ha.

 here is the recipe i tweaked from a blog called chasing the donkey. actually if you ask me they should call it chasing the magarac...(pronounced mugaratz) instead. i quite like the sound of that word and have to admit it is my favourite hrvatski insult. and just one more confession, i called ivan maric (from the richmond tigers )a mugaratz during a match. and i know he heard because he was smiling, probably thinking… is that the best they can do? all I can say he is lucky i didn’t use some other vocabulary i learnt from my dad, hee-hee.

so viewers this is a rather tasty recipe and my recommendation is to save it for the cooler weather. i did make the somun bread to go with it but i shall save that for a separate post. i have slightly tweaked it, this will serve 4-6.

traditional goulash…

ingredients

• 1kg beef (chuck steak)
• 4 medium onions halved and finely sliced
• 6 carrots grated ( you could also grate half and chop half roughly to add a bit more texture)
• 4 large cloves of garlic
• 4 bay leaves
• 300 ml red wine
• 1 litre of beef stock
• 6 tablespoons dijon mustard
• ½ teaspoon vegeta
• 2 teaspoons salt
• 1 teaspoon white pepper
• 1 1/2 teaspoon sweet red paprika
• olive oil for frying
• parsley for garnish

method

1. cut beef into smaller pieces. marinate it in the mustard and spices and let it sit in the refrigerator for one hour.
2. heat olive oil in a pot and fry the meat on all sides until it gets browned. once the meat is cooked, transfer it to a plate and add more oil to the pot. cook the onions and carrots over low heat for 15 minutes.
3. once the vegetables have browned and become slightly mushy, add the meat and bay leaves and garlic. pour over with wine and simmer for 10-15 minutes to allow the alcohol to evaporate. add the beef stock, bring to boil and then simmer slowly.
4. cover the pot and cook over low heat for an hour- two hours, stirring occasionally. thicken with a tablespoon of flour/rice flour if needed.
5. serve with freshly baked somun bread ( see up coming blog post) to dip into, mashed potato or rice.

 

 

the backyard invasion…zucchini anyone?

 

do you have a glut of zucchinis viewers? are you a beginner farmer or do you happen to live next door to some neighbours who could possibly be growing them illegally or are part of some kind of zucchini worshipping cult?

i think my neighbours are part of a cult. seriously their backyard looks like it has been invaded, so much so, the zucchinis are beginning to infiltrate. they are making their way through the fence and i am wondering what they are going to plant next. in any case i have been one of their recipients and not being the type who likes things to go to waste i decided to test a few recipes and use up the box of jars in my cupboard.

and travelling back through childhood memories mrs. roberts is my cooking inspiration for this post. growing up we lived next door to the lovely mrs.roberts who was of the country women association type. and one of the things that i distinctly remember (apart from her sewing my angel costume for school) were her home-made mustard pickles that were simply delicious. mind you hers were made with cauliflower and as a young child i wondered how she made them so yellow. and being of the ethnic variety this was the first time i had ever encountered the mustard pickle. and i liked it, sweet, vinegary with a slight crunch. i could have eaten the whole jar by myself.

i figured i could find something that might come close and use up the 20kgs of zucchini my neighbours had off loaded, hee-hee, of course that might be a slight exaggeration but we won't let that get in the way of a good story. besides i  could tell my neighbours were suffering from zucchini exhaustion.

the zucchinis they were growing were the light green coloured ones. using my best friend the internet i started to research some recipes and ended up testing two. the first one was a zucchini mustard pickle presented by bonita’s kitchen, the link is below.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=DkfGp9OjKjY&ab_channel=Bonita%27sKitchen

this recipe was reasonably good, i rate it a 7 out of 10 but out of the two i personally prefer the zucchini relish, it is thicker and reminds me of mrs.roberts cauliflower pickles the most. they are both easy to make. however, my mustard is on the relish which i have made twice, it really doesn’t take that long at all. the most time-consuming part is making sure your jars are sterilised.

https://www.bestrecipes.com.au/recipes/zucchini-pickles-2/t77nkebq

 

zucchini relish pickles from link above

Ingredients

• 1 kg zucchini deseeded and grated
• 2 tbs salt
• 2 cups sugar
• 2 cups white vinegar
• 1 brown onion large, diced finely
• 2 tbspns cornflour
• 2 tspns ground turmeric
• 2 tspns mustard powder
• 1 tspn curry powder

 Method

1.  grate zucchini into a container, add salt and cover with water. soak for 15 minutes

2.  drain and squeeze excess moisture out of zucchini and place in a saucepan

3.  add finely chopped brown onion, sugar and 1 cup vinegar and bring to the boil and then simmer for 15 mins

4.  add dry ingredients to the other cup of white vinegar and mix. add to saucepan and simmer slowly for a further 15 mins until thickened

5.  bottle in clean, sterilised jars

*you can use gluten free flour for thickening also