No Eurovision would be complete without a great interval act and the Chow Down to Eurovision 2013 is no different. We have now seen all 16 dishes in the first semi final but before I announce our interval act I just have to say....."World start voting NOW!" The poll is to the right of the blog, but you may not see it on mobile devices so select web view and have your vote counted. Kyle the pig head for Estonia in the lead at the moment, so if he wasn't your favourite you better get voting.
The most famous interval act would have to be River dance from the 1994 contest but for me nothing says Eurovision interval act like vinyl clad, big haired, quasi jazz ballet dancing archery, yes archery by Guy Tell in 1989. Even if he does miss a couple of times, no one was hurt in the making of this act, more in the watching.
It is hard to believe but we are already in Serbia, the final country of the 16 competing in Semi Final 1. We have a vegetarian appetiser today so that if you choose to host a party and cook all 39 dishes to celebrate the Eurovision weekend there will be something for everybody. It is a weekend for us in Australia due to the time difference and the way it is broadcast on the Friday, Saturday and Sunday nights. I still watch it live on the internet but it is fantastic to immerse yourself in Eurovision for 3 solid days because you have to replay it and then replay past contests and play the cd's and ......I'm not going to be on that strange obsession show am I???
I couldn't decide between which of the Serbian past contestants to include so we will be getting a bonus track. Both acts have pretty impressive hair, the first being Marko Kon & Milaan from 2009 placing 10th in the semi final. The second entry is from 2011 where Nina reached 14th in the final. It may have been due to her slightly more sensible hair.
Avjar
Ingredients
1 large eggplant
2 red capsicum
2-3 tbsp. olive oil
salt and pepper to taste
2 cloves garlic
1/2 cup parsley
juice of 1 lemon
Method
Place eggplant and capsicum in a baking tray and cover with foil
Put the tray into a 210°C oven for 20 mins
Remove the foil and cook a further 10-15 minutes till the vegetables are on the verge of collapse. (physically not emotionally)
Remove from the oven and cover with foil for 5 mins to help loosen the skins
When cool enough to handle, remove the skin and seeds from the capsicum and skin from eggplant and discard.
Put vegetable flesh, oil, salt, pepper, garlic, parsley and lemon juice into the bowl of a food processer
Pulse till chopped but not pureed
Serve on bruschetta or as a dip
To mellow the flavour of the garlic you can add it to the vegetables when you remove the foil before they finish cooking
Originally the vegetables were minced by hand but in the words of Sweet Brown "aint nobody got time for dat".
It is not the most photogenic dish in the Chow Down to Eurovision 2013 but the flavour is douze points all the way.
In May Moje 3 will bring their song Ljubav Je Svuda and what promises to be excellent hair once again.
We have arrived safe and sound in beautiful Belgium but let me tell you we had a bit of an adventure getting here. This recipe involved having to go to Rome and almost every bottle shop in Melbourne, ok it's a bit of a stretch but work with me I'm building the drama. So lets begin, 16th January 2009 10.35am flight from Heathrow to Fiumicino.........maybe I should just do the condensed version?? When I decided to do the Chow Down to Eurovision 2013 I put a call out for recipes and ideas to my friends from various European nations. We were all connected through our time studying in Roma. It is amazing how people can bond through a shared experience of overcoming adversity, ours was Italian grammar e i verbi, la gramatica non è perfetta. My favourite experience with this group was when the school tried to replace the teacher we all adored, Sylvia, for one we couldn't stand. (All I have to say is Talk Show and the memories will come flooding back to those in the class reading this) So as a group we all stormed into the Director's office and demanded that the change not occur, this happened in about 8 different languages, lots of nervous angry facial contortions and hands gestures but in the end Sylvia stayed with us. Yay for people power, but to be honest I think they just gave in so they didn't have to endure trying to speak with us again. There was almost a complete semi final of Eurovision amongst the class, Spain, Germany, The Netherlands, Norway, and Ukraine who referred to me only as "Australia" so I referred to her as "Ukraine", I'm not sure if we actually know each others names.
So the call out for Belgium was answered by Virginie who gave me this website of Flanders recipes for ideas. Grazie mille Virginie, sei sempre gentile.
Of course I decided on the beer soup, so our adventure continues. The recipe called for Rodenbach beer which with a little help from the peeps on twitter I found a store that had it, great. Only hitch by the time I got there they had sold out, as had every other store that stocked it I tried. I finally saw a bottle shop with the sign "hundreds of beers in store" what they failed to mention was the sign referred to the empty cans on display and not the 1 fridge of 6 packs. I held out hope till yesterday but I still couldn't get it so you know how I love a plan B.
I thought I'd substitute a beer of similar flavour, this involved me standing and starring at the store beer fridge till they thought I was possibly a performance art statue. I eventually found one that mentioned caramel toffee and biscuit flavour in the description, how could I lose and well transaction complete.
Before I get to the soup, today's Eurovision morsel is Belgium's 1986 winner Sandra Kim. The clip I've included is a remake of her J'aime La Vievideo 25 years later. Watch out as she swaps the ice-cream of her youth for a juice, personally I would have stuck with the ice-cream.
Beer Soup Ingredients
2 leeks
3 celery stalks
1 tbsp. olive oil
6 sections of lamb neck
660ml Rodenbach or Black beer
2 cups beef stock (or water and 2 cubes)
150ml cream
chives to garnish
Method
Chop the leek and celery into 3 cm pieces
Add the oil to a large boiler on high heat
Brown the lamb necks
Add the leek and celery and coat with oil
Add the beer, stock and reduce the heat to a simmer
Simmer for about 1 hour till the lamb is tender and soup has reduced slightly
Remove the lamb and break up meat, discard the bones
Blend the vegetables with the stock
Add the cream and stir through
Add the meat back to the soup
Serve and sprinkle with some chives (garnish is love)
Don't drink the beer before it hits the soup!
It may not taste anything like the original beer but this soup was so delicious I could eat a keg of the stuff!
This year Belgium will find out if Love Kills from Roberto Bellarosa can bring home another win.
Hello this is Nicosia calling, we have made it to Cyprus. If you thought I was a bit harsh about not using beetroot from a can in Moldova, wait till you find out today's haloumi isn't from a packet. I started making cheese about 3 years ago, camembert, parmesan, mozzarella, ricotta and I am still alive. In the beginning I followed the instructions to the letter and sterilised the whole kitchen till not a single germ survived. After I'd seen numerous YouTube clips of cheese making old school in the villages where the goat was in the kitchen while the making was going on I relaxed my processes a touch. It is much easier than you would imagine but it does take a bit of patience as I had to wait 9 months for a parmesan to mature, not exactly fast food. This is the link to the recipe I use so if you're keen you can make the whole thing from scratch.
Our Eurovision hit of days gone by is the first Cypriot entry in 1981. They came 6th out of 20 countries, not bad for a first attempt.
Todays offering is very simply as I figured after making the cheese from scratch we could have a night off. I cooked the haloumi 3 ways, 1 was on the grill press, 2 was under the gas grilled and 3 was deep fried. No points for guessing which was the best one, who doesn't like some fried cheese.
Haloumi Trio Ingredients
3 blocks of Haloumi sliced into 1-2cm lengths
1 egg
seasoned flour
canola oil for frying
1 lemon cut into wedges
2 cups of rocket
Olive oil to dress
Sprigs of oregano
Method
Divide the number of pieces of haloumi evenly for the different cooking methods (optional you could just fry it all)
To Fry
Crack the egg into a bowl and beat well
Put about 1 cup of seasoned flour into a another bowl
Dip the haloumi into the egg and then coat with the flour
In a large fry pan of hot oil fry the haloumi till golden brown about 2 minutes
Place cook haloumi on a plate to drain off excess oil
To Grill
Place haloumi on an oven tray and place under a high grill for about 5 minutes, check that it doesn't brown too much
To Press Grill
Spray grill with oil
Place haloumi on grill with lid closed
Grill for about 5 minutes
To assemble
Spread rocket on a board
Place the different haloumi around the board
Scatter lemon wedges
Sprinkle oregano
Drizzle with olive oil
The lovely Despina Olympiou will head to Malmö to perform her song An Me Thimasai.
Today we're in the beautiful green TOTALLY SNAKE FREE land of Ireland, thanks St Paddy for that one, best saint ever! While I have never been to the emerald isle I did spend some time working in an office where there was an Irish quota of at least 50% so that was like practically being there. The opportunity for a linguistic and cultural exchange was not wasted as I learnt so much about craic, it was only fair they had to "give it a burl". For a colleague's birthday I was tasked with making an Irish themed birthday cake, so shamrocks? Leprechauns? Mrs Brown? of course not Jedward. It was quite an easy decision to make. She had previously mentioned that Jedward were "beautiful boys" so why wouldn't she want them jumping out of her cake. While I am clearly not the cake boss, my fondant skills are getting better with each birthday.
Can't you just see Jedward jumping out of the cake??
With 7 wins under their belt Ireland holds the record for most wins in Eurovision, so it is only fitting that their entry in Chow Down to Eurovision 2013 has a touch of luxury. I had thought of roasting a turkey but felt it wasn't right to cook an Irish contestant.
In 2008 they thought they would enter a craic, that doesn't sound right?
Lobster Dublin Lawyer
Ingredients
1 lobster tail
50g unsalted butter
100ml whiskey
1/2 cup cream
squeeze of lemon
Salt and pepper to taste
Method
Cut down the centre of the underside of the lobster tail to remove the meat but leave the shell intact
Tidy up the edges of the shell for presentation and boil in a saucepan for 5 mins and then drain. If not using the shell for presentation this step can be omitted.
Cut the lobster into bite sized pieces
In a large frypan on high heat add the butter.
Add the lobster and the whiskey
Use a long match or gas lighter to ignite the whiskey, be careful as it is a pretty big flambé.
Once the flame have died off add the cream and mix through
Add the squeeze of lemon and season to taste
The lobster should be cooked by the time the flame has gone, it is very easy to over cook it
To serve place meat back into the shell and pour over the sauce
This served AB and I as an entrée but if you have found a pot of gold at the end of the rainbow it would be a lovely main course with a decadent buttery mash.
This year Ireland isn't sending Jedward but Ryan Dolan will find out if Only Love Survives, and possibly makes it to the finals again.
I hope everyone made it through customs without a starring role in border security and is ready for the delights of Moldova. If you are a long time reader (first time commenter) to my blog you will be aware of my obsessive love of all things purple and my inability to not tear up at the sight of a grandmother. No seriously people we have been through this, you only need to say the words Maggie Beer and I well up.
So today is a celebration of both. For the grandmother we have Grandma Boonika, reportedly a neighbour/cousin of the band Zdob şi Zdub who they just had to bring along to the 2005 contest. I find her a true inspiration proving that you're never too old for Eurovision, there is hope for me yet. If you need me I'll be out the back practicing my little turns.
Now for the purple I found a Moldovan beetroot salad, that is so delicious with just the right balance of creamy texture and hint of garlic. You need to boil the beetroots but I suppose if you are "time poor" and don't actually like the people you are cooking for you could always use beetroot from a can. (Insert disapproving glare here)
They placed 6th and I'm sure most of it was due to Gran.
Moldovan Beetroot Salad
Ingredients
4 Medium beetroots
2 garlic cloves
90g walnut crumbs
4 tablespoons mayonnaise
juice of 1/2 lemon
salt
Method
Put beetroot into a medium saucepan and cover with cold salted water
Bring the water to the boil, then reduce heat and simmer for about 25-30 minutes till the beetroots are tender
When tender, remove beetroot from the saucepan and allow to cool
Peel beetroot (or leave skin on) and grate into a mixing bowl
Mince the garlic in a garlic crusher and add to beetroot
Add remaining ingredients to the beetroot and stir to combine
Salt to taste
Let sit for an hour or 2 before serving (or eat straight away it's still yum)
You can also garnish with extra walnut crumbs if you wish
Moldova will present O Mie sung by Aliona Moon in 2013.
Dobry Vecher, Ladies and Gentleman we have landed in Belarus. Since their first participation in 2004 Belarus has never failed to delight, amuse, shock and appall. Anastasiya Vinnikova summed up my true feelings about Belarus in 2011, I Love Belarus, ('got it deep inside'). The Queen of Belarusian Eurovision is former MRS Russia Angelica Agurbash, who in 2005 brought us "Love Me Tonight" which some of us did more than others, she came 13th in the semi final.
Yes, I have an Angelica shrine
Every Google search for Belarusian cuisine came up will lots and lots of potato pancakes, Drakini. I tried a couple of versions and in the end based this recipe from a Russian clip on Youtube, I followed the pictures. I have taken inspiration from Angelica and used a filling in the centre to create that age old Eurovision standard, the reveal. After hours of watching Love Me Tonight I knew there were only 2 ingredients that could possibly do, cheese and mince. Love Me Tonight Drakini Ingredients
250g beef mince
120ml passata
1.5kg potatoes
1 medium onion
2 eggs
Plain flour about 1/2 cup but maybe more or less
Black pepper
Salt
100g grated cheese
Lard or oil
Method
In a fry pan, cook the mince and passata on high for about 8 minutes, till the mince is cooked through and the passata has reduced into the mince.
Put the potatoes and onions into a food processor and blend till the consistency of porridge
Transfer into a large mixing bowl
Add the eggs, flour, pepper and salt
Stir to combine, you may need to add a little more flour depending on the consistency.
Add 2 tablespoons of oil/lard to a hot fry pan.
Add about dessert spoon of the batter to fry pan and push the spoon in to create a small well.
Spoon on a little of the meat mix into the well.
Cover with about 1/2 spoon of pancake mixture
Let cook for about 2 minutes and then flip over.
Cook for a further 2-3 minutes till brown and cooked through. You made want to lower the heat on the fry pan during the cooking if they look like they are going to burn.
Serve with sour cream
While experimenting with the recipe I did a version where the meat and cheese was mixed into the batter rather than in the centre, this was AB's personal favourite version.
This year Belarus is sending us Alyona Lanskaya and her song Solayoh
