Presenting our grill for a friend

Firing the grill up :D The coal side. The smoke box isn't yet attached.

Here is a small presentation of our grill. My work colleague is moving to Germany and will have there a house with a garden. That and my Hubby's "looking for a new job"- search landed us on the grill matter. I happened to mention him that we have a grill which has a gas and a coal possibility and also a smoke box. He wanted to know more about our grill so I though I can present it here.

My Hubby and his friend found this grill "Char griller" in Internet some years back. But because it's American it would have been very expensive to order and import it to Switzerland as a private person. Luckily we have a  friend who has a food import company. He just happened to be loading a  container in the USA and he still had some space for a grill. Actually at the end we were three families bying a grill: us, our friend and our friend with the import company :D For the whole grill we paid about 600 CHF. The exact price we can't remember anymore but for us it was cheap. 

Here you can check out a video about the grill: Char Griller Trio - Gas/Charcoal Grill and Smoker

Following up: Pictures of some tasty grill food.

From left to right gas stove, gas grill, coal/wood grill. To the right side one can attach a smoker box.

Temperature is rising

Prawns and salmon before smoking

Prawns and duck breast after smoking

Barbecued duck with spicy orange glaze

Using the grill to bake a focaccia

Grill-focaccia being served

Grilled and glazed carrots

Lamm meatballs with grilled chanpignon, aubergine-tomato salad, baba ganoush and tzatziki

Pata Negra pork being smoked

Korean style barbecue ribs

Korean style barbecue ribs glazed and ready to eat

Chicken!!

Smoking for Christmas

Hubby in action

Funny and some other stuff

She is a cutie, isn't she?

I had to find a purpose for all the habaneros my chilliplant produced this year. This chili-oil is super hot and the rosmarin-olive oil also turned out very nice.

We love seafood...specially mussels in white wine garlic sauce

One tired cat

We did a trip to the city of Wil. From the tower of Wil there is fantastic view and a mountain panorama

Wil has a lovely old town centre. Some of those old houses you can see at the bottom of the piture.

Christmas is approaching and even though I haven't felt any christmas spirit so far I decided to bake some joulupipari, finnish christmas cookies.

And guess who was helping me?

Sourdough ryebread

Beautiful November weather in Switzerland on the 18th

 
I have been a lazy baker in the last times. Normally I like to bake bread more of less regularly but recently it has been a forgotten business. So it was time to get my hands dirty one again.

I love ryebread made with sourdough as does preatty much every Finn. One of the best breads ever is made with only water, sourdough, ryeflour and salt. That is the traditional Finnish ryebread best baked in a old fashioned stone oven called leivinuuni in Finnish.

My ryebread often has many other things in it as well like sunflower and pumpkin seeds, oats, flaxseeds etc. These components keep the bread moist longer and I can eat from the same bread for about one week. This is good because my Hubby is not a friend of ryebread and thus I always end up eating it alone. One possibility is, of course, to freeze the bread. I always slice the bread before freezing it. This way I can take out only the amount of bread I'm planning to eat during the day.

If I think I'll bake often I keep the sourgdough in the fridge otherwise I dry it. As dried it will stay good pretty much for ever. The only negative thing is that it will need a longer time to be activated so you need to plan the baking some time a head...not a fast food thing ;)

Dry sourdough

The way I prepare the ryebread is super easy. You don't need to do any kneading so you won't even get you fingers dirty. Here's some sort of a recipe but you can always change the component. If you for example prefer sunflower seeds to pumkin seed aou can just leave them away and add some more those sunflower seed instead.

Sourdough ryebread with all drum und dran :D

Step 1:

500 ml water

c. 15 g dried ryesourdough

Sourdough soaking in the water

Let the dried dough soak in water for some time and then add

300 g rye flour (not the fine but whole grain)

I always use the organic Roggenschrotmehl of Coop. Mix the flour, water sourdough mixture well, cover the bowl and place in a warm place. I put it in the corner of our bathroom because there is a floor heating. Now you basically just have to wait that the dough gets sour. You can mix it couple of times a day. When I do the bread with a dry sourdough I need about two days. The time will depend from the place and the warmth. If I use the fresh sourdough it usually let bowl stand over one night. The dough is ready for the second step when it's producing big bubbles and both smells and tastes sour.

In the middle is malt. I actually prefer the one which isn't so finely grinded. This malt in the picture I have brought from Finland. Clockwise from the top: sunflower seeds, flaxseeds, pumpkin seeds and wheat bran

Step 2:

20 g wheat bran (Weizenkleie)

60 g sunflower seeds

60 g pumpkin seeds

60 g flaxseeds

140 g wheatflour

60 g malt

8 g salt

2 tbsp sunflower or canola oil

Add all ingredients in the dough and mix well. You don't need to knead but just make sure the dough is well mixed. This dough is anyway too wet to be kneaded. I don't always use malt. You can also leave it out and add for example some oats. I either by malt when I visit Finland or order it from internet in Switzerland. In Finland it's available in every store. I often buy Rantasen leipä- ja mämmimallas or in Switzerland at Sios Roggenmalz auf wunsch geschrottet.

Bread form filled with the dough...as you can see the dough is quite moist.

Step 3:

 Butter a bread form well and fill with the dough. Cover with a kitchen cloth and let the bread rise for some hours...sometimes my sourdough has been a bit week (didn't give it enough time in the bathroom :D ) and then I have let the bread to rise over one night or day.

Step 4.

Bake the bread in about 190 C for about one hour. Let slightly cool and remove from the form.

The ready ryebread with all drum and dran :D

To compare: this is wheat bread made with wheat sourdough. I have had this sourdough wheat bread project going on for the last weeks. I had to create the sourdough from the start: the first one didn't turn out good because my bread wasn't rising. The second sourdough molded for what ever reason and now finally my third try is successful...must be that organig flour I used for the final try :D

Autumn colours on the 18th of November

Miscellaneous photos

Tangerines are getting bigger and bigger. The tree has now moved inside to our living room and is still doing great. The fruits are growing but haven't got yellow yet. I really hope we can taste them one day.

We did get lots of tomatos and I'm planning to plant some next year as well.

Habanero. I'm making some chili oil with these because they are sooooo spicy.

Thai chili

Habanero

Funny's photo shooting

Xhosa couple of days after his surgery. He got hit by a car and his hip broke. This was in mid September. Now he can already walk but not perfect. And he is still not allowed to go out on his own.

Looking through the window to the terrace

We bought this bottle from South Africa and now we opened it to celebrate Xhosa's successful surgery.

Is it normal that in a two-person-household the fridge door looks like this?

Xhosa wants to go out

Finally outside in the sun

Funny eyes

Funny doing a cleaning

His shaved behind looks so funny :D

Ready for a patrol