Espresso Style Recommends: Irish Pub, Constanta, Romania

I recently visited the Irish Pub in Constanta, Romania, my home town. It has long had a reputation for being one of the best places to eat in town. The relative notoriety and high standards are possible to uphold because of two reasons, in my opinion: one is that they are a franchise and therefor have to maintain a good joint and second because the notoriety of the brand is such that they attract a large number of people from out of town (note, the capital city, Bucharest) and, more important, expats and western business people.

That being said, let's get to the food and drink. We were a party of four, located in the non smoking area (not entirely separate, but good enough) for a semi festive lunch.

I arrived first and ordered an espresso.

First gold star they get for the attention of the waitress who asked me if i wanted my espresso normal or stretto (I already asked for a short one). So far, so good. The water was given as asked, not too cold, and served in nice tall glasses.

Then, when everybody was at the table we were served some fresh baked buns with Lupark (premium brand) butter. They were sooo good! We just ate them right away so I didn't have time for photos.

When it was time to eat, we ordered and the food was brought to us in reasonable time. We started with some salmon crostini, served with a generous helping of green salad, onions and tomato, dressed with a yogurt sauce.  It was good, regarding both taste and presentation.

The others had some eggplant dip and a lovely looking pumpkin cream soup with croutons that I never tasted.

For the main course I ordered a leg of duck (comfit) with orange and blood orange sauce. It was good, the meat fell wright off the bone and the little slices of orange were cut professionally and served without the little skins. The sauce a little too sweet, but ... who am I to complain. On the side were gratinated potatoes, cut in thin slices.

The misses had some carbonara, made with penne as a special request (in the menu were spaghetti) which she said was a little salty from all the parmesan cheese, but very tasty otherwise.

 The other couple had a roll of chicken meat with salmon in the middle (oddly tasting, strong fish taste, nice enough) with mashed potatoes and a serving of pasta with sea food and red sauce.

For desert we went for a chocolate and sour cherry roulade. That was good as long as you only had two teaspoons of it, otherwise it got too sweet.

Anyway, the place gets 4 (out of 5) stars for the food quality, and 4 as well for the service and atmosphere. The chairs were comfortable for eating and lounging (that tends to be a problem in some other places), the hall was populated enough not to feel lonely but not jam packed. The bar was well maned and worked fast and good. The waitress and helpers were also fast and polite and knew the menu. Smiles are important and we received them in proper moderation.
Not the least, the music was good (lounge style instrumental) and not too loud. I was told that it shifts towards a higher  bpm and volume in the evening. They have their own DJ. 

I recommend Irish Pub in Constanta with all confidence.

Tomato Cheese Salad (Not Caprese)

When you want to throw together a quick tomato salad  as a side dish for meat or for eating just like that with a slice of good bread, then consider this version that uses a different kind of cheese than the well known mozzarella and spring onions.

INGREDIENTS:

• 2-3 medium tomatoes (as ripe as you can find);
• a few spring onions;
• crumbly white cheese;
• extra virgin olive oil;
• salt and pepper to taste.

HOW TO MAKE:

Cut the tomatoes discarding the green part where they were attached to the stem. Cut the spring onions as a medium chop. I did it o a diagonal, for looks. Brake the cheese into bite size bits and top the salad with them. Add the olive oil (about a spoonful per tomato or less) and season with salt and pepper. If the cheese is already salty (which it should be) use more pepper then salt. Mix well to get a nice sauce of olive oil, tomato juice, black pepper and little bits of cheese.

Now, about the cheese, use what you like but it would be better if it was a crumbly kind, not a soft creamy kind. Usually, the crumbly cheeses are a little tangy and fermented as well as salty. I used a so called "kneaded cheese" or "barrel cheese" from the Romanian mountains in the Sibiu region (notorious for the sheep growing).

Chicken Drumsticks With Onion & Zucchini

This recipe is easy to make and requires minimum effort. Just a bit of preparation, as it is best to first marinate the chicken drumsticks in a sauce. You can do this over night or just for an hour before you pop the whole thing in the oven. It's an all year round recipe. Everybody will like it What's not to like: baked glazed chicken drumsticks, delicious garlicky zucchini slices and sweet caramelized onion sections. Delicious!

INGREDIENTS (serves 3):

• 7 chicken drumsticks;
• 2 medium zucchini (or one large);
• 1 large yellow onion (or 2 small);

FOR THE SAUCE/MARINADE:

• 1 tbspoon soy sauce;
• 1 splash worcestershire sauce;
• 1 splash vinegar (regular or balsamic);
• 2-3 tbspoons olive oil;
• (can use 1 cm finely chopped ginger, 1 teaspoon honey, dijon mustard, whiskey, hot chilly pepper)
• 2-3 cloves garlic, minced or grated;
• salt, pepper, dry time. 

HOW TO MAKE:

First mix well together the ingredients for the marinade, and use depending on your preference, more or less of the sweet or spicy ingreds. Wash well the chicken drumsticks and coat well with the marinade. Save some of the marinade for the vegetables, later. Let the chicken sit for at least one hour, up to overnight in the fridge. When you are ready, cut the zucchini in one inch thick slices and the onions into bits about the same thickness. Mince one clove garlic and rub it on the vegetables along with some of the sauce that you have marinated the chicken in. Put them all in a baking tray lined with tin foil or with damp backing paper (for easy removal at the end). Bake in the preheated oven at 200 Celsius for 30-45 minutes covered with tin foil. Uncover and bake for another 15-20 minutes, until golden brown and caramelized onion bits. Enjoy with salad!   

All Green Turnip & Courgette Salad

This salad is an ode to green. It is fresh, it is crispy, it is stylish!

Just cut up some fresh medium sized courgette into long thin ribbon style slices, and for this you best use a "econom", a vegetable peeler.
The turnip, not too large, you peel clean, wash and slice thin slices with a sharp knife. Assemble and season with the best extra virgin olive oil you can find , salt, pepper (I used green) and maybe some bits of green chilly pepper and chopped parsley. You can stain the corner of the plate with a little lemony mayonnaise.
Enjoy!

New Potatoes & Bacon Warm Salad

It's the time that you find new potatoes in the market. They are so small and cute. I've seen some people teach us how to peel them, but in this recipe I've decided to eat them with skin on, because it was so thin and tender. Someone fried them in duck fat. Yummy! I just decided to make a salad. And it is a warm one, since it has fried bacon in it.

INGREDIENTS:

• a handful of new potatoes, round and small;
• 3 to 5 strips of bacon;
• 1 or 2 spring onions, both white and green part;
• 1/2 red bell pepper;
• fresh parsley (can't use dry for this one);
• extra virgin olive oil, a dash of balsamic vinegar;
• salt & pepper.

HOW TO MAKE:

First you boil the potatoes, skin on, in 2/3 more water then potatoes, lots of salt in. Boil them until they are soft to the penetrating fork, but not as soft to fall apart. Drain the water away and cut the potatoes in half or quarters depending on how small they are.
While the potatoes are boiling, in a nearby pan, fry some bacon, cut into thin little inch size bits. You can fry long strips and brake or cut them after they are crispy. Do not burn the bacon. It's just not nice.
Chop up the red bell pepper into small little bits like in the picture and the spring onion into small rings. Use both white and green parts of the onion. Chop the fresh parsley roughly, not too fine. The parsley leaves look nice in this one.
Mix all the ingredients together in a bowl and (important) do it while the potatoes are still warm. They will soak up the aromas of the bacon and the onion. You can add a few drops of balsamic vinegar into the mixing bowl. Assemble on plate. Enjoy!

Potato Pleurotus Fritatta

As you may already know, a fritatta is nothing else then a fancy omelet, but done thick and with a lot of ingredients in it (and eventually with a little cream and cheese). It's like a little tart or pie, but without the crust.

Anyway, this is a potato and pleurotus mushrooms fritatta. The pleurotus mushrooms are a thin and leafy kind. They are meaty-er and more moist and juicy then others. When cooked in a pan they turn a little rubbery and resemble meat. To me, anyway!

Notice in the picture, the different origin eggs: guess wich one is organic from my godparents chickens? Only the one in the middle. The yolk has a translucent and velvety kind of orange color. The others are from the store, different batches.

INGREDIENTS (for a pan):

• 1 medium or large potato;
• 1 pack (aprox. 300 gr. pleurotus mushrooms);
• 4-5 eggs;
• 3-5 tblsp. vegetable oil;
• condiments to taste.

HOW TO MAKE:

First, peel and slice up the potato into bits the shape that you fancy, but not too thick. Heat up the oil in the pan and fry the potatoes for about 5 to 10 minutes, so they are about half done. Chop up the pleurotus mushrooms roughly and throw them over the potatoes. Stir with a wooden spoon (so as not to damage the non stick pan). They will leak some moisture, so wait for it to evaporate. It will create a delicious sauce in the pan. Season with salt and pepper, but not too much, for the eggs will have seasoning too.

Now break the eggs and beat them in a bowl with seasoning (salt, pepper, time, a bit of hot chilly flakes, parsley etc.) Poor the eggs over the potatoes and mushrooms in the hot pan and shake a little. You can put in some cheese of your choice, now, broken into 1 inch bits. Let the eggs set for about 3 to 5 minutes on medium heat. You can wait for everything to become solid or you can leave the top a little runny. I did.
Enjoy with green salad!

Granpa's Baked Potatoes and Salad

On Sunday we were invited to Grandma and Grandpa's at Negru Voda, Constanta. They enjoyed their granddaughter and we ... enjoyed a bbq with a tray of awesome potatoes, onions and carrots as well as a plate of tomato, cucumber and green onion salad with vinegar and dill.

Pork Steak (and other holiday treats)

For the winter holidays in Romanian homes it is a given to have at least one or two pork products or dishes. Along side other starters, baked things and all kinds of desert, almost everyone has the simple pork steak on the Christmas and New Ears Eve table.

So, as a good family that we are, the nice pork raw steaks came from my father in law, already salted, peppered and seasoned with lots of dry time. I just took the pork cuts and roasted them slowly in a thick skillet with some sunflower oil and some water (just to cover). It took the water just about half an hour to steam away and leave the steaks browned and tender soft. We served it with some wonderful mashed potatoes made by mom with her special tool inharited from her own mom.

Next you have a little photo hint of some of the other things that were on our Christmas table in 2010.

Cheese, olives and mini meatballs platter.

A la Rouse Salad.

Turkey jelly with garlic.

Potato & White Fish Salad

This is a favorite of mine ever since I don't remember when, from my mother's home entertaining at special occasions or holidays. The other day I just got a craving for the garlicky stuff and I bought 2 fillets of pangasius fish (it works with any white fish). Then, all you have to do is boil some potatoes (skin on), and whisk a good bowl of mayonnaise from two eggs and some vegetable oil. Do not use extra virgin olive oil that has too strong a flavor, unless you absolutely love it. I used sunflower. Into the mayo throw a pinch of salt and pepper to taste. I didn't use any lemon. I like it better without lemon in this particular salad.

After the (2-3 big) potatoes are boiled well to the core, extract them from the pot, let them rest for 10 mins and then peel off the skin. Chop the yellow things into smallish cubes (dimension to taste). 

The fish fillets are also boiled by now; you get rid of the skin and all the leftover bones as much as possible, then mash up the boiled fish meat into smallish chunks (about the size that you've cut the potato cubes).

That's it: now just mix well together the potato, fish bits and mayonnaise. Season to taste (I lke mine a bit peppery) and add the last and most important ingredient/condiment: garlic. About 2-3 cloves of garlic, crushed, for the whole salad.

If it is still a bit warm, it is best served later, chilled, so the garlic has time to infuse the bulk of it. Enjoy!

Dressed Broccoli

One of the simplest most delicious side dishes to meat is this garlic oil dressed broccoli salad. It is nothing more than blanched (boiled briefly) broccoli cut into florettes. It is important to bring the water to a boil before you submerge the broccoli into it, because if you subject the vegetable to heat more than a minute or two it will turn all soft and not nice. I think it is best served while it holds a little firmness to its structure. 

Then it is also important to put a fair amount of salt into the boiling water (i suggest course).  It's like when you boil potatoes whit skin on or pasta.

If you want to be thorough to the end, you should extract the broccoli from the water after a minute boil and immediately put it into a bowl with ice water. This is so the bright green color doesn't turn darker if left to cool in open air.

The dressing should also be put over the broccoli when it is still hot. It's simple. Almost always good food is simple! Good quality extra virgin olive oil, pepper (freshly ground) and crushed and finely chopped garlic. It's a delight anytime for me, as I discover more and more how great vegetables are.

Tomato Cucumber Salad

My (retired professional cook) father in law threw on this amazing fresh tomato cucumber salad with onions and lots of dill, as a side dish for some grilled organic raised chicken. Check out the baby grapes from the garden after the rain.

Caprese Salad With Home Grown Basil

Made with the basil leaves from my balcony, that I planted from seeds.
"Caprese" means "from (the island of) Capri" in Italian. It consists of ripe tomatoes, mozzarella cheese, fresh basil leafs, extra virgin olive oil, salt, pepper. Some people do variations (adding pesto sauce, for example). Like most italian recipes, it has few ingreds and therefor you must use the most fresh and quality ingreds you can find. If you like the tomato zest olive oil cheese combo, take a look at this.

Sote Veggies & Cucumber Salad

My interest in broad beans (fresh from the outdoor market) has materialized in yet another fine meal. For a summer lunch we had some chicken meat to grill and in my late trip to the local market I picked up some half kilo broad beans (the yellow with violet spots kind) along with some cauliflower. As I decided to bring more and more fresh vegetables into our family's diet, I went for the sote version of the veggies, with oil, lots of chopped new garlic and fresh parsley.

Because the meal asked for a side salad, I made a nice summer cucumber salad with a white onion cut julien topped with lots of fragrant dill. The dressing is made of oil, salt & pepper and vinegar to taste.

INGREDIENTS:

SOTE VEGGIES

• chicken meat for the grilling;
• 1/2 kilo broad beans;
• 300 gr. cauliflower into flowerttes;
• 3-5 cloves garlic chopped;
• 1 handfull chopped parsley;
• 2 tbsp. olive oil;
• salt & pepper.

CUCUMBER SALAD

• 1/2 kilo cucumbers, sliced;
• 1 medium white onion, cut julien;
• chopped dill to taste;
• vegetable oil, vinegar, salt& pepper.

Boeuf Salad

Boeuf Salad is a staple dish in almost every romanian household on the major holidays. So, New Years makes no exception. Both of my parents and parentsinlaw made a good quantity of the delicious mayonnaise treat.

Well, to be totally correct we made the variation "a la rouse" salad, that is the "boeuf" salad without the "boeuf".

So, it is basically  boiled potatoes, carrots, peas and pickles (green tomato or cucumbers) all diced in small cubes and mixed with lovely home made (lemony and mustardy) mayonnaise. Here it is in stages.