Tag: kugel

Orange Cardamom Noodle Kugel

Well hello there blogosphere, it’s been so long, hasn’t it?! Life has been hectic as ever, but I’ve always got my blog on the back of mind, wanting to cook, and photograph, and post and just share with y’all. Pesach (in Beijing, China!) has come and gone. I’ve since been to Ohio, and off to Antwerp tomorrow, and guess how I’m celebrating? By making kugel!

If you know me, I consider myself the Anti-Kugel. Yes, that’s right. I’m Jewish and I don’t like kugel! Why, you ask? Well I believe that instead of boiling up veggies, mashing them, and then mixing them with oil and eggs and who-knows-what-else, why don’t you skip the whole complicated process and JUST. ROAST. VEGGIES. Same goes with potatoes. And noodles? Well you can cook em and eat em JUST. LIKE THAT. But alas, kugel has stood the test of time, and you’ll find the gazillion calorie concoction in most Jewish Ashkenazi houses on Erev Shabbat (my mom included)!

So what, pray tell, is kugel doing HERE? Well in one word: Shtisel. The viral Israeli TV series that was made popular by Netflix has captured my heart, and that of many, Jews and non-Jews alike. It has me craving Israeli salad with tahini, tea, and all sorts of traditional heimish foods that I haven’t looked at in years. In short: If Shtisel has ME making kugel, and you’re not watching it, then you’ve got to GET. ON. IT. Chasdei Hashem I’m here to spread the Shtisel love!

So I’ve been sprinkled with “heimish” dust but that doesn’t mean that I’m going to made traditional kugel, because, well, I’m still ME. And because Shavuos is coming up, what do you think I did? I made dairy lokshin kugel – one that’s lightened up with the refreshing taste of orange, cardamom and vanilla bean + some ricotta for creaminess and yogurt for some tang. All in all, a perfect compliment to your Shavuot menu. B’hechlet!

Orange Cardamom Noodle Kugel

12 oz. wide egg noodles
4 tbsp butter, plus more for greasing the pan
4 eggs
15 oz. ricotta cheese
12 oz. plain Greek yogurt
Zest and juice of 1 medium orange
2 tbsp honey, or to taste
1/2 tsp cardamom
1 vanilla bean, split and scraped or 1 tsp vanilla extract
1/4 tsp kosher salt
1/2 cup pitted medjool dates, chopped (see note)

Method:

Preheat oven to 350 degrees.

Bring a pot of salted water to a boil, add noodles and cook for 7 minutes. Drain and return to the pot. Stir with butter.

In a second bowl, lightly beat the eggs. Stir in the ricotta cheese, Greek yogurt, orange zest and juice, honey, cardamom, vanilla bean paste and salt. Stir with a spoon until the mixture is smooth. Add the buttered noodles and dates and stir to incorporate.

Grease a baking dish with butter and pour in the noodle mixture. Bake for 50-60 minutes, until the kugel is set and starting to brown around the edges.

NOTE: to make chopping easier, freeze the dates or refrigerate for a few hours.

Related Recipes:

orange cardamom malabi
shavuot menu roundup
rosewater cheesecake mousse parfaits
Bubby’s challah kugel

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Mini Zucchini Muffins + Rivka’s Pumpkin Cake

We don’t have an eiruv in my community, which means that once you have a baby, you are stuck at home for Shabbos until your baby can walk! So getting invited out for Shabbos (to sleep over) is a real treat! A few weeks ago, my good friend Rivka, a shlucha in Long Island City, invited us, and we were more than happy to accept. Rivka’s mother is Moroccan and her family is in the restaurant business, so it is no surprise that she knows how to cook! She make some traditional Moroccan foods, but her table is a kaleidoscope of different cuisines.

Rivka is not only a good cook, but a very practical one. Instead of three courses on a late Friday night, she serves one. She made mini pumpkin muffins which she served at breakfast, for snack, and in a cupcake tree along with the Shabbos meal. Pumpkin cake is moist and dense, so it lends itself well to be served as a kugel. I myself have served it that way many times.

My kids were head over heels for the mini cupcakes (kids love anything mini, don’t they? maybe because it’s more their size!) so last week, I purchased a mini muffin pan, and went to work on some muffins for the kids. I’ve mentioned before how I’m not the biggest baker, and it has a lot to do with the fact that cake is just so unhealthy. When I see myself throwing white flour, sugar and oil into a bowl, I think to myself, “Am I really going to put THAT into my mouth?” Not that it tastes bad, cake is delicious. And I do buy it on occasion. It’s easier when I don’t see how it’s made (even though I know it’s full of junk). So, I justify this recipe by reminding myself that it’s filled with zucchini, a vegetable :)

Feel free to make this cake in a bundt pan, it is absolutely delicious any way you bake it. You can make a zucchini bread in loaf pans, or larger cupcakes which you are free to frost with a maple cream cheese frosting!

NOTE: When I make these, I like to shred double the amount of zucchini and freeze half for the next time. Just thaw the zucchini in a strainer and press down with a paper towel to squeeze out excess water.

Mini Zucchini Muffins

2 cups sugar
1 cup canola oil
3 eggs
1 tbsp pure vanilla extract
2 cups flour
1 1/2 tsp baking soda
1/2 tsp baking powder
1-2  tsp cinnamon (depending how cinnamony you like it)
1 tsp salt
2 cups grated zucchini, unpeeled
chopped walnuts (optional)

Method:

Whisk sugar, oil, eggs, and vanilla together. In a separate bowl, mix the dry ingredients. Add the wet ingredients to the dry and fold in the zucchini. For mini muffins, bake at 350 for 18 minutes. For a loaf or bundt pan, bake for 45 minutes – 1 hour, until toothpick inserted comes out clean.

Rivka’s Pumpkin Cake

These work extremely well in mini muffins because they are more dense but still very moist. When I called Rivkah for the recipe, it turned out to be nearly identical to mine (hers called for just 1/2 tsp more of the baking soda and powder).

I have made these to serve as a kugel, filling muffin tins with the batter, and adding a tsp of blueberry pie filling in the center (I happen to have a picture of it because I had made them on my anniversary Shabbos, and as luck would have it, the blueberry pie filling turned out as a heart in one of them, so I served it to my husband and told him I made it that way on purpose!)

2 cups sugar
1 cup oil
4 eggs
2 tsp baking soda
2 tsp baking powder
1 tsp cinnamon
2 cups flour
1 15oz. can pumpkin (not pie filling)
chocolate chips (optional)

Method:

Whisk sugar, oil and eggs together. In a separate bowl, mix the dry ingredients. Add the wet ingredients to the dry and fold in the pumpkin. For mini muffins, bake at 350 for 18  minutes. For a loaf or bundt pan, bake for 45 minutes – 1 hour, until toothpick inserted comes out clean.

NOTE: If you’d like to make this as a kugel, and you feel it’s too cakey, you can double the amount of pumpkin (either by using 2 cans, or by using 1 and halving the batter ingredients). Adjust baking time accordingly.

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