The ideal thirst-quencher - a refreshing real lemonade

I love the fact that Estonia is becoming more knowledgeable about food - both its own and in general. During the Soviet time you couldn't really buy lemons at all. Then, for well over a decade, we got lemons, but often of questionable quality. I guess with our small population - just over 1.3 million people (= a very small market share) - our fruit importers didn't have much bargaining power at the European fruit and vegetable wholesalers and often ended up with the worst of the available fruit - including dried up lemons. (Still, compared to the "fresh" artichokes or rubbery fennels I've seen, the lemons have been pretty decent, I guess).

Now, during the last few years, we've had a bit of a food(ie) revolution happening. The number of excellent food blogs have sky-rocketed. There are lots of lovely restaurants popping up here and then. Organic food is becoming more available and small, artisanal producers have appeared on the shelves. The country of origin has become more important. If we take lemons, then it's not just a lemon you're buying, but lemons from Spain, Italy or elsewhere - depending on the season and the grocery store. And just recently I've realised that some stores even mark the variety of lemons. My local grocery store has been selling Spanish Primofiori lemons -huge, juicy and beautifully acidic (NB! Do not confuse with the Sicilian primofiore lemons). According to this page, Primofiori (locally known as limon Fino or limon Mesero in Spain) is the most important and popular lemon variety in the Mediterranean basin- over half of the annual Spanish lemon crop is made up of this variety. Primofiori lemons are large (mine averaged at 350 g each!), and they yield a lot of juice for their size.

Here's how I've been making lemonade to quench the thirst - we've had weeks of sunny, warm and dry summer here in Estonia, so this lemonade has been a real hit. It keeps for a week in the fridge, so it's

Note that there's no point giving exact number of lemons here - my Primofiori lemons were weighing about 350 g, yielding about 100 ml (just under 1/2 cup) juice each. I'll just give a proportion of sugar per juice that I've used. This yields a sharp and just slightly sweet lemonade - use more sugar, if you wish.

A really refreshing lemonade
(Tõeliselt mõnus limonaad)



juicy lemons
caster sugar

to serve:
still or sparkling soda water or plain water
ice cubes

Wash the lemons carefully, cut in half and juice them. Measure the juice, then take about 100 g (3.5 oz) of sugar per 250 ml (1 cup) of lemon juice.
Place sugar and lemon juice into a small saucepan and bring slowly to a boil. Let it simmer for about 5 minutes, stirring every now and then.
Cool a little, then bottle and keep in the fridge.

To serve, place some ice cubes into a glass, pour some lemonade extract in over the ice cubes and top with (soda) water, to taste.

Beautiful

Today is my little sister's birthday - no food post today, just a pretty flower from our garden :)

Dangerously moreish (frozen) Oreo brownie bites

To be fair, these should be called Domino brownies, as I used Domino cookies, the Finnish equivalent of Oreo sandwich cookies. But if I'd call them Domino brownies, most of you would expect something like this as opposed to the cute brownie bite above. Also, most of my American readers (that's about 2/3 of all readers of Nami-Nami) don't have access to Domino cookies anyway, and could use more familiar Oreo ones for the same result.

Now, the frozen bit. I first read about frozen brownies a while ago, but dismissed the whole idea. Who likes frozen cakes anyway? They'd be cold and hard and utterly unpleasant, right? Or that what I thought. On the other hand, I've thrown away quite a few very good brownie pieces during my lifetime, just because I forgot them on the countertop for a day too long and they became dry and boring. That's not happening any more, as I've discovered - and totally fallen for - the joys of frozen brownies. You see, a good brownie, made with lots of butter, sugar, chocolate and just a little flour - and, most importantly, NOT overbaked - is absolutely wonderful eaten straight from the freezer - cooling, delicious and almost thick ice-cream-like. I've been cutting the brownies into relatively small pieces after cooling, and we've been nibbling through two batches of those frozen brownie bites during the last week already. Not just the three of us, of course, but with some help from our Scottish friends, grandparents, nephews and various babysitters :)

Estonian summer has been warm and sunny this year (again), and a frozen chocolate brownie is just what you might need to cool yourself a little..

The idea for putting chopped cookies into my brownies is from Ina Garten (here's her recipe for outrageous Oreo crunch brownies), but I used my old and trusted brownie recipe as a basis. Here's my version, that even my non-chocoholic-K. loves.

Have you been freezing your brownies? Do you like them or hate them?

Domino or Oreo brownie bites
(Domino-brownie koogikesed)
For a 10 inch/24 cm square baking tin

200 g unsalted butter
200 g dark chocolate, coarsely chopped (I used Callebaut bittersweet chocolate couverture chips)
3 eggs (size M or L)
200 g caster sugar
100 g plain flour
0.5 tsp fine salt
0.5 tsp vanilla extract
15-20 Domino or Oreo cookies, roughly chopped

Line a 10 in/24 cm square baking dish with parchment paper. Heat the oven to 170˚C/350F.
Place a heatproof bowl over a saucepan of simmering water. Add butter and chocolate and heat, stirring, until chocolate is melted and the mixture is smooth. Allow to cool slightly.
Whisk eggs, vanilla and sugar in a large bowl. Fold in the chocolate mixture.
Stir in the flour, salt and cookies, stir until combined.
Pour batter into the prepared baking pan and smooth top with a spatula.
Bake for about 30 minutes, until the brownie looks dry on top, but is still nicely moist inside.

When you want to serve your brownie warm, then cool a little and cut into big squares (9, perhaps?), serve alongside a big scoop of vanilla ice cream.

For frozen brownie bites, cool completely, then cut into small squares or rectangles and place into a freezer box. Enjoy from frozen.