In Love With Lisbon

Tag: Receita

  • Guest Post – Queijadas de Leite from Easy Portuguese Recipes

    Azulejo 14I was contacted recently by Pedro Bicudo from the Easy Portuguese Recipes website who offered to write a guest post for In Love With Lisbon. As I know you all love your recipes, I thought this was a great idea! Do check out the website. Not only do Pedro and his cousin Tiago Moniz provide recipes but there are also some excellent videos for those of us who need some extra help with cooking skills!

    Over to Pedro Bicudo…

    Portuguese cuisine is all about simplicity and enjoyment. Enjoying the act of cooking has always been just as important as the eating of the food itself. Whilst that may not be the protocol of most fine European cuisines, we have always focused on what matters most; flavor and ease to make. We like to use few but flavorful ingredients whenever we cook to get the most taste out of every component.

    Desserts are the most widely known aspect of Portuguese cuisine. Almost all Portuguese have a sweet tooth and so we have found many ways to satisfy those needs whether it be cakes, puddings, fruit medleys, or especially – cupcakes. Portuguese cupcakes, known as “Queijadas” or “Pasteis” are the most popular of all Portuguese desserts and so we would like to show you how to make one of the most delicious and traditional cupcakes of them all, Queijadas de Leite.

    Queijadas de Leite 
    Queijadas de LeiteThe sweet fragrance of Queijadas de Leite emanates those that are freshly made daily from many Portuguese bakeries. There is no surprise as to why these are some of the most popular Portuguese desserts. These delicious Portuguese cupcakes have the perfect amount of sweetness and an awesome lemony kick to them. They are really simple and easy to make. This is a traditional family recipe which has been enjoyed for many generations in our family and by many Portuguese people for centuries.

    Ingredients:

    • 2 cups of sugar
    • 3 eggs
    • Half a stick of melted butter
    • 3 cups of milk, almost boiling
    • 1 cup of flour
    • 1 Lemon or Orange rind – finely grated
    • 2 cupcake sheet pans
    • 12 Cupcake baking papers

    Directions:
    1) Beat together the sugar with the eggs, rinds, and melted butter in an machine beater for a couple of minutes

    2) Add the milk and flour sparingly until it is will mixed.

    3) Butter the cupcake baking papers in the sheet pan and add a little flour before you place the mix into it.

    4) Place in the oven at 350 for 45 minutes to an hour.

    5) Remove from the oven, place onto a serving platter, and enjoy!

    Other great Portuguese Recipes:
    http://www.easyportugueserecipes.com/portuguese-papas-porridge-grits/
    http://www.easyportugueserecipes.com/portuguese-clams-in-garlic-sauce-ameijoas-com-alho/
    http://www.easyportugueserecipes.com/homemade-fresh-cheese-2/

    We at EasyPortugueseRecipes.com are two second generation Portuguese-American cousins who cherish our heritage by enjoying the delicious food made for centuries by our ancestors. We want to share all the recipes passed down to us through numerous family recipe books which contain unique and sometimes secret recipes, enjoyed for many generations. We try to focus on the “comfort food” side of Portuguese cooking, rather than difficult to make fine European cuisine.

  • Lily makes Portuguese Easter Bread

    Azulejo 9As an Early Easter descends on us, I decided to try a recipe I found in “A Taste of Portugal”.

    Easter Sunday is celebrated after the first full moon that occurs after the Spring Equinox. Spring Equinox marks the time when the Sun moves into Aries – Equinox means equal day and equal night. The new festival of Easter harks back to the Pagan festival of Oestre (meaning ‘egg’) so eggs are traditional at this time of year across the Northern Hemisphere. Eggs are a wonderful symbol for new life and for pondering the big questions i.e. which came first – chicken or egg 🙂

    As the sun moves into Aries, the earth gets a vibrant push to produce. The ground begins to warm and new life springs everywhere.

    Marking the end of Lent, Easter is a time to indulge in good food and celebration. Regardless of whether or not you are religious, it’s an excellent time to let your hair down and celebrate Spring.

    Easter in Portuguese is Páscoa and just as we have Hot Cross Buns and Easter Eggs in England, Portugal has it’s own traditions for Easter food.

    Folar is perhaps one of the best known of Portuguese Easter foods and from what I have seen there seems to be a variety of ways to cook it. Folar is typically associated with having a boiled egg (or few) embedded into the top of the bread and held in place by a cross of bread dough. Most of the recipes I have seen are slightly sweet and contain cinnamon although I have seen reference to savoury breads as well which include meats.

    INGREDIENTS

    Portuguese Easter Bread - Ingredients

    14oz (400g) Flour
    1/2 oz (15g) Fresh Yeast
    1 1/2 (45g) Caster Sugar
    3oz (90g) Butter
    1 Large Egg
    1/2 pint (300ml) Milk
    1 teaspoon Powdered Aniseed
    1 teaspoon Cinnamon
    1/2 teaspoon Salt

    For Decoration
    2 hard boiled eggs
    1 beaten egg for brushing

    METHOD

    1. In a bowl combine the yeast, 1/4 of the flour, a 1/3 of the milk (warmed) and half the sugar.
    2. Mix together to make a dough, cover and leave in a warm place for 1/2 hour
    3. Beat the eggs with the salt and spices and remaining milk and sugar.
    4. Kneed in the flour and egg mix to the dough gradually.
    5. Kneed in the butter. The dough should not stick to the side of the bowl.
    6. Cover the dough and leave it to rise for about three hours in a warm place.
    7. Break the dough into two (or leave whole) and plant the eggs on top. Make a cross with two rolled lengths of dough to put on the top, holding the egg in place.
    8. Brush the bread with the beaten egg.
    9. Cook at 210c/425F/Gas 7 until golden brown.

    Sounds simple doesn’t it?

    What I discovered when I was setting up the photograph of the ingredients (yes I did forget to put the milk in the picture) was that I hadn’t read that the recipe called for fresh yeast and what I had was dried yeast. I attempted to use the dried yeast but found that the mixture was far wetter than it should have been. To compensate, I ended up using a lot more flour which made the final result rather doughy. This sorely tried my patience – especially when I had to leave halfway through to go and buy some more flour from the shops!

    Anyway – aside from this problem, my Folar did turn out rather nicely. I personally am not that keen on aniseed so I did leave this out. In retrospect I would definitely use fresh yeast, not only to keep the consistency but also the avoid the stench of readying dried yeast for cooking – uggh!

    Portuguese Easter BreadI really like this recipe as you can really make it your own. Whilst it might not quite be to Portuguese tradition, why not embrace your inner child and paint your boiled egg with food colouring? I’ve seen quite a few pictures of breads from other places made like this and they do look very attractive. This is what I’m planning on doing next time 🙂

    Whilst researching Folar, I also came across a couple of other recipes for Easter that you might be interested in. One is Ninho de Pascoa (Easter Nest) which is a cake made to look like a birds nest. Such a wonderful idea for Spring celebrations! This is certainly a cake I would like to make as it could involve a lot of play. I imagine just using a simple sponge mix would suffice, scoop out the top, add chocolate eggs and decoration and there you go. There’s a lovely example here (in Portuguese) and here (also in Portuguese)

    Happy Spring and Happy Easter everyone!