Czech Foods Recipes

The recipe below comes from Vickie Klimitchek, the mother of one of my aunts.    Her grandson, my cousin Ryan, has proudly mastered her kolaches recipe. And I'm fond of this coffee cake recipe. My parents had it written in their family write-your-own-recipes-down cookbook. It's quick to put together and quick to bake and delicious on a chilly, windy Sunday morning. Some topping stays on top, some sinks down into sticky, sugary, buttery veins of deliciousness. My cousin Ryan holding his kolaches made from his grandmother Vickie's recipe.  Coffee Cake For the cake: 1 1/2 cups all purpose flour 1 tablespoon baking powder 1/4 teaspoon salt 1/4 cup butter at room temperature 1 cups sugar 1 egg 1/2 cup milk  Preheat your over to 375 degrees. Combine and mix flour, baking soda and salt in a bowl. In a separate bowl, cream together the butter and sugar.  Then add milk and egg. When blended, add the flour mixture and blend again....

I loves mangoes, which I usually buy in bulk (in season) when I go shopping. Mangoes are sweet tropical fruit, full of vitamins. Here is the image how I love to cut mangoes for my loved ones for their (and my) easy consumption. Yesterday I noticed that a couple of my mangoes got quite ripe. I decided to use them in the morning to bake muffins. So if you think you would like to try this recipe, read ingredients you will need along with step-by-step directions below: 2 cups organic all purpose flour sifted 1 tsp baking powder 1/2 tsp baking soda 1/2 tsp salt 2 mangoes gut up into squares and divide into 1 cup + rest of the mango 1/2 cup sugar 1 egg 1/4 cup sunflower oil 1 tsp vanilla extract Combine sifted flour with baking powder, baking soda and salt - stir well Whip your egg and sugar on high speed for a couple of minutes. Add vanilla extract and stir. Take 1 cup of the softest pieces of the cut up mango, add it to the bowl with the...

Quinoa, oats, nuts, and dried cranberries in a cookie makes them breakfast appropriate, post-workout ready, and diet friendly. And they are sweet enough that kids like them too! Whatever type of people are in your family, this is a cookie that works for all.   Sneaking protein-rich quinoa into baked treats boarders on genius, in my book anyways. I like a little bit of 'healthy' wherever I can get it. Dark chocolate chunks and plump dried cranberries give them a definite sweetness. Almonds are toasted before used, to intensify their crunch and flavor. They bake up nice and chewy, and make about two dozen very substantially sized cookies. I had two after a long run, which satisfied both a sweet tooth, and a need for a bit of carbs with staying power. They should keep well for a few days, but I doubt they will last that long. Quinoa, what else can we sneak you in? Continue to Recipe... Recipe: Choco-Cran Quinoa Cookies Adapted from Bon Apetit Jan 2012 Serves 2 dozen large cookie...

Who can resist a perfectly crumbly, gently sweet, wholesome breakfast muffin? And when that very same muffin promotes a certain, um, regularity..well, that is the added benefit of including both prunes and oats in the same muffiny package. Prunes get a bad rap in the states. Abroad they don't seem to have attained the same stigma of being just a bowl of something old and wrinkly next to grandma's bedside. Rather they can be a welcome addition to baked goods.  Anywhere raisins are present, chopped prunes can be used for a bit more tangy sweetness and moisture. In these muffins, toasted almonds give a bit of texture. Oats and a mix of white and wheat flour make them ideal for brekkie. Orange zest, cinnamon, and nutmeg give it a bit of zing. And it's all quite healthy with honey and Greek yogurt added into the mix.  Careful when they are warm, their addictiveness hides how filling they are. Perfect for a post-run / workout bite too! Continue to Recipe... Recipe: Dried Plum ...

Some might splash in a little Baileys in their morning coffee. Jokes all around of tapping into ones Irishness. Living as an American abroad, I sometimes find myself tending to downplay such Euro familial connections, and instead, head straight for what America stands for. This morning, that happened to be maple syrup and bourbon.  Yes, banana nut muffins livened up with some mapley-bourbon goodness.  The muffins are fairly straightforward, with only a hint of maple and bourbon. But the glaze that transpired a few hours later, well, that makes them worthy of bringing to work. For the first time, I used a bit of gelatin in a glaze. I think it helped the structure a bit. If you've got the extra ten minutes to wait around for it to 'bloom' in the water, I say give it a go. Otherwise, skip it, and the glaze should be a bit thinner, but still work out if the muffins aren't traveling far. The deep maple-bourbon flavor marriage is grounded with a bit of whole-wheat flour and o...

There are no words. There is only cake. Continue to Recipe... Recipe: Pistachio Cheesecake with Cardamom-Orange Glaze Serves 12 Time overnight Eat with Muscat / Viognier Crust : 14 oz (400g) sweet biscuits (vanilla wafers or other tea cookies of choice) 1/3 cup (75g) melted butter 3.5 oz (100g) blanched almonds 1 tsp ground cardamom  optional : a bit of sugar Filling : 3 x 8oz (680g) packages of cream cheese 8 Tb of orange blossom honey 4 eggs 1/3 cup (80ml) heavy cream 2-3 tsp of orange blossom water zest of one orange Glaze : (adapted from Angela's Food Love ) 3/4 cup orange juice juice of 2 limes 3 Tb orange blossom honey 3 Tb acacia honey 2 Tb chestnut honey 8 cardamom pods - only the inner seeds well crushed (mortar-pestle/spice grinder) 2 handfuls of chopped pistachios   1) Heat oven to 375F/190C. Get out a spring-form pan and rub a bit of butter around the insides.  2) Make the crust: In a food processor/plastic bag with rolling pin, crush the biscuits and almon...

I have so many interests, that I am always trying to think of solutions, which would make my life easier. I love to accomplish a lot of things in the shortest time possible. I can now bake a bread that my family loves without much effort. It literally takes me 10 minutes to measure ingredients, pour them into a bread machine and few hours later, after machine kneads, rises, and bakes the dough, I am pulling a delicious bread out while my family is already nibbling on it. I also love one thing about it - no fake additives, no chemicals. Just pure yummy simple bread. Most of the time it is usually gone the same day. I have an old bread machine from William-Sonoma, which I have been using for nearly 20 years and it came quite handy many times. So if you have a bread machine, try this recipe. It will even save you few dollars. Ingredients: 1 and 1/2 cups water (warmed for 1 minute in the microwave) 1 TBSP milk 2 tsp sugar 1 tsp salt 2 tsp dry fa...

"..and she feeds you tea and oranges that come all the way from China.." Suzanne , Leonard Cohen. Some weekends deliver that perfect setting of quietude usually found only early in the mornings. And when that introspective peacefulness can stretch over the course of the weekend, well, when it can do that, it is something to be savoured. It can happen on a particularly grey and rainy weekend, or when one feels a cold coming on and they've been admonished by colleagues to stay tucked in bed until Monday. And it can happen especially when seeing a very close friend with whom silence is just as pleasant as anything else that can fill a room. When that kind of weekend wraps itself around you, it's nice to have cake. Not luxurious eye-poppingly decorated cake meant for guests. But cake meant for tea. Simple cake that can be had with a quick rummage through the kitchen. A bowl full of mandarins and a half package of amaretti cookies inspired this light and brightly flavoure...

Christmas morning is the perfect time to justify a leisurely dessert-like brekkie. And it seems to me that the messiness of pavlova certainly mirrors the disarray of little ones rushing down the stairs Christmas morning. I don't know about you, but for me, Christmas mornings are as relaxed and comfortable as a holiday gets. No one minds if they don't look their best in front of mom's camera when there are gifts to unwrap and gasps of surprise to be heard. While Pavlova is usually thrown together with summer berries (as in last summer's strawberry-basil pavlova ) it can take a winter turn as well with the addition of chocolate in the meringue base. Sauteed bananas are coated in caramel and a sprinkling of nutmeg, and a mascarpone cream sweetened with maple syrup simply resounds of breakfast. And did I mention it's all spiked with a wee bit of Baileys Irish Cream? Good Christmas morning! Continue to Recipe... Recipe: Chocolate Pavlova with Caramely Bananas & Masca...