Ingredients:
2 small to medium-sized potatoes
1 courgette
1 onion
1 beetroot
2 cloves garlic
1 tablespoon chopped fresh coriander
1 egg yolk
Sea salt, pepper, flour, olive oil

Method:
1. Peel and roughly grate the potatoes, the courgette and the beetroot. Finely chop half the onion. Peel and finely chop one clove of garlic.
2. Place the vegetables in a bowl, add the chopped fresh coriander, salt, pepper and egg yolk and mix.
3. Make small patties, squeezing out the liquid. Coat the patties with flour. Fry the patties in olive oil over a medium heat, turning them over after five minutes or so, to let them brown nicely on both sides.
4. As they are cooking, chop the remaining half onion and the other garlic clove. Heat some more olive oil in a small pan and fry the onion and garlic until soft, then add the liquid left from the patties after squeezing, stirring regularly, allowing it to reduce and thicken.
5. When the patties have browned nicely on both sides, serve them up, pouring the liquid over them.

Irena served her Popačak with a Bosnian pear syrup. It was beautiful, with a bit of the flavour you get when you soak dried fruits. Taking a slightly different tack, a nice chutney might do the job.

Submitted by Nick

Ingredients:
50 gms Fresh yeast
300 gms Plain white flour
300 gms Maize flour
8 tsps Demerara sugar
1 tsp Salt

Method:
1. Break the fresh yeast up between your fingers and mix in a bowl with 4 tsps of sugar and some warm water. Put it somewhere warm for 10 minutes or so, until the yeast is bubbling nicely.
2. Add the flour (plain white and maize), the salt and the rest of the sugar and mix with enough warm water to give you an elastic dough. Knead it, stretch it and pummel it for a few minutes, then cover it with a cloth and put it back to rise in a warm place.
3. If you have fresh yeast, it should have risen after around 25 minutes. Knock the dough back. Dampen a backing dish or tin, sprinkle more maize flour round the tin to stop the bread sticking.
4. Put the dough in the baking dish/tin. Don’t bother letting it rise again – just put it in a medium hot oven and let it cook for 25 to 30 mins (until it’s smelling irresistible and is looking nice and brown).

For fresh yeast you can try your nearest baker – some supermarkets might have it. If you can’t find any and want to use dried, just allow more time for the yeast to start bubbling, more time for the kneading and more time for the rising.

If you can’t get maize flour, you could try using polenta, which is slightly less ground than the flour Irena used and will probably give you a more crunchy texture.

Submitted by Nick

Ingredients:
1 bunch spring onions
1 medium-sized tub of cottage cheese
3 dessert spoons of Greek yoghurt
Sea salt
Sweet paprika

Method:
1. Chop the spring onions and add a couple of pinches of sea salt, then rub the salt into the onions.
2. Add the cottage cheese and one dessert spoon of yoghurt and mix it all together thoroughly – slightly grinding the onions with your fork. 3. Smooth it out in the bowl and add the rest of the yoghurt, using it to smooth over the surface of the mixture. Sprinkle a little paprika over the top.

Submitted by Nick

Ingredients:
1 cup dried butter beans
8 onions
3 fresh peppers
1 bulb of garlic
Half a dozen sprigs of fresh thyme
1 teaspoon of salt
2 teaspoons of sugar
2 heaped dessert spoons of sweet paprika
3 fresh tomatoes
Olive oil

Method:
1. Slice the onions and fry them slowly on a low heat in a good-sized pan, using two or three tablespoons of oil – you want to caramelise the onions, so keep stirring them every now and then.
2. When they are beginning to go soft, slice the three peppers (red, green, and/or yellow). Irena’s grandmother includes the seeds and the heart of the pepper – but not the green sprig at to top! Add the peppers to the onions and continue to cook slowly.
3. Chop the cloves of garlic (as said, a whole bulb of them) and put in a mortar with the thyme, salt, sugar and paprika and grind the mixture together. If you haven’t got a pestle and mortar, just crush it all with the end of a rolling pin – in something that won’t break…
4. When the onions and peppers are caramelised (the onions should be soft and sweet and just beginning to go brown), put them in a pan or an earthenware dish about 2” deep. Mix with the cooked beans. Slice the tomatoes and add them. Add the paprika and garlic mix and blend it all together in the dish. Add a couple of tablespoons of water and then liberally add a good few glugs of olive oil.
5. Put it in the oven and bake for half an hour or 40 mins – it wants to cook all the flavours together, the tomatoes need to be cooked, but you don’t want it to burn!

It is a great bean dish, so enjoy it with a hunk of bread that can soak up the oil and a good dollop of Satrice.

Submitted by Nick

Ingredients:
2 handfuls dried chick peas (or 1 can ready-to-eat chick peas)
2 onions, chopped (or 1 onion, or less, or more)
2 leeks (or 1 or 3)
4 cloves of garlic (or as many as you fancy)
½ teaspoon salt (consult medical opinion or ignore it)
½ teaspoon cumin (don’t overdo it)
3 teaspoons turmeric (overdo it if you like turmeric)
1 ¼ teaspoons vegetable bouillon (or maybe ½ a vegetable
stock cube)
1 tablespoon fresh parsley (roughly measured, roughly chopped)
1 tablespoon fresh coriander (or roughly the same amount as the
parsley)
1 tablespoon cooking oil (does it matter which oil? You decide)
Several glugs of olive oil

Method:
1. Chop the onions and fry them gently in the tablespoon of cooking oil. Chop the leeks and add them to the pan once the onions have begun to soften. Sprinkle with the salt, then chop and add one or two of the garlic cloves.
2. When everything has softened and maybe just begun to go brown, add the chick peas. Give it two good glugs of olive oil, then add the cumin, the turmeric and the vegetable stock. Stir it, cover it and let it cook for a few minutes.
3. Chop the parsley, the coriander and the rest of the garlic cloves an lifting the lid from the pan, sprinkle them on the top of your spicy chick peas and leeks. Add another couple of glugs of good olive oil and put the lid back on for another minute or so.

Serve with Bosnian bread or other nice bread…

Submitted by Nick

Ingredients:
Oats
Soya milk
Dried fruit(s) i.e dried bananas, cranberries, apricots, raisons etc. cut into pieces
Honey (optional)

Method:
1. Mix a small bowl of oats with the dried fruit of your choice.
2. Pour on the milk to cover and add around a teaspoon of honey if desired.
3. Eat and feel full and healthy!

Submitted by Laura.

Ingredients:
Macaroni
1 Tbsp plain flour
1 Tbsp butter/marg
1 Pint(ish) milk
About a handful or so of grated cheese (Strong cheddar is good)
Mustard
Olive oil
1 small onion
1 clove garlic
Veg- mushrooms, courgettes, aubergine, peppers, celery, carrot, sweetcorn…
A tin of tomatoes
Added extras if you’ve got them/fancy them such as dried herbs, olives, chilli…
Salt and pepper

Method:

1. For the tomato and veg sauce, sauté the onion and garlic in a little oil. Add any other veg you’re using and fry until soft and taking on a little colour. Add the tomatoes and any extras you’re using and season to taste.
2. Cook the macaroni in salted water in accordance with the packet instructions.
3. In the meantime start your cheese sauce by mixing the butter and flour in a pan and sizzling for around a minute. Gradually, add the milk. Keep stirring to get all the lumps out until the sauce is quite runny. Continue to stir as the sauce comes to the boil and let it simmer for a minute or so- the sauce should have thickened by now. Add more milk if it is too thick (remember it will thicken again when you add the cheese). Remove from the heat and add the cheese mustard and salt and pepper.
4. Drain the pasta and transfer half of it to an oven proof dish. Cover with the tomato sauce and mix it into the pasta. Next add the rest of the pasta and the cheese sauce, again giving it a little poke so all the pasta is covered. Sprinkle with some more grated cheese. Cook for around 20 mins or so until the cheese is melted and the sauce is bubbling.

Submitted by Laura.

1. Cut the tempeh into ten slices and dust with flour.
2. Heat olive oil. Shallow fry tempeh and garlic until they are well browned.
3. Add the sherry and bubble it up. Leave to simmer approximately ten minutes.

Eat with rice or salad.

* 500 gr. bread from the day before
* 2 kg. peeled tomatoes. one
* glass olive oil
* two cloves garlic
* salt

1. Blend the ingredients together (in Córdoba, people do not use the crust of the bread or the pips from the tomatoes, but if in a hurry it still works).

2. Eat with bread fried in olive oil, or toast. Decorate with chopped parsley and slices of shallow fried seitan or arame seaweed.

Aubergine
Garlic
Olive oil
Cumin
Salt and pepper

1. Slice and salt the aubergine and let it stand for 30 minutes.
2. Chop all the ingredients and fry in olive oil until the aubergine changes colour. Mash with a fork or blender.

Eat warm, as a pâté, with bread.