the baker is back B)

The May Daring Bakers’ challenge was hosted by Linda of make life sweeter! and Courtney of Coco Cooks. They chose Apple Strudel from the recipe book Kaffeehaus: Exquisite Desserts from the Classic Cafés of Vienna, Budapest and Prague by Rick Rodgers.
whew, i finished the daring bakers challenge on time! for a while it was looking like i might opt out of the second challenge i've been presented with... that would have been sad; considering how cheap the ingredients are and how easy the recipe (which can be found on many blogs, including the two hostesses courtney and linda) is! so here it is, my savoury strudel!


er... yeah. that. being the idiot i am, i closed the filling into the pastry on the table and then just kind of stood there. staring and wondering how i was going to move it to the baking sheet. as my eyes flitted between strudel and oven, i realized the rolling should have ended on greased parchment paper that i could have lifted onto the baking sheet. d'oh. so i decided to cut my losses and just picked the damn thing up. of course it broke in half and the hot, wet filling seeped out. not a pretty sight, as you can see.

the filling i used was based on a sauce mix that my mom bought for me in california. despite the HOT stamp it wasn't that spicy at all. my family used to eat japanese-style curry about two or three times a month when my mom made it from the packaged mix and poured it over piping hot rice. being the impatient type, i always burned my mouth... i rarely eat 'kah-deh' now that i cook for myself and also it's not readily available here in denmark. i imagine my mom doesn't make it too often either, now that it's usually just her and dad at home and also because she was recently diagnosed with diabetes (and her usual curry ingredients were lots of white potatoes and beef over white rice).

the recipe calls for bread crumbs but we mostly only have heavy rugbrød in our cupboard so i used black sesame seeds instead. for the filling i just added onions, peas, carrots, and sweet potato to the sauce mix and tried my best to get more solids than liquid onto the dough.

though it has the face only a mother could love (actually i think i can see jesus in there!) it tasted really good. i mean, really good. on first bite, my mind instantly went back to new zealand where i had my first meat pie. i think it was steak. surprisingly i lost weight during that trip even though i ate 1-2 fist-sized savoury pies every day. but the very best one was at a dead cafe in the middle of nowhere; my pie sat all alone under a heatlamp in a glass case. low on cash and tired from running all over a mountain, i wasn't prepared for the explosion of chicken, brie, blueberry, and pastry. it was crazy! and this pie, i mean, strudel had the same perfect texture. i was in heaven~

about an hour later, i was in hell. concentration became a strangely difficult task and my body was suffering from grossness in general. oily, dizzy, and in dire need of a nap. my suspicions were confirmed when i had a look at the package for the curry. of course my arch-nemesis MSG was spotted in the ingredients, along with a couple of his friends who make me swear i'm going to make my own japanese-style curry. and for goodness sake, palm oil is the first ingredient listed?! someone hand me a bucket, i'm gonna be sick...

lessons were learned and mina got her (baking) groove back. or rather, her whisk? spatula? oven mitt? anyway i've got all the inspiration i need to make this curry, bake cakes, and perhaps even attempt beating egg whites for the first time.