A long awaited post?

A month? Really? It's been more then a month since my last post, and I have lots to say (well, maybe not lots. But some).

Lent has passed (as has Easter. And a few weeks after Easter) and I am pretty satisfied about how my plans worked out. The market side of it didn't really work, as it's on Friday and I usually have to work, but I did eat a lot less meat and a lot more homemade stuff such as:
- vegetable lasagna: no pasta, but with meat
- oven dried tomatoes
- smoothies
- stewed rhubarb
And I have some lovely pineapple that I may or may not make into jam, if we don't just eat it first.

And again, I don't miss any foods I haven't eaten. I still love meat, I'm no vegetarian, but less is enough too.

Day 24 - pancake day

It's been a very busy week. Working two evenings, musical rehearsal and a meeting has filled every night, with more work, groceryshopping, seeing the doctor and a singing lesson filling the rest. That doesn't mean there was no cooking though. I made some lovely stuffed mushrooms and peppers on Monday, husband made pasta on Wednesday, leftovers on Tuesday and Thursday and today we had pancakes. It's national pancake day here, so instead if eating the last pasta (now relegated to the freezer) I decided on pancakes.

Most people can be divided into one of two groups: the sweet pancakers or the savoury pancakers. I'm in the last category, give me a cheese and ham one any day. Husband just throws syrup on everything, so he's firmly sweet (he really is ;) ). Not today though, at least not on the ones filled with today's special: chestnut mushroom, bacon, goat cheese filling. Seriously delicious!

All it is is 250g of mushrooms, 100g of bacon, two cloves of garlic and a packet of "spreadable goats cheese" a new product in our supermarket. The bacon takes care of the salt and the cheese contained herbs, so no further seaoning necessary.  Except for using butter. I looooooove butter. My fridge usually has at least a pound in there, and it gives such a great flavour I've seriously reduced my oil usage. Mind, I don't use as much butter as I did oil, so it seems a pretty good decision.  In this case, frying the mushrooms in butter just makes them soft and lush. And the melted cheese turns into a tangy sauce binding it all together.

I think we might be eating some more pancakes pretty soon...

Now I have to go turn my oven on, as it's cake time again. Sister's birthday party on Sunday, so a dense chocolate cake filled with raspberry and topped with extra dark chocolate ganache is in order. Yum!

Day 19 - bake-weekend

These past few weeks have been pretty easy in that I am not feeling like I am missing out by eating less meat and more fresh homemade food. This weekend was less about eating healthy and more about the homemade part.

Saturday saw us at a 40th birthday party where the men brought something savoury and the ladies something sweet. So I got to make something of both. I decided on goat cheese parcels and Mary Berry's whole lemon cake.

I love Mary Berry, I wish she was my aunt or something. She has a programme on now called Mary Berry cooks, and in the "afternoon tea" episode she made a four layer lemon cake made with three whole lemons. Just the sound of it made my mouth water, so I made it. And it was divine. Lemony without getting bitter, very refreshing!

The parcels were dead simple, just mix soft goats cheese with honey, thyme and roasted pine nuts and put spoonfuls in (in this case readymade, sorry) puff pastry. Fold the filling in and crimo the sides shut, brush with egg and put a few pinenuts on top. Because Mary says the outside should reflect what is inside.  20 minutes in the oven, done.

Sunday wad the baptism of my husbands great nephew. His mother asked me to make a fondant cake based on the invitation, and I filled it with strawberries and whipped ceeam. That is just so summery to me, and most people like it. I normally prefer chocolate, but with some kids coming and no idea about nut allergies, strawberries were the safer choice. And thew were lovely :)
I finally have a picture to add! The picture was printed on icing sheet, which tastes pretty weird, but loiks awesome. Armins baby blues just pop!

Next week I'll be baking again, and then it's going to be a rich luscious chocolate-raspberry cake for my sisters birthday :)

Day 16

As the weekend approaches, so do my opportunities for cooking. During the week I tend to go for easy and reheatable, but I try to do something more elaborate when I can. Plus, most of my baking is weekend related.

This weekend I have a party to go to where the men bring something savoury and the women bring something sweet. I'll be making noth though. I have some goat's cheese that is calling for buttery puff pastry, so the savoury is sorted.
But what to make for the sweet? A luscious cheesecake? Snickers Cupcakes? Dense chocolate cake with dark chocolate ganache? Or lemoncake, red velvet, bananabread, carrot cake, cherry pie... The possibilities are nearly endless. I'll go to the market this weekend and get inspired, because right now, I have no idea.

The meat decrease is still going, with a lovely fish dinner out yesterday and tofu today. I'm not giving up meat, as the croquette at lunch today proved, but I'm not craving meat at all. I am enjoying the fish and veg, so good news there!

Now, to search for a recipe for something sweet...

Day 11 - A typical weekend

For us, a typical weekend is being away with friends doing fun stuff. We are volunteers for theDutch Star Trek fanclub, and we started our day packing the next issue of our magazine. This is accompanied by much talking, nice background music, coffee, more talking and in this case, millefeuilles brought by one of the others. Because of Pie Day yesterday, I declined, knowing what was to follow.
After lunch (smoked chicked, crispy bacon and ansjovie-mayo sandwich, lovely, need to repeat at home)we went to see an exhibit about celebrities in advertising. It had some nice memories for us, lots of nostalgic images.

Home, I set of to use the endive I bought yesterday. Googling a recipe I found a potato-endive casserole. And realised just how much moisture there is in endive. It wilts a lot and leaves lots and lots of... endive-juice I guess. So the casserole was kindof soupy, but it did taste really nice.

Now, I have some banana-blueberry muffins in the oven, as the guys this morning were complaining that I hadn't made them any pie. Tomorrow we're going geocaching, and the mufins will come in very handy during the hike around a castle and its park.

So, more homemade today. And a typical weekend.

Day 10 - Pi(e) day

Today is Pi day, the day we celebrate the wonder that is pi. The circumference of a circle divided by the diameter. 3.1459 etc. So what do we do? We eat pie! I explained some colleagues about today and got several versions of blank stares, confused looks, disinterested shrugs and enthousiastic smiles. Some of my colleagues are nerds too, it helps.

I made a cherry pie or my colleagues yesterday, which we ate today. I used sour cherries because the pie itself is pretty sweet anyway, and that was a really really good choice.
And dinner? Pizza pie! That was a frozen one though, I haven't made pizza dough myself (yet). But another point on my list: no meat as it was a tuna pizza.

My shopping trips are going well too, I got heaps of veg today (cauliflower, courgette, cucumber, lettuce, avocado, green bell pepper, leeks and endive) together with goat's cheese, a red french cheese and smoked mackerel. I will plan some pretty nice meals with these! And I told the veg guy about the chocolate mousse, he looked very intrigued. Maybe I have a new convert for avocado/choc mousse?
I made the banana version in the past week, it was divine. Less cocoa than the pure version, but the banana takes the raw atertaste away. Next up: peppermint chocolate mousse...

I don't think I ever made endive before, so I will either be googling recipes or going through my cookbooks for the next few dayw looking for the perfect combination. Any suggestions are very welcome!

Day four - Yum sushi!

On this beautiful day, after cleaning up the unendingly forming clutter in our house, we went for a walk. No coats! Lovely lovely lovely :)

More lovely: I made sushi for tomorrow. Can't wait to eat it, so I snuck a few bites while making it :)

I am planning a pie for next week. It has to be for Thursday, as it it then March 14th: International Pi(e) Day. Because, well, 3.14 and I'm a nerd. So, i you have any good inspiration for a pie filling, let me know, because otherwise it'll just be ham and leek...

Day three

I went grocery shopping yesterday, and I came home with (amongst other things) avocados. I love these suckers. On their own, in sushi, as guacamole, I love it. So I made something I hadn't made before: avocado chocolate mousse. It's really really simple: just add a tablespoon of honey and two tablespoons of cocoa (in my case: two and half) to a ripe avocade and mix. You can use a handmixer, blender or a machine, I used a hand blender. The mixture is not liquid enough for my table blender. You can use a bit of water (as I did anyway) or some milk (rice/soy/almond if you want to keep it vegan) to loosen it though.

My husband didn't really like it, but he's not one for heavy chocolate flavours. I did enjoy it a lot, though I was surprised by the slight "raw" aftertaste. Not something I'm used to, and not unpleasant, but if you're making this for someone you don't know that well, you might want to add a bit more honey or a very ripe banana (the most common added recipe I ound online) to take that away. Next time, I'm adding either a banana or some

Definately one to repeat. Especially for others, and then not tell them it isn't regular mousse until afterwards. Hey, don't knock it till you've tried it, right?

This weekend I hope to turn my hand at sushi. I love it, but haven't made any in a while. And since we'll be away on Sunday at a comic book fair, taking along sushi seemed a really good idea. It's quite expensive to buy though, so I prefer making it if I get the chance. Most of the ingredients I have anyway, just need to decide what fish to add.

In a different vain: if you're reading this, drop me a line in the comments!

Day one

So I start Lent being sick. I have been sick for a few days, but tomorrow I'm going back to work. So this day is not a great start for my resolutions. Except that I got a gorgeous recipe for cheesebread this morning, which goes on my todo-list for the next 40 days.
And so now I'm hanging on the couch watching all three Transformer movies and making my grocery list. With a blank space for the market on Friday :)

the start of something... not so new

Here I am, starting a blog. I've done this several times, and let's just say I'm not so good at keeping it up as I am at starting. Why then a new try? Because I want to catalogue some things.

It's Fat Tuesday, tomorrow (actually in 7 minutes) Lent will start and I feel I need to do something this year. I feel inspired, as over the past few weeks I have found several blogs and sites that are about people making a conscious effort in making their life better. No more supermarkets, using no plastic, a daily act of kindness: all are examples of different peoples efforts.

What will I do? Well as I plunge headlong into this blog, I have yet to set firm goals. But some of the things going through my head are:
- visiting the market in our village every week for (mainly) fresh fruit and veg
- using that fruit and veg without binning it because I forgot I had it
- eating less meat (we eat meat nearly everyday, my aim is 2 meatfree days a week)
- making myself what I can, instead of buying readymade. This will for the moment not include bread, as I have this weird breadbaking phobia. But you never know, I tackled puff pastry with success, so...

 So these are my goals for now. Are they clear and concise? Not really, but they are things I have been wanting to do and there is no time like the present. Wish me luck!