Sea inspired weekend
Some nature on the wall collected over the last years: a crab back I found in Ecuador, a driftwood branch also from Ecuador, a feather from the beach of St. Peter Ording, a eucalyptus blossom from the local market and a japanese paper knife shaped like a whale. I love my home growing with our memories.
Celebrating Chinese New Year’s with cucumber seaweed salad with roasted sesame seeds from Olafur Eliasson’s cookbook “The Kitchen”. Eaten to fast to take a picture we also had: freshly steamed and fried dumplings (also from Olafur’s cookbook), a miso soup and mochi for dessert.
The celebration was in some ways a premiere and also left a mystery. Well, what do I mean? I have never drunken so many different teas on one evening (each tea fitting best to one plate), superfood all around with the seaweed and the jiaogulan tea, a Chinese herbal tea that is meant to make you live forever, and the question: who ate the dumpling that was stuffed with a wasabi nut and was meant to crown the emperor of the night?
Afternoon tea: scones, jasmin pearls and sandwiches
One British tradition I really love is afternoon tea.
Well, this is my version: traditional scones wit strawberry jam and clotted cream accompanied by hummus cucumber sandwiches with cress and tuna tomato lime sanwiches. As tea I chose jasmin pearl tea.
Luckily we have an English teashop here where I can get clotted cream and the jasmin pearls. Visiting The English Tearoom is like diving into another world – keeping everyday stress outside and calming down while sipping on a freshly boiled tea and talking to the lovely owners Lynn and Christian before deciding what to buy.
Ingredients for the scones:
- 2 eggs
- 50 g of white sugar
- one pinch of salt
- 100 g soft butter
- 100 ml of whole milk
- 300 g plain white flour
- 2 tbsp. baking soda
Preparation:
1. Preheat oven to 200 degrees centigrade (gas 5)
2. Beat one egg, one egg yolk and sugar for two minutes to a foam
3. Combine with salt, butter, milk, flour and baking soda
4. Spread the dough on a flourly surface about two centimetres thick and punch out round scones with a diametre of about five centimetres
5. Put the scones on a tray with baking paper and brush with the remaining egg white
6. Bake for 10 to 15 min. until the scones reached the desired light brown colour.
Serve them freshly out of the oven with clotted cream and jam.
-12 Centigrade: Gettn’ cosy inside
Hardly any market stalls on this Saturday with freezing -12 centigrade outside. But I am proud I made myself go outside to grab some winterly flowers. Back home I continued with my knitting piece. For many knitting a beanie might be routine but for me it is my first creative challenge of the year – my first round circle knitting piece – a beanie for my love. Well, originally it should have been this pattern, but I somehow did it wrong so I go on with my interpretation and hope it will be a beanie in the end (that fits). I chose baby alpaca yarn in creme and marine colour for it.
Every once in a while I snack one of those tasty roasted almonds and chocolate prezels out of this cute ceramic bowl. I got both of them from our friends for christmas. I really need to know how they roasted those almonds.
Every time I go to the flower market I find seasonal flowers I haven’t seen before and I fall in love with. I hope those little surprises will never end.
New Year’s oufit for London
In few hours I am heading off to London to visit my dear friends Medi and Dave for New Year’s. I am so excited and looking forward to some relaxing and inspiring days in bohemian London.
1. Necklace from Isabel Marant that I found at Ave
2. Black hightech turtleneck by UNIQLO
3. Incense hut by Forged & Found. My favourite flavour is pine scent that I buy from our local christmas market.
4. Tacel Skirt with a dotted print by GESTUZ
5. White “Joanne” sneakers by Won Hundred that I bought in February at Hutspot in Amsterdam
Wishing you all the best start for 2017!
Roasted eggplant with fresh herbs and honey
A perfect snack on a weekend, after a long breakfast, before a massive dinner or as a starter…
First recipe I tried from the cookbook “Chili” I got from a friend. Very easy to make but providing new flavours for your tongue…
Ingredients (snack for two persons):
- 2 eggplants
- olive oil
- ground salt and pepper
- half a lemon
- five fresh branches of basil, peppermint and parsley
- runny honey
1. Preheat oven to 180 degrees celsius. Cut the eggplants into one cm thick slices and brush them from both sides with a little bit of olive oil and add pepper and salt. Put the slices on baking paper in the oven. After ten minutes flip them over.
2. In the meantime: Finely chop the herbs, grind the lemon skin and squeeze out the juice.
3. Remove the eggplants from the oven and put them on a plate. Add the lemon juice, honey, lemon skin and herbs equally to all slices. Let it sit for 30 min more to let all the flavours soak into the eggplant.
4. Enjoy the dish with some crusty “Simit” (The Turkish version of a sesame donut) and hummus.
I drank a Turkish apple tea with it…
A vida portuguesa for home
1. This cup has a long life behind it before I found it at the little vintage shop Muito Muito in Lisbon at the LX Factory and it already experienced new adventures with me as noodle pot, fresh verbena tea cup and herb holder during our road trip. Now it’s a plant pot for one of my succulents.
2. From which house of Porto might this tile be from? I will never know but now it will be at a special place in my home. I found it at a really cool little shop in a quiet side-street of Porto called Coração Alcerim.
3. This soap from A vida Portuguesa is made of donkey milk which is meant to keep your skin not only clean but moist. We will see. I just liked the design so much.
4. A little box made from a shell. A very clever idea. It will shelter my most important ring when not on my hand.
5. I really like the design of this postcard featuring a children’s book illustration. It says: What’s difficult becomes easy. Well, is life not just a game where we constantly enter a new level getting new challenges to overcome? I will try to constantly remind myself of this picture which symbolizes confidence: Don’t worry you will make it. I found the postcard at A vida Portuguesa.
Some kind of (Portuguese) nature
Our nature escape in Portugal: Bubulcus and Bolotas Camping
Travelling Wes Anderson style: Nature camping with our equipment packed in an old Remowa aluminum suitcase. I guess they don’t know: But those wheels work perfectly off road.
Glamour Camping for me: Enjoying amazing light at sunset and sunrise, sleeping in our tentsile, getting the feeling of remoteness yet finding a breakfast basket underneath our tent upon waking up including homemade tomato jam, freshly baked bread and oak meal muffins, hot tea, juice and local cheese.
Actually nature life is really tiring and time flies by for the fundamental needs of surviving: setting up the tent with a plan B for rain at night,
improvise an outdoor kitchen and cook cowering down, sipping on a Sagres beer not realizing that a wasp is already drinking it without my permission (well, I got stung and had a massive lip lasting three days whereas the evening of day two was the worst. At least I know now that I am unsuited for Botox lips), eating, doing the dishes (it is really interesting to watch the animal cycle when you are not fast enough doing the dishes: first come the wasps, then the flies and an then the ants, first the big ones and later the tiny ones…),
wrapping up all groceries and hanging them in the tree to be protected from being consumed by other cohabitants, put on sunscreen, relax from the above mentioned things and the sun and fresh air, maybe going for a short walk,
start cooking again, making tent ready for night, taking a shower (optional, as you are in nature),
brushing teeth, watching sunset, going to bed.. waking up with sunrise and repeat…
Maybe city life is not too bad for every day life. But on the other hand in nature you focus on the essential things…
Listening: to the night rain or Some kind of Nature by Gorillaz
What I learned from Waldemar who shaped this part of nature in a sustainable way and named it Bubulcus and Bolotas: oak meal muffins are pretty yummy, yes, there are snakes and scorpions in Portugal and you can put cork in brick form and get a perfect material for moisture-proofing of houses and by the way – it looks really designy. Bubulcus Ibis is the name of a local bird and Bolotas is Portuguese for acorn.
Great features at Bubulcus and Bolotas: Getting as close to nature as you can when camping in the wilderness yet having access to amenities and the great option to get a breakfast basket delivered if you are too lazy to make it yourself. The campground is designed in a way that you can hardly see any neighbouring campers. The idea of sustainability is constantly worked on to be as little invasive as possible to mother nature. I hope Bubulcus keeps this spirit.
Salty Dimensions
…in southern Portugal
Last weekend at home…
before going on our roadtrip to Portugal. Can’t tell you how much I need this time out…
But for the moment I am enjoying the weekend:
1. Hanging around in my comfy Bobo Choses Jumpsuit. I really fell in love with this label. Unfortunatelly they do not have a womens’ collection for autumn 2016. This piece will definatelly accompany me to Portugal in only a few days.
2. Watering my Japanese hanging plant from mamecha and of course all my other green friends.
3. Inhaling the Hibi spirit : how practical is this – Two little boxes and your inscense is ready to go. Just lighten the match and put it in the other box. My favorite flavour from this Japanese label is Geranium. If you are in Zurich next time don’t miss to visit the real kitchener.
4. Reading the new issue of my most favourite “escape the world magazine”: The Weekender No 22. South Africa also sounds good for a holiday trip…
Short break with a fresh breeze
Appreciating the little things in St. Peter Ording: Breathing incredibly clear air with a salty hint (recovering my benztown city lungs), a fresh breeze blowing the too many thoughts away, just being without a goal (except when playing frisbee golf), letting the memories of childhood return while eating soft icecream covered in chocolate and looking like a two year old after two minutes as the wind makes the icecream melt immediately and spending quality time with the family and Fee- the dog.
How lovely! My hubbie was so inspired he made a seaweed salad yesterday. It wasn’t easy to get, so he found the dried algae sheets online. We didn’t match your tea variety though: Just Jasmine *g*