7,000 calories later

It's after 11 p.m. and I've given up on trick or treaters tonight. Oh well. Not really surprising since it's not a German tradition. But it has caught on in some areas, just not in our dark and scary cul de sac. That means more candy for us. Not a good thing. One more mini Mars Bar and I swear I'll explode.

Boy13 designed our pumpkin this year. I love it.




We had our usual Halloween dinner, including a very scary serpent



(no venom, just ham and cheese - recipe here)


and a candy corn cake for dessert





I'm going to go to bed now and try to sleep off the sugar shock.



Happy Halloween!

regular folks like you and me

Is it the end of October already? I haven't even finished talking about summer yet.

This was a great year for plums and my mother-in-law dropped a metric ton of them on us about a month ago.




We ate some, we froze some and there were still a whole bunch left.


Many got turned into cake



I think I made about four of these in the course of a few days. 1 1/2 times the old faithful recipe from this post was just right for my larger baking pan.


Still more went into muffins. I made blueberry ones as well from berries we bought at a roadside stand. So good!






And let's not forget the Zwetschgenknödel, the plum dumplings I've been making every summer for years and years.



The recipe and detailed information can be found here.

It suddenly occured to me that these might be freezable so I did some research and yes, indeed, you can freeze the raw, filled dumplings and then simmer them for 20 minutes in boiling water before serving. We enjoyed a batch from the freezer last night and they were very nice.


It's a bit late in the year for fresh plums now, but if you're still in a baking mood my mother recently sent me a recipe for a cake made with the next best thing - prunes. Don't be afraid, prunes are delicious and not just for old people!




This is not a fancy, fluffy cake. It's dense and a bit chewy and all those nutritious prunes and walnuts in there really keep things running smoothly, if you know what I mean.


Spiced Prune Cake - Mausi's Mum

Note: Even if it looks done, be sure to bake this cake for as long as the recipe specifies so that it can caramelize and easily release from the pan.

Unsalted butter, room temperature, for the pan
2 cups all purpose flour plus more for the pan
1 cup pitted prunes
2 cups granulated sugar
1 tsp ground cinnamon
1 tsp ground cloves
½ tsp ground nutmeg
1 tsp salt
1 tsp baking soda
1 cup vegetable oil
1 cup low-fat buttermilk*
3 large eggs
1 cup coarsely chopped walnuts or pecans
Confectioner’s sugar for dusting.

1. preheat oven to 325 degrees. Butter and flour a non-stick Bundt pan (12 cup capacity) tapping out excess flour, set aside.

2.Bring a small saucepan of water to a boil, remove from heat and add prunes. Cover and let soak for 10 minutes. Drain prunes and finely chop, set aside.

3.Meanwhile, in a large bowl, whisk together flour, granulated sugar, cinnamon, cloves, nutmeg, salt and baking soda. Set aside. In a medium bowl whisk together oil, buttermilk, and eggs. Add oil mixture to flour mixture. Mix just until combined. Stir in prunes and nuts.

4. Spoon batter into prepared pan, and bake until a toothpick inserted in center of cake comes out clean and the cake has pulled away COMPLETELY from sides of the pan. 1 hour and 45 minutes to 2 hours.

5. Immediately invert onto a cooling rack. Let cool completely and transfer to serving plate. Dust with confectioner’s sugar, if desired. Makes 12 servings.

* If you can't find buttermilk, put 1 tablespoon of lemon juice or vinegar in measuring cup and add milk to equal 1 cup. Let sit for 10 minutes before using.

so much to be thankful for

It's the end of the Canadian Thanksgiving weekend (second Monday of October, mark your calendars so you don't forget like I did!) and here are a few of the little things I've been thankful for lately

Roses in fall hues...






A burst of colour from the mother-in-law's allotment garden




A flower with my name on it...




Sage, rosemary and thyme still going strong...




Beautiful autumn leaves...




A bountiful harvest...


(Apples and tiny white gourds from our garden, the rest from the market)


Homemade pumpkin pie and cranberry pear crisp...




Hedgehogs!...




And here are the three not-so-little things that I'm thankful for all year long...


My boys. Summer 2008 - Cape Disappointment, Washington State


Happy Canadian Thanksgiving to all you Canucks out there!

the patter of little feet

What a terrible blogger I am. I have an excuse, though. Aside from a weird cold that just won't seem to go away and is making my head feel like Krakatoa before the big bang, I've been really, really busy looking after one of the things I like best about Germany - hedgehogs! And we've got tons of them this year.

This little female was the first one to show up in the evening and sometimes even during the day. That's unusual for a hedgehog since they are nocturnal, but apparently some of them do come out when the sun is shining even if they are not sick or injured. She looked just fine so we let her do her thing.

Isn't she pretty?






We know there are lots of creepy crawlies in the garden for her to eat but just to make sure she gains enough weight to make it through the winter we've been feeding her cat food




from a dog bowl



We have neither a cat nor a dog, so no one is getting his or her nose put out of joint by our new guest.

A couple of weeks ago I spied something small walking around on the grass. A baby! And another one! Six in total and the cutest things you've ever seen.



They definitely needed snacks



nom nom nom, we ♥ scrambled eggs

A mother hedgehog suckles her babies for about 6 weeks, but at 3 1/2 weeks they are developed enough to leave the nest and start learning how to forage for food on their own. The ones we keep seeing are certainly bright eyed and bushy tailed and look very healthy. I've read that it's unlikely that more than four out of a litter will survive but we're hoping for the best and letting nature take its course. As of now, we only see three or four babies at a time. Hopefully they're just eating in shifts!

So what do hedgehogs eat besides scrambled eggs and cat food? Well, they are omnivores and their diet can include all sorts of insects, worms, snails, frogs(!), bird eggs, mushrooms, grass roots and fruit. Sounds like they'll eat just about anything, but please don't give them a bowl of milk. Although they would probably love it, they are lactose intolerant and could get very ill.

I was lucky enough to get close enough to take a few pictures, but hedgehogs are usually shy creatures who will scuttle off as soon as they see someone approaching. It's hilarious to watch them assume what we've come to call the "I can't heeaaar you!" position, tiny nose towards the wall, back towards the supposed enemy, quills up.

As well as being completely adorable, hedgehogs are great as a natural pest control, eating the nasty bugs and leaving the good ones behind.

They've told me what they like best about our garden is:

1) undisturbed piles of leaves, old branches and dark spaces to hide out in
2) a big ol' composts heap teaming with insects and other delicacies
3) a ground-level bird bath to slurp out of
4) a sucker who will make scrambled eggs on demand and spoon feed them if asked nicely

At the rate we're going, we should have the babies fattened up before the first frost. We'd really like to see them emerge in the spring as young adults ready to start their own families.

I ♥ M

Whew, I can't believe it's taken me more than a week to report on this year's Whiney Expat Bloggers in Germany Meet Up. I seem to be running on emtpy these days. But anyway, after Marburg, Bonn, Dresden and Bremen, we decided to choose something in the deep south this time. And what better city than Munich?

As usual (well, except for Bremen which is just a stone's throw away), it took absolutely ages to get there. Had I been travelling alone, I would have taken the train. But this time, surprise, surprise, Mr. M expressed interest in coming along and insisted on driving down. The BMW is pining for Bavaria, he said. Fine with me, I said. I'll just pop a travel sickness pill and pass out for the entire six hours while you and the BMW fight with the 18-wheelers. I do not love the Autobahn.

We made it just fine - lovely weather, no traffic jams and only a few annoying construction sites that prevented Mr. M from driving at the speed of light for some of the time. I didn't need to slam on the invisible break even once. World record.

After checking in to the Holiday Inn (no complaints - clean, friendly staff, great breakfast, the usual "hey, this could be anywhere" atmosphere) we did a little sightseeing on our own before meeting the others for dinner. Armed with only a city map, the official Whiney Expat Bloggers Meet Up Munich 2009 Guide for Whiners and a giant pretzel for sustenance, we managed to find our way around pretty well.



Dinner was a very German affair at the Zum Franziskaner restaurant. While Mr. M dug into his Schweinshaxe with potato dumplings, I enjoyed the Würstelplatte - five different kinds of sausage accompanied by sauerkraut, mashed potatoes and freshly grated horseradish. Very nice. Not to self: sauerkraut and Diet Pepsi don't mix. Next time drink beer like everyone else and wear your dirndl.

Halfway through the evening we all took possession of our Munich souvenir kit kindly put together by the meet-up organizers who shall be named later.


Our Munich team managed to get hold of these nifty carry bags from Käfer a fancy German delicatessen and catering company based in Munich. We were gifted with two bags,one red, one pink and before I knew it Mr. M had stolen the pink one and is now using it to shop at Aldi. This amuses me on so many levels.

Saturday found us up at 7 a.m. breakfasting in the hotel dining room with the rest of the tourists who also wanted to get an early start. And then it was off to round up a bunch of bloggers at a local cafe so we could start on our tour of the city.

Wow, what a great tour guide we had. A sweet German woman who spoke perfect English and filled us in on some of Munich's fascinating history. And boy could she walk fast!

I think you can get just about anything at the Viktualienmarkt and I really wish I had taken more pictures. Next time I'm in Munich, that's where you'll find me.






The maypole at the Viktualienmarkt


The Rathaus Glockenspiel (chimes) at the New Town Hall, Marienplatz







The National Theater



With people outside choosing to ignore culture and drink beer instead.




If YOU want to rent a beer bike, click here.


More interesting architecture






And plenty of beer gardens on our way around town.




After the tour ended, our goal was a particular beer garden in the Englischer Garten. Along the way we were entertained by the Eisbach surfers. Yes, indeed, you can surf right in the middle of Munich. These guys are incredible!





Munich's second biggest beer garden, with seating for 7,000 people, is located at the Chinesischer Turm (Chinese Tower)




This was my lunch. Did you know that beer and pretzels contain the four major food groups. No? That's because I just made it up.


Later that afternoon while everyone else was taking a nap, Mr. M and I took in a bit of the Deutsches Museum and then decided to have a little snooze ourselves. All that walking!

Saturday's dinner was at an Ethiopian restaurant, something new for us. There are no Ethiopian restaurants in Dullsville. None. Mr. M was a bit sceptical but ended up enjoying his meal, and I loved all of it and would definitely go back again.

The plan for the rest of the evening was to follow whiney expat blogger tradition and go to a gay bar after dinner. I have been on two of these excursions and had lots of fun, but this time we were so tired that we wimped out and went back to the hotel to get some shut eye before the long drive back on Sunday. I heard it was an eventful evening.

Sunday morning we got up pretty early and had breakfast surrounded by French people. A woman at the table next to ours suddenly started sobbing, but my French being what it is, I was unable to understand anything more than petit déjeuner, croissant and du café. I'm hoping she was just hungry, poor thing.

A stroll around the neighbourhood and along the banks of the Isar river was just the thing to walk off breakfast and we still had a little time until our brunch meet-up so off we went.






Our final destination was the Alte Messe a beer garden and restaurant close to the Theresienwiese where Oktoberfest takes place every year.



Since we had already had breakfast, Mr. M enjoyed his final Bavarian beer and I chose a little snack - Reiberdatschi - potato pancakes with a choice of either apple sauce or sauerkraut. Where I live these are called Kartoffelpuffer and you may also hear them referred to as Reibekuchen as well as a couple of other names according to region. So confusing! They were really good, though, just like Mr. M's granny used to make.

The six hours back to Hannover just flew by. Not. We were pretty tired when we got home and the kids (who had been shipped off to Oma's for the weekend) were happy to see us, especially since we came bearing yet more of those delicious giant pretzels.

Oh, I guess you might want to know who all was there. It was a large crowd, with some people attending every gathering and others just popping in to say hello on one day or the other.

Bloggers I had met before (some by blog name or nickname) :
Adam
AmiExpat
Deutschland Über Elvis (organizer)
Heidelbergerin
J
Michelle
PapaScott
Regensbloggers
Snooker

Bloggers I had the pleasure of meeting for the first time:
Dave
Elemmaciltur
Hezamarie (organizer)
Honeypiehorse (organizer)
Jentry
No Apathy Allowed
Zurika (organizer)

Various husbands, wives, significant others and one cousin were included and it was great meeting all of them, too. If I missed anyone, please let me know. What a fun group. One of these years I'll get to have a decent conversation with each and every one of you. Sort of like slowed down speed dating blogger style. And a huge thank you goes out to the organizers of this event who helped things run so smoothly and made us all feel right at home in their adopted city.

So, yes, we had a wonderful time and we really do ♥ Munich. The last time I was there I was only 11 years old, so it was about time, and Mr. M wants to go back soon and do some more exploring.

Apparently Munich also likes us back. This is the logo they came up with a couple of years ago.



So, after the meet-up is before the meet-up and I'm sure some bloggers already have suitable locations in mind for next year's extravaganza. If you want to be in on the action next time, you can register at this site and get all the important information in a relatively private setting.

you say tomato

It's (almost) too hot to blog. 34°C/93°F out there on this Thursday afternoon. One of my boys officially had Hitzefrei at 11 a.m. today - that's when they send the younger kids home in the middle of the day because of the heat. The older ones have to stick it out but luckily for Boy16, Biology was cancelled so he got to leave early, too.

The heat has been great for the garden, providing we water everything before it all wilts and I had some luck with my tomatoes this year.





Seeing all those unripe ones made me start thinking about fried green tomatoes, something I've never made before. I know y'all from the southern U.S. are saying "Yawn, been there, done that" but where I come from, we only ate 'em red and ripe. I got my courage up and boy, were they tasty!




After all that down home goodness I decided to try something more fancy, a tomato tarte tatin based on the famous French apple tart. Somewhere (somewhere!) in my recipe files (and I use that term loosely, it's actually just jagged scraps of paper stuffed in a box) I had a recipe ( carelessly ripped out of the food section of a Vancouver newspaper a couple of summers ago) I'd been meaning to try out for ages. Do you think I could find what I was looking for? Nope, but as usual, my beloved internet came through and offered up that very recipe on page 24 of this book preview. Who knew?

My first attempt was made in a springform pan. Big mistake. Don't do it. It dribbled while it was baking, smoked up my kitchen and ended up a soggy, inedible mess. Another entry for Mausi's Big Book of Kitchen Disasters.

But practice makes perfect and the second attempt was fabulous. This time I made individual tarte tatins (or would that be tartes tatin?) in little ramekins. Cute, are they not?



These were intensely flavoured - sweet, sour and savoury all at the same time with the coolness of the fresh mozarella adding a lovely contrast. I can see myself making these again and again.

Now, check out Pepe, my one and only sweet pepper this year. When Mr. M brought the plant home many weeks ago Pepe was just a tiny little thing, one of many would-be peppers, his label promising that he'd grow up to be bright red some day. Unfortunately all his other little pepper friends dried up and fell off, but Pepe grew and grew.



He stayed green for so long that I'd almost given up when all of a sudden he started changing colour and transformed himself into this racy number.



The only question then was do we stuff him, put him in a salad or turn him into some delicious tomato and pepper relish?

My mother-in-law has been gifting us with jars of relish for what seems like eons. Mr. M is just wild about the it so he was pretty upset when Oma announced that she didn't feel like making any this year. Fine, I said, give me the recipe and I'll make it.

Here's how it turned out



First things first. It's very common in Germany to re-use old jars and lids for making jams, jellies and relishes. No boiling water baths or any kind of processing that I'm aware of. The goods are simply cooked up, put into sterilized jars and inverted for five minutes so they'll (hopefully) seal themselves. This is the way the mother-in-law has been doing it for years and no one has died yet, but I know the recommendations in other countries are quite different and after some extensive reading I didn't want to take any chances on this stuff since it contains some low-acid ingredients. I did in fact use old salsa jars, however for safety's sake the relish is being stored in the fridge and we're using it up very quickly.

This is a sweet, mildly spiced relish that pairs wonderfully with grilled meats. You could probably doctor it up in any number of ways after you'd tried the basic recipe. After watching my husband pick the whole spices out of his dinner for years, I decided to be a genius and put the peppercorns and cloves called for in a tea ball, removing them after cooking. So much easier. The mustard seeds, being very small, can be left in.

So, what to call the recipe? I have no idea where my mother-in-law got it so we'll just have to attribute it to her. If you speak German, you'll know that Schwiegermutter is the word for the woman who gave birth to your spouse. But the Germans love to abbreviate things and since Schwiegermutter is such a long word, they'll sometimes shorten it to Schwimu when the mother-in-law is out of hearing range. It doesn't stop there. If you're an umpire, a Schiedsrichter, they'll call you a Schiri. If you're doing an apprenticeship, instead of being know as an Auszubildende/er, you'll answer to Azubi. And if you're still wearing your hair in that short-in-the-front long-in-the-back style commonly know as a mullet in English speaking countries, the Germans will tell you you're sporting a Vokuhila - vorne kurz, hinten lang.

So now that you know the scoop, back to the recipe. I proudly present you with

Schwimu's Tomato and Pepper Relish

1 red bell pepper
1 green bell pepper
500g tomatoes
250g onions
4 T. vinegar
200g brown sugar
1 tsp. salt
1 tsp. mustard seeds
1 tsp. black peppercorns
1 tsp. sweet paprika powder
4 whole cloves

Seed and chop peppers, peel and dice onions. Peel tomatoes* and dice. Place vegetables and spices in a large pot, using a tea ball for peppercorns and cloves if desired, and cook over medium heat, stirring often, for 30-40 minutes. Remove tea ball and spoon relish into sterilized jars. Process according to your level of comfort. Makes about 4 jars. This recipe doubles easily but adjust the salt according to taste.

*How in the world do you get the skin off a tomato? Well, first you cut a little cross in the bottom of each tomato and place them all in a large, heatproof bowl. Then you pour boiling water over them and let them sit for a minute. After that they need to be scooped out with a slotted spoon and plopped into ice water for another minute or two. The skins will then slip right off with a little help from a paring knife.

What are you doing with YOUR tomatoes this year?

life is...

Cherry season is over now, but these cherries were from our neighbour's tree. She goes to Spain every year in July, so we get our fill and leave the rest for the birds.

Napoleon or Royal Ann cherries (similar to the Rainier cherries produced in Washington State) are quite delicate and sweet and best just eaten out of hand. In my search for something else to do with them I did come across a recipe that we enjoyed - a fresh cherry tart. It came out looking like this





Nothing complicated about this dessert. Just a pre-baked pastry shell (your favourite recipe), some cream cheese mixed with sugar to taste along with a couple of spoonfuls of raspberry syrup for colour and flavour. The original recipe called for Kirschwasser which I don't care for at all so I substituted the syrup. Pitted cherries top the cream cheese mixture and a glaze of apricot jam, put through a strainer and warmed a bit to make it smoother, gives them a little shine. This tart doesn't improve with age - I'd recommend eating it within a couple of hours of making it.

Now, when you've got all these cherries, you need to pit them, right? And that can be a tough job when you don't have a cherry pitter. Next year you can bring your cherries to my house, because I DO have a cherry pitter. Two in fact.

The larger apparatus seen here the world-famous (I'm just making that up) Kirschomat (Cherry-matic) which claims to be able to pit 15 kg of cherries an hour if you're quick about it.





Kirschen entkernen, endlich spritzfrei!, it says on the box - cherry pitting, splash free at last! Phew, what a relief that must be for the modern housewife, eh? Pits fall into the plastic container, cherries go into your bowl. Easy peasy.

The little instrument of torture on the left can be used for either cherries or plums and works well if you don't have a large amount of fruit to go through. A bit messier than the other one but it gets the job done just the same. Here's a close-up.



Ouch!

The mother-in-law also had a couple of cherry trees of a different kind. A bowl of those yielded this cake



basic white cake with mandarine oranges and pitted fresh cherries


and this cherry chutney, lovely with some goat cheese and hearty bread or crackers





I halved the recipe, which worked fine, but I had a little culinary accident when I was making this - I decided right at the end to put in a touch more powdered ginger (being lazy and not wanting to mince more fresh ginger) and the top fell off my spice jar, depositing a lot more ginger than planned. Oh well, I still think it tastes great, even if I'm the only one eating it. I knew I should have married Anthony Bourdain. He'd eat it too.

Last but not least, the beautiful apricots we bought at the market were getting their tiny noses all out of joint so we turned them into this cake made with a shortbread crust and a quark filling. The good thing about apricots is that they will surrender their pits without much of a fight.




I have to say that I didn't care for this recipe much. And good thing too because, oops, I think I threw out the German cooking magazine I found it in. It was similar to a cheesecake recipe, but came out quite dry and the taste of the lemon rind it called for was overpowering. So not rave reviews this time, perhaps a little tweaking is in order. I do like the polka dot effect though.



So you can see that I haven't just been sitting on the couch eating bon bons and watching Oprah! And there's more fruit and vegetable goodness where that came from if I evern get around to blogging about it.

The kids are back at school today, the weather is gorgeous and I can finally get this place cleaned up after a wonderful summer holiday.

Life is good. Go hug someone.

having too much fun to blog

How lazy am I? I can't believe it's been over two weeks since I spent a lovely day in Hannover with fellow bloggers Dixie and Claire. In addition, Claire's German and the adorable Little Dude, both perfect gentlemen, were there to to make it even more special. Unfortunately real life got in the way for several other bloggers planning to attend. We really missed you guys, but we'll definitely make up for it some time soon, huh?

Thunder showers were scheduled and I wondered if we'd end up switching coffee shops every two hours waiting for a sunny break. You know how unreliable those weather forecasts can be, though. Instead of dodging raindrops we ended up sweaty and sunburned. Boy was it hot!

As usual I was talking too much and didn't take many pictures but the ones I did take somehow managed to make Hannover look like a tropical paradise. I should have gone into marketing. I've also included a couple that Boy13 took with our camcorder from the top of the ferris wheel at the annual Schützenfest that ended last week.

Before lunch we headed off the the Maschpark close to the New City Hall. The park, with its water-lily filled lake and 10 hectares of shade trees is an ideal place to just stop and sit for a while and the city hall itself is quite impressive.


(this is how it looks from the ferris wheel)

Here's another view over the city. Hannover is said to be one of the greenest cities in Germany. I'm grateful for that. I need green to survive.




Lunch was at the Block House restaurant. Yeah, it's a chain, but we all agreed that the food was just fine. Best cheesburger I've had in ages and those steaks sure looked good. Family friendly too, which I find really important. Little Dude seemed to enjoy himself and kept us and our servers entertained the whole time.

After lunch we made our way down to the Maschsee, Hannover's man-made lake very close to the city centre. It's a peaceful location even if it's usually teaming with visitors. Even if you're just on your lunch hour, beer gardens, palm trees and sail boats (no motor boats allowed) make it feel feel like a vacation.






Late afternoon found us back at the train station having cool fairwell drinks and an ice cream or two, totally justified by all that walking we did.

Hey guys, I had a great time. we should do that more often!


Just for fun, a couple of gratuitous roller coaster pictures courtesy of Boy13. I leave the Schützenfest visits with the boys up to Mr. M these days. You won't catch me going on those scary, scary rides.





Other fun things I did in the past couple of weeks instead of blogging:

- Went to the animal shelter to look for a dog. No luck this time. Spot, we know you're out there somewhere. Give us a sign.

- Attended the Kleines Fest im Grossen Garten, a festival of performing artists at the Royal Herrenhausen Gardens in Hannover. Very entertaining and the weather held up for us.

- Hiked up a mountain and back down again. 16 km altogether. The weather was hideous. I was cranky. I may blog about it.

- Had even more blood drawn at the doctor's. Liver enzymes are now A-OK. No more doctor's visits for the time being. I am SO sick of sitting in that waiting room staring at the wallpaper.

- Celebrated father-in-law's 80th birthday. It was very pleasant. This has not always been the case in the past.

- Finally got going on redecorating the upstairs bathroom. Did I mention that green is my favourite colour?

- Made a ton of Mr. M's favourite tomato relish. Recipe to follow.

- Worked like a devil in the garden and finally got it looking half-decent. But only half. Evil bugs have eaten my lilies. They will pay for this.

Upcoming events:

- A visit to Hamburg

- Checking out the "First Nations of Canada" exhibition at the Landesmuseum Hannover

- A massive water fight on the lawn.

- Getting ALL the laundry done for a change.


That's all for now. The kids have two more school-free weeks and Mr. M will be off next week again so we'll most likely be busy, busy, busy trying to make the most of our time together.

How's YOUR summer been so far?

the flag doesn't come down until you finish the leftovers

Canada Day was too hot for anything more than sitting in the shade with a cool drink and waiting for dinner time to roll around. How's this for timing - as if by magic, the July issue of Canadian Living magazine arrived in our mail box mid morning. As usual, a bit late to try out any of the holiday recipes, but very welcome nonetheless. You can't be all that picky when subscribing to magazines from oversease. They show up when they want to and there's nothing you can do about it. Sometimes I'm amazed they get here at all.




We started with these smoked salmon and marinated red onion (so good!) appetizers.




Here are some skewered vegetables ready to be thrown on the grill




And everybody's favourite - potato salad. Bacon, hard boiled eggs, red onion, dill pickles, chives, parsley and mayo.




The ribs were done in two steps, first dry rubbed and oven baked and then tossed with a beer-based barbeque sauce and finished on the grill. The original recipe is for beef ribs. I used pork because, you know, we live in Germany. I don't know that I'd use this recipe again. It was good enough, but I had to doctor it up a little to get it to taste the way I thought it should taste.




Dessert was a giant fruit salad


The stars of the show were strawberries from two villages away, yellow cherries from the neighbour's tree and raspberries from our very own garden

In British Columbia, where I'm from, summer is all about locally grown fruit, especially the just-picked berries you can buy at roadside stands. This cake kind of reminded me of that. No recipe, really. The filling is cream cheese, yogurt, sugar, pureed berries and gelatin.




Well, the leftovers are long gone so I guess we can take the flag down for another year.

But before I do that, I have to tell you about the conversation our German neighbour H and I had on Friday.

H: (pointing to the Canadian flag) Hey, was war das für ein Tag gestern? (Hey, what day was it yesterday?)

Me: Es war eigentlich Mittwoch, nicht gestern. Canada Day. Kanada Tag. (Actually, it was Wednesday, not yesterday.)

H: Ahh, Kanada, keiner da! Ha ha ha! (Ahh, Canada, no one's there!)

Me: Ha ha, sehr lustig (because this is a standard German joke that I've heard a million times). Ja, und Sonnabend feiern die Amerikaner den Unabhängigkeitstag. (Ha ha, very funny. Yeah, and on Saturday the Americans celebrate Independence Day.)

H: Ach, ja, richtig. Und die Kanadier feiern dann mit, oder? (Oh yes, that's right. And the Canadians celebrate along with them, right?)

Me: Emm, nein, aber... (umm, no, but...)

He's been living beside us for fourteen years now and I swear he'll never get it. Oh well.

But hold on a second, this year I DID happen to spend the fourth of July with a couple of fabulous Americans and their loved ones. More about that in my next post.

oh, canada (I miss you so)

Happy Canada Day!

We're flying the flag here today in Dullsville and will be celebrating later by throwing some stuff on the grill. There may be pictures. Right now, this one will have to suffice.





The kids had their last day of school a week ago and we've been very busy sleeping in and generally just lazing about and enjoying the summer. I have tons (tons!) of blog posts lined up. Unfortunately it's just too humid too sit inside and type. This sort of weather is not very kind to the frizzy-haired among us. It's presently 25°C outside and the clouds are threatening to split open at any moment. Platzregen they call it here. One minute you're dry, the next you're soaking wet. Oh well, at least we won't need to water.

You have a good day too, eh, and while you're at it, go check out Ian's great Canada Day post.

birthday fallout

Curses, spoiled again!

More flowers...




Enough chocolate to last at least a week...


Can you tell I'm a bittersweet kind of girl?


And new gardening clogs! (Old ones just celebrated their 13th birthday - sheesh)


This colour makes me smile while I'm digging in the dirt.

any excuse to eat cake

In case you've been keeping track, I turned 46 today. And not a moment too soon - 45 was getting pretty old. I was ready for a change. To take my mind off of being so very ancient, I made cake. Lots of cake. Which will be eaten by eager family members later on this evening after a simple barbeque on the deck.

It's a beautiful day, I've been sitting outside in the garden enjoying the weather and contemplating both middle age and my aging middle. I've decided that being fairly well preserved and pleasingly plump is not the worst thing that could happen to a girl.

My morning started with some perfectly lovely roses from my better half







It's too hot for chocolate cake and we're all too flabby to dive into the whipped cream so I went for something fruity. Fruit has vitamins, right? Just for today, we'll pretend that cake is one of the four major food groups.



Strawberry Cheesecake



Lemon Tea Loaf



Rhubarb Matrimonial Squares (as they are called in Western Canada)


Must go now. The mother-in-law will be here any minute bearing gifts. Lucky me.

P.S. The link to the Lemon Tea Loaf recipe was broken. I've fixed it now!

they don't call a danish a danish in Denmark

Once again, Denmark did not disappoint. This was our second time in Ebeltoft, a small market town in a sheltered bay on the Baltic Sea.

I don't want to repeat myself too much, so here are some links to my 2007 Ebeltoft posts.

mellow yellow - Danish edition

Ebeltoft - how do you like them apples?

water water everywhere

fish and ships, language learning on the sly, and any flavour you like as long as it's licorice


This was our humbe abode for two weeks, pretty standard for this area of Denmark.



Once again we rented from a company called DanCenter and were very pleased with their service. They offer holiday homes (most of them privately owned, I believe) in Scandinavia and several other European countries and their website is user friendly, letting you choose exactly the kind of accomodation you're looking for. This house, like many Danish holiday homes, came equipped with a pool, whirlpool and sauna. We enjoyed these optional features in 2007 and decided to get them again this time. Electricity is expensive in Denmark so we also brought our own (recycled and clean-burning!) sawdust briquettes to use in the wood buring stove. Nothing like a nice cozy fire at the beginning and end of each day.

At about nine o'clock every morning this guy and his lovely wife came by looking for snails and juicy vegetation on the lawn. Mrs. Mallard wasn't with him on the day I took this photo but they seemed to be a devoted couple.



The Danish word for duck is and, quite similar to the German Ente. But while Donald Duck is still Donald Duck in German, the Danes call Donald Anders And. Go figure.

It's a seven hour drive from Hannover to Ebeltoft so by the time we got there on Saturday afternoon we were pretty tired and didn't have much more in mind than unpacking our stuff, having a simple dinner and falling into bed.

But on Sunday we went shopping! Yes, that's right. You can shop on Sundays in Denmark. I don't know if it's a country-wide thing or if it's just because Ebeltoft is a touristy area, but all the supermarkets and many of the smaller shops are open on Sundays year-round.

We found the older part of the little town just as charming as last time with its bright colours and cobblestone streets.









Lots of ornaments and curliques...






...and lovely flower shops ready for spring.





See this bicycle?



I doubt that it's in use any more, but we saw quite a few people riding newer models with a crate on the front to haul stuff around. Our neighbour even hauled his kids around in his.


Cafes, museums, antique shops, Ebeltoft has it all...






...including some wonderful bakeries with a huge selection of gorgeous pastries. So you're coming over all peckish and feel in need of a little something. What do you say? If you ask, "Hvordan siger du 'danish pastry' på dansk?" - "How do you say danish pastry in Danish?", the Danes will tell you it's called wienerbrød - literally Viennese bread. That's because danish pastries were originally brought to Denmark by the Austrians, and we all know how well they do desserts.

We ate our way through some mighty fine treats - kanel snegle (cinnamon "snails" aka buns), Dagmartærte, and something called a wiener trekant - a huge, huge, huge pastry triangle with a vanilla cream filling and a dark chocolate glaze, just to name a few. Yum.

Walks on the beach burned off all those calories. More on that in my next post.

watch me do the happy dance

I know, I know, I owe y'all a whole bunch of interesting posts with pretty pictures. But before I get to that I need to tell you why I'm dancing.

I spent some time in the doctor's office today discussing the results of my colonoscopy and guess what? It's official, I DO have a form of colitis, but it is NOT (NOT!) ulcerative colitis, meaning that it's not a chronic condition and that I will most likely continue to improve (as I have been doing) until I am symptom free. Yay.

Not that you're really that interested, but the results of the endoscopic exam showed a slight inflammation of the entire colon (that's the large intestine) right down to the appendix, but nothing in the ileum, the end of the small intestine. That pretty much rules out Crohn's Disease which usually presents in a different pattern. While the histological report (that's the stuff they do under the microscope after taking tissue samples) also indicated an inflammation with yucky patches of this and that, various lymphocyte thingies and microcrypt doo dads, they feel that it isn't ulcerative colitis but rather something know as infectious colitis brought on by the 10-day course of antibiotics I took for a throat infection waaay back in mid-January before I went in for my hysterectomy. Who knew? I mean of course I know that antiobiotics can play havoc with your digestive system, killing the good bacteria along with the bad, but this thing appearing more than a month after I stopped taking the pills and giving me the German version of Montezuma's Revenge (minus the holiday!) for a whole ten weeks IS pretty weird. I have a feeling my entire system was weakened by the operation and just decided to take a little break without telling me. Losing those pesky tend pounds without even trying was great and I hope I can keep it off, but it wasn't really the right way to go about it now, was it?

I HAVE been feeling a whole lot better these past couple of weeks, though, and my doctor believes that this will indeed go away on its own with the help of probiotics to build up and maintain the intestinal flora. Just today I was reading that non-chronic colitis can take up to three months to heal (Thursday will be exactly three months since this thing reared its ugly head) and six months to really get back to normal. The only caveat they had for me was that sometimes, just sometimes, a first- time bout of ulcerative colitis can masquerade as a self-limiting colitis and that if my symptoms persist or reoccur, that I MUST go and get evaluated again.

I'll be on the lookout, but I really feel that I'm in the clear and ready to get on with it, already. Enough with the sick, I've got a life to live!