More frugal eating: zucchini boats

In a quest to use the cheap zucchini, it ended up a a side one evening, in a thrown together recipe of zucchini boats:

Nothing fancy again...the sliced in half zucchinis went into the oven for a little, with a little olive oil on them. While that was happening, just a little chopped onion and garlic in a pot with some olive oil, and in when all the veg I had on hand: a few sliced mushrooms, some tomatoes, and a carrot. The boats then came out of the oven and were hollowed out.

Next, the filling that was hollowed out was added to the pot, along with some sage. That was then scooped into the boats, along with a little cheddar. It went back into the oven for around 7 min. At that point, some breadcrumbs were sprinkled on top, and back in the oven for another 5 min, enough to brown them.

Total meal cost:

.15 p each for 2 zucchini

I had already incorporated the other veg and cheese costs into the main meals where they were used, so let's add it all up to .10 p per zucchini, so a total cost of .25 p for this side serving pictured.

New friend Ian deemed this one a success and asked for a repeat performance.

The arrival of the pumpkins in the UK!

A few months ago I was terribly disappointed, I couldn't find a pumpkin for the life of me. As we know, I like to cook pumpkins, use them in stir fries, and especially to make pumpkin soup. I searched far and wide in the days in October leading up to Halloween, but I could only find a few large decorative pumpkins, nothing edible. My UK friends and colleagues tried to explain that UK people don't really eat pumpkin...

Therefore, I was pleasantly suprised when wandering around Asda this week to find these:

I was downright amazed that their source country was the UK. The green squash in the back had hit their best buy date so they were down to .50 pence each, the orange fellows didn't expire until later in the month, so they were regular priced at 1.64 GBP each. They were stored under the herbs in a hidden place well out of site, so no wonder no one bought them.

When I was in Germany in the fall I did manage to buy one there to cook, it had cost me 1.99 at Lidl. (1.64 GBP = 1.82 EUR = 2.62 USD as of today)

I did actually buy a third one, that already became soup. :-) Pumpkins in January though, usually I'd be well into my German stockpile by now and the stores wouldn't have any for sale, so this turned out to be a pleasant surprise for me this week.

Breaded mushrooms

I recently bought this book at Oxfam for 8.99 GBP. It was rather heavy to carry home, but it's absolutely superb. Every single page has a recipe and 4 photos: the final product and 3 steps leading up to it. I love photos in my cooking, mainly because I have no idea what I'm doing most of the time. ;-)

If you'd like to try some vegetarian recipes which are slightly above basic skills, I'd highly recommend it. I also like that it includes the nutritional info with each recipe, so that you can see what you're getting into.

Below, I tried out 'Mushroom Bites with Aioli' (page 161 in my edition):



On the left are the mushrooms which were dipped in two egg whites and then dipped in a breadcrumb and parmesan cheese before going into the oven for around 15 minutes. On the right is the Aioli. I took some heavy liberties with this one. The recipe suggested 2 egg yolks, garlic cloves, olive oil, and salt/pepper. However, it also suggested a variation to try instead fresh herbs and sour cream instead of the egg yolks. I combined a bit from both ideas and it all came out right in the end.

I know you can get packaged frozen version of breaded mushrooms, but these were so much better than the ones I had like that in Germany or here in the pubs. There is no oil involved in the mushrooms of this recipe so they come out much lighter and it was simple to make. (Excluding the self-inflicted injury Ian suffered while trying to grate the frozen bread into breadcrumbs.)

vegan eating - day 2 Mexican Sunday

It's difficult to find good Mexican food in Europe. Thankfully, finding the ingredients in the UK is a little easier and less expensive than it was in Germany.


Breakfast was coffee.

Here is the late lunch. Starting around the table, here we go...

11 o'clock is Old El Paso refried beans.

12 o'clock is a veg chili mix from Asda. The suggestion is to add mince to it, but it perks up nicely with dried soya chunks.

1 o'clock is some of those mushrooms from the freezer with Old El Paso Mild Fajita Sauce. I orginally bought this sauce because it was a markdown due to a torn label and I was pleasantly surprised with this one. It has a mild smokey flavor.

3 o'clock is partially hidden behind a glass, it's the lettuce, tomato and pepper salad from yesterday.

4 o'clock is fresh tomatoes, a smattering of garlic, and more garden fresh pepper - a light little flavor

6 o'clock is mild English cheddar for New Friend Ian.

7 o'clock is Heather's sauce. Chopped tomatoes, garlic, and Dave's Gourmet Insanity Sauce which I bought at Asda in the UK.

9 o'clock is some fajita wraps.

The setting is outdoors on my patio table, slightly in the shade because it was hot as heck.

Later in the day was leftover Chinese from yesterday.

Aug 1 - vegan eating day 1

Saturday started off with a long 'to do' list of things to do in town and tasks at home. As I've been living in this flat for almost two months, I'm starting to get more ideas about how I want to use the space in some areas.

Breakfast - coffee at home.

Lunch - since we were out and about in town, we went to Nosh+Coffee. The one in the center of my corner of Essex is relatively new...

On the plus side:

-they are less expensive than their coffee counterparts Costa or Starbucks

-their food selection is more expansive--salads, sandwiches, containers of fresh fruit for 1.50 GBP

-they have a vegan option - salad with beans, hummus, and falafel for 3.50 GBP (which I had), as well as plenty of decent veg options like a feta cheese salad or egg and mayo sandwich.

On the negative side:

-I suspect the people management is lacking at this particular one, or maybe they're all this this, it's the only one I've been to. When you go to the main Costa in my corner of Essex, it's staffed by friendly Eastern Europeans or Spaniards, the Costa above the bookstore is staffed by friendly students, the Coffee+Nosh people are always sour faced, or complaining to one another about their work hours. But anyway...the salad is quite nice...

Dinner: We start with fresh peppers from the garden...

I'm not a fan of eating peppers, but I enjoy growing them for my guests...

I did a stir-fry--it's broccoli from the Saturday market, zuchinni from my garden and tofu, which later had Sharwood's Kung Po sauce added:

The final results....

At 12 o'clock on the table is a fresh salad with lettuce, tomatos, and olive oil.

1 PM is a homemade dipping sauce: tamari sauce, olive oil, water, dried chilli pepers.

3 PM is homemade vegan spring rolls that oversprung

The bottom are our two plates in action

center of the table is the fresh peppers chopped up.

The fancy table setting is a giant cardboard moving box which gets a new round of paper to cover it weekly. I still haven't decided upon a dining room table or coffee table yet, so I'm making due with this one until I figure out how I want the layout of the flat to be.

Let the games begin...

One thing I was afraid about in moving from Germany to the UK was a rapid (and detrimental) change in my eating style. I ate well in Germany mainly because of a lack of processed and readily available vegetarian foods. It took me a long time to kick the processed, prepared and packaged foods from my daily intake.

Sure I made my periodic sojourns to Holland (where prepared vegetarian food is plentiful) or Belgium (land of the breaded cheese) and then rationed for a few weeks, but for the most part I prepared meals from scratch because I couldn't find good vegetarian options in the German supermarket, beyond frozen french fries and frozen pizza. Yeah sure, there's plenty of bio salad material there, but I try to vary my diet and only have salad as one main meal per day; the other should be something different like pasta and a cooked veg or two. Veg Schnitzel just turned me off, and for the most part I found German convenience veg food to be terribly salty.

Moving forward...mid-August I will have been here six months. I find the UK supermarket options to be closer to the American ones, and I feel myself becoming lazy. The vast availability of Quorn is slowly becoming my undoing as I've attempted to shed all vestiges of my life in Germany...

Periodically I go from vegetarian to vegan when I'm feeling a little sluggish and it's easy enough. To really kick it up and make it a real challenge, I decided for the month of August:
1. to go vegan
2. to give up alcohol

I periodically do both and sometimes inadvertently overlap at various meals, but this time I will purposely overlap for the entire month.

Why?
Why not?

1. I need a bit of a challenge. Just going vegan doesn't phase me, but it will be new to do it in the UK. Giving up alcohol is my January thing; I've never tried it in the summertime.

2. August is a great time to go vegan, the best local produce is in. Many people go on a new diet as of Jan 1, but January is an awful time to go vegetarian or vegan, the options where I've always lived are potatos, onions and cabbage.

3. I'm feeling partially healthy from the 4 miles a day of walking I get in on days when I walk to/from the office. I'm already in this mindset.

4. A side comment someone made to me over the weekend, who then looked up to make sure that I heard it. Noted.

5. I have some friction below the surface trying to figure out how to emerge. Somehow it should be positive change, but I can't yet figure out what it's trying to be.
(If you ever watch House, you're familiar with the tactic when he medically pushes someone to recreate the symtoms of the mystery illness by maxing them out under the same scenario, to try to cause more clues. It's a little of the same here; my ruffling up the status quo I can try to unearth what I'm currently not able to figure out.)

6. It will be great blog fodder, and it's all about you. ;-)

I'll try to keep up the posting on the sorts of things I'm eating here in the UK. Because it's me, they're guaranteed to be frugal. ;-)

Anything specific you'd like to know during this fun-filled month of healthly living (food photos, ingredients, cost, etc)? Leave a comment and I'll be sure to address it.

Eating in Guildford

On Saturday, I spent a few hours downtown exploring Guildford's High Street. I wasn't feeling up to either the Dutch pancakes or the German sausage. True to form, the German stall was selling jarred hotdogs and the Dutch lady (in the photo, she was on the way to talk to the German guy) had not only an orange apron, but also orange shoes.

I had a feeling that in a town like (upper crust and posh) Guildford, I'd be able to find somewhere with a strong vegetarian bent. Sure enough, found The Fooderie on Swan Lane just off of the High Street:


They have a tiny corner bar area for eating (where I caught the girl in the photo), but mainly it's a take away sandwich place. I had a lovely chat with the owner, she had started it about a year ago as a vegetarian/vegan sandwich place, but she had to expand outward a bit as business just wasn't good enough. So she also sells sandwiches with local free range eggs and local meats. She'll be expanding into an upstairs area to have actual seating.


I had asked for a recommendation for a hot vegan sandwich. She suggested grilled veg with hummus. My photo doesn't really do it justice, the sandwich was superb, so much so that I sucked down half of it before remembering to take a photo:

A work colleague had recommended to check out the Guildford Saturday market, knowing that I am a vegetarian. I had stumbled upon it early in the day but didn't want to have to carry things around, so I made it my last stop before leaving.

Overall, I thought it was OK, better than shopping at Tesco I guess. I was a little lucky, it was the end of the day and they were starting to drop the prices a bit to sell things off. Mostly they were selling pre-bagged items, the bags were around 1 or 1.20 GBP, but by the time I was there they were dropping most to 1 GBP if they weren't already. I bought 2 bags of tomoatos, zuchinni, mushrooms and pears. (And there are two bottles of organic wine, coffee, and a book I bought at Oxfam.)

Ever curious as to the source of my food, I was pleasantly surprised to find UK sourced spinach (OK, from Lancashire, not exactly from around the corner, but at least from on the happy island.) I was not so impressed upon inquiring about the asparagus....it came from Mexico, so I decided to skip that one. Not so impressive when you consider that Europe's asparagus season is almost upon us.

My colleague had mentioned that I should eat any of the cheese, veg or bread in the house which would go bad before her return, so I went a little creative here with some different things. My work colleague is German, so of course there was no jar of pasta sauce here. However, everything was here that I needed to make my own.

She had left half a yellow bell pepper. I combined it with garlic and half an onion, and added the market tomatos. I then sliced in a few of the mushrooms and one zuchinni and simmered it up. I had brought along the spinich ravioli and some goat's cheese from the Essex farmer's market. I put the whole thing on a bed of Italian watercress which I found in the fridge. Overall, I'm pleased the way this one turned out:

Next up, more Guildford adventures...

Sunday lunch - vegetarian Rogan Josh

One of the things I'm really looking forward to about moving to the UK will be the easy access to tasty, spicy Indian food--be it a proper restaurant or around the corner take away.

It's not that Germany doesn't have Indian restaurants, it's just that the German taste tends to avoid spicy, so it always seems that something is missing to me when eating out here. I even quizzed my Indian colleagues who have been here for some years:

'where would you recommend to go for good Indian food?'
'oh Heather--unfortunately no such thing here. Although there is a place in Leverkusen that sells authentic spices from India, I highly recommend it.'

(Having tried every Indian restaurant in Cologne, I sorta already expected such an answer.) It's like the elusive Mexican restaurant in Germany, the holy grail of US expats--just not to be found. Although if you know of one in the Cologne area, by all means prove me wrong. ;-)

One of my colleagues was very passionate about the subject. He had gone to the Indian restaurant near the Main train station in Cologne, and was appalled by the food, in particular because the proprietor was from his region in India. He accused the fellow of giving a bad reputation to their region, by serving such lackluster food. The owner explained--he had to modify the traditional recipes to make it appropriate for a German audience.

So in the meantime, I'll survive the best I can. Rogan Josh is traditionally made with lamb, here is a super recipe with photos. My vegetarian take on it instead includes tofu, broccoli, and lentils:

I'm not so good at making curries from scratch and I don't have the required cooking time during the week, so I rely on a jarred version. Here's a look inside the pantry, for those of you who like such photos. I mainly depend on Sharwoods, which I buy on periodic trips to Belgium and then ration myself until the next trip. The Sharwoods which can be found there is produced for that market--as well as for the Nordics from looking at the label languages, so it's not as expensive as an import from the UK found at the British shop here. I was just in Belgium two weeks ago, so currently well stocked. :-)

Front left is a Patak's, a gift from an expat leaving. Patak's is the only Indian food label I find at the Asian supermarkets here. Front and center is one of the few Hokkaido pumpkins still remaining. ;-)

Sunday lunch: Thai chickpeas and pumpkin soup

Christina G gives a great cooking lesson, and let's face it, I need all the visual help I can get--so I really liked the video! I never met a chickpea dish I didn't like, and this was no exception:


I needed to use another Hokkaido pumpkin, so I went out on a limb and tried another new recipe in the Thai genre. This recipe also turned out well, but I did spice it up a tiny bit more. The Hokkaidos provide the rich flavor such a soup needs, and a lovely balance to the coconut flavor.

Theae square containers are .5 liter, so a perfect size to take to the office as an afternoon snack or a compliment to the above. If lunch plans appear and if it looks like I won't be finishing these by Wed (ok, I ate one tonight already), they are actually freezer containers so they will get popped into the freezer to become an easy meal later.




A busy week is upcoming which I spent all weekend preparing for. More on that topic soon.

Friday lunch - Hokkaido pumpkin stir-fry

As I mentioned, I'm somewhat limited in what I can take to the office. The tiny 'Tea Kitchen' where the microwave is housed is constantly busy with people picking up tea and coffee, and the microwave is an older, smaller machine with limited power. So most of us use it for simple tasks, and as my colleague noted, always defrost in advance, else it takes 15 min!

I like to make multiple meals at a time so here was tonight's dinner, with a second portion for lunch on Friday, and probaly a smaller portion for Saturday's lunch.

I roasted another Hokkaido pumpkin. They're fully in season now, so they're down to 1.99 at my Kaufpark.

While it was in the oven I sliced some garlic and onions and fried them up.
Then I added the in-season brussel sprouts.
I had fried up some tofu, that went in.
I had some leftover fresh zucchini from last night, that went in.
I sliced up the roasted pumpkin and gave that a few minutes.
I put in 2 egg whites, which fried nicely.
I put in some chilli soy sauce and some vegetarian 'oyster' (read mushroom) sauce.
Sauted it up all together and off we go.
I threw in a handful of Thai basil at the end.
I had left some noodles from today's lunch in the fridge in the office so we're set for lunch.

Fall in Germany...

is my favorite time of year. Is starts with these items, but I need to explain more...

Blackberry picking

Here in tiny town of B, there are plenty of blackberry bushes on their final rounds for the season. There are so many of them here, that they rot and fall off the bushes, there's just not enough people picking them. (Keep in mind they're all over the place, free, lining parklands, taking over the abandoned rail line, etc). In the Phillyland area, we had plenty of strawberries, but other berries weren't as common as they are elsewhere in the US, such as the Pacific Northwest, so this is quite interesting and new for me, so I've been picking my little heart out. As well as my fingertips as the damn things are quite prickly.

I spent a few days snacking on them raw in the office, by themselves and mixed with strawberries. I sent them through the magic bullet to puree them into a fruit spread. Then I realized I needed to do something with the remained 1 pint plus, as their shelf life is limited and there are still more to pick. So onto preservation methods and more harvesting. What to do when you have a tiny little German freezer and no possibility of canning this year?

I tried drying them, to make homemade fruit leather. That came out pretty well, I spread the pureed mixture into a pan in the oven, drying it, cutting it into strips which I stored in glass bottles.

Then I tried drying individual berries, so that I could fling a few onto my musli in the winter. That worked pretty well also, so into glass jars went the individual dried berries.

The leaves were dried for tea.

I tried to freeze the pureed version into ice cube trays, which I dumped into a freezer bag once frozen. As I don't have much freezer space so I couldn't go too heavily into this option. However, I plan to use the little concentrated cubes in yogurt on on top of ice cream perhaps.

The very nice retired couple stopped on their way back on Sunday to chat. They brought up the topic, and gut reaction, I was expecting some sort of German negativity, about how one shouldn't pick the wild berries (as I'm sure they spied me coming or going on these adventures, they miss nothing). Although then again, they seem to think I'm a frugal American who is always picking cardboard boxes out of the big paper recycle bin (for ebay packaging), as well as eating off my balcony grown efforts, so foraging for berries probably wouldn't surprise them.

Herr K. leans in to make sure no one else is listening to this conversation...you know, these blackberries...(here we go)...they're ok...but up the street, I go to a secret place, they are bigger...you know what we do with blackberries....(dude, I'm out of ideas, so I'll take any at this point)...we put them in bottles! Homemade Liqueurs. 'Schnapps!' says Frau K. '25% blackberry schnapps'. We've done 13 bottles so far this year. Six months in the cellar, turn them once per month, and we'll be ready to go before summer comes back.

I am such a blackberry amateur, that option never crossed my mind. Hmm...

How to make a full English vegetarian breakfast (in Germany)

Pre-requisite task: Find a nice-looking British person to execute all of the below steps for added authenticity. ;-)

1. Pop over to the closest British store to buy UK Heinz baked beans, or remember to pack a few cans in your suitcase the next time you're in the UK. Scoff greatly if someone suggests that you use German baked beans, or the Heinz baked beans sold in the Netherlands. Heat those up in a saucepan for a few minutes.

2. Buy some regular mushrooms, slice into halves, and heat those up in a saucepan with a little olive oil. (Humor the colonial and 'undercook' them, so that she doesn't whine later about them being overcooked.)

3. Fry up an egg. In particular, some free-range eggs from Muensterland will do quite nicely.

4. Top right, someone was feeling artistic with the balcony tomatoes. Normally it would be a larger one or two, sliced in half and fried, but these were raw as they are quite small, and so good anyway in their freshness.

5. Center, the Pièce de résistance, fry up some vegetarian sausages in a little olive oil. This variety comes from the Netherlands, from Goodbite, they are mildly spicy and very juicy for a soy product. Two thumbs up.



Need more info?
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Full_breakfast

How life in Germany treats me well

A few years back, those of you who know me way back when, remember when I moved to sunny California. It represented a sea change in life for various points. At one time, I wasn't feeling so well, and my new, California, new-age, 'just-out-of-med-school doc' with plenty of time on her hands and my phenomenally good health insurance had run some blood tests and gently suggested that I cut out red meat for a month, just to appease her as my genetically awful cholesterol clocked in above 240.

Keep in mind that at the time I was an average to below-average sized female with decent physical activity, under 30 years old, non-smoking, with very limited alcohol consumption, so 240 was simply obnoxious. Not sure of what I'm talking about? Study up.

I felt phenomenally better four weeks later and the cholesterol had dropped to 222, so at that point in 2001 I decided to go cold-turkey and become a vegetarian. Six months later when I went back to her as a vegan (no meat or dairy products) for three months already, I was certain it was going to be much lower as I felt so much better and was at the peak physical point in my life. Uh-uh, not even close, barely lower and still over 200 (when the goal was 180) and vegans clock in around 140.

Crestfallen, I gradually came to the conclusion that there was nothing that I could do, genetics was in action here. I bumbled along, remaining a vegetarian or vegan, because it made me feel physically better, but disheartened. When I first came to Europe, I was in the UK for five months and the transistion was smooth. UK life is similar to US life as a vegetarian. Many of the same brands/products are available, or close equivalents are nearby. For fun, when I went home to the US, I went to the doctor where they ran their usual barrage of tests. The only one that came back flagged was the cholesterol, in the low 200's, but I wasn't surprised.

Fast forward a bit. I moved to Germany and officially transferred to be a German paid employee. I decided to put the whole cholesterol thing on ice, as the last thing I wanted what a lecture from a Germany doctor. So we carried along merrily for a few more years.

Fast forward a bit more, 4 years. Company J was doing a 'health day' including free cholesterol check, body fat check, infos provided, that sort of thing. With extensive trepidation I showed up, ready for the worst, having held off for four years, but drawn by the idea of the cost-free checks and no associated bad notes on file.

The woman was very impressed with my ability to produce blood upon her pinprick. (Yeah, I'm good like that.) She smears my finger on a little strip that is in a little box, then we sit there as it counts down from 200. It finally gets to the end of its analysis and it blinks 171.

My initial thought--like everything else, this must be in a different scale...Miles/Kilometers, cups/millileters, gallons/liters, ft and inches/cm, pounds/kilograms--everything is different. No, this is one of the few things that is the same...it's 171 on my scale. You.have.got.to.be f'ing.kidding.me.

More funnier. I am smashed in line among lots of too highly numbered people. My first though was--her machine is broken. I checked with a colleague later, he confirms that it came in as he knows his to be, so it's not broken. So assuming she didn't take a bad read on me personally, to what can we attribute such good news? I'd go with the following:

1. The lack of processed and convenience food.
I get none of my favorite brands of frozen, snack, and prepared foods here. In general, the only 'processed food' in my diet would be frozen pizza and an occasional can of pringles. I find a lot of the prepared sauces (which I so loved as a quick fix meal in the US or the UK), to be much more salty or sweet, as well as limited in options. And overall, there just isn't the same culture of prepared, frozen food here.

I make about 95% of my meals here, (mainly out of necessity). There's just not the same processed convenience options here, and one can only eat so much frozen pizza.

2. The lack of fast food
No, I'm not expecting fast food in the tiny town of B (the population of B and the surrounding countryside is 17k). However, my closest fast food is Burger King/McDonalds in Leverkusen--25 min drive from home, or McDonalds in the other direction for 25 min. When I put 25x2 travel to and from), plus waiting time, I may as well just make my food, for that time effort.

3. The walkable culture
I walk a lot in general in the US. However, here it's more incorporated in my lifestyle every single day. Usually on the weekend, I don't use the car, unless I'm going to see D or to the supermarket to pick up a crate of water. In general, it's easier to walk than drive into the tiny town of B as parking is limited and everything is centrally located.

Why I didn't expect such a result:
A. I go for 30-45 min walks at lunchtime, and walking for errands and shopping, but I get no formal sport beyond that and an occasional trip to the pool.

B. My alcohol consumption is much higher here than in the US.

C. I eat a lot more cheese here than I ever ate in America. Cheese/any dairy product in the US makes my not feel well, so I avoid it. Cheese here doesn't have the same result (not sure why) and sometimes it's the only veg option on a menu.

Saturday lunch - Lemon and Ginger Tofu with Beautiful Sauce

I had stopped by my local Aldi Sued on Friday on the way into the office, I decided in the morning that I was in a salad mood. While there, I bought some of their bio Tofu. Big props to Aldi Sued--they are the only 'mainstream' store in my area to carry fresh tofu. Their tofu is firm and holds up well in cooking. It is highly recommended, in particular when compared to its closest competitors: the 'non-refrigerated Kaufpark tofu in a glass jar and some kind of oil designed to last years', or the 'slightly pricy Bioladen which has limited hours' tofu.

On Saturday I was in the mood for something coconut. On a whim I tried this recipe and wow was it spectacular, even if my photo was not so hot. I'd say it rivals my old standby, General Tao's Tofu.

I followed the recipe exactly as it is written (except for putting it over noodles instead of rice), and the next time I make it, I'd make it exactly the same. Beware, however, you may have the desire to scarf down the whole batch, which sorta sucks when you were hoping to get two lunch meals during the week out of it. ;-)

Heather's new toy

Before:

After:

You'll notice the disappearance of Mr. Coffee Thermos in the second photo. He was frightened by the loud grinding noise and the occasional splatter of juice. The photo of the juice in the second photo really doesn't do it justice as you can't really see the color mixture of the basic orange with the red bits of the blood orange speckled throughout.

Since I came back from the US and shifted into flu mode, I've been extra careful to eat well these past few days. Shortly before I left for the US, I bought this handy little machine at Pennymarkt (damn them and their low, low prices!).

I've considered going all out and getting a mega juicer that does fruits and vegetables, but as a vegetarian, I have vegetables all day long, and fruit consumption is where I've been lacking.

Since living in Germany, I've become accustomed to fresh-squeezed, natural, no sugar added, not from concentrate, relatively inexpensive juice. It severely pained me during the two weeks in the US to pay Wholefoods prices to get the same level of juice.

One juice that I particularly like actually comes from a Carrefour in Belgium, where I don't have an opportunity to go so often. It's made with:
7 oranges
2 mandarins
.25 lime

I used the above as a basis to start and then modified a bit. I've been avoiding mandarins, since Mausi's post a while back, so I didn't have any on hand. From my local Turkish market, I used:
2 oranges
1 blood orange
.5 lime (I'm a big fan of limes)

All told, a worthwhile investment of time, effort, and money.

Saturday lunch: Vegetarian Thai green curry

I fell in love with green curry when I first had it at a Thai restaurant in Milwaukee. I ate the same dish multiple times just to cement in my head the full taste so that I could (try to) recreate it later.

Before I became vegetarian I used to always get Pad Thai when as my Thai food of choice, but as it tends to be made with fish sauce, I've since abandoned ship on that one unless I'm at a completely vegetarian restaurant. I've tried making it at home but it never quite has the right flavor.

However, you can easily make a green curry without fish sauce without compromising on the flavor. A lot of recipes for green curry are very complex, but here is a simplified version that I make in 15 minutes.

1. The most difficult part-find vegetarian green curry paste. I buy mine in Holland, this tends to be the main one sold in Asian food shops there. It is an import from Thailand to Holland, and it will set you back a few Euros, but with one this container you can make this meal at least 20 times.

Maybe Christina G knows where to buy it in Germany. I have seen the Thai Kitchen and Blue Dragon brands have it, but it's more of an oily sauce than a dry paste, and both contain fish sauce.

2. Fry tofu squares in oil. Then set the tofu aside.

3. Open a can of coconut milk. Personally I go for the 'light' coconut milk, but regular is also ok. I buy a refrigerated version from an Asian shop in Koeln or from Holland, but you can get the non-refrigerated kind also.

4. Put the coconut milk into a skillet on low heat. Put 1 or 2 tablespoons of the curry paste into the skillet also (depending on how strong of a curry taste you like). Keep stirring constantly. One clove of chopped garlic can also be added now, if you like.

In the meantime put the container of unused curry paste into an airtight container or ziploc baggy and put it into the refrigerator.

5. Throw in a few handfuls of chopped up mangold (chard), including the chopped up stems. Any dark, leafy green thing could also be substituted if you're not in Germany where mangold is currently abundant.

6. I like my dark, leafy greens to be barely cooked, so at this point I throw my tofu back into the skillet, so that it gets coated with the sauce. Stir some more.

7. If you're feeling especially adventurous, throw in a chopped up green Thai chili pepper (optional). Throw in a few basil leaves (optional). Take off heat.

8. Serve over rice or noodles of your choice. Today I was in the mood to have some Japanese noodles.

The final result:

back in germany - what's cooking

But not much to say after such a lovely trip to Lithuania and talking about it will just make me sad that I am back in the land of the angry dour cranks. So instead, here is the vegan meal I made Monday for Aunt B, a detox from all of the cheese, vodka, whiskey and general lack of fresh green things of the old country.

Starting at the top left, 11 o'clock is Uncle Ben's boil in a bag Thai rice. Going clockwise, 2 o'clock is Nando's sweet chili sauce with eggplant, tofu, and chickpeas. 4 o'clock is young pan-seared brussel sprouts spritzed with Bragg's Liquid Aminos.

Bottom center at 6 o'clock is two stuffed mushrooms which were gently warmed on the bottom. Their raw stuffing was mushroom stems, spring onion, and two types of fresh basil--green and purple, with a dash of olive oil to hold it all together. Bottom left at 7 o'clock is zucchini with garlic and red onion.

Aunt B is not a vegetarian and in particular she's not a fan of tofu unless it's pretty well hidden in a sauce, but she gave it two thumbs up. Although as the meat-eater in our twosome she had to eat some pretty bad looking things in Lithuania like tongue (of what animal I am not sure), and raw something that she was not sure of, except that it was red/pink and for breakfast. So I imagine known vegetables must seem rather mild in comparison.

Saturday vegan cooking

As you know, Saturday is my best cooking day. I buy my "major" food on either Friday or Saturday, so everything I cook on Saturday is extremely fresh. Also I have the most time on Saturday afternoons, and there is always the fallback that the stores are open until the evening in case I'm suddenly missing something, which is not an option on Sundays.

Today's cooking is special because Vegan Pete is in town visiting. So Vegan Pete eats only vegetarian food, minus egg and dairy products. Having been vegan for a few years, often my meals are still vegan, mainly because I'm not talented at egg cooking and dairy makes my tummy hurt. In addition, Vegan Pete is lavish in praise, not only is he verbally pleased about what I make, but he eats a lot of it, so I know he's not just being polite. ;-)

Today's menu is looking like this:
Starters: Buffalo Tempeh Wings - which will be made with my Jim Beam hot wing sauce
Stuffed Zucchini flowers (courtesy of my balkon garden) stuffed with chopped mushrooms and fresh balkon garden herbs
roasted garlic cloves

Mains: Tasty Eggplant Bake - mainly because it uses quinoa which I love for its nutritional value and I do rarely use quinoa in cooking as it's a little too adventurous for most non-vegetarians
Soba noodles with green beans and ginger and garlic (mainly for D because he is an part-time vegetarian, so quinoa does wonders for his digestive system)
Stuffed zucchini, because zucchini looked so good this morning and I liked that the stuffing in this recipe was bean based as a change for the usual breadcrumb based stuffing.

As you can guess from the above, there will be enough food that no one will need dessert, which is part of my master plan. I don't eat so much sweet stuff myself beyond fruit or berries as I don't like the taste, so I when I attempt to create something sweet myself, it is absolutely inedible. I can't figure out how it's supposed to taste in the making or at the end so it always goes terribly, terribly wrong so I've given up on this point. Fortunately so many desserts contain egg or dairy so I'm mainly off the hook on that account.

there's no such thing as a free lunch...

unless you are heather in europe and it's a Monday in July in Copenhagen. As you may recall, I left almost three weeks ago for Bergen, Norway. I traveled from Koeln Deutz and took the train to Duesseldorf airport. It's actually very quick when you get the fast regional bahn, only 33 min. I was to leave from DUS to Copenhagen with a one hour layover and then a flight to Bergen.


I usually like to bring along some snacks to the airport, in particular fresh veg and fruit, but leaving early Monday morning carrying the tent and all would have meant that I'd be carrying for a few hours a salad purchased on Saturday afternoon, so I had visions of wiltiness squared. Plan B, Copenhagen Airport has nice (albeit overpriced airport) snack bars, called something like 'To Go' with fresh food including little salads, sandwiches, cookies, water, juice, etc. With an hour that would be enough time to pick something up to take aboard and eat en route especially as it's one of those 'meals/snacks for sale' flights.


Until the plane left late that is. We're all just sitting there during the boarding time and then leaving time with no announcement given. Correction, I'm just sitting there reading the free Times Herald, my Germanic brethren are sighing loudly and looking at their watches. We finally leave 25 minutes late, so my one hour layover was whittled down to getting off the plane and looking at the board where it said 'go to gate' and then getting there and seeing everyone already lined up and ready to board.



I was a tad disappointed to not get lunch, although it was my own damn fault for not bringing something. As you may remember, I don't do breakfast, except for coffee. I don't like food in the morning, and I never have. At one point I was dating a German and my lack of breakfast sincerely offended his delicate sensibilities. Although I was as equally appalled by him eating Kinderschokolade in the morning and trying to pass that off as healthy. That was the moment the door loudly slammed shut on the German dating scene for me. I don't mind if you like to have breakfast, and I'm even willing to compromise with a Sunday brunch at 11 and call it lunch.


But I digress. As I'm walking up, they are apparently repeating again a call for volunteers to forgo this flight and take the same one, just an hour and 45 min later. I had already seen the weather for Bergen and it was a 90% chance of rain, and rain covered most of the Nordics. I was already pondering what to do with the afternoon as I was staying in a hostel rather than a fancy hotel with say, my own TV and American channels, where I could whittle the day away.

And what does one get for one's inconvenience of sitting in grey CPN an extra almost two hours? A voucher for 150 EUR for a future SAS flight that can instead by cashed out for 75 EUR cash if I want, an upgrade to business class on the next flight (don't get excited, it's low budget business class), and a free lunch in the airport with a 150 DKK voucher (roughly 20 euros). Wine me and dine me.

I could have lived like a queen at the 'To Go' snack bar, but I went upscale for Italian at Gino's Pasta. It was like the Price is Right, I want to go 'as close as I can to the 150 without going over'. I had a nice little vegetarian pasta with artichokes, a side salad with pine nuts and a bottle of water for 142 DKK and it was a nice way to spend the extra hour.