This year I´m making most Christmas gifts myself. I am usually a workaholic, but this time of the year business is slow and I learned to enjoy it. Therefore I´m baking and personalizing presents I bought, knitting and writing Christmas cards. Nice time to be with friends, too, if you still have any left when you decide work is not everything in life. 😉 Enjoy your advent time!
We started this tradition last year, we got away from the city for a weekend to get some Christmas spirit. Our destination was Røros, a fairy tale-like small town in Middle Norway, 5 hours away by train, but miles and miles away from the city stress and everyday routine. To make it a tradition, we had to do the same this year, so we chose Tallinn, Estonia. And my God were we lucky to visit such a pretty town in winter! We were totally swept away by the colorful houses, the Christmas market in the middle of the old town, the churches and thick city walls and, last but not least- the cold! I´ve never been so cold in my life as I was for those three days, and I live in Norway! Good thing there´s such thing as mulled wine, caramelized almonds, elk soup à la middle ages (meaning without a spoon), sauerkraut, sausages and pork steak! In addition to that, we had a sauna and a jacuzzi at the hotel, as well as the possibility to book various treatments- I chose a facial, a massage, manicure and pedicure! 😉 There are a couple of stores with nice Estonian design, arts and crafts and delicatessen, so gifts were not difficult to find, either. And even though either of us is particularly fond of winter, we both love Christmas! So it was delightful to just walk around, check out the antique shops, pop in for a cocoa, update our instagram, walk a little more, take some pictures, have some lunch, take a nap, take a sauna, dinner, drinks and then more sleep. It´s so rejuvenating, we´ve already chosen next year´s destination-Viena! I hope you enjoy this ride with us!
I was starting to forget the main reason why people love working freelance- being in charge of your own time. I rarely feel this is the case for my part, in my line of work I´m way too busy 90% of the time. Thank God November can be slow! This week has been smooth and good for the soul. I filled my days with a little work, walked with Sam, billed and read. I´m also making healthy comfort food since I´m on a diet. It´s just that I surpassed 60kg and knowing that Christmas is right around the corner and that I´m in my 30s, I thought I´d take matters into my hands before they escalate. Today I thought I should reward myself with a faux chocolate mousse made of avocado, cocoa, bananas, apple juice and olive oil. Blend two avocados, two bananas, 3 tea spoons of cocoa, one tea spoon of olive oil and two tea spoons of apple/orange juice. Bonne appetite!
I´m just back from a trip to Berlin and boy was it invigorating! I love that city, there´s no doubt in my mind that it has everything you could ever want from a metropole, except for the sea, perhaps. I´d settle for that anytime!
I was in Berlin for a conference; in a way it was the excuse I needed to allow myself 4 days off. The conference about community interpreting was intense and inspiring, although I found out mostly what I already knew, that the world is compromising more and more for the sake of saving a penny and that availability precedes quality.
However, that didn´t stop me from having a good time. We did some shopping, we dined French, Asian and Italian. We walked till our feet hurt, stopped for a beer and then walked some more. I´m not very much into German cuisine, except for the curry wurste and the pretzel, which I had my share of this time, too.
On Sunday we went to the Mauerpark for the flea market, but since it was Memorial Day there was no market. What else to do than eat some organic pizza and have more coffee? We then walked all the way to Mitte through Prenzlauer Berg with its colorful buildings, shops and falafel stores. Berlin was chilly and grey and yet not distressing at all. They´d just started Christmas decorating and somehow I felt I was a couple of weeks early.
Yesterday we wrapped up by cake and coffee at KADEWE, the amazing shopping center of West Berlin, where you find whatever you could ever dream of from exclusive handcrafted bags to chocolate truffles and eclairs. We had amazing eclairs and bought some small gifts and magazines, I am now the proud owner of the latest CEREAL edition! Later on we visited the Bauhaus Museum and found yet some more inspiration in the clean lines and visionary buildings. I am currently on my couch in my pjs and life has never been as sweet.
These days I´ve been active on the kitchen front and I always find it up-lifting. The thing with me is that I love cooking, but I´m also very lazy. So I have to trick myself into doing it for a higher purpose, the way I sometimes manage tricking myself into working out. This being said, there´s nothing better than enjoying a glass of wine while preparing something for the man you love. Nothing can beat that, if you ask me. I was born with a little bit of a mother nature complex- I need to feed the world. In other words, if you like my food, we´ll probably be friends in no time!
Yesterday I made my anchovies pie. It´s a classic in our house, I´ve been making it for years now. I got the recipe from a friend living in England and at that time my only relationship with anchovies was that I used to pick them off the pizza. Now I think they can lift up a whole dish!
Here comes the recipe:
butter dough (buy or make your own)
1 big onion
pine kernels
chopped tomatoes
oregano
thyme
chilli pepper (cayenne pepper)
2 small boxes of anchovies
parmesan
rusk (or dried bread crumbs)
Sear the onion for a couple of minutes in a pan. Add the tomatoes and the herbs. Season with chili pepper (cayenne pepper), salt and pepper. Let is simmer for 15-20 minutes on a low temperature.
Meanwhile, form the pie dough after the pie form and save some threads to cover the pie like a blue berry pie. Stick small holes in the dough with a fork. Put it in the oven for 15 minutes at 180 degrees Celsius.
When the tomato sauce is ready, take out the pie, spread it on top of it, cover with bread crumbs, sprinkle with pine kernels and grate some parmesan on top.
Put the anchovies on top and line up the pie dough to look pretty. 15-20 minutes in the oven. Bon apetit!
Following up on my nostalgia and my missing the mother country, I decided I should write about Bucharest and share some hidden treasures with you. I´ve only lived there briefly, from 1999-2000, as a language student at the State University. That didn´t stop me from falling in love with the city, its dusty charm and its veiled grandeur. On the contrary, it might be the very reason I never get enough of Bucharest- I wasn´t given the chance to grow tired of it. Many people I know say that I would feel different if I actually lived there- between late working hours, the ruthless bureaucracy and the everyday struggle many Romanians experience, there wouldn´t be much enthusiasm left. This might very well be the case, but I choose to believe that you have to make time for a relationship, the way you do with your loved ones. Take your time and discover the city, go for a stroll in the newly renovated old town, have a coffee on a lovely terrace in the shade, grab a beer at a beer garden or mingle with the young and the restless by Herastrau Park, the choice is yours. And it´s not only about money, don´t give me that, I don´t buy it! As a student I had no money and still I loved the city. Fill a thermos with cocoa and get out in the open air if the money doesn´t stretch. Go to a gallery, it´s free of charge! Don´t just indulge in your feeling sorry for yourself!
After depriving my body of nutrients as well as good flavours, I felt it was about time I should do something about that. So I managed to use the first window of opportunity to check out the organic marked in Stortorvet. I started doing that last year, enticed by the colours, smells and the jovial chatter the ´farmers´met one with. 2 kg apples, 1 bag of golden chanterelles and 3 corn cobs later, I was heading home with the promises of a real feast.
This week has been mostly about accountancy (which I hate so much I can´t understand how anybody can put up with it as a full-time job), a little bit of work and lots of family time. With so much unexpected time on my hands, I was fantasizing of making apple jam, scones and healthy smoothies everyday, but instead we ate lots of instant noodles and other junk food varieties. I thought sharing an office would be great- coffee breaks and quirky conversation, but forgot that my husband recently gave up snus (loose tobacco that you put under your lip), so his nerves were a wreck.
>Yesterday was one of those horror days, I worked for 14 h. I left home in the morning and came back at night. Nauseous from the train ride, hungry and beat. But as soon as I opened the door, my three favourite persons in the whole world were overwhelmed to see me: Sam jumped me and kissed my cheeks, Beo miawed in his familiar way and rubbed himself by my legs and Vuong told me there was hot Vietnamese soup in the kitchen. I mean, what more can you want from life?! Am I not the world´s luckiest gal?!
I´m back at home and I´ve already started work. I woke up early, made myself a cup of Zespresso (´cause we´re too cool to have a Nespresso, like everyone else), walked Sam for half an hour, including the mandatory ´scratch my belly´on the grass, then off to work. At 14:30 I´m home already and it feels unreal to have all this time on my hands. I´m thinking of baking something, I make a pretty good focaccia, and maybe a soup to go with. I´ll share some pictures of food I love making or just dream of making some time. What are you having for dinner today? Have a good week!
Stories and Anecdotes by Sharron Little Burnett
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