we drove to the cottage with two vehicles as i’m staying here a bit longer. had my blogging set-up going on thursday evening but got distracted by my surroundings… the internet connection has been super-slow over here, that’s why i’m packing the pictures a bit tighter and that affects the sharpness, sorry about that.
certain someone rode his new (toy) harley here. we left the dog home with a sitter, too much hassle going on here this weekend
thursday evening went “smoothly” with baby pork ribs and sljivovica
my drink had limes in it, and sugar, and mint and just a tiny splash of something strong. i only had one, honest!
we have made bandit roast (pit roast) twice earlier but i thought that we could try something different this year with a “peka”. i suppose all croatians will throw a fit now, but let me finish first. this cast iron cauldron played the part of peka, in croatia they would cook the food in the pot but as you can see, this one is a bit weathered…
…so we wrapped the meats first in parchment paper, then 3x in foil and last with wet newspaper, quite similar like we’ve done pit roast earlier. mom had dug out a 2kg moose roast from the freezer, we marinated that in red wine over-night, seasoned with salt and black pepper, wrapped in bacon before the packaging. the other package was a pork loin that got just a bit of salt. on top i placed very wet newspapers, before putting the lid on
we had burned a fire in the pit for a few hours before placing the pot in in. there it is, under that fire. at this point we started to wait…
…and while we were waiting i grilled some chicken for a “light” lunch, seasoned with just salt and pepper. it pays to get the chicken fresh and organic, even the kids noticed the difference in taste
the chicken was accompanied with a very simple green salad with tomatoes, cucumber and cantaloupe, and mom’s bread
we had figured that the roasts would take a few hours, so after lunch we took turns in bathing in the sauna. i’ve often wanted to take pictures in the sauna but the heat and stema keep fogging up my camera big time. and i’m not entirely sure people would want their pictures taken whilst bathing. come to think of it, i don’t think i would!
approx 3 hrs later we started smelling "something cooking" in the pit and decided it was time to dig the pot out
the pork looked done…
…and was, very done, very good
the moose then, it was superb when still slightly warm, but even better cold on the next day
i got the inspiration for this salad at rehab. they served several nice salads but this really got my attention, i could taste celeriac and apple in it but couldn’t quite figure out the other ingredients. when i told my mom about it, she immediately said waldorf’s (well, she did work in a hospital kitchen for a few decades…)
my waldorf had 200gr finely grated celeriac, 4 stalks of celery thinly sliced, 200gr tin of pineapple chunks (will get crushed next time), drained and juice reserved for later, 2 peeled and grated granny smith apples. made the dressing with 2 heaping tbsps of mayo, “some” whipped cream (mom was making a cake and there was some left over and could be I went a bit over-board…) and some of the pineapple juice.
if you’re eating the salad right away the dressing can be a bit runny but if the salad needs to sit in the fridge you’d want the dressing to be on the stiff side. the pineapple and apple will give out juices and you’ll end up with a very wet salad, tasty, but wet. naturally, i forgot to buy wallnuts for the salad but had pumpkin seeds, which worked great perhaps even better...
a very bad picture of a very nice guacamole (mushed avocados, finely diced and de-seeded tomatoes, parsley, cilantro, chili powder, salt). in the background two sour cream dressings (both with vinegar, salt, sugar, white pepper, the other had minced dill, the other garlic and parsley)
lake trout that my dad caught and smoked
midsummer usually falls on the name-day of almost all the males in the family, therefore a cake. another bad picture but the cake was good!
the weather then...it seems that the bonfire versus people wanting to spend time outdoors collide...we had been dreading and waiting for it to rain, because we did want to get the fire going, no rain, no fire. with enough rain it would have been safe to set the fire but not comfortable to go out and watch it burn. around 7 pm on midsummer eve we got the rain, and boy did we get rain, over 40 millimeters over 3 hrs. my dad had to play a trick or two to get the fire going in the rain.
i managed half an hour outside before my umbrella was so soaked that it "leaked" on me and my camera
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