ice, little signs of spring, maybe

on wednesday, there was a biting wind at the cottage by the lake. the sun made everything pretty, though.







so fragile







and sparkly







this tiny lingonberry is making its way thru the snow already







strong spring sun melts parts of the road to cottage early on, some shady parts remain frozen until late may...







once back at the shack, the dog stole my socks and the mouse punished him immediately!







this morning we woke up to this...maybe spring isn't here just yet

jumbo size laskiaispulla

for some reason i made the first batch of laskiaispulla already a month ago, maybe because lent was in the mid february last year, or something.

i wanted to experiment a little and made a normal pulla dough but baked it into 3 jumbo buns.







first divided the dough into three pieces and formed them into huge balls which i places in paper baking tins (more or less to secure them from spreading allover in the oven). here, all three after the second rise getting an eggwash.







sprinkled some slivered almonds on top before...







...placing them into 190C oven for 15 mins.







once cooled, i cut top third off with serrated knfie...







...and took out the strawberry jam and marzipan.







i decided to grate the marzipan in order to be able to spread it more evenly on the bun.







as this was to be his and hers, the other half got jam.







generous amount of whipped cream before placing the "lid" on.







i would like to be able to tell that this served 8, the truth is closer to 3...

lent menu, pea soup & lent buns / pastry (hernekeitto & laskiaispulla)

today is ash wednesday, the beginning of lent. everyone, i assume, might have a few things to repent, observing lent isn't neverthelss my way to do it. after the long, dark, cold, dreary (did i forget something?) winter the renewal comes naturally with spring.

however, i did make the traditional pre-lent dishes, laskiaispulla (lent pastry) and hernekeitto (pea soup). my laskiaispulla is filled with strawberry jam and whipped cream...







i made pulla dough with 2,5 dl milk, full recipe here. let the dough rise till it doubles, then roll it into a log, divide into 8 pieces, roll them into balls between the palm of your hand and the work surface, place on a baking sheet and let rise for 20 mins...







...normally i'd make about 15 smaller buns of the same amount of dough but as it's lent... traditionally you're supposed to eat big and fat (so that you pigs will grow to be huge and your grains plentyfull in the coming summer)







before placing into 200C oven for 10 mins, i eggwashed the buns







certain someone likes to have his with marzipan (almond paste), on the right







the pea soup then...another very old tradition.







i've made it several times before so this time i wanted to try little something different. there is a recipe on the side of the package of peas, to that i added 0,4 liter water, 2 carrots, 100 gr celeriac and fresh marjoram







i cubed the carrots, celeriac and the smoked ham. i added these only after the peas and onions had been simmering for 2 hrs.







i had some smoked ham rind in the freezer, the rind was simmering in the pot from the start. the ham appreared on this post. the ham rind in totally optional but gives a lot of taste. this could well be a veggie dish as well, just leave out the smoked ham and replace it with smoked tofu (if there is such a thing!)







the soup was garnish with fresh marjoram and served with rye bread.

little bling & other things

these past few weeks haven't done anything good to my aging body (feel free to laugh), aches here and there. that aside, this little bling is so pretty it makes me happy. seepia from work makes and sells them. this bracelet is from (the aptly named) aim so häpi! series (that would be "i'm so happy" for those of you who don't "read finnish"...







i'm not the only one getting old. this beast has mellowed so much that i'm starting to think someone has changed him for another dog. he has taken to sleeping under the table and resting his head on the trestle of the table.







the dog has grown very hairy paws this winter...







i might have mentioned that the magazines i subscribe have recently had many interesting recipes...now, if only there was time to try them all!







certain someone has, on more than one occasion, reminded me of the number of cookbooks i already own. however, amazon was kind enough to ship these to me. i will be trying macarons in the near future. tried them last may, but wasn't quite happy with the results.







confession time...i'm, gasp, a maplesyrupholic! the other day i was taking out recycleables and found not one but 4 empty bottles of maple syrup and got a little scare, do i actually eat it this much? that needs to change, i have to start eating natural yogurt with berries for breakfast more often, sans maple syrup!






last week i finally got rid of my comfy armchair, it went to a good home. there is the floor to sit on, or this to peddle... from now on, i really shouldn't have any more excuses not to exercise even in foul weather...

veggie (mostly) pasta bake

it seems that all the magazines i subscribe have been showing recipes for bakes of one sort or another...delicious had baked winter pies and bon appetit had too many to choose from.

i did what i usually do, took out what i had in the fridge and pantry and baked this...







i did have 400gr beef mince but the idea was to use triple that amount veggies and on hindsight, i should have skipped the meat altogether. not because i have anything agaist meat, as such, but with the amount veggies and other stuff there really wasn't any need for the meat.

here sliced celery, grated carrots, minced leek, total amount approx 3 cups







in another bowl i had zucchini (grated), mini tomatoes (halved) and red bell pepper (cubed)







started the cooking by browning the meat in my trusty non-stick soup pot, then added the carrot, leek and celery mix and a can of crushed tomatoes. let that simmer for 15 mins for the veggies to soften a bit.

i tought this would have made a nice pasta sauce as was, but i was determined to make this a bake...so maybe next time.







after 15 mins i turned the heat off and added the tomato, pepper and zucchini mix. the reason for adding them at this point was not to cook them into a mush. they were going into the oven so they'd get semi-cooked anyway.

i used torino whole wheat/wheat germ pasta, no more white pasta in my pantry.

mixed the cooked pasta with other ingredients...







...poured one fourth onto an oven dish and added some grated 17% emmental (that needed to be used, totally optional)...







...then added some more pasta mix on top. was making this in two dishes, one for certain someone and one for me to take to work later on in the week.







grated cheese on top would have been more than fine but i had some cream and creme fraiche that needed to be used as well, so i decided to make a mix of those, bread crumbs and grated cheese.







the bread crumbs quickly sucked up all the moisture in the mix but managed to spread the mixture on top of the dishes.







after 30 mins in 225 oven...the smell was so good!







again, no salt as there certainly was some in the cheese. this batch would have served, hmm, at least 8. i got 4 lunches out of mine, and a few nibbles...







ps. not too long ago i came to know of mark bittman, who used to write as the minimalist for new york times. he has great ideas about food, what we should, or more importantly shouldn't eat.

i like to think i was going to the same direction on my own, but his articles have certainly made me feel more determined to further my quest as a flexitarian, but at the same time being strongly against putting people into boxes and telling others how they should feed themselves (although the guys at work might disagree on that...)

i'm certainly not "a vegetarian who occasionally eats meat" but rather someone who likes eating good food, tries to make the mentioned food healthy, tries to make it from scratch with sustainable, seasonable ingredients, and who will occasionally cook with meat, cream and butter and what not to indulge in gastronomical delights.

recently i decided that i will only buy stuff that has maximum two E-coded ingredients in them. that has proved surprisingly difficult, there just is too many Es around and the more the food is prosessed, the more E-thingies in it. i might have to go to max three and even that narrows the selection quite a bit!