Jonesberries

People love, love, love this meal. I have cooked this meal twice in the last month for 12+ people. Serge and Jimmie swear it is the best meal they have ever had. Donald wants to cook it with me next time, “I dont cook”, he says, “but I want to learn how to make this because I want to have it over and over again”. Frankly, I dont understand all the fuss. It is based on a meal I have had all my life. Come to think of it, I think it was one of our favourite meals as kids. Well, I cant give you a recipe but I will give you a “story of preparation”. BTW, this recipe adapts well to a vegetarian meal, just leave off the porkchops and drizzle with olive oil instead. It is also great to cook for a crowd as it is one dish for meat, starch and veg. I like it also because I get to use all the leftover fresh veg laying about.

So, here goes. I get my chopping board out and a nice sharp knife. I know I will be doing alot of chopping. I normally do 2 large casserole dishes for 12+ people. So, I put my 2 casserole dishes just behind the cutting board. I take out a pile of potatoes, onions, carrots and whatever else I can find. A month ago I made it vegetarian and had courgettes (zucchini) and broccoli (including the stalks). Last nite I didnt have courgettes or broccoli but had a big bunch of some sort of strange portugeuse dark leafy thing that people say, “kinda like spinach, you just cook it longer”. I start slicing potatoes and then take turns with  all the other things in piles surrounding me. I wash everything well and leave the skins on everything but the onions. I slice as thin as I can, especially the carrots as they take the longest to cook. My animated husband helps by entertaining me with stories within stories of all things internet and blog and what people are talking about in the blogesphere. So, gradually my casserole pans got fuller and fuller. Something beautiful to behold.  Look at how the colours play with each other.  Two whole pans full of the vivid colours of playful fresh veg. I look lovingly at my sliced veg and give it a bit of a toss. My mom only used potatoes and onion and left them neatly layered. Uh, sorry mom, I am a bit rebellious, no neat layers of fresh veg for me. I give them another little toss about so the colours and textures can play a bit. I see a bit more potatoes than anything else. After both casseroles are full. Andrew is hovering now, the blogesphere stories have stopped and he is peering suspiciously at this large pile of veg that will be his dinner. He asks about salt and pepper and I tell him he can do it. Abigail has grated a generous amount of cheese, just normal boring cheese, in Portugal they have “flamenco”, in Australia it would be “tasty”, in America and UK I guess it would be “mild cheddar”. The key is a generous amount. I looked in the fridge and found a little corner of Brie and added that too. I really like some grated parmesan on top so Paulo eagerly went to the store to get some. Saying as he went out the door, “I love any meal that has cheese in it”. After the cheese I put 1 small container of cream for each casserole. I prefer 2 for each so I poured some milk over instead. I layed the pork chops over the top. Oh wait! Andrew has stolen my pork chops! Dang, that husband of mine. He cant stand the thot of me putting raw pork chops on top. He is looking guilty at the stove while he sears the pork chops with a bit of gravy left over from Sundays meal. NOW the pork chops go on and it cooks in a moderate oven for 1 1/2 hours.

So, we went to the market on Saturday. Samuel says, “I want to learn to cook squid, well, maybe octopus”. As this is not a typical request to get from a teenage boy we decided to oblige and Sam picked out his octopus, had the man de-ink it and carried it home. Edna coached Sam and Donald through the cooking and we had 2 beautiful octopus dishes.

Even Hannah loved the octopus. She wasnt sure about the tentacles but decided they were good too. “tastes like chicken chewing gum”, she said. I wonder if the whole exercise was just for the photo opportunities. hmmmm.

We celebrated Donald’s 18th birthday. He got some manly gifts, since he is a man now. As part of our family tradition he got to choose all the food for the day. We have never had such a detailed birthday menu. The best was his choice for a cake. He chose chocolate fondue.

The little ones, Nelson, Joshua and Rania, couldnt believe such a thing existed. The sheer decadence of dipping fruit or cakes into a chocolate puddle. They persevered long after the adults called it quits. We tried to capture photos of them but they were moving so fast and consistant that even though we took about 10 or 20 photos this is the only one without motion blur. At one point Nelson (right) wouldnt take his eyes off of the wonder for fear it was just a dream. He was so focused he fell off his chair, didnt cry, got up quickly and almost fell off the chair again because he refused to take his eyes off the chocolate. I am sure they were swimming in chocolate dreams long after the chocolate fondue was put away.

It was extreme decadence. It was a celebration. I think that especially in times like these when funds are tight we need to celebrate. We are back to a breakfast of porridge oats this morning but even if we had to have porridge for every meal for the next week or month to balance out the decadence of a single day of celebration we still need to do it. Celebration brings joy and life. We dont need a lot of money to celebrate, sometimes what is needed is simply to make the mundane feel special. We have had years when we had no money to celebrate a birthday or other holiday and have pulled the strangest combinations of food out of our cupboard and melted it all together to create some kind of cake but we have always celebrated. Lets celebrate life. Lets learn from the little ones and not miss the wonder and joy, beauty and celebration of life.

Well, here we are back with Barbara and picking olives this time.

Some were more energetic than others at getting every single olive.

Sam and Donald decided to even use a small trampoline to help. Barbara asked that they just dont tell the neighbours about this new technique as they already think all these foreigners that come around are crazy.

Others of us just decided to watch as Sam, Donald and Hannah jumped.

Of course there were some of our favourite activities but with a twist. TJ is now riding Nono the donkey by herself.

Andrew is still BBQing but with more veg as we had so many vegitarians about.

Lots of cooking.

carving,

Laughing,

Uhhhh, Dressing up.

Attacking the blackberries with manly fervor,

finding ingenious ways of transporting batteries for charging. All in all a great time again. Full of work and rest, serious talks and laughter. New friends from UK, Germany, Russia, Brazil and Portugal.

We decided to hang out in Britain for a while.

Andy and T let us stay at their place and made us “Andy’s Puddle Pudding” and showed us how to make it.

We found a great campground outside of Walton on the Thames. It is a membership only site for the “Camping and Caravanning Club”. Good thing we are members. We payed only GBP 12 a nite for the whole family. Plus a couple of extra pounds for electricity. They have electricity, WIFI, re-creation room, water and disposal of unwanted things. No toilets, no showers. Sam says, “now this place has its priorities straight.

The girls brought my camera out one evening to get pictures of a huge flock of parrots that came to visit the campground every night in the hundreds.

The girls took the opportunity to take lots of silly pictures of themselves.

more silly pictures.

now they are animals

They remembered why they went out with the camera and took a few last photos as they took off for the night.

At berlin we were staying with a cool friend called Kerstin. Us four girls were staying at her house for a sleepover. In the morning Me and Liz attempted to make pancakes. The last one we made looked like a fat dog (as you can see in the lovely picture on the left. On the right is me eating it.

By the way it tasted very nice……… Abi (and sort of Liz).

I tell you I love roadside farmers stands. On our way to see friends in Grenoble, France, Andrew stopped so I could get some rasberries to share with our friend. Things always taste better from a farmer’s stand. Mum

Merci taught me to make Dahl today. It was cool. I liked making it. Here is the recipe for Dahl by Merci.

Lentils

2 onions, chopped

2 tomatoes, chopped

2 green chilies, chopped

3 tablespoons fresh coriander

pinch of mustard seeds

pinch of white lentils

a few curry leaves

2 cloves of garlic

salt

lemon juice

Cook the lentils until they are soft. In another pan heat up the veg. oil. After the oil is hot add the mustard seeds and white lentils. Watch out they pop when you add them. Next add the curry leaves, sliced onions, chopped chillies and tomatoes. Add the garlic too. Cook them together for 2-3 minutes (you can also add quarter teaspoon of turmeric powder to the mixture). Add them all together to the cooked lentils. Add salt and lemon juice accordingly. At the very end, add fresh chopped corriander leaves. Bring them to a boil. Remove it from the stove. Bon Apetite!

TJ

When I saw it I thought ‘It couldn’t be’. As we all gazed at in confusion it all became clear. Yes, this was a HUGE vending machine where you can buy large waters, chocolate multi-packs and other things you find at a store a. This was the second time in my life that I went absolutely crazy about a vending machine. I know, pathetik isn’t it. It’s just one of those new technology devises that I just haven’t managed to fully get used to.

So as me, Sam, Abi and Mum gazed at the vending machine in absolute amazement as the oreos got pulled off the self and taken to the other side, these feelings of it all being ridiculous was running through my head.

Try to imagen the tension we were all feeling as you watch our ‘home movie’.

Lizzy

Dad thought we needed a day in Lisbon. He dragged the whole family around the city. He had an agenda. His agenda was the Custard factory. See how happy dad is.