Lost my foraging cherry...

...but gained some berries. Look!



I was out for a walk in one of the forest parks not too far from me when I noticed some elderberries. I've been dithering about gathering some for a while and had decided that the tree I found near work might be too close to the main road and generally being a bit scared of the whole thing. Silly perhaps but that's the way these things go. So, having decided that I had missed my chance this year and that next year I would definitely go foraging and pick elderflowers and then later in the year elderberries, I spied these ripe berries (all of the other lower branches had been stripped already, I could see where bunches of berries had been broken off but, obviously, by someone shorter than me). There were lots more berries very high up but I got these without too much trouble. After stripping the black ones from the stalks (a quick read of the internet let me know the green ones are not ripe and could make you sick if you eat them, no mention of the dark red, not quite ripe ones but to be on the safe side I won't use them) I had 75g of berries. Not quite the 500g called for in the pontack sauce recipe I've had my eye on for a while but I'll do my best and have them steeping in 75ml cider vinegar in a low oven now.

I'm excited and also nervous. Hope it works out.

WW week 2

Needn't have worried. Weight loss 1.7 kg (3.7 lbs). Definitely need to keep going for long walks at the weekend. It helps a lot.

Jeans and wishes

I have not had a great ww week and have gone rather close to maximum points (i.e. including using up extra points earned from exercise) on a couple of days. Didn't think it'd be so hard in just the second week but I'm trying to make the plan fit my life rather than ditching all the food I normally eat for the duration and then ending up putting weight on again as soon as I stop so I have accepted the fact that things will go slowly. And I'll find out tomorrow how things have actually gone and am secretly hoping it won't be too bad. I am going to cheat a little by going to an afternoon class rather than an evening class so I won't have just eaten my dinner but that's just hedging my bets rather than cheating really :-)

It occurred to me at the weekend that the trousers (knee length trousers are becoming essential to staying cool enough to stay sane in the summer here) I bought in a sale only about three weeks ago were feeling a bit loose so I decided to take a chance on trying on a pair of jeans I bought the weekend before last. There is a shop on my road which sells everything from pricey furniture and bedding to cheapie clothes and shoes, household goods and knickknacks and a somewhat strange collection of 'posh' foodstuffs. They are closing down for renovations at the end of this week and have been selling stuff at really reduced prices for a few weeks now. I have bought a few things, including huge pillows to use for my couch and some very handy measuring bowls (I bought one small one and used it so much the first week I had it I went back and bought more), a big bag to use for my knitting stuff and two pairs of jeans. I love wearing jeans but haven't worn any for years at this stage. I decided to grab a pair of the biggest ones and the next to biggest ones because at 5 euro each I felt they were worth taking the chance on, especially since they were 34' leg jeans, which are not always easy to come by. I tried them on when I got home and although I was able to pull the bigger ones all the way up I couldn't even think about trying to close them. I decided this morning that just for fun I would try them on again and that I would be able to use them to track my weightloss progress over the coming weeks, thinking that being able to wear them would be something to look forward to. They pulled up much more easily than before and to my amazement I was able to close them with only a teensy, tiny bit of effort (honest, there was no lying down on the bed nor nothin'!). And I've had them on for a couple of hours now and they are actually comfy. I was half expecting to need to take them off after a few minutes just so I could breath easily again. It feels like a big moment.

I have a few days off work and took advantage this morning and went to the farmers' market. It's the same one I go to at the weekend but much quieter. I went fairly early, hoping to get to chat to some of the people I buy from regularly for a change but I ended up with the most impatient woman behind me (and she seemed to be following me from stall to stall) who kept huffing and looking pointedly at her watch while I was making my choices. If a couple of other people hadn't shown up behind her just then I would have just let her go ahead of me because I can't stand that kind of thing. I bought 1.5 kg strawberries and one small punnet of raspberries. I'm going to make one more batch of jam and then the rest of the strawberries are just for eating. I asked the guy today and he said he reckoned there are only about two weeks of strawberries left so I am going to take full advantage and eat as many as I can fresh while I can still get them. I also bought about 4 kg tomatoes, 2kg courgettes and 2kg onions. Yep, there are a few more batches of chutney in my immediate future. Wish I had more jars!

Meal plan - 22nd to 28th August 2009

Saturday 22nd
Breakfast - after coming home from the market, bread roll with some turkey breast, tomatoes, cheese
Lunch - wrap with salad, tomaote, turkey breast, mozarella
Dinner - salad with seeds, tomatoes, cheese and vinaigrette dressing

Sunday 23rd
Brekkie - banana followed by a kaesebroetchen while out walking
Lunch - flammkuchen at flea market (v. v. bad points decision but I did enough walking to cover it I think. And it was delicious.)
Dinner - chicken parcel with salad. Slices of courgette then slices of tomato with a chicken breast fillet on top of that, slices in the chicken breast with a piece of garlic and a piece of mozarella and loads of herbs and black pepper all wrapped up in a tinfoil package (leaving plenty of room for steam to circulate) and cooked in the oven for 30 or 40 minutes. Love this dinner and haven't made it for ages.

Monday 24th
Brekkie - yoghurt with banana [made into a smoothie along with some strawberries]
Lunch - the second chicken parcel in a wrap [yum]
Dinner - salad [salad with some turkey breast and cheese]

Tuesday 25th (knitting group after work) - late in work so didn't make it
Brekkie - bread roll or toasted bread with frischkaese (cream cheese) [had this for lunch and just a kaesebroetchen from bakery for brekkie on the way to work. I was late and disorganised!]
Lunch - pasta with tomato, courgette and onion sauce which I made this evening. [had this for dinner instead]
Dinner - bread and cheese

Wednesday 26th (day off work and no choir in the evening)
Brekkie - yoghurt with fresh fruit from market
Lunch - pasta with tomato, courgette and onion sauce
Dinner - potatoes with scrambled eggs

Thursday 27th (day off work, ww in evening but may try and find a morning class instead)
Brekkie - smoothie [made with yoghurt, strawberries, raspberries and banana]
Lunch - potato salad [kaesebroetchen]
Dinner - rice with tomato, courgette and onion sauce [fried potatoes with tomato and courgette, cheese and turkey salami]

Friday 28th (day off work)
Brekkie - toast
Lunch - may try to do something with that box of quinoa I bought a few months ago and haven't known what to do with.
Dinner - possibly out, if not, bread and cheese.

The onions have arrived

I was delighted to see new harvest onions at the market a couple of weeks ago and bought a pile of them this week, along with some new harvest apples and plums, courgettes and tomatoes. And made chutney no. 1 yesterday. 17 x 240ml jars. The next couple of months are going to be tough, waiting for it to mature but I am really looking forward to it already. I bought a box of 45 jars, thinking I'd have some for next year as well but now I think I'll need to go back and buy more. Want to do at least one more load of tomato and plum with courgette based chutney and one load with pumpkin as well. I've also been looking through the River Cottage Preserves book again and have nearly convinced myself that I want to make piccalilli. Definitely want to try the hearty ale chutney as well, not to mention the figgy mostardo.

I dried some more tomatoes as well and have a load of strawberries drying at the moment. I bought 1.5 kg of strawberries but somehow only 1.2 kg made it into the dehydrator. Wonder how that happened?

Otherwise I've been trying to fit some exercise into my days. Went for a swim on Friday so I have finally gone in to the pool up the road from me and checked it out. It's amazing. A quick check on wiki tells me that it was opened for the first time in 1902 and the fact that it not only had a swimming pool but also baths and showers was good for the people living around as apartments in those days didn't necessarily come with those facilities. It was destroyed in a bombing in 44 but was able to reopen in 45 and was renovated in the late 90's. They don't use chlorine to disinfect it but some kind of membrane electrolysis. The changing rooms are individual 'cabins' and line the pool (plus there's a balcony above with more). So you walk down the back of the cabins, find your number, enter by the door, which you can lock and there is a cupboard to lock your stuff into. Then you simply open the curtain which hangs across the other side of the cabin and you are standing poolside. Showers are then down the other end of the pool. It was a bit weird to have a shower after swimming and then have to walk the length of the pool with a towel wrapped around me but really, anyone with nothing better to do than be watching me would have been able to see less than when I had my swimsuit on (I was glad I had brought a big towel though!).

This morning I took the tram out to Rath and walked up into the woods again. Walked for about an hour although the heat meant I needed to stop after 15 minutes of uphill and wait until I'd cooled down before getting going again. Even at nine in the morning it was heading for 20 degrees. Great if you're doing nothing but hot if you're moving around. Then this afternoon I met a couple of friends and we went to a huge flea market. Not very much interesting there although I was able to pick up a couple of brown bottles, which I know my brother has been looking for and I also snagged a copy of the Emperor wears no Clothes in English for 4 euro. I've been wanting to re-read it.

Oh, and for any youtube (or indeed art) fans out there, this is a video of the woman who won the Ukrainian version of "Got Talent". I'd never heard of sand animation before but thought this was amazing. It's telling the story of the German invasion of the Ukraine during WW2.
Kseniya Simonova

WW week 1

Weight loss = 2.5 kilos (which I was calculating as about 5 lbs since it's roughly double. But I just did a quick google and apparently it's 5.5 lbs. Even better!)

Bottled tomatoes

Here's the finished article:


The large jar with its lid slightly off is the one I used yesterday for dinner. I remembered just in time that I had wanted to take a photo. All of the lids sealed properly so although I'm not going to take any chances and will use these fairly quickly I think it was a good first attempt and I understand far more about the whole process now. If I can get my hands on a not terribly expensive gas one-ring hob next week I think I will go ahead and do some more. And I have big plans for next year.