pea soup comfort

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autumn, comfort food, cooking, food, healthy, home made, pea soup, recipe, soup, stew, vegtable

There is nothing better than a hot plate of soup when it’s cold and wet outside, and when the soup is thick and stewy it is just pure bliss.

Since I live on my own I often just buy a tub of fresh soup as I don’t want to be eating the same dish all week long. While they mostly are yummy and filled with vegetablely goodness they do tend to be more on the slurpy side, lacking that little bit of bite and substance.

So yesterday I took the wooden spoon into my own hands and stirred up a batch of pea soup, one of my favourites. Since I didn’t have a recipe, and I was too lazy to google it I decided to make it up as I went along and was delighted with the result.

I chopped up some onions, added a handful of cubed bacon and braised them in the pot. Once they had simmered nicely and the onions where clear I took the mixture out of the pot and put it to the side. Then it was time for the peas.

I bought a large glass of fresh peas in my local shop, added some broth, a bit of salt, a tad of pepper, some garlic and a good handful of a soup mix (lentils, split peas and barley) and let it cook.

While the soup was bubbling away I chopped up two carrots. After about ten minutes my hand blender blended everything together while still having a stewy consistency. Finally I added the onions, the bacon and the carrots and let the soup simmer away for a little while (until the carrots were soft).

Once all was done I poured myself a large bowl of soup and enjoyed every comforting spoonful and I am delighted that I made enough to enjoy more of the scrumptious soup today.

new day – new tablecloth

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flowers, home, home made, memories, photo, photography, tablecloth

Easter is over and with it all of my decorations have disappeared. Last night, after a friendly drop in and chat, I decided it was time for a change and took down everything Easter, stored them away in a box for next year.

Since my friend had presented me with a bunch of springtime flowers and my mother had made me a gift of a home-sewn table runner I knew exactly what I wanted on my kitchen table. I put the flowers into an old stoneware jug – red with white hearts – that use to stand on a shelf in my mothers red and white kitchen – childhood memories embedded in its sturdy shell.

So this morning, as the sun bathed my home with warm spring light, the tablecloth and flowers made me smile. There was something just so cheerful at how the tulips bobbed their heads at me and how neat the runner sat on my table.

A new day – a new tablecloth … what could go wrong?

so cheerful – the red jug use to live in my mothers kitchen so I found it fitting it should stand on her tablecloth

 

Christmas jam

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Carrageen Moss, christmas, Christmas jam, cooking, food, home made, jam, making jam, photography, photos, plum jam

Maybe a few months too early, but yesterday my home smelt of Christmas. Cinnamon and other spices mixed in with red wine and plums wafted around the house as I finally got around to cooking jam.

I didn’t have quite enough jam-sugar so I experimented. Through online research I  found out that the main ingredients that makes jam, well, ‘jammy’, is pectin and since plums are high in pectin (like apples, citrus rinds and cranberries) I decided that plain sugar would suffice. Being in  the experimenting mood I even added some Carrageen or Irish Moss (a tasteless but really healthy seaweed) into the mix. Not just based on any old whim, but based on the fact that it is know for its gelling properties – an added benefit is that it is known for its anti-viral properties and that it is believed to be an aphrodisiac can’t be a bad thing either!

The plums I had bought at the fruit & veg market were still a little bit hard, so I cut them up, pitted them and let them sit over night in sugar. When I went to make the jam and lifted the lid a wonderful fruity smell seduced my nose with its sweet plumy goodness.

A short while later, as I stood in the kitchen, while adding some red wine and spices and pureeing the fruit, I was enveloped by the scent of Christmas. And I have to admit it took some will power to not just put on ‘Jingle Bell Rock’ and give in to the feeling of Christmas.

Now I have thirteen glasses, of all different shapes and sizes, filled with a dark ruby red jam that will hopefully tastes as good as it smells – my morning toast will just have to surrender to some testing!

hot tea

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crafts, diy, family, gifts, home, home made, miscellaneous, random, style, tea, tea cosy

The sound of something dropping in through my letterbox woke me up this morning. I could tell by the sound that it wasn’t just a letter and since I wasn’t expecting any deliveries and it’s not my Birthday anytime soon, I was pleasantly confused over what it could be that made such a promising thud.

As soon as I saw the large brown cardboard envelope I recognised my mum’s handwriting and my puzzlement grew. My mother is a generous person but she doesn’t normally send me gifts out of season, so I was more than a little confused.But as soon as I opened the little parcel up I had to smile.

When I was in Germany for my mum’s 70th Birthday I had brought an old apron of mine with me. It was pink and had shoes on it but it was starting to get stained and as I had received a sparkling new apron for Christmas I figured I could sort it out.  However since I love shoes, I wondered if maybe my mum could make something out of the fabric, possibly even a cover for my tea-cosy that had seen better days. And that is exactly what my mum did.

So now my turquoise teapot can keep my tea warm underneath a beautifully unique shoe-y tea-cosy. What a lovely way to start the day, and week for that matter. A surprise gift symbolizing home and comfort reminding me that sometimes receiving is just as lovely as giving.