The Year of the Tomato

When I sowed my tomato seeds back in March, I never thought that this is what I would end up with:

Do I  need to mention that we have had quite a crop this year?  Obviously, tomatoes have been on our plates often in the last weeks. They are also seen frequently (on said plates) in my Instagram feed.

Bruschetta, Caprese, sliced tomatoes with cream cheese on whole wheat bread, and Texas Caviar (recipe via Jules) are some of the things we have been having in the last few weeks.   I know the garden tomato season will come to end soon, but for now I will it enjoy every single day.

Something New

Not so much the recipe, but the fact that I am posting at all.  No excuses, but I will take a moment to hang my head in shame.  Now on to business and to summer.

What better to post about on the day before July 4th than a salad recipe?  One of our favorites for the summer months is Tabbouleh.  Coincidentally I made it on Saturday and most importantly I remembered to take a picture.

Tabbouleh
Serves 6-8

1 1/8 cup Bulgur
Instant Vegetable Broth
2 Tomatoes, chopped
1 Cucumber, chopped
1 Red Pepper, chopped
1 Red Onion, chopped
4 sprigs of Fresh Mint, finely chopped
1 bunch of Flat Leaf Parsley, finely chopped
2-4 cloves of Garlic, pressed
1 Lemon, juiced
2 tbsp Olive Oil
Salt & Pepper to taste

Add bulgur to 2 1/4 cups of water with instant vegetable broth (to season) and bring to a boil.  Turn off heat and add lid.  It should be done in 10-15 minutes.  Set aside and let cool completely. Add the tomatoes, cucumber, red pepper, onion, parsley, mint and garlic to a large bowl.  Whisk the lemon juice, olive oil, salt & pepper in small bowl.  Add the mixture to the remaining ingredients and toss.

Enjoy!  For those celebrating, Happy 4th of July!

A Game of (Falling) Dominoes

That pretty much sums up how the work behind this post seemed like to me and it all started here.

We bought this bread box for our apartment in Brooklyn with it's hole in the wall kitchen.  It worked well there and in the apartment we had before we moved into our house.  Here it was just a big space hog and it took me almost 3 years to come to terms with that and another 5 months to do something about it.  Let the dominoes fall.

I knew I wanted to move the bread into the drawer under the stove, but before I could do that I had to move part of what was in there. Of course I neglected to take a before shot, but it wasn't that exciting. Just picture vitamins and ibuprofen where the bread is now.

Keep them falling.

Said vitamins moved here and the baking condiments that were in this spot moved to the cabinet with the spices.

There they are on the top shelf.  Luckily the spot was empty and nothing had to be moved someplace else. Which brings me back to the spot where the bread box use to be.

We have already come to appreciate the extra square inches of counter space. Plus, I finally got hang up my utensil rod.  Game over (for now).

“Have nothing in your house that you do not know to be useful, or believe to be beautiful.”

- William Morris

Please visit Jules at Pancakes & French Fries for a lot more William Morris inspiration.

Cranberry Meringue Cookies

These are among my favorite Christmas cookies.  So much so, that this is the second batch I am making this season. The third when considering that the first batch was a double.  It might have something to do with the fact that I haven't met a meringue that I didn't like.  Need some convincing?  Then take a look at what I posted in April.  Anyway, the cookies eat fast.

Cranberry Meringue Cookies

2 egg whites, cold
1 teaspoon lemon juice
1/2 cup sugar
4 drops of food red coloring (optional)
1 teaspoon lemon zest
3.5 ounces dried cranberries, chopped

Preheat oven to 250˚ F and line baking sheets with parchment paper.  With an electric mixer set on medium, beat egg whites until slightly foamy.  Add lemon juice and continue to beating until soft peaks form.  Gradually add sugar (about 1 tablespoon at a time); food coloring (optional) and lemon zest, continue beating until the mixture forms stiff peaks. Gently fold in the chopped dried cranberries. Drop the meringue by teaspoon (mounds about 1¼" diameter) onto the prepared baking sheet. Should yield approximately 60 cookies.

Bake at 250˚F for 35-40 Minutes, or until dry.

Enjoy.

More of Less

It has been very rainy here in Germany, so I had to regroup my to-do list and am now working on some projects I had thought to do in the Fall and Winter.  Last November I started to organize my spice cabinet.  Notice the word November (wet and grey).  It is now July (also wet and grey).  OK, I am now moving on. I still have a five tickets for the outdoor pool.  Moving on. At the BBQ we had this weekend guests huddled around the grills. Really moving on. Now. 

First thing I did was buy more jars during my trip to IKEA.  I had originally thought to buy the DROPPAR jars, but when I saw the ones from the 365+ IHÄRDIG series it was container love at first sight.  After a little rethinking about which spices would go in what jars I got out my glass marker  and got to work. Labeling was a step that I skipped last go around and I came to find it is really hard to tell the difference between curcuma, curry and masala once they are in the jars.

 

Much better.

I got rid of the box the salt comes in and am now storing it in this canning jar.  The opening was the perfect size to use during cooking.   Then I just added an unnecessary label and I was happy.

Keep Calm

 

Many would say that it has been over done, but if I like something I really don't care. I felt the same way  about the Cole & Son Woods wallpaper that I put in our guest bathroom. The only difficult part about getting the poster was agonizing over deciding on what color, but once I did I ordered it from here. 

For me the kitchen was the perfect place to hang it.

More of Less

So last week wasn't a very productive blog week for me.  I did do a lot of blog reading and I also spent more time at Pinterest than I care to reveal, but posting not so much.  Are you pinning yet? When I first read about it I knew that it would be dangerous, so I resisted.  A while back Tesca did a post about it and I have been hooked ever since.  It is a huge time suck and very dangerous territory, but lots of fun.   If you want to join let me know and I can send you an invite.  Don't say I didn't warn you though. :)

So now back to business.  It is Tuesday, the day for "More of Less" and we are back in the kitchen.  This drawer clearly needs help.

 

It is really suppose to be a baking drawer, but over the last two years other items have found there way in.  The popsicle molds are moving on out (glad that they caught my eye though because, duh, it is Summer now) and the Christmas cookie cutters don't really need to take up valuable real estate in the kitchen either.

They have been moved into the cookie tins and stored in the basement pantry (a site of future More of Less posts).  By the way, the heart laying next to the tin is one of my favorite cookie cutters.  The little notch on the side is to hang the finished cookie on the side of a coffee cup or glass of milk.

The drawer looks so much better now and I was even able to add a few items:  handheld mixer, mixing bowl, a Pyrex baking dish and a quiche dish.
Check or rather ☑.

Brownie Improv

On Friday I tried a new brownie recipe. Actually, probably my first that didn't come out of a box.  I made the double recipe and I didn't have two pans that were the size suggested.  So I came up with this improv.

 

I folded the parchment paper into a triangle at the end and used a silicone potholder to hold it in place.  Violà, it worked!

The brownies were for dessert on New Year's Eve and were a hit.  I received several comments along the line of how typically American they were.  Had to laugh to myself because the recipe was from an English bloke.

Turntable Redux

Awhile back I posted about organizing my spice cabinet.  I had to replace the single-tier turn table with a double-tier version to use the space more efficiently.  That left me with one question. What is a girl to do with an extra turntable? Drum roll please...

No more shuffling items around to get that one thing you want that is always in the back of the refrigerator.

Progress

I think that this post pressure thing might work (see To do's).   On Sunday morning, while the house was still quiet, I made myself a nice cup of coffee and got to work on my spice cabinet.  Stage one, take everything out of the cabinet and clutter up the counter top.  This is where the blog pressure kicked in, because I saw all of this crap and I just did not want to deal.

Deep breath.  I threw out everything expired and made two lists: have and need.  The need is especially important with the Christmas Season almost upon us.  It is Weihnachtsmarkt time and every respectable one will have a spice stand.   Anyway... I moved one shelf up and  replaced my regular turn table with a two-tiered version (by the way the old turntable has found a home and I will do a post about it soon). This is how the cabinet looks now.

A bit of an improvement, I think. Now I just have find some more cohesive containers to make it look a little less all over the place.  I am thinking of picking up the DROPPAR spice jars  from IKEA.  As you might be able to see (my apologies for picture quality) I have a RATIONELL VARIERA spice rack mounted on the door, but I think I will just keep it to one and will eventually keep my six most used spices in them.  On to the next.