Photo album from Winter Garden

I have uploaded photos from last weekend's visit to the town's freshly renovated Winter Garden, you are welcome to view them here (click).

94th birthday of my home country

... included pink roses, the best muffins and donuts, salmon dinner, lots of wine, Seinfeld and Arrested Deveopment, and Mammu sleeping off the hangover :))

Twins - Angry Mammu

Like two drops of water - Mammucat and Black Explosive Angry Bird :) Even the white spot on the forehead matches :)

Portrait of a cat

Furry, soft, a bit chubby, purry, sometimes cute and stupid, but always make you smile :)

Week in photos

* On Tuesday I attempted to make a classic Manhattan cheesecake. That led to another set of complaints that go something like that: "What do you mean you don't have that kind of sour cream/yoghurt/mayonnaise/quark/cheese curd in here???" Unfortunately for other countries, Estonian dairy industry is the best in the world. In here (to my knowledge), the only things close to sour cream are kermaviili (nearly not as soft and satin as proper sour cream) and smetana (too thick). Estonian yoghurts taste a lot better than yoghurts in here. They don't even sell proper fresh mayonnaise that could be found from refrigerators; there are some weird mayos on regular shelves (which makes you think that who knows what has been put in them...) And they don't sell any cheese curds. Not a single one can be found. I want my cheese curds!
Okay, rant over. If there is something I miss food-wise, it's Estonian dairy products. (And cheap booze, occasionally.)
All that irrelevance aside, the cake was good! Recipe seemed quite accurate, except I maybe would have had to add more melt butter to the biscuit-bottom, as it was a bit loose in the end. But that didn't affect the taste.


* On Wednesday, our freezer broke down. Generally, I don't care much, it's natural that gadgets break down once in a while. However, this breakdown came with annoying humming noise in regular intervals. We could not unplug the machine because the refrigerator part seemed to be working and there were foodstuffs in there. I'm the weirdo that cannot sleep with machines on, some weird lights in places, anything blinking, anything humming. I tried sleeping with earplugs, but still faced two sleepless nights. I was really angry at the fridge. This fridge also seemed quite ancient, I have no idea how old it must have been. It was made by ElektroHelios, a company bought over by Electrolux, which used to make appliances mainly in 1970ties... I have a sneaky suspicion this fridge was *very* old.
And now it gave up. The freezer died and we had to find new home for frozen berries, fast. They were divided between Jan's parents and sister. I kept four boxes and ate litres and litres of smoothies and fruit cocktails. That is the benefit of a broken refrigerator :) On the picture: smoothie-to-be made of a banana, blueberries, strawberries, redcurrants, plain yoghurt, milk and honey. Heavenly.
On Friday the new refrigerator was transported to our humble home and the old one was taken away. When I heard that the shop is only sending one transportation dude, I prepared to see 2x2 m giant man who carries 2m+ height refrigerators on his back. Well, the dude was quite big, but to my disappointment, he used a nifty lifter machine to transport the big home appliances.


* I got a new vauva on Tuesday /D The last phone I was using was old... It was the stylish Nokia 7370 (I got jealous looks back in the days when I got it and it had just been launched). I think it served me for 5-6 years without breaking down once. That's Nokia quality for you :)


* Cat life. In addition to regular fancy cat food and snacks that Jan-Erik orders from Germany, this time the package also contained a massage brush. Mammu sure enjoyed her spa-treatment this morning.
On the first photo is Robert in the radiator nest. The nest is attached to radiator and it's very warm there in winter :) Robert loves the nest, he's hugging it as can be seen.
The last photo could be called "The Big Couch Love". I have a feeling that some day, the cats are gonna leave this couch wrecked :p They use it like 10+ hours a day.

Day 7

Belated day 7.

For brunch Jan made me mannapuuro (with jam). I had big plans for dinner (bruchettas and cauliflower-broccoli... some kind of oven thing), but after we had been outside (with minus 20 something degrees) for more than a hour, and a Hesburger fast food diner jumped out of nowhere, we took the easy way out. So I had a fish burger. In the late evening we watched Presidential elections' programme on TV and ate Runeberg's torte cakes (because it was also Runeberg's Day).

So in conclusion, during the week I did not slip regarding the goal I established (which was to avoid meat but didn't include fish and seafood). If I remember correctly, I ate fish three times during the week, and shrimps once on pizza. I didn't suffer from any specific health problems, nor did I feel considerably better than before physically. I did have some strange belly aches some evenings, but there is no telling if it was because of food or some other reason. Mentally, I felt good knowing that I have some amount of self-discipline, and I felt good making nice foods and cooking in general.

I will return to some form of meatless diet when it gets warmer around here.

Day 6

Brunch.

Nibbled on last evening's pizza. Nothing photographing-worthy. + orange juice.

Dinner.

Made the spinach soup, at last. The first spinach soup in my life, and it tasted good. Jan wrestling with onions in the middle picture :)




Before-the-bed-snack.

A slice of rye crust bread with cheese and red onion.

Neck pain had got better, but in general I feel a bit down because of the weather and not being able to go outside (I suggested to go outside yesterday, but after learning there was minus 21 degrees of cold, the thought went back to where it came from).

Day 5

Not a very successful day. In the morning, I managed to sprain my neck. Now this is one of the most annoying things imaginable... and it happens to me from time to time. It results in the most uncomfortable feeling that you have difficulty holding your head up properly. It sometimes also includes nausea, loss of appetite, head ache - of course, and general feeling of utter crappiness and depression. So most of the afternoon/evening I just lied down, napping, reading, complaining to Jan :p, etc.

Food intake was chaotic as well (but still no meat).

Brekkie.

Cold latte and two oranges.


Lunch.

Skipped - no appetite, and no-one at home (yet :p) to bring food to bed :p

Dinner.

Pizza - I chose my own ingredients, which were shrimps (yea, wasn't ready for hardcore veggie pizza just yet...), onions, mushrooms and asparagus. It was tasty, but I couln't eat much. And a glass of Crowmoor. And a salmiakki ice cream.


Luckily the travel books from Estonia arrived yesterday, so I could dig into them. Now that I live in Finland, I have started reading more books in Estonian... Back in Estonia, I used to prefer English.

Day 4

I am watching/listening Finnish President Tarja Halonen's interview to Estonian national TV-station while Jan is watching the debate of the two men, one of whom is going to become new President on Sunday, from Finnish TV :p Tarja Halonen is talking about what she is leaving behind (and, as a proper Finn, she gets a chance to mention that she uses a Nokia phone :p), and Pekka Haavisto and Sauli Niinistö are talking about... I don't know what, because they are speaking in Swedish :) Since Swedish is the second official language in Finland, people are asked to speak it from time to time. (That of course doesn't mean that every Finn is able and/or willing to do it.)

So I have conquered more than half of the week. Today's menu:

Brekkie.

Simple, rye crust bread with cheese, cucumber and red onion. Tasty!


Lunch.

I ate with Jan in his office diner. It's the kind of place where you can choose whatever you want from plentiful of different foods. Usually there are two main courses (combine yourself), pizza, soup, salads with lots of different toppings. Today there was some meat (I didn't even check what it was), some fish (flounder), and some soup with meat, so I didn't check that out either. So on the picture is what I ended up with:


Tasted some of this fish, sauce, mashed potatoes, freshies and sprouts. I didn't manage to finish everything due to feeling a bit off, it might have been because it is just so cold outside. And the reason why 95% of Thursday lunches take place in this diner - the funny Finnish pancake. With whipped cream and raspberry sauce. Even if you feel a bit down for the whole morning, after finishing this piece of food life feels worth living again :p

Edit: The lunch pictures are taken with a small digital camera, thus the quality difference :p

Dinner.

Still didn't feel hungry, so decided to skip spinach soup and made only the summer pumpkin * - mozzarella snacks. (Jan-Erik doesn't mind eating some of his meat pies from the fridge :p) Very easy and tasty and healthy snack to make. Just need to brush the summer pumpkin slices with oil, grill them in oven for a little bit, add mozzarella pieces on top, grill a bit more, then add cherry tomatoes and basil, and then *omnomnom*. Very tasty.

* summer pumpkin = summer squash = zucchini

Feeling perfectly okay today, except for the cold. I don't usually complain, and I really like winter, but today was the first day this winter when I just didn't want to go outside. It's possible to dress really warm, but I can't cover my face, and the air is so cold that breathing feels like a task of its own.

Day 3

Today was a strange day. I ate quite randomly, but touched no meat (and no fish, nor any other seafood either :p)

Brekkie.

Ta-dah! That's some kind of rice pudding with strawberry jam. Not awfully filling, but awfully good.



Lunch.

No picture, since I simply finished off the tomato soup and had a few slices of rye bread with it.

Dinner.

Tastes better than it looks - it's feta-spinach pasta with cashew nuts. Could have put more spinach in. And more pasta :p



Somewhere along the way there were also some apples and some of yesterday's dessert.

Have been feeling moody in the second half of the day, but that's not a rare occasion, and I doubt it has anything to do with food. Otherwise I feel good and there has been no craving for meat, whatsoever. It's easier than I thought.