The Piri-Piri Obsession: Our simple (almost) original, flame-grilled Nando's Chicken Recipe

During our time in London, the prince of sun and I got completely passionate about Nando's. Our favourite is the medium spice version of the flame-grilled Piri-Piri chicken.

Luke was obviously admiring the chicken from
start till end :D

We were unable to forget the incredibly delicious taste and decided it was time to get our hands into business. First step: During this year's early September market in Porto Seguro, we bought the long wanted simple churrasqueira (portable for future beach barbecues!) and came up with our very own and simple

RECIPE FOR PIRI PIRI CHICKEN * NANDO'S CHICKEN
Ingredients:
- any chicken you prefer, could be breast, whole chicken, there goes your preference, ours was chicken breast with some bones

For the Piri-Piri sauce, you'll throw the following ingredients into the mixer:
- fresh chiles, depending on how hot you like it - or chili sauce
- 2 heads of garlic
- salt, pepper
- olive oil
- coriander (Brazilian coentro)
- bit of vinegar, bit of lime

Our new flame grill churrasqueira & the prince
of sun taking care of the Piri Piri Chicken

You should get a delicious, hot sauce - very fresh smelling, in our case with a tendecy to coriander which we both adore.

We then cut out the breast bone to get butterfly-shaped open-lying breast shape and massaged the sauce into the chicken. Best would be to actually leave it soaking up the sauce during the whole night or at least 3-4 hours to get the lovely taste right until the bones.

And then you just throw the whole lot onto your barbecue grill of choice (or skewer) and roast the chicken to your preferred bronzed tone, our preference is quite deep and dark.

We had our Piri-Piri chicken with Graviola juice, garlic rice and vinagrete (tomato salad with onions, vinegar, oil and coriander). Yum.....

Enjoy!

Trip to Germany & Berlin coming closer! PLUS Information on Aguia-Branca, MeinFernbus & Condor luggage allowance

Since Dezember, I am planning my next Trip to Germany and Berlin! YAY!!! This time together with the prince of sun <3 Now there are only about three weeks left, OMG, so excited =)

I am going to visit my friend Berlin girl at her place in Potsdam, do Berlin sightseeing (and shopping) with the prince and her and we will even do a short day trip to Warnemuende, a seaside resort and former fishing village situated on the Ostsee, Baltic Sea in the North-Eastern part of Germany, close to Rostock. I am really looking forward to showing the prince an authentic German beach and sea as well as traditions and his first, ever dunes (and dune rabbits!). (He does not know about the day trip, so.... cannot wait to see his face when he suddenly stands in front of the beach and sea, he thinks we are only going to visit Berlin and Potsdam, no word from me or Berlin girl about the trip or destination hehe....

Castle beauties - Fantasy vs Reality 

There is more, my family and I are planning to go on many castle trips, at least 4 different ones, one will be the Hohenbaden Castle, one castle near Gengenbach (forgot the name, I have to research some more...) plus the beautiful Hohenzollern Castle (those three are all located at less than 2h by car from my parents' place) and the famous Neuschwanstein Castle (the one that Disney used as a template for their dream castle) (located more or less 4h by car from my parents' place).

And as a cream-top for my holiday cake of wonders, two of my dear London friends, holiday girl and dance girl, are coming over for a weekend trip, none of them have been to Germany so I am thrilled to introduce them to our wonderful culture, delicious hearty German food, relaxing Roman bath-spa, breath-taking waterfalls.... *_* so excited!

So, other than that I have been planning to take lots of books and have made some packing lists (what to pack in Brazil), German-culture-related items (especially German children s books and items), shopping lists, Berlin packing list, Berlin to-do list, Berlin shopping list, my region's to do list, home-trip packing list.... I did mention that I love making lists... haha....

I mentioned some of our travel companies during my Europe trip last year already, I actually used the same companies as we do this time, but now I'll explain the baggage allowances for each company in detail.

So here you go, here more about each company we are travelling with:

Our first travel company is a Brazilian coach company called

Aguia Branca - 12h night bus from Porto Seguro to Salvador
-one suitcase of 30kg (to be stored in the luggage department of the bus)
-no exact restrictions for hand luggage

Last time I travelled with them, I only had one hand luggage (the carry on size), but most people travelling with me on the bus had a carry on plus normal handbags plus enormous plastic bags with them so I am quite optimistic that they are pretty generous with hand luggage taken on the bus with you (as long as you can fit it into the relatively generous space in front of you).

Arriving at the bus station in Salvador the next morning, we will take one of the local buses to the international airport in Salvador, where we will catch our flights in the afternoon, we are flying with

CONDOR, 10h over-night transatlantic flight from Salvador to Frankfurt
-2 suitcases of 32kg each (yes, you are reading right here *_*)
-hand luggage=carry on of 6kg
-1 laptop bag plus laptop
-1 small handbag
-umbrella

Isn t that just a dream....! Let's get that straight.
Proper 64 kg checked luggage. 6kg carry on. Total: A whopping 70kg. Not counting the handbag and laptop bag stuff!!! AAAAND the prince and I are travelling together. Each of us has those allowances, making it official:  140kg. Plus content of two small (hand)bags & notebook bags *_*

Right, last trip to Berlin, we will probably leave most of my stuff at my parents' place when we leave for Berlin and only take one suitcase and backpack with us, so our last company mentioned is

MeinFernbus, 10h daytime coach trip from Karlsruhe to Berlin

Our luggage planning

-2 suitcases of each 20kg
-hand luggage of 15kg

Whopping, isn t it!

I know now you'll ask me how I will ever be able to get my luggage sorted with so many different luggage restrictions.

Keep calm and... read on ;)

Love parcels: If I were a little bird and had 2 little wings, I'd fly to you!

Today I had two sweet surprises waiting for me at my doorstep.

One was literally sweet: A parcel from my lovely mum <3 full of goodies, delicious, sweet forest fruit tea (that I am slurping right now) as well green tea and as other sorts, loads of beautiful poems, songs and prayers as well as the invitation to my cousin's wedding and some cheerful baloons. =) My dear mum always manages to surprise me over and over again with new ideas and beautiful memories of my childhood and favourite childhood songs as well as showing me new poetry and in general re-inventing life and love the whole time.

The poem that touched me most was my alltime favourite little bird song (shown on the postcard in the middle picturing a young woman with a looong braid sitting under a try, being thoughtful and observing little birds flying around. The only colour aspect of the picture is a tiny heart on the bottom <3 so beautiful! *_*).

The poem says:                                                     (this old-style-German poem translates to something like:

"Wenn ich ein Voeglein waer,                                If I were a little bird  
 und auch zwei Flueglein haett,                               and had two little wings,    
floeg ich zu dir.                                                      I'd fly to you!
Weils aber nicht kann sein,                                    But as it cannot be,
weils aber nicht kann sein,                                     but as it cannot be,
bleib ich all hier!"                                                   I'll have to stay right here!).

She has also sent me loads of beautiful poems by Rudolf Alexander Schroeder, which I will come back to in a minute =) By the way, my mum had sent some cosmetics as well, but those errr got lost on the way somehow - we will never know where, right, aehem....


The second nice surprise was a traditional postcard from my friend law girl who is doing her LLM, master of law, in San Francisco and has sent her lovely lines over. It is the first postcard that actually arrived, she had sent one from New York once that got lost in the nirvana of international air mail =) So happy it arrived this time hun! <3 And who knows maybe the Brazilian mail will be getting better and better each, paying a bit more to their staff resulting in more reliable work force resulting in better service offered to the public!

(So yes, just need to work on that 'stuff disappearing'-issue, but we'll get there right, as we say in Germany: Es ist noch nie ein Meister vom Himmel gefallen = It never happened that a master fell from the sky., meaning we all continue learning and perfecting what we do...

And now, as promised before, here some of the beautiful poems by Rudolf Alexander Schroeder:

Good hair, bad hair and our world`s fear of gray/white hair & Update on hair cut

Just as anyone else on our dear planet, I have been confronted with hair issues during all my life. Any kind of it really. But today let`s only talk about our precious tresses!

Starting at teenager age, I had just decided to let my hair grow and quickly learned that the hair business is not as simple as it seems. I was quickly told that my hair was not thick enough to be grown long or that it had too many split ends and needed 3cm to be cut and after some time, it was suggested that I also do something about my rather boring hair colour. Insecure as those teenagers are, my colouring routine started at about 16 ranging from dark blue-black to chocolate-red-brown and went on until I was about 23 ending with indigo-and-henna-dark-red-brown. (I love how literal you can see the expression DYING HAIR. right!?....) Seven long years of dying my hair. Seven long years of horrible chemical substances eating into my scalp and flowing down my poor vains. And at about 20 years of age, the first grays started to appear. So as soon as I realized that those grays were appearing, I was pretty much condemned to colour my hair forever. So I was told. By the media, TV ads, magazines, some of my family (except my mum who herself has the most beautiful gray-streaked tresses herself since her late 20s/early 30s <3), friends, and finally after enough brain washing, by myself. Getting grays in such a young age, dreadful!

Well, during those 7 years, my routine was quite simple compared to what other people do, I had a shampoo and conditioner (silicone loaden of course), some loreal and fructis and such. Plus one finishing cream for shiny and non-frizzy hair. Plus some hairbrushes (in 4-5x daily use), hair dryer (about every 3 days when washing my hair) and a small set of flat ironer, curler etc (which I used at the age of 22-23, maybe 10x or less in total before changing my routine radically). I coloured my hair about every 3-4 months, sometimes later and went to cut it about every 4-6 months. I was pretty low maintenance most of the time, already before changing my routine, some might say now.

New hair cut:
Shorter front hair on March 2014

Wake-up-hair ;)

Then, about 4 years ago, I started researching about product content and general (beauty=) health related issues as well as going through some personal growth and changes in attitude and how I viewed myself and everything around me and totally stopped EVERYTHING I did before. I went through a lot of different stages (like trying out the no-poo-movement and such) and then finally decided to let my true hair/hair colour shine (and sometimes bounce) again =)

general length the same,
kept at hip length

And I have not looked back ever since. I did go back to shampooing due to my sensitive scalp, no other products such as spray or such, a very mild shampoo version (see my hair routine for more information) (most of my shampoos are Alverde) and wash my hair about once a week now. I brush it once (sometimes twice) a day, mostly in the evening, sometimes in the morning, but here in Brazil I have it up in a bun for most of the daylight (HOT) hours as it is really too hot for having hair longer than your ears ;) I have it down in the late afternoon and evening hours as well as when sleeping, I just throw it over the pillow and wake up with my octopus hair almost strangling me ;) I have tried sleeping with buns and braids during almost 3 years. But it is just not the same comfort and now that my hair is long and heavy enough, I just keep it over my pillow for most of the night and from time to time, throw it back into its off-pillow position when it gets into my face after tossing around too much and have to grab it from under the prince of sun`s head haha.... oh well ;) since changing my routine, my hair shows that it too has its moods. Sometimes it is very wavy and almost curly, sometimes it is almost sleek with just really slight waves.... it probably just depends on my current state of mind haha..... one thing that I noticed though is that the longer I go between washes, the easier it goes to the wavy-curly state. I do love combing my hair and letting the curls (that appear at the ends mostly) bounce around for a bit.

Side view of new shorter front section

I also cut it myself (straight across mainly, at hip length), a few weeks ago I decided to cut some of my front hair as my hair was getting too heavy for my taste and finally had the courage to cut about 3 hands of length! But I love it, the rest of my hair is still hip length, it is lighter and the front section lies in a soft wave next my face.

My beautiful glitter-whites in the sun <3

Now about the gray hair/white hair issue: I LOVE my white hair which distributes in layers and fine glitter-lines throughout my head, but mostly at the front sections and I get so many questions who coloured my hair and did the delicate light-blond highlights and that it looks sooo nice and natural and shines like little stars glittering in the sun, especially the front highlights sections... and how I managed that sometimes only a few hairs are highlighted and not streaks of hair, really SINGLE hairs. I always answer that my hair dresser is called god and that he is a real genius in making me perfectly look exactly how I am supposed to be, combining my hair colours and structure exactly to how it best combines with my natural skin, cheek and lip colour :D

I get strange looks then, some pauses and deep thinking periods and some ask:

Punctuality revisited: Cultural differences in German, London and Brazilian culture - part 1

Punctuality. Efficiency. Honesty. I guess those things were mostly mentioned when someone talked about positive aspects of German people's character. So here my three cents to a few related topics, all in comparison of my experience in each culture I am living in: Germany, London (UK) and Brazil.


PUNCTUALITY

German translation: Pünktlichkeit
I won't say that there are no exeptions but in general, Germans (including myself) take punctuality quite serious. It is seen as a polite act (of kindness) to respect each others time and (most probably) commitments (the other person might have after meeting you). So that's why in most cases, when you plan to meet someone at 11am, it will be 11am. Not 11:05 or 11:30. Or very often, the person you are meeting with might be arriving in a so called Puffer-timespan. Which means he or she arrives about 10minutes or so earlier just in case something might happen that could cause some delays. So don't be surprised if you are early and your friend already sits on a bench with a book in his hand, smiling when you arrive early as well =)

Londoners & punctuality:
I have to be honest, I cannot say too much about the rest of Britain as I have only done a few day trips to other cities so... Anyway, in most cases one could say that Londoners are pretty punctual. Maybe not in an arriving-too-early-manner like Germans, but you will not wait longer than 5minutes after the agreed time. (I can only refer to what I have experienced with teachers, friends and appointments). And in case they are late, they will make sure to let you know by message or calling you. I do know one exception, but I guess my friend dance girl just tends to run late anyway (so I do know that she will arrive late and always have a book or some work stuff with me). We always meet close to cafes so I always end up having a coffee or tea while waiting for her and she then joins me for the second cup ;)

Brazilian translation: pontualidade
I guess it is no news that Brazilians are famous for being late. People don't mean to be rude and lazy, it is just that everyone assumes that the other one will be late, so in general anything from 10 to 40 minutes of delay can be possible. Just take a book with you in case you wish to be punctual. In my experience, people tend to call only in case they have to cancel the meeting, not if they run late. But I am sure there are exceptions. So no worries if you run late, in most cases people will probably not even notice or mention it ;)


SENSE OF TIME AND SPACE
German translation: Das Empfinden von Zeit und Raum
This one might sound strange, but I will try my best to explain what I am at here. When you are out and about in a new place, maybe a tourist in an unknown city, you always end up asking locals for directions. Those are always measured in time and space, how long will it take to get there and how far is it. Germans will mostly try to tell you the exact time or check on their smartphones in case they don't know. Most preferably in exact minute and meter description. It will take you 5 minutes and 2 seconds and it's 155,55m distance. (Just kidding). Being known for their (slightly perfectionist) exactness, they would probably rather tell you that they actually don't know about how long it will take and how far it is, in case they really don't know or have no mobile (google map) help at hand. Just to be on the sure side so don't think they don't want to help. It is just that they don't want to lie to you. You might however also meet someone offering to take you straight to the place where you wish to go or telling you that they are on their way to go there and offer you to come with them.

Londoners' sense of time and space:
Most Londoners think in tube stops when they talk about time and space. Most probably when someone is late, the tube (or some delays in the tunnel) are the reason. (Or pretty convenient excuse). So most people tend to give a rather foggy description of time span, such as 'in case you catch the tube when you get on the platform and it is not too crowded, then in case no tunnels are blocked or no inspectors stop you, you might get there at maybe 10am'. But due to construction works, certain roads might be blocked, so the journey could be much longer than originally thought. To be on the safe side, they might check google map or the London transport page called Transport for London which has an excellent Journey Planner for their whole bus, tube, train etc network. A life saver really. And tube and bus stops show the exact time in minutes when your next bus or tube arrives..... ok, that might be another topic ;) Just always leave with least 30minutes time puffer and you will be fine.

Brazilian: Senso de tempo e espaço
Talking mostly about my husband, his sense of time and space is rather... flexible. He might say that he will just get some bread at the bakery around the corner 'REAL QUICK'. And arrives one hour later, telling me some interesting story about what happened this time. :D He probably just knows too many people around here, is very sociable and kind, and tends to chat around and looses his sense of time. A few months ago, I learned the hard way that his sense of time and space REALLY is very very different from mine when we went on a walk with our puppy Luke and the prince of sun just QUICKLY wanted to show me something 'closeby'. His favourite words are 'rapidinho' (very fast, very quick) or 'pertinho' (very close). So me thinking 10minutes, 1km. At the most. It rather turned out 70 minutes and a few kms more than imagined and resulted in a deep sunburn and a very thursty hubby, dog and me. haha.... Most Brazilians tend to have a very generous sense of time and space (mostly in their favour ;), so do count on a few minutes and km more, when someone tells you, that this and that is VERY close or very quick.

EFFICIENCY
Let's maybe take two examples for efficiency: work place and supermarket

German translation - I had to list quite a few words in addition to the obvious as we Germans do describe it in quite a lot of words depending on the area: Effizienz, Faehigkeit, Tuechtigkeit, Leistung (the list goes on)

Work place: People tend to concentrate pretty much constantly on what they have to do, most people have their to-do lists and time sheets and organisation sheets and packing lists and... haha, am I talking about myself here? Let`s just say that Germans are very efficient, time efficient, work load efficient. They prefer to really concentrate on getting their tasks done before or for the deadline, to then leave work and enjoy family life or free time (if possible not do more work at home), most Germans really like to seperate their work and private life as much as possible.

Supermarket: There might be some supermarkets that have more relaxed cashiers, but most (especially discounters such as Lidl or Aldi) have reached almost dangerous speeds in getting your shopping from scanning into your bag. And you really are expected to join the put-stuff-in-the-bag-as-quickly-as-possible-RUSH. Do prepare yourself and have your money at hand as soon as possible to avoid annoyed looks from the cashier assistant or even the people waiting in the queue behind you. (They should relax a bit more ;), I guess people are getting pushed way too much in those shops and the older they get, they probably are in danger of getting a heart attack sooner or later - but I do have to admit that it is excellent when you are in a rush and have to leave this supermarket REAL QUICK and then have to face a huge queue. In general, in such supermarkets, you really get out quick even if you join a 30 people queue...

Here a taster, and no, there is no quick-play-trick, just observe the people behind the lady moving in a rather `normal` way:

Easy 32p Soda Baguette with a slight taste of Bretzel

Freshly-made warm bread is one of the things I never get tired of. Especially when it's simple ones with basic and only few ingredients, a short preparation and short baking time.

This Soda baguette is kind of a copy version of Easy Soda Bread - A girl called Jack - a simplified 32p Soda Bread recipe posted by Jack Monroe.

I have changed a few things, but most of the recipe is the same. Wonderful and quick "Airy Fairy Easy Peasy Soda Bread", which surely will become one of my quick weekly fresh bread options from now on. I was really surprised that the bread had a slight Laugen (pretzel) taste on the bottom side and crust *_* Another plus point here!

I have to admit although I had warm lunch and warm dinner, (heavy lunch of rice, beans, pumpkin and cooked chicken and heavy dinner of rice, beans and fried carne-de-sol meat), the latter actually just about 1h before the bread was ready, I still managed to eat the whole baguette (supposed to serve 4) all by my own and had it warm with melting butter and blackberry jam......

Ingredients:

Coconut Chicken with Cabbage & Pimenta Arriba-Saia

Tonight I was working - the heat and humidity of the air almost the same as during the day. Silently sweating my way through the tasks and messages, I drank some water with ice cubes when FINALLY, a slow but steady rain shower cooled my hot head and everything around us seemed to relax and sight of exhaustion and relief.

Coconut Chicken with Cabbage & Pimenta

Feeling all cosy and refreshed with new motivation on board, I suddently felt an urge to cook up a storm and off I went to check what I had in the fridge. I had most things I usually get as my `basics` except the coconut milk that I picked up randomly (but instinctively) during my last shopping trip.

I HAD to use this coconut milk no matter what I was going to cook. I checked what was in need to be eaten so that I would not have to throw it away and TADA, a pretty big chunk of cabbage lying innocently on the bottom of my fridge, neglected during the last few days.

So I did a short search on cabbage and coconut milk and found an overwhelming amount of coconut cabbage chicken recipes, mostly curry-related dishes. I don`t have curry spice at home, but thought, alright, cabbage+chicken+coconut=dish should be totally working out so I mixed some of the ingredients I found in different recipes and came up with my own version of Coconut Chicken with Cabbage, adding my self-made pimenta spice I had mentioned beforehand (*Pimenta Spice), quite simple as it is just plain Arriba-Saia pimenta-vegetables in a salt-vinegar solution.

Ingredients (serve 2):
400g chicken (breast), cut in 2-3cm cubes
1/3 of a medium-sized cabbage head, finely chopped
1/2 teaspoon of butter
a tablespoon of finely chopped fresh coriander
a bit of black pepper
1/2 teaspoon of Arriba-Saia pimenta(-vinegar) (if you have another pimenta or hot spice such as pepperoni or something similar, that should probably work as well, depending on how hot you like your sauce)
1 tablespoon of loose chicken stock (add more salt if preferred)
1 onion, finely chopped
2 medium garlic knobs, finely chopped
1 tomato, finely chopped
100ml coconut milk
juice of 1/4 lemon (or half a teaspoon of plain lemon juice)

I first quickly pre-fried the chicken in a bit of water, butter and chicken stock in the pressure cooker for about 6min while chopping the veggies. Then adding first the onion and cabbage, letting it fry a little bit I later added garlic and the rest of the ingredients, finishing off with half of the coconut milk, then letting it simmer on low heat for about 5min and adding the rest of the coconut milk and lemon juice just before serving it. Maybe you might need a bit more salt, the prince of sun and I do not add much of it compared to most Brazilians around here, in general, when I cook with chicken stock, I don t feel the need to add more salt anyway.

I preferred it with plain rice and nothing else as it is very flavourful and sweet-spicy, but the prince of sun had it with rice and beans and found it a delicious match as well.

BOM APETITE!

`Capital` by John Lanchester: Hilarious, moving & suspense-packed book about Londoners & financial crisis

I have already read a lot of books, articles and blogs about the everyday wonders of life of normal (and particular) Londoners. But no book captured the daily struggles and beautiful moments and feelings and interconnections between residents of the capital so beautifully as John Lanchester did in his book CAPITAL.

I finished the book wanting to read it again just to dwell in my favourite chapters. John Lanchester describes the happenings concentrating mainly on one London road, Pepys Road, with a thrilling, weird threats-postcards-addressed-to-all-residents side-story. He connects the lives of workers, (a Hungarian nanny or the Polish painter working for the rich, an English banker, his shopaholic wife and their sweet two boys as well as a  young football star from Senegal, and the immigrants, an extended Pakistani family (owners of a local shop) of uncles and brothers and wife and their wonderful little children, and police force and the pensioners, an elderly woman dying of a brain cancer and loads of other Londoners, describing their life, feelings and interconnections, outside and inside happenings, so neatly that you often believe he is not writing fiction. This all just sounds so warm and human that it feels like you already know and have met those people in real life.

My favourite residents are:

Design, build and live in your own house - all at the same time: Part 2

Update of my house plan

It has been quite some time since I had first written about how to design, build and live in your own house - all at the same time.

Blogpost:
Design, build and live in your house - all at the same time

I just stumbled over this old blogpost and realized that by now - almost one year later - we have changed quite a lot during the course of construction works and changes in our previous plans and needs. I guess the best and biggest change was that we managed to seperate the kitchen and living room space, first we were not sure if we were able to fit in all furniture into the rather narrow kitchen-laundry room area neatly and comfortly but luckily it all worked out perfectly - we did not even have to remove the hammock!

And now it feels like our whole house is bigger :D Both livingroom and kitchen have a much larger feel to it. Amazing what a bit of moving-furniture-around can make of a drastic change.

I really could not resist adding in this picture of Luke who decided to gently remind me that I have been sitting at the computer/laptop for long enough, gently pawing my foot *_* and bringing along his all-time favourite toy: An old t-shirt of mine! ;-)

Limonada de casca de lima (Limonade of Sweet Lemon Peel) - good for the flora of the intestines!

Today, the prince of sun`s India grandmum (Indio (masculine) and India (feminine) are the Brazilian expressions for ``Native``, not to be confused with India, the Asian country!) came over for a visit and brought a huge basket of "limas" with her. She explained that it is kind of a mix between lime and orange. She recommended having the fruit part just by itself and making juice of the lima peel.

Intrigued I immediately went on trying it out and was really surprised: The fruit pulp is really light, almost whitish and very mild compared to lime or lemons. Even Luke - who normally only plays with and barks at lemons or limes - ate half a lima.



The juice turned out amazing, just added half a liter of water and some sugar to the peel of one whole lima, put the whole lot in the mixer and then pressed the juice through a sieve. I have never tasted something like this before!

Very refreshing and delicious. Mild, just a tiny bit bitterish and sourish but again sweet and almost no aftertaste at all. I am loving this fruit!!!

Even better that it is good for the flora of the intestines! ;)

Puppy play time: Luke and his best friend Rhalf

Rhalf close to Luke's ear, whispering: "Luke, you won't
believe what happened yesterday...  Oh dear,
I have to whisper they're listening in :D!"

A few days ago we went to see a friend of ours who has two dogs, one puppy called Rhalf and one adult dog called Hans. Luke is best friends with Rhalf and together they run and jump and build sand caves and do just everything, like people say here "os dois estão grudados como cola" (those two are stuck like glue).

Luke will stay with them during our spring holiday, he has already spent one week there and thank god was alright and not too homesick, although from the day we picked him up again, he was even more stuck like glue to me ;) But I do love it, I freely admit it hehe....

More pictures of the 'gang of two', playing, wrestling and drinking water, exhausted from playing like the crazies - next to the 'old, wise often grumpy a bit jealous but mild' German-shepherd-mix ginger Hans:

Love parcels: Belated Christmas bunching

So waiting patiently during Christmas and New Year really paid off ;)

Punctually at about 2 weeks into the new year 2014 (oh and I totally forgot: HAPPY NEW YEAR BY THE WAY)! 

A small letter with a wedding invitation arrived around the 10th of January, then the first two Christmas and indulgence related parcels from my mum arrived on the 14th and the last Christmas surprises parcel came from my sister on the 16th.

My mum`s Christmas parcel had a really sweet mouth painted postcard with a wintery setting, a decorated Christmas tree and a pretty child-angel holding a the top star of the tree, in the background of a snow-covered landscape with a cute bridge and little houses. And even Luke received his own postcard, with a cute Christmas sausage dog frontside and a tiny yummy", crunchy dogfood plastic bag. Luke`s eyes totally glimmered when he was eating it, so this was a true Christmas treat!

The second parcel was poetry and arts indulgence with a beautiful butterfly spray painting, a ballet-culture postcard, a tiny calender for 2014 and a mouth-painted calender picture with a beautiful quote by Jean Jaures (German: Die groessten Menschen sind jene, die anderen Hoffnung geben koennen. = English: The greatest people are those who are able to bring hope to others.) plus some amazing dividable dog-sausage treats for Luke which he absolutely loves - a good thing to use for our training sessions, need to get more of those when I visit my family in spring. Oh yes, I did not mention it yet, but YYYAAAAAY, we are close to another trip to Europe, this time together with the prince of sun and we are concentrating on Germany only with a short visit to our funky capital Berlin (and Berlin girl obviously) and other treats coming soon *_* - cannot wait to see my sweet niece and sister, brothers, mum and dad, grandma, friends.... aaaah =) By the way, I was really laughing at the name of the Orlando dog sausage product but cannot go into details due to privacy reasons but... I really love the fun thought behind it and understand why mum picked exactly those HILARIOUS! And finally, my favourite relaxing Camilla bath liquid *_*

  

Now let`s get to the final love parcel, sent by my sister (and partly my mum as well):

When your alarm clock does not wake you up anymore... although it had done it for about almost 27 years

I could never believe it when people told me that they just didn't hear their alarm clock. I thought they did hear it and would just ignore it until it finally stopped.

I was one of those people who would stand on their feet (on their bed) with eyes wide awake trying to silence the alarm clock at the 2nd or 3rd ring at the latest. I almost never arrived late in school due to missing my alarm (rather due to confusing days a few rare times). It also never happened at my work places and this did not change at all, even when I started working from home at often rather confusing and changing hours, often also night shifts, I could always pretty much rely on my ability to immediately wake up to the first few alarm rings.

Until now.

It is just after Christmas. My neighbours decided that they would have a three day party from 24th to 26th of December. 24h. Night and day. Without stopping. Not a single hour. I am not kidding.

But unfortunately, they only seemed to have two CDs to back their (rather poor-taste-like, primitive-level) music selection up. Which I now still have unvoluntarily playing up and down in my own head. (It`s nasty lyrics. Really nasty ones.) And this is pretty persistent. o_O So yes, I was working during the Christmas time, rather crazy hours sometimes more than 10h, to make this worse and I did not really get much more than 2h sleep per day as my whole house rather seemed like the next best club: the walls would often vibrate slightly with the bass sounds and rhytms. On the third day, I was pretty much exhausted and slept through various unsuccessful phone calls by friends and family, worried people coming until my house trying to call me from the street in front of my house and not getting through to me as I was obviously slipped away into near-coma-state sleep phases even with the whole crazy sound phrame around me (my dog was in the same state funny enough, poor thing with red eyes and sometimes desperately barking at the noise with no effect of course, just as the neighbours dogs did who had to live through this three-day party right at the heart of the chaos) and therefore did not wake me up either, he was sleeping on the floor next to my bed....). I finally managed to sleep in the afternoon and only woke up, when the prince of sun walked in totally worried as I did not react to his phone calls.

So... the moral of this story:

`Pimenta nos olhos dos outros é refresco`: Tissue Burns through Brazilian pimenta vegetables

Yesterday, my sweet sister in law gave me a whole basket full of fresh vegetables and fruits. Her husband had been at a friend's farm and came back with a car boot (trunk) full of fresh goodies.

Delicious smells of freshness, amongst others, we got heaps of sweet, mild bananas, passion fruits, green peppers, lettuce, sweet potatoes, mandiocs and other veggies, not to forget green and yellowish-orangy Brazilian pimenta vegetables, which are comparable with chili.

A Brazilian proverb says:
`Pimenta nos olhos dos outros é refresco'.

This proverb has a WHOLE NEW level of cultural understanding for me NOW! (But more to that one later).

So that's where the actual story begins... Today I decided to try cooking with pimenta - the prince of sun believes those pimentas are called pimenta de cheiro. (But he is not totally sure, it might be pimenta malaquita as well...). (*update a few days later on 15/12/2013: my sister in law told me that pimenta de cheiro is not hot and burning at all, it is more for your tastebuds and smells delicious (cheiro is the Portuguese word for smell) - she thinks that the one I prepared is another powerful vegetable-spice called: PIMENTA ARRIBA SAIA! update end)

I have already had many dishes that included pimenta, most people use a bit of it and put a pimenta-oil mix on the table for those who like it more spicy and hot. In general, a few tiny drops are wayyyy enough, I sometimes just sprinkle a little bit in one corner to check my current state of 'spicyness' (haha) and then mix it with the rest and add a few drops more in case I'd like some more. But most of the time, I don't actually mix any pimenta oil into my food.

So I was totally aware of the sheer fire of this vegetable. I handled it reaaally carefully and thought, alright, you'll just put in a few tiny bits and then go from there, tasting and checking along the cooking. I would just start with 1/3 piece of this innocent looking vegetable which actually turned out really nice (with a reaaally slight sensation of tinglyness burning in the food which turned very delicious and could even have had a bit more of the pimenta....

But I was totally unprepared for what was expecting me about 1h after using, washing, cleaning out and cutting ONE SINGLE pimenta vegetable....

Funny enough, I did not feel the slightest sensation when washing and cutting it at first. But about 1h later (I was in the middle of washing up), I felt a crazy sting-like sensation on ONE finger. I thought ---- oooookkkk, did I just miss a bee around here that decided to sting my finger. I carefully examined my finger (the one, that I had just used to tear out the tiny seeds inside the pimenta and then ALSO hold it to cut it), but besides feeling a sensation of total burning inside-out, I did not see a single change in my finger's state (it did get a bit pink later on, but that might be due to myself trying to find a remedy and working what-not into my hands :D).

That left me totally confused. I kind of remembered that I had used pimenta, so I thought, OK, that might be that one and decided to thoroughly wash my hands, then I put some Calendula essence and Arnica lotion (those usually save me from whatever inside-outside pain I am suffering from) onto it. I thought that simply washing the pimenta-rests off my finger would resolve the problem.

NOT THIS TIME.

About 10 minutes later, my WHOLE LEFT HAND and parts of my right hand were ON FIRE. I kept on washing my hands with coconut soap then switching to putting my hands into the freezer and taking out most ice cubes that were available. They just melted in few seconds. I have really never seen or felt anything like this in my whole life, my hands seemed to be soaking in pure acid. I spent about 30 minutes between washing and freezing my hands, which left BOTH my hands burning like crazy. It always felt like when I was washing and cooling my hands, the sensation went away, but the second my hand dried, the burning went back WORSE! In my attempt of ridding myself of the pain, I had actually DISTRIBUTED THE burning THING!

I had only one option of salvation left:

London's best kept budget-books secret: Southbank Centre book market

Southbank Centre book market under Waterloo Bridge

I have always been a book worm, starting from a tender age of four when I wasn t even able to really read - didn t matter, I would still take out my favourite books and pretty accurately tell each story word by word to my younger siblings - by heart.

This passion has not really changed, although nowadays I have less time than I wish for curling up with a thick novel....

One of my favourite London budget-books markets is under Waterloo Bridge, right in front of BFI Southbank: Southbank Centre book market.

Passing London Eye
on my way to the market

You can get almost all genres, novels, poetry, cooking, children's books - the list of 2nd hand and antique books is infinite. Prices vary, you can get smaller books for 1-3 pound, heavier or newer books and depending on the genre the price can be higher.

Beautiful view on London Eye

As far as I know, the market is the only outdoor second hand and antique book market in London.

Address and opening hours:

First impressions of my new-ish Fenix e-piano

In September, I had finally decided that I wanted to start playing piano again (and more frequently than just now and then on our church piano). My birthday was close as well so I thought, 'ya gotta treat ya self from time to time!' - and took on the challenge to find a good e-piano here in Porto Seguro. (Which is a real challenge as people here prefer shorter keyboards and there are not many full-keyboard e-pianos available...)

I finally decided to get a Fenix and was positively surprised with the general quality such as sound, sensibility, touch (the only things that really matter for me, I am not too much a person that likes to change the sound effects, I am pretty much a classic player and would be totally happy with a good old one-sound-non-electric-piano, but that s kind of impossible here, and those that they offer are about the cost of a new car o_O so... 

I was still pretty happy about the performance - which I am until today concerning the piano, sound, sensibility, touch - just one point is pretty disappointing:

My Old Dutch restaurant in London: Delicious poffertjes (dutch-style mini-pancakes)

Did I mention that I love eating? Oh and I have a sweet tooth as well......

Overall I just absolutely adore how in London you can have almost any food and drinks people ever invented on earth, in just one single city. A continent at a time, my friends and I used to joke. African Nigerian sweet buns or Angolan funge with grilled tilapia on Monday. Japanese omelettes or sushi on Tuesday. Turkish Kebab or Persian Grill Plate on Wednesday. Brazilian feijoada or Spanish paella on Thursday. Traditional German pork knuckles *_* on Friday. Taiwanese Bubble Tea on Saturday. Aaaaand British Sunday Roast - obviously on Sunday ;)

This time I`d like to tell you about an amazing place in London, cheap but good food. And kind of a European classic, favourite and simple dish at the same time: Of all of my friends, almost everyone loves pancakes and this time I`d like to introduce you to particularly good ones: Dutch poffertjes!

I had mine in a My Old Dutch restaurant in London (the one in Holborn) and chose to have it with strawberries and cream *_* excellent choice, I still sometimes dream about it.

The restaurant itself is simple but cosy, no problem if you would like some tap water with your dish instead of paying for a drink, just ask one of the lovely waiters and you`ll get it with a smile and as quickly as the dish you ordered.

I went there around 1pm during the week and was quickly led to a table, it was pretty busy, people having coffees, lunch and snacks, I believe they also have free wifi, although it didn t work when I was there.

Pricing is fine as well, I paid around 5 pounds for a pretty filling, delicious and very authentic Dutch dessert-lunch-snack....

Here more information about the restaurant:

Pink Dolphins in Porto Seguro: The Amazon River Dolphin

Now that summer has finally arrived in Porto Seguro, the sea water is getting warmer every day, especially the river section next to the port of the town. You can imagine my surprise when I saw something pink jumping out of the water. First time I have ever seen pink dolphins! They swim-travel to Porto Seguro together with the hot water streams and stay in the region until the water streams travel further.

Here they are called `Boto-cor-de-rosa` which literally translates to something like Pink Dolphins. On google they were referred to as the Amazon River Dolphin, but here they make a clear reference between BOTO and the Portuguese translation for dolphin which is GOLFINHO. To me it seems like the pink boto dolphin has a much longer mouth than the grey golfinho dolphin brother.

On another page I found out that Amazon River dolphins are becoming an endangered species due to overfishing: http://www.catholic.org/green/story.php?id=37323 So hopefully it is a positive sign that loads of them are still to be found here in Porto Seguro.

I also found a sweet Brazilian Pink Dolphin Tale: The story says that the Pink Dolphin is the most playful of all dolphins and that`s why he particularly attracks women and children close to the river. According to the legend, he protects everyone in case of drowning risk. People also tell that the boto is also famous for being a conqueror of hearts. That he seduces girls who dance at the parties in town, who take a bath in the river and those who navigate alone in small canoes. The legend also tells that in the nights of the June parties, the Pink dolphin transforms himself into what?

Chantilly Rose chocolate cupcake with melting toffee centre

YES! This cupcake IS as delicious as it looks like. (It was almost too late to take a picture as I was already ravishing the rose when I remembered that it might be nice to have a picture memory of it, but it is almost complete on the photo (well, at least at the front side of our view ;-) !

Where and how did I get it?

Well... Here I was sitting and working - my brain was pretty much fried.... when the prince of sun came in and surprised me with this lovely rose cupcake! Thanks love! :-*

Its rose and the white waves around are made of chantilly, the pink parts outside on the rose have a strawberry-ish taste and the rest just wonderful cream taste, outside a bit thicker texture and inside wonderfully soft melting. The lower part of the cupcake is made of dark chocolate cake with several soft melting toffee centres. *_*

This cupcake pretty much unites everything I love in cupcakes in one single piece. Absolutely brilliant job of the lovely tiny bakery around the corner!

Love parcels: Winter Wellness Parcel, mouth painter Ivanov and thoughts on Brazilian sense of time & space

Today I ran some errands in the centre and arrived at home in the late afternoon - totally tired (and sunburned :D aehem, but we'll get there later ;))! As if the post man had known that I was really needing a good amount of sweetness and love right now, a lovely surprise was waiting for me - tucked under our front gate:

A winter wellness parcel from my mum!

She had sent it in October, so the parcel and post service was quite punctual this time =) That's lovely news in addition to a wonderful surprise wellness parcel!

So, let's get to the lovely contents: My mum had sent relaxing camomilla bath packs as well as my favourite Ginger Lemon tea and Green tea that will both come into use in a just few minutes! She has also sent a delicious strawberry shower gel, a cherry wood nailfile set and last but not least high children sunscreen 30Spf.

(I have to admit that I am dangerously lazy with sunscreen and only use it about once a week or even less - although living in one of the hottest, sunburning-regions on earth. And I should really have used the latter today morning: during our usual rather early morning dog walk, the prince of sun wanted to show me something that 'é pertinho' (which translated means 'it's very close') so I thought that the sun wouldn't be too strong until our return and that we would be back in about 30min time but - as very often happens when Brazilians tell you that something is either 'pertinho' (very close) or 'rapidinho' (very quick) it actually isn't! So I thouroughly burned my shoulders, face and arms as I was only wearing shorts and a shield tank top.... hasn't happened in a long time as usually when we plan to continuously walk in the strong sun for longer than 30 minutes I make sure that I use sunscreen or at least shield my face and shoulders with a t-shirt and cap. Well, should have known better by now that the 'Brazilian very close' really cannot be compared at all to the 'German very close' ;)

Anyway, back to the lovely contents: The picture postcard my mum has sent this time is a beautiful painting called 'Wiesenlied' (German for 'meadow song') by mouth painter Aleksandr Ivanov. It`s a still-life of a flower vase with a mix of 'blue-purple centaureas' and 'white-yellow anemones blandas' ((as far as I google-searched the sorts, so no guarantee on that one!)). The painter himself was born in Astrakhan, Russia in 1956, studied painting and visual arts from his early youth on and then started working in the field until suffering an accident in 1990: