Celeriac salad with pears and pomegranate and a special parcel.

A refreshing salad..full of crunch and texture…a delight on the taste buds with the soft sweetness of the pears and the tart exploding sweetness of the pomegranate seeds. Fitting for a special parcel…

Suggestions:

• Red cabbage ribbons can be added for more colour.
• Add the pomegranate seeds last if you want you salad to be “unstained”.
• A yoghurt dressing with lemon and honey is great too.
• If you want a more “sustainable ” salad, add some coarsely grated hard  cheese of your choice.
• Good with fish.
• Can be served on its own as a starter or accompaniment as a side.
• A good salad for losing weight  and/or detox.

Some days are sometimes unexpectedly special. Like a Tuesday when the post lady knocks on your door and with a broad smile hands you a parcel: “Voilá! Toujours Noël!” (still christmas for you!)

A lovely surprise from the extraordinary Monique at A la table de Nana. After opening up the very well wrapped outer box and fixing my eyes upon the beautiful first layer, I found myself working softer and more delicate with each unwrapping;  lingering, feathering and stroking my fingers deliberately over each wrapping, wonder what hides underneath, trying to prolong the seconds to minutes, enjoying the feeling of excitement and yielding to the pleasure of feeling special.

…opening up onto creative bookmarks and cards...

…then a next surprise…

…even more delicate and beautifully wrapped…

…so many unfolding surprises in such a small box…

…a notebook, beautiful chcolate transfers, even more beautiful cookie transfers…

Few things in life give us that warmth around the heart than caring, attention, a spontaneous compliment…a little act of some kind making you feel special. This little parcel did exactly that. It had something of everything…

…a little bit of romance, a touch of personal creativity, a hint of refinement, a sprinkling of originality, a taste of beauty…finished off with drizzlings of warmth and  presented with care and delicate attention…

Have you sent a small parcel to someone? Wrapped with care and attention to small détail, adding a little note here and a chocolate there, a smile, a giggle, a wish…not a Christmas gift. Not a birthday gift. Just something to say someone else is special. No? So…let’s just do it!

Trucs et astuces de nos grands-mères:

To substitute for crème fraîche to make whipped cream, beat an egg white to meringue phase(stiff) and add in 1 teaspoon of melted butter.

Missing Coin Perdu

I love Montlouis and our house  here by the Loire. I love the beautiful town of Tours, a mini Paris with its incredible architecture. I love the Loire with its wild unpredictability.

…la loire et ses oiseaux…

But my love lies even deeper at Coin Perdu, where the sunsets and clear stars  keep me outdoors early until late… Where I love the roaming cattle with their undisturbed manner, the bells clinging even somewhere at night. Where I love the buses roaming the skies, where I love listening to the the complaints of the owls in the dark of night, crying their dissatisfaction with us taking their barn…I’ve said all these things before. I will say it many more times. They are important things in my life;  the simplicity and honesty of the country side, where life isn’t always easy, but where the  comfort lies in knowing and acknowledging it. There aren’t short cuts in honesty, no shifting of boundaries. There is no playing around with honesty. Taking on a day can’t be played around with…animals can’t wait for their food, hay will be wet tomorrow if not cut today, the birth of a new calf cares not for convenience,  rain boots wait by the door for a good reason…nature dictates and man dances. It gives life its equilibrium. Keeps man humble, with his ear to the ground, his instinct awake. It keeps him alive. It gives him life.

…coin perdu…

I am looking forward to when we can get started on our restoration again and return to our life in the barn which is temporary home until the house is finished.  Read and see more on Coin Perdu, a mountain home, about our country life in Correze.

So,  while I am waiting for March and spring to break through so we can pack and take off to Coin Perdu for the spring and summer months to resume working and restoring our mountain home, I have last year’s photos and many memories to keep me going these next two months.

But still, I can’t wait to…

…start working…

…enjoying evening barbeques…

…enjoying breath taking sunsets…

…delighting in simple, delicious food…

…go for long walks…

…revel in rediscovering nature and animal life…

…paint, paint and paint…

…visiting with angelina et agnes…et billy-jean…

…fiddle in our barn kitchen…

Urgent need in Haiti and many others…

Please make a donation to the relief of the awful  disaster in Haiti, but be careful of online donations. There are already many scam emails going around asking for donations. The safest way is to make a donation to a well known organisation or do it by mail or phone to a known organisation in your area.

And please, don’t forget other countries that are also in need of help.  Make it a habit to give a little something maybe every month? There are so many who need help out there..a little drop each time leads to a full bucket…

The Red cross is a good example, they can also be contacted to find your nearest branch.

International Federation of Red Cross and Red Crescent societies

British Red Cross

Croix Rouge Francaise

Fondation de France

American Red Cross

South African Red Cross society

Australian Red Cross

Medecins sans frontieres, which is an excellent organisation…….thanks to Kate at Serendipity for adding it!

How to help Haiti

UNICEF

Lentil salad with apples and red onion and a vitamin boost.

We all know our list of vitamins and minerals, but it is especially in this stretch of witer here in the North, that we need to dig it out again and check our daily nutrient intake. Like so many people in the North, I am also overcome by a bad fatigue. So I am turning to nutrients even more to boost my energy and morale. Anti-fatigue foods. Like lentils and apples and kiwis, loaded with vitamin C. And many short walks during the day.  It is the getting out, getting the metabolism going and feeling the cold, which revives the mind and the body.

Suggestions:

• Make enough lentils for a salad the next day to take to work for lunch.
• cook lentils until tender, but still with a bite.
• See how to make a bouquet garni at Velouté de topinambours.(Jerusalem artichokes)
• Add walnuts for some protein.
• Use kiwis for vitamin C and add pumpkin seeds for crunch.
• Use the lentils warm in winter for a feeling of comfort and cold in summer for coolness.
• soak the red onion in luke warm water for 5 minutes to remove some of the pungency.
• Use whole grain rice if you don’t like lentils.

Tips to fight fatigue

Choose food containing vitamin C, which is the main energy stimulating vitamin. It is active in the production of energy in the cells, it protects the cells agains free radicals and it assists in the absorption of iron and calcium.

Vitamin E diminishes the feeling of fatigue. Along with vitamin C and A, it acts against free radicals and protects agains the effect of pollution.

Vit B group facilitates the transformation of proteins into energy, they regulate mood and intellectual energy and they improve the absorption of iron, assists with carrying oxygen in the blood.

Foods high in vitamin C: kiwi, parsley, cassis, raw red pepper, chercil, watercress, citrus fruits…

Vitmain B1(thiamine): liver, whole grains, seafood…

Vitamin B2(Riboflavin): REd meat, poultry(dark meats)dark green lefy vegetables…

Vit B3(Niacin): Liver, poultry, seafood, seed and nuts…

Vitamin B6(Piridoxine): Meat, fish poultry,legumes,  spinach, sweet potatoes, avocados, bananas…

Vitamin B12(cyanocobalamin): oysters, sardines, tuna, turkey chicken, eggs…

Some of the most important minerals to fight fatigue, would be selenium, iron, potassium, magnesium and calcium.

Calcium: Dairy products, dark green vegetables, sardines with bones…

Magnesium:  dark chocolate, almonds, dried beans, walnuts, wholegrain rice, lentils, dark green vegetables, meat, fish poultry, nuts…

Potassium: Meat, fruits, legumes…

Selenium: fish, organ meats, grains…

Good foods to fight fatigue: lentils, brown rice, fennel, sweet potatoes, endives, fish, chicken, petit pois, cauliflower, apples, dates, papaja, citrus fruit, berries…

This is by no means a complete list or complete information on nutrients. There are many complete health books on the subject…this is only an inspiration to get reaquainted with our daily nutrients to give us a boost during the dark and cold days of winter.

Drink eight glasses of water per day. Cut out milk products and wheat to avoid all sorts of allergies. Cut out cafeine and all sodas. Take regular walks during the day and do some exercize. Turn the heating inside your house a little lower during the day, which forces to body to work harder at energizeing itself. Move more during the day, get up often from behind the desk and take a walk, instead of keeping water by your desk, get up and go fetch a glass of water, do some stretching, open the window and breathe in the cold fresh air…

Bibliography: Live longer cookbook – Reader’s digest; New optimum nutrition bible – Patrick holford; La Methode Montignac – Michel Montignac; Ma cuisine anti-fatigue – Marie Borrel; Total health program  – Dr. Mercola; Eating well for optimum health – Andrew Weil, MD.

Be sure to drop in at Kalyn’s kitchen, where you will always find a healthy recipe with fresh ingredients, great ideas loaded with nutrients but light on the hips and with appetizing photos.

Trucs et astuce de grands-meres:

Throw your used coffee grains on youir plants in the garden, it is a good fertilizer for plants.

La galette des rois and a slow start.

In France, as I suppose everywhere else in the North, January is a quiet month. Many businesses are closed  up to take their annual congé, now that they have quiet days. The days are long and grey and cold. A highlight of January is la galette des rois(cake of the kings). Epiphany.  On the twelfth day. 6 January.  Although we start eating la galette already on 1 January and the boulangeries are happy to provide les galettes right through the month of January.

…a home baked galette des rois…

A recipe from the book Pâtisseries maison, by Florence Edelmann.

Traditionally a galette was shared around the table, with the youngest  sitting under the table calling the name of each recipient of a slice. That would make the game fair in hoping for the féve(fava bean, but nowadays a trinket). The person finding the féve in his slice, would be king, wear the paper crown and provide the next galette on the table.

The boulangeries bake extraordinary galettes, much better than I could do. So I am happy to buy my galette at the corner up in Montlouis at Aux pains gourmands. The traditoinal galette  was a filling of crème d’amande, which is a mixture of ground almonds , sugar, butter and egg. Modern day finds the galette with a variety of fillings, from frangipane(sort of crème pâtissière with creamed butter and sugar and added almonds, flour and eggs), raspberry to apple to chocolate and more.

Suggestions:

• Work with cold pastry to have it rise high and flaky.
• Be careful not to cover with egg on the sides or else the pastry won’t flake.
• Add a traditinal fava bean instead of a trinket for a real traditional touch.
• Warm in the oven and not the microwave, to get the pastry crispy.
• Leave the galette in the fridge for at least 30 minutes to have it very cold, before putting in the oven.

♪..J’aime la galette

Savez vous comment

Quand elle est bien faite

avec du beurre dedans…

tra la la la la la la la lére…♪

Along with the galette des rois come the thoughts and reflections of what to do with this new year. Personal goals and dreams. As for myself, I always feel a bit lost in early January.

With December and family gone and the days cold and grey, I fiddle around, searching for the start-off to take on my goals . It takes me a while to really get going and start moving in a definite direction. But I know time will push me out of the starting blocks soon…hopefully…

So in the meantime, while trusting in patient old Mr. Time, let’s put on our boots and stroll the garden(and the Loire)to find some January greenery for the house. A dried branch. A twig. A branch of bayleaf .

Maybe some rearranging of paintings and prints…moving those upstairs, down and others upstairs. A change is good for inspiration.

The bookshelves can do with some organising too and don’t forget the cleaning closet. I pride myself on a neat and organized cleaning cupboard, but after a houseful of people, even the most tidiest corner can be turned upside down.

Let’s not forget the rearranging and sorting of clothes, linen and adding fresh sachets to the linen cupboards, cleaning out read and unused magazines, freshen up the pantry, oil the wooden cutboards, remove containers with left overs from the fridge and stock  with fresh vegetables , clean out your desk, find a place for all those Christmas cards, reflect on the finances, put a lock on your purse….in short, a lot can be done whilst waiting for inspiration or rather, for Time  to push you off the starting blocks.

Les trucs et astuce de nos grands- méres:

A branch of parsley added to deep frying oil, will soften the heavy smell of fried food.