Time for some serious celebrating!

Guess why?

...My 2012 jewelry collection is done! The designing part of it, at least. Most of the items are already in my possession (and boy, am I wowed by the results), only a few items still need to be produced. If everything goes well, the whole collection is complete and ready to sell (including decent pictures, updated website, web shop and all that stuff) halfway around November. Lots of work to do of which I can't wait to start with.

To celebrate, I bought myself a few 'congratulations!' presents. Okay, I'll admit it was just an excuse to buy some of the new products in the shop where I work, really. The place has been remodelled recently and the collection has expanded with loads of awesome goodies, I just want all of them! Life ain't easy working there, way too much temptation ;).

A tiny baking tin for pies: because everything I bake has to be eaten by only two people and I want to bake quite often, normal pie tins are often too big. Even the best apple pie or cake gets boring after eating it for several days in a row... So this size is perfect!

Le Creuset (you probably know them from their cast iron cookware) has some fantastic (oven-resistant) ceramic mugs. I already have two big mugs and two espresso mugs in my possession, but since a few weeks we also have mid-size mugs in the store. I couldn't resist!

I made some apple sauce, so easy to make and so incredibly tasty!

And I've been walking around again hunting for mushrooms. And I found them...

...even though most had already been destroyed unfortunately.

...except for this humongous fungus! (yes, I just hád to say that).

Okay, recipes!

For the tiny apple pie, I took half of the following (Dutch) apple pie recipe:

- 250 gr flour
- 175 gr butter
- 80 gr sugar
- 2 eggs (1 1/2 for the dough, 1/2 egg for on the pie)
- 1 teaspoon cinnamon
- a pinch of salt might be a good addition

The dough is made by mixing everything by hand (less dish washing to worry about) and letting it chill in the fridge for half an hour while you peel and prepare the apples. Apparently, the cooling is necessary because the butter in the dough needs to be cold when you put it in the oven. The warmer it is, the earlier it will melt during baking, resulting in a less crisp crust. At least, that's what I read and I think it makes sense ;).

For the pie filling, you'll need to mix:

- 1 kg apples, peeled and cut in parts or slices
- 50 gr sugar
- 70 gr raisins (I usually leave those out because J. is not a big fan of them)
- 3 teaspoons cinnamon

Put the 2/3 of the dough in the baking tin, put the apple mixture in, then use the remaining dough to make small, diagonally crossing stripes on top of the pie. Brush the remaining egg over the stripes, and bake the pie in a preheated oven for about an hour on 170 degrees Celsius. Yum!

For the apple sauce, peel and cut several apples in pieces, put them in a pan with a layer of water (I fill the pan with water up to about halfway the apples, but usually less water is used). Add sugar and cinnamon (for 1 kg of apples: 100 gr sugar, one big teaspoon cinnamon), let the apples boil until they have become soft (usually about 20 minutes). Use a masher (Dutch: pureestamper of stamppotstamper) to make the apple sauce less lumpy -that is, if you want it to be.

Fall food

Yep, it's for sure. Fall has begun. A good excuse to stroll around outside with my camera (you know, daily dose of daylight and such):

It's good that there are a lot less people outside nowadays, because otherwise I no doubt would have gotten many strange looks because of my photographing stances (i.e. almost lying on the street/ground).

Lately, I've tried to ward off my cold-wheather-induced cravings for comfort food by making some healthy lunch meals and snacks

The age-old saying goes: eat breakfast like a king, lunch like a prince and dinner like a pauper. Well, this soup would certainly qualify, as after I forgot to prepare my grain porridge ingredients the evening before, I ate the leftovers of this soup for breakfast. And, here in the Netherlands, orange is the colour of the royalty, so there you have it: breakfast like a king!

I love to eat bulghur for lunch. It's healthy, warming and not to mention very tasty.

I tend to forget to eat the fruit in our fruit basket. Trowing it in the blender is a perfect solution for that. This smoothie from just one banana, one mango and some water is simple, healthy and perfect for sweet cravings.

In all my 'health-food' plannings, the ones below can be considered absolute failures, but ah well... I suppose I'll just have to forgive myself ;).

Chocolate truffles, always a treat.

I never made chocolate mousse before: reason enough to try it out! I don't like the idea of raw egg in my food, so I went for a recipe with just chocolate, whipped cream and chocolate mints. Without the chocolate mints, because I don't really like chocolate mints, actually. Thus, a most basic version of chocolate mouse, which tasted rather good actually!

Okay, recipe time!

I always buy organic pumpkins, so I won't have to worry about pesticides when I throw in the peel as well. Which is easier, faster and it even tastes better!
For the soup, I wash the pumpkin, remove the seeds, cut the pumpkin in parts, together with an union and some garlic, bake then for five minutes, then add water, laurel leaves and cumin (maybe ginger or a bouillon tablet as well). Let it boil for 30 minutes, take out the laurel leaves and use a hand blender (Dutch: staafmixer) to turn it into a smooth soup. Add some salt & pepper (and perhaps even some shoyu/soy sauce) and you've got a delicious soup.

For a lunch meal, I take about 60 grams of bulghur, wash it in a strainer (Dutch: zeef), then let it simmer in a pan with water (bulghur to water volume is 1:2) on low heat with the lid on top for about 15-20 minutes. I usually throw in some vegetables, this time green beans (Dutch: sperziebonen) and a tomato. Spicing everything up with turmeric (Dutch: kurkuma/geelwortel), salt and cayenne pepper, it becomes a delicious warming lunch meal. I often combine bulghur with turmeric and shoyu/soy sauce, it's one of my favorite combinations, but the shoyu didn't really match with the vegetables this time.

For the truffles, boil 175 ml of unwhipped cream, take it off the fire, add 400 g of dark chocolate (in small pieces or chopped) and stir until the chocolate has melted. Add 75 gr butter until melted and 3 tablespoons of Cointreau. Put the mixture in the fridge for several hours, then roll small balls of the mixture and roll them through pure cocoa powder.

The original recipe (4 portions) asks for 200 grams of dark chocolate, 300 ml whipped cream (in its not-yet-whipped phase, if you know what I mean) and 8 after-dinner chocolate mints. I used a third: 75 grams of dark chocolate and 100 ml (un)whipped cream for 3 portions, because even I have to think about my waistline now and then, and the dessert is heavy enough already.

Melt the chocolate au bain marie, whip the cream and stir it together (it might take a while before you get a solid brown colour). Scoop the mousse in cups and put it in the fridge for an hour. Voila, easy peasy.

Photography and obligatory slacking off

I've been doing some more photographing lately, this time while using -oh horror- external flashlights (external, so not the one attached to your camera, that one makes it almost impossible to create good photographs). Using external flashlights allows me to make good pictures even when there is not enough daylight. Since the skies seem grey for almost the whole day nowadays, it was starting to become a necessity so I finally conquered my fears and asked J. (the photography wizard) to explain me how to use them. And, providing the flashlight's batteries are full, it is quite simple really.

I really need to step up my game and practise, because if everything turns out well, I'll receive my designs (pendants this time) from the third batch at the end of next week. That means I've got a lot of product photographing to do then, and the more I practise now, the easier it'll be to make good photo's then. I hope.

(Nope, I didn't bake this, this was a ciambella (Italian type of cake, apparently) that my Dad and his girlfriend brought from their trip trough Italy. Mmm...)

I had been feeling a bit 'stressy' and overworked lately because I still have so much to do in so little time, and I suddenly noticed that I for a while I hadn't been feeling like doing any of the things I normally love to do, like baking or drawing or tinkering around. Actually, I didn't like anything to do, even brainstorming for my designs. Hmm, wait, that's a red flag!

Without realizing it, I had slipped into a 'sacrificing everything for work' mode, denying myself time and space for hobbies (or for just loitering around), obsessing over to do lists and the subsequent lack of inspiration and progress. While at the same time my work hours in the shop had almost doubled due to a remodeling of the shop, ánd I was having a cold so I was not feeling optimal as well. Whoops, no wonder things didn't go well.

After realizing this, I decided on some daily obligatory slacking off time. Which was happily spent the same day at a local super-cheap store (for Dutchies: the Action, of course) looking for photography props. I found two items, a small wooden treasure chest and a purple candle plateau (and presto, afterwards I suddenly felt like photographing again!). I'm still looking for some nice natural looking cloth or placemat to serve as underground or background. Maybe I'll just use that as an excuse to visit IKEA as another slacking-off-activity (and hey, it takes 30 minutes of cycling to get there so it even fulfils my daily 'moving' and 'fresh air' quota ;) ).

(The new candle plateau)

(The wooden treasure chest)

Since fall has really started now, I also decided to try starting the day with porridge from freshly milled grains, instead of the usual cereal with yoghurt. Nice and warm and uber-healthy to boot. The grains will have to soak for a night, so tomorrow will be the first tryout.

And from the uber-healthy stuff we move to a 'guilty pleasure', well my guilty pleasure at least: hot cocoa with marshmallows, yum...

If I would have to give this picture a title, it would be "You and me", because I picture these cups belonging to a pair, sitting closely against each other in a romantic setting. However, since my significant other would run far, far away if you put hot cocoa with marshmallows under his nose, naming this "You and me" would be a case of blatant artistic freedom. Rather unfortunate, since that means no romantic tête-a-têtes with hot cocoa for me, but at the same time fortunate, because that means I get both cups for myself, making a title like "All mine! Mwuhahaha!" a lot more appropriate...