Rein's Cookumentaries and other Stuff

Then I would be able to make you all drool again (except for my vegetarian friends, I’m afraid ).  Still feeling the dent in my pocket after the Japanese Splurge, I opted to take a look in my deepfreezer instead today.  Lo and behold, there still was a piece of rabbit lurking behind all the chips, pizzas en fishfingers!  Leftover that didn’t make it to the ‘neighbour dinner’ we had quite some time ago, I remember now.  Well, there’s only that much rabbit 2 women can eat under the disapproving stare of their offspring

As there’s still no offspring here (*sniff* I miss them, especially as it’s Mother’s Day here in Antwerp – yep, only here, we’re special ), there won’t be any disapproving looks either.

I made it in my tajin (best buy ever, seriously!) with a surrounding of carrots, onions, prunes, bayleaves and potatoes.  No defrosting, just bunged it in with the carrots and onions first, with a generous splash of olive oil.  Let it brown, covered on high heat for about 5 minutes, add prunes, bayleaves and the main ingredient, a bottle of brown beer.  Grimbergen this time.  Heh, to be honest, I use that most of the time, it’s one of my favourite ‘stew’ beers   Add some ground pepper, salt and the roughly chopped potatoes.  Let it come up to boiling again and then turn down to half, so it just keeps on simmering.  No need to look after, the tajin drips on the meat and keeps it just right.

Three quarters of an hour afterwards you will be presented with this:

Rabbit stew

As you can see I pricked the potatoes and they’re just right   As they’re usually the last to be ready, the rest will be good too.

I know it’s a weird time to eat ‘dinner’ (it’s 15:41 here now) but during the holidays (and certainly when I’m on my own) we eat when the mood gets us, be it once or five times a day – my body just has to put up with it

I’ll let you know if anything was left

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Report (21:27): it’s all gone now (just had the last bit as a nibble before bed ) and boy, was it good!  Sometimes I amaze myself with my culinairy concoctions   Uh-oh, I just realised that that also means I had about 15 prunes…  I bet no-one wants reports on that, do they?

That’s what most of my daily life revolves around: “What are we having for dinner tonight?”  Sad, really, but well, you have to eat to live

Yesterday I was so totally out of ideas for dinner, that I went to the local Japanese and told them “Just give me a taste of everything!”, which resulted in ‘dinner for 1′, which costed (ouchie!) 30 euros…  I will only buy this once I think >_<

It could have fed 2, even taking my big appetite into account, but I managed to finish it.  I don’t think Japanese the next day is as good as Chinese the next day, anyway…

Japanese dinner for 1 - could have fed 2, really

In this photo going around the clock, starting top left: ‘ordinary’ inside-out rolls – crunchy but very nice rolls with a dot of sauce (cocktail???) – enormous cone, had to use hands for that – 2 more ‘ordinary’ rolls, but right side out – also crunchy, tasted a bit different from the other one but couldn’t define difference (egg?) – 3 sushi rice balls, one with salmon, one with white fish, one with prawn – I think tuna in a tangy dressing/marinade – carrot spaghetti I wonder how they got those very long threads – pink ginger flower – green wasabi, nosewatering strong – tuna – salmon – flattened squid tentacle slices, chewy, not much taste .

On the menu this box was called: Sushi, Sashimi, Maki, Temaki combo, 25 pieces, for 1 person.  They also added a little container with soja sauce, a pair of chopsticks and a little bag of kroepoek (prawn crackers).  Those I ate later in front of the tv

It was a very nice dinner, but very pricey, come to think of it …  30 euros doesn’t sound a lot, but when you ‘translate’ it back to the old money, it’s 1200 Belgian Francs – wowee, 20 years ago that paid for the foodbill of a whole week!  Is life getting that expensive, or are we just not paying attention any more to what we spend our money on?  This will be only repeated on very special days I think and even then we will be taking something a bit cheaper

Sayonara!

It’s that time of the year again – where my daughters go abroad for a few weeks to visit their dad and I’m left at home with the cat, feeling empty-nested…
This time I have had instructions on how to fill my days constructively though, so no wasting time behind the pc playing games of facebooking or any such trivia Only allowed to check mails and chat with them when they’re online – and knowing their dad it will be far, far less then what they’re used to

So what’s on the agenda today?  Making a start with my bedroom – that’s the main project of these weeks and well overdue, really, I hope I will be able to finish it – putting the fish tank back in order, even if we’ve only got the one clown fish now (Ziggy has been returned to the shop as he had outgrown the tank and kept jumping up out of the water and bumping his head on the light O.o) and baking bread.  For a Sunday that will be plenty.

So girls, enjoy your holidays and we will see each other on the web

Birthday present for a 7y old

Originally uploaded by Reinhilde.

Eldest girl of the neighbours across has her 7th birthday today – what better stuff to give than lipgloss, body glitter, hair ties, a necklace and sweets and all that in a crackly, red, shiny paper? Problem is, her (almost) 3 year old sister wanted it all too, so was bawling her eyes out, until I promised her she would get such a present on her birthday too – which is in only a few weeks

Tomorrow and the day after no post, I’m in London, fetching the girls back – WOOHOOH!!

Let’s hope the weather is a bit clear and not like it is here now – I hope I will get to the Eurostar without looking like a drowned cat

The TV is on too – with half an eye watching the opening ceremony of the Olympics in Beijing (of course I’m recording it!) They really have pushed the boat out – all very nice of course, but I do hope that later on the people who have been evicted and those in the poorer regions of China will profit one way or another of those games too…

I shouldn’t have complained about the hot weather yesterday Today I woke up with thunder and lightning and the roof being pelted with rain as if a thousand mice were dancing a tarantella on it. Having a modern house with high sloping ceilings is nice, but a pain when trying to sleep when it rains – not as bad as a tin roof, but it comes a close second!

So I’m scratching my head again for a subject for ‘picture of the day’. Maybe I’ll go to the park later, inbetween rain bursts, and see if the deer are out, otherwise I could go to the rose garden for a few scenic pics. I will have to pop over to the shops too. Eldest girl of the neighbours across has her birthday tomorrow – 7 I thought it was – and I have to find her a birthday present, so I can go and give it before I leave for London tomorrow evening. Which also implies no posts on Saturday or Sunday. The kids already txted me they would like to go to Camden Town. If we make that, it should be a good photo opportunity

Proof

Originally uploaded by Reinhilde.

Yesterday I had a ‘blah’ day and didn’t post a pic – so I got a worried txt this morning from the girls. When they were re-assured I just had a little ‘dip’, missed them something awful and couldn’t sleep as I was missing their nightly noises but would be there on Saturday morning, bright and bushy-tailed, they were quick to ask for the latest ‘Joepie’ (a teenmagazine that already existed when I was young – now that is a long time ago – not that I bought it, I rather went to the library for ‘proper’ books – I know, I’m a geek and proud of it ). So here is proof I went and bought it and – oh joy – no Tokio Hotel on the cover this time!

Today it has been hot, hot, hot. I really should cut the grass, but I rather not scorch to a crisp. If the mower doesn’t get through it, I always still have the strimmer to do it next week

You know what? I can always squeeze a pic of Oki in from yesterday as #14 – I caught her red-pawed when she was on the table checking out Rooz who came out for a nibble.

13-Hamsters all present and accounted for!

Originally uploaded by Reinhilde.

Normally I never do the hamsters. My kids are very good – each looks after their own pet and they’re doing a splendid job. This time though, I have to make sure they’re fed and watered and have a not too smelly house.

So here’s the proof I’m still performing my duty and both hamsters are safe and sound!

I had to chase Oki off the table a few times as she came to investigate, but no animals were harmed during the making of this mosaic!

Meh – it’s dull and grey and I just can’t find anything interesting to photograph today. It’s Sunday, so I’m not allowed to mow the lawn, so no pics of a clean garden. Oki’s been sleeping all day, the hamsters haven’t left their house for the whole day – they will have to tomorrow though, they’re getting a bit smelly, their ‘pooh corner’ needs cleaning – and I don’t seem to be able to find a nice juicy snail for some gory pics with the turtles…

So I’ll just leave you all with this Lolkat I saw today, which fits in beautifully really

btw – you know what is worse than PMS? PMS and having no-one to shout at

So, after almost 24 hours loading etc., here’s Oki’s first appearance on Youtube:

[youtube=http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=cCJrQsym3AU]

I do apologise for the wobbles and strange non-cat noises (especially et the end ) but as I said before, editing it – even taking 30 seconds off – increased the size with 100 Mb from the original 200 to 300 Mb * Anyone knowing a good program – or how I could make better use of Windows Movie Maker – feel free to suggest so

* even the shock icon has given up it seems – let’s try that again 80 8-0 – meh… now one of them seem to work, typical…

btw – anyone trying to figure out the background noise? It was a Classic Disney Cartoon – Micky, Donald and Goofy Building a Boat – just before the news at 8

Pink

Originally uploaded by Reinhilde.

It was a rather cloudy day, so no garden pictures. Nothing much to do either. I could hardly give you another one of my food pics (although today’s chicken tajin with carrots and mushrooms was simply delicious ) so we go with one of Oki’s food pics today

Never realised she’s that dusty!

A video of her snoring is uploading on youtube – I really have to take lessons on how to edit vids – even with the program included with the pc (Windows Movie Maker) I can’t seem to be able to bring it under 100Mb. Funny thing is, the unedited version is 2 minutes and 200 Mb, the edited one is 1min 30 sec but 300 Mb – weird or what? So as 1Mb of video takes about 1 to 5 minutes to upload – according to Youtube – I went with the unedited one. It will take a few hours then before you can enjoy her song