Ice dancer

Monday is kind of like a day off for me because I don´t have any lectures. Since I don´t have to make a schedule for Mondays I can do whatever I like - do everything in reverse, for instance! I started this Monday with skiing now that for once I was free during the daylight. There was a sunny spell, only a few minus degrees. Skiing gave me amazing energy for the rest of the day. I had lunch, ran my errands in town (returned my work clothes), had afternoon coffee and only then went to the uni. At uni I studied and tried to print for a couple of hours. It was a good day. Exercise in the morning seems to be wise.

 

Later on I felt an urge to make cookies. I found this recipe that met my needs: http://blogit.hs.fi/kauhaajarakkautta/2012/04/26/kun-makeanhimo-iskee-maapahkinavoi-kaurakeksit/

This is my version:

Peanut butter oaties

1dl peanut butter

1dl cane sugar and honey

0,5dl chia seed gel (or one egg)

2dl oats

1tsp baking soda

2 tbs sultanas/raisins

Bake in 175 degrees for 7-10 minutes until golden brown. 

My god they are good with milk !!

Since this day was dedicated to spontaneous acts and urges, I realized my dream of being an ice dancer. After studying for a couple of hours at home, my lungs were screaming for fresh air. (Also, cookies taste twice as good after outdoor exercise.) It was 22pm and skating in a darkened ice rink seemed like a romantic idea. My ice dancer outfit was simply a skirt and my favourite winter coat. I had to have music as well so I took my mp3-player with.

Here are some "highlights" from my playlist... 

First it felt like a stupid idea to skate in the dark, making late-night dog walkers freak out. But skating to music is really fun, especially in the dark. It was like being in a shop after closing time. The only problem was that my mp3-player cords got stiff in the cold and the plugs kept falling out of my ears. I had a proper dance spectacle in the dark anyway and maybe some people in Olympia saw my show through window...

 I will go out tonight
Don't wanna waste my time
I feel I'm bound to fly
And I don't love you no more

Gingerbread !

On Independance Day I decided to make some sweet treats for me and my dinner guest. I´ve been wanting to make gingerbread from the scratch, and now that I found a nice recipe online I could realize my plan. The original recipe belongs to Olga and it doesn´t contain the two baddies, white sugar or white flour. This gingerbread is really delicious and the texture is great if you bake them just for as little time as possible. Here´s the recipe translated and modified by me:

Anne´s Gingerbread

1,5dl agave syrup/maple syrup/honey
4tsp gingerbread seasoning (cardamon, clove, cinnamon, ginger)
100g butter
1 egg
1dl cane sugar
4,5dl spelt flour
1tsp baking soda

1. Heat up the syrup with the spices, don´t boil.

2. Chop the butter into dices and stir into the hot syrup. Cool down.

3. Beat the egg and the sugar until foamy.

4. Mix the egg foam with the syrup.

5. Add in the flour mixed with soda.

6. The dough will be quite runny but it´ll firm up in the fridge overnight. After that you still have to work some more flour into it while rolling it.

7. Bake in 175 degrees for about 9 minutes or until light brown.

Way better than ready gingerbread doughs!

Summer treats

Summer is the time of sugar and spice and everything nice. I like to treat myself or family and friends with sweet creations, preferably served on beautiful plates like these old Arabia saucers. On midsummer Sunday me and my "long-lost relative" Anna went fishing and afterwards, not catching any fish, made special pancake from Åland. (Åland is an island that belongs to Finland and is very Swedish.) Anna shared the pancake recipe she learned while working there and I´m sure she won´t mind me sharing it here aswell...  

Tea time with Åland´s pancake, whipped cream, black currants and my very own rhubarb-apple jam

Tarja´s Pancake from Åland

1 l milk
1,5 dl semolina (mannasuurimo)
1 tsp salt

Make a porridge out of this by cooking semolina in milk for about 10 minutes. Add salt. When it´s ready mix with...

half a tbsp salt
1 tbsp ground cardamon
1 egg
50 g butter

Bake in 175 degrees for about an hour. Afterwards let it cool for 10 minutes.

Pretty pink

This is what was left of the Beetroot cake I made while visiting my folks. For the lack of muscovado sugar my cake looks quite pale. This was a big success though so I truly recommend! Pumpkin seeds turned out to work really nice and fresh lemon in the icing just dots the i... I´ve been wanting to make a cake out of beetroot for long time because the one I had at Earth Café was just great. This would surely be awesome with cream cheese topping, too.

I´ve already done quite many summery things apart from summery baking. I´ve done horse riding, cayaking, fishing, music festival, hitchhiking, flower picking, swimming in the sea, outdoor bouldering (climbing) and so on and so forth. I still want to sleep outside in a tent.

Make the most of the summer! Peace and love. xx

Ready, set, go raw!

It´s half past midnight and Monday. I´ve just started the week of raw food that I promised to do. I have approximately two reasons why I want to do this:

1) I want to know what the fuss is about. Will I feel better and more energetic?
2) I like challenging myself and trying new things.

... and a third reason...

3) I like setting an example and showing that there are indeed options for the way we fat westerners eat. And live.

Hempseeds, I´m lovin´ it!

To kickstart the week I´ve put some beans and peas into water overnight and marinated mushrooms. Knowing myself and my sweet tooth I also prepared some delicious date munchies and mint chocolates to die for. Whenever I feel desperate during next week I can just seek consolation from the "sweet shelf" of my fridge...

I guess it would be appropriate to explain more about the idea behind all this obscure talk about raw food. I´ve written about raw food before, atleast chocolate, and I´ve read a lot about it on the net. Raw food or living food is just another trend in nutrition and the idea is to preserve all nutrients and vitamins food contains by not cooking it. (People on raw diet call it "killing the food".) Obviously this is not for hardcore carnivores even though also meat can be eaten raw... Think about sushi, for instance.

Raw foodist consumes heaps of fresh vegetables, fruits, berries, nuts, seeds, sprouts, even cereals (?), beans and peas... I want to underline that fresh veggies are always better than canned stuff. The diet is not as harsh as it sounds like and I will be sharing some recipes along the week.

 

One thing about pulses. As far as I know, nearly every bean, pea or lentil can be soaked, sprouted and eaten raw. Some of them don´t sprout but atleast mung beans are good. I have some of them going in a bowl. Tomorrow morning I´ll try and start sprouting them (never done it before). Back in times at Earth Café I tried marinated raw chickpeas and they are really lovely and fresh.

As treats are so important, I share my sweet recipes first!

Date munchies

8-10 dates
1tbsp sunflower seeds
1tbsp almond flower
1tsp cacao powder
1tsp maca powder (optional)
1tsp grated fresh ginger
1tbsp cashew nuts
pinch of good salt
pinch of cayenne pepper

>>Mix everything in a food processor, form small balls and coat them with coconut or why not sesame seeds. Ready to eat as it is!

Mint chocolate

1dl coconut oil and/or cacao butter
2tbsp raw cacao powder
1-2tsp honey or other natural sweetener
2tsp lucuma powder
a couple of drops of natural mint extract

>>Melt the oil in a bain marie and add everything else. Mix well and pour into an icecube form or onto a plate. Freeze for half an hour or cool in the fridge for an hour. Phenomenal, I say!

Some like it simple

Ciao folks!

It´s time to talk about food again. Even though I´d rather not recommend pasta I want to share a couple of my favourite pasta sauce recipes. According to my philosophy one must not give up something you absolutely crave for... like a steaming bowl of spaghetti after sports! I don´t mesure while cooking so I can only give you ingredient lists. My pasta sauce always starts with frying onion. Fresh herbs are surely welcome; just add them in the very end. Trust your instinct with seasoning and keep tasting! Add olive oil in the end aswell.

 Tomato sauce

Onion
Garlic
Chopped tomatoes
Splash of cream
Grated cheese/cream cheese
Paprika
Chili
Salt+Pepper
Fresh rocket
Olive oil


Beetroot sauce

Onion
Boiled and chopped beetroot
Cream
Nutmeg
Marjoram
Salt+pepper
Fresh rocket
Olive oil


Isn´t it pretty! :)

A perfect dessert would be this sin-free Banana icecream with cacao sauce. For one portion freeze a banana in pieces. Smash it with a blender stick and, believe it or not, it turns amazingly creamy. For the cacao sauce mix coconut cream and raw cacao powder. Sweeten with agave syrup or honey. On top toss a few mulberries or other berries. Awesome!

And it gets even more exciting! My new thing is Chaga mushroom which got "legalized" recently. It has 500 times more antioxsidants than blueberries. Need I say more? Last time I visited my hometown I collected a lot of Chaga, chopped and ground it. It looks like coffee! I don´t know how to describe the taste because it´s not very strong. I drink it as tea.

I´m planning to have a raw food week as to experiment how it affects my energy levels. Whenever it happens I´ll keep you posted and tell you everything! I´ll be a volunteer guineapig.

Peace!

Mmm... getting PISSed

The consept of "slow life" includes a great deal of making things by yourself. That´s to ensure getting products that are pure, preservative(+other shit) free and that include that essential touch of love! When it comes to fruit and berry liquors, they´re often way too sweet which is another good reason to make it yourself. Last time I made liquor was in upper secondary school (don´t tell my mum) and back then it was a success. I´ve been intending to do it again since then. Only now was the time ripe..! My intention was to make it organic but unfortunately Alko´s range of organic spirits was scarce and so was the situation with organic lemons in the supermarket.

There are variou recipes for "limoncello" on the net. I used five lemons for 0,7l of very common Finnish spirit. Simply peel the lemons and add them into a clean jar with the booze. Let it sit for two weeks and mix every day if you fancy...It turns nice and yellow.

 

Yesterday I drained out the lemon peels and added some water (4dl?) and sugar. I was stupid enough to use brown sugar and my beautiful liquor turned brownish and looks like piss. I´ll let it sit for another week and taste it.

BYOB gets an entire new meaning!

Raw power!

Fight against the bad reputation of “salads” is the toughest fight of all. In Finland "salad" normally means some lettuce, cucumber and tomato. No wonder people feel sorry for vegetarians because “they only eat salad”. Well, it´s time for a revolution. It´s time to pimp up salad onto a whole new level! Salad can totally be a full meal even without any meat at all.

Viidakkomies too writes about salads that are out of this world even though his ingredients sometimes sound like a chemistry lesson. But, the man has a good philosophy: don´t be afraid of flavours, just mix everything!

I found adding more raw vegetable into my diet excellent. It gives me heaps of energy and no need for that notorious after-meal-nap. I make my salad in three steps and the result is always mouth-watering. The best thing is that it´s ready in minutes. Also, there´s no possibility of failure, you don´t have to plan how to make it, just toss in whatever you got in your fridge. Some ideas for each level follow...

1. Base: lettuce (not iceberg, something better like lollo rosso or romaine), spinach, cucumber, tomato, courgette, carrot, pepper, cabbage, broccoli, cauliflower...
2. Accessories: onion, chilli, garlic, shrimps, cheese, herbs, beans, seeds, nuts, olives, seaweed, corn, tuna, egg...
3. Dressing: virgin olive oil, vinegar, soy sauce, salt, pepper, cayenne, turmeric, paprika...

Mix with care and enjoy sitting down comfortably. It takes more chewing ofcourse but you can find a nice tempo for your eating e.g. from Jamie Cullum http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4LU7leX9RCc

After some succesful climbing yesterday at the gym, I rewarded myself with this salad: spinach, pak choi, carrot, cauliflower, garlic, chilli, hempseeds and courgette.

Join the crew

I read something interesting a couple of weeks ago.

The company we most times are in has a huge influence on what we are like and what we do. Actually, you are the average of the five people you spend the most time with. (Jim Rohn)

So, there´s a very good reason to choose your friends carefully! It´s easy to realize this theory is true. Isn´t it obvious that if you really like someone, you want to agree with them so they would like you too? It´s not always the case, you might enjoy a good quarrel, but maybe your subconscious is plotting against you... 

This allows you to develop to whatever direction you ever want! If you want to get fit, hang out with fit people who do sports and you will adopt their enthusiasm and become fit aswell. If you wish you would study more but feel distracted, tag along with hard-working students who seem do be doing well. If you´re middle-aged longing for adolescence, put a cap on and go to the local skate park...

In terms of self-developement, it´s consequently a good idea to hang out with people who are smarter than you. I have a friend who can discuss anything and knows loads about society and politics, and that´s made me become interested in “serious matters” aswell. 

A few years ago I was on a French course in France. When I got there I realised that most people were much better in French than me. But quite quickly I realized also that I would learn a lot more in that company.

All and all I think it´s important to have different kinds of people around because that keeps things interesting. However, don´t waste your time on people who discourage or bore you, load you with their own troubles or use you in some other way. Friends´ company should ideally be energizing, inspiring and uplifting.

Influencing people around you. That´s what this petty little blog is all about! I want to spread my ideas on good “slow life” and maybe help people find better ways to live and be healthier. This includes very basic indulgences with the best ingredients like these little sweethearts, my first raw chocolates!

Here´s the recipe: coconut oil, cacao powder, roasted and salted almonds, coffee, honey, vanilla extract and a handful of love.

Before you diagnose yourself with depression or low self-esteem, first make sure you are not, in fact, just surrounded by assholes. (W. Gibson)