Banana soup! This might sound bizarre – but it tastes amazing. Bananas are a favourite curry ingredient in Indian cooking and sweeten dishes ever so slightly. They contain potassium and magnesium among other nutrients and they can strengthen our nerves and improve our mental capacity.
Lentils are the ideal way to stay fit and slim, making this lentil and curry soup the perfect and healthy start to the New Year. The protein level of legumes like lentils is around 20% and their calorie content is relatively low. In addition, because they are a high fibre vegetable, lentils are also brilliantly filling.
Happy 2017! What are your New Year’s resolutions? My 2017 will be all about mindfulness and deliberation, with a healthy diet of course, which is an ongoing habit. Many people start the New Year with many virtuous plans like losing weight and starting a healthier lifestyle and often, the word DETOX comes up.
Some swear by oil, others don’t use anything but soup. Some prefer fish-broth, melted cheese or even chocolate sauce. I’m talking about fondue, the communal dish which exists in many variations from savoury to sweet and has had a steadily growing fan base for decades. Sharing food with friends!
Dumplings are to Austria like Tapas to Spain and Tacos to Mexico. Unfortunately they are an indulgence I have to avoid for the most part, as it is virtually impossible to get gluten-free dumplings anywhere. Especially not at ski lodges in the Alps.
At the beginning of autumn, garden vegetables are ripe and bursting with flavour. Lettuce, peppers, fennel, green beans, zucchini, pumpkin, squash and particularly tomatoes of all varieties. Specifically sweet cocktail, cherry and tomatoes on the vine are available at farmer’s markets until almost the end of October. You can eat them raw, cooked or braised and they can be used for pasta, salads, stew or as the base of a sauce.
It has always been one of my biggest dreams to throw a huge food party with all my readers and blog followers in order to give some of the love back and exchange knowledge and ideas.
I think most people very much identify with one of the four seasons. Most are summer people, others love the winter. But who would want to go without the spring when everything is in bloom or a ripe, mild autumn? You don’t get four seasons in a year everywhere on the planet, unfortunately. Over here in Western Europe, the seasons have a strong influence on us and we love them all. As for me, the autumn is my favourite. Even though I like when the trees are in bloom and I definitely love the sun and the ocean as well as the snow and snowboarding, but a beautiful, magical autumn gives me that cosy, homely feeling I don’t get at any other time of the year.
At the Bi-Rite food market, I found a cookbook. I checked under the term “figs” and found the following: „But when they are allowed to ripen on the tree, they have a creamy, nectary center that’s bursting with luscious sugar. Put simply, a fig’s perfection lies in its excess.”
Are you a fan of paleo or gluten-free recipes? These currently very trendy diets are ever present in my own kitchen, partly due to my coeliac disease but also my desire to experiment. Here, I’ve baked some sublime paleo buns and topped them with beef patties. Have a taste!
One early morning in the Villa Villekulla, Pippi Longstocking invented a new word: SPLUNK. Of course this had to be a thing. So Pippi, Tommy and Annika start looking for it. They ask at the local candy store and the ironmonger in town. Unfortunately, neither one of them sells any splunk. Might the splunk be a disease of some kind? The three friends visit a doctor. But the doctor can’t find anything wrong, certainly nothing splunky. But just as Pippi makes her way home, a splunk crosses her path. She almost didn’t see the little bug and nearly stepped on it – this could only be a splunk, Pippi was certain …
This recipe is my personal summer favourite. It’s quick, light and delicious: zucchini noodles, also called zoodles. The only tool you need to create this wondrous veggie pasta is a spiralizer or julienne peeler.
