"What I Cooked Today" Day 196

Today I had a pretty good day. I slept in a little, had coffee while browsing through my new world trip travel book (courtesy to my awesome in-laws), had eggs for breakfast with Jochem while watching Bones (always a pleasure), planned our world trip a little, ran some errands, and read a lot in my Twilight saga (so sue me). Unfortunately, Jochem had to leave in the afternoon for work, so I was by myself for dinner. I was therefore very grateful to have left-over pumpkin risotto. Now I think I'll go and watch The Holiday in bed to end the weekend.

Source: Jamie's Italy by Jamie Oliver

"What I Cooked Today" Day 195

Today Jochem's older brother and his girlfriend came over for dinner. Whenever we cook for Jochem's family I always get a little bit nervous, because they like to eat meat, potatoes and vegetables, which is something we make for ourselves, well, almost never. Not because we don't like it, but because we're far too scatter-brained to stick to these three ingredients and like to make food that tends to be a bit more exotic. Then again, when they like it, it is a huge pay-off. We made a couple of things: roasted potatoes from the oven (Source: Nigella Kitchen: Recipes from the Heart of the Home by Nigella Lawson) and pork chops with a dried apricot, prosciutto and sage butter filling (Source: Jamie's Italy by Jamie Oliver).

We also made our favorite carrots from the oven with white wine, butter, thyme and cumin (Source: The Return of the Naked Chef by Jamie Oliver).

For desssert we made what Nigella likes to call a devil's food cake, which basically translates to a chocolate cake oozing in dark chocolate frosting (Source: Nigella Kitchen: Recipes from the Heart of the Home by Nigella Lawson).



And to top it all off: limoncello!

Panic

You might be interested to know that my post-world-ticket-purchase glow lasted for about a couple of hours before I had an axiety attack. I wouldn't go as far as saying that I was actually panicking, but I definitely took the time to think: OH MY GOD!!! In less than a year I'll be traveling out of a backpack for 9 months! I won't have my own place! I'm homeless (or living with my parents in Almelo, which could be even worse)! I won't be able to see my cats for almost a year! Will they remember us? Will my fish still be alive (since I think it to be a distinct possibility that my mom 'forgets' to feed them or clean their bowl)? Am I am even the kind of person who likes to travel for so long? The last time that I was away for a long period of time was when I was studying at UCLA, and this was only for 6 months, where I had a room of my own, friends nearby and was operating in a society where everyone speaks English. I like to be at home with my pets. I like to cook. I won't have a homebase at the hostels we'll visit and the only cooking we'll be doing will be on little gas burners in the Australian outback. I was suddenly very afraid of the finality of it all, and it remains scary. Scary in a good way, I hope.

"What I Cooked Today" Day 194

Today Jochem made pizza again! We still had so much leftover pumpkin that we used it to top the pizza. We also used homemade tomato sauce, mozzarella and bacon. It was fall on a pizza!

Source: Jamie's Italy by Jamie Oliver

"What I Cooked Today" Day 193

Today Jochem had a day off. This is worth mentioning because Thursday is my weekly day off and we could therefore spend the entire day together. Of course there were errands to be run, but still, it was a nice change of pace. After booking our world ticket we were so excited that we decided to head into down and shop some more things for our trip. We got home pretty late and decided to leave the homemade pizza till tomorrow and just get food today. We bought some fries, some sandwiches and some cookies and just slummed on the couch.

World Ticket

You guys must be surprised to see a post of mine that does not feature food! I have to admit that lately I have either been too busy or too lazy to write anything substantial besides my daily "What I Cooked Today" posts, and the only reason that I am forcing myself out of this lame yet surprisingly comfortable stupor, is that I have BIG NEWS: Jochem and I booked a world ticket!!! It is kind of a loose term, because so far we have only paid a small deposit and, since you can generally only book flights about 11 months ahead of time, we have only actually booked the first flight. But we have our very own travel agent at Travel Nation (a British company that I can highly recommend if you are planning a big trip from Europe since they offer world tickets at amazing prices) called Jackie Jones (whom you've just gotta love if only for her awesome name) and she has made us reservations on all of the other flights and will book the actual tickets over the next couple of months free of charge. So, after a long week of e-mailing with Jackie back and forth and over 2 years of planning, and researching, and then planning some more, I am proud to show you our final route:

London - Bangkok, overland to Bali - Darwin - Cairns, overland to Sydney - Christchurch, overland to Auckland - Santiago de Chile - Easter Island - Santiago de Chile, overland to Lima - Madrid - London

[PAUSE FOR REACTION]

"What I Cooked Today" Day 192

Today was another exhaustive day. Life is so much harder when you are trying to get used to the fall and the dark, rainy and windy afternoons that accompany it. Not seeing Jochem on a regular basis makes everything even harder. One of the upsides of him working in the hospitality industry while I work a 9-to-5 kind of job (and it may be the only one) is that he usually makes me dinner these days, and today when I came home there was big pan filled with pumkin risotto waiting for me. You'll probably keep seeing pumpkin on this blog for a while - it's the season!

Source: Jamie's Italy by Jamie Oliver

"What I Cooked Today" Day 191

Today was an EXHAUSTIVE day! Luckily, we had leftover ruined stroganoff for dinner. And Jochem brought home a white chocolate chip cookie. Now I simply must sleep before I am unable to even finish this sentence.

"What I Cooked Today" Day 190

One of the things that I almost never get to do anymore (because I almost never have time to visit my family in Almelo anymore), is come home from home with a bag filled with leftover groceries. It usually lasts me through the whole week, which is both convenient (no thinking about doing groceries) and cheap (no buying of the groceries). Today I had leftover pumpkin soup. Sadly, I had to eat it alone in front of my computer, but the soup was still good.

"What I Cooked Today" Day 189

Today was Halloween. I love Halloween, although not so much for the overall atmosphere or even the trick-or-treat-ing, but for the food. Jochem and I always try to make some special fall dishes for Halloween and today we made three. First, we made these amazing fried zuccini flowers with a ricotta filling.

Then we made our simple oriental pumpkin (of course) soup.

Finally, we made one of our favorite dishes: stroganoff. Unfortunately, we kind of ruined the wild deer. We'd never used this kind of meat before and it turned out too dry. Luckily the other flavors came out great, but damn, what a shame on such fine meat!

Last but not least, Jochem made me a scary pumpkin. We named him Harry. Happy Halloween!

Source: Jamie at Home by Jamie Oliver