The vegetable most closely associated today with the celebration of Dziady, Samhain, Halloween — call it what you will — is the pumpkin.
Filling:
Dough:
What’s the worst thing about vacations? Especially when you live alone. In the middle of the forest.
The contents of the fridge when you get back.
It’s a good idea to get rid of everything in the fridge before you leave, so you don’t get greeted by a newly evolved civilization when you return.
And when you come back, there’s almost nothing to eat at home.
Sandwiches built Germany. Actually, not just Germany. All of Europe and North America. Sandwiches that workers took with them to work. And these weren’t sandwiches with fancy cold cuts — workers couldn’t afford that.
But, for example, with various spreads, because those were easy to make tasty out of scraps, leftovers, and the cheapest ingredients.
My latest culinary fascination is… German cuisine.
Yes, the very same German cuisine I regularly bash.
More precisely, something I consider to be a true German specialty.
And no, it’s not Bratwurst or oatmeal.
Parsley is an excellent source of iron if you’re on a plant-based or vegetarian diet, or if you eat little meat. The best source, incidentally, is… young nettle — but only in spring, when the shoots are fresh. It makes excellent pesto.
However, this is non-heme iron, Fe³⁺ (remember that from middle school chemistry?), which must be reduced to the divalent form, Fe²⁺ — called heme iron — before it can be absorbed. The key point in the kitchen is that non-heme iron is much less readily absorbed.
The Belgian-Swiss chocolate giant Barry Callebaut is working on cell-based cocoa.
This is probably the first case of this technology being applied to a plant-based product.
The effects of climate-change-driven weather anomalies are already being felt by all lovers of the two pillars of our culture and civilization: coffee and chocolate.
Coffee and cocoa prices have been hitting record highs for about two years now.
The European Commission wants to ban the use of 29 meat-related names to describe plant-based products.
This proposal effectively highlights the contradictions that plague the Commission and the EU as a whole. It comes just after the European Court of Justice blocked a French law that tried to enforce such a ban on a national level.
I’m not a dessert guy. Nor am I a baker or pastry chef.
Though in reality — and not just in my current job — you often have to be a one-man army and do everything.
Lately, for added fun, it’s been my eating disorder that’s been pushing me toward experimenting with sweets of all kinds.
INGREDIENTS:
1. You’re on your feet all the time. Your legs and spine feel it.
During a workday, depending on the nature of your position, you might easily walk 10 to 20 kilometers. Often carrying heavy loads — in my case, it’s usually up to 20 kg, but hauling 50 kg bags of vegetables is nothing unusual in this job.
2. It’s hot and humid.
All the guests have left already, the weather is… Tippischenorddeutcheswetter, meaning rain turns into drizzle or downpour half the day, so not exactly the time to go anywhere.
Although… I’ve survived rainy walks before.
A year ago, I got caught on my way to the city (6 km) for a train to Hamburg, just on the outskirts, luckily, by the storm that swept through Hamburg and wrecked the fan zone at Millerntor.