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november, lately
hello all,happy thanksgiving week! it started snowing sunday night and there was a blanket of snow on the ground by monday morning – and still snowing (despite what the photo above from a lovely day last month shows!). i really got in a more wintery mood in iceland as there were no leaves on the trees anymore and festive decorations all over the main streets, but there is absolutely nothing like a blanket of snow on a monday morning to get your week going! (if you like snow, that is) since coming back from my trip, i’ve just felt like there are endless things to do – catching up on…
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expat thoughts on the bake off finale
a bake-off post! in case you still aren’t sure what i’m nattering on about, i’ve been baking along this autumn to the show, the great british bake off (series 9) which just had the finale this week. as i know this series will hit the states several months later, i just want to say: i will mention the winner of this series sometime in the post (spoiler alert!), so if that matters to you, go ahead and skip to my bakes (below) or click out. but something has been rattling around in the old craw about this year’s bakers that i just felt like i had to comment on. i…
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october, lately + bake off update
hi guys. it’s been a strange start to the school year this time around. i’ve had a few work switcheroos and cancelled lessons throwing me for a loop – not exactly the kind of thing you want to have happen a month or so before you go on a big trip. ohhh, did i mention i was going on a trip next month? more perceptive readers will know i tend to post my travel plans on this page as soon as i’ve scheduled them, but i haven’t yet got a chance to mention that next month, one of my biggest travel dreams is going to come true. one that i…
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SEPTEMBER LATELY (& bake off week 2+3)
hi friends! some happenings of the past couple of weeks… SELF-STUDY maybe it’s the back to school fervor combined with more time than usual before all my courses start again, but i’ve been positively swept up in a very literary and studious obsession lately. between furiously reading the best book i’ve read in years and trying to finish my german course book from the summer before my lessons begin next week (with a bit of herbal studies sprinkled in when time allowed), september has been very scholarly for me. of course, the amount of language study still can’t compare with doing the intensive course and homework last month, but i’ve still…
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happy september, indeed! + bake along #1 (biscuits)
well, we’ve made it to six years in europe, y’all. i don’t know how it happened and this year, it was certainly against all possible odds, but it did. that’s right! our major visa issues have been resolved thanks to the wonderful people we know here in budejovice and apparently, they are the right sorts of people to know. i am ever so grateful. i’ve heard about others in the same situation as us not having quite the luck we did and that it had been the end of the road. but for us, not today. cynthia and alex are going to keep this crazy thing going into year seven.…
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sunday cookin’: yorkshire pudding & mushroom gravy
alright, i admit it! not officially participating in the bake off bake along this year has me feeling a bit shut out of the kitchen. although it’s lovely, because i can bake when/what i want, i did want to try something that really grabbed me from the show if i saw anything. as i watched last week’s “batter” episode of this season of the great british bake-off, i smiled as they announced the contestants had to make yorkshire puddings. my personal experience with yorkshire puddings is kind of silly:the first evening in our cottage in arisaig, scotland, i went rifling through the freezer to see what past guests had left behind and saw…
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the bake off bake along, week 10 (finals)
you guys. it’s been a long road these past ten weeks, but the great british bake off bake along has come to an end. i went from a completely novice baker who only made cookies to a person who made biscotti, creme brulee, a frickin’ seven layer czech cake with no sugar in it, and so many more. i learned so many baking terms. i made custard at least three different times. i would say i am no longer afraid to attempt those recipes that seem a little out there; that this baking challenge has made me realize that i can do it. i mean, if i can do a…
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the bake off bake along, week 9
how funny– we all started bake off in the beginning of august and now instead of sundresses, i’m wearing hoodies to bake! i was pretty thrilled about chocolate week, because guys, i think that alternative ingredients week killed my baking mojo. i was such an ambitious, chipper little squirrel that first week with my madeira cake, but every week especially after that turning point, i have rarely liked my bakes. then i almost quit during victorian week, so it’s been a bumpy ride. and perhaps you noticed… i didn’t even post a bake last week! i really wanted to, but with a weekend in the city planned, i only had…
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bake off bake along, week 7
hey friends. as some of you may have gathered, i’m participating in the 2+ month bake off bake along, a cooking and baking challenge where participants bake along with the BBC program, the great british bake off. i know some of you, dear readers, may not all be not digging all of the attention to baking on this here expat lifestyle blog of mine, but i assure you… i am starting to see the light at the end of the baking tunnel! this is the seventh week, which takes us into the dreaded victorian week. and hoo boy. i am not using dreaded lightly. as soon as i watched the…
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the bake off bake along, week 6
week 6 of the bake-off brings us to pastry week! we had to pick from a frangipane tart, flaounas (a cypriot cheese pastry), or a gazillion vol-au-vents (puff pastry hors d’ourves). though i really wanted to give the flaounas a go because they looked delicious, i happened to be the recent recipient of a bag of apples. it’s apple season! so i knew it was apple frangipane tart time. there is no way i could find almond paste, key ingredient of a frangipane, in czech grocery stores. they do have loads of marzipan, because central europe, but in the end, i actually made by own. first i decided to make…
