Flour + eggs = PASTA

Last week I was watching Jamie Oliver and his new show, 'Jamie at home'. I think it's in its second season in the UK, but it is new for us here in Norway. It's my favorite Jamie Oliver show thus far. He has this cottage out in the country where he has a HUGE garden and a hippy gardener called Brian.

Every week he picks something from the garden or farm to make stuff with: eggs, root vegetables, fowl, lamb, greens, ect. Well, last week, Jamie was making things with eggs. Not just any eggs, but free range organic eggs. But before he got to the cooking, he gave us all a lesson in why eating eggs from caged chickens is really inherently evil. To illustrate his point, he took a chicken, whom he had heroically adopted to come live in freedom at his little farm and join the free range chicken flock, out of its cage, and the chicken just stood there, not moving a muscle.

IT DIDN'T KNOW HOW TO RUN! And the comb on top of its little chicken head was really anemic looking when it should have been vibrant red!

The lesson was for us to always buy free range chicken eggs.

But do what you want.

So, with his eggs, he was going to make pasta. I love homemade pasta. Last Christmas Christopher gifted me with a stainless steel pasta maker. I was in pasta heaven for months and we used it often. When we moved last summer, it got put away and I had really kind of forgotten about it.

Until Mr. Oliver and his free range eggs.

So, lets make pasta!

I just followed Jamie's basic pasta recipe:

100 grams of flour per person
1 egg per 100 grams of flour. I used Tipo '00' flour. It is an Italian pasta flour. Look for it in your grocers baking section.

I have made pasta 2 times in the last few days, one batch of plain and one batch of spinach, so the photos are mixed together a bit!

Put the ingredients into your food processor and pulse it until it resembles crumbs. Pour it out on a floured surface and knead the heck out of it.



Once your dough is smooth, break it into 4 different pieces and get ready to roll it through your pasta machine. I find it a bit difficult to give you good directions, so I will just copy and paste the instructions from Jamie Olivers website:

"Dust your work surface with some Tipo ‘00’ flour, take a lump of pasta dough the size of a large orange and press it out flat with your fingertips. Set the pasta machine at its widest setting - and roll the lump of pasta dough through it. Lightly dust the pasta with flour if it sticks at all. Click the machine down a setting and roll the pasta dough through again. Fold the pasta in half, click the pasta machine back up to the widest setting and roll the dough through again. Repeat this process five or six times. It might seem like you're getting nowhere, but in fact you're working the dough, and once you've folded it and fed it through the rollers a few times, you'll feel the difference. It'll be smooth as silk and this means you're making wicked pasta!



Now it's time to roll the dough out properly, working it through all the settings on the machine, from the widest down to around the narrowest. Lightly dust both sides of the pasta with a little flour every time you run it through. When you've got down to the narrowest setting, to give yourself a tidy sheet of pasta, fold the pasta in half lengthways, then in half again, then in half again once more you've got a square-ish piece of dough. Turn it 90 degrees and feed it through the machine at the widest setting. As you roll it down through the settings for the last time, you should end up with a lovely rectangular silky sheet of dough with straight sides - just like a real pro!"

See how easy Jamie makes it sound? When you have a long sheet, flour it a bit, fold it in half, then in half again, so it looks like this:



I used to roll the sheets through the cutting mechanism of the machine, but Jamie's method is much easier. Just CUT it!!



After you cut the pasta, pick it up and use your fingers to separate the strands:



Here are your two different kinds of pasta after they have been cut and tossed:
Plain egg noodles:



Spinach egg noodles:



For the plain egg noodles, I made a gorgeous pasta carbonara on Friday night:



And tonight, I made an equally gorgeous bolognese sauce for the spinach pasta:



There is no telling when my current pasta obsession will end. It is one of those things that I think is really amazing, to start out with flour and eggs and end up with perfect noodles! Noodles that I made! From scratch!

It is magical!

The Bagel Woman Cometh...

As is typical of me, the craving demon hit me at some point last weekend, Saturday evening to be specific. I couldn't tell you what triggered it, but suddenly, I HAD to have bagels. It might have been residual craving left over from the Reuben episode a few weeks earlier. I don't know. It doesn't matter.

All you need to know is that I had to make bagels. So, let's make bagels shall we?

So, I hopped on over to Recipezaar, you know, where the worlds recipes are, to look for a bagel recipe.

There were alot on there, so I found a basic one and, since I don't ever follow recipes, I proceeded to make it my own. I wanted to make them whole grain, with a high fiber content, the ultimate goal being to make them as Weight Watchers friendly as possible! Those of you who follow 'the plan' will know what I am talking about- Anyhoo, these are delish and are only 2 points!


Basic Bagel Recipe:
1 1/2 cups warm water
2 packages yeast
1 pinch of sugar (to activate the yeast)
1 pinch of salt
3 1/2 cups flour- I used 1 cup of spelt flour, 2 1/2 cups of whole wheat flour. I also added flax seeds and about half a cup of oatbran.
2 quarts water , to boil
1 egg white

My bemused husband could only shake his head when I pulled out the Kenmore Pro mixer at 8pm, but I think you know by now, it had to be done.

First, put the water and sugar in the bowl of a mixer and let the sugar dissolve. Add the yeast and let it stand til it gets frothy, like so:



Combine the flours and salt, dump it into the mixer and mix on low speed using the dough hook for about 10 minutes or so. Put it in a greased bowl, cover it and let it rise til it is doubled in size. Preheat the oven to 350!



Once the dough doubles, punch it down, turn it out onto a floured surface, and divide it into 12 equal balls, like so:



At this point, fill a pot up with water and put it on the stove to BOIL. Meanwhile, go back to your bagel balls, take each ball and punch a whole through its middle, so they look like this:



Cover them and let them rise a bit more. I was making everything bagels, so I got together what I wanted on the top. I used chopped fresh basil, sea salt, cracked pepper, rosemary, sesame seeds and some crushed red pepper:



Now for the fun part, dunking the bagels in scalding water! I think this is what makes them chewy, but I am no bagel expert.

At this point, the water should be boiling. Turn it off. Take the bagels 4 at a time (depending on how big your stock pot is) and drop them in the water. About 45 seconds on each side. Put them onto a baking sheet:



Now take the egg white and brush the tops of the bagels and dunk them in your toppings:



Slap them in the oven til they are golden brown, about 20 to 35 minutes, I can't say for sure cause I don't know how hot your oven runs. IF you want, you can flip them half way through.
Suddenly, you have BAGELS! Amazing, no??



I devoured 2 right then and there and they were DELISH.
I went to bed happy.

The next morning, a rare thing happened here in Norway, the sun came out!!! After months of darkness, I could feel my soul stirring in reaction to the rays of the sun. I knew the weather could change quickly, so with military precision, I orchestrated our first outdoor breakfast of the year. I was handing things to Christopher and shouting 'Go! Go! Go!'. Just kidding. I wasn't shouting that, but I really wanted to catch the sun while it was a-shinin'.

So, we set the table and the bagels performed so well! Here is what Christopher had for his sunny breakfast:




And here was mine:



So, we ate our bagels, soaking up the late winter sun, wrapped in scarves and coats, drank our hot coffee and enjoyed every minute of it!!

Now go make bagels!!!!

The Most Pitiful Thing. EVER.

So, as chihuahuas often do, our little Elly went for a teeth cleaning at the vet on Tuesday. I took her to the vet and it was pouring down rain. We walked in and two HUGE dogs were in a shouting match and my little Elly was shaking like a leaf. What had started as an unusual and rare morning walk, had ended up at the vet, and I could sense her suspicion. She probably thought I just brought her with me to buy some more dried pig ears. I think she remembered she had just been here a few days earlier. So, the technician came to take her away and THOSE EYES! She was looking at me like: 'Whoa! What is going on here?? Who is this? Really? Are you letting her take me away? Hold up sister! Are you leaving me here???? NOOOOOOOOOOOO' Ok, so that is a dramatic re-enactment, and she probably had no clue what was happening. But it was pitiful and I felt HORRIBLE. So guilty. I walked back to train in a daze, hoping that the Norwegians hadn't accidentally written 'euthanize' instead of 'teeth cleaning' on her forms.

They knocked her out good and when we picked her up she was a shell of her usual self.

Like a limp noodle. A rag doll. She was flopping all over the place. Tongue hanging out, body like jello. I was so scared to see her, but when she heard my voice, the only sign of life was the faint wag of her tail. We put her on the ground when we got home and had to take off our coats. She was stumbling around like a drunk on a 3 day binge. She kept falling over. I felt so sorry for her, so naturally, I had to take pictures, cause at the same time, I couldn't stop laughing.

Sweetest dog ever.





Sometimes all you need is a little sheltering and some love:



Say it with me:
Awwwwwwwww.

Tag, you're it!

I've been tagged by Jen at 'Use Real Butter' and can I just say what a THRILL it gave me? I LOVE her blog and have mentioned it several times on this one,usually for sending me into fits of cravings after having seen something she has made. She is amazing and is worthy of your reading! So, needless to say, being tagged by her felt a little like getting asked to sit with the popular kids at lunch.

Here are the rules:
1. Link to your tagger and post these rules.
2. Share 5 facts about yourself.
3. Tag 5 people at the end of your post and list their names (linking to them).
4. Let them know they’ve been tagged by leaving a comment at their blogs.

So, FIVE things about me:

1. As a child, I was OBSESSED with The Chronicles of Narnia. I wanted DESPERATLY to get transported into Narnia to do Aslan's work thereby fulfilling my destiny. I do not know how many times I read 'The Lion, the Witch and the Wardrobe', it never got old. My greatgrandmother, Mama, had an old wardrobe in her closet and I used to go in there and stand in front of the old piece of furniture with butterflies in my stomach, knowing that THIS time, I would go through it and end up in a snowy, wintery Narnia, just like Lucy had. Of course I was always bitterly disappointed, but that didn't stop me from having the FAITH that it just might happen...someday. When I moved to Norway, we were out for a walk in the woods one day and I suddenly looked up, and my heart skipped a beat. Whenever I had imagined what my first view of Narnia would be, was right before me, and it gave me goosebumps:



Alas, Aslan did not come bounding out of the forest, but it made me feel good inside to have a bit of my childhood desire fulfilled in a very unexpected way!

2. When I was 2 or so, I thought it would be a good idea to drink some 'Liquid Gold' furniture polish. Who knows why. Panic ensued. I was rushed to the hospital and saved. Death by furniture polish, what a pitiful way to go. I am probably the reason why they invented child safety tops shortly thereafter:



3. My husband and I are in Rick Steve's Scandanavia 2007 travel book! Long story short, he came to Oslo to do research, we showed him around town, he took a picture of us holding a pack of hotdogs and a six pack of beer and the rest is history! It's in the Oslo section. Good times:



4. Very little grosses me out. I don't know why. Give me blood, vomit, poo, whatever, I can handle it. Makes me think I have way undershot my potential and I should have been a surgeon.

5. I have a highly developed sense of smell. I can tell you the different smells and tastes in wines and identify the various notes in perfumes with astounding accuracy. It is kind of weird. And I also associate smell with taste. For example, I will say 'Oh, this tastes like honeysuckle smells'. There is a scientific name for it, but I can't remember what it is. Oh, and I smell diabetic people


There you go. Those are some fascinating things about yours truly!

So now, who to tag?

1. I tag Amylia Mainly because I think she is a pretty amazing person. She writes beautifully and always makes me think. Plus, she got to go to an Oprah taping last week, and I think that is REALLY something. PLUS, she is an identical twin, and since losing my little sister Courtney, who was also an identical twin, I have an ifinity for those single egg pairs.

2. The Homesick Texan:
This girl is amazing! Whenever I am feeling down in the dumps and missing Texas, I go over to her blog and feel my soul being FILLED. Everything she makes is MAGIC.

3. Shell at 'Fiber among the roses'. I don't know her yet, but people who can knit and make ACTUAL things you can WEAR, I find VERY impressive!

4.
5.

Sad, I know, but I don't know anyone else to tag! So, I am breaking the rules.
Sorry!!!

Thank you Jen for tagging me!

Oh, Reuben, how your memory haunts me...

As many of you know by now, I am a woman driven by cravings. The general rule seems to be, if I can't find it here in Norway, I crave it even more.

I'm not sure why, but I have never been one to get excited about sandwiches. You would never catch me saying 'A sandwich just isn't a sandwich without the tangy zip of Miracle Whip'. Now, I won't turn up my nose to a good pimento cheese or a BLT. My dad made the best homemade pimento cheese and the BLT's weren't too shabby, but other than that, sandwiches don't really float my boat.

Except for one.

I don't know where my love affair with Reuben began, it didn't seem significant at the time, but it has endured the test of time. I think it is the combination of the of the saurkraut, the rye bread, the corned beef, the russian dressing, all of it grilled til it's all melty and delicious.

To me, it is food porn. And it all culminated last summer in New York City. I had one singular goal. It was to go to the legendary Carnegie Deli and order a Reuben and possibly be yelled at by the grumpy old waitresses.

It was classic. We went in, sat down, and our waitress, who had to have been at least 75, came over, slammed our silverware down and said, in a voice like gravel, 'Whaddya havin'??'. I knew instinctively that I shouldn't ask for ANYTHING on the side and that substitutions would NOT be tolerated. Even though she couldn't have been an inch over 4 foot 11, you could tell the tourists were terrified of her. She was the queen.

She took our order, shuffled to the counter and hollered our order to the cooks, and moments later, my perfect, gorgeous reuben was before me. I was living the New York dream and it was PERFECT.




Well, I hadn't thought of Reuben since, until Sunday. I went over to 'Use Real Butter', that is Jenny's blog. She is a kitchen goddess and her blog is like CRACK to me. Inevitably, I always see something on her blog that sends me into a complete craving spiral. Well, of course she had made a perfect, gorgeous Reuben! Just seeing it again made my mouth water. And that was that.

I HAD TO HAVE A REUBEN!

One teeny, tiny problem: I LIVE IN NORWAY!! I had a feeling this wouldn't end well, but I was determined to try. I needed rye bread, saurkraut, swiss cheese, corned beef and thousand island dressing. I had ZERO of those things and had very low hopes of finding them here in Scandanavia. So my turning Oslo upside down yielded the following: Spelt sourdough bread, low fat Jarlsberg cheese, Pastrami and norwegian saurkraut. I went ahead and made homemade thousand island dressing. I was determined to TRY and recreate what I had in NYC.
So lets get started shall we?

My scandanavian ingredients:



A close up of the pastrami and cheese, really cause I liked the way it looked:



Putting it together:



Grilling up nicely:



Out of the cast iron skillet and on to the cutting board:



And onto my plate:


I wish I could say that it totally satisfied my craving, but it didn't. I just kept thinking about the mean old waitress and my perfect Reuben in New York City.

Then I felt sorry for my little pitiful norwegian reuben. It couldn't help it that we were in Norway! So, I pushed NY Reuben out of my mind, and enjoyed the Nor-reuben thoroughly!

But how the memory haunts me...

The times they are a-changin'

I know it's been awhile since I have posted and I am sorry, but I have been a little conflicted. I love blogging and I love writing about things that happen in my life, but I always feel guilty writing about random things on a blog called 'the beautiful diabetic'. I feel like I should be writing things about diabetes. And, to be honest, I feel like diabetes is such a small part of who I am, that I feel CONFINED. Heart disease is a much more pressing matter for me. I could rename the blog 'Long Qt girl', but again, it's only a small part.

The sad part is, i LOVE the name. The Beautiful Diabetic. Here is what I wrote on my very first blog entry:

"I didn't decide on the name out of vanity and strong conviction of my beauty. I decided on the name because I am tired of disease marking people as 'flawed' or 'weak' or 'sad' or 'dying'. I decided on the name after living with disease throughout the last decade. After watching an UGLY disease kill my little sister, who truly was beautiful. After realizing that I have spent too many years at war with this thing called my body. Calling it names that are ugly and spiteful. No more. I am diabetic and I am beautiful. Therefore I am the beautiful diabetic. I expect those words to love each other. To be what my mother always called 'Fast Friends'. To wrap around each other in a warm embrace, like two things that were always meant to be, but were always somehow kept apart. A homecoming of sorts. Where diabetic will say to beautiful- 'At last!' And beautiful will say to diabetic- 'It's so good to see you!' And two words who have been kept apart, will fall together naturally, and suddenly the beautiful diabetic will have taken flight."

Isn't that poetic and nice? To me it was. It just RESONATED within me.
So, I don't know what to do. Can I keep on being JUST the beautiful diabetic, when I feel like there is so much more? Is it just me? Is the name not that big of a deal?
Maybe I can just call it 'the beautiful' and leave it at that.

So, here is one of those beautiful moments of my life that I have been thinking about lately.

One of the highlights in my life thus far happened in the summer of 2002. I was in Japan with my mom, aunt and cousin. We took the bullet train from Tokyo to Mt. Fuji. We got to Fuji-san (as the locals call it), and it just so happened that we were there in the middle of the few weeks that it is open for climbers. Well, for some reason, Megan and I thought it would be a good idea to climb it. Why not, right??

In hindsight, there were MANY reasons NOT to. However, those eluded me at the time. I was engulfed by the challenge of it all. I was standing at the base of Mt. Fuji! THE Mt. Fuji!!! I was flooded with emotions. My little sister had recently died. I had had my first heart surgery and I was angry at my body. I was angry at many things, and it felt as though I had something to PROVE. I wanted to prove to myself that I could do ANYTHING despite the betrayal of my body and my bad heart. So, the combination of Mt. Fuji and a girl with a dead sister and a flawed heart seemed like a match made in heaven.

My mother protested. I could not be swayed. So,she and my aunt returned to Tokyo with hugs and tears and the promise that we would meet them tomorrow.

So, here is the scene. Climbing this sucker was not planned. Apparantly, if you intend to climb a mountain, it's best to prepare and do a little research and planning. There is a list of things you need, we had a total of ZERO of those things. To help you understand my idiocy, here is a visual of mountain climbing Kathryn:
White linen shirt under a pair of blue jean overalls topped with a stylish black cashmere sweater. I had on thin socks and a pair of running shoes. OH, and for some reason I had a red bandana. Oh yea, sounds like I was really prepared. We bought rain slickers, gloves and walking sticks in the supply shop and started our climb.

It was actually pretty easy. At first.

We met people from all over on the mountain. The higher we got, the vistas became increasingly beautiful. 5 hours into it, I was cold, I was exhausted, I was in pain, but I was determined. I would pick a place in the distance and tell myself that I just had to make it to that point and then I could quit. I would get to a point and I would suddenly look beyond it and see other mountains below it, and I would be flooded with emotion. I kept thinking about my sister and how she would NEVER have the chance to do this, to see this...and I wept.

I wept as I climbed. I wept as I thought of Courtney and a life without her. I wept as I yelled at God for taking her and I wept as I thanked Him for the grace and mercy He gave to survive it. It was a mess of emotions. It was intense, but I continued.

It was really stupid to be there in the first place, but as night fell, we were halfway to the summit. They say you should climb halfway, sleep for a few hours in a mountain hut, get up at 2am and continue to the summit to be there in time for sunrise. The Japanese call it 'Buddah's Halo'.

In this hut we met 3 older Japenese men. They met every year to climb Fuji-san. By the end of the night, they had adopted us. My Japanese grandfather was called Shimnee. I think he could tell instantly that I would need help. Megan went on at a olympic pace with the other two old men, and Shimnee stayed behind with me, the obvious weak link.

As we climbed in the darkness, we shared stories. I told him about my sister and he was silent and understanding when I cried. He told me about his life and his wife and children. We were moving slow. It was hard to breath at that altitude.

But I was determined.

I was having to stop alot. I was freezing and Megan had mercifully given me her coat that she just happened to have. I kept sitting on big boulders along the trail and Shimnee would admonish me and say 'No Katrin-san, you must rest standing style. No sit.' It was a race.

I NEEDED to be there at sun rise.

It was so quiet on the mountain. I could hear a clanking noise and I turned to look and there was a snake of lights wrapping down the mountain. The noise was the swaying of lanterns. There were hundreds of people making their way to the top. It was a stunning image, pitch black on the side of Mt. Fuji with hundreds of flickering pin pricks of light. All of these people going to the top. I seriously doubted I could finish. I hurt EVERYWHERE.

And then I heard my name being called. It was Megan and she was smiling and waving. She had made it to the top. The sun was getting ready to appear and Shimnee put his hand on my back and said 'We finish now', and with that, I took a deep breath, and with everything in me, I climbed that mountain. Megan and the other 2 old men were cheering me on, Shimnee was right by me silently willing me to continue. I was so close and I was STILL crying and then, I WAS THERE!

I was on the top of Mt. Fuji! I did it! I was totally overwhelmed. I was hugging Megan and Shimnee and the other men and everyone was doing a little half bow thing and then it happened. A collective 'OOOhhhh' spread across the summit.

It was like a crack in the steel grey sky. Like fire and light had just cut through the darkness. Then the sun rose in all its glory and it took my breath away and I wept again. But this time, I felt new. I felt cleansed. I felt STRONG. It was in that moment that Megan called me again and said 'Smile!! You did it!'

I did it.

One agonizing step at a time, I climbed a mountain and a part of me was reborn:

White Pizza. mmmm, mmmm good.

Pizza, in my opinion, is probably close to being a PERFECT food. I really love it, and a pizza done well can elicit moans. As a diabetic, I need to be careful with pizza, as it is one of those things that can get my blood sugar levels out of whack quickly. And as one who tries to adhere to the principles of Weight Watchers, pizza is one of those things that does not make it into my menu rotation often.

However, neither of those things can stop the craving.

The key for me is the crust. I am a thin crust kind of girl. I NEVER understood those people who didn't eat the end of their pizza crusts. I am always the girl asking those people, 'um, you're not going to eat those? Can I have them??' Deep down, it just seems WRONG to waste them. So, Friday night we decided to make pizza. Of the white variety. So simple and so tasty. Here is what you need:

Ready made whole wheat pizza dough. (usually found in the biscuit section)
Ricotta cheese- fat free, low fat or regular
Fresh Mozzarella
Shredded mozzarella- reduced fat
Fresh Basil, torn into pieces
Thinly sliced red onion
Crushed red chili
Olive oil
fresh basil and parmesean cheese for garnish.

Take your pizza dough and roll it out until it is VERY thin. You will need to flour the counter to keep it from sticking.

Put the rolled out dough on a baking sheet with baking paper, or even better, on a pizza stone.

Spread the ricotta evenly on the dough, kind of like cream cheese. drizzle a good quality olive oil on top. Add sea salt and fresh cracked pepper.

Sprinkle the shredded mozzarella on top. You don't need the whole bag. Tear up the fresh mozzarella and distribute it evenly. Follow with the basil, red onion and crushed chili:



Here's a close up:

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Slap in a HOT oven, around 225 celcius, on the bottom shelf. Let it bake for about 15 minutes. Just keep checking on it cause cooking times vary from oven to oven. Take it out when it is golden and bubbly:



Slice it and garnish it with fresh parmesean and basil:



Take a couple of slices and enjoy. This is one good pizza. Whether it's the lack of tomatoes and meat, I'm not sure, but it is brilliant in its simplicity:

Embrochette. Not as fancy pants as the name sounds!

So, as we often do, we went to Sweden yesterday to shop for cheap meat. That always sounds funny to me. Being from Texas, which is HUGE, the thought of going to an entirely different COUNTRY to grocery shop doesn't even begin to register. Because of that, even though I have been countless times now, I ALWAYS get excited about going to SWEDEN for groceries.

Things are cheaper in Sweden and the Norwegian kroner has about 15 percent on it's Swedish counterpart, so not only do we get cheap meat, we get an additional 15 percent off thanks to the favorable exchange rate.
Sweden is cheaper because they are part of the European Union and Norway is not. So, as an example, where a kilo of lean ground beef runs about $30 in the kingdom of Norway, in Sweden the same thing runs about $10. You do the math.

Anyway, yesterday was the day for Sweden. We set out from downtown Oslo where it was cold and raining and by the time we got outside the city, it was full on SNOWING hard. The roads were horrible. We were sliding around and I was terrified. My husband took it all in stride assuring me time and again that he had full control, but miss Houston, Texas was not convinced. White knuckled, I tried to think happy thoughts that would take my mind off of the snowy nightmare unfolding on the highway in front of us. So, naturally, I thought of food.

So, while Christopher dealt with REALITY and bravely navigated the icy roads, I was daydreaming of being at Pappasito's in Houston. You could call Pappasito's highend Tex Mex, not really authentic, but certainly good. I love their beef fajitas and I LOVE, love their shrimp embrochette.

Embrochette. It sounds very french and fancy, but if you deconstruct it, it seems very simple. Shrimp. Cheese. Jalepenos. Bacon. That's it. I was thinking that I could make that, when my cooking fantasy was interrupted by our imminent arrival at the grocery store in Sweden.

We had friends come over last night, so I decided I would get all 'I have dreams of owning my own Tex Mex restaurant' on them, and I tackled the embrochette head on. It was suprisingly easy and the results coaxed 'oohs' and 'ahhhs' out of our guests. Here is what you need:

8 Large shrimp or scallops
8 to 16 small, thin squares of white cheddar
1 fresh jalepeno, deseeded and deribbed and cut into 16 thin strips
8 strips of THIN bacon.

I used scallops because that is what I had on hand, and I really LOVE scallops:



And here are the ingredients you need:



Grab a scallop and butterfly it like so:



Take 2 strips of jalepeno and cross them and put a piece or 2 of cheese over it:



Continue with all the scallops and wrap them each in a piece of bacon. Treat the bacon as you would a ribbon on a gift. Same concept and you don't have to use toothpicks this way:



Put them all in a pan on medium high heat and cook them on each side until the bacon is crispy and the cheese is melty:



Meanwhile I took a head of baby cabbage and sliced it into thin ribbons and tossed it with a light coating of Greek dressing. I also whipped up some pico de gallo and guacamole and fried some strips of corn tortilla for garnish. The end result was gorgeous:



My guests were impressed and it is easy to understand why. It truly is one of the most PERFECT flavor combinations. The heat from the deseeded jalepenos is mild. The smokiness of the bacon perfectly flavors the scallop and the cheese gets all melty and crusty in the pan. Every bite seems perfectly balanced in your mouth.

Simply divine.

There aint nothin' like Texas barbeque!

Happy New Year, y'all!

Thanks for all your emails inquiring to my whereabouts! I have been stateside for 2 weeks, got back to Norway and was struck down by a vicious flu bug. I am hardly myself, but getting strength back daily!!!! I have been DYING to update the blog for days now!

So, over the holidays, I was charged with the task of showing Texas to my husbands parents who came to Houston from Norway for a week of FUN!! Seeing as I am obsessed with food, I had quite the culinary list compiled. Actually, there were only 3 things that I knew they MUST have while in Texas:

1. Texas Barbeque
2. Authentic Tex-Mex
3. Whataburger

We'll get to numbers 2 and 3 later. Let me set the scene for you. We are driving on Highway 59 from Nacogdoches (the oldest town in Texas and birthplace of yours truly)and my sister and I are looking for a barbeque joint. There is no such thing as a barbeque 'restaurant', it needs to be a barbeque JOINT. Suddenly, we spied a trailer on the right side of the road and a sign that said 'Dee's Barbeque' and 'come right on in!!!'. I knew instantly that we had to go there.

It was one of those great East Texas days. Clear and chilly (mid 40's). Everything felt crisp. We stepped out of the car and the heady aroma of smoking meat was in the air. It was amazing. Excitedly, we all moved towards the double-wide. I was giddy as I just knew instinctivly that this was one of those joints that would be memorable and a real experience for my inlaws. I was not disappointed.

We walked in and were greeted by long tables covered in red and white checkered table cloths and a smiling gentleman who welcomed us with 'Hey Y'all! Welcome!' That turned out to be Ronnie of Dee's barbeque. He got quite excited when I told him I had people in there from Norway who had never had real barbeque before and he insisted that we sign his guestbook, saying 'I've never had anyone from Europe in here before!'. It was awesome!

Now, I'm a simple gal, and one of my most favorite things is a chopped beef sandwich, so of course we ordered those. Ronnie uses brisket for his chopped beef sandwich, and a good one is a thing of beauty. Soft white bread, slices of white onion, sour dill pickles, brisket and barbeque sauce. Such an amazing combination and Ronnie did not disappoint:





A true sign of a good piece of smoked brisket is the pink ring around the edges. The tell tale sign of proper smoking. This sandwich was PERFECT!

We also ordered a plate of mixed meat, which turned out to be brisket, sausage and ribs:



We had just eaten breakfast about 2 hours earlier, so we didn't order beans and potato salad, just the meat and big 'ol Dr. Peppers.

You don't get much more Texas than that!

So, if your ever driving down 59 and passing through Corrigan, Texas, be sure to stop at Dee's Barbeque, it's the kind of place you can smell in your hair hours after leaving:

Breakfast: The MOST important meal.

So, to make up for the coma inducing marshmallows I posted last week, I thought I would post about my new favorite breakfast: Pumpkin Oatmeal.

I first heard about pumpking oatmeal on the Weight Watchers Core board. It always sounded really interesting, but sadly, involved a can of pumpkin, which I cannot get here in Norway. That is one of the most challenging things about being away from Texas. No Kroger. No Piggly Wiggly. No Whole Foods. No canned pumpkin. I have seen canned pumpkin on occaision, but I just can't bring myself to pay over 6 dollars for a can of it. I don't care if it is Libby's. This past Thanksgiving, one of my culinary triumphs was a homemade pumpkin pie from scratch. In looking for a recipe, I learned that the kind of pumpkin you choose is very important. There are pie pumpkins, and these are NOT the ones you carve up at halloween. So, as usual, I bundled up and went on a search. Here, pumpkin is called 'gresskar' and it has a beige outerskin and it's brilliant orange on the inside. I quickly found it, and luckily they cut it for you and sell it by the kilo, so you don't have to buy a whole pumpkin. They had some at my local Turkish store on the corner, big chunks wrapped in saranwrap, vivid orange:



Good enough, I thought, and I bought it. Thus began my love affair with pumpkin oatmeal. If you like pumpkin pie, you will LOVE this breakfast, if you don't, well, you won't.

Here is what you need:
2 to 4 cups of cooked plain oatmeal
2 cups of fresh mashed pumpkin OR 1 can
1 egg
can of fat free evaporated milk
nutmeg, cinnamon, splenda
handful of raisins
handful of walnuts

So take your fresh pumpkin, (if you have a can, just skip all of this part), cut it into chunks, boil it until it is soft, take the skin off and mash it in a bowl:



To this pretty orange mash, mix in your egg, the milk, the spices and the splenda. You are just making pumpkin pie filling, but instead of pouring it into a pie crust, you will pour it into oatmeal.

Once you have your piefilling made, add it to the cooked oatmeal, stirring well to combine. Throw in your raisins and walnuts and voila:



Seriously, this is soooo good! I usually make a big batch and just heat up a little every morning for breakfast. Oatmeal is a great choice for anyone with bloodsugar issues as it is fairly low on the Glycemic Index. I usually have an egg with it as well to get a good balance of carbs and protein and it always holds me until lunch.

Try it.

It truly is a bowl full of LOVE:

The evolution of a marshmallow.

This is what happens to marshmallows in my house. I tried to think of a good fate for them. I wanted people to oooh and ahhhh, so naturally, that ruled out rice krispies treats.

This was the best I could come up with: Melted raspberry dark chocolate and crushed almonds:



I think if you look close enough you can see the vanilla bean:




They were packed into cookie tins to await their 'tin mates', who will be born sometime this weekend.

Ah, the life of a marshmallow.

Not too shabby.