chicken noodle soup for the needy soul

I woke up yesterday morning with a terrible cold. The kind that makes you want to stay in bed all day in your pjs, watching old Audrey Hepburn movies and with a box of kleenex close by. (which is exactly what I did)

Unfortunately the medication I took made me sleep all day, which meant I didn't sleep at all last night. Decided this morning when my alarm went off at 6:30 that there was no way I could make it into work. One of the perks of working as an unpaid intern is that it's not a huge deal if you call in sick.

After sending my manager a text, I rolled over and went back to sleep for a few more hours. I woke up much later, with the sunlight streaming into my bedroom and was feeling much better. Yes, I was still a little stuffed up, but I didn't feel like being cooped up my room all day.

Now, yesterday when I went shopping for cold medication, I also bought some other cold fighting essentials... cough drops, OJ, ginger ale... but there was one item I couldn't find. Chicken noodle soup... just inhaling the steam from that soup helps me on my way to being cured.

This morning I decided to make some.

I did a search on the Food Network website, and after discarding a few recipes that instructed me to roast a whole chicken first (who has time for that when they're sick and hungry?) I found this one - the Monday to Friday chicken noodle soup. Just the name said 'hey, this is easy, no frills chicken soup that won't take too much time!'

I never really follow recipes completely, and I like to add some of my own ingredients as I see fit. This one was pretty simple already, so I just added some extra veggies (frozen and fresh) and played around with the amount of water. I found that it was pretty thick and not soupy enough near the end, so I added a bit more water to get more broth.

The only mistake I made was adding salt near the end without tasting first. The broth was a little too salty for my liking, but I figure when I heat up the rest I'll just add more water to dilute it a bit. I have enough left over for lunch tomorrow and dinner another night this week. Hopefully this cold won't last that long.

xo

live from the viking apartment

Just saw my cousin off at the train station and am now hanging out with my favourite viking, awaiting another sunday family dinner.

posts and photos from the weekend to come in the next few days!

wont write much though... this swedish keyboard is way too difficult to navigate.

xoxo

The most labour intensive salad...ever

I'm lucky enough to have a few wonderful friends scattered around the world, and this past weekend I went to visit two of my favourites who reside in Gernany - Fraulein Caroline and Bman. It was a lovely and relaxing weekend, definitely what I needed after a hectic few weeks in London.

Caroline and Bman love to cook and so every night was a chance to try out new recipes or bring out old favourites. On my second day there, they decided to prepare a traditional Germany dish - schnitzel paired with potato salad. Very typical Germany dish, but with a twist, the potato salad would have an asian flair to it (perhaps in honour of their visiting Chinese friend?)

Anyway, when Bman told me that we would need about 2 hours alone to prep the salad, I thought he was kidding.

He wasn't.

I won't even try and recount all of the steps to this recipe, but it involved peeling a lot of potatoes by hand using fancy German engineered potato peelers, chopping then blanching carrots, de-seeding cucumber then slicing and salting it, de-stemming cilantro and chopping the leaves, and making your own mayonnaise and fancy chili sauce

We started at around 5 and sat down to eat around 7:30. Was it worth it? Definitely. I'm actually not a huge fan of potato salad, but this one I couldn't stop eating. How can I describe this salad? It had a perfect combination of textures, from the crunchy carrots and cucumber, to the still-warm mealy potatoes. The flavour was a mixture of sweet, sour and spicy, with a dash of cilantro to finish. And to top it off, we had veal schnitzel that was perfectly tender thanks to Bman's efforts with a frying pan and a little muscle.

Thanks Fraulein and Bman again for a really wonderful weekend. I can't wait to visit you both (and tru luv) again!



Bman using his manly power and strength to crush the poor veal for our schnitzel



Attempting to use the fancy German engineered potato peeler - they have devices for everything, I should have taken a photo of the egg cutter!



Step #17 Caroline chops the carrots...



Step #52 Adding the bean sprouts



Finally we eat!

are you f-ing kidding me?

So I just spent a good half hour composing a deeply thoughtful and well-written blog post only to delete it accidentally!?!?!

Stupid blog... oh well, let's see if I can sum it up in point form

- weather has been amazing
- have got a tan
- weather will be crap soon
- only 3 hours of sunshine!?!!
- going to Germany this weekend
- attempted to row on Sunday at Regent's Park
- apparently rowing skills are up there with my frisbee skills
- ...yah that's all I've got, am going to bed now.

Here's a photo that Melon took of me relaxing on the rowboat, after I had made us go in circles and one of the guys thankfully took over.



good night people

something strange

I did something strange to my blog, was trying to add it to some sort of blog analytics website (work related) and then all of my posts disappeared!!!

Meh, sorry I haven't posted in weeks, I'll try and update tonight, but right now I"m off to go enjoy the beautiful weather!

xoxo Irene

A Sunny Weekend in London

Amazing weekend. Friday night was spent with my housemates and some new friends I just met. Saturday I managed to get out of bed and venture to Portobello Market. It was a little like Niagara Falls. You go just because it's a major tourist destination, and when you get there, you're too busy trying to walk through hordes of tourist who inevitably always walk too slow that you forget to admire the surroundings. The only difference is that instead of thundering waterfalls, you're surrounded by antique spoons and old postcards. Honestly, I wasn't a fan and won't be going back.

Afterwards I hopped onto the tube and met up with some friends for a picnic in Regents Park. Like all the other Londoners, I was basking in the sun trying to soak up as much of it while I could.

Today I went to Columbia Rd Flower Market. Like a total idiot, I left my A-Z London Street Map at my flat, so I ended up getting myself and my flatmate Rob completely lost before showing up an hour late to meet my friends. Good news is that we brought home a massive arrangement of lilies!

Tonight my friend Helen had tickets to go see an outdoor screening of "The Soloist" at the Somerset House. Amazing. We went to our friend, Tobi's place for dinner and did our traditional sunday night family dinner (I cooked this time) and then myself, Helen and Tobi headed down to the Somerset for a movie under the stars. The event was put on by a company called First Direct, all proceeds went towards a charity. As someone who's dong a little event planning, I have to say that this one was pretty amazing. The goodie bags were full of treats, and the best part was that everyone was given a blanket to sit on.

I wish I could say that I really enjoyed the film, but Jamie Fox pretending the play the cello was more than a little cringe-worthy. I won't even get into the opening scene of him playing the violin...

Unfortunately I wasn't able to use flash to capture what it was like at the Somerset House, but trust me, it was beyond cool. The perfect end to a perfect weekend.

here comes the sun...

I'm sitting at the sports field of regents park right now, and shockingly the sun is out and the sky is blue. Amazing. I might still have slight goosebumps because of the breeze (ie strong wind) but myself and what seems like half of london are taking advantage of it!

Right, I'm going to go throw my sweater back on.

Hope everyone had an amazing long weekend in canada!