St. Nikolaus Day Dinner

Happy Holidays Everyone! Here is my first holiday Tablescape...sure hope you all like it and that it inspires you to create a special tablescape of your own.

My Christmas Dishes......

love my tablecloth...red poinsettas....

Love the Christmas Bulbs.......

Happy 2nd Advent...take time and check out more great holiday tablescapes at....

Between Naps on the Porch
the tablescaper

and of course check the following blog parties for more holiday inspiration.....

Wow us Wednesday
Feature yourself Friday
Masterpiece Monday
Lets Dish Wednesday
Show and Tell Friday


and be sure to stop by this Sunday, for new Recipe Sunday here at Cook Bake Love

a wonderful surprise

What a wonderful surprise I found in my mailbox this morning---a package for me! Now,you are probably wondering; mail on Sunday? Of course that was not the case, we just didn´t check the mailbox yesterday! And, I am sort of glad we waited till today, because I was having a blue day and this package put a great big smile on my face. We used to live in cloppenburg where we had the best landlords one could ask for. Berni and Lisa were not only our landlord, but also my second set of parents. Their oldest daughter Gaby lives in Berlin and recently we all were able to sit down and have dinner together. Well, the package was from them! 3 handmade wooden mushrooms(Berni is a carpenter), made from a tree out of Gaby´s backyard! Double good! This package once again reminds me that I have family and friends scattered allover this world and that distance does not stop me from feeling so very loved by all of them.

Although, not pink I still wanted to share this picture with you on this Pink Saturday

Thermomix......Bread

Recently my friend Sabine and I went to a thermomix brunch party. We were about 20 people watching in awe what a thermomix all can do. One of the recipes our group prepared was the bread that was served. Oh it was sooo good and sooo easy. Now, I know not all of you have a thermomix, but I am pretty sure you can still enjoy this recipe(just with a little more elbow grease!)

Ingredients:

500 grams Flour ( I used spelt flour)      
1 cube of fresh yeast
1 TL Salz
280grams luke warm water
cheese
french dried onions

Once your dough is ready, place it in a cold oven, bake at 100°C and after 10 minutes brush with milk and continue baking at 200° C for app. 20 minutes.

Thanksgiving 2012.Take 2

Thanksgiving.....is really that time of year again? This year I celebrated twice, once with family in Cloppenburg and a second time, this past weekend with friends. Both celebrations were great and as always I throughly enjoyed the turkey, the mashed potatoes, the stuffing, the sweet potato casserole and oh the apple pie for desert. 

This years tablescape all came about the day, the tree guy was here to cut down one of our pine trees. What perfect charger plates, then slices of tree? My husband borrowed a chain saw and successfully sliced off some charge plates for me! Best part... my niece found them online.....40 euros for 2!!!! Hey, hey, hey I just saved myself a bundle! I think my husband would have had my hide if I would would have bought 12 of these online for that price. 

Not all the friends could be with us, but in spirit I had my girls at my side...the salt and pepper shaker are from Kirstina in Florida.

Hershey Kisses from Miss Kim!

Love all the material.....got it all in Cloppenburg at the fabric store. Wow, that store was great and I could have bought sooo much  more!

Happy Belated Thanksgiving Everyone! I hope you all had a great celebration.....I know we did!

Linking to: Between Naps on the Porch
                 The Tablescaper

Pink for the baker

My friend Adriana who now lives in California, found this pink oven mit for me! A must for every baker!!!

Happy Pink Saturday! Be sure to stop by at How Sweet the sound for some more pink!

Pumpkin Seeds!

Hello Everyone and welcome back to New Recipe Sunday! This week I would like to share with you another easy recipe. I was talking to my girlfriend in Austria the other day and we were discussing  heathly snacks(like the kale chips I told you about). She mentioned to me that you can also roast pumpkin seeds! So, yesterday after baking a pot of pumpkin soup, i took the saved seeds and roasted away! OMG! SO GOOD, I am surprised that I even managed to take the pictures we ate them so fast!

So easy, just toss with some good quality olive, some salt and roast in the oven for about 25 minutes at 325° F.

Happy Halloween

Happy Halloween 2012!

Be sure to stop by Between Naps on the Porch for more tablescapes!

Soups on!

While at the pumpkin farm, in addition to buying pumpkins to carve, we also picked up some pumpkins for cooking. In addition to the butternut squash I always buy, this year I wanted to try my hand at Hokkaido Pumpkin. OMG..... so delicious and thanks to my thermomix oh so easy to make.

Recipe: Hokkaido Pumpkin Soup with fresh ginger

Ingredients:

800 grams Hokkaido pumpkin, cut in small pieces

1 onion

fresh garlic

fresh ginger

cayenne pepper

salt, pepper and nutmeg

200 grams orange juice

500 grams veggie broth

200 grams cream

A City goes Pink

In honor of Breast Awareness, the city of Hamburg Germany went pink! My niece Heidi who lives in Hamburg took this wonderful picture.

Happy Pink Saturday Everyone. Be sure to stop by How Sweet the Sound for more pink!

How a stop at the book store can inspire me

Yesterday I made a quick trip to the mall, to go to one of my favorite places: TJ Maxx! This time instead of buying kitchen supplies, I actually spent some time looking through the clothes and found some nice items to wear to work. After my TJMAXX fix, I stopped at the book store and found a book called "111 spots i Berlin that one has to see" Wow, there sure are alot of places I still need to go to and explore, app 109! This afternoon we were able to knock the list down to 108, as we made the trip to Prenzlauer Berg to go the  "Book Forest".  You might have heard of the Book Forest, if not go to "www.bookcrossing.com". It really is only a small group of trees, but one small group that is filled with books. You can take a book and replace it with another.....what a cool idea. We put a book in the tree.. it is registered at bookcrossing.com which means if someone borrows it and logs on, I can track where my book has been. Of course there were some really, really old books which were fun to look at. Turns out I was not the only one donating a foreign language book, I found some books in french and here my husband thought that was a a silly idea.

Wish me luck in my quest to see the remaining 108 spots in Berlin!

Kale Season

Finally it is kale season here in germany. Now I am by now means a kale eater, but today I made an exception......found a recipe for kale chips! Oh my so easy, so good and oh so healthy!

Ready for the oven. 

And after just a short time in the oven, ready to enjoy!

Directions:

Just shred some kale, toss it with some qualtiy olive oil and seasoned salt.

It really is that easy!

Happy New Recipe Sunday!

Happy Hour

Where to start? I guess I need to go back to my high school days..... i was your typical band geek and for the post part went through the 4 years under the radar. Unlike me, though there  was a kid named Kirk who took the percussion section by storm. I was a junior when Kirk entered high school, so we were only 2 years fellow Pontiac High School Band Members. Well, now fast forward about 25 years.... I am living in Berlin Germany and Kirk is living his dream as a musician and teacher in Las Vegas. How did we reconnect? Silly question... FACEBOOK! I know many are not a fan of Facebook  but it has helped me reconnect with many from my past and that makes me happy. Anyhow......Kirk has a friend, Johnny Rivera, also a musician and the two of them have gotten together to host google+ Hangout concerts. There is a large time difference, so while the boys are up early, my day is coming to an end----or you could say my evening is just starting. :) I suggested to the boys that they host a concert on a Friday---Happy Hour Time here in Germany. And so, last Friday on the 12th of October  my wish was granted. I rounded up some of my husbands co-workers, set a "Halloween" Themed Table as it is the season and got busy cooking in the kitchen.

The menu: Mango Shrimp, Stuffed Mushrooms, bbq chicken wings, mini quiches, stuffed jalapenos, mini cheeseburgers,  brownies, and cake pops.

Okay, this pictures was taken well after midnight, so please forgive me, we all do not look our best! Our guests had gone home and family and I enjoyed a bottle of champagne to celebrate my sons 17th birthday

Should you like to take a listen to the concert, here is the link: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xO1a_ac0Ro8&feature=share



Wishing everyone a great day! I am linking to the following:


Tablescape Thursday
Seasonal Sunday
Wow us Wednesday
Feature yourself Friday
Masterpiece Monday
Lets Dish Wednesday
Show and Tell Friday