An old year says goodbye

It's the last day of a year

and of a decade

I'm summing up

thinking about the friends we found,

the loved ones we lost

the good things that happened

the walls we climbed

the laughs we had

The changes that came

the songs we sang

the battles we fought

the beauty we saw

and the love we felt

This is what I do every year

And when the first day of the New Year awakes

It's time to be ready

Life is, after all, like a box of chocolate

You never know what you're gonna get!

Happy New Year!

A break

I have to admit it

at Christmas we eat

a lot of great grub,

but after just a few days

we're fed up of meat, gravy and rich desserts

It's time for something different

Popcorn

(the corn is from my friend Christo)

And fish soup for dinner and a couple of slices og garlic bread

We are everyday people, we like our everyday food!

Bit of relaxing, before the New Years weekend!

Pudding and dogs

Red is an important color at Christmas time!

I seem to have written about almost every thing I've cooked

during the 3 years I've been blogging.

But this is strangely enough

somenthing I haven't mentioned:

Trifle

From the bottom, yello, sponge, fruit coctail, custard, sponge, whipped cream.

Our family's all time favourite

Like an upside down cream cake!

Dinkie is watching the pile of presents shrinking

resting her head on Blåmann, her big blue boyfriend

The day after she tries something she has never done before:
Chewing on the lamb bone!
(she had an easily upset stomach when she was younger
hopefully she has outgrown it, and will not be sick tonight!)

Another popular pudding in our family
The yorkshire pudding
After a few years of practicing

A Norwegian girl has learned how to master

the art of making a fluffy yorkshire pudding!

Little Chef eats his with strawberry jam,

and the rest of us eats it with all the trimmings

of our Christmas dinner!

Merry Christmas!

My friends

I want to wish you all

A Merry Christmas!

We're following our tradition
making the same Christmas dinner as the years before
Leg of lamb on Christmas eve
and Turkey on Christmas day.

Fish and fire

"It's Christmas timethere's no need to be afraid"

Or cold...Lutefisk

And I prepared it well

my husband said.

He enjoys one of the

Norwegian Christmas dishes and wants it again.

Even though he is a yorkshire lad.

As for me, the Norwegian girl, I don't like it at all!

Lefse I do like that!

Scottish shortbread

Inspired by our recent trip to the UK

I decided to make some scottish shortbread:

I am all for simple baking!
No stress

Splendid with a cup of tea, just splendid!

Home away from home

We've been off on a little trip to England again

and once more have we stayed at our favourite place

Rockingham Arms, Wentworth

The atmosphere is so personal, warm and welcoming

Our room was cosy, the bed big and comfortable At Wentworth Garden Centre, they make

The best scones there is!
This time, there was winter and snow in England!

Luckily the airports, roads, schools, shops, pubs

had reopened, after days of snowy chaos.

I had to take a photo of the snowy fields,

thats something I've rarely seen in England!

The Wentworth village looked like an English postcard!

Playing the potato mandoline, and shrinking some spinach

If you meet the Norwegian Mr Potato head with his hat

You'll know that his mandoline isn't far away!
Done in a few seconds

Fingers still in one piece
Thanks Christo, what a useful gadget!

I do like some spinach every now and then.
Have you seen the volume of these leaves!

Ater a little steaming, it looks a bit smaller
and reminds me of something found in the water,
under a bridge

The taste is lovely!

Served with salmon, gratinated creamy potatoes, and broccoli

It's dark, it's cold, it's winter!

Advent is here again

The color of advent is purple

Every night i light several candles

Outside it is freezing, windy and snowing.

See all the hay under the snow?

It is put there to prevent the ground to freeze solid.

Someone is coming to dig a hole,

to prepare for a carport.

Luckily we're not digging it ourselves!

Pile up the firewood

I'm cold to my bones!

Our fire and wind in the chimney sounds like an engine
And the warmth is so good!
Still baking and this time it's cookies
with cinnamon, cardamom and cloves
almonds and dark chocolate

It is Advent after all

Battle Lemon

I wanted so much to enter The culinary smackdown November

Kitchen flavors, this is my entering

and this time I have to enter with a previous post

(you said it was allowed)

Lemon bars from one my favourite

pages: Joy of baking
Sweet and tangy
With cream on top!

Still baking

These days I'm on the baking track

I'm riding the wave, and filling the freezer,

as long as the inspiration lasts.

In late November

When the weather is freezing

we enjoy these warmed up, with cheese or jam

and maybe a cup of hot chocolate.

This is one of our favourite baked goods: the pizza!

This is part of our hibernation ritual!

Sausages and naan

One of our christmas sausages in Norway:

It is lightly smoked and the meat is finely ground.

It is already cooked, so you can eat it as it is cold or fry it.

Sausages in Norway are rarely sold raw/uncooked.

On a ordinary day, I just cut it in pieces like this,

and serve it with a mash of potato, carrot and swede

or mashed peas and potatoes.

I made some indian(ish) food the other day

(which I didn't take a photo of)

And I really fancied naanbread with it!
I couldn't be bothered to go to the store to get some,

so i figured out that I'd try to bake it myself:

To have been baked in a (very hot) ordinary oven

I don't think the result was to bad!
They blew up like ballons, and tasted very good!