Kale and raspberry with yoghurt

Kale;

kale is fashion;

kale is anti cancer;

kale is the food for foodies.

For me kale was kale and one of the favourite vegetables of my mother. In my youth we ate kale in winter every week . The 'boerenkool' today thought as one of the most effective vegetables against cancer. Proved and cherished by researchers in the fight against cancer. Embraced by foodbloggers and high profile chefs.

An antioxidant which boost your immune system and is highly significant to beat infections.

We used to eat kale shortly boiled and mixed with a home made mashed potatoes dish.  Often eaten with sausage and mustard.

I admit I rediscovered kale and I owe my mother. The knowledge about the healthy properties kale was hers, long before the trendy appreciation of kale stole the hearts of so many and researchers proved her massive qualities for a healthy diet. 

Kale salad: fresh washed kale, raspberries, mixed seeds, white cowl, dressing made with honey, oil oil and balsamic oil. I like to serve with plain yoghurt.

Recipe Request

I can be very honest about my feelings over the last two weeks, it hasn't been easy. I realize that two weeks is what it takes, to re-adapt to the city and to get my life back in London. Summer came to an end as prompt as it can be. The rain and London looking grey were simply to much for me and I spent long days inside the apartment...
not my favorite me activity, not much captured my attention or my involvement...

I have been busy though with the start-up of the school-year for the girls. Although they are independent and well organized... 

I still have a role, a final touch and the mother eye.

 All three seem so busy now and London is good for them. They too miss the weather, the light, the evening stroll that make summer the best if season. But these kids are cool in the way they get back to school. Picking up their lives, hanging out with friends. First days of school blossoming with excitement and some anxiety. 

Today I feel good, things have changed over the weekend. My clock is set. Time has come, fall is in the air, a birthday next week for my youngest and lots of other stuff. No way to stick into my off thoughts, time to move on, and no more silliness ... 

In one year there will be a new start and so on for the next years ..

And then there is food! 

 Today there was ta request from my allergy girl for a decent dish, a dish from the provence, a nice taste, a recipe please...we looked up some folders with a variety of sweet and savory collected over the last years. 

A collection of recipes through the years, packed with our stuff in the summer of 2012 when we left Morocco after four years. I secretly wonder how I possibly saved these recipes in the middle of that catastrophic move. 

Together we open some cook books and we found a nice and colourful recipe: 'Daube Provencale'. 

While she went back to school I went out for groceries and a search for a gallery where they do framing. Found one in Fitzrovia neighborhood . I brought three pieces to frame. A child drawing of one of the girls: a little ballet dancer she once drew for her sister . And two paintings , one is a bouquet of wild flowers in dark blue and velvet, the second is a composition of purple plumps and a blue grey ginger bowl. My husband heritated both from is father, who collected art during his short life. He was accepted to the famous Rietveld Academy in Amsterdam. Due to an allergy of oil paint he left the academy. 

Cooking through French recipes is one way to learn or to keep up with French language.

The recipe: Daube provençale 

4 personnes/ I think you can share with many more!

Ingredients 

800 g de boeuf ( à bourguignon)

3 oignons

5 carottes 

1 branche de thym

2 feuilles de laurier

1 bouteille de vin rouge.'.... De Provence 

2 cuillères à soupe de farine ( maïzena / corn)

4 cuillères à soupe d'huile d'olive

Préparation :

Coupez la viande en petits morceaux, faites le revenir dans une cocotte avec huile d"olive jusqu'à ce qu'il soit bien doré. Pelez et coupez les oignons et les carottes en rondelles .

Ajoutez au bœuf. Laissez colorer pendant 5 minutes.

Verser le vin et ajouter le thym et le laurier.

Laissez mijoter à feu doux pendant 2 heures.

Mélanger la farine avec un peu d'eau froide et versez dans la daube 30 minutes avant les ravir la daube provençale .

Serve with sweet  patotoes and a green salad.

Tuesday baking.

It is always a time for baking and exploration of new fields of taste and flavors. While S is busy with the ingredients and the actual process of patisserie,  I am running up and down the stairs, on my way to the local supermarket to buy a few missing elements.
Haha baking is a 4 hands-on project and while preparing the next step in the recipe, there is an exercise in between. I like that. And as long as the sun shines these last days over good old Westminster, London we're just gorgeous delighted and in a terribly well mood. I can do those stairs easily and run around the few blocks between the local super market at Great Portland Street and another corner shop at Euston Road.

Instead of the buttermilk - impossible to find today - we decide to go for butter instead. The shredded apple with a pinch of cinnamon and the maple syrup frosting make these fancy Tuesday cupcakes a celebration of flavor. We're both thrilled with our new kitchen-aid. This makes our tiny Westminster kitchen better equiped. Look at this, there they are smiling on a glaze plate, topped with the hand of the master. Blossoming under tulip's freshness. 

Pauw's project: Ikea Dining Table, the 'bronze' chair is from Anthropology. The little pink and yellow can* was a farewell gift when we left Cassis, Provence, France in the summer of 2005 to move to Lausanne, Switzerland. The pink tulips remind me of Amsterdam.

*I use the can for different purposes. Might serve as a water jar too while having a seated dinner.

Macaroon a delight

    Vanilla macarons, recipe from the Cordon Bleu patisserie baking book.