Hungry Norie's Raw Nik-Naks 1

Since I got my dehydrator, I've been making all sorts of stuffs. It actually never really stopped.
And I enjoy eating ones I made, recently my friend Sylvia tidied up her kitchen cupboard, and gave me some foods. Including, her own flaxeed crackers. She told me she wasn't eating that kind of foods, so time to get rid of something she didn't need. Well, If she wants to get rid of her dehydrator (she has 9 trays with timer), I defo wouldn't mind having it at all, now my 4 tray excaliber is becoming a tiny bit small for me, I need a bigger one. But this one does for now. 

Well, Since my trip to France made me think how I eat. I ate a huge ice cream dessert, and I had stomachache after, that same happened when I was at work. My shoulder and neck were so stiff, my foot hurting, snore really loud! etc...
I think it's now time to go abstinent from cakes again. It was long relapse. But hey, I can anytime quit and start again.

It's been 10 days since I've gone abstinent, and feeling not bad. I've been making my savoury and sweet(not very much) nik-naks, and I'm ok with it.
Basically, I haven't been eating: dairy, wheat, and sugar. I took them out from my diet, and if I don't make nik-naks myself, there's not a lot to eat. I even cut down on dried fruits (naked bars!), due to high sugar contents and they are acidic.
Instead, I increased flaxeed intake and I have a question. "do flaxeeds make me go to toilet lots?"
I certainly need to google this question, I keep going to the toilet, but it's a good thing I think.

Buckwheat and chocolate crumbles

I soaked buckwheat(very cheap!) and sprouted, mixed with: pureed prunes, raw cacao powder, hemp, chopped cashew nuts, coffee extract and palm syrup. Then dehydrated till crunchy. I love them. They have texture and flavour. Yum Yum, I seem to satisfy nibbling them when I fancy something "sweet". I suppose, buckwheat helps to balance out  blood sugar levels...?

Flaxeed and seaweed crackers

This is my favo nik-naks. I had some soaked flaxeed left, so I made them. It has: mixed flaxeed, chia seeds, hemp, mixed seaweed, salt, nutritional yeast, tamari and pepper. Simple. I dehydrated till crispy and crunchy. 

They are only a part of what I've been making/experimenting. Upload more later!

Camping in Norfolk

We fancied camping last weekend. So, Marcus booked a camp site in Norfolk, so we went.
Apparently, this was called "Glamping". We stayed in a yurt. It was awesome. Because it was Sunday we went and stayed, everyone went home already and very quiet.
Tell you more later.

In evening, we did BBQ for our dinner. Took a while to start the fire. We bought eco fire starter etc, but they didn't work very much, we used whole bag! (after dinner we lit the chimay for a bit warmth )
We ate loads! I didn't want to waist foods i took, so, ate the most of them. We even had 2 packs of tofu sausages! Mmm, very naughty!

Preparing our BBQ!

Our first round!

Vegetable skewers, grilled sweet potatoes, tofu sausages, char grilled asparagus and baked beans! they were delicious and this was our first BBQ together.

We enjoyed so much, planning to do do some more before this hot(very unusual in England) summer finishes. Maybe after poodle week in August will be nice with our canoe!

Marcus's trying light coal

home made brioche in France

I  cut down on lovely cake intake for a while, but it didn't last. Now, I'm on more or less 2 cakes(or pastry a day...). I was going to be good in France, but that idea didn't last either. Because, in France, every cakes and pastry look soooo yummy and taste good, I had to try them.
I always love to try something rustic and look home made, so this time i tried a few things. 

Pistachio topping cake was filled with chocolate cream, light sponge with chewy texture... It was yummy.
2nd picture I bought were choux pastry bits and apple filled pastry. I bought them from small bakery when we visited a market. It was situated in one of the side streets, a lady in the shop told me her grandad baked them in the kitchen next door. I saw him! He looked a bit grumpy! But baked lovely pastry!

Next one I had was croissant chocolat and apricot tart from intermarche. they were delicious for supermarket. Much nicer than here. I bought pastries a few times there. Still chocolate was soft, buttery pastry... yum yum.

Since my trip to France, I had pastry few times, but they weren't as quite as the same, so, at moment, I'm giving up my pastries in mornings with my decaf coffee.

When we got to Douche, I was excited when I saw this on the dining table!

Wow! Home made brioche and jam! Unfortunately, this jam was already melted. Probably it didn't reach the temperature...anyway, I only stayed one night there, so, I took this bread home for my breakfast.  I really enjoyed it. (not too sweet either)

Lunch at the square, St. Guilhem Le Desert

Mmmm, buckwheat pancakes, I heard lots about it. Marcus kept telling me about this pancake stuff, I came to the point where "I now just want to eat it!!!!" 
I never made buckwheat pancake myself. When I made it before, with cream cheese and chive and smoked salmon. It always had wheat in it. Due to Marcus's food intolerance, this pancake had to be 100% buckwheat. He had this before and praised how good it was.

O.K, it was my turn now to taste this. I couldn't wait. 

We had pancakes for two days for our snacks....

That day, we went out for walks. We walked about 4-5 hours, including pottering time. When we got back to the village (downstairs), we were hungry again. We did take snacks with us though. We thought we treated ourselves with pancakes and chips! And we thought I was going back to UK following day. Previous day, we had pancakes too! (after our big walks)
It was so yummy, when I got back home, I made vegan pancake for my late breakfast too. 

On Monday, I had buckwheat pancake with goats cheese and walnuts followed by chocolate ice cream and chantilly. Oh, they were both divine, but I seemed to overload with dairy products on the desert, I had heart burn and tummy ache after that.

On Tuesday, thinking it would be my last day there, so I asked Marcus to go to the cafe opposite to the ice cream shop to eat chips and pancake after our walk. He only had chips. They were good though.

It was also hot and sunny day and we were tired, sparkling water tasted very refreshing. 

After our treat, we sat in the square chatting and drinking spring water coming out from the fountain. Then we saw huge boxer dog attacked an old dog (apparently he was 17yrs old, poor thing...), blood everywhere, a couple guys tried to separate the two, but they couldn't for a while, felt like it went on for long time but I would imagine it only went 5mins or so. By the time two dogs were separated, little dog bled really badly and in shock, couldn't stand up. He was taken to the vet, but later I was told he was put to sleep straight away due to the serious injury on his hip. I still remember the eyes the dog had, shock and fear. Poor thing. Villagers were saying at the same time they relieved it wasn't a child. I now wonder what happened to the boxer, he should be put to sleep, he wasn't safe to anyone now.... I felt a bit useless afterwards, I couldn't help, I wanted to, but not sure how.

French market in Agnes

We visited twice to the French market. One was on Thursday, it was big one. Everything so beautiful and looked yummy, I really wanted eat everything. Home made goats cheese looked wonderful. So lively and so different from English ones. We didn't buy anything from the market, as we planned to go for walks, it was sunny day also. So, we just had look round. 

Just looking at those photos, I could almost smell all those products, and make my mouth really watery!
In winter, just before the Christmas, we have French Market for 3 days in town. They do have people from France come here to sell their products. But because they travel and I'm sure they go round other English market towns, their products are not as fresh as those in France. I stopped buying from them years ago. They never have home made goats cheese like I saw in those french markets. I suppose that's one of many excuses to go to France to taste those magic foods! And why not?

Oh, by the way, we bought some jars and local herbs in the village (St. Guilhem Le Desert).
It was tapanade and pickled garlic, I couldn't stop eating them. This tapanade didn't have anchovies or capers. Pure black olives and herbs, just like one we had in Italy. Need very good olives and extra virgin olive oil to make this. 

Our shopping @ La Moisson Aniane, St Guilhem Le Desert --Health food shop

Cor, blimey. I don't know anyone apart from Marcus. He knows every health food shops wherever he goes. Sure, he knew a cute health food shop in just out side St. Guilhem Le Desert. 
It was called " La Moisson"

This shop had very good selections of everything. They even had raw sea weed too. Of course, we bought a pack and put them in salads, reminded me of home... it was tasty. Picked in France. Mixed nuts with raisins was a bit pricey, but tasted fresh, and raisins tasted nothing like here in England. very soft and there weren't even that sweet either. Quite often, raisins/sultanas mixed in cashews/ nuts here become crystallised and basically don't taste fresh. In France, the most of time, food we bought tasted soooooo yummy!

Here's our shopping from the shop!

This Goma-shio (sesame salt) was very very nice, I added every time on our salad. It's really, chubby sesame seeds slightly blitzed and mixed with sea salt. I'm going to make this. First I need to find chubby sesame seeds. Here in England, thin and flat sesame seeds are more accessible to get. I probably need to go on line to get this as I never seen it in my local town!

This buckwheat flakes were also yummy. Second time we went there to get some more, it was run out. We bought spelt flakes in stead. Taste wise, buckwheat one was nicer and had more flavour. 

Next year, I'd love to grow black moori here. I'm not sure if it grows or not, but I can experiment....

The lady who worked there spoke good English.  We didn't know till our last visit to the shop actually she understood English! And I felt a bit embarrassed. Every time, I was really excited going into the shop, how nice shop was and I wanted to buy all of them and wanted to eat the whole shop etc...!

Anyway, she was lovely, and again, I wished I could speak French, I wanted to chat with her! Well, I wanted to chat with lots of people, French people were kind they tried to speak English with us...
 

La Moisson Aniane
Za Les Terrasses
6, Rte de St Guilhem
34150 Aniane
Tel: 04 67 57 42 38

Mulberry trees in St. Guilhem Le Desert

Our trip to France, it was gorgeous as usual, food we tasted was fantastic.
On our second day, we went for walks in the area, found loads of mulberry trees. Since then, we noticed mulberry trees every where. Again, no-one seemed to pick them. Why? We did. We picked a small container full of them, and mixed with our fruits salad for afters. There were not only purply colours, also they were white ones. They were very sweet. I never tasted so many mulberries in one go! 

We bought lots of fruits from lovely intermarche. There were some tasting in fruits section. 
I couldn't resist tasting water melon and green melons. Some French people were doing exactly the same thing, tasting all fruits. Everyone looked very satisfied what they were munching in their mouth. Oh, what an beautiful supermarket. Anyway, we ended up buying melons, oranges, and cherries....
Felt like I was in the right place in the right time...
Only one thing a little bit disappointed was: cherries we had and tasted places, weren't sweet enough. It mite've been due to the weather, cherries tasted a bit watery and less cherry-like taste. Then remembered how gorgeous Greek cherries were and very very cheap. We ate shit loads!

Anyway, we had plenty sweet mulberries, and forgot about cherries afterwards.

Sea Kale Ohitashi

Sea kale...
I didn't know they were edible till just before our last visit to Shingle street in May. Sea kale on the Suffolk coast looks very healthy and yummy.

 Well, here they are everywhere. If you want to try to pick some and eat, come to Suffolk. We went to Shingle street to pick, but I think I saw them in southwold or walberswick.

Well, taste was like broccoli and asparagus just like what everyone said.

First, cut off the tough stalks. Then blanched the leaves in lightly salted water. Drain them, put in cold water to prevent further cooking. It cooks quite quickly. squeeze water out. Then I marinated in: lemon juice, miso, little tamari, chili and sesame oil.  Garnished with pumpkin seeds. That's it. It was tasty.

Rest of sea kale, I chopped small and mixed with my carrot juice bits(what comes out after juicing) to make "crackers". 
I made juice with carrot, celery and cucumber (it was my snack), mixed chopped kale and soaked linseed (I blitzed 3rd of the soaked seeds), some spices and tamari and dehydrated them. It was nice and moorish. I ate very quickly, since then, I keep making "crackers" often even without sea kale. 
I think Marcus juiced some sea kale, he said it was nice. 

Oh, I think I also added strips of nori seaweed to make them more sea taste and nutritious.