Blackberry picking 2015

A summer just isn't complete without some berry picking.  Bryce would say that a summer isn't complete without blackberry pies.  We had at least a berry pie each week for a month once the berries were ready.  We rode our bikes to the woods about a mile away and picked (for free!) as many berries as we could carry (as long as the kids were content).  Anyways, just wanted to share some photos since I couldn't believe how much bigger Maddie looks since last year when we first moved here and found the berry patches.

Mama's little helper

A few days after Thanksgiving, Maddie helped me make a pie for the first time.  Then we made another one.  And another one.  Now, she wants to "make dough" all the time.  But really, when she says, "make dough" she means "eat most of the dough and roll what's left."  She is really becoming the little helper in the kitchen.  The other day, it was 3pm and I headed into the kitchen for a snack.  She immediately got up from playing with toys, followed me in, and said, "Momma, we make dinner?"  When I actually am making dinner, she quickly pushes her stool over to the stovetop and says "Nannie stir" or "Nannie help" or "Nannie do it."

Another funny note about that stool that gets used almost all day--when making dinner yesterday, she wasn't on it, so I used it to get a spice down from a high shelf.  She practically jumped up on the stool while I was on it, saying "That's Nannie's stool, Mama.  Nannie on it.  Please move, Mama."  As soon as I got off, she hugged me, kissed me, patted my back, and said "Thank you, Mama."  I'm not making this up.  She's hilarious.  I am so thankful that she likes to help in the kitchen!  We have so much fun together.  

Here are a few pictures of our pie making afternoon.  When she would eat some dough, she kept saying "just a leetle"...

We brought the pie to our friend's house, but don't worry, this was extra :-)

"I need a leetle more"

Our Swiss Thanksgiving

Just like any other American, I went searching for a turkey a week before the big day.  No such luck.  It turns out, the Swiss grocery stores don't sell turkeys, but for Thanksgiving, they will kindly put a couple (yes, I saw 2), on the shelves on Thanksgiving day.  How thoughtful for their fellow Americans, right?  I keep wondering if they do that, really, just for the Americans living here who will celebrate the holiday.

You should know, it was only the four of us for this holiday.  One more than last year, but when it comes down to it, it was just the two of us actually eating any of the Thanksgiving dinner last year.  This year, I had high hopes of Maddie loving the mashed potatoes, sweet potatoes with pecan candied topping, and maybe a bite or two of turkey.  She is not very picky when it comes to tasting food.  EXCEPT when it is baby food.  I can thank myself for that because I didn't want her eating all of Carter's food when I fed him, so I gave her a bite of baby oatmeal made with formula.  She is convinced all baby food is yucky.  So on Thanksgiving, when I excitedly gave her a bite of mashed potatoes with gravy, she forcefully gagged.  You can guess how she reacted when I proceeded to move a bite of sweet potatoes towards her mouth.  "Mama, that's yucky.  That's baby food. No no."  Ooookay.  I think she ate a smorgasbord of what we had in the fridge-cheese, deli ham, some cucumbers, and a roll with some peanut butter on it.

Like I said, it was the two of us actually eating Thanksgiving dinner this year, just like last year.  In the spirit of being a proud American, I started preparing the meal a couple days before.  I found an old NY Times article about preparing ahead for the meal.  I made the sweet potato casserole, green beans and mushroom saute, gravy, stuffing, and pie crusts.  On the day of Thanksgiving, I did in fact find a turkey at the store.  I didn't have my phone with me, but if I did, I would insert a photo of it here along with the price tag which read something like this: 110 CHF for a 5.6 kg turkey ($114 USD for about 12.5 lb turkey).  No, thanks, I'll buy the chicken for 12.95 CHF.

We made Rice Krispy treats that morning, just for fun.

I was really happy with each of the recipes I made.  Roast chicken, basic gravy, mashed potatoes, sweet potato casserole, pumpkin pie, green beans sauteed with mushrooms, and stuffing.  We were lucky to have pumpkin pie, or pie at all, because I couldn't find a proper pie pan and then I couldn't find evaporated milk.  That pie is special because it came out of a box sent all the way from Oregon and our old Bible Study group.  We are still enjoying it :-)

She loves that little stool.

Our food barely fit in the little oven.

And I cannot leave out pictures of our two turkeys on Thanksgiving day.

He is so interested in her and everything that she does.

Here is the grand table.

Happy Thanksgiving to you, dear friend!

Favorite Chocolate Chip Cookies

I found brown sugar! But it's not like I was seriously searching for it.  I felt like it was a necessary kitchen ingredient, until we didn't have it, and I realized that I didn't use it that much.  It's pretty strong though, like, I can taste the molasses.  Maybe it's more like dark brown sugar?  I don't know, but it's not like the Domino light brown sugar that I used to have in my pantry.

Okay, I wrote this post before I actually researched it.  I thought I found brown sugar because it was brown and I one of the many German words on the back was "melasse" (molasses).  It's whole cane sugar.

Whole cane sugar is an unrefined sugar places that from the juice of the sugar cane by filteringis obtained, thickening, drying and grinding. Depending on the clarification of the final product is gray to bright brown. Whole cane sugar has a characteristic taste of its own and is composed of 95% sucrose and other sugars .  The natural taste is described caramel-like, but also licorice-like. (Wikipedia) 

The main issue was chocolate chip cookies.  I started making a new version of chocolate chunk cookies and we LOVE them.  Seriously, I don't have any self control when it comes to these cookies and a glass of milk.

It's derived from the Original Nestle Tollhouse recipe for Chocolate Chip Cookies with all white sugar and half the amount of butter.  Thanks to Meredith, I started halving the butter which we definitely prefer.  And chocolate chunks because there are no chocolate chips here.  The white sugar happened because we didn't have brown sugar.  Apparently other people have found it to be pretty good, too, after google searching it.

I need to stop making cookies on a weekly basis!  [side note: in the USA, probably 5 out of 7 days a week, we would eat ice cream after dinner-just a little in a mug-and we have yet to find reasonably priced good ice cream here.  This is why I'm making cookies so often...we have some sweet teeth in our house.  Our favorites were Turkey Hill All Natural Vanilla in Blacksburg and Blue Bunny All Natural Vanilla in Oregon.  With a little chocolate syrup.  Which also doesn't exist here.]

Favorite Chocolate Chunk Cookies
2 1/4 cups flour
1 teaspoon baking soda
1 teaspoon salt
1/2 cup butter, softened
100 g chocolate bar-average size, chopped (45% cacoa)
1 1/2 cups white sugar
1 teaspoon vanilla
2 large eggs

Preheat oven 375 degrees F.  Mix flour, soda, salt.  In a separate bowl, beat butter, sugar, vanilla until creamy.  Add eggs.  Mix dry ingredients with wet ingredients.  Fold in chocolate.  Drop by tablespoon onto ungreased baking sheet.  Bake 9-11 minutes.

Carter eats

Just to show you how much better he is with eating solids from a spoon...this was just a couple days ago.  It's banana apple oatmeal (baby food from the store).


This kid likes to eat.

I don't know why, but just him improving is such a relief for me.  Now to just get him to drink from a bottle.  And go longer than 3.5 hours at night between feedings.

And the "ice cream" that Maddie is eating...peeled bananas, cut in half, and frozen.  I tell her it's banana "ice cream" and it's been a huge hit lately.  It's great when I'm cooking dinner and she's hungry and sometimes a little grumpy.  "Nummy ice cream, Mommy!"  :-)

He is also trying hard to sit up on his own.

AND he is rolling over both tummy to back and back to tummy.  Today he was rolling over back to tummy multiple times.   It's so funny because I don't normally lay him on the floor for long periods of time, but today, we were on the floor for at least an hour while Maddie napped.  It was also special because he doesn't get much of my 100% attention.  I kept laying him on his belly and he kept rolling over both ways.  Such a proud mommy!

Blackberry picking

Today was Sunday, which meant quiet and relaxed family day for us.

Bryce goes for a run at lunch a few times a week.  His office is just a stone's throw from our new place.  Less than a mile from the office, trails go into the woods and are lined with bushes upon bushes of blackberries.

As you guessed by the title of this post, at 9:30am, we all packed into the car with bags and a big plastic bin to pick berries.  For almost two hours, we picked and picked.  Correction, Bryce picked and picked.  I picked for a few minutes and then entertained Madison singing about animals, took them on a walk to find sticks, then fed Carter.

It was fun to go berry picking together.  For Bryce, it meant a lot because he grew up picking blackberries in West Virginia with his family.  A lot of memories for him.

We probably picked about 2 gallons.  Maddie ate enough for all of us.  Tomorrow should have some fun diapers to change...

We froze most of them and I had to make a cobbler with the rest.

Speaking of cobblers, we had a discussion (mild argument?) about a true cobbler versus a pie versus a crisp.  If you are wondering the same thing, this article and this article helped explain.

Even with no proper measuring cups or spoons and butter that comes in a big square of grams, it still turned out okay.  We are getting places in the kitchen people!  I've also made Snickerdoodle cookies because it's one of the few recipes that don't require brown sugar.

(P.S. it was Pioneer Woman's blackberry cobbler with all butter because I couldn't find Crisco)

Grocery shopping here

Living abroad, it seems that every little thing is a big accomplishment.  This includes a successful grocery shopping trip or baking a loaf of bread--and getting a decent meal on the table for dinner each night, which doesn't always happen, mind you.

The first few times I went grocery shopping, I felt like an idiot.  It took 4x as long to go, especially with 2 kids, one in the ergo and one in the umbrella stroller because our BOB double stroller doesn't fit through the tiny aisles.

I've taken on grocery shopping and meal planning as my new challenge.  I know it will continue to get easier, and it has already, but I still sit during nap time spending awhile researching translations such as "baking powder" versus "baking soda", flour, vegetable broth, canola oil, vinegar, etc.  You would be surprised at the time it takes to look at a recipe from the States, then try to translate each ingredient, go to the store, try to find said ingredients, then try to cook the recipe with no measuring cups.  Recipes here are measured differently in grams and too difficult to translate (i.e. the back of a muffin mix box in German).  Add into that the witching hour between 5pm and bedtime at 7:30pm when everyone seems grumpy and hungry and nearly intolerable.  We've gotten into a groove now, though, and things are getting much easier all around.

The last couple weeks, we've gone grocery shopping in Germany as an entire family (Daddy duty with the kids while I run around and grab things).  Mainly because we were driving around sight seeing.  Then I go every 2 or 3 days for restocking milk and produce.

Speaking of which, milk comes in 1 liter bottles.  Our fridge is small so we only buy 2 at a time usually and just replenish after a couple days.  Madison drinks quite a bit of milk and with eating cereal in the morning, it goes pretty quick.  Produce goes bad quickly because I think there are much less chemicals and preservatives on/in anything here.  It tastes wonderful but you have to plan wisely to use it all up before it goes bad especially since the price tag is higher, it makes you want to use up every last lettuce leaf because you paid for that leaf!

There are a few different stores that are common here.  I've been trying to check them out.  Migros, Coop, Aldi, and Lidl are a few that I've visited.  Aldi and Lidl are German discount stores.  It's crazy, but Aldi gives me a "home isn't so far away" feeling since they are found in the States.  But it's been 3 times now that I've grocery shopped in Germany.  There's still not a grocery store that I go to regularly and know well.  Don't take for granted going to the same grocery store every trip and knowing where to find the jelly (or anything for that matter)!

There are little things that I have yet to figure out, like sour cream versus cream cheese, versus creme fraiche.  I haven't baked anything yet, but that's my next feat.  I did make pizza crust which was a good first step.  Zucchini bread will be next.

Update: I made zucchini bread and it turned out well!

That's hand shredded zucchini, folks.  She looks disgusted.

Zimt=cinnamon. No vanilla extract, so I used a packet of vanille zucker (vanilla sugar).  Natron=baking soda which comes in 1 teaspoon packets.  Backpulver=baking powder which comes in large packets of maybe a couple tablespoons.

But I don't quite understand the flour yet because there are a bunch of different kinds and they have different "type" numbers which I don't get.  I need to research it.

They DO know how to make bread.  Even the small grocery stores have awesome fresh bread.  Croissants, pretzel rolls, artisan bread, and other baked treats.  It's fun to grab a couple goodies for dinner or breakfast the next day.

The Brot section.  (brot=bread)

I don't have time while in the grocery store to get out a smart phone and look it up because I have to avoid a toddler meltdown so I research before.  I'm telling you, there's a method and strategy to it all.  Parenting requires precise planning.  Speaking of which...

This is the entrance to Migros just a 2 minute walk from our apartment now.  Whoever decided to place this motorized car toy obviously didn't have toddlers who had meltdowns.  Every.  Single.  Time.  I have to use a cookie or the park to bribe her off of it...or just let her get very upset.

The tomatoes here have been delectable and garden fresh even from the grocery store.  The strawberries taste sweeter with more flavor than the ones I used to buy in the States.  I've read that groceries are much more seasonal.  You pay a pretty penny for out of season produce if you can even find it.  Even now, in the summer, strawberries in a small container-not a full pint- are around 6 CHF (almost $7 USD).  At the same time, some things are comparable in price considering the exchange rate.

One interesting thing was having to weigh your produce.  I made the common foreigner mistake of picking a bunch of bananas and then at check out, the cashier had to go back to the produce section, weigh them, the sticker prints out, and then you stick it to your bananas.  Most produce is like that, but some aren't, like lemons and cucumbers.  You can just take those to the check out and they know how much each one costs, regardless of size or weight.

When we went grocery shopping for the first time, it felt like everything cost money.  It cost to park in the parking lot at the grocery store.  It cost to use a cart.  If you don't want to use the super cheap, easily ripped plastic bags, you have to buy or bring your own reusable bags.

You put a franc in the black thing to get a cart.

Meat is pretty expensive, so we only eat it 2 or 3 times a week.  If you buy it in Germany, you can only bring back 1 kg per person over the border.  I don't think they check closely, but we did have to stop at the border and "claim" what we were bringing back in.  (Just get our receipt with a tax form stamped.  The grocery store gave us the form and stapled it to our receipt.)  They also have limits on tobacco and alcohol but that isn't so much a problem for us.

Someone asked me, "well what kind of meals are you making?"  I have been trying to make meals that are easy, quick, economic, with simple ingredients, and enough to have left overs for lunch the next day.  That's a lot of requirements but it's been kind of fun to think about and plan.  Bryce would say, "you call that fun?!" But for me, again, it just feels like a challenge and gives me confidence if I can figure it out and find some mainstays like we had in the States.  I've started with easy things but I'm trying to branch out and try more.

Some meals that I've made so far:  BLTs, stuffed peppers, a big salad, BBQ chicken breasts with a side salad, spaghetti, pizza, soft tacos, hamburgers, pasta with peas and bacon, and veggie stir fry.

[Stuffed peppers: mixture of white rice made with vegetable broth, can of diced tomatoes, pinto beans, salt, pepper, and chopped onion and red pepper.  All cooked and put into a red pepper and baked with gouda cheese on top.]

[BBQ chicken breasts: we found "Stubbs" BBQ sauce at the store!  I couldn't resist.  They actually love to barbecue and grill here.]

[Big salad: we have this once a week.  We love big salads.  Sometimes we get fancy and put things like a hard boiled egg, bacon, or feta on it.]

[Soft tacos: it's hard to find good Mexican food here.  I brought my own Mexican type spice mixture to make tacos and fajitas.  AND I found decently price flour tortillas.  All 3 of us were excited.  Maddie loves tortillas.]

[Hamburgers: It's harder to find actual hamburger buns.  I actually saw some today and we made the hamburgers last night with sandwich buns that were similar to hot dog buns.  Funny, but still American-ly delicious.  Also, I like the potatoes here.  They made some yummy fries, too.]

The beef from Germany is also tasty.  I have no clue if it's 80/20,  90/10, or what.

[Pasta with peas and bacon: Pasta is probably the cheapest base for a meal any where in the world.  I have been really into Jamie Oliver lately.  I found this recipe and it was so good!  Simple, good leftovers, and even a toddler approved.  I didn't have all the ingredients-no mint, no creme fraiche-but it was STILL good.  I'm sure it's even better with those things.]

[Veggie stir fry: White rice. Soy sauce.  Chopped carrots, onion, broccoli.]

Here are some pictures of products that look different here for your humor...

Mustard comes in a weird metal squirt thing that reminds me of a caulk gun from Home Depot.

The closest to Hidden Valley Ranch.  And it comes in a plastic water bottle.

Is it Miracle Whip or MiraCEL whip?

And our small 1 liter bottles of milk.

A small thing of flour.  Oh, and in case you were wondering, it's type 1050.

We found wheat sandwich bread!

Anyone have any go-to meals that meet our criteria?  Please let me know!  I'm getting braver by the day.