Seasonal | Seasons Worth Savoring

Summer Groove

Posted by Kristen on Aug 16, 2012 in Family Fun, Seasonal, Virginia | 3 comments

Yes, yes I know summer is almost over. But in this house we are just now finally having our FIRST normal week of summer routine. We joined the Y last week so this week our schedule has included me working out while the boys have gym time and then when the weather permits we have been making it to the pool. The winds are starting to get a bit chilly but nothing compared to that alpine air that we never grew accustom to at the pool in Switzerland. In between catching up with friends we haven’t seen in a while and our pool and gym times we are enjoying having some time at home where I am not working on the house and we are just doing “normal” day to day stuff. It is refreshing for me to be on this side of transition. I realize we will have a new wave of it when our fall routine ramps up but for now I am just enjoying the new groove and thankful for…

…the summer tomatoes from my friend Rebecca’s garden (the menu for last night was tomato pie and tonight we will have fresh salsa with our tacos, thanks, Rebecca!)

…my husband that planned well financially for this insane time of house-gutting and having to buy two cars at once! Ouch

…and beach boys

post coming soon on our trip to VA Beach over the weekend for a friends wedding!

A Saturday with the neighbors

Posted by Kristen on Jun 19, 2012 in Family Fun, Friendship, Seasonal, Switzerland | 3 comments

This past weekend we spent our Saturday with our neighbors. We started the morning with some semi-successful strawberry picking and ended it with a big pot of Hungarian goulash over a fire pit and kids playing in the sprinkler.

you can barely see the mountains in this picture but they were visible yesterday!

Great job Scott and Erika! So yummy!

watch out world, Owen discovered the water guns!

snake bread (stick bread) over the fire

Strawberry Rhubard hand pies…from last weeks post (Southern Living)

Strawberries!!

Posted by Kristen on Jun 9, 2012 in Cooking and Recipes, Seasonal, Switzerland | 1 comment

SO all week I waffled about if this Saturday was the day to pick strawberries. We had a group that wanted to go together, the weather was iffy and I drove by and saw that lots of the strawberries were still green. So by this morning I decided with a friend that we would pop over (it’s less than 10 mins from us) and pick a few and return with the group next week when the weather and fields were more promising. I am glad I didn’t take everyone along because the berries weren’t in their prime but I got a big bowl for the weekend and will head back.

I promised you this recipe from my friends mom, Theres! Thanks for the recipe, Theres!….

Theres’ Strawberry-Rhubarb Dessert

serves 6-8 people
750g strawberries
750g rhubarb
Einback (a very fluffy white bread, similar to Zopf) or Zopf (something like challah)
250g low fat quark (what is quark in English? it’s similar to joghurt, but firm, like a fresh cheese…)
500g semi fat quark
butter
sugar
syrup

Wash and slice the strawberries. Put them in a bowl and marinade in syrup for 30 min (Holundersyrup tastes best, but any berry or fruit syrup will do).

Wash rhubarb and cut in 1cm pieces. Add sugar and cook in the microwave until it’s soft (10 min at full power. Instead of microwaving, you can cook the rhubarb in a pan. In that case add some water.

Slice the Einback oder Zopf (challah white bread) in 1 cm slices, enough to cover the bottom of your serving dish. Butter them, add some sugar and toast in the oven until they are light golden.

Mix both quarks, add sugar to taste.

Pour strawberries and if necessary rhubarb in a sieve/strainer
Lay the toasts in the dish, cover with a layer of rhubarb. Add a layer of quark and put strawberries on top.
Enjoy!
T.

I realized that really we don’t have anything comparable to quark in the US. You can use cream cheese whipped with sour cream and sugar I bet to get something similar.

Here are some other strawberry recipes!

*Last year we made strawberry bread…like banana bread but with strawberries! Here is the recipe we used last year.

*In Barcelona we went to the Hard Rock cafe because you know every American abroad needs a decent burger every once in a while….the point of mentioning this useless information is that I ordered a strawberry basil lemonade and it was amazing! This Strawberry Basil Lemonade recipe isn’t from hard rock cafe but I bet it’s similar.

*This year I plan to work our way through some of Southern Livings suggestions for strawberries that came in the April edition. Here is the link for them online if you aren’t a regular with them! We will for sure be trying the chicken salad with strawberries, strawberry hand pies and some of the other salads!

*and of course you can make jam! I learned last year from a friend how to can jam and also made a batch of freezer jam. If you haven’t tried freezer jam give it a go! It isn’t too tricky and you will feel oh so domestic each time you pull out a fresh jar of homemade strawberry jam.

Domodossola, Italy!

Posted by Kristen on Apr 29, 2012 in Friendship, Seasonal, Travel | 1 comment

Yesterday I hopped a train to Italy with some girl friends and my mother in law made it just in time to come along! We had heard about a fun market in a little town about an hour and 40 min train ride from Bern. We caught the 7:31 train, bright and early and arrived around 9:15. We browsed the market and found a restaurant for lunch and espresso. After lunch we finished up at the market and “happened upon” some gelato…that we may or may not have been hunting for!