Weekly small pleasures

Middle Europe Weekly Small Pleasures #14 – Frost and Christmas

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Well, the last week or two (or months says J) I have been working very long hours and it’s been a bit stressful, but the good thing is that it’s almost Christmas holidays! Just one more week to get through. The weekend trip to Norway was also good and very interesting, but I’ll write about that another time.

In between all the work, here were a few of the good moments:

Hanging up our Christmas star. We have yet to decorate our Christmas tree (it’s a living one, still in a pot since last year), ice our pernicky cookies (gingerbread without ginger as my uncle calls it 😉 ) and cut out and assemble the paper Betlem (nativity scene) we bought last year in Třebechovice.

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Visiting the Christmas market with some work colleagues and friends. It was crowded but it’s always nice to drink some gluhwein, eat some hot caramelized almonds and eat some German food (this time I had some flammkuchen).

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Some photos of goodies picked up at various Christmas markets, except for the fudge, which despite the name was not like fudge at all, but nice try 😉 At the markets they sell caramelized nuts in the cones pictured on the right, these are delicious!

Seeing the Christmas tree at Hauptbahnhof (the main station, Berlin). I arrived in Berlin on the 1 December 2012, just in time for the Christmas season. So somehow seeing all the Christmas trees up around Berlin always reminds me of that first month where everything was new and exciting although a bit lonely. I used to look for the huge Christmas tree at Hauptbahnhof to find the right exit from the station so that i could find my way back back home.

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Small pleasures in Norway. More on Norway another time, but a few of the small things that stood out for me were the space-saving bed in an alcove in our airbnb apartment, which I found so cosy, the very low sun in the sky (it popped up late, dashed in a low arc across the horizon and then back down again at about 3pm) and the beautiful frost, something we don’t see that much in Berlin.

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Wishing you all a lovely week.

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Middle Europe Weekly Small Pleasures #13 – Christmas market season

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Last Sunday was the first Advent, and so the Christmas season has started. So many Christmas markets (Weihnachtsmarkten) to visit, and not enough weekends! This time of year always flies by very quickly as there is always a lot to finish off at work before the holidays, including planning for the new year so that things run smoothly upon returning to work, as well as  presents to find, cookies to bake, Christmas decorations to put up and Christmas markets to visit. There are a large variety of Christmas markets in Berlin, ranging from traditional ones, touristy ones, design, modern or “hipster” ones, to the country specialty markets (Nordic Christmas market, Dutch Christmas market) and the unusual ones (Japanese Christmas market). Some of them are open the whole season, whereas others are only open for one weekend. Here is a map of the markets in Berlin for 2015, here is a description of a few of the traditional ones we visit every year (not all inclusive!),  and here is a list of more unusual ones to visit.

So here are some of the good moments from this Christmassy week. Continue reading →

Middle Europe Weekly Small Pleasures #12 – Christmas is coming

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Our apartment is filled with the delicious smells of roasting turkey, herb stuffing and pumpkin cheesecake, prepared while snowflakes flutter gently down outside the window. In between cooking we sip jasmine tea and eat mandarin oranges. Our friend is visiting so that we can prepare some food together for a Thanksgiving-inspired potluck we’ve been invited to for dinner. Winter has (unofficially) reached Berlin, but that doesn’t mean there are no small pleasures!

I haven’t written anything for Weekly Small Pleasures for a while, but here’s the moments I enjoyed this week: Continue reading →

Middle Europe Weekly Small Pleasures #10 – Changing seasons

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It’s been a while since I updated on the little pleasures that make the week good!

First it was really busy at work, and then I was away on holiday for two weeks. The first week I was at home in South Africa (always a BIG pleasure, nothing small about that!) and the next week we went on holiday in Slovenia and Croatia, which was also fantastic. But here are some of the little moments I’ve enjoyed over the last weeks.

While summer was still here, swimming and playing badminton at the lakes, and a weekend trip to Cesky Raj and Prague with our friends.

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Spending time with the kitties and dogs in Czech. I miss having pets so it’s always great to spend some time with these guys.

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A trip home meant springtime in South Africa. I went on hikes, visited the beach and Kirstenbosch garden, marvelled at all the spring flowers at West coast national park, enjoyed the sunshine and most of all just enjoyed being home. It was also nice to have my car back for a few days!

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During the 2 weeks I was away from Berlin, summer suddenly disappeared and autumn arrived in its place. That means it’s time for cold weather foods such as goulash and stews, and seasonal foods like pumpkins and pomegranates. It’s also time to start doing some indoor sports such as squash and climbing/bouldering.

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To read what other people around the world have been up to this week, check out A New Life wandering. Have a lovely week!

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Middle Europe Weekly Small Pleasures #9 – Cake and kayaking

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This week’s small pleasures included a meal at a  Moroccan restaurant, J’s birthday, and a lovely hot weekend in which we could do some outdoor sports.

1) Although the best Moroccan meal I’ve ever had is still the one in Lieges, Belgium, i always enjoy a tasty Moroccan tagine, the mint tea served in pretty glasses with a silver teapot, and the lush decor in maroons and burgundy. At this restaurant they also came around with a jug of rosewater to wash our hands before the meal, which smelt beautiful.

2) It was J’s birthday on Thursday so I made him this Sachertorte cake with a Mary Berry recipe. I always find her recipes really reliable, and this one turned out very nicely.

3) On Saturday we went for a cycle on part of the Oder-Neisse cycle tour, which runs along the Oder river on the border of Germany and Poland. It’s very scenic and we saw lots of animals and open fields of countryside – will write more about it some time when I have time!

4) On Sunday we went to Müggelsee for some kayaking, which was perfect on a hot day. More about that here.

Have a good week!

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Middle Europe Weekly Small Pleasures #8 – Summer thunderstorms

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It was quite a nice week. This summer is much more like my first summer here than last year, with lots of “Gewitter” (thunderstorms) in the evening, bringing heavy downpours of rain. I like summer rain, when it’s been hot and humid, and suddenly with a crash of thunder and a flash of  lightning, the clouds open and drench the earth with water. Since it’s not cold, it’s nice to open the windows and let the cool breeze waft through the apartment, inhale the smell of rain on earth, and listen to the rain pouring down.

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I also enjoyed an impromptu dinner J prepared. I was tired and had come home from German class, and he put together some feta, olives and cherry tomatoes on a plate, which we ate with sesame and rye crackers and a bottle of cider. It’s such a simple meal but somehow so delicious. We ate the same once for breakfast after visiting one of the Turkish supermarkets here and buying a big can of mixed olives and a large pack of good white cheese. When I visited Turkey they served white cheese, olives, tomatoes and cucumber for breakfast, so we did the same.

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On Thursday some friends came around for dinner, and J made one of my favourite Czech dishes, meat and knedlicky (bread dumplings) with a dill sauce. I’ll post the recipe for this some time (and a photo), as it’s a good one. This time he cooked the meat (beef) in the pressure cooker his mom gave him for Christmas, and it turned out lovely and tender. For dessert I made a lemon fridge tart, which required some experimentation with German jelly. In South Africa the jelly includes sugar but here it doesn’t, so I just premixed the packet contents with the amount of sugar suggested on the packet and then used the amount of one packet of the German one (plus sugar), hoping that it’d be a similar quantity to one packet of South African jelly powder. The dessert set nicely, so it worked out.

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In the weekend we went to Czech to visit J’s family on the farm. The weather was great and the plums, apricots and peaches were in season, so we were picking them and eating them directly off the trees. We went swimming at the lake, walked the dogs, spent time outside in the garden and just enjoyed a relaxing weekend, as it’s always nice to see everyone again. For breakfast on Sunday his mom made an amazing savoury “cake”, which consisted of layers of bread, cheese, peppers, ham and salami, sandwiched together and covered with cream cheese. You serve it by cutting a slice and eating it with a knife and fork. I’ll definitely have to try making one of these one day!

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To share the good moments in your week, join the Small Weekly pleasures blog event over at A New Life Wandering. Have a good week!

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Middle Europe Weekly Small Pleasures #7 – Summer flowers

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Two weekends ago we took a trip to the Baltic coast, and last week we were in Spain for four days. Apart from these great weekend trips, it has been all work work work. But in the weekend, although I also had to go to work for a bit, we had the opportunity to go for a walk in the park near where I used to live, where we enjoyed the summer flowers. This afternoon we also got to relax and BBQ in the garden of a friend-of-a-friend in the outskirts of Berlin. When you live in an apartment in Berlin, like many, it’s always a luxury to relax outside in a garden. Here are some pictures of the summer flowers that are out at the moment in Berlin. To see what others have been up to this week, check out the Weekly Small Pleasures blog event.

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Middle Europe Weekly Small Pleasures #6 – Summer days

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On the beach in Boltenhagen

This week a heatwave struck Europe, and the summer we had been longing for suddenly struck full force! We’d booked tickets in advance to go and visit my uncle and aunt who were on a three week holiday by the Baltic sea (Ostsee) in  Boltenhagen, but had a three hour travail trying to catch the train out of Berlin because so many people had flooded to the station to escape to the coast that we could not get on the train with our bicycles. However, after a long wait and a detour, we finally made it to the coast and countryside of the Bundesland (province) Mecklenburg-Vorpommern and enjoyed a weekend there catching up with family, cycling, swimming and walking around. More about that later, but in the meanwhile here are a few of the highlights of the week. Join the blog event Weekly Small Pleasures to share your own!

1) It’s been drier than usual for this time of year, in fact, many farms in Brandenburg have been suffering from lack of rain. In Czech, the rivers are also very low at the moment. During the weekend after the extremely high temperatures there were thunderstorms both Saturday and Sunday evening, so at least that brought some rain. I’m not sure if it was just a coincidence or if it was related to the dryness and then the two weeks of cool weather we had before the heat, but I found a beautiful leaf in Berlin last Monday morning – maybe from a confused tree!

2) A friend organized a BBQ in the park on Thursday evening. It was so relaxing to spend a summer’s night outdoors that it felt almost like a Friday.

3) On Friday we went to Prater biergarten with some friends. i really like it there – it’s full so it has a good atmosphere but there always seems to be somewhere to sit. My friend B and I both had a classic Berlin drink: Berliner Weisse (wheat beer) mixed with  red (raspberry) or green (Waldmeister) syrup. It’s great and refreshing for those who prefer something sweet to a more bitter beer!

4) The strawberries on our balcony are still yielding fruit!

5) I didn’t know this before I moved to Berlin, but there is a big Turkish community here. In many neighbourhoods you can find shops selling delicious Turkish sweets, including baklava. I don’t know the names of all of the different varieties, but they are all variants of sweet pastries containing nuts such as pistachio or walnuts.

6) And to the seaside! About 4 hours from Berlin on the train, but so worth it.

Have a good week!

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Middle Europe Weekly Small Pleasures #5 – Food and more food

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Anyone reading this blog might get the idea that my life revolves around food! (I can see my mother nodding vigorously). But hey, if you are ever in Berlin, now you will know where to find good food! Here are my week’s highlights. Join Mani’s blog event to share yours!

 

1) Rain! My least favourite weather is hanging grey skies without rain, especially in summer. And apparently the crops of Brandenburg were not enjoying the dry spell. Luckily it finally rained, and of course, after the clouds had rained themselves out, we finally had some blue skies again.

2) We’ve run out of Dr Who episodes on Netflix for the moment and have now started watching Heroes. I’ve seen it before, but  J hasn’t, and I’m enjoying watching it again.

3) Our first tayberry (growing on the balcony) was ready to eat! (apparently it’s a cross between a blackberry and a raspberry).

4) “Sein oder nicht sein, das ist hier die Frage…” We went to see Hamlet in German at Monbijou park theatre. I really liked the theatre, which is wooden and built in the traditional style of Shakespeare’s era. Sometime the German was too fast to follow (for a non-native speaker), but you could get the general story and it followed the original quite well – amazing, considering there were only 3 actors playing all of the roles! Watching them juggle between roles was also entertaining. The mysterious Ophelia was always talked about but never seen…

5) Cheese fondue at Ars Vini! Followed by chocolate fondue at Ars Vini! Do I need to say more?

6) A friend of ours told us that Tommi’s burgers (in Berlin) has great sweet potato fries, which we didn’t notice before (usually we arrive so hungry that we just automatically order cheese burger and fries without even reading the menu). This time we went for lunch with aforementioned friend on a rainy Saturday and I noticed they also have a “Burger of the month” (I didn’t order this month’s one as I’m not a huge fan of sauerkraut on burgers, but our friend enjoyed it). The sweet potato fries were amazing. I would go there just for that. I also had a thick, coffee milkshake – delicious.

7) Pizza on Sunday night at Il Giradischi in Prenzlauerberg, Berlin. Everyone prefers a different style of pizza – this place and Pomodorino in Friedrichschain are my two favourite pizza places in Berlin. Normally I can never finish a whole pizza and take leftovers for breakfast, but in Il Giradischi I always finish it (so unfortunately…no leftovers!). At Pomodorino they serve it sold in squares, so you can mix and match or take away.

8) Biking on a Sunday. We did a 60km bike ride from Oranienburg to Eberswalder, through forests, past rivers and canals, lovely villages, farms and fields, and old stone roads. The scenery was amazing. I’ll write a separate blog post about that with some photos.

9) Our bike path led us through a small village where they were selling fish brötchen and renting canoes. The Backfisch (fish in batter) option I tried was absolutely delicious – crispy batter and good fish. Of course, food always tastes good after exercise, but so far it’s the best fish I’ve eaten in Germany and I’d happily cycle 60km to get there again!

PS – In case it seems as if I live on pizza and burgers, I should add for the record that I also had lots of huge salads in the cafeteria this week (but they were not included in my weekly pleasures 😉 )