First Meal at Home

It wasn't the first meal actually, however it was the first 'real' meal I cooked at home after the honeymoon trip.

I choose not to give detials of the first dish I cooked at the first days of our marriage. Oh my it was a kind of a weird dish of green beans which we both wish to never remember again!

On the other hand I can say that it is way much better now. I'd never cooked a full meal when I was single. Considering this then the real first meal is a sample of success of mine! Haha!

My husband (still sounds strange to call him 'husband') loves soups. Any kind of soup but soup as a starter all the time. I'd once cooked a soup for mommy when she was a bit ill, and it was a simple "medical soup". With such a lack of experience of soup I needed a good start.

Tomato soup!

Sounds simple and feels comfort.

I searched it on a Turkish food blog (Devletsah.com) and tried her recipe with a little touch of mine. Result was perfect. Do I need to say that my touch made the soup great?!

It was nice to see the big smile on his face when he took the first sip of the soup. And the rest came as well.


Here my first menu:

Tomato soup
Chicken with soy & curry sauce
Fusilli pasta with pesto sauce
Mixed herb salad




Tomato Soup

Ingredients

1 tbsp olive oil
1 tbsp plain flour
1/2 tbsp tomato paste
3 medium tomatoes
2 cups water
1 tsp salt
1 tbsp thinly sliced fresh basil



Method

1. Grate tomatoes into a bowl (and of course keep the juice)
2. Add flour and olive oil in a stewpot, and keep stirring on medium fire till the colour of flour turns.
3. Add tomato paste, keep stirring. Just be carefull to not to burn it. Then add grated tomatoes. Cook it comes to boil.
4. Add water, and salt. Let it cook till it gets a bit thicker.
5. Finally, add thinly sliced fresh basil just after you take the stewpot off the fire. You can serve it with cream or grated cheese. We love it plain with basil.



Chicken recipe comes in the next post :)

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Tied The Knot

We tied the knot!
Went to the honeymoon holiday.
And now back!
Stay tuned :)




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Oh My Heart!

Twenty four days later. I'm doing better.

Four days left to go for the wedding. (I know it's still 5th of May but it's not so wrong to omit today! Ermm, well and don't count the final, 10th of May!)

Some of you cannot imagine in what kind of a rush I can be.
And some of you know it so well!

Oh my! I've never worked that much hard and never done such a lot of house work in a week! Clean there, tidy those, pheww!!! All decoration is finished (thx God!) Tomorrow the washing machine and the fridge are coming. My bridal dress is ready in my wardrobe but I'm still waiting the designer to bring the veil at this time of the day! (10 pm here!)

I needed to give a break to re-charge my flat batteries, and urge my butt (oops!) to the kitchen to make some healthy(!), sugar-free, diet cookies!



I'm not sure if it is correct to use the term of "sugar-free" for these cookies; however I didn't use any white or brown sugar. Just fresh, home-made grape molasses (which doesn't contain any white or brown sugar: only the natural sugar that grapes have itself) is used to sweeten. We love those hearty cookies! At least a thousand time better/healthier than any other "diet store-biscuits"!



Whole Wheat Molasses Cookies

Ingredients

100 gr butter (softened)
1/3 cup grape molasses (natural/home-made/additive & sugar-free if available)
1 egg
1 tsp ground cinnamon
1/2 tsp ground ginger
1 tsp baking powder
1 cup whole wheat flour**
1 cup plain flour**
1/2 cup wholemeal**


Method

1. Pre-heat oven to 180 C/ 350-375 F. Line your cookie trays with parchment.
2. Mix butter, molasses, and egg with electric mixer till the batter turns smooth.
3. Add cinnamon, ginger and stir well.
4. Sift all flour and baking powder, then add the flour mixture cup by cup till it gives a smooth dough which can be rolled. **So the amount of the flour depands on the brand you are using. And it's just up to you to choose a kind of flour or a mixture**.
5. Roll your dough thinly (about 0.4 inches/ 1 cm -or less if you like). Cut it to any shape you like. (There is only 'heart' shape left at home :D)
6. Cook them till they turn golden brown.



These cookies go well with anything but black tea (esp. with Earl Grey to me... Spicy vs Citrus). If you don't have any problem of diabetes you can also enjoy it dipping to lingonberry jam!



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Lume, lume sora lume...

I haven't been writing for 41 days. I couldn't write. I'm just between the edges. When I turn my left I see rush and happiness, but when I step one back I face sorrow. This is what life is called, huh?

It's sometimes heavy my friend. Sometimes too heavy to carry on.

Probably you remember that one of my uncles (who are not blood-relatives), Erol passed away in the New Year's eve. That was a deep pain to me. Not only his loss but also waiting another appointment with the angel of death...

It was something that we all knew, and something we wish never be true...

My dearest uncle, to whom I often brought hazelnut shortbreads, who had always been my light on my way of knowledge, Yilmaz passed away by cancer in 23rd of March, 2009.

Death is sometimes meaningless. Meaningless that it doesn't hurt you. Because sometimes parting apart comes way before the death. Be-loved may sometimes go far away from you, may become stranger to you when he's still with you... When he's still breathing...

Yilmaz was away from us inside his bed with his closed eyes which he was rarely opening. Without loosing his consciousness, he was just aware of being at the end of his way... It was hard to him to cope with the fact that he can't eat anymore, or can't go to the Moda Park anymore, or can't... Can't... cannot... anything...

Death is sometimes meaningless my friend. Having your heart beating is not preventing from dying. If you cannot share life with him anymore, my friend, doesn't that mean death? If you cannot walk along the beach together and talk on politics anymore, my friend, what do heart beats mean?

It's been so hard for me since the 23rd of March. I hate the saying "life goes on", however we tell it inevitably.

My wedding is on the 10th of May. Wedding dress is being prepared. House has been getting decorated. My heart is aching.

What does life mean, my friend? Both sorrow and joy?



***The song you listen to in this post is sung by a Romanian singer, Maria Tanase, who died by cancer, when she was 50, in 1963. Here I add the English tranlation of the lyrics from the website VirtualRomania.org


World, world, sister world
World, world, sister world
When will I have enough of you
When will I have enough of you
When I give up bread for Lent
And the glass will give up on me

Maybe then I'll have enough of you
Maybe then I'll have enough of you
When they hammer the nails on my coffin
When they hammer the nails on my coffin
World, sister world
When they put me in my grave
And I won't be on earth anymore
World, sister world

That's how the world is, transient
'Cause that's how the world is, transient
One is born, another dies
One is born, another dies
World, sister world
The born one suffers
The dead one rots

'Cause that's how the world is, transient
One is born, another dies
World, sister world
The born one suffers
The dead one rots
World, sister world


* Note from the website: "Cand s-o lasa sec de paine" - "When I give up bread for Lent" is a very loose translation. Romanians have "selective" fasting on Wednesdays and Fridays and certain periods of the year. Those days they give up meat for Lent, and anything of animal origin. However, bread is such a basic food in Romania that giving up bread for Lent would be unimaginable, and it doesn't exist as a tradition. A very exact translation of "When I give up bread for Lent" would be "never". Same with "when the glass will give up on me", which is meant to be the other way around, "when I give up drinking", which again has the meaning of "never".

My additional note: Here in the song the first "World" rather means "folks/everybody"...


The photo of Yilmaz you see on top was taken in a barouche, on Buyukada (the biggest of Prince's Islands on the Marmara), in April 2007, by me.
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The Turn Back

An undistinguished day.

In fact to be fair rather a good day as Feridun was in it.

Morning hours wasted in dad’s office, then the crowd of Saturday rain in Caddebostan.

Weather is as cold as ice. Something which has the sound of rain but which also looks like snow falls on earth. A cup of Cristmas tea for me, a cup of Haitian coffee for him…

The sun emigrates, dusk comes. Feridun goes back home, and so do I…

A young man sits next to me in the shared taxi. He holds the giftbox of a love of which VAT is paid, and a bunch of flowers… Mostly red roses, and some little poor, purple hyacinths.

Young man takes off the taxi in a rush, and he never notices that he drops a small bunch of purples. I save the Lady Hyacinth, and put her in my shopping bag.

I come home. I bring together the flowers and the water, place them next to a pile of books for a rest, and watch them. Night is still cold, but Lady Hyacinth smiles at home.

I sleep with her scent.

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