Dead Until Fried Buckwheat Paddies

I wandered around Waterstone's today pretending to just aimlessly look for nothing special, holding securely in my hand some Tolstoy, just to prove my literary superiority. Then, thinking someone might think I hadn't read Anna Karenina before (which I of course have), I decided to exchange it to something by Iris Murdoch.

In fact, I was on a determined search for the True Blood books by Charlaine Harris. It was almost as if I was pretending even to myself that I was actually there to get something by, let's say, Iris Murdoch, and then, oh, just by accident, sort of slipping in a Dead Until Dark just for some silly fun on the side.

I can only remember doing something similar when buying condoms those first times, and sort of hiding them between a toothbrush, some news magazine and a chocolate bar. When buying condoms, I remember being achingly aware to not get at the same time anything that would create a story. Like I could not get condoms and lipstick. Or condoms and tampons. Or condoms and even things like hair spray. I didn't want the person at the cashier to think Oh, what a slut! She must really want it, buying condoms and lipstick and hairspray and all...

I was not going to ask for those books. That would be too embarrassing. So I walked around with this la-la-la-lala face for some time, just hoping to stumble upon those guilty pleasure books somewhere. But even when I carefully went over the fiction A-Z/H section for the third time, I could not detect Charlaine anywhere. It dawned on me then, that they might not be under fiction at all, but under Horror. I sighed in relief. And so I sailed, slowly, unsuspiciously, along the long cashier counter where three handsome young men were working, hoping they wouldn't notice me, and if they did, that they would please see the Murdoch books in my hand.

But, weirdly, there were no Charlaine to be found in the horror section either. I sat down then and opened instead Murdoch's The Sea, The Sea. I couldn't manage to read even one sentence without wanting to strangle myself rather than to continue reading. And so I ran up to the cashier and pleaded for someone to please show me where the hell they were hiding the True Blood books. He pointed me in the direction of Horror repeating (sensing my urgency) To the left, the Left...

And, finally, there they were. All glossy and shiny and lined up one after the other. I couldn't believe I had missed them before. And so I had to put down The Sea, The Sea in order to stack my seven True Blood books. Ahum. And then I sort of just forgot it there, among Lovecraft and Stephen King...

Dead Until Fried Buckwheat paddies with basil yoghurt

3 dl cooked buckwheat

handful of basil leaves

a few capers

sun-dried tomatoes

a pile of grated parmesan

samlal oelek

vegan stock

pinch of salt

Mix (with a handmixer) in a bowl the buckwheat, basil leaves, capers, sliced sun-dried tomatoes and sambal oelek, a minute until roughly 'chopped'. Then add the rest (the parmesan, a teaspoon of stock and salt) and mix to a nice dough.

Make nice paddies and cover them in a mix of black and white sesame seeds and poppy seeds. Fry in a pan until hard on both sides.

Yoghurt: Mix together goats yoghurt with a 2 cm piece of ginger, 1 clove of garlic, basil leaves, and a pinch of salt. Make some avocado dip too so you have some range...

Non-Robotic Lamb Meatballs

I haven't spoken to a single person today. Not in person, anyway. Even at Sainsbury's, as I desperately wanted to pay at the human cashier, a tired looking man just shook his head and pointed to the robot cashier on the other side.

At least, the thing had a voice. Please, take your bags! Please. The metallic voice might as well have shouted Hurry up you lousy good-for-nothing, you are yesterdays news! Take your shit and move along! Please! We are trying to work here.

I was strangely depressed walking home with my two orange plastic bags, feeling a little guilty. I had, once again, forgot my canvas bag and so used the worlds resources shamefully and selfishly. And was I, on top of all, a part of the worlds economic down-fall, as I am just too slow to pick up my bags, slowing the cash-flow down in a way that someone could calculate to the precise percentage... I'll stop here.

To my great joy the phone rang the moment I stepped in the door. Oh hurrah! I basically threw the bags on the floor (not caring about my dad's voice in my head Caroline, for God's sake! Never pack the eggs lowest in a bag! You must put them on top! Why? Why can't you ever learn this?) and shoot like a rocket, grabbing the phone on my way, to the sofa.

Hello? I answered excitedly. For all I knew, it might be Alan Ball or A Friend or at least my mother. After a moments hesitation, a strange woman's voice talked back.

V: Have you considered changing bank...

No, I said back, but she didn't stop to hear me out. I realized then, that I was trying to communicate with a robot, again. And that's how it went the hole day.

Hello? Friendly me.

Have you considered The Kitchen Specialists Special Christmas...

NO.

Ring-ring.

C: Hello? A little less friendly, but hey, how many such calls can a girl get in a day?

V: Have you considered changing your cars tires...

C: NO. NO AND NO!

Ring-ring.

C: Yes?

V: Have you considered paying your bills...

C: NEVER.

Ring-ring.

V: Have you considered the home service of...

V: Have you considered renting a car within the...

V: Have you considered joining the worlds largest...

C: Have you considered to shut the fuck up?

Man does it feel good to shout at the top of ones lungs. Even if only to a robot.

Non-Robotic Lamb Meatballs

500g minced lamb

1 egg

a spoon of breadcrumbs

a cup of water

the rind of two lemons (grated)

parsley, finely chopped

2 big cloves of garlic, finely chopped

salt and pepper

Mix all the above in a bowl.

Sauce

1 yellow onion, finely chopped

1 can chopped tomatoes

a little sugar or molasses

salt and pepper

Let the onion fry for some minutes before adding the rest, then let it simmer for about 10 min. Make nice, big balls with the meat and pop into the pan (must be a large pan!). Cook for about 15-20 minutes. Serve with red or black rice. Sprinkle over fresh herbs, like basil or thyme...

Yum. Thanks Anna for recipe!

Hangover

I was set. I was not going to give in to temptation. I was not going to let the triggers push me so far as to start again with the bad bad stuff. I was determined. You know I was. In my rage I even devoured a couple of innocent chorizos. I knew, that way, I would stay away from pasta, ginger breads and those darling little chocolate cakes they push in your face in the que at Marks & Spencer. But there will always be someone evil to lure you away from your path.

Unsuspecting where my night was heading, I took the bus to my preggie friend, who, in-between, has successfully had a, you know, baby. I was expecting a night of tuna salad and a cup of tea. But at her house, a friend of hers sat on the sofa munching chocolate, a man introduced as 'oh, Caroline, I think you guys have the same thing'. Of course that set up for a long discussion about food, doctors and poo-tests. The man finished with the words 'I was on the diet for two years, but it didn't work, so now I eat everything'. He took another piece of chocolate and purred as it melted in his mouth. I sat silent, stunned. He went up to the stove, poured a pack of spaghetti in a bowl of cooking water, simultaneously stirring some weep-inducingly, well-smelling, buttery, creamy, saucy thingie. He piled the pasta high on a plate, practically throwing a whole grated parmesan on top, and poured the buttery sauce in a glittering, gleaming stream of goodness over that magical tower.

I stared at the golden spaghettis hanging out of his mouth, shining moist with butter... I heard every bite as if magnified by a thousand and the sound kept echoing in my ears, each sound overlaying the other into a symphony of complex structure. Noticing my staring, trance-like stare, he asked if maybe I wanted some? I swallowed, my throat dry. No, no I couldn't. My diet, I had to keep to my diet. I forced myself into the bathroom where I sat hyperventilating until I heard the man slam the door shut behind him. Only when he was gone, did I dare to peak my head into the kitchen again.

The room was empty. My gaze was magically drawn to the stove. One single pan stood shining spookily in the otherwise quite dark kitchen. I floated up to it and as if sleepwalking, I lifted the lid and discovered a small heap of the remaining pasta. Without thinking I just grabbed it and shoved it into my mouth. The poison was working its way to my blood and it felt gooood. It was as if some spirit demon took possession of me, I threw all cupboards open, pulled out all bread I could find, including a pizza, and just started eating my way through like a mad person.

OMG. How many weeks of wheat/butter/sugar celibacy had I just destroyed? I didn't care. I left as if walking on sunshine. I fell asleep as if on ecstasy. I slept blissfully. And then I woke up. My head spinning, my stomach turning, nausea spreading through my entire body. I had my first wheat hangover.

Instinct Oven Veggies

After my decision to never eat again, some primal animal instinct took control over my body and led it into the kitchen. There it opened the fridge, completely without my consent, and grabbed a few old chorizo sausages laying way back in the darkness next to a few rotting beet-roots. The animal devoured the sausages beast-like, finding great pleasure in diving its teeth into the meat and pull the sausage apart as if it was a small, dead animal. Which I guess is more or less what a chorizo is.

After eight hours of coma, I woke up to myself again. And I couldn't wait to have some zucchini for lunch.

Instinct Oven Veggies

1 parsnip

1 red onion

1 zucchini

some cloves of garlic

red rice

some spinach leaves

Place the chopped up veggies on an oven-tray and sprinkle with olive oil, garlic salt and pepper. Heat the oven to about 180º, then leave the veggies in there for ca. 30 minutes.

Boil the red rice.

for dip:

1 small avocado

2 cloves of garlic

a handful walnuts

2 table spoons olive oil

a little lemonjuice

some salt

Mix together the ingredients with a hand mixer.

Mix the rice, the veggies and the spinach in a bowl, then add a spoon of dip.

Absolute Abstinence

I am going mad. The pressure in my head is inhuman. I might have to hit it against a wall just to relieve the pain. I need a baguette. I need truffle brie. I need whipped cream, blueberry muffins, cheesecakes, chocolate fondue, ciabatta with melted appenzeller. I need tagliatelle with saffron-lemon cream sauce. I need a Pret Italian Artisan Prosciutto Baguette. I can't take the absence of this food any longer. I want to bath in whipped cream, lick butter of my fingers, dig my head into a super-sized heap of spaghetti carbonara and grunt.

I am an addict on the verge of giving in. So I looked up how to deal with it:

Recognizing the medical and psychological aspects of drug withdrawal.
Identifying triggers to drug use and developing techniques for avoiding these triggers.

Learning how to handle drug craving without relapsing.

First, the counselor should help the patient to identify the people, places, and things that will trigger or lead to a craving or urge. Then the counselor should point out that the patient must avoid the people, places, and things that trigger craving and have the patient discuss how he or she can avoid the triggers.

Ahhhh... Ok. I will just have to stay indoors for the rest of my life. No, that won't help. I'll just have to lay still on my bed with closed eyes and wait to die. Because I am refusing to eat another piece of zucchini again! I refuse to set my eyes on another asparagus, tomato or eggplant. No bean, leek or pepper will ever enter the dark cave of my mouth. Ever. Not. A. Chance. My hands refuse to chop another onion. My stomach repulses at the thought of another avocado.

I'd rather just starve to death. Yepp. That's right. See you on the other side brothers and sisters.

Twilight Toast

I have just started the book Twilight by Stephenie Meyer. It's about teenagers and stuff and, ahum... vampires. I am also, simultaneously, watching True Blood for the gazillionths time. Also with vampires. Since when do I read or watch anything as silly as something with vampires?

Where is Dostojevski? The Upanishads? Healing Hands For Beginners? The Gnostic Gospels? New Perspectives on Austrians and WW2? Where is Lajos Egri, C. G. Jung and Eckhard Tolle?

I have a suspicion.

I think...

Oh boy.

I think I might have...

Maybe...

I am just saying maybe, it might not be the case at all...

I mean, I don't want to jinx it...

I might have started to learn how to...

How to...

How to enjoy myself.

This is scary stuff. Will this mean that I am just going to spend the rest of my life doing nothing but having a good time? Does this mean that I won't ever be ambitious again, you know, since I am having a perfectly good time anyway, in the very comfortable position of laying under a pink blanket on the sofa in my comfy-pants?

Relaxing and actually enjoying myself might prove to be the most dangerous thing I have ever done in my entire life! Gone my chances of becoming a successful writer. Blown away any chance I had of at least becoming enlightened and telling others all they do wrong in their life. Erased my chance of proving my... my... my Abilities, my Genius, my Inner Beauty and Sense Of Life And All Its Madness... you know...

Oh well. At least I have another fifty sequels to Twilight to look forward too.

Twilight Toast

3 pieces of quinoa bread

toast it

put avocado on it

soak it in olive oil

place a chunk of alfalfa sprouts on top

pour over herb salt

Scholarship Salmon

So, I have exactly one more month, and then I am out of school. Shiat. What to do after that? Should I panic? Should I run around the house madly pulling at my hair and dream up all the bad things that could happen when school is over? Like: I won't get an agent! I'll never write again! I'm gonna be stuck in Vienna and die of depression and repressed creativity!

But I have learned a little something from all the years spent meditating and practicing astral travel; I am not the control freak I used to be. What happens happens and one just has to deal with it. And the more one just lets life has its way, the more fun it gets. Living out of the empty space, I call it. Letting go. For example, I had an appointment with dear Dr. Pajamas again yesterday, and as he told me to get out of my stockings, I realized I hadn't shaved my legs for, hmmm, weeks. There was a moment I was about to panic and on the verge of feeling deeply embarrassed, but, thanks to all my spiritual practices, I just inhaled and accepted the fact that my poor doctor was going to have to deal with my long body hair.

That's all fine and good, and a little bit brain washed too, which I happily admit to. Not wanting anything, I thought I had actually mastered the art. That is, until I discovered that I am TWO people away from Alan Ball (and one from Berlusconi... hmmm). And now I have set my greedy spirit on something else too. Frida sent me a link to a screenwriters scholarship, and oh boy, do I want it. One year of just writing and here it comes... getting payed for it (I am sighing deeply here)! OMG. OMG. How I want it! How I long for it! Could something splendid like that actually happen to me? Send me your blessings folks, I want them.

Take Bad Back Stir Fry and use Salmon instead.

Food Spy Quinoa Stir Fry

I am still just fascinated by this whole food question. Ok. So certain food-stuffs are not good for you. One should maybe try to eat less meat, a little less sugar, processed stuff and so on. Eat healthily. Eat vegetables. But it doesn't stop there does it? Then you have no idea what the hell someone has been spraying on those spanish tomatoes... I read this on a package of Sainsbury's organic dried apricots today: Of the ingredients that could be organic, 100% are organic. Hahahahahahahahahahahahaha! That really cracks me up!

Quite manipulative. That says absolutely nothing. Of course, crazy shit like chemical preservatives could never be organic. And there was no other indication of what was actually in the product. It just wasn't clear what was in the bag. Which reminds me of an article in der Spiegel. There was some fuss about Calf's-liver-sausage. In the product, which was called Calf's liver Sausage, there wasn't actually any Calf's liver. There was some calf meat mixed together with some pork liver. But the company were allowed to keep the name for some unintelligible reason. On one hand that is just hilarious. On the other, so sad. One has to be a sly spy these days, when it comes to food. Don't trust anyone.

I heard of a company the other day, that changed the sugar content in their yoghurts to fruit-sugar some time ago, after having made research on what the main concern parents had on the food for their children. But as soon as the parents were convinced of the naturalness of the product (after extensive advertising communicating the change from sugar to fruit-sugar), they swapped right back. Because industrial sugar is cheaper, of course.

Food Spy Quinoa Stir Fry

Everything that can be good in this recipe, is good.

Quinoa

zucchini

pointed red pepper

scallion

handful young spinach

sambal oelek

fennel, coriander

fresh basil leaves

vegan stock

avocado

garlic

lemon

(I actually have no idea what was in that meal, it was like a week ago I cooked it, but since I ate out today, I'll have to try to remember... this page is just not the same when there is no food photo.)

For two, cook a small cup of Quinoa about 15 minutes. Fry the veggies, add sambal and vegan stock. Add the quinoa when ready, together with spinach leaves and whatever fresh herbs you have handy.

Make an avocado dip to that.