Snowstorm, so soup it is!

It's been snowing 7 hours. Forecasts say it will be snowing until tomorrow noon.

So soup.

We had one and a half cervelat-type sausages in the fridge (local basic sausage). Not my favourite, but hb likes it and it IS cheap. And I know how it's made, because I've been in most sausace factories here. I fried it before adding to the soup -not necessary step, but it tastes so much better.

It looks like any other potato-based soups I make these days, because I have a lot of beets and everything cooked with beets gets red. Ok, someone might call it a stew, whatever. This is how my grannies made this ❤️

1,5€ for the sausage, 0,2€ for spices and stock cube, max 1€ for vegetables (carrot, swede, beet, potato, peas). So pot full of soup less than three euros, less than 50 cents per portion.

Hello darkness, my old friend....

 As a child I was afraid of dark. While walking to school I frantically squeesed my flashlight. It wasn't very powerful, it was 70's anyway.

Now the darkness is my friend. It's a good thing that we have formed a friendship, becaus during cold seasons there's not much light. It's dark when I wake up. It's dark when I take 'Suma for a walk. It's dark when we leave home when I take ys to school (no public transportation here, school trip is 14 km one way). And of course it's dark when I finish my work, at four pm. Yay.

But it's not pitch dark, there is tones in darkness. Last weekend there was more than enough light - full moon at it's brightest illuminated even forest floor. And if there's clouds, nearby town sheds enought light to shatter it from the clouds so I can walk safely without having to worry about stumbling. It WAS darker in the 70's. There was energy crisis (oil crisis) so street lights in the town  were off, if there even were any. It was 70's, not a modern day light pollution era.

And if I don't use any extra light, I can see everything around me, with flashlight I can see only what's in the narrow beam of light. And if there's too dark that I can't see - well, nobody else can't see me neither! So it is safe to walk in the darkness in the countryside.

Cities are totally different. I've never seen so dark shadows like there are in cities - darkness is a deep void, not a soft and comfly blanket like it is in the countryside.

Chocolate semolina pudding

I usually cook one porridge a week. And when I say porridge, I actually cook something rest of the world calls as pudding. 

Today was porridge cooking day, as it is Sunday. On Sundays I try to make something that can be easily eaten during the week as a snack, breakfast or when you are hungry but have no time to make a sandwich!

Favourite is, of course! Semolina chocolate pudding. Chocolate semolina pudding? Chocolate porridge 😁

I'm cooking on the woodstove now. It keeps the house warm and save electricity.

Once cooked, you can see separate semolina grains. This time I used a small amount of polenta, too. I'm the only one liking polenta, and we were given one package. I'm not wasting any food!

You can buy semolina grains with cocoa and other stuff, but it's quite expensive - at least I think it is. It's easy to mix yourself.

1 l milk

1 dl semolina

1 dl sugar

(1 tsp vanilla sugar)

1/4 tsp salt

I cook this in bain marie/double boiler pot, because I just can't cook milk in normal pot without burning it...

I mix everything but salt and let it cook in double boiler for half an hour or longer. In normal pot it takes only 10 to 15 minutes. Once it's cooked, I add salt.

This is very good hot and cold. You can have it with  milk, cream, vanilla custard etc but I just eat as it is. It is very sweet! But this is how we like it.

I also made a sort of Yorkshire pudding. We eat it as a sweet dessert with jam.

I use pizza cutter to make slices, I forgot to take a picture before I sliced this. (and someone had already took a slice or two)