the red kitchen

The value of eggs

We just got back from summer holidays here, here and here. Finally, it seems as if we have turned a huge corner with our family holidays, and we had a surprisingly great time. Not that we don't have a good time usually, but we have realised that Lola is old enough now to do fair amounts of walking and sightseeing, and we really did a lot of things (ok, mainly visiting castles and walking in the mountains) that made our holiday memorable.

We did a lot of walking, and we had a few picnics. Perhaps it was just this article at the back of my head, but I made sure to pack a clutch of hard-boiled eggs along with the sandwiches and fruit, and boy, were they the highlight of the day! I'm not sure what makes a hard-boiled egg so appealing to a stomach emptied by vigorous walking (I'm not usually a big fan of hard-boiled eggs), but we all wolfed them down, even when I forgot the salt wrapped up in a twist of foil. I did long for lashings and lashings of ginger beer to wash them down with, but alas, we had to make do with plain old water.

Still, I've come a new appreciation of the humble picnic. Fancy stuff is all fair and good, but when you're really hungry, well, actually, anything even vaguely edible will do, seasoned as it will be by the fresh air, sunshine and the atmospheric value afforded by mountainous alps, lakes and forests.

Schlangerbrot

We had a party for Max and Lolly on Sunday, a sausage sizzle in the park*, in the bitter cold and mud which no-one seemed to mind at all (much fun was had by all).

Above is a specimen of the (infamous) schlangerbrot (snakebread), lengths of bread dough wound around a bloody great stick and charred, err, cooked, over a fire. One of those things for which nostalgia seems to play a key part in the attraction (for Bruno, harking back to his days in the pfädi, or scouts). Most often they are rumoured to be blackened on the outside but raw on the inside, but these were surprisingly delicious and well-cooked. Or maybe they tasted so good because it was so damn frrrrr-fr-frr-freezing cold, and they were so divinely hot.

* Found a use for my 2 leftover rolls of frozen chocolate chipper dough. Chippers were a party hit with the semi-frozen, smoke-wreathed guests.

mittagessen, or lunch

this article about school lunches is interesting (via daxaing). growing up in nz and australia, school lunches were always brought from home, so the notion of mass-produced and consumed school food is pretty alien to me. it seems like a good idea, if the food is good and healthy. here in switzerland most kids come home from school for lunch (there is a 2 hour lunch break). often it is the main meal of the day. i actually like this, as it seems more sensible to eat a large meal in the middle of the day when you are busy and active as opposed ot eating a big main meal just before you go to bed.

the difficulty with the swiss school lunch system is that, obviously, someone needs to be home to make the kiddies lunch. usually this is mummy. increasingly, however, many mothers are returning to the workforce, and while the 2 hour lunch is the norm for many industries/professions, it does then entail working close to home and being able to get home in time for lunch. talk about restrictions! i've said it before and i'll say it again, the swiss school system is NOT kind to mothers/primary carers.

it is only very recently (the one at our local school was built last year)that mittagstisch (lunchtable) clubs have been set up for kids whose parents both work and cannot be home to provide them with lunch. i have no idea what they serve the kiddies though. presumably it is something healthy, as fast foods like chips and burgers are barely even available from commercial outlets (there is one mcdonalds in zürich, and a burger king somewhere on the outskirts of zürich, but that's about it).

having said that, i do think it is a nice tradition for everyone to sit down together at lunch, if possible, and eat a good hearty meal. i know that i survive the latter part of the day better if i make an effort and cook lunch. if i only have a yoghurt or bread roll with something i find i just nibble the afternoon away. the kiddies are also less likely to pester me for snacks if we have a cooked lunch.

i'm not sure what i will be doing when max goes to school. we are just beginning to plan for when he enters kindergarten in august. he will go every morning but be home in time for lunch. so my return to the workforce will have to be squeezed in around that and lola, who will be attending max's kinderkrippe (childcare) for 2 days a week. in all, i may have around 2 mornings a week to go back to work. hmmm. that's not much. some careful scheduling will have to happen here, or else a major career adjustment.

mass production

phew. just finished kneading a double batch of zopf - that's a whopping 2kgs of flour bashed around by yrs truly. i've now got the ginormous forearms of a well-seasoned old sailor, and my muscles are all a-tremble from all the unaccustomed exercise.

i've been meaning to increase production of zopf loaves for some time now, as i always want to give out extra loaves to our favourite people but never have enough - usual output is a piddly 3 loaves per batch (one for us, one for bruno's parents, one for peter and steffi). but the thought of handling all that dough has quite frankly scared the pants off me. even now, the double batch of dough is threatening to break loose from the gladwrapped bowl and take over the kitchen bench, and i've only just finished kneading it! anyway, i thought i'd give it a try today. fortified myself with a few bracing cups of coffee and kneaded away...2kgs of flour, 200g butter, 1.2L of bio milk, 2 Tb salt, and it will later need the yolks of 4 eggs to glaze all 6 of the loaves i will make. crikey.

at one time i thought to go into commercial production making zopf, as everyone seems to love it. however, seeing as my maximum output has been 3 loaves which take a number of hours to prepare (admittedly much of that is spent waiting around for the dough to rise, not actively doing anything), i reasoned that it would not really be a profitable exercise. however, if i had that kitchenaid...... : ) actually, even that would probably be too small. i'd need a massive commercial mixer, and a huge oven to bake the loaves. one small domestic oven certainly wouldn't cut the mustard with that lot. well, maybe one day if we ever go back to oz i will think about it again.

now, who has been nice enough to me lately to warrant a loaf of freshly baked zopf....

(this is an old picture, taken by the lovely michael a couple of years (!!!) ago)

the vexing question of saturday lunch

saturday morning is always such a frenetic rush in the kitschenette household. there are shopping lists to be written (entailing at least partial planning of the up-coming week's meals), recycling to be sorted (glass - green, brown, white, tins, PET bottles, plastic milk bottles...they all need to go to different places) and dropped off, and afore-mentioned shopping to be done. by the time i get back home it's practically almost lunch-time, and i'm starving, the kids are starving and bruno, well he always seems to be hungry : )

most weeks we just throw together a kitchen sink lunch ie. bread, cheese, avocado, yoghurt etc etc but today was so cold that i really felt like something warm and comforting. i'd bought some ready-made pastry when i was shopping so i had the brilliant idea of making little pies for lunch. so quick, and easy (always my main criteria), and with the added bonus of little kiddies adoring them.

so simple! i used a large mug to cut out pastry rounds, and lined a muffin tray with the rounds. i had some left-over tomatoey chicken casserole, so i used that to fill some of them. i grated an apple and used that to make a quick apple pie, sprinkled with brown sugar. then i used a drinking glass (importantly, smaller than the rounds made by the mug) to cut out rounds for the top. i then wet the edges of the pastry casing and laid on the top, pressing the edges closed with a fork. a brush of egg yolk, and into the bottom of the oven on a baking tray (to crisp the bottoms) at 200°c for 15- 20 mins or so, until golden brown and delicious (you can move the pies up higher in the oven to brown the tops after 10 mins or so).

i made these mostly for the kiddies, but adults seem to find them irresistible, too. so keep an eye out for marauding adults if you leave them prone on the kitchen bench, wafting off their gorgeous smell.