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Sissi´s Delicious Cheesecake

February 7, 2023

With Valentine´s Day just around the door, I thought of sharing this festive cheesecake with pecan nuts and caramel topping that my beautiful and extremely talented sister baked for me and some guests for our last New Year’s Eve party. You can find the Romanian recipe on her and her friends Sabina´s Instagram page at @povestiaromate, or keep reading for the English version. Whether you’re baking it for or with someone you love, or just doing it for yourself, I am sure you’ll love it as much as I did. And with that the #guestchefseries kicks off another season.

International Food

Salmon, Avo and Orange Salad

January 9, 2023

I´ve been meaning to promote this latest salad recipe I came up with as a winter salad, but who am I kidding? This one will work as well in summer and any season, really. It’s the oranges that give me a winter feeling, along with the fact that due to the cooked salmon it’s a warm-ish salad. But the oranges can just as well take your mind to a summer in Tuscany, and give you all the sunny vibes we so direly miss this gloomy winter. Whenever you decide to make it though, I assure you that you’ll love it, as it is such a perfect blend of flavours – the buttery flavoured salmon (Ras el Hanout is my absolute favourite spice blend for salmon), the sweet and slightly sour orange, the mild yet buttery textured avocado, the nutty, kokumi parmesan, the fresh mint, and finally the complex sweet balsamic vinegar. It’s taken me quite a few iterations to get to this level of perfection, and now I am ready to share it with you.

France

Food I Loved in Paris

January 3, 2023

Paris, mon amour, and her finger licking food. Upon my last visit to Paris, in July, I decided it was high time for a city and a food guide of this tremendously incredible city. It took me long enough to finally get to writing it, but alas, here we are. As always, I divided my restaurant recommendations into breakfast, lunch and dinner categories, this time adding wine and snack spots, because well,´ were in Paris after all. Bookmark this for your next trip to the city of love and enjoy one of the ´worlds best cuisines.

Vegan Spanish Vegetarian Food

Salsa Brava (Spanish Spicy Sauce for Patatas Bravas)

July 5, 2022

Spending three weeks on the Spanish coast meant : 1. I finally got a bit of a tan and 2. I absolutely abused on their delicious food. And since we last spoke about Costa Brava, let´s speak about the Spaniards´ delicious dish of “patatas bravas”. Essentially meaning “spicy potatoes”, this dish is as simple as it gets and I won´t insult you by showing you how to make the potatoes (just cut them in cubes and fry them). Buuuuut I will give you a super easy recipe for the sauce that is sometimes also used over seafood, and that to be frank you can just put on top of anything. So here goes…

Spain

A Guide to Costa Brava – Part I – Cadaqués

June 29, 2022

Cadaqués – a town Salvador Dali described as a “mystical paradise”. A town that even to the ones without an artistic bone in their body will come across as full of a creative energy that is hard to ignore. Located up north on the Costa Brava, sprinkled with artistic studios, fantastic boutique stores and great restaurants, it´s no wonder Cadaqués attracted not just Dali, but also the likes of Picasso, Miró and much more. This June I spent a couple of days there, and as per usual, I just had to document where I recommend you stay, eat and what to do in this gem of a town.

Brazil

7 Fun Things To Do in São Paulo

February 24, 2022

A month ago today I was in very rainy São Paulo, eating a gigantic mortadella sandwich (more about this below) and marvelling at this grey city, which has so much to offer. Let me set something straight though: São Paulo is not exactly what one would call a beautiful city. Its buildings stretch towards the sky, as if trying to make a connection to a God that might have forsaken the many poor of the city. Bursts of colour appear here and there, but especially when one thinks of the other iconic Brazilian city – Rio de Janeiro, São Paulo pales. What the city does have plenty of though, is an impressive art scene, mouth-watering food and great restaurants, and music – lots of music. For the scope of this article though, I´ll focus on seven fun things to do in this enormous and intimidating city of contrasts.

Portuguese Christmas Dinner Food

Portuguese Duck Rice (Arroz de Pato)

December 20, 2021

This Christmas season I wanted to bring a different Christmas dinner recipe for this international community, so I went for the Portuguese duck rice – a yummy dish of crispy rice and tender duck. Hubby and I did it for the very first time, and although it took us hours, I am quite proud of the outcome. These proportions are for a big meal of ten, but worry not if you´re a smaller group, it freezes quite well, so you can do that and enjoy it for the next couple of months. And I personally recommend you do just that, rather than cutting the ingredients, as this recipe takes about three hours to cook and if you´re gonna spend that much time on it, you might as well have duck rice for the full next year to show for it. 🙂

Portugal

A Day in Coimbra

December 12, 2021

Coimbra, the former capital of Portugal in the 12th and 13th century, is nowadays the most notorious university city in Portugal and a perfect weekend destination if you find yourself either in Lisbon or Porto. The city has an intriguing and tragic love story behind it, that of Infante Pedro and Inês de Castro (a Spanish lady in waiting to Pedro´s wife, Constança). You see, Pedro and Inês were in love, so after Pedro´s wife died, they stopped hiding their love affair, a thing that enraged Pedro´s father, the king. He was so angry, that he had Inês killed, a thing that in return turned Pedro incredibly angry. One thing led to another, an uprising against the king started, and Inês´ killers basically ended up with their hearts ripped out, earning Pedro the name of “the Cruel”. Had Shakespeare known about Coimbra, Romeo and Julia would have been an entirely different story.

Christmas Vegetarian International Dessert Food

Coconut Cookies (With a Dash of Orange)

December 6, 2021

As you might have seen on my Instagram, I have now officially entered the cookie frenzy period. Five days into December, and I am on batch number three. The twist? I´m switching it up and started experimenting with new flavours. So for this #homemadeMonday, I´m bringing you this super easy coconut cookie recipe that thanks to its dash of orange, will fill your house with a Christmas smell. These cookies are much fluffier and less flat than my traditional Christmas cookies and as they do not take chocolate, they´re lower in calories. Not that anyone´s counting anyway.

International Vegan Dinner Food

Baked Tomato and Bean Soup

November 30, 2021

This #homemadeMonday is for both the ones of you that don´t like tomato soup (and need a twist to the tangy tomato taste), and for the ones of you who love tomato soup (and want to try it in a different shape and form). I, for one, love the taste of tomatoes, but as I was trying to rescue some that were going bad in my fridge, I just felt that they alone would not make for a great soup. So I researched the topic a bit on Pinterest and got this idea to add white beans to the tomatoes. Long story short, I loved the result, I feel the beans were just what was missing to make the whole thing creamier and add a bit of starchy, buttery taste. And am here to share the whole thing with you.

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