It's Japanese and it's HOT.

My life's been full of action lately. My boyfriend is moving in and that combined with Christmas stress, last exams, parties, work and hosting 2 Dutch guys means a lot of action ;)

As action seems to be the word of the day, I decided to dedicate this post to Japan that is famous for its action movies (kaukaa haettua, eikai). That is why today's recipe is for hot Japanese food which is easy to make and it's really good.

It's Hot and it's Japanese:

less than 1 dl water
2 dl white wine
1 dl soya
1 bottle of Mirin (can be found in Stockmann's Japan section)
3cm ginger
2 tablespoon sugar
1 (red) onion
600g beef (small slices)
mushrooms
chili
(spinach)

cut everything cuttable into small pieces. Put liquids, sugar, ginger and chili into a pan and let them boil for 2mins. Add onion and heat 5 more mins. Then add mushrooms and beef and heat couple of more minutes and voilá, you've got hot'n'japanese that looks nothing like in the picture below.
Serve it with rice.



X

Wine and Worry.

I spent this weekend at home. Without parties (not to mention themeparties), bars, socially engaging activities that involve alcohol and excitement. Instead, I went to the gym, visited some friends, had a dinner in a proper restaurant, finished a book that I'd been reading for 3months and went for a coffee with my sister. However, I wasn't alone - I had half a bottle of wine and my boyfriend with me. Now what worries me is this: I cannot cannot cannot remember the last time I went to bed at 10pm on SATURDAY evening (even to watch a movie) nor the last time I didn't go to a bar with my mates during a weekend. In addition, I haven't been out during the weekdays at all (for weeks). This is another thing that worries me. Am I a really that old now? Or is this the famous Finnish depression everyone seems to suffer from? Or can it really be that being in a relationship has changed me?

To understand my worry, one has to understand and know me. I have always been very outgoing person, literally and going out has been more a lifestyle than an occational fling. I don't want everyone to think now that I can't have fun without alcohol and can't express my feelings without drinking like a typical Finn. Quite the contrary, I'm usually more emotional when sober than when drunk. Another example of my strange but yet Vee-like behaviour is last March when I decided to stop drinking. I didn't drink for a whole month but still I was out every single weekend. Now you must start understanding why this "staying at home and not going out during the weekdays" worries me.

All this worries me also because I felt guilty about it. I felt guilty about staying at home the whole weekend and was making up different excuses. The Vee my friends know is the Vee who goes out every weekend but can it really be so that that Vee is changing? Is it ok to stay at home at the age of 26 and feel good about not going out? God these questions are starting to sound like Carries' so called problem questions in Sex and the City. I hope I'm not that pathetic yet ;) Now, drinking wine home alone on a Sunday night, I start to realize that maybe I should try to change worry into glory. Isn't it actually freedom to be able to choose to stay at home or to go out every weekend? I can do whatever I want. Despite my age, depressionrate and relationship status.

To celebrate this freedom, I'll write down my grandma's favourite meatsoup recipe that I seem to lose every week. At least now I'll find it from here (from now on).

Mummin terveellinen lihakeitto

400g naudan jauhelihaa
1 sipuli
1rkl vehnäjauhoja
0,5dl vettä
1 lihaliemikuutio
1 kasvisliemikuutio
suikalevihannespussi
4 perunaa (suikaleina)
viherpippuria
100g (viherpippuri)sulatejuustoa
2dl kermaa
mustapippuria

C'est bon. Kokeilkaa ja nauttikaa :)

Bruschettas and Charleston

As this is my first post on my own blog, I decided to write it in English. The name of the blog comes from my English nickname, Vee that my portuguese friends invented years ago. I'd like to think that they just wanted to give me a nice nickname but it was probably because they didn't know how to pronounce my real name. However, as I know that some of my Finnish friends find it annoying to be reading English, I'll definitely write in Finnish sometimes in the future (asianomaiset tunnistavat tästä ehkä itsensä ;)).

The aim of this blog is to share experiences, recipes and theme party tips. As I have lost all my cookbooks thanks to living in 8 different flats in the past 5 years, I want to keep this also as my private cookbook. In addition to lifestyle and cooking blog, this blog also pretends to be a travel blog. The aim is to write down experiences from every single new country I visit (or hopefully live in).

In the following I will give this half-naked chef's recipe for depressingly gloomy Tuesday evening. In Finnish.

Bruschettoja ja viiniä

Ainekset:

• maalaisleipää


• tomaattia


• sipulia


• valkosipulia


• Bruschetta aurinkokuivattu tomaattitahna


• naudanpaistileikkele


• Dijon-sinappia


• mozzarellaraastetta

Valmistus: Pilko sipulit ja tomaatit ja paista niitä hetki pannulla jotta ne hieman pehmenevät. Leikkaa maalaisleipä reilunkokoisiksi viipaleiksi ja paahda ne esim. leivanpaahtimessa. Levitä paahdetuille leipäviipaleille tomaattitahnaa sekä sipuli-tomaattisekoitusta. Lisää päälle 1-2 siivua naudanpaistia jonka päälle voi sipaista hieman Dijonin sinappia. Lopuksi leivän päälle kasataan pieni määrä mozzarellaraastetta ja voila! uuniin 225asteeseen muutamaksi minuutiksi kunnes juusto on sulanut.

Bruschettojen kanssa voi tarjota esim. viikonlopun jäljiltä jäänyttä punaviiniä ;)

Now at the end I will give you one piece of advice regarding theme parties. We threw a 1920's party on Saturday and... well how to put this nicely... it was a success :) Thanks everyone for showing up and especially for dressing up. It was great to see so many gangsters and flappers in one place. Anyway, we wanted to offer the guests something "authentic" so we after long and hard googling we decided to make some Planter's Punch:

"During 1920's, 'rum-running' became a 'legitimate' trade in the United States. Smugglers used station wagons, trucks and boats to heist rum from Mexico, Cuba and Puerto Rico. Many rum-based drinks became popular, especially in the Southern regions. Even as far North as New York, people loved it. After studying the speakeasy menus of New York, the Museum of New York’s Sarah Henry said: “On every menu we looked at, the Planter’s Punch was offered.”

Recipe

• dark rum


• grenadine


• orange juice and pineapple juice


• club soda


• lemon or orange slice for garnish

The punch tasted good and the guests were very jolly all night ;)