One Greek One Serbian

I’m talking about food! 🙂

One of my favorite Greek recipes is for a delicious cheese in olive oil. It’s simple and fast to make, you could store it in the fridge and use it in so many ways.

There are many ways to make this, but here is what I used:

Pepper, garlic, onion, bay leaf, chili peppers, and of course cheese. It’s important that the cheese is not soft, but I think Feta could work well too. I have here cow cheese. Goat cheese is the best. 🙂

Simply cut the cheese in cubes, layer them in a jar with everything else in between, and pour olive oil to cover it well.  Put the lid on and let it sit in the fridge for a couple of days before using it, to let the cheese soak up all those lovely flavors.

Use it with anything – as a side dish, as an appetizer, in your sandwich, on pizza, on toast… And the best part is that when you eat the cheese, you get the most fantastic salad dressing ever! Try making different combinations – with herbs, with olives, etc.

The other dish, the most famous Serbian one, is “Prebranac”. People from all over the world who came to Serbia and tried it are all in love with this dish. But be prepared, it’s not a light one.  This is perfect for cold Autumn or Winter days when you want your belly warm, full and happy. 🙂

If you want to feed an army, you will need one kilogram of white beans, and at least one kilogram (it’s better to have a bit more) of onions.

First, slice the onions

And cook the beans

Put the beans aside and fry the onions in oil (a generous amount of oil is needed, at least one cup), until they are soft.

Then add 2 or 3 full table spoons of paprika and fry that for a short time, not over a minute,  just to warm up paprika and make it more fragrant. Be careful, if you burn paprika, the dish will taste horrible. Add salt and pepper to taste, having in mind that it will spread onto whole dish.

Then take a baking dish, grease it, and put half of the drained beans first, then the onions, and finish with the second layer of beans.

In the photo above you can see the unfinished second layer. Cover it all up with beans, and then take the water that you cooked beans in, and pour until it’s just covering everything.  Then put it in the oven at 220 degrees Celsius (I think it’s about 430 F) and bake until the water is almost completely evaporated. It shouldn’t take long.

You will have an amazing meal!

And it’s always always served with cabbage salad. Just cabbage with olive oil, apple vinegar, salt and pepper.

Have a great day! 🙂

My Sizzix Coat

From drab to fab! 🙂

Well, the photos are not very good, but you will be able to see the difference.  My very old coat, which was very much loved and used, was at first a long one, then I cut it just above the knees and wore it for a couple more years. After that I decided that it was not fashionable anymore, and forgot about it.

But no, I don’t throw away things easily. 🙂 I even kept the fabric that was cut off! And recently, I decided to play with it. I used Sizzix Tattered Florals Die to make the flowers, Tattered Leaves Die for the leaves (of course),and also several of my crocheted flowers, and beads. I attached them to the collar and the sleeves, and the coat looks very pretty now! Well, at least to me. 🙂

It took me many hours to do this, but it was worth it.

Because it is an old coat I could play with no fear of ruining it, but in the end it turned out great and I’m going to wear it again! That’s how I am – when I buy something I really like, I have no intentions on getting rid of it until it’s completely destroyed.

Another successful project. Me happy. 🙂

Have a great day/evening everyone!

Something New

Actually, all I wanted to do is organize and clean my studio! But then some of my souvenir journals sold and I had to make new journals for the shop. Then a friend called me to say that her friends wanted to buy shawls from me , so I had to weave. And then my dog had some health problems, which as usual made me go insane with worry, so to calm my self down, I made beads. Lots of beads. That way I could be in the same room with him, and it kept my hands busy and my mind occupied. It helped.

Luckily, he feels better now.

So here are the shawls:

Variegated yarn with a touch of sparkling mohair,  very warm and soft.

The next one looks completely different than in this photo, but my camera didn’t want to cooperate. It’s a shame it looks so ugly here when in real life it’s lovely and sparkly and violet…

Shades of green:

This shawl was finished about a month  ago, but I forgot to photograph it, so here it is now.

I hope ladies will like them. 🙂

Masculine journal:

Coptic binding, mixed media journal.

And a feminine one:

Altered book. Handmade paper, coffee stained paper, lace, paint.

And beads, of course!

Beaded beads

Yarn beads

Sequin beads

Painted beads

Denim beads

Suede beads

Leather beads

Paper beads

Crazy giant bead

And now I want to make even more beads! They are SO addictive! I’ll have to buy more storage containers because I have no idea where to put them. 🙂 But it is so relaxing and fun to take all those fabric scraps, bits of yarn, all kinds of paper, and while watching (well, actually listening to) TV, make these beauties. And yes, my living room is a mess again, but who cares. I have gorgeous beads now! 🙂

Oh, and I almost finished organizing and cleaning my studio, although it will soon be a complete chaos there, as it usually is, but never mind. 🙂

Saturday

Oh I love Saturdays! The best day of the week! 🙂

The weather is finally gorgeous again, after days and days of rain, so my husband and I had a lovely walk. Together. No stress. No hurry.

Listening to beautiful music in the street,

Admiring the architecture in our town, me looking for patterns and inspiration. 🙂

Buying books is always a must. I’ve spent more money on books lately than on clothes, that’s for sure.

Here I am, showing off  my handmade belt (which I’ll show you in another post) in front of the book store. 🙂

There were so many interesting things to see. Beautiful shapes and textures, things that could tell a story…

Lovely colors

Interesting windows

And more inspiration

Connected

Always

But obviously being watched. 🙂

Passing through a beautiful gate into the park

To admire the statues

and find marks of someone’s love, written on the ground. 🙂

My Goulash

If you like delicious, heart and belly warming food, food that asks for a nice glass of wine with it (and in it, LOL!), then this is for you. 🙂

As usual, I don’t have exact measurements for the ingredients, but as we say here in Serbia, the best food is made without the exact recipe. But I’ll try to give you some directions with the photos.

First you’ll need a bigger pot in which you’ll put about six or seven table spoons of oil and add one big onion, chopped. Fry that for a couple of minutes.

Then add as much bacon as you like :), or about 300 – 400 grams, cut into small cubes. When bacon is fried a bit, add chopped carrots, leek, red and green pepper, and fry that again for a couple of minutes. I used about four peppers in total, one whole leek, two medium carrots…you get the point. You can put the amount you like. You can also add mushrooms into this dish, but I didn’t this time.

The best goulash is made with two or, even better, three types of meet. I used beef, pork and wild boar, but if you don’t have wild boar you could use lamb, it is absolutely delicious in this dish.

So, I added about 500 grams of each meat, chopped into small pieces,

and one glass of white wine, four bay leafs, ground pepper, salt, one big spoon of paprika, one chopped potato and chopped celery (root, about half a cup).

Put the lid on top, cook on medium heat, and forget about it for one to one and a half hours. After that time, the meat should be very soft when you pinch it. Or you could and should try it, check if it needs more seasoning, and you’re done. The amount I cooked was enough to serve about eight very hungry people, but since it’s a “strong” dish, you could serve it with potatoes, rice, or pasta, and then you have it for even more hungry mouths. 🙂 But the great things is that you could cook a large amount, freeze portions,  and when you reheat it, no one will know it wasn’t cooked minutes ago. 🙂

Of course, when the goulash is ready, add chopped garlic and parsley before you serve it.

In my defense, I’ll say that we had guests and I needed this amount. 🙂

They loved it! 🙂