Childhood memories | Anyone 4 Curry & Other Things

I really can’t help it, but nearly every time I eat Carrots in any kind of form, shape and sizes, I hear a tiny little voice of my late Mom “Mutti” …….’do eat your carrots now – they are good for your eyes and will make you see in the dark….”

At that time I was little and like most children I of course believed her. Not that I hated carrots, no not at all, quite liked them actually and now that I am grown up I truly love them. As vegetables, prepared in many many different ways, as soups (after all I was born in Germany and we do love our soups), as salads for when I want to be extra kind to my body and as nibbles.

Even now, typing this page, I have a small plate of freshly cut carrot sticks next to me and keep munching on those, like a little Rabbit – maybe Grandpa knew in his wisdom why he nicknamed me “Kaninchen” (little Rabbit) all those decades ago. (But mind you, in this tremendous heat we are having here right now I really would love an ice-cream or even two, but……).

Today we all surely know that Carrots are one of the healthiest foods around containing over 100 % of Vitamin A; so we should make food like carrot part of our everyday diet.

Velvety Carrot Soup with an Asian Twist

= this should not take you more than maximum 30 minutes =

I was greedy and used up all the carrots which needed to leave my vegetable compartment. I did not weigh, so just do what I did, and go by your eyes, appetite and what’s in your own fridge. The measurements given therefore are for those 2 large bowls of soup I made for my husband Jo’s and my Lunch with a little bit left in the pot.

Ingredients

2 x medium sized onions, cubed
4-5 x large carrots, peeled and chopped
5-6 x cloves of garlic, crushed (our garlic is really small)
Salt, black pepper to your own taste
2 x Tbsp of Peanut butter Sauce
1-2 x Tbsp Lingham’s Hot Chilli Sauce
¼ – ½ x cup of Coconut milk (optional – or use some milk)
3 x cups of earlier prepared Vegetable Stock (I used KNORR cubes)
Tiny bit of oil for sweating the onions

Method

Heat oil on medium heat, add onion and garlic, stir and after maybe 5 minutes add the carrots.

Season, stir and add the vegetable stock, stir again and cover pot.
Now reduce heat to simmer and cook until vegetables are nice and tender. It only took me 15 minutes since I cut everything fairly small and also I wanted to retain a certain “crunch”.

I do not have an immersion blender – yet! – and therefor ‘blitzed’ the soup in stages in my Mixy with the PB Sauce and the Lingham’s. (You can also add a few more peanuts in for good measure, if you like).

That’s it really. Pour into soup cups; sprinkle some coriander, tiny carrot slivers and a couple of drops of thick coconut cream on top and serve.
This goes very well with just slices of brown-bread toast or Arabic bread, slightly warmed.

So my friends, enjoy this little soup and you never know, maybe you too will be able “…..to see in the dark…”.

Guten Appetit – enjoy your meal – znegosmac – buon appetito – bon appétit – ทานให้อร่อยนะ –

Carina

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6th of December. Saint Nikolaus Day. Soon it will be Christmas – once again! How does time fly so quickly?

My earliest Childhood memories of this Saints Feast Day are somewhat bitter-sweet.

As a small child one was always told “… you must be a good girl, or no gifts from Saint Nikolaus, and only the “Rute” (Birch) from his helper, Knecht Ruprecht”. Occasianally one did remember to be just that –good! Learn well at school, keep out of mischief, not answer back to Adults and not kick ones little (boy) friends when they teased you and pulled on your long hair.

This applied certainly to me, especially once it was past my birthday, which is end of October.

Then came the 5th of December. My little black patent leather shoes were polished to mirror-standard and put into their prominent position outside our door in the high hope, that Nikolaus would come to me and leave some little gifts behind – which were then mainly apples, nuts, one orange! and some sweets.

But the day was not over until after school had finished. As always Nikolaus came to my school – an imposing figure dressed like a Bishop and carrying his “Golden Book”; In that all the bad – and good – deeds of each child were recorded and read out and we watched with glee when one of the boys was ‘introduced’ to the dreaded Rute. The crafty ones were even known of having padded their trousers!!

Only much later did I learn about the real Saint Nikolaus – Nikolaos the Wonderworker – Bishop of Myra, who was born 15 March 270 in Patara and died 6 December 343 (aged 73) in Myra.

But this maybe is for another Blog.

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6. December. Nikolaus tag. Bald wird es wieder Weihnachten sein – wie schnell doch die Zeit fliegt.
Meine fruehesten Kindheitserinnerungen an den Namenstag dieses Heiligen sind etwas gemischt.
Als kleines Kind hoerte man immer: ….Du must ein liebes Maedchen sein oder Nikolaus wird keine Geschenke bringen sondern nur Knecht Ruprecht kommt mit seiner Rute”.

Manchmal erinnerte man sich ja auch dran “gut” zu sein: fleissig in der Schule zu lernen, keinen Unfug zu machen, keine Widerreden zu Erwachsenen zu geben und nicht die kleinen Jungs zu treten wenn sie wieder gestritten haben und an meinen langen Haaren zogen.

Das war ganz bestimmt fuer mich der Fall, besonders nach meinem Geburtstag, der Ende Oktober ist.

Dann kam der 5. Dezember. Meine kleinen schwarzen Lackschuhe wurden auf Hochglanz geputzt und vor die Tuere gestellt in der Hoffnung, dass Nikolaus auch zu mir kommen wird und kleine Geschenke hinterlaesst – welche damals moistens Aepfel, Nuesse, eine Apfelsine und ein paar Bonbons.

Aber der Tag war noch nicht zu Ende bis nach Schulschluss. Wie immer kam Nikolaus auch zu meiner Schule – eine imponierende Erscheinung die aussah wie ein Bischof und er trug sein “Goldenes Buch”; in diesem waren alle boesen Taten – wie auch die guten – all’ der Kinder eingetragen waren. Diese wurden vorgelesen und wir guckten mit Schadenfreude wenn einer der Jungs Bekanntschaft mit der Rute machte. Die ausgefuchsten waren auch schon dafuer bekannt, dass sie ihren Hosenboden ausgepolstert hatten.

Nur viel viel spaeter lernte ich dann die Geschichte des echten Sankt Nikolaus kennen. Bekannt als Nikolaos – The Wonderworker – Bischof von Myra, der am 15 Maerz 270 in Patara geboren wurde und am 06. December 343, im Alter von 73 Jahren, in Myra verstarb.

Aber dies ist vielleicht fuer einen anderen Blog Beitrag.

Carina

(Source of all pictures: Wikipedia – with thanks)