by Krista | May 19, 2013 | Bits 'n' Bobs
A few weeks ago I went hunting for beauty and found it among rusted and neglected items.
I loved it so much that I went out again this week, passing time on a cloudy afternoon peering into junk piles and old cars and abandoned bits of machinery in search of vignettes like this.
“Even in the familiar there can be surprise and wonder.”
Tierney Gearon
It’s becoming a highly anticipated ritual each week. Some days I wander around our farm, others through town, sometimes I just look around a familiar cafe or park and find the loveliest things I’ve never spotted before.
I’m discovering it’s a form of therapy too. A practice that takes my mind away from painful things that grow bigger than they are when I focus on them too much. Somehow taking time to look, really look and enjoy, calms my thoughts and puts things in a much healthier and manageable perspective.
“Our brightest blazes of gladness
are commonly kindled by unexpected sparks.”
Samuel Johnson
As you know, I’ve been very sick for a long time. I’ve been going through heaps of tests, experimenting with different medications and therapies, trying to figure out something, anything that will help.
Finally, this week, we got some conclusive results and now we know exactly what to do to help me. HOORAY!
Finding out what is wrong is my “brightest blaze of gladness” this week. I still need to visit a surgeon to rule out some other things, but I’m so thankful for this huge dollop of hope.
Recovery is going to take several months or more, but they will be months of hope and understanding, not fear and uncertainty. I’m so grateful for that.
Before we got this great news, I decided to use the waiting time to plan a Mexican feast of beloved dishes.
Bear had never tasted Mexican food before, a tragedy that had to be rectified. So I filled my grocery cart with peppers and black beans and a gorgeous hunk of pork and couldn’t wait to get home to start cooking.
The first dish I made was pico de gallo – that luscious fresh salsa made glorious with lashings of lime juice and hearty sprinklings of sea salt.
Bear is of the opinion that cilantro (coriander to my Aussie folks) is of the devil, so I made his pico de gallo cilantro-free and happily loaded mine with the greeniliciousness.
Then I made queso fresco – a creamy yet crumbly fresh Mexican cheese that only takes 15 minutes to make.
I could not stop eating it and the first batch was nearly half gone by the time dinner arrived. I’m definitely going to stock up on milk this week to make heaps of this wonderful cheese.
Next up were frijoles negros – savory black beans (turtle beans in Oz) simmered for several hours with white onion, garlic, and a large jalapeno. Sea salt brings out the exquisite flavors and makes this one of my very favorite side dishes.
The first night we had all these good things piled in tortillas with carnitas – I’ll share that recipe with you next time – but the next day I turned it into picnic food.
I topped the frijoles negros with pico de gallo and sprinkled the lot with queso fresco and a few chunks of carnitas and had a wonderful picnic while I waited for my doctor visit. Fears about unknown test results are beautifully assuaged with Mexican food.
Do you have favorite comfort foods that ease difficult times in your life?
Pico de Gallo
Ingredients:
6-8 ripe Roma tomatoes, diced fine
1 white onion, diced fine
1 jalapeno, diced fine
juice from 1-2 limes
sea salt to taste
Directions:
- Combine all ingredients and stir well.
- Let flavors meld for 30-60 minutes before serving.
- Will keep well sealed in fridge for several days.
Queso de Fresco
Ingredients:
8 cups whole milk
1 tsp salt
3-4 Tbsp lemon juice or vinegar
Directions:
- Pour milk and salt into heavy bottomed saucepan and bring to boil, stirring occasionally.
- Stir in lemon juice or vinegar. Milk should immediately start to separate.
- Stir for one more minute then lower heat, stirring constantly until milk has completely separated into curds.
- Pour into cheesecloth-lined colander and drain well. Twist cheesecloth to drain completely.
- Use as is or keep cheese in cloth and press under a weight until cheese is firm to the touch.
- Use immediately or store in fridge, sealed, for several days.
Frijoles Negros
2 cups black beans
1 jalapeno, split and seeded
2 medium white onions, peeled
3-4 cloves garlic, peeled
1 tsp sea salt
Directions:
- Place all ingredients except salt into heavy bottomed saucepan and fill with water until beans are covered by two inches.
- Bring to boil and cook over medium-high heat for one hour. Check liquid levels regularly and make sure beans are always covered.
- Add salt and continue to cook for 1-2 hours more, making sure beans are covered with liquid.
- When ready to serve, remove onions, garlic, and jalapeno, taste for seasoning, and serve.
by Krista | May 13, 2013 | Bits 'n' Bobs
It’s funny the things that trigger our emotions.
One moment Bear and I were cozy in the living room watching an interesting documentary on the Ice Age and the next I had paused the DVD, tears streaming down my face as I turned to a very startled Bear and said, “We don’t really matter, do we?”
(Feel free to feel sorry for Bear at this point. I’m afraid my trains of thought tend to stun him on a regular basis. :-))
In fairness to my overwrought self, this pronouncement had been building for quite some time. Losing a dear friend, cousin, and grandparents in a very short period of time had given rise to feelings of, “What is the point of this life? What’s the purpose of living if we just die and within a few years are forgotten?”
It all felt so very short and so very sad.
Thus, on that cozy night, as I watched stories of people that lived and died thousands of years ago, I found myself mourning them. Mourning the fact that we don’t even know their names, have no idea what they believed or thought of the world, how they loved and cared for their children, not even what language they spoke. What did they do, think, feel? We don’t know.
It felt like they didn’t matter.
It felt like the people I had loved didn’t matter.
It felt like one day, I wouldn’t matter either.
Once Bear recovered from his shock, we talked it over. He listened as I spilled out all those deep fears and doubts and questions. We talked about famous people and obscure ones, people we loved and those we’d lost, people who’d already died and the ones still to be born. We talked about them, their beliefs and experiences, the foods they might have eaten and clothes they’d worn. The crafts they’d done and work they’d accomplished and people they’d loved and fears they’d had. Their comforts and joys, hopes and failures, griefs and soul-surging happinesses.
Then Bear said something I shall treasure forever.
“Babe, we do matter. We matter in our own time and to our own people.”
In those words I found my peace and my comfort and also, somehow, my connection to all those who have gone before and will come after.
We do matter. We ALL matter. From the cave men who made clothing out of fur and leather and painted pictures on rocks to my beloveds who aren’t in this life anymore but who live so vividly in my memories and thoughts.
We do matter. We matter to our own people – the people who love us, whose lives are better because we are in them, the people whose very names make us smile. And we matter in our own time, this time, this very day.
That moment of grief and apparent hopelessness was transformed into a treasure for me, and the ramifications continue to ripple through my thoughts and spirit.
I don’t feel anger about my past anymore. Although the bad things people did to me are still bad, my anger towards the perpetrators has dissolved. And I’m so thankful for that. They may have done cruel and abusive things, but they matter too. And I earnestly wish them real love and healing of their own wounds.
I feel greater contentment and gratitude. I think this society of ours often pressures us into feeling like we need to be amazing in order to matter. It’s lovely to know that we don’t. We can be poor and in debt and still matter. We can be overweight and have messy houses and still matter. We can have crazy relatives and whacked up children and still matter. We can be chronically ill and mess up regularly and still matter. We can just be our plain ol’ lovely selves and matter enormously.
I feel more purposeful. My days are more precious to me now, but not in the way I expected. I don’t feel driven to fill each day with experiences, don’t feel compelled to “not waste a minute!” If anything, I’ve actually relaxed more. This is My Time to Matter, and I want to live it, not with greater accomplishments but with greater awareness, greater enjoyment, and greater love. I’m trying to live more “in the moment” rather than in a “cross this off the list” manner. It’s been lovely. Cooking, chores, exercising, making things – they all become so much more enjoyable when I focus on enjoying them rather than completing them.
Perhaps the biggest change is I’m not afraid of death anymore. I dearly hope there is a heaven where all of humanity will be together in peace and restoration and healing and love, but if there isn’t, it’s OK. I feel so lucky to have lived, to have known love and friendship, to have eaten dark chocolate and ripe tomatoes and fresh peas, to have felt sun on my skin and wind in my hair and splashed in water and fallen in snow. So, so lucky.
Wishing you a beautiful day, dear Mattering Ones, a day of good food and good company and the sure knowledge that you matter.
XO
Maple Cumin Sweet Potatoes
Ingredients:
4 sweet potatoes, peeled and cut in chunks
salt
1/4 cup melted butter
2 Tbsp real maple syrup
2 Tbsp ground cumin
salt and pepper to taste
Directions:
- Place sweet potato chunks in saucepan and cover with water. Add salt and bring to boil. Simmer 15-20 minutes or until potato mashes easily when pressed with a fork.
- Drain and return to pot.
- Add remaining ingredients and mash well.
- Serve hot.
by Krista | May 7, 2013 | Bits 'n' Bobs
“Art washes away from the soul the dust of everyday life.”
Pablo Picasso
After a rather dreadful bout of glandular fever, I’m finally returning to the land of the living.
It is wonderful, I tell you!
Yesterday I pulled on a flannel jacket and went for a walk. Not a bustling walk but a restorative one, one where I could amble at my leisure and soak in the beauty and fresh air of all I’d been missing while curled up in bed.
Much to my delight, I found art. Not the usual art of a human artist, but art formed by the elements on old bits of timber and iron, weathered into something beautiful.
What is it about cracked paint and rusted metal that evokes such a feeling of nostalgia and peace?
Seeing them makes me want to hide away for a while and read old books and watch old movies and drink Earl Grey Tea with honey and milk.
There’s something encouraging about finding beauty in old weathered things. Maybe it’s because we feel so old and weathered sometimes, and it’s nice to be reminded that we’re still useful, still valuable, still worth something.
“A man should hear a little music,
read a little poetry,
and see a fine picture every day of his life,
in order that worldly cares may not obliterate the sense of the beautiful
which God has implanted in the human soul.”
Johann Wolfgang von Goethe
I love these words by Goethe. This lovely nudge to notice beauty and take time each day to rest in it, to earnestly, willfully, purposefully find that which reminds us that no matter how bad or painful things get, life is not all darkness, loss, and grief. There is always beauty and light and goodness to be found if we look hard enough.
I don’t mean a silly blinding of ourselves to the genuine hurt and badness in the world – it is there and if we don’t acknowledge it and wrestle with it, we cannot change it. I mean a gentle balancing of the bad with the equally valid and important good.
I’ve been very sick for a long time and it’s going to be that way for a while until my immune system is restored. It is what it is.
Some days it feels like it is my life, but it isn’t.
Yes, the pain is real, the frustration and anxiety are real, the fear, grief, and suffering are real, but there’s also much, much more.
There is my Bear and my dear friends who love me.
I get to recover and restore on our beautiful little farm in Australia, a place of quiet and peace and hammocks and campfires and coffee on the porch and sunsets and walks in the bush and animals that entertain and bookshelves full of stories and movies and music.
Yep, I get to have my weepy moments and my scared ones and it’s totally OK. It really is, because I know I won’t stay weepy and scared. I know that those emotions will pass and even though the illness may be here to stay for a while, there is so much more to my life than it.
I will still love and be loved. Still cook and create and photograph and travel and explore and read and rest and be.
I’ll be OK. And so will you. Whatever you’re going through. You are so much more than “it”. So much more.
Today is my Bear’s birthday and we are celebrating with all sorts of good things to eat. Tonight we’ll have Porterhouse steaks, au gratin potatoes, and garlicky greens with big slabs of Dark Chocolate Truffle Cake for dessert. Then, as we cozy in for a movie night, we’ll be nibbling on these beauties: Maple Spiced Roasted Hazelnuts.
Wishing you a beautiful day, whatever you’re facing. May you find art in your life that cheers your soul and reminds you that there is light in the darkness.
XO
Maple Spice Roasted Hazelnuts
Ingredients:
2 cups hazelnuts, shelled
2 Tbsp real maple syrup
1/8 tsp each ground coriander, cumin, ginger, smoked paprika
finely ground sea salt
Directions:
- Preheat oven to 400 F (200 C).
- Spread hazelnuts on baking sheet in single layer (use baking paper to limit clean-up).
- Roast in oven for 10 minutes. Remove from oven but leave oven on.
- While nuts are roasting, in small saucepan combine remaining ingredients and heat over medium-high heat until simmering. Remove from heat.
- Pour roasted nuts into saucepan with sauce and stir to combine.
- Return to baking sheet, sprinkle with more salt if necessary and return to oven for 3-4 minutes.
- Let cool completely before eating as nuts will be very hot.
- Serve at room temperature and store any remaining nuts in airtight container for 1-2 weeks.
by Krista | May 3, 2013 | Bits 'n' Bobs
I can’t think of anything I like better than sitting around a campfire with people I love. So I was thrilled to pieces last night as Bear and I braved stormy skies and cool temps to have our very first campfire of Autumn.
We gathered fallen branches and curly bits of gum tree bark (brilliant fire starters!) and Bear built a cracking good fire while I collected food stuffs, roasting fork, and torch.
I love that campfires welcome you just the way you are, clad in grubby farm clothes, hair wild from the wind, no make-up to be seen, exhausted after a return of the dreaded flu. None of that matters. Just pull up a log, sit yourself down, and be enveloped in the coziness of wood-smoke, crackling flames, and good company.
Sheets of rain fell in the distance as we huddled close to the fire pit, but nary a drop fell on us while we feasted simply but lavishly on good ol’ campfire food.
I stepped things up a bit from traditional campfire fare with gourmet wagyu beef sausages encased in grilled crusty rolls smeared with strong Dijon mustard. It was exquisitely wonderful to cuddle close on a fallen log as the darkness deepened, hearing only wind in the gum trees, the occasional boom of thunder, and sausages sizzling over the fire.
I couldn’t find graham crackers, Kraft marshmallows, or Hershey bars here in Queensland, so I made an Aussie version of s’mores with slabs of dark chocolate, pint-sized pink marshmallows, and homemade vanilla shortbread cookies. I fell into a sugar coma after just one, but it sure was good!
After dinner I hauled chairs closer to the warmth of the fire while Bear made us steaming cuppas of coffee to wrap our hands around.
Then we just sat in companionable silence, dreamily mesmerized by the dancing flames, feeling like the luckiest people on the planet.
It was a beautiful start to Bear’s birthday weekend.
What are you looking forward to most about this weekend?
by Krista | Apr 29, 2013 | Bits 'n' Bobs
“There is virtue in work and there is virtue in rest.
Use both and overlook neither.”
Alan Cohen
Today is a day of pulling back, nestling in, and resting.
A day of restoring through sunny naps in my hammock as it sways in the morning breeze, cups of chamomile tea, and beautiful words found in blogs and books and status updates.
It was a wonderful weekend of working on projects with Bear and spending time with dear friends. I got to collect my first harvest of rosy crab apples and can’t wait to make my first batch of crab apple jelly.
Crab apples hold such lovely memories for me, of my childhood spent in Northern Canada. I used to eat these tart little beauties straight off the tree, eyes squinting and cheeks puckering at the sour but delicious juice.
My Mum and Grandma would can them whole and in winter we’d have bowls full of glistening little apples, soft and sweet.
I’m so glad our crab apple tree – our Christmas tree – is thriving. It’s my bit of Canada in Australia.
I’ve been craving porridge lately and have been experimenting with different grains, fruits, nuts, spices, and sauces.
When I make meals or desserts with sauces, I like to make extra to use with other things. When I make Ginger Caramel Roasted Pears with Fresh Ricotta, I always make extra caramel sauce. Then I drizzle it over oatmeal or ice cream or pie, or stir a spoonful into my coffee.
This weekend I used it with Spiced Basmati Rice Porridge studded with black currants. It was warm and comforting and slightly decadent, making a very ordinary dish a bit special.
Now it’s time for a bowl of soup and the next chapter of my book.
What is your favorite way to restore yourself after a busy weekend?
Spiced Currant Rice Porridge with Pear Caramel Sauce
serves 2
Ingredients:
2 cups cooked brown Basmati rice
1 cup milk
a few shakes each of cinnamon, cardamom, cloves, and nutmeg
1/4 cup dried black currants
Pear Caramel Sauce to taste
Directions:
- Combine first four ingredients in saucepan and bring to boil over medium-high heat. Stirring often to prevent sticking.
- Lower heat and simmer 5 minutes, stirring often to prevent sticking.
- Ladle into two bowls and drizzle with pear caramel sauce.
- Serve warm.
by Krista | Apr 26, 2013 | Bits 'n' Bobs
I was rousted out of my early morning reverie by Bear shouting, “Babe! Grab your camera!”
I hurriedly found said object, pulled on a flannel jacket, slipped into my farm shoes, and dashed out the door.
And saw this.
I’ve lived on this farm for a year and a half now, yet it still astonishes me with its beauty and wonder.
Bear chuckled, very pleased with himself, as I dashed about exclaiming in wonder and absolute bliss as the misty fields were suffused with golden light.
I leaned on the dewy front gate for a long time as the burnished light enveloped me, Bear, every leaf and blade of grass.
It is not possible to feel sadness in such moments. Or fear. Or anxiety. Simply an exquisite peace and deep, deep gratefulness.
I wandered through my gardens, loving the sunlight shimmering on feathery asparagus fronds and glistening on the crab apples jeweled by droplets of mist.
Even my little greenhouse wall, usually plain old plastic sheeting, glowed as if it were made of molten glass.
After our walk we returned to our little kitchen and held hands as we visited and sipped maple cinnamon coffee.
It made me smile as I thought of my younger self, so eager for big adventures and grand experiences. Now it is these little moments I treasure, these quiet, beautiful ones shared with people I love.
“One grateful thought is a ray of sunshine.
A hundred such thoughts paint a sunrise.
A thousand will rival the glaring sky at noonday –
for gratitude is light against the darkness.”
Richelle E. Goodrich
Today I am grateful for cozy flannel shirts and maple cinnamon coffee, Autumn sunshine, fallen seed pods that crunch when I walk, seedlings for my winter garden, NUMB3RS on DVD, being creative with dear friends, and love and hugs from Bear.
What are you grateful for today? xo
PS – I am very honored to be interviewed at two lovely sites by two amazing and inspiring women. If you fancy learning a bit more about my life, click here to read the interview at Budget Travel Talk and click here to read the interview at Reading is Fashionable.
Maple Cinnamon Coffee
Ingredients:
2 Tbsp espresso (more or less according to your desired strength)
1/4 tsp ground cinnamon
1 tsp real maple syrup
1/4 cup whole milk
Directions:
- Place espresso grounds and cinnamon into your coffee brewer of choice (I use a French press) and brew.
- Pour into mug and stir in maple syrup and whole milk.
- Sip most happily.
