a bit of green

What we loved most about Italy was the food. Coming home from our trip to Rome, being the foodies that we are, we stuffed our baggage with delicious stuff;  parmigiano-reggiano from Parma, salame from Milan, various sausages and a packet of herb mix called Diavola.

Having tasted several pizzas in Rome we wanted to make one ourselves for our friends using a relatively classic Italian recipe. Here we go then, for our Italian thin-crust pizza!

Today I did a second short trip to IKEA (results from the first one are here) and got myself some lingonberry juice (Dryck Lingon) because I’ve already tried the lingonberry jam they have and it’s actually pretty good. The product is actually called a “lingonberry drink” because it does not contain enough fruit content to be legally called a “juice” in Sweden. More precisely, it contains 6.1% (I have no idea if this is by mass or by volume, but I suppose it’s the latter) lingonberry juice and 3.9% red grape juice. So it’s 10% juice and the rest is water and sugar. Dryck Lingon also claims to be organic (“Ekologisk”). According to livestrong.com, this drink contains 36 kcal per 100 ml. All of its calorific value comes from the 9 grams of carbohydrates it contains per 100 ml, which is about 3% of the GDA. Now, my impressions.

Today we were at IKEA doing some Christmas shopping (mostly looking, actually, being the poor students that we are) and eating. The restaurant is not bad at all, and very cheap. They also have this little shop just before the exit with a bunch of Swedish products. You can find sweets, jam, köttbullar (meatballs) and, naturally, salmon – both fresh and smoked. You can also find a series of (mainly) apple-based (i.e. cider) alcoholic and non-alcoholic beverages. These are labeled “ekologisk” which, according to the translation on the back, means that it is organic. We’ll come to that a bit later. I chose an “Äppeldryck med Hjortronsmak” (appledrink with cloudberry flavour) and Kynthia chose a “Kolsyrad Pärondryck” (sparkling pear drink). We’ll try to briefly describe our impressions below.

Recently, we’ve been spending a lot of time in the kitchen, baking all kind of goods. Our latest addiction is bread! From baguettes to country bread, we’ve tried different recipes until we made one of our own: breadettes!

The recipe is based on a traditional french baguette recipe and various other bread recipes we found across the Internet.
Here you go:

If you’ve ever visited Greece in the summer you will probably know how hot it can get here. While going through one of our usual “over 35 degrees Celsius” weeks I discovered a very refreshing drink, Lipton’s lemon flavored Green Ice Tea. It was a very convenient discovery as I am currently trying to reduce my coffee and coke intake, without lowering my caffeine intake too much to cause withdrawal symptoms. However, Lipton’s product is sadly packed with preservatives, loads of sugar and taste enhancers. Not to mention that it costs €1.50 per 0.5 liter bottle.

As you know, when it’s hot, it helps if you eat light foods. Add to that the fact that we are both trying to lose some excess weight, and you will have two great reasons for eating lightly. So, last night we made a delicious open sandwich, which also enabled us to celebrate our little herb garden, as this was the first time we actually used one of the plants. It turned out great and it also adheres to the rules of Mediterranean diet, which is well-known for its health benefits.

For those of you with a sweet tooth, we recommend YummyEarth Organic Lollipops and Organic Candy!  Totally organic, allergen-free, gluten-free, GMO-free, egg-free, soy-free, nut-free, casein-free, dairy-free… In other words, all natural.

No artifial dyes or flavors are used, since the candies are colored with red cabbage and purple carrots. Flavors include: Sour Apple Tart, Pomegranate Pucker, Mango Tango, TooBerry Blueberry, Googly Grape, Strawberry Smash, Very Very Cherry, Wet-Face Watermelon.

So, there you go: the juiciest Gummy Bears (pack of 12) by YummyEarth,  $25.95 on Amazon.

For the vast majority of human history, agriculture could be described as organic, meaning there was no use of synthetic materials during food production. During the 20th century, however, new synthetic chemicals were intruduced to the food supply. Chemical fertilizers, insecticides and herbicides were used to increase the agricultural output, in order to satisfy the increasing demands of the western population. This more recent style of agricultural production is known as “conventional.”