A weekend with Flemish food

A long weekend in Belgium is a treat in many ways! Johan and I went to Brussels to meet up with his siblings, with families, in January. It was, as usual, a great fun event. 

Surpricingly, the winter temperatures were colder than in Sweden, and the sun was shining all weekend. There are lots of things to tell, but this text will focus on the food!

A wonderfully creamy chocolate cake!

When we arrived in Johans sisters house, his sister and her husband was still at work. As a welcome instead their wonderful dog greeted us warmly (once he understood who we were) and Johans sister had prepared a welcoming FIKA! Apple pie and chocolate cake, tea and candies.

Johan and a happy Banner!

For dinner later in the evening a speciality from Belgium was served – witloof in hesperolletjes en kaassaus (endiver inrullade i skinka, med ostsås). A dish which is real winter food, and one of my favourites. Unfortunately we ate it all up so I never had the possibility to take a photo – but do try it in Belguim if you have the opportunity!

On the Sunday we met up with Johans friends at a restaurant for brunch. The brunch was surely delicious with youghurts, tea, different special sandwiches, eggs and different sorts of hams, and then sweet breads as dessert. 

Incredible brunch!

The restaurant was part of a concept store, and linked to it was a shop where they sold really high quality products, mostly locally produced. If you would like to go ther - the name was CRU in Overijse. https://cru.be/nl/

Oranges and lemons galore

Whole branches of spices 

It was possible to taste a lot - here it is pepper which can be tried!

The meat section was not bad! At all! Here small chicken and birds!

And of corse there was a chocolate section - with shop assistant ready to help you choose

"Homemade" nutcream - really nice!

Tasting a great scallop which was served with some veggies and sauce.
Delicious!

Cool fish! 

Veggies and fruit for the new year!

A new year has started and small certain steps will soon bring us into spring!

This is really a time of longing for the light and warmth, and still enjoying the freshness in the cold, or actually just cool (around 0 degrees) days outside.

Happy in the January mist outside the stables

The past year suddenly feels so much further away, but we regularly see remnants from it – in the shape of stored veggies and fruit!

This autumn we decided to test two ways of storing apples. Some nice ones we just put on the shelves inside the old milk room in the stables. And some other ones we wrapped in newspaper (I had read that somewhere, that it would keep the fruit from going bad) and we put them in a basket in our “new” cellar.

Just recently I tried some of the last apples from the shelves. They have kept themselves beautifully, and are still really good in taste. Maybe a bit sweater even, than in September. The wrapped apples will be for later, most likely they end up in a last apples pie.

They just needed a good wash - The apples had managed our storage.

In the freezer Johan fund some pear-ginger-chili-cinnamon chutney as well, which we happily consumed with grilled chicken! This will be a chutney to repeat this autumn (if we get a good harvest this year too!)

More than we thought - of carrots and Jerusalem artichokes.

Just after New Year Cecilia and I went out to harvest the last carrots! And we found quite a few! We also managed to dig out some Jerusalem artichokes (jordärtskockor). The carrots tasted fantastic, and we already decided to seed more carrots for next year. But we also tried to get the red beet roots that were still in the ground, but they were not in a fancy shape. A bit soft and attacked by both animals and frost, we learnt they these roots need to get up earlier in the season.

And we did find Mr Carrot as well in our veggie garden!

How do you support friendship between two rabbits? And how do you add two cats to that family?

These questions have been rumbling in our heads for quite some time. It started this summer with our only rabbit Candy. She was increasingly difficult to handle, and ready to bite us if we wanted to catch her in her out door cage and bring her into the stables at night. 

Candy clearly needed a friend. Maybe. But the family rules were also quite clear – we did not want to suddenly have several little rabbits, that we needed to sell or, even "worse", to eat. According to wise people it is best for rabbits to have a friend, and preferably a sister or a brother, whom the rabbit knows from the beginning. 

Candy in the straw - almost still

When reading on the web it became clear that putting two rabbits of different backgrounds together was not an easy thing. They may hate each other for the rest of their lives, if both of them were dominant, and one did not give in. 

After some search I found a rabbit breeder who seemed to care in a very good way for her rabbits, and needed to sell a male rabbit. When I called her up she was very clear in that this rabbit needed to be off the market as a male. He needed to be castrated, because she had used him for breeding, and one of his off-springs had developed some physical problems. On the good side was that this little rabbit was a happy easy going lad with a very nice temperament. Maybe this could help our Candy to be a more easy rabbit too.

Do It who has jumped up in the new hay to check it out.

Now, finally, some months later, we can really see a difference! We have two happy rabbits that every morning and every evening jump out of their cages to play, run around and have fun in the big horsebox were they live now in the winter. Little "Do It" (the male) has very nicely accepted to have Candy as a friend, and Candy is still a bit puzzled over Do Its easy temperament. But she is so much easier to handle now!

Exploring

When then the kittens moved in this autumn, we really took care in the beginning never to leave rabbits and cats alone. Our little cat Tass has always been careful with the rabbits, but early on we saw the big cat trying to play in a cat way with Candy. He would sit behind a corner, and when Candy passed he quickly stuck out his paw to tap her. Not acceptable! 

But after some training together (encouraging him to be careful with paws and claws) Candy started to try to play with him. She would suddenly jump towards him. And wow, did he move quickly to a more secure place!

Now it is nice to see that the cats always come into the rabbit-box when the rabbits are loose. Quite often they say hello to eachother, sniffing, and several times we have seen the cats carefully lick the rabbits. And the rabbits come close, close to the cats for some affection.

Tass in Cecilias lap, checking out Do It. We still supevise the encounters a bit when needed.

One night Candy managed to escape from her cage, and when we came out in the morning we saw a happy rabbit with two cats. They should be enemies, but they are not. And that feels really nice!

It would be nice to have a picture of all four together but that is still impossible. They are all 4 very different in character, and none of them are wanting to understand what it means to sit still. However, that is good. I hope they continue to be natural animals with their instincts still intact to some degree.

The tricky thing now is to teach the cats to actually understand that the rats, however, are there for them to catch. Since the cats came the rats has basically disappeared over night, but they are still living there somewhere. And we do not know who is eating all the cat food each night -  every morning the bowls are totally empty….

 

Rackarn relaxing in the straw

Mårten Gås - Good food and family is brought together

St Martin was a guy in the 16 century (1500-talet) who were reluctant to be elected bishop. He hid in the goose pen, but the geese made such noise that he was found.  Later on he became the known bishop Saint Martin from Tours, France. The tradition to eat goose is related to him, and in the Medieval times the tradition to celebrate him was important.

In Sweden the first notice of a goose feast is actually from Stockholm, in 1557 (The Nordic Museum has written a very nice text about this tradition.). Nowadays it is mainly in the south, in Skåne, where goose is eaten on the evening the 10^th November, the day before St Martins day, which is the 11^th November. That started in the mid-1800. The name Martin in Swedish becomes Mårten.

In our family Mårten Gås has always been celebrated! My grandparents lived on a big farm, breeding mainly turkey and chicken, but every year they also had some geese, specifically for Mårten. In the sixties my grandmother wrote down the recipe (we have since then used the same recipe each year!) for the “Svartsoppa”, a goose blood soup (it includes a lot of good red wine and has to be served with sherry), with goose sausage made from the goose throat and paté. The main course is the goose cooked in the oven , with the related extras of red cabbage, apple halves with red currant gelé, apple mousse, potatoes, sauce, and as a dessert – the petit choux in the shape of swans (or geese) filled with vanilla ice cream. (No apple-pie! That is what you usually get if you eat Mårten in a restaurant. Never in my family J)

This year Johan and I decided to invite the family for the feast, and on the Saturday 12 November (2 days late…. But OK) the whole house was full of nice relatives.

Axel helps with apples and sallad

Lotta rinses sallad.

My sister Lotta, who had flown up from Belgium, and Axel supported us in the morning by pealing and boiling all the apples halves in sugar water. My parents came with the 2 geese and the black soup that they had prepared the day before. And the sauce of course! Before the dessert I had some good helpers to organize the swans, and fill them with the ice cream. (And I think some creative children found some chocolate sauce to add on the swans…)

The soup and goose came with my parents

It tasted like it should - perfectly round, with a twist of sherry

We all fit in the livinng room. Amazing house with great space!

Lots of gossip going on in the childrens corner of the table...

It felt great to see everybody again, and to be able to sit together and talk and have fun.  

The swans with powered sugar on top!

birdwatching

Birdwatching is fun.

Carin's son compared it with Pokemon Go. You try to find as much birds (Pokemon) as possible. And the more special the bird (Pokemon), the better.
It is even possible that your celphone is saying where to go for finding the birds ... euh ... or is it Pokemon.

Some time ago I saw passing a golden eagle (kungsörn - steenarend). 2 raven were flying high in the sky and the eagle was flying above them. Still the raven seemed to be small birds. 
This is the first time I see him here. Golden Eagle is a local bird. I see them quite often in the winter along the highways. They feed on the carcasses killed by the cars. 
And while I was writing this some time ago, an osprey (fiskgjuse - visarend) showed up, heading straight towards the south. This is a real migratory bird.

Some spotted flycatchers (grå flugsnappare - grauwe vliegenvanger) stayed some time in our garden. Even 2 European pied flycatcher (svartvit flugsnappare - bonte vliegenvanger) joined them. It looked even funny as there were at least 6 or 7 flycatchers in the pear tree in the middle of our lawn. Typical for flycatchers is that they catch something in the air and return to the same place. Multiply this with the number of birds and our peer tree seemed to have sparks flying in all directions.
The flycatchers are gone now. Together with the swallows. The last group was a little group of youngsters who came to say goodbye but now the sky is not any more loaded with their antics. The robins (rödhaka - roodborstje) have taken over. 

Erik was here again. Although we did work hard on the farm, we escaped 2 days towards Falsterbo.
Falsterbo is one of the best places in Europe to watch birds in migration time. As good as al the Swedish and Norwegian, and even a part of the Finish migratory birds are passing in this peninsula on 40 minutes drive from our gård (farm).
Each bird has his migration period. In the end of august it was the time for the raptors.  So we took 2 white plastic chairs, 3 binoculars, an old telescope and a pocket camera. Especially the second day was really fun. When we left more than 100 people was standing or sitting in a row to see the raptors flying by.

Reports can be found on http://www.falsterbofagelstation.se/

The plastic chairs were not "conventional", but our being in Falsterbo turned out to be a wonderful experience with lots of raptors comming over close or far away.

At each side a row of birdwatchers focussing on the birdspecies comming over.

Harvesting

Now we are nearby finished harvesting. Pears, plums, apples, blackberries, raspberries, blueberries, elderberries, rowan berries, ... it's hard to keep harvesting and processing in time.

Every morning I enter the garden and pick some fallen fruit to make a fresh juice.  Now I am in the pears and apples. I even started to use the fruit remains separated from the juice by the juicer, to make pancakes.

Just take a big handful of the remains put 2 or 3 towered spoons of flower and 1 or 2 eggs (depending how soft you want to have it). I take a spoon full of "dough" and drop it at the side of the pan. As it is quite consistent, I use the spoon to smear it open into a small pancake. When they are baked at one side, I turn them around and push them even a little bit flatter to have 2 nice sides. It taste wonderful, a pancake with a touch of apple and pear.

Our vegetable garden changed in a lush flowerbed.

Also the vegetable garden has given his full load now. Carrots, beans, several different coals, parsley, and of course very Swedish the dill, ... all this wealth let us feel happy to have this wonderful place.

A big cauliflower (blomkol - bloemkool) still hidden but eaten soon.

The only white cabbage (vitkål - witte kool) not full of holes caused by the snails.

Kale (grönkål - krulkool) surrounded by high growing marigolds.

 Even harvesting zucchinis (squash - courgette) is trying to empty the ocean with a thimble. They give far more fruit than we can eat.

Two 3 kg heavy zucchinis waiting for harvesting.

Our little tiny yellow zucchinis

The salad Carin has seeded, is fully grown.

The salad turned out to be soft tasty.

Yesterday evening we ate homemade sandwiches with cheese and ham, richly covered with salad or for the warm sandwiches with parsley under the melted cheese. Carin even had put freshly picked grape on top of it. A few days ago the East Indian Cherry was the coloured appetizer.

It is wonderful to  have al this good things straight from the garden on the table. Although the children do not like so much to eat vegetables Carin and I enjoy every little bite we take.

And to end, you can imagine our newly bought freezer is already quite full. 

obstruction in the sewer system and the rainwater system

Our farm is renovated in the 70's by the parents of the former owner. The base of the farm although is in his present form build somewhere around 1880. Even from earlier being 1840 there should be some sources but most probably that was not in the present form of the farm.
That also means some of the things remain from the early period. You have already discovered together with us the basement. Most probably build in the beginning but closed "for ever" in the 70's?

New in the 70's was the sewer system. Concrete and plastic are the materials used to evacuate the used dirty water from the sinks, bath, shower, ... Even more recently a pump pit was added to pump the dirty water towards the water treatment plant in Malmö. We had already some problems as the pump broke down. And the bulb from the alarm light was broken. So the pump and the electronics had to be replaced. The municipality of Staffanstorp was very helpful, fast and kind to help is with their part. And the whole system needed cleaning from all the dirt piled up. Therefor we had to ask a private company.

the electronics were submerged and totally broken down

The pit had to be empty as the pomp was lower in another compartment.

Where I wasn't aware of, is that this really old farm has a separate sewer system. In Belgium this was coming up only in the 80's. So the dirty water is pumped away. The rainwater is another story. 
After cleaned up the sewer system it turned out that the rainwater system is also clogged. Moreover, even some of the rainwater goes to the sewer system. And we have to pay for that. But even if we should not care spending money on discharging rainwater in the sewer system, it is very stupid to do so. Rainwater doesn't need to be purified. It's reducing the efficiency of the water treatment plant. So there is an urgent need to clean this pipes too. But... it's very unclear were all the pipes are and go. It was even not sure there were pipes. Was it not just a stonepit as they used to do so here? 

When Erik was here a few weeks ago we began digging. Starting at a rain pipe, following it in the ground, till we hit something else. And yes there was water and yes it was clogged. so we took a 10 meter iron stick and tried to push through it. Unfortunately we did not hit any resistance. So the clot was not reached. 

Hitting all kind of tubes and kabels in the ground.

failing to clean the pipe.

So we looked with a (hired) camera. One thing became clear. There are tubes going down, comming together and then most probably passing the farm. But that point is still unclear.  There are no pits to monitor ... so digging is needed.

Rainy weather obstructing my digging today. The hole, already 1,5 meter deep, is covered preventing to fall into it.

One luck we have is that just down the buildings there is a lid on a pit for the rainwater comming down and rying to escape towards the road. And there it is not clogged. So now I started digging there.  And found already some promissing things be it quite deep. And when we could hit the central tube, we hopefully will be able to clean out the pipe upwards. 

Just some "nice" pictures.

Very special clouds above our farm.

"The proof". The third species of eagle above our farm. An osprey (fiskgjuse - visarend). Unfortunately the camera would not join my enthousiasm and the bird turned out to be not more than a spot of dirt in the sky. :-(