Sunday on the Q

Last Sunday, my favorite girls and I met up for brunch at the DFAC (dining facility) on post. It was the first cool and sunny day we've had this year and I couldn't pass it up. So I invited them over for a BBQ. We all went to the commissary after brunch and decided on our menu. I knew I was going to be trying out smitten kitchen's hacked caprese salad because I had bought three rounds of fresh mozzerella the day before in anticipation of making it.



Cecilia bought a magazine (I forget now which one) that had pictures of 12 different ways to enjoy hotdogs this summer. One was with onion rings on top. I decided to try it. Because you know, trying one new recipe when entertaining company isn't enough. I like to live on the edge.

Plus the commissary had something like 1/2 a pound of pre-sliced onions for 60 cents. They looked at me from the shelf and asked me to please batter and fry them. I don't take the words of talking onions lightly, I obliged.



It was amazing. Please do this if you are going to have a hotdog again ever in your life.



To finish, Cecilia made brownie cupcakes.



With cream cheese frosting on top.



Cecilia loves brownies with cream cheese frosting.

Having the girls around makes things so much more fun and makes me feel a lot safer when my man is gone.

German one-stop-shop

Bloggers, I've been someplace magical.  A place where all the sights of Berlin are in one place and are delicious. A place that isn't pretentious by having a red carpet leading up to it. They deserve that carpet.



Fassbender & Rausch is on the corner of a beautiful square in Berlin. On the bottom floor is a chocolate shop and upstairs is a hot chocolate cafe. It's like a place from my dreams, Bloggers.



All of the great buildings of Berlin are here and made entirely out of chocolate.



I'm not usually one to watch a foreign film and shout out during the whole movie, "I've been there!" Because I know that if I did that none of the other people watching the movie would want to be my friends. The words were already half way out of my mouth before I realized I was saying them when I entered this shop. Maybe because I had just seen half of these sights that very same morning.



I need friends in my life. Reasons: I live 4,000 miles away from my closest family member. I don't readily speak the language in the country which I live. I am a military spouse and therefore living by myself 94% of the time. If I get a flat tire, I want to have someone to call. I want to be one of the cool kids.

Onwardly...



One of the coolest things about this shop is that the chocolate is really affordable. I got 5 truffles and 2 chocolate covered figs all for a smidgen over 3 euros.



I obviously didn't get the camera out fast enough to capture all five truffles on film. It's a danger to be aware of, disappearing truffles.

THE coolest thing about this shop? Two words: chocolate volcano.



This thing was ERUPTING. I tried desperately to get a picture while the chocolate was shooting out the top but I just wasn't fast enough. But don't take my word for it. Go to Germany. Go to Berlin. Go to Fassbender & Rausch. See the glory.

Cecilia and I got off to a late start. I stopped by the Commissary to grab some sandwiches and she couldn't get away from her chatty dog sitter. Once Cecilia and I were driving to the airport we got caught in traffic. According to the electric signs over the autostrada there was "traffico intenso" ahead. We cursed the traffic and turned up Flight of the Conchords. It was a car accident. Cecilia said that she saw a body bag. Could you imagine if we had been just 15 or 10 minutes sooner?

After the inappropriate pat down and bag search through security it was just a flight, bus ride, and taxi away from our hotel. The next morning, after my makeshift sausage egg roll, we set out to see the sights. It took us an hour at the train station to buy a metro ticket. Then we got on the train going the wrong direction. Good thing I made that sandwich in the buffet line. It kept my stomach calm during our next unsettling incident: accidentally going to the red light district of Brussels. I saw more boobies than I've ever seen at one time. And I've been in an Italian woman's changing room at a water park, so that's saying a lot. There must have been tens of pairs of them. We just looked at our shoes and walked a really fast round-about way back to the train station.

Since we'd been lost for about 3 hours at this point we decided to try to find some traditional Belgian food for lunch near our hotel. Two hours later we decided on Thai. Chicken with rice noodles for this girl. It was there in a Thai restaurant in Brussels that we discovered the most fantastic beverage known to man: Sparkling iced tea.

One word: fantastical.
One action: fist pump.

Thank you Brussels for introducing us. My trip was worth it for this only. Thankfully this wasn't the only good thing.

Stay tuned...

There is no extra extra

Near Verona, Bonamnini sits surrounded by vineyards and orchards of olive trees.



They get a lot of visitors.



It's very easy to get a tour of the olive oil factory. First they show you the old way of crushing the olives with the large granite stones that would roll around and around to press the olives.



They explain to you the old way of spreading olive paste on these white circles then having them be pressed by that large machine. The machine would then spit out olive oil and water, which are separated. The oil left behind is extra virgin olive oil, the water they use to irrigate the trees and the pits of the olives they burn and use as fuel for heat and such.



Then she took us to the new olive press.



It's made out of stainless steel instead of granite. She explained that this is much better because the stainless steal doesn't contaminate the olives like the granite would have having been used for only one season.



After everything is pressed and separated the new way they store the olive oil in these large vats. Then they eventually bottle it and sell it.

Interesting fact: olive oil people are liars. The experation date on the bottle is not the date from which the oil was pressed, but the date from which it is bottled. This can make for not so fresh olive oil sometimes.

Another dirty lie: there is no such thing as extra extra virgin olive oil. Just like there is no such thing as olive oil light. There is only extra virgin (which is what our lady guide produces and is the very best) and olive oil. There is no spoon. Name that movie. Olive oil has had chemicals added to it to make it palatable. Extra virgin has not.



After explaining to use the process of bottling we got to the good part. The tasting.



Small amounts to start.



It's best if you warm the oil up in your hands first a little before tasting. It releases the flavors. Also, you know a good olive oil if when you swallow it burns your throat.



Did that sound official or like I just made that part up? I'll let you decide.



After the olive oil we got to taste a few of their olive pastes and some pesto made with their oil. Oh my holy smokes the pesto. A.MAZ.ING.







I came home with some olive shampoo, pesto and artichoke hearts stored in olive oil. I'm saving the pesto for the winter time since I can easily make it now with so much fresh basil around.

Can't wait to take my love here when he gets back.

Tea on Tuesday

The commissary stopped selling Lipton's peach tea. My mom has told me that she hasn't been able to find it around in the States either. Maybe they are cancelling it. Anyway I bought some from the Italian store.


On the side are the instructions. It's nice that they use pictures for us non-native Italian types. At first glance everything seems to make sense.

And then I saw this step...


A little fuzzy here but I think you can still make it out. Person equals peach tea? Man equals tea bag? Super heros are equal to the power of peach tea?

I can't make it out. What are your thoughts?

Copenhagen eats

We've already discussed the churros, which unfortunately aren't native Denmark (or Italy) fair. Denmark is more of a meat and potatoes (and lots and lots of herring) kinda place.

The first restaurant we went to was:

Another thing that I love about the nordic countries is the hard cider. It's like drinking feel-good apple juice. This isn't my first encounter with hard cider thanks to my brother introducing me to Woodchuck.

We saw a ton of commercials for this Temp Cider while we were there. We couldn't wait to try it. It lived up to the sexy commercial hype.

I ordered a "Wild Burger" with high hopes. Because as much as Italy does culinarily well, hamburgers are not one of them. I'd probably say I haven't had a good burger (that my husband hasn't made) since I've been in Europe. That all changed in Copenhagen. It was perfectly cooked (medium), juicy, bacony, cheesy, and on a fresh roll.

They said that this burger came with a salad on it and they weren't kidding. I couldn't wrap my mouth around this thing until I took all the lettuce, rocket, pickles, and wedges of tomatoes off.

My salad looked similar to Cecilia's on the side of her chicken and potato. I stole a bite of her chicken and it was really nicely tangy and not dry at all.

On our fiasco quest to find the Little Mermaid, we came across a nut vendor. She was selling praline almonds. I have an intense love for praline nuts.

Come with me for a moment down memory lane. When I was probably 12 or 13 my family took a trip to Charleston, South Carolina, to see some military family friends that live there. They took us to an open air market where they were selling praline pecans. I ate almost the whole portion. I would have eaten the whole thing if my parents weren't still regulating what I ate. Sometimes I wish they still regulated what I ate. I wouldn't get as many tummy aches for sure.

Cecilia and I split this package because it was about 1 pm and we hadn't had lunch yet. That and they were warm and delicious in a cold, cold country.

Swordfish Tacos

Night before last Cecilia had some of us over for dinner. Usually dinner parties are at my house and hang out movie time is at Cecilia's. It's good to mix it up. Mix and match. Salsa dance.


The first time I ever had swordfish was last summer in Palermo. We had it the one time we went out to eat. It might be my most favorite fish ever and if it wasn't so expensive I'd probably eat it once a week.


This is what fried swordfish looks like. Looks kinda like strips of pork chop. I bet your tastebuds are watering. Do tastebuds even water? I know mine are.


We got to enjoy swordfish tacos because when Cecilia's husband was home for R&R he bought 60 euros worth of the stuff. At the time that was over 100 dollars worth. Sometimes Cecilia's husband goes a little over the top. It's a typical soldier trait. Above and beyond. Army of one. Hoo-ah.


Jocelyn (who's pregnant belly you can kinda see here) made tortillas from scratch. They were fantastic. Makes me want to try my own soon.

France: the eats

French food makes me weak at the knees.



Just look at this menu. It's exactly the kind I like: vague. Entree, plate of the day, dessert and coffee.



It started off with a small salad and the best deviled eggs I've ever had. Mamma mia the eggs! The yokes were mixed with mustard and something delicious. The salad also had a mustard dressing. Usually I don't care for mustard because it tends to overpower whatever it is on, but this flavor was muted.



Next came fish with rice and veggies. That sentence is so plain compared to the plate I received. The fish was covered in a cream sauce and had muscles on top as well. The veggies had a heavy, creamy mustard sauce.

Dessert was a small bowl of fruit. The perfect fresh end to a creamy meal.



After lunch we headed down the street to a candy shop. It was a fantastical land. They had a tower of macaroons. I got six and gobbled up before I remembered to take a picture.



They also had beautiful chocolates. We got some orange rinds covered in chocolate. Also gobbled before photo shoot.



Finally at the end of the trip we stopped for crepes. Mine was filled with strawberry jam. My friend's (which you can kinda see in the picture) came with cheese.

This was my third trip to France and the first time I was able to find macaroons. I had never had them before because I wasn't able to find a shop on my short trips there. I'm so glad I did this time.

Road food.

Photo cred

I'm going on a bus trip to Nice, France this weekend. We're leaving at 2 am on Saturday morning and getting back at 3 am Sunday morning. No hotel. Only bus. I'm not sure yet if this is a good idea, but I figure if I'm going to try it with any place Nice is a nice place to start. Nice is nice. I couldn't resist.

I need snacks. Serious snacks. I know for sure Puppy Chow (puppy food, monkey munch, muddy buddies, reindeer chow, etc). I want some kind of salty mix. And something healthy and/or hearty. Please post your suggestions!