For the film evening with the Luisenstadt ladies

By the way, we had agreed to watch Greta Gerwig’s “Little Women”. What a crashing bore. We lasted about fiften minutes before deciding that it was too silly for words and was about everything there is to dislike about chirpy women, and pretty puke-worthy. The title should have been “Silly Women”, and I am definitely not going to bother with any of Greta Gerwig’s other films.

But we did not let that ruin our afternoon/evening.

Coconut Thai Curry Sauce:

For one kilo of salmon:

• 2–3 tablespoons coconut or olive oil
• 2 large shallots or 1 small onion- finely slced
• 4–6 garlic cloves, finely sliced
• 1– 2 fresh hot chilies- finely chopped
• 3 tablespoons lemongrass, very finely chopped
• 2 teaspoons turmeric root, grated (or sub 1 teaspoon ground)
• 1 teaspoon galangal (or substitute fresh ginger), grated
• 1–3 tablespoons Thai Curry Paste (optional) red, green, or yellow (I will probably cheat and buy a red curry paste ready-made
• 1/2 l chicken, fish or vegetable stock
• 8 lime leaves
• 1/2 teaspoon salt
• 1 kilo mixed vegetables – I might use kale and snap peas, green beans, green asparagus, carrot, and/or perhaps mini aubergines if I can find them
• 1 red bell pepper, diced
• 2 cans coconut milk
• 2 tablespoon fish sauce
• 2 lime
• to garnish for example chopped (preferable Thai) basil, cilantro (perhaps served separately), spring onions

1. Cut the fish into large, approx. 5×5 cm chunks, pat dry and place in a bowl. Season with salt, lime zest from one lime and 1 tablespoon lime juice, and massage lightly to coat. Set aside.
2. In an extra-large saute pan, heat the oil over medium heat.  Add the shallots and saute until golden, about 4 minutes. Add the garlic, lemongrass and fresh chilies. Saute 3-4 more minutes, until fragrant. Turn heat to low. Add the grated ginger and turmeric, stir and then add the curry paste, and sauté one minute.
3. Add the stock, lime leaves, and salt and bring to a simmer. Then add the vegetables with the ones that take longer to cook first and simmer gently, covered, till they are tender.  If you are using very fast-cooking vegetables, save them and add them along with the fish later.
4. Stir in the coconut milk and fish sauce, and a generous squeeze of lime juice- start with half a lime, add more to taste. The broth should be a little salty, “limey” and a little spicy. Adjust with fish sauce, curry paste, garlic/chili paste, keeping in mind that the flavours will mellow when the fish is added and it is all served over rice. This broth can be prepared in advance.
5. When ready to serve, add the fish and most quickly-cooking vegetables.Nestle in the fish, and quick cooking veggies. Simmer gently, occasionalle stirring very carefully over medium low heat, for about five minutes.
6. Garnish, and serve over rice.

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Thai Quinoa Lentil Salad

Asian Cucumber Salad

• 2 salad cucumbers, about 300 g, scored lengthwise with a fork and finely sliced
• 1/2 teaspoon salt
• 1 red onion, finely sliced
• 1 teaspoon ginger, grated
• 1 clove garlic, finely minced
• 1 tblsp rice vinegar
• 1 tsp soy sauce
• 1 tsp toasted sesame oil
• 1 teaspoon chili garlic sauce (sambal olek)

Place the cucumber slices in a bowl and toss with the salt, let stand to release water while preparing the remaining ingredients.

Mix the other ingredients and add the drained cucumber slices before serving.

Optional additions: Fish sauce, lime juice, roated sesame seeds, roasted ccrushed peanuts, cilantro, Thai basil, fiinely chopped red onion, finely chopped red chili.

(To-do list for myself)

Rathenow, suggested walking route in Komoot here

Luckenwalde

Schwerin

Rudow-Altglienicke Nature Reserve

Suggestions from Tagesspiegel

Kloster Chorin

Hochschulbibliothek Wildau

Beskow St Marienkirche

Templin (?)

Koster Neuzelle

Friedrichstadt

Greetsiel

Husum

Königstein um Taunus

Bamberg

Attenburg

Genshagener Heide

Gitti’s walks on Whatsapp

Lisa’s walks in emails

Eckehard’s walks on Whatsapp

Mühlenfließ – Flakensee

Halbe (Kaiserbhf, Waldfriedhof)

Luckau

Lieberose

Jüterbog (Kulturquartieres Mönchenkloster, Kloster Zenna, “Grösste Wanderdüne in Brandenburg nahe Jüterbog”

Lübbenau

Heideblick OT Börnsdorf

Neustadt Dosse

Nordwest Uckermark

Lychen

Schönweide Glien – Perwenitz, Pausin, Bötzow

Pritzwalk

Doberlug Kirchhain – Galerie für Zeitgen. Kunst im Kunsthaus am See

Finsterwalde

Dahme Mark

Wiesenburg/Mark

Bad Liebenwwerde – Pfarrgarten Saxdorf

Miedzyrzecz Museum

Niederer Glämig

Baruth/Mark

Luckenwalde (E-werk)

Siehdichum

Chajna

Oderaue Neukünstriechen

Bad Saarow

Müncheberg

Liebenwalde

Nauen OT Grossbehnitz

Hels Pfuhl

Krumme Pfuhl

Rheda-Wiedenbruck

Münster

Lübeck

Quedlinburg

Rothenburg a/Tauber

Bremen

Bremerhafen

Wetzlar

but I have to say this again: The enforced hugging, including of total strangers and not just reserved for family and close friends, has gone out of control again. This has happened before and then Covid19 came along and mercifully helped us get rid of both that and handshakes.

We had a golden opportunity to abandon those stupid practices, but now we are doing both again – with a vengeance – why?????

My niece had a stopover in Hamburg between arriving there on a nighttrain and proceeding to Copenhagen on a daytrain, so I went to have breakfast with her at the central station. It was great to see her, however briefly.

I took a handful of photos from the train.

My local cemeteries just a short walk away.

More on Wikipedia here.

Recommended by “PINK – Aktiv gegen Brustkrebs”, which of course means they contain no refined sugar.

Once I start making them, I will translate as I go along.

Gesund naschen in der Vorweihnachtszeit
Was wäre die Weihnachtszeit ohne selbstgemachte Plätzchen?! Da wir im PINK!-Team selbst große Naschkatzen sind, möchten wir Ihnen ein ganz besonderes Rezept vorstellen, das beweist, dass Plätzchen nicht immer kalorienreiche Fett- und Zuckerbomben sein müssen. Es ist vegan, kommt ohne Haushaltszucker aus und weil die Plätzchen nicht gebacken werden müssen, sparen Sie bei der Zubereitung auch noch jede Menge Zeit.

Rezept für vegane Zimtsterne (ohne Backen)

 Zutaten:

• 300 g Datteln
• 1 kleiner Apfel (gerieben)
• eine Prise Salz
• 250 g gemahlene Mandeln oder Haselnüsse
• 280 g Hafermehl
• Zimt
   

Zutaten für die Glasur:

• 3 EL geschmolzene Kakaobutter oder Kokosöl
• 1 EL Zitronensaft
• 1-2 TL Ahornsirup
• 3 EL Kokosraspeln

Zubereitung:

• Geben Sie die Datteln mit dem geriebenen Apfel und einer Prise Salz in einen Mixer.
• Pürieren Sie alles, bis eine homogene Masse entsteht.
• Vermengen Sie Hafermehl, Zimt und Mandeln in einer Schüssel.
• Geben Sie die Dattel-Masse zu den trockenen Zutaten und verrühren Sie alles, bis ein weicher, fester Keksteig entsteht.
• Kneten Sie den Teig im Anschluss mit den Händen noch einmal gut durch.
• Rollen Sie nun den Teig mit einem Nudelholz aus und stechen Sie mit einer Ausstechform kleine Sterne aus.
• Legen Sie die Sterne auf einen Teller und lassen Sie diese für mindestens eine Stunde im Kühlschrank ruhen.
• Für die Glasur vermengen Sie Kakaobutter oder Kokosöl mit Zitronensaft und Ahornsirup, geben dann die Kokosraspeln hinzu und rühren alles noch einmal gut durch.
• Verteilen Sie die Glasur mit einem Löffel oder Pinsel auf den Zimtsternen.

IN PROGRESS

A reminder to myself that when I moved to Berlin, I set out to visit as many towns and cities in my new neighbouring country – Poland – as possible. A certain pandemic, and a regime change, put a temporary stop to those plans, but now that Poland is back on my good books, it is time to resume those visits.

Visited	Visit again	Still to be visited
Gdansk		Byalystok
Krakow		Bydgoszcz
Łódź		Częstochowa and Chorzow
Lublin		Kostrzyn
Poznań	Poznań	Katowice
Szczecin (x 2)
Torun
Warsaw	Warsaw
Wrocław

Multiple-panel panoramics – my take – more or less successfully.