Friday LUNCH at work

Here it was. Pulver soup - great packing and all you have to wait for is to boil the water. Even though it is already spiced and ready, some extra spices are always welcome.


So, here was yesterday´s lunch. Didn´t have to think about cooking and food before or after.

Ingredient

Had enough cooking for this week. I had the left over from yesterday´s soup, with feta cheese.
I was going to make the favorite salad again. But I just had enough with the cooking. So it turn out to be one ingredient only:

bREAKfAST

Always the same. For months or years, until I get fed up and change it and follow the new one for approximatelly the same time.

There is a system in breakfast making too - as little time in kitchen as possible. So, while water for coffee is boiling the toast is grilling.

So, two toasts are ready. I like to bite them before I toast them. It feels right.

 Butter.

 Managed to put on the feta cheese as well (always) and just on time when water is boiling. Just a short break from the toast preparation to make the coffee.

 Coffee behind there, waiting. Spicing with bulgarian spices, or any kind really, except for cinnemon or turmeric. The first one is for a dessert and the second one for color.

 Two slices tomatos and I have a left over for a lunch salad.

 Cucumbers...and...tadaaa, done. I think it took 7 min with the photographing.

 Choosing a plain cup for today, as it is a normal day and leaving the nice two cups on the sides for the weekend. :)

That´s it.

DA SOUP

 Todays dinner was soup. It is always the same soup as I have become an expert on it. Well, it is not REALLY the same soup as I can never match the ingredients with the water and ofcourse I always put something extra and don´t remember what it was.

Here it goes. A nice glass of wine...and you find your pot that you have to match your ingredients to.

 Measure the water. This is tricky. You never know how much is enough. But I am taking a guess again.

 Take the products. Left overs from the previous soup. Now these could be too many ingredients and I may have to skip some of them. It can get too packed in the soup basically. But it looks good.

So, there is a system here. To spend as little time as possible in the kitchen I need to have some of those stuff ready to drop in the water before the water boils.

 Peel the potato directly in the trashbin so you save time on cleaning.

 Now I can peel the carrots on the table as they could be cleaned with one grab of the hand - saves a lot of time.

Like that

 Well, it never really works, despite my best intentions. There are always some left overs that slows down my process.

 Half way there,...water still not boiling. Can make it and chop another ingredient.

 A left over onion. Easy.

 I forgot to take out the garlic. Not much of it left though. Could hardly find it in the cupboard. It will do. There are so many other things in the soup anyway.

 Chopped onion. Ready to drop the first batch of stuff. Water is boiling.

 Small bubbles but just on time.

 The RealLife function "Grab and Drop" ...

 Not always totally painless because the water splashes around and cooking in T-shirt is definitelly NOT a good outfit for that method. But I am used to it...kind of. Still it always surprises me when it happeneds.

 Now I have calmed the boiling down some with the first ingredients. I will have the time, whitout decreasing the heat, to chop the rest. Until the next burst of bubbles.

 Cauliflower to be killed...tadaaaa...here I come...

The cauliflower massacre...Ops, feels like it is too much material for the space left in the soup. But I will not throw things I have already sliced. It is a waste of time spent in kitchen. Every piece counts.

 Alright. It is just in time for the next water boil. Calmed it down with cabbage. Now spicing and coloring.

 May be there is some extra space for unpredicted ingredients. Some  peas may be? The whole soup looks too white. Needs some better colors.

 Just pour in, without any worry...It is blobbing up and down unpredictably.

 As usual some fell on the floor. It is just a small part of those I have to find and collect. More unnecessary time spent in the kitchen. Then I had to wash hands again...and so on and so on...Annoying, but anyway. As always, there is an ending to it, luckily. Back to the soup.

 I think some broccoli won´t hurt either. Now the pot is really getting filled up and there is a danger that the soup lacks water. Which has happened many times before. And sometimes it lacks material. I actually prefer the soup that lacks water then the other one. So more stuff in it.

 Plopping it in. A handful is enough.

 Ok, one more little piece won´t overflow it.

 Now checking how much ingredients there is and which of those are more likely to shrink. Because it doesn´t look like a soup at all to me at the moment. It is even hard to mix. But I know that some of those will shrink, so I am not worried.

 Mixing more. Now there is more color. Very nice. Still needs some more coloring. The water looks like water and not like a soup juice.

 Color it with some tomato paste.

 And some chicken broth. Water starts boiling again...Now it is the time to take the heat down.

 Alright, some more coloring material. I don´t really know how a turmeric really tastes like. It smells wierd, but it colors well and it fits to every dish.

 Some bulgarian spices.

 Ah, I found another piece of garlic in the cupboard. Great. Chop it in on top of the soup.

 More spices can never hurt.

 Ok, may be the last one...

 Checking if it is done. As everything cooked for a long time, everything is soft and eatable. No raw things. The water has disappeard, but also, some ingredients has shrinked. It does look kind of like inbetween soup and stew.

 Just drag and drop some dill from its packaging plastic bag.

 And before eating anything, just make sure you have the feta cheese in. It minimazes all the disappointments.

Very succeful soup-stew eventually. An old recepie in a new way as usually. I recall the first soup of this one was best, but I can never remember what I put in it...and do I really have to. I am not going to read it or go out buy the ingredients that are missing anyway...That is a waste of time spent on cooking...

If you follow the recepie. Enjoy

Lunch Box

I like to have different sizes lunch boxes. I like them small, because their spare space in your bag and also, if you are a good packer, which I am, you could have a normal portion lunch fitted in a very small box. Most of my colleges at work have the same portion sizes as mine packed in a huge boxes. That doesn´t make your lunch bigger at all, it just takes more space in your bag.



Alright, that is my 4th cup of coffee for the morning. I always have 5. The last one I have when I get ready for work and wander around in the house, choose earings, cloths and so on...and pass by the kitchen and sip some coffee. Really nice.

So, here is my preparation. I will make my newly discovered sallad, which I had on Monday and yesterday and will have today as well. The one I tried to have last evening too but ended up making a completly different recepie.

 Forgot to take a pic of my breakfast because it is always the same except for on saturdays sometimes. Anyway, this is a left over tomato from breakfast, as I have two slices of tomato only to my toast. And there is todays lunch box. I want to make the same sallad. I will have that until I am fed up with it.

 Tomato´s in. Here is the rest of the cucumber. I don´t like to trow away stuff. So, used that.

 It is too little. Starting on a new cucumber. Here it is.

 The green lentis, new package, here it goes.

 The box opening never works for me. I never know where the scissors are but I always look for them hectially for 30 seconds, then I give up and start cutting it with a knife. It works half way, then I start pulling, to tear the last piece away. It ends up like that. Fine. I have no problem with that. I don´t want to compete in a nice box-opening of lentises. I just want to get them out of there and into my lunch box.

 Pouring some water out. I want to be able to dig in. So some more tearing is involved. Now it looks like that. It´s fine. It will not go bad for at least 5 days, in which I could have some more of this sallad.

 Here it is. Very nice. Some more space to fill in, which I have planned for.

 Left overs from red pepper. I have been using some of it as "something extra" in other recepies.

 Here we go, still left overs from the pepper for other stuff. I basically like to keep a lot of stuff in my fridge because you never know what kind interesting recepie may be developed in days of "mixture from the fridge" experiments.

 Green onion. Now, when it is whole like that I usually have two options, to cut it from the head or from the bottom. It slightly changes the recepie. I have been cutting it from the head for two days, now I need to change things some and cut it from the ending.

 Here you go, it is more greener then. Very nice! I like it.

 I have already put the black olives - 3 of them and chopped in pieces so they even out the space. Here are some jalapenos that I still have in the fridge.

 Jalapenos also chopped to even out the strong sensetion when eating and ofcourse for the purpose of a better packing. I still have some space left so I will add up the new ingredient from yesterday - the green sallad. Not much, because there is short on space now.

 So, looks better and better. And I still have some parsley left. It has been in the plastic bag for a week now and it starts to smell and getting bad.

 Yes, here it is. It is alright though, there are still some green leafs left there somewhere.

 Where are they? Yes, there are definitelly some. They are not green green, somewhat yellowish, but it is not a big problem.

 Tadaaa. Well packed and done! Very well.

 And now there are really no green leafs left. I can throw that away with a clear conscious.

 You see, very nicelly packed. I also add feta cheese to it because it is the answer to all my failures in cooking. It just makes the taste of everything tasts better. I forgot to take a pic of that, because I take it for granted.

If you go for this recepie. Enjoy!