Falling Asleep at the Wheel ...

sometimes I wonder if this really happened or if I read it somewhere ...

55 euro later I have a badge and an info package. Boy are these euro notes funny looking. A bit big too. Like play money. Weird. ‘Jessie Watkins, Marlies’ is printed on my name tag which I wear on a red white and blue lanyard around my neck. Cool. I walk to the conference room and take a seat in the half full room near the front. Katrin walks on stage right on time and everyone applauds. She’s exactly like her picture. Middle aged, stout but not fat – firm – commanding, but gentle, taller than I had expected with shoulder length dark blond hair held up with a clasp – she’s wearing jeans and running shoes, a white polo shirt and a small set of pearls. Her hair is up and her glasses sit on the edge of her nose. I laugh a bit to myself. She looks as if I had taken Maya and stretched her another foot. Katrin is introduced, and the title of her talk, ‘Taking the Bite out of Social Networking’ appears behind her on a large wall screen. “Good morning. My name is Katrin Lawson, I’m currently living in Germany where I work for a large food service company – which I won’t name as they aren’t paying for the spot - I’m a chef, a mum, and my blog, when I have time to write it, is Dandelion Jam.” There is a brief moment of laughter from the audience and from Katrin herself as she looks at her notes, “If you find yourself in the wrong talk, you now have the chance to leave, I believe there’s a talk on chocolate sculpting going on next door … ” She smiles and there’s more polite laughter. She turns around and looks at the screen behind her as the title changes to a slowly animated selection of restaurant images. “I’d like to talk today about social media and how it affects your audience, the millions of middle class foodies and cooks who enjoy the food we prepare for them in our various businesses around the globe every day. As if that weren’t a daunting enough task as it is, internet blogs and food channels are making them even more demanding, expectant, and knowledgeable than they already are. So, what does this mean for us? What the heck is social marketing to your average restaurant owner? How does the internet take the old addage, ‘One happy customer tells two friends but one unhappy customer tells ten friends’, and with a simple mouse click changes ten friends to three hundred friends on foodbuzz, or twitter, or facebook? …” Katrin’s voice continues as the slides behind her change and I look around the room’s hundred odd faces. Until know I hadn’t thought that there were obviously other people around the globe reading Katrin, that it wasn’t just me. Funny. I had taken her words and imagined they were for me alone. I smile to myself and lean back to listen.

... :O) kisses, katrin

Close to the Maddening Crowd - in the Algarve, Portugal

Dear Readers - this a bit late hitting my blog but I wanted to share it with you!

Next time I’m looking for a bottle of HP sauce I’m going to simply fly to Portugal because the store shelves are just sagging with the stuff. What a shock! Biscuits, Quality Street chocolates, anything that wouldn’t be out of place on any High Street in London. Portugal is sadly not far from the maddening crowd. Fortunately for us however our hotel (Hotel Casabela) was in Ferragudo and not in Portimao. Ferragudo is a small village with a beautiful beach and fishing village while Portimao is like Atlantic City populated by drunk Brits FORTUNATELY seperated by a wide estuary which you must drive around. Even though I’m dying for a full English Breakfast I know that my stomach would be dragging in the sand at the end of the week unless I pay close attention to what I put away so it’s fish and salad most of the way. The salads are amazing and you really must try one because they are almost exclusively a sort of greenish red beefsteak tomatoe, very large and thickly cut with onions and balsamic vinegar and then there is a lot of garlic. The fish you can get cheaper anywhere BUT in Portugal - funny that because they’re scooping them out of the ocean at the edge of our table and whacking them over the heads before our eyes but there you go eh? a warning: do be careful of the plates of prawns and other delicacies they place on the table while you're deciding what to order because these are NOT free. It's just like when you’re in Paris when after dinner you notice a few extra bucks at the end of your bill because of the table cloth or in Germany because you ate a pretzel from the basket which you thought was ... bread? Same thing as the plates of lovely fried fish in Portugal. But I digress - right well, just pump that up a notch and you have the Algarve. If you’re not sure don’t eat it okay? We made especially sure we didn’t crack any of the packets of sardine paste not just because it was absolutely disgusting I am sure but you are going to get nailed for each cachet of butter you open. So you’ve been warned! :O)

The fish was REALLY good and so was the the sun setting behind the guy at the grill and the kids tootling by on their electric scooters adding extra charm. Even the girls ate without complaint. If you aren’t sure, then order the King Fish with the huge eyes. Start with some prawns sauteed in garlic and don’t forget the salad. Wine. Forget what you heard about the scary Algarve wines fondly know to the locals as “Dog Throttler”. No matter how hard we tried we only found wine from the north of Portugal on offer and they were all very good. The whites especially from around Porto where light and tasty.

So I’m wondering, what’s with all this we hear that the world’s ocean levels are rising each year? What about the water carved 10 story high cliffs I’m seeing here on the Atlantic coast? Where did all that water go then? If it’s rising on the east coast of the US it must be because the world’s tilting and all the water from the west coast of Europe is getting sucked away. Wasn’t the water level then once much much higher? Where did all the water go? Hell, the grand canyon was full of water once. And WHO are these people who bring inflatable wading pools to the beach!?

ola! :O) katrin

... and the winner is ...

... chococo! after tasting a dozen of the chocolates we brought back from the london chocolate week kickoff chocolate unwrapped, we found chococo the best for taste, packaging, friendliness and honesty of their makers, price and family interactivity value! others we love? paul wayne gregory definetly got my vote for the most amazingly friendly chocolate makers. wonderful packaging, design and wonderfully tasting would be lauden chocolate.

http://www.chococo.co.uk/ Claire and Andy Burnet. :O) katrin

London Calling

I love breakfast buffets, and for years the best I had ever eaten was in Toronto’s Royal York and the worst at some little place in Baker Street. I know there have been some very good breakfasts in between but some just stick with you. The Princess Hotel in Bacelona has an excellent breakfast buffet included with the price of the room as does the Reval Hotel Lietuva in Vilnius, Lithuania. The May Fair has one of those breakfasts which you love to hate. First because costs almost 20 pounds, but ours was included in the price of the room, and second because it’s gorgeous! So I have to hate it for its generous gorgeousity! Hubby was still snoring and the girls had not yet called so I went to enjoy the luxury of a single breakfast – then sat in one of the deep leather sofas in the lobby while I waited for the restaurant to open. I understand half seven to be 630 and not 730. Such is the result of living so long in Germany. Full breakfast menu, as much as I wanted it, I had to decline if I was to remain fit for the rest of the day and not simply go back upstairs and curl into a ball of lard beneath the comforter. How can some people eat so much for breakfast? Are they agricultural labourers? In construction? Certainly they don’t physically appear to be in any of those professions. The buffet was piled high with mini boxes of Dorset Cereals and jars of Wilkin and Sons jams, glass jars of Loseley dorset cream yoghurt, tall muffins wrapped in cones of baking paper and topped with lovely goo, bowls of fresh blueberries and strawberries (in October?) salmon, meats, cheeses … how was I to eat all of this? My cappuccino arrives thick and creamy and warm and topped with chocolate and I’m full already just looking at it. I’m the sort of woman who, when you look at me you would think, oh she probably eats her fair share. I look healthy and full figured and I’m proud of it. As a mother and chef I don’t need a decorative figure, I need a useful one. However I keep fit and can still easily turn heads when I need to. However, I really can’t eat that much without feeling somewhat inert and unhappy. So I try to pace myself between what my eyes and mouth want and my stomach will tolerate. I order two poaced eggs on buttered english muffins but the muffins are somehow delivered cold which is quite a feat considering the open kitchen in two tables away from mine. However the smoked salmon, herring, tomatoe and mozzarella with a crusty roll, followed by fresh blueberries and strawberries with yoghurt, granola and honey filled me nicely However I still had another two hours before London Chocolate Week’s Chocolate Unwrapped begins …


The show is quite wonderful. Kate and Emma and their team have finally taken a great idea and put it under one roof. Hats off to Suzanne at Sick Children’s Trust, Antonia at Ooh La La Chocolaterie, Artisan du Chocolat, Lauden Chocolate, Paul Wayne Gregory chocolates, Claire and Andy at Chococo, Clay Gordon, and Bill McCarrick to mention but a few of the devoted and talented people on site. Chocolate is becoming more and more exclusive, almost tentative and beyond our reach, in its packaging. Like an elixir. There is no reception for my mobile in the ballroom so I go upstairs to text hubby I see five messages from the girls who are apparently lost somewhere near the Thames but who think they can make their way safely in the direction of Piccadilly which isn’t far. So all is not lost. As long as we are in sms contact we know they’re alive. I have sent hubby out in search of postcards and when he returns we take a break from the chocolate show to dash over to the Clarence for a half pint and some of their amazing seasonal sausage and mash with parsnip chips and gravy. I’m not particularily hungry having drunk 5 cappucinos since breakfast and while I do feel a bit like a jumpy cow they are just the sort of thing to melt the taste of all that chocolate from my mouth. I order half a London Pride with Lamb and Apricot sausages and hubby takes a full pint of the Landlords ale with the Cumberland sausages. There is no mention of crisps while we’re waiting which I know I won’t regret later, being so partial to them. The sausages are brilliant and we have a wonderful but short lunch.


When the girls arrive breathless but happy two hours later we decide to make our way out together. We are very cavalier about the weather and were running down Berkeley Street from our rooms in the May Fair much later with no umbrellas and only sweaters on when the rain appeared out of nowhere. Well, from the grey windy horrible London sky actually where it had been lurking since our arrival that afternoon. Beneath an awning one of the girls notices the taxis rank beneath a stand of trees and we all run over and pile in. “Harrods please!” We were a bit far away from Kensington being at Green Park and once I had my bearings I realised we could have taken the tube which was probably cheaper. The taxi ride was 5 pound 80 when the friendly lights of Harrods greeted us. Sending my husband in for some umbrellas, I sent the girls off to wait for their father in the safety of the Harrods food arcade and ran back down the street to Harvey Nichols which I had noticed a few blocks back. Coach products were nowhere to be found but Chris, a lovely blonde in a black pant suit, was very helpful in helping me to select a D&G wallet to replace the one I had stolen last week with not only my credit cards inside but also my Victoria Secret points card. Which is worse I’m still debating. The wallet was marked at 185 pounds but rang on the till at 170 pounds. So I was very happy when I ran back to find my pastry muching family under the awnings of Harrods near the Kensington tube station. “Corn beef pasties!” They all cried in unison. We decided we should go back to the hotel and get some of the many foodstuffs I’d promised friends back home from the Sainsbury’s next door. So we went into the tube station only to find that it was 4 pound a person for the two stop return trip. So we went back up the stairs and found an empty taxi. London is the easiest place I have been able to find a taxi outside of … Minsk perhaps but then you never know if they’re over charging you or not. Back at the hotel, the girls go up their rooms to watch TV while hubby and I go along to Piccadily Square and marvel at the wonders of London at night and in the rain. All those umbrellas make the sidewalks that much more full. We stop off for a peek at Eros which has been under renovation as long as I can remember, and then stop in at EAT for a clam chowder and a thick slice of brown bread each. We sit there and fill ourselves with warm comfort as the rain drops outside. For dessert we buy 400 grams of chocolates from Maison du Chocolat next door to enjoy back at the hotel. And then I have to have a second look when we pass beneath Parket Snob Eatery and look through the windows at the restaurant which is oddly enough almost empty. London is a scream! LOL! katrin

Recipes: Sundried Tomatoe Cheese Biscotti

300 gram flour
1 tsp baking powder
100 gram butter
80 gram sugar
2 eggs
8 unoiled sundried tomatoes julienne
100 gram grated padano cheese
sesame seeds or poppyseeds to coat

whisk sugar and butter together.
add eggs and whisk.
add cheese and tomatoes.
flour and baking powder sifted together and then folded into mix.
form into a single log on baking paper, roll in seeds.
bake.

180 C convection oven. 30 minutes, slice the loaf and let dry on lowest heat setting and with the door open to let out the steam.

I just never find time to blog lately. Already thinking of Thanksgiving and Christmas and my heart just flutters! I love biscotti, and the glass jar on the counter is mostly always empty. Except for the last one of any batch which as a family rule is always left in the jar as a polite reminder to make more. We love savoury biscotti with soups or as a change from croutons with salads or as a low sugar snack. poka! katrin :O)