beauty and the beast (take the spell away)
my beautiful plants are infested with aphids. but i won't capitulate just like that, i shake my fist at you, whoever sent me this plague! (yes, i take this very personally because i have so many other things that need to be done at the moment. if there ever is a convenient moment for discovering that small sap-sucking insects are crawling over my plants it is quite definitely not now.) i am trying to get rid of them by spraying the leaves with neem tea. if anybody has had positive experiences with other home remedies, please go ahead and share your wisdom.
very little time means that nothing much exciting is happening in my kitchen (not having as many darlings and loves at hand as jamie oliver to get me the olive oil and those lemons...). however, yesterday i managed to find the time to make paradeissauce.
paradeissauce (homemade tomato sauce, traditional style)
- a little more than two pounds of tomatoes
- two tablespoons of flour and oil each
- water as needed
- one to two teaspoons of sugar (or to taste)
- salt
- optional: vegetable stock powder, tomato paste
cut tomatoes into quarters.
gently heat oil in a pot, stir in flour, then add tomatoes. the tomatoes should be cooked very slowly so that they can release their juice to form a sauce with the flour. if needed a few tablespoons of water can be added at the beginning to prevent burning.
when tomatoes are soft and mushy, run through something like that or mash through a sieve.
season with sugar and salt and vegetable stock powder if needed. the sauce should have a pretty mild taste, not too acidic. if the tomatoes are not perfectly ripe, adding a tablespoon of tomato paste might be necessary.
this sauce is either served over short egg pasta or used to cook stuffed bell peppers in it. my grandma used to toss some potatoes in a little butter and together with the tomato sauce they made a nice, light dinner.
btw, on my search for the vocabulary for the above (un)mentioned cooking utensil i found a few really strange articles on wikipedia in the "food utensils" category...
