Been on my mind for a while now

 {Lidls'croissants in a tube - French week}

 {breakfast: warm croissants + honey}

{Lidl random ad - Mexican week}

I have such a weakness for Lidl products. Being such a cook-aholic, I consider them fun and exciting.

Of course, I should be buying local, from the farmer's market, especially, should be supporting the local market, buy foods that are not packaged and not brought from abroad, made with god knows what. I know this very well, I believe in that and I will want to support that in the future. I really do.

I get my basic stuff like flour, sugar, oil, canned goods and such from Kaufland, Billa or eventually Carrefour. I love Auchan for their bulk section, where you can get your nuts, seeds, dried fruits, tea, coffee, pasta and so forth. I just love that you can get any quantity you want, you can see them there, I don't know, I just do. Of course, it would be even better if you could come with a reusable fabric bag, or a jar and not have to use plastic bags. That would be insanely amazing.

These are good for your grocery shopping.

But. There is a but.

But when you want something else, something special, maybe half baked, or just something to go with what you already plan on cooking, you (or just me) go to Lidl. 

I love their diverse weekly products. I like that after a while they go on sale because nobody buys them. I regularly buy their greek yogurt, asian cooking sauces, noodles, tortillas, a tortilla chip dip once in a while, if it's something special.

 R says that their nonfood products are pretty decent. Like, for example, a few months as the biking season was opening, they brought a lot of cycling stuff, saddles, lights, helmets, and lots of other things. They have hardware tools, kitchen tools, sewing machines, sewing kits, gardening tools, and lots of other stuff at a decent price.

I don't like their flowers, neither stems, nor potted. They just feel waxed and too polished and you feel like they've been drugged to get here from some far away place.

I kind of like going there on weekends and get a little something for the week to come. I do enjoy their ad and I scribble on it and mark the things to buy.

And there goes another post about food.

Have a nice weekend

{rainy weather}

Have a nice one!
Guys, you have to go see this if you're in town. Believe me. I went to school today and noticed all those people in the park, figured I should check it out and I was amazed of how pretty all the pots and plates and the rest of the ceramics are. I already saw a few things I want to buy, and I'm going again tomorrow with R and take a closer look at all of them and then decide.
Before this, I hope tomorrow morning I'm going to be able to go visit Adra and Ionela at Sophia, as they're working until noon. I need to get my bike fixed and then Sunday I'm looking forward to R's new bike arriving, get some reading done.

p.s.
this lil'old photo project - it's not just a random thing.I know well some of these bloggers; I love Brian Ferry's still life photos especially, and Pia Jane's are just magical, every time, check out her blog. Oh and this, one year after the 1001, same bloggers.
this illustrated interview with Meryl Streep on beauty, and lots more on the right
her work and blog - check it all out

home/food

It's been good.
We've done a bit of moving around the furniture, cleaned a lot, made the place feel like us. I've already bought a kitchen cart and a rug and a few kitchen ware and we still need a few more things.
It's a one room apartment with a kitchen about the same size as the room, a little hallway and a decent bathroom. It's perfect for us. There's so much space I can't believe it.
The neighborhood is Ok, I guess. There are a few kids around in the afternoon screaming and playing down in the playground, but it's fine.

 My plants are not doing so fine; well, not all of them. The mint and basil are going strong, especially the mint, she's tall and proud. But my ranunculus is not. It's probably because it doesn't get enough sun, because we're facing north and there's no room outside the window for them to sun bathe. It's sad, cause it was going so well and I thought they would make it and I would have beautiful flowers, but no... I still have some bulbs left, and I'll probably try again but I'm not sure it will work.

 {kitchen window view}

 {the main and only room}

{farmers' market buys}

I've been cooking a little since we settled in, nothing new or exciting, as I'm just getting around the new kitchen.

 {mint lemonade}

 {pretty little potatoes}

             {roasted potatoes+ dill/garlic yogurt}                      {tomato soup*+nibbles}

{double chocolate banana bread** - recipe here}

 {mini pizzas***}

 *The tomato soup is a regular around here. The recipe is Jamie's and it's this one. There is another one of his, where he says to add a can or a couple of cans of whole tomatoes - to give it more body and get more of a creamy, less soupy thing. I did not have a couple of cans of tomatoes,and I just needed to get rid of five tomatoes so as to not throw them away sooner or later( we're not big tomato fans). So with five tomatoes I did not make a lot of soup, thus I did not added so much water, plus I skipped the cream/yolk/vinegar part and just added some cream before eating it. Sites everywhere you find this recipe advise you to serve this soup with grilled cheese sandwiches...yeah, in an ideal world. I'm not mocking, sure that would have been great, but it didn't happen.

** Being the first time making this bread I'm glad I did it, but I'm not sure I'll add it to my favorite recipes list, because the combination of chocolate and bananas is just not my thing. Of course, we finished it off in a day after baking it, but that's because we did not have anything else sweet in the house.

*** Mini pizzas cook way faster than a big regular one, so it's good.You'll notice that one is slightly more yellowish than the other. It's because it's been fried before putting stuff on it and going in to the oven. I've discovered this way back a few years in Jamie's Jamie's Italy book (great, great cooking book), but never really got to try it out. My fried pizzas weren't that different from the baked ones but I'll tell you why. I should have made them thinner than the baked ones and then the whole experience would have been different, I'm sure. It was funny, because frying the dough made the kitchen smell like we were making doughnuts. I will definitely do a better job the next time, by making them right.

This was supposed to be a post about our new home, not food, but they're both very important to me, so it's OK.

Couple of weeks back

 {craving hot chocolate on a hot day}

 {snacking outdoors while others works out}

 {Copou - back-lanes}

 {snacking - second time around}

 {shaorma at Warda - pretty good}

{Mai Bine menu}

Whilst looking for an apartment and packing stuff, moving out and then unpacking everything we took well deserved breaks, like bike rides up Copou, meeting up with friends, eating out and even enjoyed a bit of Street delivery on the last night. Cause otherwise you could go nuts.

Copou is the best, and I love it so much, especially walking along the less known alleys where you have the most beautiful houses and gardens with flowers and smells that will make you feel like you're in the countryside. I just keep contemplating them and annoying R with my wishes of owning a house there, even a tiny one.

As I mentioned we did get to spend half an hour on Sunday night at Street Delivery. There was a concert and other stuff and lots of people and it was nice. We shared a beer and a Mai Bine egg sandwich between us and I took a photo ( blurry one) of the menu so I can replicate it at home. It was pretty simple but awesome.