In the spring break

The pool that we use has this great Hamam, which we usually use, depending on who is in there - usually it's empty. The elderly ladies who we occasionally meet in there can be unpredictable when faced with several littles intent on a waterfight..... We keep the littles at the bottom end and get to sit and chat and do what you do in a hamam at the door end. This is a DIY hamam... no staff except for a grumpy door lady....

These are the marble 'sinks' they have no hole in the bottom, No3 thinks it's fabulous to sit inside these..... yes that is steam!

You pour the water over yourself with these copper bowls, or throw water at your friends of course. The pool we use is on the 'fresh' side temperature wise, the hamam is always so toasty it's very welcome....

Wordless Wednesday

I missed my birthday

How did that happen - my 2nd blogoversary got forgotten - the ticker no longer works, or is beyond my skills to fix..... so here is cake!
This is the most fabulous cake I have eaten for such a long time..... I have the recipe, in Turkish, which I will, translate, convert to metric and then try - it seems way too easy on first reading for such a great cake, it's creme caramel on a chocolate sponge, all cooked at the same time. The caramel soaks into the sponge.... I had a piece one day, and was dreaming all night of a piece the next day..... fortunately there was some left. mmmm did I say it was good??
My friends are bad, introducing me to something SO good!

Silly Halloween fun....

I keep falling off the blogging waggon. Every time there is a school holiday it seems to take 2 weeks to get things straight. Not everything in our life is straight.... but you do the best you can. After the excitement for the Halloween party in October, Lisajo said she was going to bless us with some Halloween goodies that were on sale...

The came at a fantastic time, smack in the middle of spring break, the clings were put on the window, the trick or treat bags were toted about and there was talk of making cookies.... we have yet to try the cookie cutters out.... The plate and bowl got stashed quickly

Weirdly I found the packing paper very interesting..... small town newspaper. Included was a piece of fabric - I think this will get made into a table cloth...... no hurry, it's only 6 months until then.... maybe I should start soon .... haha.... and a Sandra Dallas book too - the first one - will see what they are all about.....

Thank-you dear friend!

Wordless Wednesday

Mutlu Paskalya

We went down to one of the chocolate makers on Saturday and the littles got to choose either an egg or a chicken - all the rabbits had gone. There really wasn't bloom on the chocolate, they just got seriously shaken on the way home. Interestingly, rather being sold by the item they were sold by weight.... half a kilo of chocolate divided by 3 littles..... boy child chose the black chocolate... they got lucky and the owner gave them all eggs as well, a hen size chocolate egg, but for free - yeahhay!

Paskalya

Easter is not celebrated here, but in the bakeries there is a special Easter bread called Paskalya - a kind of Brioche with finely ground walnuts on the top. There are lots of variations - we had a delicious one on Friday. One of our Turkish friends dropped one in from a 'famous' bakery. It was delicious and eaten way before I got the camera out so you'll have to have the link...... This is Binur's blog - a seriously good Turkish cooking blog. One of the few that I use for reference to figure out the detail of a dish.... she's good!