Project 365 - Week 4

It's already week 4 of my project 365!
I am feeling good about it, I like writing a short recap of the photo I took and of the day.
Even if sometimes I almost forget of taking a picture or think it's a horrible photo I took (it's the only one of the day) and am wuite ashamed of posting it (like the one under, terrible light).
But it's a way of remembering what I've done during the year, not a photography competition, right?
So, let's see the pics of this week:

22/365 30122010
Run away from parents' houses and have a cheap dinner on our own? Quite impossible, but we did it. We bought a prepacked salad, some bread, a martini to spoil ourselves and had dinner in the car! haha, it was much fun and we had the chance to talk a bit without having always people around judging and saying what we should do.


23/365 31122010
On New Year Eve Roberto wore a tie , wow! Haha, apart form this we had more fun than we'd have thought. We wanted just to go out for dinner, to see firework and walk around the city with no destination for a few hours and then go back home. We basically did that, but we missed midnight and instead of being in the first row for the firework, we were in the middle of the crowd. Than Roberto met someone very important to him, he was so happy. And then we danced for some hours.
It was funny because usually I have dancing and hate when people stare at me (or I think people is staring), but I felt that I had the right to celebrate this new year, because maybe it'll bring me nice surprises =)



24/365 01012011
Happy New Year!
This is just a little something I am painting for my blog. It's a foggy day and today I just read, listened to music, read blogs, and not much more. A typical 1st January.



25/365 02012011
Roberto and I went for a walk and while walking to the car we met this cutie. He was in the middle of an enormous (for him) parking and I think he was trying to see something except from asphalt.



26/365 03012011
We just stayed home reading, then went to buy some tofu for the veggie-eater here. Last days at home with my father's Christmas decorations. In Italy it's a tradition to leave the decorations until the 6th of January.



27/365 04012011
Cereal yogurt with walnuts. So yummy, especially if eaten with my favorite spoon. =)


28/365 05012011
Roberto woke up with a terrible cold. He didn't feel well at all, so I made coffee, brought him cookies, mandarines, apples.. We stayed home and at the evening I watched Inception with my family.

This was last week.
We're having such a bad weather now, it's pouring! I can hardly get any sleep since a few days, therefore I'm not feeling 100%.
The Christmas decoration are being put apart until next year and exams are approaching inexorably.

Have a nice weekend!

Juliette

Normally in March, or at the beginning of April, I would already have gone once to the seaside. At least to lunch on the sand and enjoy the first rays of the sun.
This year has been completeley different.
In March it rained, the same goes for April, and well, now it's May. May has been cold and rainy this year, with some days of sunny weather, but never too much.
Fortunately, my mood doesn't go along with the weather. But after these months, I just needed the sun to shine.

So,
Why am I saying this?
Because today was the first wonderful, sunny, pleasant, warm with a bit of cool summer breeze day of 2010. And I am so happy!
Ok, I have been studying. But studying on the balcony, with a cup of tea and sunglasses, isn't the same as studying in a cold, dark room.

(this is a detail of my mother's little tomato plants)

And obvioulsy I wanted to bake something. Given that Summer is here (I'm not saying it will last forever..) I thought of making some fruity tartelettes (tartlets, or?).
I have no tartelettes moulds, no similar kind of mould, nothing of that kind, so.. well I tried to make something similar from scratch.

Ok, stop talking and talking.
Here's the recipe:

Fruity tartelettes (with yogurt pie crust)



Dough

250 g all purpose flour
150 g yogurt (you can use both whole or low-fat)
65 g granulated sugar
65 g cold unsaltened butter
a pinch of salt

Mix flour, salt and sugar.
Cut the butter into little cubes and add it to the flour mixture. Mix and slowly add the yogurt until it becomes a consistent dough.
Wrap it into a sheet of plastic and place into the freezer for 3 hours.

Filling/Topping

1 apple
1 banana
10 strawberries
1 orange
70 g sugar
1 Tbs flour

1 egg

Cut the fruit in pieces/dices. Blend all the ingredients together.

---

Preheat the oven at 180 °C.

Now, after the 3 hours have passed, I rolled the dough out, cut big circles of it (7cm or so) (the dough was 2-3mm thick). Then I placed a tablespoon of fruit in the middle and wrapped the dough around it, just to make the borders, and not to let the fruit flow away.
Beat the egg and brush it onto the crust. (I haven't done this as you may see from the pictures)
When I used all the dough (and fortunately also all the fruit), I baked them in the oven for 20 minutes.
Let it cool on a rack for 10 minutes.


Today was a good day.
I hope the tartelettes will be good as well.

Have a nice evening!

HappyFroggy

What a breakfast means to me..

Ladies and gentlemen found the cable, oh yeah, it was in one of my ten thousand bags. One one those bags I never use. I wonder how it came there =)

This weekend was fantastic, like every weekend I spend with Roberto. We always want to do something funny. And most of the times we succeed.
Saturday we went to the seaside. We stayed there only 2 hours because I had to work, but the weather was lovely.
But before going to the seaside we ate a super breakfast which doesn't let us eat until the evening.

When we have time enough to stop for a second and actually really enjoy preparing breakfast and eating together, while talking about the week that passed, I feel so relieved, so happy.
This week our breakfast was wonderful. Look at it! It makes me happy only to see it =)



I made the Banana Yogurt Bread friday evening. It's simple actually and I liked it a lot, you really can taste the banana a lot.
I took the recipe from this blog. (Thank you, Tara!).

For the Smoothie I just used the fruit we had: Bananas and Strawberries.
It's not really a recipe, but I'll say how I made it:
Strawberry and Banana Smoothie
4 or 5 Strawberries
1 banana
1/2 cup ice cream (I used "fior di latte", it's cream)
1 cup milk

and no sugar otherwise it's less healthy and it becomes less "homemade" (in my opinion, but you can add some sugar if you want).

Just mix everything toghether with the mixer and that's it.
For the serving I suggest fresh strawberries or maybe 2 leaves of mint.

I made the Granola last week, and I like it a lot, but not with yogurt or milk. I like eating it alone, with nothing else. It's super-crispy!

Ok, back to my books, hope you had a fantastic weekend!

HappyFroggy