Cooking Club Spy

An evil spy infiltrated in the last cooking club documenting all the activities as the young and brave (and unsuspecting) volunteers and local Georgians tried to find a common ground for such powerful nations as the French, the Portuguese and the British.

At first the spy wanted to use the collected photos to report this dangerous activity to the alien king NoBros who is of the colour of socks that are given to you as a Christmas gift and is president of the club "Intergalactic Puppy Haters". He despises and fears all kinds of friendly dillydallying and such nonsense as peace and mutual understanding. NoBros had planned to take over the Earth on Saturday (because on Fridays he is visiting his granny) so he sent the evil spy to document the greatest threat to his power. 

However, the love and joy the evil spy experienced in cooking club turned him (just like the overwhelming goodness of Smurfs turned Smurfette) and he decided to spread this tasty message of companionship because it is the only way to prevent NoBros usurpation.

Here you can see the photos: Also below you will find RECIPES.

 Sangria
3l wine
1l Sprite
4 apples
3-4 oranges
1 cinnamon stick
brown sugar

All the ingredients should be mixed and put in a fridge with lots of ice for 1 - 1,5 hours.

British Flapjack
6 tbsp Golden Syrup or corn syrup
200g unsalted butter
330g oatmeal porridge


Preheat the oven to 180°C/Gas 4. Butter a form of 9"x 13"/23cm x 33cm Swiss roll tin and line the base with
baking parchment. Place the syrup and butter into a large saucepan and heat gently until the butter has melted into the syrup and stir well. Make sure you add all the golden syrup, sometimes it is hard to get it exact and more is always better than less if you want your flapjack gooey but not falling apart.

Put the oats into a roomy baking bowl, add a pinch of salt then pour over the butter and syrup mixture and stir to coat the oats. Pour the mixture into the prepared tin and spread evenly to fill the tin making sure the surface is even.

Bake in the preheated oven for 25 minutes or until golden brown. Remove from the oven while the flapjack is still slightly soft, it will harden once cool. Place the tin on a wire cooling rack and cut the flapjack into squares and leave in the tin until completely cold.

The flapjack can be well stored in an airtight tin.

French Quiche
250g flour
30 g butter
salt
5 spoons of water

Mix the flour, softened butter and water as needed for a smooth, non-sticky dough. Make a dough ball, wrapp it in foil and let rest for at least 120 minutes in the refrigerator. 

Lightly roll up 1/2cm, prepare pancake thickness layer and place in a greased mold (pie or cake), bevel the edges. Stab the dough with a fork. Put chopped bacon pieces on top of it (can be brown) and cover with cheese. Whisk the cream and eggs, add a pinch of ground nutmeg and pour into mold.  

Bake in a preheated oven at 200 degrees for about three quarters of an hour. You can use everything that you have in your fridge - vegetables such as tomato and onion or eggplant, or just spinach with egg.

Alilo

On 7th January we joined the Alilo Christmas procession in Tbilisi from the Rose Square to Sameba Cathedral. “Alilo” is a Georgian traditional Christmas song that now refers to the practice of walking from home to home singing and collecting donations for the less fortunate that has nowadays transformed into a massive street celebration where people gather in several spots of the city and move along the streets to the cathedral. 

As we guessed, it metaphorically stands for the shepherds who heard the heavenly angel choirs (in our case impersonated by a nice white Mitsubishi with speakers on top and several people dressed in church clothing) and went to visit new-born Jesus and bring him gifts (in this case, donations - as Jesus said, “Truly I tell you, whatever you did not do for one of the least of these, you did not do for me” which also means that what we do for the least of these, we do for him). 

 

The angelic Mitsubishi was followed by four boys dressed as shepherds and carts pulled by some bulls who behaved in a very dignified and respectable manner as if recently graduated from Young Gentlemen Biblical Scene Acting Academy. Several priests made sure that we inhale the divine presence instead of exhaust fumes and others generously poured holy water over the heads of the crowd purifying us from our sins. 

 

Changing scope from a local, private visitations to a mass procession certainly reaches the goal of creating an impression of societal unity and peaceful revolution, exchanging intimacy for grandeur which is appropriate, considering the culture of collectivity. I observed various impressions among the general public from light nonchalance to being deeply touched on the verge of tears. 

 

Christmas Cooking Olympics

As it turns out, Christmas food preparation seems to take almost as long as the elephant gestation* period (same applies to the Christmas food digestion period). 

We might call it Christmas Cooking Olympics and the biggest golden medal definitely goes to our taste buds charmer Zosia. Everyone gained either victory over the wild pronunciation of “beetroots” or at least a few extra pounds.

Christmas and Cooking Olympics, in fact, provided preconditions for truce that saved us from the extensive Polish invasion we experienced for quite a lengthy period of time.

Here is what some of our hosts had to say:

Ala, “I realized that cooking is not my destiny and from now on I will stick to eating.”

Zosia, “Christmas is exhausting.” 

Ieva, “I liked that the food was in different colours of the sunlight during its passage over the sky at daytime and that it wasn't the colour of the night.”

Eva, “Lots of food. That's my statement. (Ieva, “But that's not funny.”) I'm not funny.”

Tomas, “The number you are trying to reach is currently partying in Istanbul.”

A guest's opinion:

Tamuna, “EVS Polish ghetto in Rustavi with delicious food.”

All in all, Christmas Eve was spent in peace and fellowship. New friendships (with each other and with Lekso's wine) were made and new inspired insights reached (mostly that the roominess of one's stomach can be compared to an average marshrutka in a rush hour). We thank our hosts and our guests who participated in creating this festive Christmas miracle. 

*For those too lazy to google, “gestation” = “pregnancy”.

"Adios Khachapuro" Fitness club

If you are an active person who likes exercising and making sports and in the same time you want to spend your energy in productive way - I have something for you. Every Thursday at 5 pm I am leading fitness which helps you to stay in shape and have a good time. It's also a good way to prepare yourself for summer.

Here is the link about this fitness :)
Zosia's Aerobic Club "Adios Khachapuro"

Zosia

Italian cooking club

 

Risotto with spinach

• 0,5 l of vegetable bullion
• 2 spoons of butter
• 1 onion chopped very small
• 1 cup of rice
• 50 ml white wine
• 250 g spinach
• 50-70 g sulguni cheese
• salt and pepper

Clean the fresh spinach well and cut into smaller pieces (into about ¾ inch pieces) and set aside. Place the butter, onions, and a half teaspoon salt in a large heavy pan and set the flame to medium. Cook down the onions until soft and then add the rice. Toast the rice until the rice becomes translucent (the center can have a bit of white color). Pour in the wine and stir the ingredients well (you want to make sure the alcohol has had a chance to evaporate out of the liquid).

Next, ladle in 2 cups of hot boullion. Cook and stir again for 2-3 minutes and add the spinach on top of the rice and stir well (the spinach will wilt almost immediately). Continue to ladle in more bullion to cover the rice and stir frequently and when the liquid is almost completely absorbed ladle in another cup or bullion.

After 15 to 20 minutes taste the mixture and adjust for salt and pepper. When the rice is creamy and has a slight crunch in the center you can add your butter and about ½ cup of grated cheese.

Spaghetti bologna

•  0,5 kg  pound lean ground beef
• 2 onion chopped very thin
• 2 medium carrots
• 2 green celery (we don’t have it)
• 2 cloves garlic, crushed
• 2 can crushed tomatoes
•  salt to taste
• 1/4 teaspoon ground black pepper
• 1 cup of white wine
• 1 packs spaghetti
• Sulguni cheese for the top

1    Cut carrots and celery sticks(green of possible) and onions in little cubes and fry it till onions are translucent. Add minced beef meat (and add one all onion, which later you remove before serve) and when it is brown add one glass of white wine. Add tomatoes and salt and pepper to taste. At least 1,5 hours slow cooking

Pasta cook in salty water. 

Almond chocolate cake

• 180 g sugar
• 5 eggs
• 200 g dark chocolate
• 100 g butter
• 100 g almond flour
• 75 g flour
• 1 teaspoons of baking powder

Heat the owen for 180 degrees, make the form oily with butter.   Make the butter and chocolate liquid, wait a bit and add yolks and sugar, mix with robot. Put in also almond flour, flour and baking powder.  In the second bowl make the snow from the wtite part of the eggs.   All together.

Bake about 25-30 minutes. 

Zosia