Foodblog: bergerka

[emilyr]

I'm so glad that you're blogging this week! Yours was the very first foodblog I read and one of the reasons I joined eG!

[KatieLoeb]

Kathleen! Great to see you blogging from Espana! How exciting. I'm very interested to see the cooking later in the week and hear more about your fabulous lifestyle. Sigh. You are truly Livin' la Vida bella!

Congrats on your successes with your singing career! That's awesome. A former roommate of mine does what you do and teaches (in Germany, but occasionally sings around Europe and in the States when the role comes up) so I know just how difficult and competitive it is. You should be very proud of yourself! The magazine cover looks gorgeous by the way...

Carry on. I can't wait to read about your week.

[mizducky]

What a cool adventure you're living! Happy blogging--looking forward to it!

[bergerka]

I'm so glad that you're blogging this week! Yours was the very first foodblog I read and one of the reasons I joined eG!

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This may well be one of the nicest things anyone's ever said to me. Thank you.

Good morning, all! Ok, yeah, it's not precisely morning my time. I got up at noon. I have an excuse, though (not that I need one...I don't have a day job anymore!!!)...was up till 4:30 am translating the interview in that magazine for friends, family and some professional contacts who wanted it (so it had to be a GOOD translation) and arranging to go to the US for the first week of September to work with my teacher. So far this morning I've been doing exciting diva things like laundry.

I now have had a coffee and have Café Quijano's La Taberna del Buda playing on iTunes and am ready to show you what ELSE I've been doing!

I needed a couple of things at the store, like milk, flour and hairspray ( ), so thought I'd show you my neighborhood.

This is my building.

This is my street!

If you walk to the end of my street, you'll be on Avenida General Perón. If you turn left and look all the way down, you can see the Real Madrid stadium, Santiago Bernabeu.

When I got back from the store, it was time for coffee, made in the Bialetti Mukka. I love my mukka. My voice teacher's fiancé introduced me to it, I immediately asked for one for my birthday that year, and I've never gone back. It's painted LIKE A COW!!!

Currently, I'm drinking this coffee, from the Canary Islands. It has a ton of flavor, I love it, very smooth and tasting of pure coffee.

First, the water goes in the bottom.

Then the coffee goes in the filter basket.

Then you screw the top on and milk goes in the top.

The whole thing goes on the stove, and after much experimentation and ruined coffee (too hot, too cold, the works - the Mukka really works much better with a gas stove), I heat it to level 8 of 12.

After a short time, there's a POP and the sound of steaming milk. I pour it into my beautiful coffee mug, into which I've put a teaspoon or so of raw sugar, and voilà! Coffee!

I decided to make a banana bread for the blog. I love banana bread. Last week, in anticipation of blogging, I set these bananas to aging, and now they're just right. Hint: the older, more alcoholic-smelling and soft and icky and brown your bananas are, the better your banana bread.

The recipe I use is a combination of my mother's and my friend Rebecca's in NY, with an addition of my own. It's as follows:

1.5 cups all-purpose flour

1 teaspoon nutmeg

1 teaspoon baking soda

0.5 teaspoon baking powder

0.5 teaspoon salt

5 tablespoons plus 1 teaspoon (1/3 cup) unsalted butter, at room temperature

2/3 cup sugar

2 large eggs

Mashed banana from 4-5 large bananas

1 tablespoon vanilla extract

excellent quality dark chocolate, as much as you like, broken into small chunks

Preheat the oven to 350 degrees F (about 177 degrees C). Lightly oil a 9 x 5 x 3-inch loaf pan

Sift the flour, nutmeg, baking soda, baking powder, and salt together on a sheet of waxed paper, and set aside.

Cream the butter in a medium-sized bowl until light. Add the sugar and beat until thoroughly mixed and light. Add the eggs, one at a time, beating thoroughly after each addition. Add the mashed banana and vanilla. Mix well. Fold in the dry ingredients until thoroughly incorporated. Fold in the chunks of dark chocolate.

Pour the batter into the prepared pan, run the blade of a knife lengthwise through the batter (to prevent the bread from cracking on top as it rises during baking), and bake until the bread is golden and springs back when lightly touched, 45 minutes. Remove the pan from the oven, unmold the bread onto a wire rack, and let it cool before serving.

Here are the bananas, mashed in the bowl:

I still use the stupid US measuring system for baking. My mother saved my life by finding these baking cups and spoons on sale and sending 'em to me.

I mix the wet ingredients with our household immersion blender, known by all and sundry as...the Butt Butter.

Why, you ask, is it called the Butt Butter?

Well you might ask. One night, I was sitting around with Willow and my friend Julia, sipping wine. We were all exhausted. Willow'd been teaching for ten hours. Julia and I had been moving my stuff from apartment to apartment all day. We were somewhat punchy. Willow asked me if I had an immersion blender, making the up and down gesture (you have to imagine this part) of putting an immersion blender into a bowl. I, having been at one point in my past an Emeril devotee, said, making the same gesture, "oh, you mean a Boat Motor???"

A minute later I noticed that Julia and Willow were both staring at me incredulously. I said "...what?"

I said "Boat Motor." They both - not one, but BOTH - heard "Butt Butter."

Apparently, combined with the gesture, it made quite an impression.

I'm using two kinds of dark chocolate today, one Lindt 70%, the other this INCREDIBLE 91% chocolate from Ecuador that Willow gave me. It's not bitter, but it's not really sweet, either - my friend L says it's just amazingly CHOCOLATE tasting, you try a small amount and your entire mouth is immediately filled with the sensation of chocolate. For purposes of the banana bread, though, it has to be mixed with a slightly sweeter one.

Batter mixed, in the bowl:

Batter in my cheapo loaf pan from the €1 store (you can buy ANYTHING there, I swear. I could probably buy a small child there if I were so inclined).

...and here it is, cooling!

I'm now going to go hang one more load of laundry and then scramble out of the house - I am supposed to be meeting Eric and my friend José Antonio for lunch at 2:30, and, as usual, I'm going to be late!

Today's schedule is: lunch at 2:30, then I'm supposedly having coffee with another friend at 6 if he ever gets back to me, then at 10 or so Eric and I will get together to have dinner (and it's going to be something often seen in Spain, although not Spanish) and talk about the program for our upcoming set of recitals. Around midnight, if there isn't a delay, C will arrive from Barcelona and pick me up and I'll go to his place again! That should be fun. He likes banana bread.

K

[Shelby]

Kathleen, I love your writing style. It flows so smoothly! I can't wait to read more!

[MelissaH]

I love/hate it when a foodblog makes me homesick.

My handmade cream pitcher and sugar bowl.  I have one coffee mug that matches these, you'll see it tomorrow.  My parents bought me these in Ouray, Colorado, when we were all on vacation there.  I was about eleven, I think.  I adore them.  I had another coffee mug, too, but a roommate past broke it.  *sigh*  I hate it when people break my stuff...I know it happens, but I still hate it.

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I've never been to Spain. But my husband and I were married in Ouray, and my parents live there. (I think I know which store your mug came from, K.)

Here's a challenge that most people get wrong the first time: pronounce Ouray!

MelissaH

[Shelby]

I love/hate it when a foodblog makes me homesick.

My handmade cream pitcher and sugar bowl.  I have one coffee mug that matches these, you'll see it tomorrow.  My parents bought me these in Ouray, Colorado, when we were all on vacation there.  I was about eleven, I think.  I adore them.  I had another coffee mug, too, but a roommate past broke it.  *sigh*  I hate it when people break my stuff...I know it happens, but I still hate it.

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I've never been to Spain. But my husband and I were married in Ouray, and my parents live there. (I think I know which store your mug came from, K.)

Here's a challenge that most people get wrong the first time: pronounce Ouray!

MelissaH

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Not to hijack this blog, but I was raised in Lake City, Co. Ouray is just over the pass from us!

It's "Your- Ray"

[FabulousFoodBabe]

Oh, what a wonderful story -- foreign lands, daring and creative careers, food and romance! And food!

Are we able to listen to your singing online?

[docsconz]

Fun blog, Kathleen. I am looking forward to a little catching up from May and getting more of a sense of Madrid, a city that I haven't been to in over thirty years!

That Ecuadorean chocolate was from Cacao Sampaka, one of Barcelona's best chocolate makers. They were one of the first (and best) to make chocolates with exotic flavors, a trend that has become much more prominent everywhere chocolates are sold.

[Kent Wang]

You mentioned that you're making less money than when you had a full-time job. Is the cost of living and food also lower in Madrid?

[therese]

One more piece of what could, I suppose, be called culture shock.  In the first three weeks of my being here, I lost 15 pounds (granted, I was on tour. I have to eat like a horse on tour if I want to even maintain weight). 

In the ensuing year, I lost ten more.  Without trying, and no, I am neither anorexic nor bulimic (singing and barfing: not compatible). 

This means that I am currently holding steady at 59 kilos, or just under 130 pounds, down from my high of 155 pounds when I left NYC (I was NOT happy about that higher number). I am 5'11", or, if you prefer, 1m80.

Now, as you will see this week, I eat.  I eat a lot.  I'm in excellent health.  So...what the hell???  Granted, I get a fair amount of exercise and singing burns calories like crazy.

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You are happy and relaxed. Even when you're busy you're busy in an excited and energetic way, not a stressed way. And your body reflects that.

[bergerka]

You can, in fact, hear me (and see me, in a little black dress) sing on the web - the sound quality isn't great, but it's a food - or at least booze - related song, so it fits here. The date was July 14, 2007, in Cervera de Pisuerga, the second of the series of concerts I'm doing this summer. This was before Eric arrived, so the pianist was a Colombian named David Barón.

The song is "Vodka," by Gershwin (I end the recital with a set of four Gershwin songs). The lyrics are as follows (and if you listen to both verses, you get a couple of high notes!):

Of all concoctions alcoholical,

I know but one that's diabolical.

I simply thrive on old champagne,

and sparkling burgundy.

Whisky, Cointreau, Moselle and Eau de Vie

are just like tea, but...

Vodka.

Don't give me Vodka.

For when I take a little drink,

I forget to think,

what a little drink can do to me!

Vodka.

DON'T give me Vodka!

For when I take a little sip,

I begin to slip,

and I start romancing

with the man that I am dancing with, for

Vodka

makes me feel...oddka.

I go and grab a six foot two,

anyone will do,

if he's only wise enough to see

I'll not scream should he kiss me!

Vodka, you ruin me!

The link is here Vodka

If you think it sucks...just don't tell me.

[bergerka]

You mentioned that you're making less money than when you had a full-time job. Is the cost of living and food also lower in Madrid?

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Hi, Kent. Yes. Definitely. I find cost of living here to be SIGNIFICANTLY lower than it was in NYC - especially groceries. I needed twice as much money just to barely get by in NYC. Granted, I'm also getting paid in euros, which go much farther than dollars. When I am working, my travel and housing expenses are covered, although usually not food, so that's not a problem.

I wanted to edit this post to add a couple of examples. I have no idea what prices are like in NYC right now, maybe someone there could do a comparison?

Today at the grocery store - this is a regular chain, Sabeco, not a discount store, all name brand stuff - I bought Pantene hairspray, a bar of Lindt dark chocolate, a small bag of regular white flour, nutmeg, a 1.5 liter bottle of Bezoya water (I like it, I needed a big bottle to walk around with, and also to refill with Madrid's very good water and carry around with me).

The only items that cost me MORE than €1 were the chocolate (€1,33) and the hairspray (big bottle, but expensive at €3,55). Every other item was less than €1, for example, the water was €0,45.

I used to get my hair cut and colored in a salon in NYC. Total for both ran me around $150-160. Here I get it cut by Raúl at a Marco Aldany (chain) for €18-20, and I color it myself with Garnier (colorist in NYC whispered in my ear that it was the same formula they used) for €4,50.

so those are just a couple of examples.

I also spend less, just as a general rule. If I'm home in Madrid, I will maybe go out to eat once a week, and I never order in. I do not go to expensive restaurants (then again, I don't need to, the inexpensive ones are really terrific here). For example, there is an awesome tapería about a fifteen-minute walk from my house where for two euros you get a glass of wine and a tapa that is a pretty significant portion of food. Six euros in, you've eaten dinner. My idea of an expensive evening is €20-25 per person, and for that I can eat very large amounts of food, drink a lot of wine and have dessert. I walk or take the metro everywhere - and the metro is much less expensive than the subway in NYC.

One large expense that has all but disappeared from my life: back in NYC, I was drinking a hell of a lot of cocktails. Guess what? Hard alcohol is expensive, in more than one way. Cocktails will run you $10-12 each if you go out, which can add up pretty quickly. In addition, it messes with my voice in a big way - if I am working, hard alcohol is a no-no. It's also chock full of sugar and calories. Alcoholically speaking, I pretty much only drink beer and wine now, with the VERY occasional gin and tonic if I'm out somewhere at 4 am.

My big expenditures are my trips to NYC to work with my teacher, and those are what I reserve my money for. Fortunately, since they're working trips, they're also tax write-offs (yes, I have an accountant for that. No way do I try to do that on my own).

and OMG, Ouray!!! I LOVED that town!

big post with lunch and walk home pix coming as soon as the damn pix finish uploading.

K

Edited August 14, 2007 by bergerka (log)

[bergerka]

Ok, here we go! I'm posting these now because, well, I need to iron clothes, and I don't want to iron clothes. HAHAHAHAHAHAHAHA.

I went to lunch with Eric and my friend José Antonio, a bass from Las Canarias who is one of the few people in Spain significantly taller than am I (he's got to be 6'7", seriously). He's also one of the nicest people on the whole planet.

We went to El Gran Jamonal, in the first neighborhood I lived in here, Arguelles. Gran Jamonal has good associations for me - Eric brought me to lunch here with an American bass who was working at the Teatro Real right after the first tour was over and I had decided to change my life and was scared out of my mind. The food is just plain Spanish, very traditional, very good. They have a €10,50 menu for lunch from Mon-Fri that includes first course, second course, wine or other drink and dessert. And bread. And their bread is actually good. Good bread is kind of hard to find in Madrid, bizarrely.

The board in front of the restaurant (sorry about the shadow on the right side. It's an actual shadow from the canopy of the building and not associated with my lame photography skills).

Today's menu of the day. As you can see, lots of choices, and yes, one of them was guisantes con jamón. Unfortunately I wasn't hungry enough. Another time.

First courses. I had the gazpacho (I LURVE gazpacho in summer), J-A had the paella (which is very good), and Eric the judías blancas (white beans) con chorizo (also very good, just very, very heavy for about a 90-degree day):

Second courses. I had the ragout de ternera (basically a pot roast!), J-A had the tortilla de queso (cheese omelet. This one was a tortilla francesa, which is what we know as a regular omelet, rather than being the egg-and-potato tortilla española), and Eric the caballa (mackerel).

Dessert. Eric and I both had cuajada (link to description is in one of the above posts) with honey, J-A had the crema catalana (which is supposed to be burnt on top like crème caramel, but this one was not):

We also had coffee, not pictured. J-A had a café solo (basically an espresso), Eric and I both had cortados (caffe macchiato, for those more familiar with Italian coffee. An espresso with a little sploosh of milk).

I walked home (4.8 kilometers or almost 3 miles, according to google maps. Oh. That's why I can't gain weight), because I wanted to stop at one of my favorite shopping places and show you.

This is the Mercado de Maravillas (the market of marvels).

Although I'm not buying anything today, it's one of my favorite places to buy groceries. More stalls are open and they have more products in the morning (and when it's not August), but ech, mornings...ew.

jamón ibérico, anyone?

My favorite meat guy (all these guys know me and they all wanted their picture taken).

Beautiful fruits and vegetables

Same stand, other side

My second-favorite meat guys, aren't they cute?

I absolutely defy you to find better chicken and eggs in Madrid. Seriously. These guys are a bit pricier than some, but ohhhhh so worth it.

this guy has great cured meats...but I shop him for something else.

And here's what it is

This picture is dedicated to ewindels.

pretty fish

Pretty fish guy

Randomly adorable fruit and veggie guy who wanted his picture taken.

and for a touch of the incongruous, the Chinese products booth.

Now I'll hang around to see if anyone has questions so that I can put off ironing just a little bit longer!

K

[ewindels]

Hateful... evil... torturous... WHERE"S MY NEXT SHIPMENT? *salivate uncontrollably*

[markemorse]

Just catching up, but there is something naggingly familiar about this whole "quitting your job, moving to Europe" plot...

Total greatness so far, and really looking forward to seeing a snapshot of your expat experience, and Madrid, where I've never been.

And I too was made homesick by this blog, but I would never have guessed that banana bread would be the culprit....

...and here it is, cooling!

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Blog on!

Edited August 14, 2007 by markemorse (log)

[Kouign Aman]

Gaspacho Andaluz is an acceptable second place to the guisantes con jamon. That was my second favorite dish of my trip. Thank you kindly!

[johnnyd]

Just catching up, but there is something naggingly familiar about this whole "quitting your job, moving to Europe" plot...

I was thinking the same thing. I never mentioned it in my blog but I have a long streak in the music biz so KB is the third musician blogger in a row. I obviously have to start packing and join you lot.

The vendor pictures are outstanding, K. The guys are adorable and the products are - just what I said - mostly unavailable states-side. Is there a secret list of eG folk to whom you are smuggling quesos e jamons that I need to pay someone to get on?

Last time I was in Madrid I had to leave in a hurry. It was Spain's fifth anniversary sans-Franco and demonstrations popped up hither and yon. Got a little too hot.

[Safran]

Oh Kathleen!!! The shops...the cheeses....oh!!!! Easy to understand why you decided to stay...and congratulations on being brave enough to follow your heart! I have always enjoyed your blogs but this one is really cool....

[Kent Wang]

For me, it is the charcuterie that makes me envious. How much did the jamón ibérico cost? For the brief month or so that the ibérico products imported by Fermin were available here, the sausages were $20/lb and the lomo $90/lb.

[Genny]

Brava amiga! Have you been to any of the REAL Madrid matches? If so, what foods are served there?

What is the ratio of sparkling lemon soda to beer? Will Sprite or 7-Up work or is it more lemonaid-ish?

Blog on!

[Shelby]

Just two words:

I'm jealous.

Ok technically three words

[Abra]

Wow, membrillo sin azucar, now there's something I never imagined. Is it just astonishingly sour, or does Spain go in for artificial sweeteners?

That's a cute video clip, even though you're a bit drowned out by the piano. At least we get to see you stagger around!

[bergerka]

Hey Genny - 7-up will work fine, says C. Depends on what you prefer. If you like the taste of beer, you can put half and half or 1/3 lemon, 2/3 beer (that latter is the norm). If not, add more lemon till you do like it. Haven't yet been to a Real Madrid match yet...but I'll get there (sadly, I haven't been to the Teatro Real for an opera yet either, because, well, it's expensive and I am never home).

Kent, I'm so sorry, I didn't even LOOK at the jamón prices!!! Normally, for the good stuff, it will run you in the area of €50 a kilogram, for a whole piece. Sliced costs much more.

Hey Abra, yeah, apparently that didn't happen in the church...it was the teeny recorder that was used. I may get my brother to edit the sound. Neither C nor I have ever tasted membrillo sin azúcar, but you should have seen the face he made when I mentioned it.

C has asked me also to mention that the guy in the Mercado de Maravillas SHOULD NOT have been cutting that jamón by machine. Really great jamón should only be cut by hand, and the use of a machine is a sin.

Dinner!

I wandered back over to the Moncloa neighborhood, to Eric's apartment, to have dinner with him. His roommate Ruben (a very nice physics doctoral student from León) was there, with two GORGEOUS girls, friends of his from Poland. They were cooking pasta and invited us to try it. How could we say no???

It was made with bowtie pasta (tricolor), garlic, cream, zucchini, chicken and parmeggiano. It was delicious.

Here it is. Blurry.

Now, I still had to forge ahead with my original dinner plan, which was to eat something commonly found in Spain...but not Spanish (no, not McDonald's).

The answer is: Döner Kebap!

Eric just happens to live upstairs from the best. döner. ever. His neighborhood is right down the street from my first one, and after we discovered this place, my old roomie Angela and I would wake up about 2pm on Sundays, with enormous hangovers, and look at each other and say "ok...who makes the coffee and who goes for döner???"

this is it.

Near wheel is lamb, far wheel is chicken

The condiments

Artistically plated, with fries (and sauce. Have to have the sauce, as the fries kind of suck and are really only convenient vehicles for sauce, much as snails are convenient little sponges for garlic butter)

Yummmm

After the kebap orgy, we shared a bottle of Bach wine with Ruben and the lovely Polish girls.

C picked me up after he was done with work and I'm now at his house, drinking white wine and about to go to bed. See you all tomorrow!

K

[Genny]

Hey Genny - 7-up will work fine, says C.  Depends on what you prefer.  If you like the taste of beer, you can put half and half or 1/3 lemon, 2/3 beer (that latter is the norm).  If not, add more lemon till you do like it. 

Yummmm

K

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Dooood, that sandwich made my mouth **water** like crazy! It is a tsazaki sauce?