Potato goulash

By Horst on May 15, 2012 12:22 PM | No Comments | No TrackBacks
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Lately, I've become somewhat addicted to potato goulash. I've loved the dish for a long time (had it a lot when I was a child), but my own attempts at cooking it never totally satisfied me. Then I had a look at the Plachutta/Wagner cookbook [English edition] [German edition] (very much recommended if you want to dive into Austrian cuisine!), and it prompted me to change three things about my recipe. The result turned out to be perfectly delicious.

In case you were wondering: yes, the picture accurately represents the actual colour of the meal.

Here is the recipe:

Continue reading Potato goulash.

Ten tips to make sure your chili plants grow

By Horst on April 19, 2012 3:14 PM | No Comments | No TrackBacks
  1. Provide a sufficiently large flower pot. The minimum is 17-19cm (about 7").
  2. Make sure the plant is not exposed to temperatures below 10°C (50F).
  3. Don't keep the plant too moist - water only if earth is very dry or if plant looks exhausted.
  4. Put plant in a bright, warm spot. Direct sunlight is advised.
  5. Don't use fertilizer - if you do, the plant will grow lots of branches and leaves, but no chilis.
  6. Remove the first blossom or chili. This will multiply your harvest.
  7. If there are blossoms, but no chilis, use a cotton swab to pollinate them.
  8. If the plant has aphids, put the plant outside and hope for ladybirds, carpenter bees or ichneumon wasps.
  9. If the plant has lots of aphids, shower it with lukewarm water.
  10. If the plant has lots of aphids and lots of black larvae, rejoice, for the ladybirds have arrived.

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(plants in office, awaiting collection)

Still plenty of chili plants where these came from, contact me if you want some.

Bibimbap, or The art of visual frustration

By Horst on April 14, 2012 12:39 PM | 1 Comment | No TrackBacks
I guess the Korean dish Bibimbap must be one of the visually most frustrating foods in existence. Essentially, what you do is cook rice, sauté some vegetables, stir fry some meat and then arrange everything in a bowl.

Immediately after serving, Bibimbap looks something like this:

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However, immediately before eating, Bibimbap looks like this:

Continue reading Bibimbap, or The art of visual frustration.

Dietary recommendation

By Horst on April 10, 2012 3:32 PM | No Comments | No TrackBacks
If you are in Munich and are trying to lose weight, you should probably not enter this restaurant.

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(Further investigation has revealed that the name of the restaurant is not a warning for weight-conscious customers, but instead the Cantonese pronunciation of the Chinese letters below, which read "Wan Fa Jiulou", meaning "restaurant of the ten-thousand accomplishments" or "restaurant of infinite riches". - Thx to the colleagues from the East Asian Studies Library and @kattebelletje on Twitter)

Greek eggplant salad (Melitzanosalata)

By Horst on March 29, 2012 11:01 PM | No Comments | No TrackBacks
I've come a step closer to finding out why so few Greek restaurants in Vienna have eggplant salad on the menu, and why, if they do, it's usually not cheap: Three eggplants and 80 minutes' work don't even fill a small tupperware container. However, the result is so yummy that you may want to give it a try.

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Here's the recipe:

Continue reading Greek eggplant salad (Melitzanosalata).

Easter is approaching

By Horst on March 19, 2012 11:55 PM | No Comments | No TrackBacks
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And the children's wear shop next door is trying to kill me with cuteness.

Beim Laden mit der Maus

By Horst on March 18, 2012 10:25 PM | No Comments | No TrackBacks
Summary for English readers: The "Mouse show" is a popular German children's programme that has been broadcast since the 1970s. A shop in Cologne sells tons of merchandise. In the background: Cologne cathedral.
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In Köln konnte ich natürlich nicht umhin, den Maus-Devotionalienshop in der Breiten Straße zu besuchen und herauszufinden, ob es da irgendwelche netten Dinge gibt. Leider waren die Preise etwas happiger als erwartet.


Sowas hätte ich auch gerne

By Horst on March 17, 2012 11:17 PM | No Comments | No TrackBacks
Summary for English readers: I'd like to have one of those too.
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Klingt so, als ob ich mich da drinnen von dem "Happy Picnic" von gestern erholen könnte.

Alles gut überstanden

By Horst on March 16, 2012 11:14 PM | No Comments | No TrackBacks
Summary for English readers: No bad surprises on my birthday. No clownfish, ants, ponies or yetis.
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Keine Clownfische, Ameisen, Ponys oder Yetis. War ein sehr angenehmer Geburtstag.

Quelle: Melanie Watt, Scaredy Squirrel Has a Birthday Party (französische Ausgabe).

Happy?

By Horst on March 16, 2012 8:12 AM | 1 Comment | No TrackBacks
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Germanwings calls this a "Happy Picnic". It didn't make me particularly happy. It also didn't include any kind of toy. Nor was there any meadow or even lawn nearby. The bread was kind of stale. The passengers who had forgotten to print out the letter-sized voucher didn't get one.

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Horst Prillinger is a librarian, writer and university lecturer living in Vienna, Austria. He has been writing The Aardvark Speaks since 2002.

His latest novel Mr Singh Has Disappeared is available from Amazon.de.

The remainder of his extensive website is at www.aardvark.at.

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