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.

200g onions, chopped

300ml beef stock (or water + 1/2 beef stock cube)

20g sweet paprika

2 tbsp oil (rapeseed or a mild olive oil work best)

2 tbsp white wine vinegar

1 clove garlic, crushed

1 tsp caraway seeds

1 tsp marjoram

salt

crushed black pepper

optional: 1/4 tsp hot chili powder

Peel the potatoes and cut into quarters (or smaller, if potatoes are very big).

Heat the oil, then fry the onions over moderate heat until golden.

Reduce heat to minimum, then add paprika and mix thoroughly for a few seconds.

Add vinegar, mix for a few seconds more.

Add beef stock, stir well.

Add crushed garlic, potatoes, and all herbs and spices.

Cover pot, bring to boil, then let simmer over moderate heat for about 20 minutes, stirring occasionally.

Cut smoked sausage into bite-sized cubes.

When potatoes are done, remove pot from heat and add the cut sausage.

Stir carefully to make sure potatoes don't break, let rest for about 5 minutes, then serve.

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

Immediately after serving, Bibimbap looks something like this:

This is because immediately after serving, after having looked at it for a few seconds, you take a spoon and mix everything into a moderately undefinable mixture. "Bibimbap" apparently means "mixed meal".

It's even more frustrating in a Korean restaurant, where the waiter brings the Bibimbap to the table, shows it to you for a split second and immediately starts mixing everything without letting you appreciate the food in its unspoiled state.

I wonder whether in Korea there is actually a minimum time where the Bibimbap must be undisturbed and you are simply expected to look at it and do nothing before mixing it all up.

per person:

Boil the rice. 

Soak the seaweed in some water, (optionally) season with hoisin sauce and rice vinegar.

Sauté the mushrooms.

Sauté the beansprouts.

Cut the carrot into thin stripes (julienne).

Stir fry the beef briefly over high heat, (optionally) season with bean paste

Fry the egg.

Put the rice in a bowl and place the egg in the middle. Arrange the drained seaweed, mushrooms, beef, carrot stripes, beansprouts and pepper paste around the egg.

Season with sesame oil and serve immediately.

Look at it.

Take a big spoon and mix everything up, then eat.

Here's the recipe:

Preheat oven to 180°C/360°F. Pierce the eggplants several times with a fork and place in oven. Bake for approx. one hour until the eggplants are all soft and the skin is slightly burned.

Remove skin from eggplants and chop into very small pieces. Place in a bowl, add garlic, finely chopped parsley, salt and pepper to taste. Mix well.

Add one tablespoon of olive oil at a time, keep stirring. Add vinegar to taste. The salad should have a texture that is about half way between smooth and chunky. You may want to use a blender to get the texture right.

Optional: Once you have the texture right, break the feta cheese into crumbs and stir it into the salad. 

Serve cold.

And the children's wear shop next door is trying to kill me with cuteness.

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.

Klingt so, als ob ich mich da drinnen von dem "Happy Picnic" von gestern erholen könnte.

Keine Clownfische, Ameisen, Ponys oder Yetis. War ein sehr angenehmer Geburtstag.

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.