Foto by Rafael Natal
Happy New Year, friends!
Five years ago, when I was just graduating from College, I would have never imagined myself living in Berlin. When I met Rafael back in 2010, he was already planning to live abroad, and so he did. A whole year passed by, and after he got back from Canada, we started dating for real and began making new plans. After saving money for three years, our dream finally came true!
After worrying about my first Christmas as a host last week, today I can tell you that it was a success….YAY!!! I’m so happy that everything went well, thank God! Of course there was a little a stress in the kitchen the day before Christmas eve (minor disagreement about lemon curd), but in spite of that, the food was delicious and the people were pleased. This was the first Christmas that I spent away from my family or anybody’s family, it was a special Christmas with friends that are also a long way from home. Our Italian friends Maurizio and Ivan came, and also I had the pleasure to meet Gabriel and Ana, a couple from Brazil, he studied in College with Rafael and they were here in Berlin as tourists, so we invited them of course. We had so much fun, Italians and Brazilians have so much in common, the language is very similar, sometimes it’s easier to speak in our native language than english, or german….of course…hahahha.
We sure did have a great time, we laughed and ate a lot! I get so happy when I see other people eating my food and enjoying it. I’m so grateful and thankful, it could not have been better 😀
For the first time in my life, I’m going to cook a whole christmas meal. Rafael and I spent all day running around after the ingredients, and we still do not have all of them. We just came back from Ikea, because we just have one good roasting pan, now there’s three…and four more wine glasses, two spatulas and an appetizer set 😀 it was impossible to buy just the roasting pans…hahaha
Anyway, I’m finding this dinner a bit of a challenge, because I was thinking of roasting a big chicken, with at least 2 kilos…but it’s impossible to find it here, you only find little small ones. I found out that the famous birds for christmas here are turkey, duck and goose. I almost changed the recipe to turkey, but instead I’m going with two small chickens…no problem 😉
So, here is my ideia for dinner on Thursday night:
Appetizers:
Main course:
Dessert:
I hope that everything goes as smoothly as possible, and of course I’ll have my special helper, Rafael of course…ha! I’m going to start preparing tomorrow, so wish me luck! And of course I’m gonna share the results of this game, Christmas Dinner x Bruna, later this week or the next one.
I hope that you all have a wonderful and blessed Christmas with your loved ones! We are going to miss our family for sure this year, but at least we have one another and dear friends close by 🙂
Merry Christmas!
xoxo and hohoho!
Today I’m not going to post about my five favourites of this week, because something much more important is in my mind. Today was supposed to be my dad’s 65th birthday, and I bet that my mom would cook a great dinner if they were still here. When my father passed away, I was 14 years old and it was just 5 years after my mother’s death. It was sudden, nobody in my family was expecting that to happen…a heart attack during his sleep. I also like to think that it was peaceful, of all the things that could happen, at least this type is quick. I would also like to say that he didn’t suffer, but I would not be telling the truth. He broke his heart before when the great love of his life, his rock, his everything passed away. When she died, I was 9 years old, and I can remember that when I received the news, I changed a little bit…I became more introspective. I can’t imagine what my father went through, because he lost three important things at once: his job as a teacher and researcher at a big university in Brazil (which he dedicated his whole life to), his mother (two months earlier), then the mother of his children. How are you supposed to continue your life, with two girls to raise (my sister was 17 at the time) after you lost some of the most important things in your life?
If there is one thing that I love in this world, is pasta! Any type, any kind…no prejudice here! I love cooking pasta at home, and for my luck, so does Rafael….we make an awesome pasta duo! hahahaha. I already told before that when I was a teenager I used to spend my Saturdays helping my beloved aunt to cook pasta. She would mix the ingredients in a bowl and I worked the dough, then she opened the dough using a pasta maker and cut it in the right size to make lasagna, cannelloni and rondelli, and after that I would cook the dough and sometimes help to make the dish. But with conchiglioni it was different, it’s not an easy type of pasta to make, so my cousin would buy it ready and you just needed to cook it and then stuff it. I usually did the stuffing part, with a delicious combination of three cheeses, that I never resisted to…so I would stuff a little and eat a little…hahhahahha
Let’s get on with this recipe!
Why is December the quickest month of the year? It seems like it has just began and already it’s the 11th, and I still have a lot of Christmas sight seeing to do in Berlin….would you please slow down a bit?!
Here are my five favourites from this week:
1- This week the St. Peter’s Basilica was the canvas to project photos of endangered animals to bring attention on environmental protection, you can see more photos here;
2- The new X-Men Apocalypse trailer is here!!
3- Astonishing pictures of Canada taken by photographer Stevin Tuchiwsky got me thinking to take the next plane there! Check out his website and/or Instagram;
4- Finished my second hoop art this week….yay for me! Don’t you just love The Rollings Stone’s tongue?!
5- Funny illustrations of Disney’s princesses and princes as grandparents and elderly folks by Isaiah K. Stephens.
Have a wonderful and blessed weekend 😉
xx
I find it quite difficult to write about my favourites places to eat here in Berlin, there are so many options of restaurants here…some very good, some, not so much. As a food lover, a good home cook (at least I think I am…ha!) and raised by a family who works in the business, I am not so easy to be impressed. Usually in Brazil, the best places are the most expensive, but since I came to Berlin, I have learned that is not a rule. You can find amazing places, with amazing food with very affordable prices.
Happy Monday y’all!
Part II of our visit to the Museum Island here in Berlin is divided in the other three museums: Bode Museum, Alte Nationalgalerie and the Pergamon museum. Boy did we see a lot of art this day! But I did not get tired at all of seeing some of the great pieces of art in the world, just a little bit from the walking around…but still totally worth it!
Hope you enjoy it as much as I did, and if you have the opportunity of visiting the Museuminsel, please do!!
This week passed so quick! We are doing a lot touristy things around Berlin lately, so much is going on in this city in December, I highly recommend visiting the beautiful Christmas Markets, I’m gonna write about that later on for sure 🙂
Here are my 5 favourites of this week:
1- I was in shock today when I read that Scott Weiland is no longer in between us, the first time I saw him live was when I went to see an Aerosmith concert in Brazil back in 2007, and Velvet Revolver opened the night. I was amazed by Scott’s performance and voice, he really knew how to capture your attention….a real rockstar! Then I saw him live again in 2011 at a festival, but this time it was with the Stone Temple Pilots, and of course it was amazing again! I have Velvet’s first album, Contraband, in my iPod, and I listen to it all the time, Slither is one of my favourite music. R.I.P Scott, thank you for your great contribution to rock’n’roll;
2- This video of David Grohl and the Muppets band playing Learn to Fly, made me laugh!
3- We started to watch Scandal on Netflix, mainly because we are running out of series around here, but if I knew better, I would have started it before…it’s so good, we’re really hooked up, just started the third season;
4- I love tattoos, currently I have four, but would like very much to increase that number…hahaha. Found these beautiful tattoos by Marla Moon, loved the combination of nature and geometry;
5- Pantone’s new colours for 2016 are pastel pink and blue, you can find out here why they choose two colours this time.
Hope you have a wonderful weekend 🙂
xx
Back in August we reserved a whole day to visit the Museum Island in Berlin, we already had it on our list since we got here and finally crossed it out when Rafael’s friend from Brazil, Lucas, came to visit us. The museum island is located in the Spree river in Mitte, and is divided in five museums: Altes Museum, Neues Museum, Alte Nationalgalerie, Bode Museum and Pergamon Museum. We went on a Thursday, because that day all the museums stay open until 8:00 pm, so we bought a combi-ticket for 18 euros and started visiting around 11 am. Today I am going to share the photos of the Neues and Altes Museum, so that the post doesn’t get too big…haha
Flowery Soul 