I am an art piece!

I'm going to be in the catalog of the exhibition!!!

Geneva printing

3 minutes of printing.

Geneva

Knust is going to Geneva to print a Dotdotdot magazine within the context of the group exhibition 'Wouldn't it be Nice' curated by Emily King and Katya García-Antón (25 October – 16 December 2007).

There goes a stencil machine from down the first floor...

Straight into the van...

Where everything is nice packed...

Waiting at the German/Swiss customs along with the real big trucks...

Our working space at the gallery (Centre d'Art Contemporain Geneve)...

Which we share with the other art pieces. You see a hammoc? That's my favorite.

Anderhalfwitavond in Extrapool

Anderhalfwitavond is an evening where the novelties of the Halfwithal shop are presented. Halfwithal shop is a part of Extrapool which is open every friday afternoon and is selling books and fanzins, CDs, LPs, Tshirts, badges, which you can't get anywhere else. There's also an online shop.
Next week there will be the next Anderhalfwitavond (write down this date in your agenda: 27. 10 at 21.00 in the Onderbroek). Next to presentation of books, there are also concerts and cakes and DJs and here you can see more about the program.

Registering at the Gemeente part 1

Gemeente means municipality in Dutch. Slovenia became a part of the EU in 2004, and joined the big union with workers movement and portability, and everything got so much easier, and you can get a lot of information about that on the EU portamobility site here.
Well, don't believe that it's all that simple. The workers market in Holland only opened in May 2007 and several other countries of western Europe are still requiring a work permit if you want to work.
But ok, I want to work in Holland, and now I can. Only one small detail. If you want to work in Holland, you must be insured. Ok, I am insured in Slovenia, and by having an EU health card, I get the same rights in other countries as I have in Slovenia, no?
It's a bit hard to find an answer to that question. EURES - The European Job Mobility Portal is only giving information about moving to another country. Well, I am still staying in Slovenia, thanks, I just want to work in Holland, when I am in Holland.
So I asked around. The employer is only leaving an option of a dutch insurance company and I couldn't find a solution for my case. Maybe my case is a bit dubious, but for example, I come to Holland for 2 months of season work, picking up the strawberries, or whatever. For staying under 3 months, I don't have to register at the municipality, but what about the insurance? I couldn't get any answer. Maybe the only place where they might give me a hint would be some organization specialized in providing foreign workers to Dutch working market. I guess there are many for Polish workers, but for sure none for Slovenian.
So, there it will have to be. Dutch health insurance, as an addition to my Slovene one. But another problem, in order to get a dutch health insurance, I need to be registered at an address in Holland. So now I have to register although I travel to Slovenia at least every 3 months.
So in August, when we got back from Slovenia, I decided to register. It said on their web page, that one has to register in 5 days after the arrival. A bit strange, what if I decide to stay after 2 months. But whatever, I went to the municipality and asked at the desk, where can I register. They told me, that I need to make an appointment if I am moving from abroad. Again an appointment, I thought, nothing happends in this country without an appointment.
"Ok, let's make an appointment."
"No, no, no," he said at the desk: "we can't make an appointment here, you have to call this number and make an appointment."
And he gave me a phone number. How ridiculous, I am standing at the desk, and he can't make an appointment for me. Why doesn't he call that number? Huh.
So I went home and I called. The person who picked up the phone didn't make an appointment for me, but only took my data and asked for my phone number.
"We will call you back."
Phhhhhhrrrrrrrr. I have to register in 5 days from my arrival and I need to have a phone number. If you are moving to Holland, first thing you need to do is buy a prepaid phone card, because everything will go over that phone. I learned much faster how to say my phone number in dutch than how to spell my name (btw, they never wait for the spelling of your name, they just write something and then you have problems when your name is not matching with the one on the appointment schedule).
I was called back the next day and was told to come next week on 22. of august at 10AM. I need passport, a birth certificate and a permit for moving in a house where I am going to live by a house owner.

Bio cultures turning everywhere

That's what happens if you leave right turning cultures out of control. Click on the picture to see it bigger. For more information refer to my previous post about Right turning (bio) cultures.

English pie

I watched Nigella Express the other day, a cooking programme on BBC2, where she prepared chicken pie. I was surprised that she is calling something, that is just covered with puff pastry and thrown in the oven for 20 minutes, a pie. Here's a common definition of pie: A baked food composed of a pastry shell filled with fruit, meat, cheese, or other ingredients, and usually, but not always, covered with a pastry crust. I agree with that, you can't call something covered with some puff pastry a pie!
But I thought it might be interesting to try, so I made my own version - off course not filled with chicken. I took some precooked potatoes and cauliflower, and mix them with a sort of bechamel sauce, cheese and spring onions. I covered each model with one sheet of puff pastry and let them bake for 20 minutes at 180ºC. This is what came out.



I will call this an English pie. It looks nice, but the inside part was very very hot because of all the liquid which came out of cauliflower and not very thick bechamel. It was practically boiling! And we were very hungry and wanted to eat it immediately, so that was a real minus for this recipe.

Paksoi lasagne

Here is a simple recipe for a paksoi lasagne for 2 persons. I found it again when tiding up my recipes and remembered that it made a really nice meal. You can replace paksoi with "blitva". I'm sorry - I only know the Slovene name for it. It's very similar to paksoi.

Ingredients:

8-10 sheets of (green) lasagne
1 piece of paksoi
1 onion, chopped into small pieces
a bit of oil
2 tomatos, in slices
100g feta
2 eggs
(optional 100g champignons, in slices)
2dl yoghurt
pepper and salt
oregano
rasped cheese
3 table spoons of bread crumbs

What you need to do, is:
Wash paksoi and chop it into smaller pieces. Heat the oil in a pan and sauté the onion, throw in (the champignons and) the paksoi and let it steam for a few minutes (until the paksoi leaves drop). Crush feta cheese and mix it through the vegetables.
Oil and fill up the lasagne model with layers of vegetable mix and lasangne sheets.
For the topping: mix eggs, yoghurt, half of rasped cheese, oregano, salt and pepper and pour this mixture over the lasagna. Take care that the top layer of lasagne is nicely covered with the topping mixture. Put the slices of tomatoes on top. Mix two spoons of rasped cheese with the breadcrumbs and spread that over it.
Bake at 180ºC for 30-45 minutes.

The topping is what makes this recipe really yummy. Cheese and crumbs make a really nice crust on top. And yoghurt mixture with eggs is a more light option than the creamy one.

Right turning (bio) cultures

No, this post is not about politics, it's about food and chemistry. I thought I was done with organic chemistry when I finally passed the last exam of study program Graphic arts technology at Faculty of Natural Science and Engineering in Ljubljana, but then I happen to see this on the fridge shelf at a local supermarket: standyoghurt: rechtdraaiend melkzuur, aangezuurd door rechtdraaiende bio-cultures. Translated, right-turning milk acids, made by right-turning bio-cultures.
I have to admit that I find yoghurt in Holland quite different from those which I know from Slovenia. Holland yoghurt is more creamy and it is sold in tetrapak, like milk. The above mentioned standyoghurt was packed in a cup, and I learned that it is different from the other ones. But not because of the right turning milk acids!
There are two different types of yoghurt which differ by the temperature and the duration of the making process:

• Roeryoghurt, which is more common in the Netherlands, is processed at a lower temperature (32°C) for 10-14 hours. It can be made in big containers (up to 20 cubic meters), where it's also being mixed. Because of that it has a very creamy texture and it's easy to make big quantities and then fill up the tetrapaks.
  
• Standyoghurt is a yoghurt known in the rest of Europe. Cups are filled with warm milk and acid cultures and closed. That is then being kept at a temperature of 40-45°C for about 4-6 hours. This yoghurt has more sensitive structure which is destroyed if stirred, that's why it's packed in cups and not tetrapak.

And what do the right turning cultures have to do with this all?
Milk acid is chiral and has two optical isomers.

Optical isomers are substances, known for the ability of turning the polarized light into left or right. Depending on the side of turning, we call them left or right turning substances.

But what does it matter? Left or right turning?
Not much, it doesn't affect the taste nor quality. As a fact, most natural milk acids are right turning. Someone just thought it could attract customers if this is written on a package.

Cauliflower and sweet potato curry

You need (for 2 persons):

1 middle size sweet potato
1/2 of a small cauliflower
1/2 or one small onion
a hand full of green beans (sperziebonen)
1 small teaspoon of curry pasta (for example chilly&garlic by Pataks, which is very hot, so in that case take care the small spoon is really a small spoon)
1 teaspoon od garam masala spices powder (available at toko's)
1 teaspoon of vegetable bouillon
1-2 spoons of (olive) oil
2 spoons of cream yogurt
basmati rice for two persons (don't forget to cook that :)

Clean the green beans and cut it into 2-3 cm long pieces. Put it in a pot with some water and vegetable bouillon and bring it to cook for a couple of minutes. In the meantime clean the cauliflower and divide it into small pieces. Peel the sweet potato and cut it into cubes (1-1,5 cm wide). Cut the onion into small cubes.
Take a larger (teflon) pan, heat it up and moisten with oil. Add the onion and fry for a minute or two. Add curry paste and powder, stir so it all divides equally and you can smell the spices. Add cauliflower and sweet potato. Stir around till it all gets covered with curry.
Then take the smaller pot with beans and bouillon and add all together to the bigger pan. Lower the heat, cover the pan and let it simmer for about 15 minutes till sweet potato gets softer. Then, open the pan, higher the heat and let the rest of liquids evaporate. Turn of the fire and after it calms down, mix in 2 table spoons of good cream yogurt.
Serve immediately with basmati rice.

That was today's dinner and we finished it before anyone even thought about taking a photo for the blog. Sorry, maybe next time.

Kiiiiii and Le Club des Chats in Extrapool

There was a concert yesterday at Extrapool. Well, it was in the Onderbroek, since Extrapool is still being under renovation process. There were two bands playing, a french duo Le Club des Chats and two japanese girls called Kiiiiiiiiii.
I didn't see much of the first band, because I was sitting at the kassa with Ani, but I saw the japanese girls and they were crazy. My camera died, it's last words were CHANGE THE BATTERY PACK! so no pictures from me.
But you can take a look at these videos to get a taste of the concert.

Kiiiiiii



Le Club des Chats

...

Making a mushroom risotto

Some champignons were left after yesterday's salmon champignons quiche, so I decided to use them together with two umbrella-mushrooms (portabella in dutch, marela in slovene) and make a mushroom risotto.
Joop offered to go to the shop to get some more ingredients, including risotto rice. In Holland almost everything comes with a recipe which tells you how you could/should use the product.
This one caught my eye because of the line which suggests serving risotto together with some beefsteak and beans. And as a type of the dish it says a main dish.
So, I am supposed to make this risotto as a main dish and serve it together with beefsteak and some veggies??? Wow! That's real Italian style cooking, oh, yeas! Amazing! Thanks for the tip Lassie!

Started to work at Extrapool

Today I started to work at the graphic space of Extrapool.