Christmas morning french toast

I think this could be the last Christmas post! 

 I'm still suffering from the come-down of Christmas, I don't know if you noticed, but I really really really love the holiday! 

Christmas morning breakfast was the mandatory coffee and bacon, but this year french toast casserole joined the bunch as well. I served it with barely thawed (self picked) summer strawberries and blueberries. DELISH!

The recipe is from my sister's father-in-law who made this one year when we visited for Christmas morning. He used french bread though. It was AMAZING! We took the easier route and just used toast bread, also because I had to make a gluten-free version for my dad and there is a good toast bread in the frozen section he likes. Ah, convenience. :) 

Here is the recipe as e-mailed by my dear sister.

The Best French Toast Casserole:

1 loaf french bread
6 eggs
1 3/4 cups milk
1/2 cup butter
2/3 cup brown sugar
2tsp cinnamon

-cut bread in 1 inch slices
-combine eggs and milk in a blender
-pour into shallow dish
-soak bread for 5 minutes
-turn once, then cover
-refrigerate overnight

next morning....
-melt butter in microwave, add sugar and cinnamon
-spread baking dish with sugar mixture
-place bread pieces on top
-bake uncovered 30-40 minutes 350 degrees until golden brown

serve flipped over

 Please, go make this and eat it for breakfast. I am!

Thanks for reading! And Merry Christmas until next year! :)

Tasty salmon

The weather calls for indoor activities and if you happen to be like me and listen to your ipod while cleaning, this gray weather inspires reflection. 

Isn't it funny how certain songs can conjure vivid memories of certain days or remind you of people from that time in your life? I am so grateful for everyone I have had the pleasure and displeasure to meet in this life so far, they've all played a part in who I am and the life I lead today.

Oh reflection, not always the best way to pass the time for an analytical person...

I have thoroughly enjoyed this week back at school, I feel like I have so much time for myself for once! 

We've eaten well; Monday was bratwurst and sauerkraut. Tuesday we ate this oven baked salmon with boiled potatoes and a simple salad.

I seasoned it the way my sister does: butter, dill and some salt and pepper. However, I did all Trader Joe's 21 season salute, which is a salt free seasoning mix with EVERYTHING that my husband's mom special ordered from a certain California aunt. It's a pretty good seasoning mix, I see why she likes it!

And Wednesday, the leftover fish became a salmon casserole. So easy to make, just layer salmon crumbles and potatoes with dill in between and pour some cream or whole milk...Bake and voila!

(We're also eating this for dinner tonight)

Today I went and stopped by a little thrift store on the way home and picked up the base for a Christmas door wreath. I also found some ramekins, 4 for 1.20 euros! Finally -- RAMEKINS! Lol! I see pizzookies in my future...

I also stopped by the store next to it and walked away with fuses, toothpaste, a snickers and...yarn! I can't show you or tell you what I am going to do with it though, it's going to be a Christmas present for a certain someone close to me. :) 

Now I am going to continue cleaning, make some tea, and contemplate making sugar cookies. (I think I will).

Thanks for reading!

 ("May joy come to this home, a good year to prosper, long life for the host and for the hostess a wide rear")
Finnish heritage and flea markets <3 Lol!

Easter going-ons

Hi and hope you had a happy Easter! Ours was quiet but nice. I'll get on to that in a minute.

First, I want to share a picture or two of my berry pie that I made on my day of freedom (aka day off from clinical training) last Thursday. My lovely friend came over and we made a ham and potato casserole for lunch followed by this pie.

Such a pretty pink! I got the recipe from here.

Here is how I made it (I never follow recipes exactly) and a quick translation of the recipe.

150g margarine/butter (US folks, that is 1 1/2 sticks)
1 1/2 dl sugar (about 1/2 cup)
2 eggs
2 1/2 dl flour (about 3/4 cup)
3/4 dl oats (about 1/4 cup)
1 tsp baking powder

Beat the butter and sugar together in a bowl. Then add the eggs and beat some more. Mix the dry ingredients together and then add to the egg-butter-sugar mix. Spread into a pie dish. The foil one in the picture was a bit small for this recipe, I ended up having left over dough and filling with which I made little tarts by spreading the leftovers into muffin cups. (also really good and pretty).

Bake in the oven at 200C or 375F for 5-10  minutes so that the crust can set a bit before the filling. 

The filling:

2 dl sour cream (1/2 cup or so)

1 egg

1/2 dl of sugar (a little less than 1/4 cup?)

a pinch of vanilla sugar or a drop of extract, depending on what you use ;)

2-3 dl frozen raspberries (what I used, but you can use really any fruit or berry!)

Mix everything together. Spread on the half-baked pie crust and for looks I dropped some whole raspberries and blueberries on the top. Do whatever your heart desires. 

Bake for about 15min or until the crust is golden and the filling has set. 

Here is a picture of our ham and potato casserole:

Take a bag of frozen hashbrowns or potato pieces like we have in the frozen sections of Finland. This amount seen here was about 1kg (I think the bags are 500g each)...

Add some chopped onion.

Layer some ham pieces (as much as you like, we used a bag of chopped ham that was about 300g *hammy!*) in between layers of potatoes.

Mix 2 dl of cream and 2 dl of milk or 4 dl of cream or milk to an egg (we didn't use one but should have) and add salt and pepper to your liking. 

Pour mixture into casserole dish. Grate some cheese on top and bake for about an hour at 200C or 375F. Tasty delicious and super easy to make. :)

So that covers the food part for this post. lol.

Easter as I said was quiet and sadly we forgot our camera so all the pictures (ok, I only took a couple) are on my dad's camera. Once I get a hold of it, I have some other photos to share, pictures of our garden! I will try to get around to uploading them from his camera this week... We'll see...

Kissa has the best grandma ever! My mom grew some Easter grass (tradition in Finland) especially for her. :) She loved it. Her new hobby is mowing the lawn, lol. 

As for crocheting... I have ended my plight with the wraplet. I am so sick of it, it's better for us both if we take a break from each other. If that break becomes permanent, I might not mind. 

I spent hours (I think) on Ravelry yesterday, favorite-ing every crochet pattern that tickled my fancy. I figure I can always go visit my favorites when I want an idea or a new project. I think Ravelry is one of the most inspiring websites out there, just a collection of patterns and projects and shared with other yarn obsessed folks. If you don't have a Ravelry account and you knit and crochet, get one. I recommend it. 

Anywho, off the tangent we went on, I have given up on the wraplet and am moving on. I feel like I might finally like to start a blanket. I have been keen on granny squares for a while, but sewing in the ends (my crocheting over them is haphazard at best) and joining the squares (I don't really understand joining squares as you go) and then changing the colors in every square seems just too tedious. I have been working on those circles in a square for that pillow (posted about them here) I was going to make for a friend. I ended up running out of time and bought her a gift, but on I trudge now. I will complete this pillow!!! So far I have 16/25 squares. Woohoo!

And now that we've fallen off the topic again, I'll go back. I want to crochet a blanket. Not a granny square blanket. Ripples are pretty but I don't have patience for that at the moment. So I think I might try my hand at GRANNY STRIPES! I got the idea from this blog/website The Purl Bee. I love this blanket. Well not really the colors, but I love how modern and elegant even a granny stripe blanket can look. I found inspiration to make my own. So, the new dream project is a granny stripe blanket/afghan/whatever, out of all the old bits of yarn I have. It's mainly thin wool so we'll see how it goes, but I am going to try to use up all of the blues, greens, browns and some yellow that I have. I was even thinking of throwing a few rows of black in it, kind of like how the Purl Bee uses the lime green. 

New dream project. I could barely sleep last night. Go figure I come up with it when I have a full week of work ahead of me. Lol!

Well that's it for today, thanks for reading! =)