Plugging along

School is busy. I’m behind on grading. A lot of my work time I’m needing to devote to lesson planning, and then there have a been a lot of additional meetings with students recently. And on top of it all, this last week, everything was put on hold because of the annual UWC Day celebration, on which our school celebrates both the United Nations’ International Day of Peace and the founding of the United World College movement in 1962. This year, Queen Sonja of Norway came to the school, which meant more organization and events than normal. All of these things have meant that grading has been pushed aside. Now, it’s urgent, so that’s what I’ll be catching up on this weekend. I’m busier than I would like to be.

Still, one has to eat, and my husband and I have been enjoying some good cooking projects that help me keep at least one foot out of the classroom. It started with a batch of sauerkraut that finished fermenting two weeks ago. We used to make sauerkraut a lot back when we lived in the US, but for the last few years we’ve stopped. Now, inspired by my sister, who has rapidly become a fermento extraordinaire, we’re back into it again.

Back in Minnesota, we would always have the sauerkraut with bratwurst and mustard. Here, though, until actually just this year, you couldn’t buy brats in the supermarket where we live, and this was one of the reasons we had really stopped making the kraut. The normal sausage here in Norway is a “pølse.” To my American eyes, it’s a hot dog, and not the kind of thing I want for a nice dinner.

We improvised the brats by making brat-inspired meatballs. We bought some pork, ground it up, and mixed in the spices used in a brat (in addition to salt and pepper, I think we used nutmeg, oregano [since we didn’t have marjoram], and ginger, although, and I’m kicking myself, we didn’t actually write the spices we used down!).

We cooked the meatballs up following this Norwegian recipe for Danish meatballs… don’t know how we ended up there! Anyway, they were fantastic. As it turns out, as I alluded to above, right around the time we finally made the first batch of brat-meatballs, the grocery store began stocking pretty decent bratwurst. Globalization? Maybe tastes among local people are expanding beyond the pølse. With the brats available, will we make the meatballs again? I have no idea. They were great though, so maybe.

Weather has been rainy, but with some days of sun. In this photograph of the classic view I can never resist capturing on my walk to work, the “Flekke Himalayas” as my neighbor calls them are almost entirely obscured by the low clouds.

And then, after being ill a couple of weeks ago, I did manage to get out for a couple of (short) hikes, just up to the bench above campus, about twenty five minutes’ walk up from home, and twenty minutes to get back down.

Leaves are beginning to change. Mushrooms are stretching up, heaving the pine needles–here is what the Seek app identified as Leotia lubrica, the ochre jelly club:

Then the rain comes again, and I get caught in a short storm.

Last weekend, before the madness of UWC Day, we did a pot roast. We used some venison that we had still in the freezer from last year. We did mashed celery root, which is our new favorite over potatoes. We also had made some sourdough bread–I think our sourdough starter is weak, and so we’ve been experimenting keeping some of it in the fridge. This was our first test of the fridge vs. countertop starter. Both loaves were great. Anyway, the pot roast tasted really good, but it was dry. We aren’t sure why.

I’ll sign off now. The truth is, I’m tired. I don’t feel as inspired as I would like to. I’m keeping going though, and it’s good to come back here every two weeks to reflect on what I’ve been doing, what are the beautiful things around me here.

And you, too. I’m wishing you well, wherever you are in the world. Thank you for reading. Be well.

Jimmy