Alustuseks võiks vast natuke endast kirjutada. Tühja koha pealt oma elust rääkima hakata on ka natuke imelik, või noh vähemalt minu arvates.

Ehk siis olen 26 aastane ja elan Berliinis. Elukaaslane on sakslane ja 27 aastane. Ma lõpetasin Tartu Ülikoolis geenitehnoloogia eriala magistri, aga sellegipoolest antud erialal töötada pole veel jõudnud. Berliini kolisin püsivamalt 2013 aasta teises pooles. Hetkel olen lapsehoolduspuhkusel ning enamiku aja sellest veedan kodus. Ilmselt käiksin ka palju rohkem väljas, aga kuna oktoobris sai natuke trepist alla kukutud, siis pahkluu on täiesti katki ja ortopeed ei taha, et ma eriti kõnniksin. Tema arvab, et kõige parem variant oleks kohe opereerida, aga no sellest me veel vestleme.

Eesti keel (ega ka mõni muu keel) ei olnud just mu lemmik õppeaine koolis, sestap kirjatehnika võib koledasti longada. Aga no loodame, et sellest saab mööda vaadata. Muidu kodune keel on inglise keel, sekka ka eesti ja saksa keelt. Lapsega räägin eesti keeles ja elukaaslane räägib saksa keeles ja vahepeal on kõikidel kõik sassis ja siis igaüks räägib, mis keelt tahab. Lisaks sellele oskan või noh oskasin prantsuse keelt. Ilmselt oskan ikka siiani, pole lihtsalt ammu vaja läinud. Olen õppinud ka vene keelt, itaalia keelt, portugali keelt ja ladina keelt. No seda viimast ei oska ma üldse ja portugali keeles suudan mõne lause vist ikka lausuda. Vene keelt peaks õppeaastate järgi päris hästi oskama, aga noh, kui 10 aastat pole keelepraktikat olnud, siis ei saa sellega just väga hästi olla.

Elukaaslasega kohtusime Eestis. Ja siis läks nii, et mina kolisin Saksamaale. Ega see tuli kõikidele kui välk selgest taevast, sest eelnevalt polnud mul Saksamaaga mingit kontakti olnud ning pere ja sõbrad arvasid, et ma hoopis Prantsusmaale või kuskile sinna kolin. Aga elu tegi omad korrektiivid ja siin ma nüüd olen.

Ma luban, et ma üritan vähemalt korra nädalas midagi kirjutada, isegi kui midagi kirjutada pole. Aga no ma olen loomult laisk ja mul võib see kõik meelest ära minna. No loodame, et mitte. Peatse kohtumiseni!

Pavlova is a meringue based dessert that has been one of my favourites for years. It is very easy to prepare and the result is always amazing. For the meringue you need:

• 6 egg white
• 4 dl sugar
• 1 sp starch
• 1 tsp white wine vinegar

Beat the egg white to a very stiff consistency and add slowly sugar always mixing. Mix until the sugar is dissolved. Add starch and vinegar, mix a little more and put into a piping bag. Make approx. 12 cm diameter rounds and cook in the oven for 1,5-2 hours in 120 degrees. Cooking time varies also with the ovens. Adding starch makes meringue really delicate product and gives it really crispy outer shell. Vinegar is added for the nice shine

When meringue is ready and cooled down, you can prepare the filling. Basically the filling can be whatever. The most classical combination is whipped cream and strawberries. As spring is rhubarb season, I decided to make my Pavlovas with Rhubarb cream and syrup. For this you need:

• 500g rhubarbs
• 2 dl sugar
• 400 ml water
• vanillabean

Clean rhubarbs and cut them to 5 cm long pieces. Put them to a pot with water, sugar and vanilla and cook in slow fire until rhubarb is cooked. Take rhubarb and vanilla out and continue cooking slowly the water-sugar mixture until it thickens and becomes a syrup. Puree half of the rubarbs and leave other half for decoration. Whip 4 dl of cream into thick foam and slowly fold in the rhubarb puree.

Fill the meringue just before serving. Decorate with rhubarb and syrup. As another option you could puree also some of the strawberries and fold them to the cream with rhubarb puree. Decorate then your Pavlova also with strawberries. Personally, I think strawberry give Pavlova the best taste

Macarons, are supersweet meringue based almond cookies that doesn't conatain any flour. For years I have carried the thought about preparing those, but as I am not a huge fan myself, then I postponed it all the time. Until some weeks ago, when I started to read all the different recipes and preparation explanations.

Well, what can I say. I can tell you that first patch were not macarons. They were nice crispy chocolate cookies that were eaten so fast, that I had no chance to take a picture. Despite of the failure, I wanted to try again. This time I prepared them totally differently. The texture and the taste were as they should be, maybe not as sweet as original. Only the shape needed improvements. I considered it well, as I had no equipment what so ever to prepare them. Out of all my pipingbags they had wrong sizes or wrong ending and so they came all different shapes and different sizes. Maybe I exaggerate a little, but they also were not so perfect round cookies as they should have.

So, last week I tried third time and I can say that they get better and better. Of course I invested a little for the right equipment and was more familiar with the preparation process.

Macaron:

• 3 egg whites (room temperature)
• 110 g almond flour (sifted)
• 170 g powder sugar (sifted)
• 40 g granulated sugar

(for chocolate ones I added 30g of cocoa powder to the mixture)

For preparations first thing you have to do is to sift almond flour, powder sugar and if wanted cocoa powder to a bowl and mix it gently. It is wery important that you weight all the products and that they are in room temperature. Also sifting is very important. Beat the egg whites strong and add slowly granulated sugar while mixing/whisking. Egg whites should be strong and if you turn the bowl around, then they should stay in the bowl. When this happens, you've done it right.

Next you have to start mixing the egg whites to the almond flour/sugar mix. I suggest to do it slow by slow. Adding first half of the egg whites and mixing it in, then 1/4 and slowly turning it in, from down to up and then the last part. I suggest to mix it as less as possible. If you mix it too much, then the air is out and the cookies won't rise in the oven. Of course too much air inside is also not good. Try to get the mixture into a lava consistency. The mixture should sink flat in about 5-7 seconds. If it does that, then your mixture is right.

What to do next. Put the mixture into a pipingbag or use a small spoon and put little cookies into a baking tray. Be careful not to put them to close to each other. When done that then trop the baking tray from about 10 cm high several times to the table. This is important, because then all the airbubbles go out and the mixture evens up in the baking tray. Leave them to rest for about 45-60 mins then cook in the 150 degrees in about 12-15 min. Cool down and fill them with lemon curd, flavorised butter cream or with chocolate ganache. And there you have approx. 24 nice and tasty macarons.