Viva o São João!

Tomorrow, June 24th it's Saint John's, São João, but in Porto (and in some other cities around the world) the real party is tonight! Sardines, Caldo Verde (popular soup made with collard green), popular music, small toy hammers, colorfull hot air paper ballons and lots of fireworks on the Douro river!

Do you think it makes no sense? So visit Porto on the night of June 23rd and you will never forget the date :-)

Well, this is a small post to wish a great São João to everyone! I'm not in Porto, but there will be sardines tonight here! :-P

June 4th 2011

Yes, I'm alive! Very much alive! Don't worry, I wasn't caught by a tsunami, an earthquake or a volcano! :-P

This blog has been sleepy lately, but not its author! ahah I like to be busy, but in the past few months I've been super busy.
It's sad to realize I haven't been updating my posts for 2 months! :-S Time really flies when you're having fun! ahah

I've been doing more or less the same, flying, driving, hiking ... travelling around.
This Year of the Rabbit has been having a charged agenda... but not overcharged! ahah

I took this special date, June 4th, to update this blog with an entry directy from my hometown, Porto.

Let's see if I'll post more often, or else one day someone will call the police to report my disappearing! ahahah

Happy Holidays from Porto

I interrupt my unusual blog posts to wish my friends and readers Merry Christmas!

I leave you with this postcard from the best city in world. As you can see, even Santa Claus loves this! ;-)

Merry Christmas!

Live from the best city of the world, I wish you all blah, blah, blah, blah and happy christmas!

The city is quiet this morning, everyone is still sleeping and resting after celebrating christmas' eve.
So I've decided to take my camera and walk around town on this cold Christmas morning.

And, in case you still don't know, the best city of the world is Porto ;-)

Ho, ho, ho!

ps: do you know why Santa Claus says "ho, ho, ho!" and pirates say "yo, ho, ho!"? Me neither!

Portugal around the corner

When you're abroad, a good way to find a bar of your preference is by looking at the outdoor beer sign: Guiness stands for irish bar, Foster's for australian, Budwiser for american (yes, it's a "beer"), Corona for Mexican, Franziskaner for German... and if you want a Portuguese bar, well, just follow the red light ;-)

Today I found this one by chance... I think it's a good sign for today. It's the FIFA World Cup 2010 stage draw... and these were the results for Portugal:

Brazil, North Korea, Ivory Coast and... Portugal!

It's going to be a crazy World Cup! Let the party begin with samba and Super Bock ;-)

Road to World Cup 2010

Another great football night and Portugal is qualified for the final stage for next year's FIFA World Cup.

But tonight I decided to watch another game, France vs Ireland, on an irish bar! The ambiance as great, everyone glued to the giant screens, Guiness beer for almost everyone (the french supporters were more into Cokes and french beers)... but unfortunately Ireland didn't qualify! Thanks to an "illegal" goal, scored with the help... of a hand! :-P

Anyway, the important is Portugal will be in South Africa next year! We are going to have many soccer nights... and afternoons! A good excuse to gather people around a table... a full table ;-)

Happy Easter, part 2

What a Easter weekend! After an amusing Saturday with my japanese class, I had a very long Easter Sunday... in the kitchen! eheh

This year I've decided to prepare a typical Easter lunch and invite some friends! We were a small group of 6, each one of us from a different country. And this is what I enjoy the most: to host, cook and show all the best from my culture to my friends.

I could go easy when preparing lunch, but I don't like easy. So I've decided to prepare starters, a fish course, followed by a meat course and end with dessert. eheheh
The fish course was the typical codfish, with mashed potatoes, cheese and mayonnaise (just for the gratin). This recipe is called Zé do Pipo Codfish (Bacalhau à Zé do Pipo). For the meat course I prepared a festival of pork meat, blood and potatoes, called Rojões.
Dessert was easier, because it was more cakes and pastries.

Good food needs good wine, so there was also good portuguese wine. White wine (vinho verde) for the fish, red wine for the meat.... and Porto for dessert! eheheh

It started well... but a roller-coaster of unexpected cooking events (it's a nice way to say loosing control) led me to put everything on the table on the wrong sequence! eheheh

We've started the meal with the meat course, then the starters, then the fish and finally the dessert! As usual, I spent most of the time in the kitchen... so the lunch became more like a long brunch! eheh

The important is at the end everyone had fun and enjoyed the food (as I prefer to think!) eheh

The worst came the next day, with a super huge pile of stuff to wash and clean! eheheh

Time to rest now, until the next event... and I "smell" more football coming soon ;-)

Happy Easter, part 1

Well, it's almost Easter and this year I started I little bit earlier. Like Christmas, Easter as typical things... like food (yes, as always). There are cakes and pastries which are more popular during these festivities. So, this year I will be showing everyone around here the best I can.

Thankfully I can count on all portuguese supermarkets and grocery shops to help me in this herculean task! eheh

As you all know I continue with my japanese lessons. Today's idea was to show my sensei (teacher) and the rest of the class the cake pão-de-ló (sponge cake). Besides being one of the pastry symbols for Easter, the sponge cake has a curious background for Japan and japanese.
There's one typical japanese cake named castera which comes from the sponge cake, introduced by the portuguese when they established missions in Japan, around 16th century.
Besides castera, there's also tempura (vegetables fried in oil), which were also influenced by the portuguese gastronomy.

By the way, the word castera comes from castela in portuguese (to beat the egg white) and the word tempura comes from the portuguese word têmpero.

So, 5 centuries later, a portuguese once again introduces the original and authentic pão-de-ló to japanese. My sensei was really delightful to hear the story of the this cake.

To make it more special, I took a fine bottle of Porto wine, which is a good choice to accompany almost any kind of dessert. Unfortunatelly only two persons dared to drink a small glass of Porto... after all, who wants to drink alcool at 11am on a Saturday? eheheh
Our teacher gave the good example: green tea only! Ocha wo nomimashita! :-)

Well, this Easter Sunday my tour de force continues. This time I've invited some guests for the typical portuguese Easter lunch, with a meat and fish courses, wine and more dessert! eheheh

Stay tuned for more gastronomical adventures! ;-)

World Cup so far away...

This was a football weekend, with many teams playing in order to get qualified for next year's FIFA World Cup.
As I couldn't watch the game on the stadium, it was my "obligation" as a portuguese supporter to watch on TV and... to prepare the usual dinner that goes with it! eheh

Portugal played against Sweeden and it was very very important to win the match, so we could still hope to qualify for the World Cup.

Besides this Portugal-Sweden match, there were other matches being played at the same time. So, in order to make this an international competition, I invited my friends Barry and Stefan in order to represent Ireland and Germany respectively.

With the help of a tv screen and a computer we were able to watch several matches simultaneously!
We were ready to, as long as we had snacks and drinks on the table!

Unfortunately the result of the portuguese match was a deceiving 0-0. Luckily we had our baby bottles to cheers us up! eheheheh

The qualification is now more more difficult... but anything's possible!
The most important is to keep playing... so I can have this "excuses" to watch and celebrate these matches with friends! eheheh

Cheers!

Happy Saint Martin!

Is true that Saint Martin's Day is November 11th, but in Portugal we usually celebrate it on the following Sunday. How do we celebrate it? Typically with chestnuts and local light alcoholic beverages.

Chestnuts are usually eaten roasted, preferably outdoors on an open fire, with friends and family. Alternatively, if going out and cold are an obstacle, you can prepare them in the oven.

Regarding the wine, in Portugal St. Martin's day is also associated to the maturation of the year's wine (the first day when you can taste the new wine).
The popular beverages are água-pé (a watered-down wine) or the stronger jeropiga (a liquor).

At this time of the year the weather really doesn't invite you to go outdoors, but in Portugal usually there's a small period of good weather which we refer as Saint Martin's Summer (Verão de São Martinho).
But this weather "phenomenon" is related with the most famous Saint Martin's legend. By the time when he was a roman soldier (travelling supposedely from Italy to France) he met a beggar during a rain storm. So he cut this cloak to save the beggar from dying of the cold.... after a while the rain stopped and the sun started to shine.

Now is time for some chestnuts! Even if I'm in France, for me a tradition will always be a tradition! ;-)

Happy St. Martin! Bom São Martinho!

Feel the rush!

And it's the kickoff! The Euro 2008 starts today, and I couldn't let pass the occasion without wishing good luck to my favourite team (hmmm... which team?) eheheh

During the next 3 weeks all football fans will breath, sweat and cry (well, only for those sick fans!)
Unfortunately I didn't choose the best time to go on vacation (almost one week away), but no matter where I'm going, my support will always be heard and feel! :)

And it's not so bad to be in Paris during an international football competition, after all the biggest foreign community here is portuguese! ;)

Now let's feel the rush! Go Portugal! Força!