Greetings from 2012!

The Breadbasket

A new year. A fresh and clean point in time. A time to reflect and to grow. A time to eat more sauerkraut. What does this new year mean to you?

Justin and I have just arrived back from time with our families in our homelands. The journey back home was nourishing in many ways--time with family and old friends spent around tables filled with good food, hundreds of puzzle pieces, or a mountain of homemade cookies was time spent remembering our roots, dreaming our futures, or just basking the comfort of familiar faces.



Returning to Port Angeles has been bittersweet: we miss the feeling of having to find time to visit with grandparents and parents and aunts and uncles and cousins and friends and running into familiar faces on old stomping grounds; but driving back to Port Angeles to reunite with Scott, going for a New Years Eve hike in Olympic Park, walking through our farmer's market for groceries, and peering into the windows of our soon-to-be home made it feel like we were home. It's quieter and slower paced here, but returning reminded me that we now have three places to call home. How lucky we are!

So, on the last day of 2011, we had a quiet reintroduction to our home on the North Olympic Peninsula. We checked out the Aurora Creek Trail by Lake Crescent and enjoyed our first jaunt into some snow and the treat of a few hedgehog mushrooms that had survived the freeze. At home, Justin cooked up some Sauerkraut Soup --a specialty of his family-- and we rang in the new year by the fire with games and some local libations.







Friends and family, near and far, thanks for making this past year and this life so rich! Greetings from 2012!

New Years Sauerkraut Soup

4 c. sauerkraut
1.5 qt. water
1 onion, chopped
a handful of mushrooms, chopped
3 TBS. flour
1/2 c. Bulgar wheat
4 TBS. butter
salt and pepper to taste

1. combine kraut and water in a pot and simmer for 1 hour.
2. While kraut is simmering, saute onions and mushrooms in butter until translucent. Stir in flour to thicken.
3. Stir onion mix and Bulgar into kraut mix and continue to simmer for 25-30 min.
4. Season with salt and pepper.
5. Enjoy with a grilled cheese sandwich.