Scents of Sunday

Offending "hash browns": and successful apple crumble

I am back on the front lines of the battle of the bulge--lower case b intended.  Many of you know that I have struggled with weight issues since I was a teenager, and certainly have been no poster child for proper weight management.  But I refuse to give up, and am engaged in what I hope will be the last battle with excess avoirdupois.  

My efforts at finding a way to be--not to diet, but a sustainable way to live--are slowly paying off.  I most certainly did not come to France to never again eat bread or butter.  (The charcuterie I can probably live without for the rest of my life, but not bread and butter)  I have managed to cut back drastically on both and that seems to be working, so far.  (Except for that run of grey, cold days last week when I couldn't seem to shake my carb cravings.)

Stuck-on mess

I happened upon a recipe for cauliflower hash browns....I like potatoes and eggs once in a while for breakfast.  Potatoes are forbidden at this point, so I thought I would give this recipe a try.  But I never really felt "good" about the video or the recipe steps.  Something just didn't feel right.  Added to that was my own emotional state over having received some deeply disturbing news.  I do think our mood influences our attempts and I perhaps should have waited until I was in a better frame of mind.  But I wanted eggs and hash browns for Sunday breakfast.

I began this process yesterday, and from the get-go----nothing I did worked and my results certainly bore little resemblance to what I saw in the instructional video.  My misgivings all played out---and I had a disaster of a morning which left my kitchen looking like the Wreck of the Hesperus.  The proof will be in the tasting--I do have to admit that they smelled good (until the bits that had overrun onto the oven floor began to burn)--redolent with the fresh local violet garlic that I included.  

I certainly wouldn't call this "golden"

At one point I considered throwing the whole mess into the garbage can and just going to get two or three of those new little potatoes starting to appear in the market.  Fortunately it is Sunday and the markets are closed.  And my upbringing will not permit me to throw out good ingredients.  I was determined to make this work.  Eventually, I got the "patties" back into the baking sheet and back into the oven, but what a sloppy mess!  And of course, they stuck to the "non-stick" surface.  Sigh!

Only a part of the Wreck of the Hesperus

Clean up took forever and thank heaven for bicarbonate of soda--it scrubbed the only cookie sheet that will fit into my oven back to pristine cleanliness.  

On the plus side, the apple crumble that I made yesterday and waited until this morning to bake, turned out just right---and has no flour, just about a tablespoon of oatmeal, almond flour, no sugar, and lots of muscade--nutmeg, my favorite.

Oh the fragrane wafting through my apartment

It's been pretty fragrant around here at #4 today---garlic, then baking apples and spices and my downstairs neighbor Sunday grilling.  Sunday  breakfast consisted of a piece of Comte cheese and some cubes of fresh melon.   Ah, the good life in France!