The Piggies have been grumbling a lot lately…about the weather, you know the usual stuff that we all get miserable about. On top of all that, their Yoga teacher left a couple of months ago to the greener pastures of San Antonio. There has been a lot of squealing, squeaking and squawking and general complaining on Coco-Prune Resorts. Of course Mayor Gnome was awfully concerned for the emotional welfare of the community of Paradise Piggies and held a meeting to find a solution.
Mayor Gnome: “How can I make life better for the gated community of Paradise Pastures/ Coco-Prune Resorts and Condos?”
Piggies: “There is nothing to do at the resort…it’s so boring!! What are we supposed to do in the condos…watch telly all day?”
We Are Bored!!
Piggies: “We need a reason to live…we need to find meaning in life!”
Gnome: “Okay, Piggies, it looks like you have done all your frolicking and fun and now you want some spiritual food. I know what you need!”
Piggies: “Oh Mayor Gnome, what are you going to do?”
Gnome: “We’re moving you to the Zen Garden. The Zazen Duckies can help you lot get back on your feet! No more resorts!!”
Zen Garden For Duckies and Piggies.
Tune in tomorrow (if you are really bored and have nothing else to do) for THE BIG MOVE!! How exciting, can’t wait….
When we were living in Scotland (yonks ago), we came across an old doctor’s book dating back to the 1900’s. There was a section on diet in convalescence and this is where we discovered an old-fashioned recipe for lemonade. Gnome remembered the time that I made it and he absolutely loved it. Since then, he has said a few things now and then like:
“Dearest…do you remember that smashing lemonade you made once in Scotland…it was really good!”
and,
“Oh, I could do with some of that lemonade you made once.”
and,
“Oh it’s hot today, a nice glass of refreshing lemonade would go down well, don’t you think?”
I Could Murder a Lemonade!
I would normally respond with,
“Yes dear, when I have the time.”
and then promptly forget.
Well this time, Gnome (after 12 years of waiting patiently for lemonade which never materialised) growled at me at said,
“MISSUS!!! WHAT DO I NEED TO DO TO GET A GLASS OF LEMONADE AROUND HERE!!!!”
At that point it suddenly dawned on me that he had asked me millions of times for over a decade. He really was losing patience…and gosh…what an amount of patience he had!!
This is what I said,
“Yes, right away dear.”
And this is what I made:
Old Fashioned Lemonade:
Squeeze the juice of 5 lemons,
Add one lemon, sliced
Add 1/4 cup of sugar and 1 tbsp tartaric acid dissolved in 1 cup of water
Add enough water to all ingredients above to make up a quart (about 1 litre) and refrigerate until nice and cool.
Serve with ice.
Ahhhhh!! Lovely and refreshing….
This is what Gnome said after I made the lemonade in a record 15 minutes,
“Well it didn’t actually take that long to make! Why did I have to wait so long for it!!”
Ooooh…look at that…stacks of Chocolate Artisan Soaps. We are getting ready for the new season with our lovely soaps made from Toledo Cacao and coconut oil. Here is a gallery of some of our chocolate offerings made by Gnome, the budding artist!
The Artist Known as Gnome.
These are brand new for the season: White Chocolate Mint Soap….smells delicious…you’d think you could eat them!!
White Chocolate Mint Soaps.
Artisan Chocolate Soaps…these are the swirly ones….
Chocolate Artisan Soaps.Chocolate Artisan Soaps.
Oh…and of course….100% Doggy Approval…this one tries to grab and eat them!!
When I say Chips, I mean fried potato cut into chunks like what you get in the Fish ‘n Chip shop in Glasgow. Some people call them french fries but that has connotations of skinny fried potatoes. I mean chunks!
I got this idea from watching an anime about a young chef trying to create innovative meals and in one particular episode he was cooking potatoes in a bamboo steamer. The reason behind is that you get perfectly cooked potatoes without the sogginess associated with boiling them. So, I tried this method too but took it a step further to make chips:
Steaming Potatoes.
They just need to be steamed for 15 to 20 minutes until they are tender but still firm. Switch off the heat and allow to cool down. At this point, they are dry and ready to be fried. Simply fry the chips at about 400F (200C) until nicely browned. Double fry if you want it extra crispy…this is another anime tip…just scoop the fried potato and hold it over the oil in a wire basket for 30 seconds (letting the oil drain) and then re-immerse in cooking oil for the second fry.
Ooooh…look at this:
Fried Chips.
Just like Glasgow…but serve with a wedge of lime for some Belizean flair. Otherwise, if you want to be traditional, smothered in tomato ketchup and malted vinegar!
Still messing around with SEO (Search Engine Optimization) Whatsits. Today was really tedious because I had to delete all 824 pages of old blog posts and pages…one at a time…because it would not let me delete in bulk. Phew…it was totally brain-numbing and my head is spinning!! I had to remove the old blog because apparently you can get penalised by the search engines for duplication of information. Anyway, it’s done!! As a reminder, new blog is at blog.casamascia.com and apothecary is at https://casamascia.com/
After I had finished, Gnome decided to throw a bit of humour into the situation by saying,
“Oh Dearest…I have a Gnome Operation SEO for you….”
Gnome with Enigmatic Smile.
Munchkin none to pleased with the thought of more Internet work:
We started making soap because we were both fed up with the quality of shop-bought soap. The bars that we bought were a funny pink colour with an artificial rose scent. We didn’t think much of the well-known brands either because they all smelled of unnatural fragrances and dried out the skin. And so we decided to embark on the making of our own soap…at that time we did not have Internet on the farm and had to conduct our research at the Internet Cafe in town.
Our purpose was to make a good soap for us to use instead of having the buy the poor quality supermarket stuff. The properties that we sought for in our home-made soap was a good lather and a moisturising bar with natural scent.
Generally speaking, soap is made from oil/fat and lye. The oil/fat lends the qualities and properties to a soap bar and so we started off by experimenting with anything that we could find off the supermarket shelf. We tried everything from shortening, to lard and a whole plethora of vegetable oils.
These attempts were a great learning experience: shortening was actually okay but the lard soap actually smelled quite piggy!! We came out of the shower smelling like we had smothered ourselves in bacon!! The vegetable oil made a soft moisturising bar but disintegrated very quickly into bits.
At the time, we were also making coconut oil and selling it to the lady at Punta Gorda market. It was a slow, laborious process of grating, boiling and stirring. We spent many full days setting up a fire (with coconut husks) and stirring our pot of coconut oil together under the shade of the coconut palms. It was a very significant time, when we tried to seek meaning in our lives, after extricating ourselves from the rushing urgency and pressures of our previous lives as medical doctors.
I remember making a test batch of coconut oil soaps and eagerly waiting for the results. When soap is made in this way ie. not commercially, the soap needs time to “cure” and this can take anything from 3 months or longer. The longer you wait, the better…it is like a fine wine. Anyway, after waiting 3 months, we tried this soap and discovered that it had all the properties that we were looking far. It lathered well, did not dry out the skin and the natural scent was lovely. The skin felt so clean and smooth.
This was the perfect recipe and we were using our own coconuts from the farm!
Our Lovely Coconuts.
Our soaps are still made from this original coconut oil recipe. In addition to this, we have created Medicinal Soaps and Chocolate Soaps.
We are still working on the Apothecary Website…aaargh!!! It is never-ending and I just spent the afternoon filling my brain with articles on SEO (Search Engine Optimization). Aaaargh again!! I got in a bit of a strop and whined to Gnome:
“Aarrgh!!! Nothing is straight-forward!!!”
Wise Gnome looked at me and smiled,
“It’s not just about using whatsits like Meta Keywords, Meta Tags and Meta Descriptions my dear.”
Gnome continued,
“Our Apothecary is All About the Stories. There is a story behind every single product that we have created and invented together…”
“…go forth Munchkin and tell the stories behind each of our magical, herbal creations!!”
The weather starts off kinda sunny and cheery in the morning and then by about early afternoon, black clouds move in and there is a huge downpour. At least that has been the weather pattern for the last few days. It ends up being really cold and miserable…reminds of good old Scottish weather!
Anyway, we all need to keep on going despite the greyness. Here are some pictures from the farm taken on better sunnier days. This one looks a bit startled but honestly, this is a happy, gurgling guinea pig:
Cheery Guinea Pig.
Geese are fine with the rains and don’t really know what all the fuss is about:
Who Are You Looking At?
Duckies: What’s Munchkin upset about? This is Paradise….
Hello Everyone, I better keep on writing because ever since we changed hosts, our viewing stats have virtually gone to zero. We are lucky if we even get 2 views in a day! Just a quickie this time to thank our Singapore connection for the packages of special Asian food. This time, we got Matcha (green tea) KitKats!! I tell you…if you ever have one of these Japanese specialty KitKats, the ordinary milk chocolate/dark chocolate/even white chocolate do not compare!!
Matcha KitKats
Also, a Big Thank-you for all the other wonderful stuff including the lovely mooncakes, teh tarek and sambal belachan. What a treat!!
Hey guys, we have been compiling a whole bunch of new product pictures for the online apothecary (it is coming soon!!). We don’t have any photography studios in Toledo (Belize) or for that matter, in the middle of the jungle, where we live, so we had to come up with a “light box” made out of a cardboard box and table lamps. Check this out:
Light Box For Taking Photographs In The Jungle.
Here are some nice pictures of our New Chocolate Artisan Soaps. These ones are our Dark Chocolate Range. The dark violet hues of the cacao have come out really well in the light box! 🙂
Dark Chocolate Soaps.Dark Chocolate Artisan Soaps.
