Your 15 minutes of skin care: Garnier Skinactive Hydrabomb

Busy people tend to set low priorities for the time spent for themselves only, and for us, women, the skincare routines seem to be the first victims of full schedules and never ending merry-go-round of children care, meetings and house chores. However, the modern beauty industry created many incentives to challenge dramatically such a perspective. Smart and highly efficient products were created, that don't need more than 15 minutes of your time the week. I agree that it is important to take care of your skin every day, but at least for now, it can be a good beginning and the good results are an incentive to keep up the good work of respecting yourself.

In the last three weeks, I tested every week one of the Garnier Skinactive Korean skin masks, each of them promising a full hydration after 15 minutes of use for at least one week. It sounds a bit miraculous, but after I used the first well soaked mask, I was convinced that this could last even more than that. Each of the products were available at the local drugstore chain - Rossmann or DM in Germany - for 2 EUR. each (actually Rossmann may have some even cheaper discounted rates). Given the results, it is also a more than smart investment.

Each of the masks has a special ingredient, besides the hyaluron. The first I used has chamomile extract, which is recommended for sensitive and very dry skin. It works slowly, without even noticing what happened in the last 15 minutes. You will only see when you look yourself in the mirror, at your shining skin. The next one has green tea extract, one of my favorite cosmetic - and food too - ingredients. It has a soothing and relaxing effect - as in the case of all skin masks, my advice is to keep it in the fridge for at least 2-3 hours before using it, as it has also a very refreshing effect. During every of the 15 minutes, I felt as my skin was under permanent water and was a very healthy sensation. The skin was so smooth thereafter, that I felt that I don't need to apply any makeup for the next days. The last mask, with pomegranate essence. Compared to the others, it also has a pleasant smell, as it contains special fragrance. Due to the high percentage of hyaluron, I was able to feel how it was working on my skin. It is very recommended particularly if your face is too tired and dehydrated. In the case of the previous two masks I prefer to clean the liquid from the face, but in this case, I just left it on the skin to work further on.

The conclusion: those products are high quality, with good effects on the skin, that last for at least a couple of days. You can easily take with you in your travel bag too. It is about time to start taking more care about yourself, but take it easy. You can start with just 15 minutes the week. 

Good luck and a happy healthy skin glowing 2017!

Smart housekeeping made easy

Books and consultancy services for decluttering or wisely organising the homes are becoming a new special category in the bookstores or job classifications, but how and why we have to do it is rarely going beyond the stereotypical level.

Yes, we need to have an organised house - who loves to look for hours after the keys or the last phone bill and found it only one month later when it is already too late - and yes, we are obsessed with gathering unuseful things, lured by the consumerist passion for collecting what's new not necessarily what's useful for the daily housekeeping.

Smart Housekeeping by Anne L. Watson is a realistic approach of a very popular topic. It is honest too, as it doesn't promise than from tomorrow on your house look like a feature in a glossy magazine. The basic assumption of the author: 'An organised house doesn't mean an empty house'. Thus, the reader and potential decluttering candidate is advice to have what he or she really need not what other people advice to have or not, on TV or elsewhere. Another aspect outline is that decluttering is not the cure for our obsessions, failures or even depressions. 'Where I differ with some is that I don't think possession are mostly to blame when I feel stressed'. And even more importantly: 'Reducing clutter and organizing your life can free you for more worthwhile pursuits. But you don't get a spiritual life just from discarding possessions, any more than from owning them. If spiritual fulfillment is what you're looking for, you need to find it elsewhere'. It is an approach I really appreciated and liked it, encouraging me to skip further to the practical ideas and steps. 

The step-by-step organisation of the house should be done by the person, based on what is needed or not for the daily chores or activities. Sometimes, finding the space for objects might be easier than just throwing them up. 

This book is for independent people, able to use their own mind and set their priorities, but in need of a good advice about how to improve the house management, step-by-step, one corner at a time. Smart Housekeeping is the intelligent answer tailored to a lot of practical approaches and I strongly recommend it to anyone whose NYE resolutions are to have a friendlier and clutter-free house.

Disclaimer: Book offered by the publisher in exchange for an honest review

Easy latkes recipe

To latkes or not to latkes...this was my question Saturday evening on the first day of Hanukkah - Jewish holidays start in the evening -, when I knew that for the next days all the food stores are closed and thus, most probably I cannot prepare a great deal of food for the next days. Relying on the welcoming invitations from friends is a great solution too, but I am stubborn enough to not accept that my Hanukkah will be latkes-less. Thus, yesterday morning, the cooking fever finally returned into my life and I decided that, among other recipes that I did - more updates in my next posts - I should also prepare for the lunch with baby D. and me some latkes. I made a short tour of my pantry and realized that, in fact, I had enough ingredients for a fresh portion of latkes. Because the baby D. is still quite sensitive to spices, I eliminated garlic or onions from the recipe, and had the following combination of ingredients:

7 small and medium potatoes, peeled and finelly grated
1/2 teaspoon salt
1 pinch of za'atar
2 small eggs beaten - one was enough also
15 gr. baking powder - it make the composition fluffy but it might leave a taste so you can easily forget about it
1 tablespoon margarine for a milky creamy taste and appearance
Mix well everything. Try to pour the extra water out by using a strainer.
Meanwhile, pour generously oil in the pan and wait to get warmer at around 250C. I used peanut oil because I tried to see how the final result comes out in terms of taste but it was not a big deal.

I preferred to fry in batches of three, leaving more space in the pan. The warm is easier distributed when there are not too many items frying. It resulted 9 small latkes, that I left to rest and get the oil out of it on a parchment paper. 

The entire preparation and frying process lasted around 45 minutes and although baby D. wasn't too keen to taste it - and it seems is his problem with latkes in general - I enjoyed my portion and the spirit of the holidays. 

Now, I wonder if I am brave enough to try some sufganiyot too. Why not? Given my passion for home made cook, a final - positive - decision may be only a matter of days, or rather hours.

Stuff every cook should know

'Wanting to cook is one of the best impulses that can wash over a person, but the path from desire to dinner is rarely a straight line'. As a novice cook - as I also used to be not that far away in time - I appreciated every single tip and idea, starting from how to cut an avocado or how to choose the best knife for meat. This book would not help you with the avocado part, but you will find plenty of advice about kitchen ware - knives included - cooking oils or how to conquer your fear of baking - seriously, is this issue properly addressed by serious therapists...if not, it should. You can use it as a 'crash course in fundamental home cooking' and even right now I consider myself on a higher cooking level - and no more under the spell of panic attacks when it comes to baking, I still discovered some inspiration. The naked truth is: 'every accomplished cook has many tales of recipes gone awry. Making mistakes is an integral part of the process of learning how to cook'.

There are many ideas that I liked and agreed with in this book. For instance, that you should not worry if your kitchen is small. How to keep in mind to check when looking for a cookbook if the recipes were tested before. Or when to use regular oil or virgin oil. How to choose the right meat or to properly master a weekly meal planning. Besides the cooking part, the aspects of cooking/kitchen management are brilliant too. One will learn about how to set up the home bar or to organise a party or how to plan your food budget without giving up quality.

Overall, a very useful book that you need to read it if you care about your kitchen knowledge. Strongly recommended!

Disclaimer: Book offered by the publisher in exchange for an honest review

Strawberry-banana-matcha detox smoothie

Ready to take a healthy break from the overwhelming delicious meals of this season? You may say that you have a lot of time to do it afterwards, or even that you were on a strict diet long time before the cooking spree started. It doesn't count. Right now, I am talking about a short healthy break in-between greasy, oily, but irresistible meals. I tried today to be as fast as possible, yet using healthy ingredients, as follows:

1 big banana

250 gr. fresh strawberries, halved

1 tablespoon matcha powder

250 ml. fresh water

Put into blender and mix at moderate speed for around 2 minutes.

His Highness the smoothie is ready. The preparation time is of maximum 5 minutes - if you are fast at cutting strawberries. It serves two. Before serving, I refrigerated for around 30 minutes.

My biggest pleasure in enjoying this smoothie was how the tastes so different of the ingredients melted together and created a completely new, refreshing and with a very modest sugar concentration. As the banana was quite ripe, I was expecting more sugar, but luckily it wasn't which made the tasting experience even more enjoyable. 

Overall, a pleasant experience to be repeated as soon and often as possible.

Now, time to go back to the table for more enjoyable feasts!

How to choose and take care of your knives

Photo taken at the KaDeWe store in Berlin

When I attended my first cooking class, two of the participants come with their own knives, carefully packed in elegant etuis. They explained that they can only cut the vegetables for preparing the dishes required for the class with their own knives as they are not only used with, but they are high-quality expensive items that are used to and need for outperforming the recipes. 

Later on, I faced myself the need of better knives, when had to cut veggies or meat in specific ways, particularly when it comes to small amounts for salads. 

Buying a knife or specific knives for specific kitchen chores as I would find out later as my kitchen experience advanced. 

Altough I accumulated a lot of knowledge about the choices, I am still far away from acquiring that dexterity of cutting at high speed and with special movements of the wrist. As for now, I am ready to share some of my knife tips for a better cook and awesome recipes:

- The knife should always be very sharp, thus, you need to sharpen it regularly. In order to evaluate the sharpness, you need to try slicing through a sheet of paper.

- One needs to clean the knife immediately after using. The rests of foods left on the metal can create corrosion which destroys it. It is also recommended to keep them in the special knifeblock, where the blade is fully protected.

- No compromise should be done regarding the quality. As in the case of everything, the cheaper you buy the lower the quality and, therefore, the results. 

- For every special kind of cooking, there are special knives - for vegetables, fish, meat etc. You may need a separate knife for slicing, dicing, chopping, mincing, bread, or for preparing your favourite sushi or sashimi. There are also special knives to slice squash, carve a melon, dice an onion or garlic or mince parsley. Thus, when you are looking for one, keep in mind to specify what is the destination of it. Used wrong, it can either destroy the knive or your recipe. Or both.

- When buying a knife, it is important to have the opportunity to see it and eventually, do some little exercises with it. Thus, it is not recommended to buy it online, as in this case you don't have the occasion to fully experience the handle and the object as such. You shall have the opportunity to weights it in your hands, balance it in the palm

- When you choose a knife, you need to find the right for you. The chef's knife should be like a dance partner, the natural extension of the hand, coordinating the movements and together following the recipe directions. 

- The normal size is of 8' inch. The 10-inch size can cute more volume but may look a bit intimidating. The weight of the knife depends of the user, as it should allow the hand to freely move and has the full ability to move and perform the kitchen duties.

- All the elements of the knife should be considered when shopping for one. For instance, the bolster - the meeting point between the blade and the handle. It is an element of stability and strength to the knife. The models with partial and no-bolster can sharpen the full length of the items. The heel is the broadest and thickest part of the edge, whose performance has effect on the level of precision. It helps, for example, to cut throughout the winter squash or the poultry. 

- One of the most famous trademarks of knives are the Japanese ones - particularly recommended for the fish, sushi or sashimi preparation and the German ones (Messermeister, Trizor and Wüsthof being one of the most appreciated brands).

What about you, what are your best tips for the perfect knife?

Food52: A New Way to Dinner

I am a big admirer of the Food52  network, for the way in which makes every step of the kitchen management and any recipe achievement just a matter of time. For someone like me, growing up with the deep feeling that I will never be able to bake or cook anything but fried eggs, it is an invaluable incentive that helped me to go through the challenges of managing almost successfully a house with children and regular hungry guests. 

The founders of the website, Amanda Hesser and Merrill Stubbs, kept up helping lost-in-the kitchen people like me. A New Way to Dinner aims at offering first-hand and long tested assistance to busy family - of four - for managing the chores and challenges of having every day something new, healthy and tasty on the plate. Scheduled as one-week seasonal menus, with ingredients that can be easily switched and combined to create new dishes, the recipes suggested are easy to make and require a minimal time investment. In addition, you are promised to save money on groceries and waste less food, improve the shopping and cooking habits. Sounds delish, isnt't it? The aim: 'Gone will be that nagging to-do anxiety about what you'll put together for dinner after work'. 

You are offered a weekly plan, with details about the time you need to spend in various days for cutting or cleaning the veggies or for the cooking per se. You have reheating directions, advice about how to store the veggies or meat, what kind of storage containers you need. 

The menus are meat-based, but most probably not impossible to substitute them with meatless variants.  Although the portions are aimed for a family of four, with a but of flexibility and imagination, the recipes can be extended or restrained for bigger or smaller households. 

As I am an instant lover of everything that aims to better organize and manage the time, I loved the book even more. However, there are also some of the recipes that I have in sight for the next days, so expect soon to read about applesauce cake with caramel icing, meatballs with onions and zucchini or watermelon puree. 

Strongly recommended to anyone interested in tasty dinners with a minimal time and financial investment.

Disclaimer: Book offered by the publisher in exchange for an honest review