We couldn’t wait more for playing snowball. It wasn’t only two of us who were joyous because of snow. Lots of people were out enjoying themselves with snow, they were playing snowball, making snowman, walking and even lying on snow.

We have already got used to living with snow and it’s not very likely to see people outside playing with snow these days. People are trying to escape from snow anow and they are rushing into their homes to have a cup of hot drink. It looks like they are bored of snow and they start to wait for sunny spring days! This is human nature, isn’t it?

This roasted chicken and veggies was made on such a snowy weekend. We love to cook inside when it’s rainy or snowy outside! This fantastic dish came out with what we had in the refrigerator. We had it with a large bowl of green salad.

Put chicken tighs and all vegetables except tomato and two green peppers in a large bowl.
Dissolve pepper paste with water in a bowl. Add 3 tbsp olive oil, salt, spices and flax seed in it.
Pour the mixture on chicken and vegetables. Rub them with your hand to coat each of them with the liquid mixture.
Preheat oven to 200C.
Transfer first chicken tighs into a baking dish. (Mine is a gift from Dilek, my sister-in-law. Would love to thank her from here!) Then add vegetables on tighs and pour any remained sauce over them.
Place tomato rings and two whole green peppers on the top randomly. And drizzle ½ tbsp olive oil on them.
Roast them in oven for 50 minutes. Enjoy!

Heat olive oil and add carrots, cabbage and leek in this order. Let them cook for a few minutes.

Mix pepper paste and water until smooth. Pour it into the pot and add boiled lentils. Cover the pot and cook it over low medium heat for about 20 minutes.

Pour lemon juice, add salt and black pepper and cook it for 10 minutes more until all vegetables are tender. You can add a little more water if it absorbs all water and needs some more.

Serve this stew hot accompanied by a bowl of yogurt.

So what are the health benefits of cabbage?
For one thing, it helps you keep fit or lose weight as it has very low calorie.
Cabbage is recommended to people with diabetes since it balances blood sugar.
Cabbage is like a hero for women because it removes cellulite. So eat enough cabbage in winter and look more beautiful in summer!
It cleans and refreshes skin and helps you look more beautiful.
Finally, it is protective against bowel cancer with the help of antioxidants it contains.

What do I cook with cabbage? I sometimes add some chopped cabbage into green salads. And here are some more suggestions:
Cabbage Stew
Stuffed Cabbage Rolls
Easy Pickled Cabbage

Soak bulgur and semolina with a little water and wait about 15 minutes. Mix them with a spoon. Break an egg in it. Add pepper paste, salt and spices and mix. Add flour and the rest of water little by little. Now combine them with your hands and knead it a little until it’s not sticky. You can play with the amount of water and flour to have this consistency.

Make balls as small as hazelnut and put them in a tray. Don’t pile them up in a bowl and sprinkle little water with your hand over them so that they don’t stick one another. Put them aside.

Heat olive oil in a pot. Add pepper paste and dried mint, stir. Pour 3 cups water and 1 cup meat broth. Add lemon juice and boil it. Add bulgur balls and boiled chickpeas when it boils and cook about 20 minutes.

Serve hot.

Drying lemon zest could have a similar effect in your kitchen. It is very easy to dry lemon zest at home. When you squeeze lemon for a dish, don’t waste the zest. Put them aside on a plate and wait for 2-3 days. You will see they start to dry and to curve on edges. Put them in oven and cook at 100C until golden. and pound them in a mortar until powder or the size you like. Hubby made this lovely colored dried lemon zest and he left them in the size of crumbled nuts. He said he wanted to feel them in mouth so he didn’t pound it a lot.

What can you do with dried lemon zest?

It’s up to your imagination and creativity, but to share some ideas, here are his suggestions:

• You can put a little in your herbal tea or fruit tea (check out our apple compote with lemon zest and cinnamon stick).
• You can add it into your cakes, cookies or breads.
• You can add some when boiling or ovenbaking chicken.
• To have a surprise ingredient in your salad, sprinkle some dried lemon zest on it.
• You can even prepare tasty salad dressings with these little cute yellow cubes.

Thanks to dokuzuncubulut for inspiration! Aslı Abla suggests using it in meat, chicken or fish marinade.

1)    I will try to save more time for my blog.
2)    I will prepare a list before grocery shopping.
3)    I will try not to eat until I take a few photos of the food when I visit a new place.
4)    I will try to be a better driver. I started driving in 2011 and I absolutely need to improve it.
5)    I will start swimming in the pool once or twice a week.
6)    I will try not to bring work to home, I will try to finish it at school.
7)    I will not postpone emptying the dishwasher!
8)    I will not stay in front of computer screen for a long time, I must have breaks more often.
9)    I will go to the ticket office at the beginning of each month so that I can find tickets for the plays.

Quite a lot, right? Hope I can achieve all these!

The picture above was taken on our way back. Although it is normally very cold and snowy in winter here, we haven’t experienced such kind of a weather yet. That’s why it was exciting for us to see this snowy landscape. Perfect for the start of the new year!

It was my first experience of a long distance driving, so this was another exciting part of my journey. Thanks a million to hubby as he is the best driving teacher for me! I got my driving licence years ago, but I wasn’t an active driver. He started to teach me how to drive in June and I believe I’ve made a great progress since then! My husband and I drove in turn; I was the driver for the first 2 hours and the last 1 hour of our journey, which lasted 7 hours of driving in total.

What do you need to dry apples? Apples in the amount you want, clean cloth and sun. Chop apples with their peels in the shapes you like, spread them on clean cloth and wait under sun until dried. You can dry them in the oven too, but I’m not sure if they have the same flavor.

The amount of water in apple shrinks when it is dried, but its health benefits are still there! Although it loses vitamin C, sundried apple is still rich in minerals, and it protects our body against free radicals. Its tea is recommended to diabetics as its sweetness is enough and you don’t need to add sugar. It is a good source of fiber and makes your digestive system happy.

An apple a day keeps the doctor away, right? Dried or fresh, no matter!

Compote is a kind of side dish in Turkish cuisine and it is absolutely served cold. As it is already cold outside, I thought it would be better to serve hot, just like a herbal tea. So this one is like a fruit tea indeed, based on dried apple. We had it in the form of tea, not as a side dish. Instead of having our regular black Turkish tea, we made this compote and accompanied it with some homemade biscuits –the recipe of which will be given soon.

We decorated our dried apple compote with a stick of cinnamon stick and crumbled dried lemon zest –husband’s addition. I will share how to make it later. The idea of the latter is from a great Turkish blog named dokuzuncubulut by Aslı Balakin. She always surprises me with her creative and unique dishes and ingredients. I’ve learnt a lot from her. Thank you Aslı Abla!

This compote is sugar free as we thought the sweetness of apple would be enough. And we loved it this way, but you can add a few tablespoons of sugar if you like it sweeter.

Boil chopped dried apple, water and one cinnamon stick together until apples rise and tender. It will get a little thicker then.

Share it into cups when it is still hot, put cinnamon sticks into each and sprinkle dried lemon zest on them and serve.

You can store the rest of it in refrigerator for a few days. Just heat it when you crave for a heartwarming and aromatic drink on these cold days.

You know how common nigella seeds and mahaleb (see sesame seeds with mahaleb) are in Turkish savory pastries.  They are like the main ingredients in such biscuits as they give the flavor. Using cinnamon is not as common though. For me, it completes the flavor. Considering the health benefits of cinnamon, I try to use it in various ways.

Sift flour in a bowl and add salt, cinnamon and mahaleb into it. Add dry yeast on it and pour warm milk on the yeast. Mix them.
Add olive oil, butter and egg white and mix them until combined. You will have a soft dough.
Roll it out on the counter and cut with your cookie cutters.
Preheat oven at 180C.
Lay baking sheet in your oven tray.
Place the biscuits you cut on it.
Beat egg yolk and brush biscuits with it. Sprinkle nigella seeds on each biscuit.
Bake for about 25 minutes until golden.
Cool biscuits on a wire rack and serve.
These make about 100 biscuits!

Take your fruit to your workplace. You can put one or two apples or a banana in your bag.

You can also put some dried fruit in a plastic bag and carry it with you. It is easy to carry and snack on them. It also helps you not to get hungry easily. Whenever you crave for something sweet, just eat a few dried apricots or grapes or your favorite dried fruit. You can add walnuts or almonds in the same bag to make your snack even more nutritious!

When you can’t have enough fruit during day, eat one of your favorite fruits 2 hours after your dinner when you’re home.

You can make a great dessert by mixing yogurt with your favorite fresh or dried fruits and have it after dinner. You can even have it as breakfast in the morning. It is a great start for the day as yogurt and fruits help your digestion system.

You can prepare a fruit salad as a dessert if you don’t like yogurt with fruit.

Don’t try to find any more excuses after these suggestions, eat fruit!

Some healthy recipe suggestions for fruits are as follows:

 Black Mulberry Yogurt Parfait

Fresh Fruit Salad

Kaki (Persimmon) Puree, The Saver