Silversea Water Cooler: Part 3, Welcome!

[UKCruiseJeff]

Welcome home Spins ...... place is ready and dusted.

 

JP ..... Prague ..... looking forward to the pics of Chris and you with lager and pils etc.

[Camillus112]

Jeff, save the Piña Colada Muffin for me!!

 

Spins, how wonderful you are out to sea again. Just a few steps on land... and then, splash! I particularly like the Spirit, but now I read in another thread that the plans are to "stretch" it (?) to make it more like the Muse. Heard anything?

[UKCruiseJeff]

Baked bream today just going into the oven ... will be with Jersey Royals and some peas ....

 

 

 

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[mysty]

Greetings Coolers! Rainy, yucky day today. However, our snow is gone!

 

J....mmmmmmuffins! Delectable!!!

 

Spins...safe travels home!

 

Cam...we may have to arm wrestle for the pina colada muffins. :)

 

JP...we love stir frys (or should that be stir fries). Yours sounds great!

 

A few more pics from our last adventure:

 

I love clouds!

 

 

And here is the Wind in Porto Mahon, Spain:

 

 

Sailing into Marseilles:

 

 

Interesting wall in St. Remy de Provence:

 

 

Have a great day all!

[mysty]

J...that bream looks superb! Enjoy!

[UKCruiseJeff]

Lovely pics M!

 

I'm going to use coconut and some rum, but I wonder what I can do about the cola bit? Substitute more rum ...... any suggestions welcome. Perhaps muscovy sugar might do?

[Camillus112]

Jeff, are you referring to the PC muffin? Of course you are pulling our leg, but "colada" means "strained", so you need strained fresh pineapple... and certainly more rum!!

[UKCruiseJeff]

Perhaps I was being too ambitious!

 

Still I'll do other muffins!

 

Today ....

 

 

 

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[jpalbny]

Yummy lunch, Jeff. I'll have my leftover eggplant in a few hours.

 

Mysty, your pictures are beautiful! Makes me want to do another Med cruise. Our last one was 2014, but that was Eastern Med. I think the last Western Med cruise was in 2012. Ever since we started doing river cruises we've been focusing on Germany and the surrounding areas. Too many beautiful places to see.

 

Speaking of food pics, there's a thread in the river cruising boards about a current Crystal sailing. The Crystal cruisers are a different breed, but the food pics that are on that thread sure look tasty!

 

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[mysty]

Thanks J and JP! The ports were new to us and it was great fun exploring them on our own!

 

JP...your river cruise blog is awesome. I have to catch up on the trip now. Internet was awful on our adventure.

[TLCOhio]

Dreaded packing begun. Posted yesterday to cooler, but it vanished. Internet is not good.

I have been keeping up with the Coolers.

 

Appreciate these wonderful pictures, comments and follow-ups. Love the muffin before and AFTER!! Cute!! Lots of nice food visuals. Makes me hungry. Congratulations to Spins and team for their excellent trivia success. Love Barcelona and it should be interesting what they see and pick up in their port as the Muse docks there tomorrow

 

For us, the “Silver Box” from Silversea arrived this morning at home via UPS Express. It was shipped from Italy!! Seems that it arrived earlier than “normal” and came directly to us, not to our travel agent. As I vaguely re-call, thought this "box" arrived about a month out. Reactions as to getting it now for being early or normal? Miss the "good old days" with the baggage tags that were the very nice red leather. But, these work out OK, too. It is now seven weeks till we fly to Lisbon on June 9 and 54 days till we do our Silver Spirit sail-away on June 14 to go up that Atlantic Coast to Rouen, France.

 

THANKS! Enjoy! Terry in Ohio

 

AFRICA?!!?: Lots of interesting and dramatic pictures can be seen from this live/blog at:

www.boards.cruisecritic.com/showthread.php?t=2310337

Now at 31,345 views for this visual sharing including Cape Town, along South Africa’s coast, Mozambique, Victoria Falls/Zambia and Botswana's famed Okavango Delta area.

[spinnaker2]

O my...food looks great.

 

I think I will be skipping any food once we get home.

 

But perhaps just a little wine...[emoji48]

[UKCruiseJeff]

Good afternoon Coolers,

 

Safe travel home spins ..

 

Today was Cypriot sheftalia ......and boite de vin rouge ..

 

 

 

 

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[Camillus112]

Welcome back to the Cooler chat bar, Spins! Great you will keep visiting the Spirit in 2018. Enjoy your time back home.

[Camillus112]

Good day and good looking/tasting food, Jeff. Never had it, are those breaded lamb chunks?

[TLCOhio]

Good afternoon Coolers, Safe travel home spins .. Today was Cypriot sheftalia ......and boite de vin rouge .

 

Wonderful food pictures from Jeff. Super tasty!!?? Yes, safe travels home for Spins. Now, back to the shocking culture with the "real world" and not having a big, excellent staff to satisfy your needs.

 

Any predictions today from Jeff as to how the the French Presidential run-off will happen tomorrow? The top two finishers? Updates on the quickly upcoming UK election set for June 8? Just read in the Telegraph "polls that indicate she could win a huge Tory majority in Parliament." Does that sound accurate for right now?

 

THANKS! Enjoy! Terry in Ohio

 

From our Jan. 25-Feb. 20, 2015, Amazon River-Caribbean adventure that started in Barbados, here is the link for that live/blog. Many visuals from this amazing river and Caribbean Islands (Dutch ABC's, St. Barts, Dominica, Grenada, etc.):

www.boards.cruisecritic.com/showthread.php?t=2157696

Now at 50,182 views for these postings.

[UKCruiseJeff]

Good day and good looking/tasting food, Jeff. Never had it, are those breaded lamb chunks?

 

Hi Camels,

 

Blitzed red onion, cinnamon, garlic, chilli, white pepper, fresh mint, oregano, parsley stalks, celery salt, tablespoon of tomato paste and a little sugar into a paste and mixed with a course lamb and pork mince mix and shaped into little sausage shapes and grilled.

 

https://www.google.co.uk/search?q=sheftalia&client=firefox-b&source=lnms&tbm=isch&sa=X&ved=0ahUKEwjt74qcnLjTAhUhM8AKHcI0DOYQ_AUICCgB&biw=1280&bih=617

 

They are a Cypriot dish often served on the street in pitta with salad. A lovely smell in the kitchen whilst they are cooking.

[UKCruiseJeff]

Mocca and walnut chocolate chip muffins.

 

 

 

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[Camillus112]

Oh, Jeff, I would absolutely love this dish. Thanks for the link. I may get DH enthusiastic enough to try it with me. And then, of course, the muffin.... Yummm.

[UKCruiseJeff]

Oh, Jeff, I would absolutely love this dish. Thanks for the link. I may get DH enthusiastic enough to try it with me. And then, of course, the muffin.... Yummm.

 

Hope you try it. It's one of my favourite dishes. I prefer mince meat kebabs / kofte to ordinary meat kebabs (except satay) because you can introduce flavour and it's never tough. I love all kofte and flat bread.

 

On one of our early visits to Paphos we use to go and sit in a place that just did meat and salad (with lemon juice) in pitta. They cooked over charcoal. Mum did thensalad and assembly, dad the grilling and the kids served. They only made lamb or sheftalia or mixed and it was either frozen Keo beer or cola. We use to go to Cyprus often for work and pleasure and I use to go there every day when there and eventually the kids who served us grew up and opened a restaurant and the kebab place closed. The magic was gone but that sheftalia stays in the memory as though it were yesterday. I once reassured wifey that if all else went wrong with our lives I'd buy her a bucket and she would thread marinaded kebabs and sheftalia onto skewers and I'd take up smoking (they always have a ciggy sticking out of their mouth) buy myself a string vest and grill shetalia over charcoal and make flatbreads. What I always make is basically the same as we had all those years ago and exactly as I remember it.

 

If you aren't shopping at a butchers and are buying pre-packed then you can dispense with the pork and just use lamb. Around 400 - 500gm of meat for two ...... and it can get to be a bit sloppy and so I add some dried bought breadcrumbs until they keep their shape. The breadcrumbs also hold some of the juice that would get lost so in a way it adds flavour.

 

Sylvia Moy .... an unknown lady who gave us some memorable music.

 

https://www.thetimes.co.uk/article/sylvia-moy-7q62f57rj?shareToken=0fc2c1c0591ce8f80de7d0630fd8b96e

[Camillus112]

Wow, thanks for all recommendations. I'll let you know when cooking happens. Like you, I feel that food is one of the best memory triggers, especially when good food triggers happy memories. And it can run in reverse. At a very strict private school, I was forced to drink a broth with grainy chickpeas they called soup, and to this date I associate chickpeas with the monitored lunch experience. I love hummus, however, because I don't get to see the chickpeas.

[ShotsnCruises]

Well Coolers, after clearing massive amounts of fence lines, I was exhausted but managed to crank out this pizza. I may not have the oven, but this was my best attempt yet.

 

 

 

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[UKCruiseJeff]

That pizza looks extraordinary Shots.

 

Not just that topping but a lot of ingenuity went into cranking up the heat to get that leoparding.

 

Very impressive .... :)

[ShotsnCruises]

Thanks Jeff! I was inspired by your dough technique. This crust sat in the fridge for 27 hours. I made a second that I plan to use Friday. I will see if we can tell the difference. My oven goes to 545F which wasn't quite hot enough, but I did the crust alone for a few minutes, then added the toppings and finished under the broiler. It was great! 5 cheeses and pepperoni. Nothing fancy for toppings but tasted good. I always make my own sauce, as I find most jarred or take out places have too much sugar and an unpleasant sweetness to their sauces. Mine is garlic, and Italian dried herbs.

 

 

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[UKCruiseJeff]

Shots, that was a lovely pizza .... I guess it was around eight to ten minutes or so?

 

If you have a cast iron griddle with one side flat and your happy to have pizza roughly the shape of the griddle then putting a griddle into the oven to warm for as long as you can might give yo a fair advantage.

 

I have found a supply of perfect rustic chopped passata which I mix with chopped up fresh basil (I keep some growing on the window ledge) some dried oregano, some garlic salt and black pepper. My current dough is over three weeks old and it's perfect. It really pays off to let it slowly mature in the fridge. And of course ... it pays off if you can not go anywhere near a rolling pin as you'll be flattening all those precious baby air bubbles. Pull and stretch as Dr Ruth might have said .... and I think you may have used one on that pizza you naughty person ... :) Practice!

 

I know I go on about it, but making space in the fridge and always having a few dough balls waiting for a spontaneous pizza really is a life changer. You are basically having available a pizza that is much much better than you can buy at virtually no prep or trouble. It is a liberating experience ar 02;20 am .....