Friday Photo - Chillin' Frog

Last summer I spent a glorious, sunny, sparkly day taking pictures of everything I loved at the cottage.  Our cottage is on an island, so I walked around the island taking photos and ended up taking over 400 pictures in one day.  This little frog was nestled in the perfect little puddle on a rock on the far side of the island.  For no particular reason, this is the picture I selected for my Friday Photo.

Have a chillin' weekend!

Culinary Adventures Around the World - Norway

Today I decided to re-visit one of our favourite dishes from the around-the-world cooking adventure - fiskesuppe from Norway.  If any of you are Norwegian I would suggest that you leave right now and read another blog, as I'm sure my version of fiskesuppe and the one your mother made are not even close.  In case you are curious about our cooking adventure, you can read about it here and about the last country we visited here.

The ingredient list for fiskesuppe calls for two vegetables I had never bought before - and frankly, between you and me, I can see why.  They are the UGLIEST VEGETABLES IN THE WORLD.  Have a look at celeriac (also called celery root):

Really, only its mother could love that vegetable.  It has a serious image problem.  And how about this one:

Parsley root - slightly more appealing than celery root, but it still looks like an anemic carrot.  

Now that you have got over the shock of how ugly the ingredients are, we can get on with the recipe.  I have put my editorial comments and adjustments in blue.  I found the broth, in the original recipe, a little thin so I added one extra tablespoon of flour and reduced the liquids.

Ingredients:

4 cups (1 litre) seafood stock or fish bouillons (I used 4 cups water and 4 teaspoons chicken bouillon - chicken is pretty close to fish, right???)

2 bay leaves

2-3 carrots, chopped

2 stocks celery, chopped

1/2 celery root, peeled and chopped

1 parsley root, peeled and chopped

3/4 cup green onions (I didn't have any, so I didn't use this)

1/2 cup chopped onion

1 tablespoon red wine vinegar (I only had cider vinegar, so I used that)

1 teaspoon sugar

5.3 ounces (150 grams ) tilapia fillet or other fish

5.3 ounces (150 grams ) salmon fillet

5.3 ounces (150 grams ) shrimp (forgot to buy both the salmon and shrimp so I didn't use any this time, but I did the first time - nice but not necessary)

5.3 ounces (150 grams ) cod fillet (unfortunately, there's no cod left in the ocean, so I omitted it)

Note: 600 grams of seafood seemed like a lot to me so I only used about 200 grams of tilapia and 200 grams of sole and it was plenty

salt and pepper to taste

3 tablespoons flour 

1 1/2 cups (1/3 litre) cream (I used skim milk, because that is just how I cook)

Preparation:

Bring water/bouillon/stock and bay leaves to boil in stock pot.

Add vegetables and cook for 5 minutes.

Cut fish into smaller pieces and add to pot.

Bring to a boil again and turn down heat to simmer.

Add vinegar, sugar, salt, and pepper.

Stir flour into cream/milk and add mixture gradually while simmering.

Remove bay leaves and serve.

Enjoy fiskesuppe.  

Enjoy saying fiskesuppe.

Fiskesuppe, fiskesuppe, fiskesuppe, fiskesuppe...

Framing Albumens

We love our albumens and have taken special care in framing them. Since they are so old, it almost seems like we are their guardians and it is our duty to preserve them for the future.

Framing albumen photographs can be a little bit more challenging than framing regular black-and-white photographs, because they are very susceptible to light damage. We had them framed with special museum-quality glass and have taken care to hang them in locations that do not get direct light.  

The colour variation in the albumens also sometimes made it tricky to decide on the mats and frames. 

They range from brownish -

 

  to grayish-

and sometimes even yellowish, if they have had some sun damage.

These albumens (below) are side-by-side and you can see that the ones on the left are more gray in colour and the ones on the right are more yellowish-brown in colour.

This variation in colour led to some challenges in choosing matting and frame colours.  We also wanted to have some variety in the frames we chose - I mean if your are going to have lots of photos around the house, you don't want them all framed the same.

Here is a sampling of the mats and frames we put with the albumens.

We sometimes chose a neutral cream with a green undertone for the mat and put a platinum (between gold and silver in colour) frame with it.

We also framed some with cream mats and a wood frame.

 For others we chose a medium brown mat with a dark brown frame.

Others we chose a goldish colour mat with a gold twist frame.

Still others we just put in off-the-shelf frames, no mats, as we wanted them to be small in size since they were to go in the powder room.  We did have the glass replaced with museum-quality glass to preserve the albumens.

Which one is your favourite?

The Grand Tour

While there are many reasons we love our albumens, one of them is that we have purchased photographs that are meaningful to us.  

You can find albumen photographs from places all around the world but we have selected to only purchase ones from two of the favourite countries we have visited - Britain and Egypt.  We haven't been to all the exact locations that we have albumens for, but we have been to a few.  Hubby and I have plans to go on a grand tour one day, visiting all the rest of them.

Just for the record, these are the ones we have visited so far:

Karnak, Egypt

Me at Karnak, although a different part than our albumen picture (1986)

Parliament Buildings (upper) and 
old London Bridge (lower)

William and myself by the Parliament Buildings in London (2002)

Lake District (upper) and
Salisbury Cathedral (lower)

Me in the cloister at Salisbury Cathedral (2003)

There are still many more albumen spots to visit, which sounds like fun to me!

Albumens

Many years ago we were searching for something to put on our walls.  We wanted something that was:

• meaningful to us
• beautiful
• not expensive
• an original piece of art

It seemed like a tall order, especially the "not expensive" part.  I originally thought about black-and-white photographs as hubby and I both like them.  I started hunting around on eBay for some and that is how I discovered albumens.

Albumens, as it turned out, were the perfect combination of photography and history, which my husband and I both love. They are a method of developing photographs that used the albumen in egg whites (along with salt and silver nitrate) to bind the photographic chemicals to the paper.  It was invented in 1850 and became popular in the 1860 - 1890s.  In fact, most 19th century photographs are albumens.   

We decided to limit our search to photographs of countries we had visited so that there was a personal connection. 

The thing I like most about albumens is looking at the little details, especially the people and vehicles.  In the picture below of the old London Bridge, you can see horses pulling carts of hay and a little sailing boat on the Thames.

They seem to vary quite a bit in colour - ranging from brown to gray and sometimes with yellowish tinges, if they have light damage.  They are extremely susceptible to the effects of light and oxygen, and as a result, many are faded with reduced contrast.

As with any photography, there are famous artists whose art is more highly valued than others.  Most of our albumens are unsigned but the three doors, we have in the living room, are by the three most famous albumen photographers.

I love the details on the doors - to think they were that old and worn in the 19th century.  A friend saw one of the door photos and recognized it - turns out his parents were married in that church.

St. Edmund's, Wootton, Isle of Wight

1870s by Frith

 

Barfreston, Kent
1870s by G. W. Wilson

St. Mary's, Iffley, Oxon
1870s by J. Valentine

I'll leave you with one last photo of our family room albumen.  I had this Egyptian albumen framed for my husband when he finished writing his books, so it has special memories for us.

Linked to Vintage Thingies at Coloradolady 
and Sepia Saturday.