Happy Valentine's Day!

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And more importantly: HAPPY GALENTINE'S DAY!

© Text & Photos - Annika - All The Live Long Day (unless otherwise stated).

Pawnee is the Opposite of Hip

I've been waiting to watch Parks & Recreation for such a long time that it might have easily been a huge disappointment, with the weight of all the expectations I had of it hanging over its head. But turns out I love it! Now it's showing both on Netflix and on the BBC, and I have been power-watching. I'm currently well into series 3. The show doesn't offer a loud, ha-ha kind of humor, but I am often chuckling away while I'm watching it. All the characters are quirky and quite loveable in all their strange, wacky ways.
One of my favourite scenes (out of many) is this one, in which Amy Poehler is just brilliant as Leslie Knope, bringing up all kinds of stereotypically female answers while trying to explain why she allegedly shot her boss Ron Swanson in the head:

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What about you? Do you like Parks And Recreation? Who's your favourite character? What's your favourite show to watch? Do you get as obsessive over box sets or Netflix as I do? Tell me about it!

Fictional Fancies

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May I please invite you to click along to Chocolate & Cream Cake, where Mandy is letting me gush over Twin Peaks' Agent Cooper. Cause that cherry pie is worth a stop!
  © Text & Photos - Annika - All The Live Long Day (unless otherwise stated).  

Banana Ketchup

 

Usually, when I watch Man V Food, it just makes me feel like I want to move to the States and stuff my face with ridiculously high stacks of ridiculously bad-for-me food. Sometimes, it inspires me to recreate said food in my own kitchen. (If you have never heard of this show, I encourage you to spend a little time watching these videos before you read on...)

Like the time when I watched the episode in which Adam Richman goes to The Black Sheep in Richmond, VA. There, he eats a 2-foot-long sandwich with jerk chicken, cole slaw and banana ketchup. 

Hang on. BANANA ketchup? I had never heard of that before. Sounds interesting. Adam describes it as a mixture of bananas, brown sugar, soy sauce, rum and jerk seasoning. I want it. And I just so happen to have a bunch of lovely brown bananas in the fruit bowl that realistically will probably not be eaten by anybody anymore in the state they are in.

So, a quick googling spree for banana ketchup inspiration later, I have moved from my sofa to my kitchen and am standing over a hot pot, stirring a spicy fragrant banana mush.

The end result turned out really tasty. It is indeed good on a chicken sandwich, as well as with grilled meats or as a fiery partner to homemade fries. You can control the level of spiciness by choosing chillies that are the right hotness for your taste buds. Here is my recipe:

BANANA KETCHUP (makes about 500 ml)

NEED:

2 tbsp olive oil

1 large onion, roughly chopped

salt

3 garlic cloves, minced

3 red chillies, roughly chopped

thumb-sized piece of ginger, grated

1 tsp coriander seeds

5 cloves

1 cinnamon stick

1/2 tsp black pepper

1 tsp allspice, ground

1/4 tsp nutmeg, ground

1/2 cup dark brown sugar

1/4 cup cider vinegar

1/3 cup dark rum

1 tbsp dark soy sauce

5 overripe bananas, mashed

1 lemon, juice & zest

1 lime, juice & zest

1 tsp dried thyme

1 bay leave

DO:

Heat the oil in a medium pot. Add the onions and a little bit of salt and sweat them over a medium heat until they turn soft and translucent, about 10 minutes. Add the garlic, chillies, ginger and dried spices and fry over a low heat for about a minute, stirring all the time, until the mix starts to give off a fragrant smell.

Add sugar, vinegar, rum, soy sauce, bananas and the citrus and herbs. Stir well and bring to a boil. Cover and let simmer over a low heat for about an hour. Stir from time to time to check nothing is burning.

Remove from heat. Fish out the cinnamon stick and the bay leave and discard . Blend the rest of the liquid to a fine sauce. I used my immersion blender for this directly in the pot, but you could also transfer the ketchup to a blender with a glass jug. Be very careful, though, as the liquid will be very hot.

Fill your ketchup into a suitable vessel using a funnel (I re-used a squeezy ketchup bottle that I cleaned with hot water and soap) and let cool. The ketchup will keep for a few weeks in the fridge.

  © Text & Photos - Annika - All The Live Long Day (unless otherwise stated).

Strictly Exciting

Do you know what my favourite thing about fall is? No, not the colour of the changing leaves. Not the fresh crisp air in the morning. Not the fact that hot chocolates are good to drink again. No! Every September, I eagerly wait for the start of a new series of Strictly Come Dancing (which is like Dancing With The Stars, for you overseas readers). I just love cuddling up on the sofa on weekend nights and let the old school type entertainment fluff my brain. A live band, a national treasure of a presenter, ballroom dancing and glittering outfits are truly my kind of a good time. 
This year's celebrity contestants have just been announced, and I actually know quite a few of them. Which either means I have lived in the UK entirely too long or that the quality of stars is actually getting better.
Without having seen her dancing abilities, Victoria Pendleton (Champion British track cyclist) is going to be my favored participant for the time being, and that's because I quite like her personality. And also because my secret plan to get on Strictly myself has always been to become a cycle racer and to be invited on the show after my retirement. So Victoria, you are giving me hope that my plan might actually work!
The BBC has given each of the celebrities a set of questions to answer for the viewers to get to know them a bit better. This is what they were asked: What's your earliest memory? What would you do if you were invisible for a day? What's your ultimate fancy dress outfit? If you could dance with anybody, past and present, who would it be? What's your biggest indulgence?
These are my favourite answers:

And just for fun, I though about what I would have answered (practising for my own Strictly experience, you know...): What's your earliest memory?
I think it might be when I was alone in the house for a moment when I was maybe 5 and got my head stuck between the rungs of the banister. I do not know what I was trying to achieve by sticking it through there in the first place, but we were living in the top part of a house with our landlady down the exact staircase I was stuck in, and I remember being horrified that either the lady or my parents would come back inside and scold me for being so stupid. Luckily I got myself unstuck again and nobody noticed.
What would you do if you were invisible for a day? 
There is this huge old villa near at the end of the street I grew up on, and I always wondered what it looked like inside. If I was invisible, I would sneak in somewhere and have a good look around.

What's your ultimate fancy dress outfit?

I don't dress up very often, but the costume I liked most in my life was when I put on a potato sack and went as Annika (from Pippi Longstocking. Genius, right?!)

If you could dance with anybody, past and present, who would it be? 
Gene Kelly. No doubt. He is grace and charme personified.
What's your biggest indulgence?
Probably going out to eat in really, really fancy restaurants (Michelin-star-kind-of-fancy) from time to time.

How about you guys? Want to let me know in a comment?

Last, but not least, I am also looking forward to the professional dancers, especially James and Ola Jordan, the show's sexy-as-hell power couple. I think I might have a crush on both of them. Don't judge.

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Rawr! Bring on the sequins!
© Text & Photos - Annika - All The Live Long Day (unless otherwise stated).

Technology Loop

I finally signed up for Netflix and the first thing I started watching was Portlandia, which I've been wanting to do forever! I loved the show 10 minutes in, I can so relate to 90s nostalgia and chicken provenance. But what hit home most was the following scene. I feel like that a lot!

 
 © Text & Photos - Annika - All The Live Long Day (unless otherwise stated).

Fine Tuning: Barenaked Ladies - The Big Bang Theory

The new season of The Big Bang Theory has just started over here. Which means that I finally have new episodes to watch. Once, or twice. Maybe three times if I have nothing better to do. I like this show!
When I first tuned into it, I knew I would enjoy the show even before the opening credits were done. The theme song is by Barenaked Ladies! They just published a video for it this year, which was filmed on set. 
Enjoy!

© Text & Photos - Annika - All The Live Long Day (unless otherwise stated).

My Childhood Crush

I was never big on boy bands when I was a teen. New Kids On The Block left me cold. Nor did I ever like anyone from 21 Jump Street or the young Baywatch studs. Nope. When I was 13 through to 14, I had a major crush on Richard Dean Anderson. In his MacGyver persona. He was rugged, he was smart, he was cute. He was able to stop chemical leaks with a bar of chocolate. I was in love. I saw me and this 40-year-old man going places.

I religiously watched every episode and the worst thing my parents could do when I had misbehaved was put a TV ban on me. Here's the intro to the show, if you do not know what I am talking about. I can still hum the whole theme song...

I spent hours in the backyard, honing my wilderness skills and made my friends re-enact episodes with me. I also had a MacGyver scrapbook. Anything I could find on Ricky Dean (apparently his friends call him that) went in there. Do you see the white Nike hightops he's wearing? I had a pair, too!

I wrote a small biography from all the intelligence I had gathered. I especially liked the fact that the man had a dog called Whiskey and counted diving, ice hockey and motorbikes amongst his favourite pastimes. And that he was single! The massive age gap did not concern me at all. I am liberal like that.

     

I mean, would you look at that! Wearing a muscle shirt and a crooked smile. On the Harley with his tux. Playing the guitar and walking his dog. This is a man who's fit, fun and sensitive!

The pride of my collection was a photocopy of this article that a friend of mine had been given. It came from the States and was in English, and thus had an air of utmost authenticity. It explained all about the science facts behind the show, which I found fascinating. I spent a lot of time with a dictionary translating, so I could read it.

I also spend a really long time on a pencil drawing of this man's portrait, with one of my numerous MacGyver posters as a model. When I was done, I sent that to his contact address in LA. I was hoping Ricky Dean would see it, be amazed by my boundless talent and love for him and come visit me in Germany. Never happened. But I was sent this autograph card, which was kind of cool.

I meticulously assembled a log of all the shows, using cuttings from the TV guide. I also wrote in to the TV station, asking for a complete list of shows, which they actually supplied. I thought that was amazing. Did you know that a lot of the show was filmed in Vancouver? Yes, I guess I have come full circle on this...

After a while, I must have grown up a bit and started being more interested in real boys. But I truly think that Richard Dean Anderson was my first love. I credit him with my interest in DIY and my love of the outdoors and far-off places. And my family and husband are ever so grateful for the limitless tease-potential my affair of the heart has given them.

If you want to borrow my MacGyver box set you're out of luck. I am not sharing! But do tell me if you had any similar obsessions as a kid!




P.S.: 
Dear Mr Anderson. 
If you're reading this. Is Whiskey still around? Did you ever see my drawing? Let's grab drinks some time, okay? For old times sakes. We could even talk Stargate if you wanted. Or General Hospital, if it can't be avoided... 
Sincerely, 
Your #1 Fan! 
(Mwah!)
© Text & Photos - Annika - All The Live Long Day (unless otherwise stated).