It's chanterelle season. And there's a tool for that.

And...I’m back. Last Friday marked the end of Miss Holly's two week visit, and she and I pretty much exhausted the list of things you can do in and around Oslo. We also had time to - gasp! - relax on her vacation. And go to Sweden! (More on Sweden soon. That was entertaining to say the least.) I guess that’s the benefit of a long vacation in a not-so-large city (only ~600,000 residents) as well as staying with the ‘locals’ (um, that would be us): see a little, chill a little, repeat.

One of the things we did while Holly was here was go mushroom hunting. You may be thinking that, since I am originally from the rainy, wet Pacific Northwest, I am a regular mushroom collector. I am not. In fact, the extent of my past mushroom collecting involved visiting the produce section of the local grocery store. So, when some German friends of ours invited us to go hunt for chanterelles (or kantareller, in Norwegian), we said, yes, yes we can. There were nine of us that went which seemed a little crazy at first, but we quickly spread out near Songsvann, a nearby lake, and hunted.

Now, I cook. A lot. So, I was pretty sure what a chanterelle looked like. Pretty, soft, and kinda orangey-yellow. I am here to tell you that’s the grocery store experience. In the forest, all bets were off. They call it hunting for a reason. In the first hour, I had seen so many mushrooms and had no idea what they were, but none of them were chanterelles. Which was pretty much okay with me because of the awesome wild blueberries and raspberries.


For example, this is not a chanterelle:

These, however, are wild raspberries (I was blurry with excitement.):

And then I spied a slew of mushrooms on an arid hillside. Could it be? Yes it could. It turned out I had found the elusive chanterelles!

After that, people began to find a bunch, but I only found a few more. For me, tromping through the woods was just as enjoyable. It was so quiet and peaceful, and really made me miss hiking in the Cascades. I will assume G felt the same way, although I swear he was also hunting for trolls.

After a few more hours we headed back to our friends' house where we cleaned and sorted the mushrooms and drank some wine while two of the guys made dinner – quiche and crepes:

They took their crepe making very seriously, which was fun to watch.

Note to self: this is a rødskrubb. Turns blue when cut. Edible when cooked. Funky. Check for worms first.

It was a long day, but the end result was great. We had a tasty dinner with friends, good conversation, and a fun story to add to our Norwegian adventures. 

A few days later, I paid tribute to our fun outing by shopping, of course. Seriously, what would a new culinary pursuit be without adding a new tool to the toolbox? Come on, did you really expect me to pass up the opportunity to own a mushroom knife, complete with brush and metric ruler? I think not.

Ladies and gentlemen, we have kale.

Beklager for my absence. My friend Holly C is visiting for a couple of weeks from Seattle and I am giving her the full Norwegian experience (well, as much as an ex-pat in Norway can). For me, that includes visiting several grocery stores and ogling the plastic-wrapped produce and shelves of Leverpostei. Normally these days I buy the vast majority of our fruits and vegetables at the local ethnic food markets like this one:

But I made an exception today. Why? Because as Holly and I were wandering through the produce section I found this:

This, my friends, is what I believe to be kale. If you remember from this post, I could not find chard. I should have also posted that I couldn't find kale, but I kind of lump them in together. I love chard. I mean, if you've had chard enchiladas, you would love chard too. I will accept kale in place of chard for now. Holly will attest that, upon seeing this in the produce aisle, I gasped and snatched it off the shelf as though it was the last Elmo doll and it was 1998. Seriously excited.

I don't know what we'll make with it right now, but I don't care. I have it in my fridge and that's what matters. Happy day.

We now return to our regularly scheduled programming.

I am back. Back from Paris and Bergen and Crete and Stockholm and Seattle. The good news is I have many stories and photos to share with you. The bad news is I have 182 other things I need to do, including this:

G and I just returned from a 3-week visit to Seattle (well, my 3 weeks and his 2, but det er det, my norsk-speaking friends), and suffice it to say we have a lot of unpacking to do. This is just the content of 1.5 bags. I'll just say we may or may not have exactly hit the weight limit on three of the four bags we checked. Public transportation and 200+ pounds of luggage. Now that's a good time!

Given my state of jetlaggedness, the only thing I feel qualified to blog about at this point is the list of random thoughts bouncing between my synapses right now. Lucky you. I am apologizing in advance.

God bless the inventor of Space Bags. I am sure I will be cursing them when I start ironing all of the clothes that have been trapped in them in our luggage for 24 hours, but for now, god bless 'em. Otherwise half our clothes would still be in Seattle.

It is okay to purchase large quantities of toiletries and other awesomeness that are unavailable in Norway (such as real Q-tips and decent hair conditioner that doesn't cost $65/kr 360 a bottle) and stuff your suitcases full of them. Well, at least in my head.

It's been 24 hours and I already miss Whole Foods. Why? Here is a a shot of about 1/10 of the Whole Foods' produce department near my old home in the States:

This is probably the size of the entire produce section of my local grocery store. And that is all I am going to say about that. Excuse me while I go cry on my $8 plastic-wrapped yellow pepper.

I am going to keep myself sane for the next week by alternating between Excedrin during the day and Melatonin at night. Because I am sure that forcing my body by using drugs to regulate to GMT +1 is the best approach.

Super happy to have been in Seattle and seen friends and family and Jessi the incredible personal stylist at the downtown Seattle Nordstrom and Brandi Carlile in concert and more importantly the other Brandi in my life get married to Mr. Jones. And Ziggy and Murphy the cats. Them too.

Here's hoping you have a fabulous, jetlaggedless day,

Colleen