and just like that - the snow came back!

yep - so far - a totally normal winter. we get some snow, it melts and goes away for a day or two and then we get some more snow.

this snow will be around for another day or two as it is abnormally cold for this time of year - it's -6C (about 22F) and it is going down to -9C (about 19F) overnight. but then we are back to normal temps and the snow should melt. but who knows? sometimes we get staying snow all winter, and other times we have no snow in mid-feb. snow is not a real problem for us as if we are snowed in, then we are snowed in and fully-stocked. our problem in the winter is wind storms as they are the things that wreak havoc, knock out power lines, shake the whole house, etc. jambaloney has to constantly check the pump, check the generator, run the kerosene heater and a whole pile of other jobs during the bad windstorms. we are finally getting used to the wind storms here.

but on a cold bright day, some pumpkin pureed soup will make you feel better and fill you up!

i start the soup by putting a big glump of EVOO in a pot and then add onion, carrot and celery. this is only to get their flavours. once they have browned i add 1 pint of homemade pumpkin puree and 1 pint of homemade veg/bone broth. i let that heat almost to a boil, then lower the heat and add about half a can of coconut milk. let the coconut milk melt into the soup slowly and heat it slowly. then i fish out the celery, onion and carrot. normally when serving i will sprinkle pumpkin seeds in the soup but decided to go with toasted sesame seeds that i had made earlier to have with a stirfry. they were already toasted and ready to go - so why not? and they added a lovely flavour and crunch to the soup. and jam always adds a dollop of his homemade hotsauce.

what is the best thing about fresh, healthy snow? adding a handfull of it to your water - yummeh!

it makes your water super cold and Harry, PP, and Ed - there is no need for any of you to mention in the comments not to use the yellow snow. beat you to it!

kids - what is it about january that makes me crave soya sauce and wasabi? and sushi? and wontons? and potstickers? i don't know but it happens every single january since we moved here. back in ottawa we had 20,000 different restaurants to chose from. here - we gotta make it ourselves! here is some shrimp sushi with soya and wasabi for dipping, kimchi and pickled ginger. and a glass of garrison irish red ale for jambaloney as a treat. i had my snow water with mine.

here's a beautiful sunset from the other night.

finally, the days are starting to get longer. i woke up this morning craving wonton soup. homemade wontons in homemade broth to be exact.

i made the wonton filling with some chicken, shrimp, carrot, celery, sprouts, ginger, garlic, soya, sesame oil, and a bit of fish sauce. jam is better at folding the wontons than i am, so i scoop the filling and he folds them. and jam added his regular dollop of hot sauce. we really enjoyed this! he enjoyed it so much he went back for a second bowl.

here's this evening's sunset...it's beautiful. but as i was taking the pic just off the porch - i thought i was going to be swept up in a hurricane - it's really windy and cold out there today and this eve. how cold you ask? cold enough that we haven't even had one hottub dip today - that's how cold!

we're like postmen - rain, snow, sleet, hail, shine, normal wind - and we will still get in the hottub! it's gotta be pretty awfully windy and cold for us to not get in!

jam went into work on-site on tuesday and guess what? THE FISH GUY WAS THERE!!! WOOHOO! he bought every bit of tuna that the fish guy had. we have a ton of tuna in our freezer! he also got a big, giant bag of mussels - sigh! i made us a big plate of mussels to share with kimchi and jam made himself a couple of pieces of raw tuna. i tried a tiny bite but i know that you are supposed to flash-freeze your raw fish (for 24hrs) to make it sashimi grade. neither of us is dead so i guess this fish really is top-grade.

so for tonight's supper we had.....you guessed it! SUSHI!

the tuna nori rolls aren't the prettiest but we were rolling them by hand. the shrimp sushi is always delicious. but the tuna sushi was like butter - it just melted right in your mouth!  thank goodness we defrosted a ton of it (there was a lot more than what i plated for the picture), because as delicious as the tuna was on the rice and dipped into the soya and wasabi (and it WAS delicious!), just eating pieces of the raw tuna on it's own was also divine!

it was when we were making our sushi that we remembered that our friend t, who works on the crab boats, cooked 10lbs of crab, fresh out of the water, for us and then brought to our besties b and c's freezer. that was like in september! DUH! we could have had crab sushi as well.

no biggee. we'll be seeing our friends very soon and get our crab then. yummeh!

we had our vfd meeting last night and it was nice getting to see some people that we haven't seen in over a month or so from not going to the new year's eve party. we had some good discussion and voted in several motions. all in all - a good couple of days!