Hans Christian Andersen, and a recipe for pea and ham soup!
Today is the bicentenary (200th anniversary) of the birth of one of the world's greatest writers, Hans Christian Andersen (from Denmark, where he is known as HCA). In Denmark, HCA is revered in the same manner as Shakespeare and Goethe.
Andersen wrote wonderful stories like The Emperor's New Clothes, The Ugly Duckling, The Little Mermaid (there is a wonderful statue in Copenhagen - my human tells me that it is a nice walk from the royal palaces, and no, the story was not written by the Disney Corporation!), and The Princess and the Pea amongst many others.
The anniversary is being celebrated all over the world. You can read more about the celebrations here: Hans Christian Andersen 2005 Bicentenary Festival and Danish Broadcasting Corporation - DR.
I love a good story and there are really good underlying messages in HC Andersen's stories (although my human is unable to read these to me in the original Danish language! Even I can understand Danish meows!).
........ooooooooOOOOOOOOoooooooo........
Today was a warmer day, 28 degrees Celsius and my human was with me all day! However, I spent most of the day on my mat on the deck by the back door catching the warmth while my human did lots of chores like drag a vacuuming machine across the floor before mopping it. I managed to go outside for a little while, while he hung out washing.
He also cooked pea and ham soup which simmered on low heat on the stove nearly all day. It smelt delicious. I was so happy when he gave me some of the ham meat from the ham bone before he 'souped' it. My human uses the ham bone from a ham leg (available from most delicatessens - it should still have a fair amount of meat on it), 500 grams of dried yellow split peas (which have been soaked), 2 big carrots diced, and half a celery bunch also diced, and two bay leaves. He pre-cooks the ham the day or night before so it is cooled and when the fat has solidified on the surface (overnight in the fridge), it can be easily removed. When the soup is cooking on a low simmer, it needs to be stirred often (about every 30 minutes to stop it sticking to the bottom and burning, so a big heavy pot, or a slow cooker works best).
Merlin's human Kim came over too, and they ate the soup for dinner. My human told her that the soup can companies have really improved the pea and ham soup and they now taste almost home-made. She didn't believe him. I also got to sit on her lap.
keisercat@wildmail.com
Andersen wrote wonderful stories like The Emperor's New Clothes, The Ugly Duckling, The Little Mermaid (there is a wonderful statue in Copenhagen - my human tells me that it is a nice walk from the royal palaces, and no, the story was not written by the Disney Corporation!), and The Princess and the Pea amongst many others.
The anniversary is being celebrated all over the world. You can read more about the celebrations here: Hans Christian Andersen 2005 Bicentenary Festival and Danish Broadcasting Corporation - DR.
I love a good story and there are really good underlying messages in HC Andersen's stories (although my human is unable to read these to me in the original Danish language! Even I can understand Danish meows!).
........ooooooooOOOOOOOOoooooooo........
Today was a warmer day, 28 degrees Celsius and my human was with me all day! However, I spent most of the day on my mat on the deck by the back door catching the warmth while my human did lots of chores like drag a vacuuming machine across the floor before mopping it. I managed to go outside for a little while, while he hung out washing.
He also cooked pea and ham soup which simmered on low heat on the stove nearly all day. It smelt delicious. I was so happy when he gave me some of the ham meat from the ham bone before he 'souped' it. My human uses the ham bone from a ham leg (available from most delicatessens - it should still have a fair amount of meat on it), 500 grams of dried yellow split peas (which have been soaked), 2 big carrots diced, and half a celery bunch also diced, and two bay leaves. He pre-cooks the ham the day or night before so it is cooled and when the fat has solidified on the surface (overnight in the fridge), it can be easily removed. When the soup is cooking on a low simmer, it needs to be stirred often (about every 30 minutes to stop it sticking to the bottom and burning, so a big heavy pot, or a slow cooker works best).
Merlin's human Kim came over too, and they ate the soup for dinner. My human told her that the soup can companies have really improved the pea and ham soup and they now taste almost home-made. She didn't believe him. I also got to sit on her lap.
keisercat@wildmail.com
posted by Keiser at 22:10
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