This was the day that Luz and I stayed back in
the cottage at Raattama to start our volunteer work. We were to prepare some
Portuguese gastronomy samples so that our hosting organization could have a
taste of Portugal in Lapland.
I started by trying to help Tuliki with the
preparation of breakfast and the teas and coffees to go, and therefore at 06:30
I was downstairs cutting tomatoes and cucumbers, preparing lettuce, setting the
cheese and ham slices, the different bread slices and crackers, and watching
her cooking porridge, which Finns have with a notch of butter, or my favourite
version – a ladle full of berries cooked in sugary water – yummy!
After everyone left for Levi, and I did the
washing up, we went into the kitchen and started preparing the Portuguese food
– Luz cooked for 2 hours “ Arroz Doce” a creamy rice porridge cooked in
cinnamon and lemon peel milk with a bit of sugar, for flavour…
Meanwhile, I had on the stove ½ Kg of soaked
black-eyed peas, which were boiling and some 6 eggs boiling in a different pot,
after it was all cooked and ready, I added tuna to the drained black-eyed peas,
Luz took off the eggs shell and we put it all out in the porch to cool.
While
helping Tuliki making salad for the 4pm dinner – I sliced and cut into small
pieces white cabbage, green pepper and watermelon, while she shredded carrots
and zucchini, Luz took a couple of photos:
… And then, she started to yell: “come, look!
COME, COME, QUICKLY!”… I then, saw this most bold little animal a “kärppä”, as they call it in Finnish, "arminho", in Portuguese… an ERMINE trying to get into our Portuguese dishes – especially the tuna and
black-eye peas salad…
… and then left as it came – quickly and
silently – what an encounter… so funny!
When the others came and after dinner, we had
some Finnish games outside,
After
the games, time for the Portuguese wines and food tasting.
And each one of us received as a gift a”kuksa”.
