Creatively Green is the blog of freelance writer, avid crafter, and La Mamma Verde (the green mom), Wenona Napolitano.
This blog features everything about her creatively green life from green crafting to eco-gardening, green parenting and green living in general.
You will also find articles on writing, being a mom writer, and see guest posts from authors.
Full of green musings, eco-product reviews, book notes, eco-friendly crafts and so much more.
In the Kitchen with Stanislava "Stacy" Buevich #SalmonTarator #Recipe #IntheKitchen
The Salmon Tarator is the absolute staple in my home. I always come back to it when I need a gorgeous, delicious, and healthy main course, and I'm short on time. It looks as impressive as it tastes and is relatively easy to make.
Some years ago, there was a potluck dinner for parents at my daughter’s school, and one of the ladies brought this dish. She had no idea what it was called and refused to share the recipe. I was so impressed that I scoured the Internet for it and discovered that it’s called Salmon Tarator, and it hails from the Middle East. I cooked it so many times that I’ve adapted it to my taste. Now, I must warn you that I am not the kind of cook who measures things; I very much believe in cooking by feel, so the measurements are approximate.
You will need:
Fresh Salmon - I prefer a big chunk of loin. However, you can use individual fillets from any part of the fish you like.
A generous bunch of parsley or 2 small bunches (some might prefer coriander/cilantro)
Small bunch of mint
Garlic - 2 cloves
Lemon - whole
Walnuts - 2 generous handfuls of halves
Red onion - half
Tahini paste - 1-2 tablespoons
Greek yoghurt - 3-4 tablespoons
Salt and pepper to taste
Optional - a sprinkle of Baharat or Sumac.
Pomegranate seeds for decoration
Place the salmon into the oven and cook for 15-20 minutes (depending on the thickness of the fish) on high heat. I don’t put anything on the salmon. The sauce is more than enough to give it flavour.
While the salmon is in the oven, I whip up the sauce and the salad/garnish elements of the dish.
Garnish: Roughly chop up the parsley and mint. Break walnut halves with your hands or in a mortar. Dice the red onion and mix everything together. Squeeze the juice of half a lemon and add that into the mix, along with some salt and pepper, to taste. Now, you have a parsley, mint, walnut, and onion salad.
Sauce: Mix the Greek yoghurt with the tahini paste, add crushed garlic and juice from the other half of the lemon and salt to taste. The paste should be smooth and not lumpy; just keep mixing with a spoon until Tahini is adequately integrated. I prefer my Tahini sauce to be very strong, so I sometimes add more Tahini paste. It is entirely up to you and whether you like sesame as much as I do.
Take the salmon out of the oven and place it on a gorgeous serving dish (optional). Now, let's layer the dish. First comes the sauce. Smear it over the top of the salmon, covering it whole. The salad element goes on top of the sauce. You may finish the dish with a sprinkling of Baharat or Sumac and some pomegranate seeds. Enjoy!
Clearlake
Stanislava Buevich
Genre: Upper Middle Grade/Teen Mystery Horror
Date of Publication: December 1, 2023
ISBN: B0CMQHGC24
ASIN: B0CMP432S1
Number of pages: 245
Word Count: 73K
Cover Artist: Sabina Kencana
Tagline: Don’t go into Room 214
Book Description:
"Hi, I'm Moon and this is my story. It all started with a terrible cold. When the lady in purple promised my mother that Clearlake Institute would be able to cure me without the use of modern medicine, my mom was hooked.
There was nothing I could do, or say, that could’ve changed her mind. She was determined from the moment we set foot on a remote island far, far away from everyone else, until the moment we were separated, and I was trapped in a creepy, gothic hospital."
Clearlake Institute was hiding something!
Deep beneath the shadows, something sinister was brewing - darkened halls, strange doctors, ghastly nurses that watch your every move, and children who are sent into Room 217 never to return.
Aided by the other children she meets at the institute, Moon Rains embarks on a perilous, suspenseful adventure to uncover the secrets of the Clearlake Institute.
Now, the race against time begins. Will Moon and her friends make it out before it’s too late? Or will Clearlake claim them as its next set of victims?
There will come a time when you wonder, how did a girl like me end up
in a place like Clearlake and mortal danger? Well, it all started with a
terrible cold. At first, it was just a blocked nose. Then a sore throat,
nothing major. About a week later, I got a temperature. And the blocked nose
got worse. Much worse. I lost all sense of smell and the ability to breathe.
Snot kept trickling down from my nostril to my top lip, and I had to
persistently wipe it off with my sleeve or taste the said snot. I had a
headache. A constant, nagging, relentless headache as if a woodpecker was
incessantly pecking above the bridge of my nose.
I was thirteen at the time and missed so many days of school that my
mother got fined by the government. Now, I know what you’re thinking - any
responsible parent would have taken their offspring to a GP if the wretched
illness hadn’t gone away within a week. Well, not my mother.
My mother didn’t trust Western Medicine, you see, particularly vaccines
and antibiotics. As far as she was concerned, those two were the source of all
evil. I count myself incredibly lucky that, so far, I have managed to avoid
catching something particularly nasty like Rubella, Mumps, or Measles. I’ve never
had anything more severe than a cold, in fact. And while most colds went away
without intervention, other than a honey, lemon and gin concoction (which was
surprisingly effective, never mind that I was far too young to take it), this
cold proved to be something else entirely.
About a week in, my mother marched into my room early in the morning.
Loud, insistent stomps woke me up from a hazy, feverish dream. She touched my
forehead with the tips of her fingers and raised her eyebrow, nodding as if
everything was going according to plan.
“Well, I think I know what will finally do the trick,” she said.
I rolled my eyes. Well, not actually. Not on the outside. The outside
she could see. I rolled my eyes on the inside, imagining them going so far
inside their sockets that all that was left were the white bits.
“Beetroot!” she exclaimed, her voice chiming like a Christmas bell.
“Beetroot?” I yawned, and a few tears seeped out of the corners of my
eyes. I wasn’t sure if the yawn caused it or the ever-escalating feeling of
utter desperation.
“A few drops of beetroot juice inside your nose three times a day, and
you will be good as new. I promise.”
She made similar promises a lot.
“If you stick a clove of garlic in each nostril overnight, in the
morning… Poof. Cured. Gone. I promise.”
“Breathing over a pot with hot potatoes and a duvet over your head will
open up the sinuses and unleash the phlegm. All of the gunk will stream out.
You’ll see. I promise.”
“If you do a wee in a little pot and then take some of that wee with a
little pipette that I’ve got here for you and…”
“NO!”
I drew the line at urotherapy, as it was apparently called, and it did
take quite a bit of courage to stand up to my mother. She fussed and fretted
but couldn’t get me to administer urine into my nose.
About the Author:
Stacy Buevich is a British writer and a film director with many award winning short films. She started writing novels during lockdown (wait did that really happen?), beginning with a magical mystery Maya Fairy, that she wrote for her daughter. Since then she has written several more and not planning to stop
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