How to Make Homemade Dumplings from Scratch
In today's food blogger series I will demonstrate how to make homemade dumplings from scratch. Well, almost from scratch, there are a few handy tools that might be very useful preparing this delicious food.
I love dumplings, in most cases dumplings is a cost effective solution when you are in hurry and really hungry. It hasn't been rare for me to visit local groceries shop at 2AM just to buy a pack of frozen dumplings. Today I will show how you can prepare dumplings at home. It's a really simple and doesn't take a lot of time or a lot of effort.
Ingredients for dumpling dough.
1 kg of flour
600 ml water
100 grams of butter
1 tsp (with top) salt
Rest the dough for 30 minutes…
Tabor Monastery of the Transformation in Tbilisi
You have probably noticed Tabor Monastery of the Transformation in Tbilisi if wandered around Abanotubani district - it's the one you can see up in the hill left from Narikala. The idea to visit this site arrived for me when some of the Georgia Expat Photographer club members posted a picture of this church.
I believe you can climb up here and have a lovely and a very spectacular hiking trip doing that, but for this time we opted for a more convenient way - a taxi. We took a regular street taxi and he took us up here, agreed to wait for 30 minutes while I will take photography here, and the took us back to the city for 20 Lari.
And this is actually the way I suggest to you for…
Painting Floor - Final Touch For Maximum Effect (Second Paint Layer)
Right, we have arrived to the second post in my painting floor adventures from home remodeling series. Today I will show you how after adding second paint layer to our rural house's paint we achieved the maximum effect.
Paint work was performed at the start of July, 2015
Make sure you read other posts in our adventurous efforts of remodeling an old country house.
Floor ready for second layer of paint
Read more how I prepared this floor and applied base layer of paint here:
Floor waiting for a new layer of paint
As you can see in the background - it is a kitchen starting to get already a decent look
Applying second layer of paint
Wow,that's a dramatic makeover…
Wanderings In The Tbilisi Old Town (HDR Efex Pro)
It was day 62 from my 365 photo challenge project and I felt I'm out of good photography locations. For couple of the last days I have been doing nice landscape photography in close to me locations, and it seemed that I'm out of options. I asked a friend (photographer) and asked could he give me some advice. He advised me to make a list with items to photograph, like birds, macro's e.t.c.
Still I felt I need to continue improving my landscape photography. Then another person asked have I tried HDR Effect PRO (For HDR photography I have been using just Photomatix) - my answer was no.
And here did came the inspiration - I decided to head to the lovely Abanatobuani district in…
Sachebureke Abanotubanshi (Cheburek Cafe on Abanotubani)
The other day we were just wandering around Tbilisi sulphur bath (Abanotubani) district doing some cool photography of probably most popular tourist spot in Tbilisi - Abanotubani district. During our wanderings we noticed small doors with title - Cheburek Cafe and decided to return to this place once photography session will be ended.
Cheburek Cafe is located on Grishashvili street 8, Tbilisi
Those of you who don't know what a Cheburek is, here is a good explanation from Wikipedia - Chiburekki is a deep-fried turnover with a filling of ground or minced meat and onions. It is made with a single round piece of dough folded over the filling in a half-moon shape…
Fresh Vegetable Market Near Gori Highway
I once had a friend visiting me from Canada, he was pretty much obsessed with eco friendly foods, I took him to the local Tbilisi Dezerter bazaar and told - hey look there are plenty of eco foods here. He took some carrot from local salesman and answered me - this probably is natural, but it's not eco!
Believe me or not - but my friend was right, I understood that immediately. If you just like my friend are into eco thing - you wont probably find eco friendly food near Gori Highway (connecting Tbilisi with Batumi) some 60 km from nations capital. On the other hand if natural is OK then you can buy fresh vegetables here for sure.
In fact this is what we actually did after…
Motsameta Monastery near Kutaisi in Georgia
Motsameta monastery is one of the most spectacular sites I have visited while being living in Georgia. To get here yo will need either to own your vehicle or hire a taxi, probably there are organized tours as well heading to Motsameta monastery.I first visited this site in Spring 2015, unfortunately it was already a night and I didn't see much nor photographed anything decent here, the next time I visited Motsameta was in Autumn 2015, together with my mom, this time I was better prepared and it was a day.Rail tracks near Motsameta monasteryThere is actually a train making a stop in front of the entrance at Motsameta monastery, the Train is connecting Kutaisi and TkibuliForest surrounding…
Water Reflections on Lisi Lake
She was free in her wildness. She was a wanderess, a drop of free water. She belonged to no man and to no city. - Roman Payne, The Wanderess
Spectacular water reflection photography done in Tbilisi, Republic of Georgia on Lisi Lake.
Water reflections on Lisi lake in Tbilisi
A perfect harmony water reflection
Mountain reflection on water
Boat deck reflection on water
Building reflection on water
Ducks
Cost of Living in Tbilisi (Republic of Georgia)
This post is a result of an experiment I performed for one month in October 2015, I counted my everyday expenses and summed it up to see how much actually it costs to live in Georgia. This information might be useful if you are planing to move to Georgia or just to compare how your country stands to Georgia.
For tracking my (our) everyday expenses I installed Expense Manager Android app on my phone and entered spending just after purchases.
Total expenses in October 2015
In October in total we spent GEL 4,385 which equals to $1,823 or EUR 1,708 (according to exchange rates on November 20,2015)
Now to clarify the results for this experiment I must mention that bellow listed…
Simple Aspic (Meat Jelly, Kholodets) Recipe
In today's food blogger's series I will show how to prepare a really tasty and delicious homemade aspic out of pig's trotters.
I'm not sure how popular an aspic is in the Western world, but it is a super popular in post Soviet countries, and is served in every fiests. Russian have a name for it - a kholodets (Холодец).According to Wikipedia - Aspic is a dish in which ingredients are set into a gelatin made from a meat stock or consommé. Non-savory dishes, often made with commercial gelatin mixes without stock or consommé, are usually called gelatin salads. Nearly any type of meat can be used to make the gelatin: …
Postcards from Tbilisi
Tbilisi is city which have inspired many great poets, writers and of course travelers. Mikhail Lermontov, Alexander Pushkin, Leo Tolstoy and even Marco Polo have spent some time in Tbilisi.
Who knows maybe the sulfur baths in Abanotubani district has inspired the great poets?!
As for a photographers - Tbilisi is a lovely destination and we have found a lot of inspiration here (This is the place I learned to create a decent night exposure photography).
This time we headed to catch the Golden Hour and ended up with lovely postcard style images from Tbilisi.
Tbilisi - thanks for being a piece of our lives.
David Agmashenebeli street in Tbilisi
Metekhi church and river…
Gelati Monastery in Georgia
Gelati monastery together with Bagrati Cathderal are one of the main sights in this region (Imereti) in Georgia. Although I have been living in Georgia since 2011, first I visited this site just in the Spring 2015 together with my dad, unfortunately it was a late evening already and I was not proficient of taking night photography (now I'm).
The second time I visited Gelati monastery was together with my mom already in Autumn 2015. This time I was prepared much better and instead of just taking photographs here I took HDR images.
Gelati monastery near Kutaisi
Gelati is a monastic complex near Kutaisi, Imereti, western Georgia. It contains the Church of the Virgin…
How To Make Floating Banana Photo Trick (Photoshop / Lightroom)
I created this simple floating banana image using a tripod, camera and Adobe Ligtrooms + A little retouching in Adobe Photoshop. I wanted to make the image look even better so I did a HDR image.
Floating Banana Photography Trick
I did this image for my 365 day photo challenge project and submitted it as day 49 picture. I really feel proud of my self - like on day 1 I barely knew how to take a decent exposure using Manual mode, while on day 49 I'm photographing floating bananas already. I can't wait to see what will I submit at day 365.
Now back to the floating banana... Actually it is very easy trick. I was taking two separate images - one with a banana and background, while second…
Masterclass in Asian Cuisine
At the start of November 2015 I took a master class in Asian Cuisine. The master class happened in a lovely Georgian restaurant Sareckela in Tbilisi and was led by a gourmet chef from Russia Natalia Chvileva. You can follow Natalia on her Facebook page: Touch to Food
The reason that made me to take participation in such master class was simple - I love to cook, I enjoy Asian cuisine and I have a food blogger section on my blog. Being a food blogger means just one - I'm always learning new things and I'm happy to share my knowledge with my readers (you). This master class was not only good for learning new things in Asian cuisine but also a good practice for my digital photography school…
Prometheus Cave near Kutaisi (Georgia)
Prometheus cave is one of the interesting places I have visited lately in Georgia. In fact that's the second cave I have visited here. The first one is called Sataplia Cave. In case you are into caves and speleology I recommend to visit both of them.Prometheus cave is located some 20km from Kutaisi in village Kumistavi (Tskaltubo Municipality), and if you are arriving to this lovely city - I can only recommend include Prometheus cave in your itinerary while being in these parts of Georgia.And that's how it actually happened last time I were here - my mom arrived to visit me in Georgia through Kutasi international airport, and I immediately took here to the Prometheus…
Painting Floor - Adding Base Layer of Paint
After we cleaned up our space from junk, I painted walls and ceilings in white using just a water based paint. Both our future temporary bedroom and kitchen started look decent. Then my father helped me with electrical wiring and installed a few new power outlets. Now was the right time for painting floors. I started with our bedroom. Bought the most cheapest paint available on market (brown) and started to paint.
I was hoping that for temporary solution it should be enough just with one paint layer, but I turned wrong - floor looked screwed. But that's not a big issue, because you can always add second layer of paint after the first one has dried up.
Bedroom prepared for floor…
My Outdoor Working Place During Last Summer (2015)
Owning an old rural house is nice, and it's even nicer if you can both live and work from there. Since I'm into a thing called a digital nomad (place doesn't matter as long as there is an internet connection), during last summer I had setup my working place in different corners both inside and outside of our country house.I remember how back in 2014 we used Turtle lake for our working place in Tbilisi. Prior of having a basic outdoor working place there are three main important things you will need - an internet connection, a laptop and of course an electricity, speaking of the internet - in rural areas most probably you will stick with a mobile (3G/4G), you should have a phone with a…
Replacing Electrical Wiring and Installing Outlets
On June 25th electricity was connected to our old rural house, and that was the next big issue to fix soon. The old electrical wiring was done like some 30-40 years ago and it just wasn't safe. Luckily I'm familiar with the best electrician, and he is my dad. So I called him and asked for both advice and assistance.
Dad seemed excited and soon he was on site, with a lot of wires, cables, screwdrivers, different unknown for me electrical measurement devices and the wiring replace works started.
Old wiring
We agreed to disconnect all the old wiring and install a new cable connecting it directly to electrical distributing point. We had to drill a few holes. In above image - white…
Homemade Noodles in Spicy Sauce
November started with a huge goal - not to spend a tetri eating outside, instead we decided to cook good food at home. Today I will show how to prepare a really fresh egg pasta noodles in spicy sauce.
I really love to make noodle pasta by my own - and actually it's very easy, thus a hand strength is required if you are not using some dough mixer machine.
My recipe for noodle pasta is simple - one egg for every 100 grams flour. Today I took 7 eggs and 700 grams flour. Add a little bit salt (1 tbs) and sugar (2 tbs).
Directions for preparing fresh egg pasta
Add Flour to a bowl (make a small cavity to put eggs in)
Add eggs to the flour
Knead your pasta
Today…
Abandoned Armenian Church in Tbilisi (Surb Nshan / St. Nikoghayos)
Tbilisi never ends to surprise (at least me). I thought I'm quite familiar with all the places in Tbilisi's Old Town, but turned out - I was wrong. It was a Halloween eve and we decided to head to Shardeni (Tbilisi Old Town) to photograph some Halloween pictures.
Prior to that we went to lovely noodles place called Fire Wok on Shalva Dadiani street, and then just to randomize our route we decided to take a slight right turn on Lermontovs street, our first discoveries started already here, so I find a lovely Boutique art shop - Estia.
After Estia we continued to wander through narrow Old Town's street when suddenly we ended in some yard which featured a really majestic building - as…