Spaghetti Squash

From time to time I have seen spaghetti squash in the blogosphere (to be honest I have known of this squash for a long time even before blogging became fashionable), however, I never could get my hands on one. This week my health food market offered spaghetti sqash for the very first time. Of course I couldn't resist. So I bought a nice specimen:

I consulted the internet about how to prepare the squash and decided to use the oven version; I don't use a microwave anyway, so this was not an option. The first problems presented themselves.  The squash was incredibly tough, so I was glad when I heard M's car coming around the corner. I definitely needed some muscles to help me cut the squash in halves.

The rest was quite easy I scraped the seeds and the gooey stuff out with a spoon, oiled it and placed it, cut side down, on a tray.

So far so good. I already knew it would take about an hour for the sqash to soften up, so I pushed some potatoes in the oven and waited. After 75 minutes the squash was still so firm you couldn't push a fork into it :( I waited 15 more minutes but finally got it out. By then  at least the flesh was soft and it was possible to scrape it out. Now the real tragedy started. On all the photos on other blogs you could see wonderful fluffy spaghetti like scrapes. But not with mine :(

I have to admit it resembled short threads, but in no way like spaghettis but rather like exceedingly super extra short vermicelli :(

I used Lori Lange's spaghetti sqash recipe from recipe girl as a kind of template. Of course I didn't use meat but a tofu mince and added some bell pepper to the sauce, but this was roughly how I served it. I especially liked the way she used the toppings to not only make it an eye-candy but also very very yummie. However, I missed the starchy texture other squash has (butternut or hokkaido), so it was no replacement for spaghettis at all. I was only satisfied when I got out the baked potatoes and added them steaming hot to the plate.

The dish was actually vegan, but M and C sprinkled some Montello cheese on it.

But my big question is: has any of my readers used spaghetti squash before? What have I done wrong with mine? What are your experiences with this sort of squash? I would really like to give it a second chance, so I rely on your help :)

Hohhot, Inner Mongolia - the Blue City

After a nice vegan lunch we drove back to the hotel and had the opportunity to see something of this beautiful country along the roadside, like these not so beautiful trails of industrial smoke. I hope they will soon  install dust collectors and stop polluting their country :(

A pebble hanzi (Chinese character) meaning water:

Two staples, maize (left) and sorghum (right). They are not only used for food and fodder, but also for biofuel.

Horses are still an important factor in Mongolian life. Less so in the city, but in the surrounding steppe grass land, as it is manifested in this piece of art.

To our surprise it started to rain heavily when we reached the city again. After all this desert experience this was kind of unreal.

After a day out and about, dinner in our hotel was very welcome. We used the buffet restaurant at the Xin Cafe and I was really surprised about the many vegetarian options they had. And I thought Mongolian food means mutton, mutton, and more mutton.

http://www.shangri-la.com/en/property/huhhot/shangrila/dining/restaurant/xincafe

After dinner we wanted to explore the little park we could see from our hotel window:

By now it was dark, but that didn't really matter. The last stalls in the park were closing and there were only few people left, some love couples, some late anglers, and us.

The Shangri-la building with its beautiful reflection on the lake. 

This is the little pagoda in the middle of the lake you can see on the upper photo:

A warrior at night:

When we came back we redeemed our gift coupon for a cocktail at the lobby lounge bar; superb! C had a mocktail called 'Mongolia Blush' with sea-buckthorn berries (the red one on the left) and mine was called 'Green Knot' with local bamboo liqueur and a green plum. Together with the vegetable crisps a perfect ending for our long first day.

Inner Mongolia in 3 days and 4 nights

While P and M were probably soundly asleep on their flight back C and me took a flight to Hohhot. We had a couple of hours wait in Beijing, so after exploring the airport we had some tea in the tea house:

 

But finally we arrived at Hohhot, were picked up by the Shangri-la staff and transported to our hotel where we had booked the 3-days and 4-nights Grassland package.

http://www.shangri-la.com/en/property/huhhot/shangrila

By then it was quite late and we knew that we had to leave early in the morning, so we went straight to bed. Which we found out later was a good idea because we had a long and exciting day ahead of us.
A driver picked us up early and brought us to the 'Singing Sand Ravins' (Xiangshawan sand dunes, 响沙湾沙漠) which is a magnificent landscape with sand dunes as far as your eyes can see. In case you are interested where it actually is, have a look at the google map below:

(c) google maps

This is a satellite view of the area. As you can see the Chinese used the spectacular landscape and attached a tourist entertainment park to it.

(c) google maps

On our way I noticed how differently Mongolians transported their horses. Ours are treated as they would get a complete nervous break down when on the road, whereas these horses actually looked quite content.

Mongolian Script:

We are closing in, please note that this is not a triple-A tourist attraction and not a quadruple one, but a quintuple; yes, a not less than 5-tuple A-star tourist attraction:

And here we are, a whole day of fun in the desert:

A cable car brings you up to the 30m high top of the sand dunes:

Alternatively you can try to climb the dune, as you can see this alternative has its drawbacks:

Very modern facilities:

I really loved C's  'sand socks'! But when the hot sand burnt my bare feet in my sandals, I wished I had taken a pair, too:

We were confronted with curious instructions (I'm still wondering what they meant us to do or maybe it was giving directions to the joy sand, or...or...)

Leftovers from a Chinese picnic:

We had a camel ride (did I mention that I love camels!):

I didn't love the nose pins, though :(  they didn't need those in Dubai.

Look at those soft hair! I want to cuddle my very own camel!

We admired sand art in the sand sculpture garden,

inclusive sand art long gone,

saw the first yurts from a ride on the desert train,

and slided down the dune.

Time went by really quickly and we had to rejoin our driver who was waiting with a nice vegan lunch packet for us.

Taal Volcano, Philippines

Our last day in the Philippines draw closer and we were thinking about what we could do as a last adventure. We already had been to the National Museum (Museum of the Filipino People) in Manila and moreover, nobody but me thought it to be even slightly exciting. And even though it contained the oldest cultural material from the Callao Cave and the fabulous burial from Neolithic Duyong Cave and although I couldn't have a look at all the exhibits because they were closing and throwing us out, there was no way the rest of the family would go there once more.

We could have spent our day lazing around like this tired bike driver,

but we instead opted for a tour to the Taal volcano. What is truly remarkable about Taal volcano is the fact that within the Taal caldera which filled up to Lake Taal there is another small volcanic island called Vulcan Point, and on this island there again is a lake. If you consider that Luzon itself is an island, there is actually an island within a lake on an island within a lake on an island. Hm...does this make sense to anybody?

Anyway, we were packed into a minibus with one other guy and brought to Tagatay. On our way we stopped to watch fields of ...

can you guess?

Quite right, pineapples, lots of pineapples. We headed on and soon had a first glimpse of our target, lake Taal with a view on the island Vulcan Point:

We were greeted by a friendly monkey

and settled on a motorised outrigger which brought us to the island.

Although you can have a horse ride up to the crater rim of Vulcan Point we decided against it due to M's allergy and instead had a hike up the mountain.

Once you reach the top, you will notice that stands with knickknackery arrived long before you, selling souvenirs and drinks.

After a nice and cool coconut and getting back our breaths we had a closer look at the scenery.

This is the lake in Vulcan Point; in the background you can see lake Taal.

Since it is an active volcano, you can see smoke billowing out of the larger cracks:

After having a close look at the butterfly effect

we climbed down the volcano again and returned with the outrigger boat to Tagaytay where a wonderful lunch was waiting for us. Sorry, you are late, we nearly finished off everything.

On our way back to Manila we shortly stopped at a streetside market with huge jackfruits

and met a proud jeepney owner

The next day, M and P had their flight back home, but C and my humble self went off for more adventures. But this is a different story for a different blog entry :)