here's to sunshine

Dear warm, shiny, cheerful Sun, we miss you here in Moscow!
This makes us want more yellow in our lives.
It's already Wednesday night so only two days are left till the weekend -
and we hope it's enough for you to make your way to us.
Dear Sun, please, come visit!

someone to hug

It was a very busy day today and by busy i mean all that waking up at 6am, going for 1,5h to work, then having an A4 list of to-do-today-asap things, then getting right into the rush hour on the way home and experiencing something like THIS again - oh, Moscow, you make me so tired - i finally get home and want nothing. absolutely nothing. And this is when you eat wonderful soup that your mama made for dinner, you chat with your father, and your awesome mister comes to see you and brings you yummy cream candies and a big hug. I am happy and going to bed! Have a great Wednesday!

Fried Green Tomatoes: A Taste of Old New Orleans

A story begins with me going to a farmer's market and admiring green tomatoes. I love green color and everything green but there was something else about them: i didn't know how to cook them and it delighted me even more! I had something new to try! How happy i was to discover that Ben actually was pretty familiar with green tomatoes and he knew a super yummy recipe from his father! So we bought them, spiced them and fried them! 

Ingredients

    3-4 large green tomatoes
    1 cup yellow or white cornmeal
    1 cup all purpose flour
    1 teaspoon salt-or to taste
    1 teaspoon black pepper-or to taste
    1 teaspoon cayenne pepper-or to taste
    vegetable oil

How to make it

    Slice tomatoes to desired thickness.
    In a medium bowl combine cormeal, flour, salt, black pepper and cayenne peppper.
    Dip tomato slices into cornmeal mixture.
    Pour 1/4" to 1/2" of oil into a cast iron skillet. Heat over medium high heat to 350 degrees.
    Fry tomato slices for 2-3 minutes per side or until golden brown.
    Drain on paper towels.
    Serve hot. YESSS!!

Noone in my family has ever tasted it and oh yes they loved it! We have some more of spicy cornmeal left and we want to try it with zucchinies, peppers and other veggies.

a sunny happy day and what we wore

Me: jacket - billabong; turtleneck - stradivarius; jeans - gap; shoes - h&m

Ben: coat - andew; sweater - uniqlo; shirt - thrift; trousers - american eagle; shoes - thrift

We have some big surprises coming here the next week but now we really want to show you the sunny pictures we took recently! It's pretty rare now that you can catch sun here so we felt very lucky and happy about it. Of course we grabbed our camera and went for a walk! Oh, and we wanted to show you what we wore, too, as all these items came from our different trips: Ben got his stuff in Korea, Idaho and Moscow; mine is from Montana, NYC, Barcelona and Moscow, too. I just wish all the days were like that!

Autumn Leaves

♫ ♪ Nat King Cole - Autumn Leaves

I hope you excuse me for so many pictures but i can't help it! The whole week was rainy and grey... We still had lots of fun and i like how my hair gets all curly after the rain but everyone loves sunny autumn weather more, right? It's so great we have all these shots from the last weekend! I'm posting these now so we all enjoy the views and in winter we could go back and feel how warm and perfect it was!

And some super good news: IT"S FRIDAY!! Have a great weekend!!

come and play

This is what happens when your boyfriend's best friend is visiting Russia for the first time and you can't spend much time with them because you work. Then you find shots like these on a camera. Pretty Russian i should say. And i guess it's better than vodka, bears and gypsies, right? ;-)

PS: oh and yes, they visited Red Square, Lenin in his Mausoleum and Tretyakov Gallery!

7 things

I love name Katia - not only because it's my name but also i believe that it always belongs to great people! It was great to meet one of them online: Katia from Kitty Snooks has a nice little blog with some cute pictures and pretty outfits. This week she tagged us in a post "Tell me about yourself Award"! Well, i guess it means it's time to share with you some secrets about Chestnut Mocha.

Here are the rules:
1. Say "thank you" with a linking post
2. Write 7 things about yourself
3. Give the award to 15 other blogs
4. Inform them about it!

1) We have a cute little ball of fur named Jena.

2) We always have some toy cameras in our pockets when we go outside.

3) We met in Montana, lived in South Korea and Ukraine and now settled in Russia for awhile.

4)We travel a lot and usually have Michael TheMonkey with us.

5) Our favourite food is chocolate and sweet peas (separately haha).

6) B is a filmmaker, an artist and a singer.

7) K is a mushroom hunter, a horse-back rider and a massage lover.

B and I in Provence

So that's it! Now lets give out the tags!
*Laura from Polaroids&Kisses
*Kylie from Spencer and Kylie
*Debbie from Debbie Cuttie Face
*The Noisy Plume from The Life and Times of the Plume
*Taylor from Fanciful Wanderings
*Chloe from Lazy explorers
*Sonja from Big {Blue(print)} Ball
*Melissa from Simply, Melissa Ashley
*Angela from Grahangela
*Autumn from Stay gold, Autumn
*Lady from Mr. Taylor and his Lady
*Angela from Simply Simple Me
*Shari from Exploring the Wonders of Life
*Katie and Reuben from House of Humble
*Nicole from The Lookbook
*Patience from Love Never Fails
*Becca from Adorable optimism
Ooops haha i made it up to 17! I just too curious i guess :-)Hope to be reading 7 things about you soon!

¡Buen provecho!

To warm us up on these fall days we decided to try out a Mexican chocolate drink Champurrado which is thickened with corn flour, the same flour used to make corn tortillas. 

And lets add some freshly baked cocoa cookies ;-)

 

Champurrado

The ingredients:

·         1 chocolate bar

·         1 liter water

·         sugar to taste

·         4 tbsp corn flour

·         1 cinnamon stick

·          milk (optional)

1. Bring water to boil and add cinnamon and chocolate bar. Stir constantly until chocolate dissolves.
2. In a separate glass or bowl, dissolve corn flour in about 1/2 cup of water. Make sure it is a smooth mixture. Add to the chocolate.
3. Add sugar to taste, bring back to a boil while stirring constantly until it thickens.
4. You might add milk to give it a creamier texture.

Cocoa cookies

The ingredients:

- 1 3/4 cup flour
- 1/2 cup good quality unsweetened cocoa powder
- 1 teaspoon baking soda
- 1/4 teaspoon salt
- 1/2 cup (115 g) butter
- 1 1/4 cup sugar, plus another 1/2 cup sugar
- 2 eggs
- 2 tsp vanilla

Sift together the flour, cocoa, baking soda and salt in a bowl.

Melt the butter in a medium to large saucepan over medium low heat and cool slightly. Add the 1 1/4 cup sugar and stir until smooth. Whisk in the eggs one at a time until well blended. Stir in vanilla.

Stir the soft butter mixture into the flour/cocoa mixture until just combined. Wrap the dough in plastic wrap and refrigerate until firm - around two hours.

Line cookie sheets with parchment. Shape dough into even sized balls. Place the 1/2 cup sugar in a bowl. Roll dough balls in the sugar then place on the cookie sheets around an inch and half apart. Bake for 12 minutes at 350 F (176 C). Remove from oven and let cool on a wire rack.

¡Buen provecho!

what i wore: a nice september day

coat: mango

dress: h&m

sweater: mango

bag: zara

boots: lucca

Perfect saturday: falling yellow leaves, a farmers market, a walk in a park, some rain, some sun - more details on the day are coming later, now just wanted to share what i wore. 

Have a great week!

autumn changes at home

Now we have mushrooms drying in the kitchen that makes everything smell so good.. Some plants don't understand it's actually fall - they keep growing and don't want to have winter sleep! And now my cooking sessions are even more meaningful with the measuring cups and spoons B brought from the States! Absolutely love the autumn changes around here!

and a quick hi to you from Ben

I laughed so it was hard to keep the camera straight :-)

kimbaps and yoga

The whirl of life is pretty intense recently! I don't even have time to just stop and look around! Last Thursday Ben's best friend arrived for a week long visit (should i better say week-short? because it is very short when you look back!). Then the same week Ben started working and now he isn't off till 8pm in the evenings! So on Friday night we had a welcome dinner at Ben's - he made quiche! On saturday morning we headed out for my friend's wedding. It was all grey, rainy and windy - i got very cold. There were very nice moments as well - my mom sewed me a salmon colored dress; we slow danced a lot that night; the dinner was very good! 

The next moring I met with my friend and we went to a yoga class - Bikram Yoga - it was so great!! You practice it in a heated room so your body relaxes and the muscles become really elastic. The only bad thing is at the end you are completely wet and hot so even after washing and drying you are not compltetely dry.. It's hard to explain it but i guess you get the same thing after spending couple of hours in a sauna - you won't be able to fit into your jeans and such :-) Also my hair didn't want to dry completely and no fans could help. We got out of there and headed to a cafe to have tea as it was still raining outside. We went to Viet Cafe and had some spicy and very yummy treats. Then Ben and his friends joined us. They spent the day sightseeing - went to the Red Square and Tretyakov Gallery. While drinking our teas and chatting we found out another frind of ours lives nearby - so we went to her place and played memory games with Vincent van Gogh paintings! I came home late, all wet and very tired... just to wake up on Monday morning and head to work of course! That was terrible! I started getting flu with all the nice symptoms but we already had a Korean dinner planned for this night at Ben's. 

I don't know how i survived the whole day but the evening was pretty good. This time i even took some photos! Ben made kimbaps and Anya brought a cherry pie. Today is only Tuesday. I'm earlier from work because i guess my red nose made it clear to everyone that i need a break. I'm drinking my magic ginger-lemon-raspberry tea now and really hoping to feel better soon. Then i'll try to be more productive with the pictures.

Hope all is well! Have a nice week!