Life's getting sorted

 

I have a house with 2 other assistants. We live in Remire Montjoly, a kinda fancy town in the Cayenne agglomeration.. basically we’re living in the ‘burbs, tropical style. (I never pictured I would ever be doing that). Everyone in our neighbourhood has pools and gates that open electrically with flashing lights and dogs that bark when you come home late or leave early..and we’re pretty much the only people in the neighbourhood to ever go anywhere on foot.

We got a pretty sweet set up; a room each with ensweet bathrooms, a kitchen, a lounge we hardly never use and a terrace out back and front, all for 900 euros between us including bills. I got the middle room, it’s smaller and has a single bed (the boys got doubles), I wanted it like that. Our house is in the backyard of our landlady's, originally her dad built it for his three daughters when they were growing up.

Liam is American. He spent 2 years in Senegal and 6 months in New Orleans before coming here. I don’t know which of us is more into MIA, he’s also pretty big on Bob Dylan and New Orleans music – but he hadn’t heard The Meters.  He’s awesome.

Marcus is from Brazil. He likes beer and zoo, and loves burgers with garlic. He’s good company and always up for partying.

Kayla is another assistant who lives across the road from us. She’s the kinda girl you dream about when you think of America. She’s from Michigan, studied art history, spent a bunch of months in Paris before, has a scooter. She easily fills top gal pal position out here, and she’s veggie. Co-mealing=cool mealing!

We all hang out on the beach together in the afternoons (you can hear the waves from the terrace, it’s at the end of the road), and evening we cook good food, drink rum, listen to music and complain about the mosquitos.

So, life is getting sorted. I got wheels now - I bought a cute red scooter that I can't ride around yet cos I don't have insurance. I have a hammock to siesta in when the afternoon heat is hitting hard and the early starts got me tired, and we've been cooking some really nice meals. We've met a bunch of our neighbours, who are pretty nice, and I've fairly decided I'm going to stay here next year.

Pile of picutures of my new life:

 

 

Colorful Cumin Salad

It's really nice to eat light, cool, zesty meals here. I like to have a couple of salads in the fridge that I can eat together or on their own for a big lunch. Here's one that's great as an accompaniment for roasted or stewed veg or on it's own for a simple meal. 

1 onion

3 spring onions

Couscous

1 tomato

1 carrot

1 stock cube

cumin seeds

curry powder

some pine nuts

chunk of cucumber

half a lime

cut the onion into fairly big chunks, fry. When it’s starting to get soft, chuck a tablespoon or two of cumin seeds in and keep frying for a couple of minutes.

Meanwhile, prepare the couscous with a stock cube and a decent amount of curry powder.

Cut up the tomato, spring onions and add to the couscous.

Mix in the onions and cumin seeds. Squeeze the lime juice in.

Grate the carrot and cut up the cucumber. 

I serve this by dishing out as much couscous as I’m hungry for, then adding the grated carrot and cubed cucumber on top. Then I add the pine nuts, which I’ve dry fried. 

I keep the carrot and cucumber separate because I leave a bunch of couscous in a thupperwarez for another meal and I don’t think they keep as well. 

Totally delicious on its own..loads of variations, you can pretty much chuck in anything you’ve got laying around. Peppers, beet, mango, would all be awesome in this, you could sub the pinenuts for peanuts or walnuts. You could use couac (like couscous but made of cassava), or bulgur wheat (which has a higher protein content than couscous).

It’s not got much protein, so you could have some lentils on the side, or yogurt, some cheese (goats or feta) or a couple of boiled eggs.