The menu was a classic Thanksgiving feast for the first-timers but also involved some first times for me. Like my first time brining a turkey! Apparently the ratio of one gallon of water to one cup salt and one cup sugar  is ideal to unwind the meat proteins of the turkey, allowing the flavored solution to be drawn up into the meat. Sweet. More moisture + more flavor = happy eaters. There’s nothing worse than dry turkey breast. And you can add your choice of spices, aromatics and flavorings to make things even more exciting. Here’s what I came up with based on the contents of the kitchen:

Brine For A Juicy Turkey:

1 gallon water
1 cup salt
1 cup sugar
1/2 orange, sliced
1/2  lemon, sliced
4 cloves smashed garlic
1/2 tbsp black peppercorns
about 1/2 tbsp white pepper
about 1/2 tbsp Chinese five-spice
a few sprigs of thyme

Here is Boris (named for our London mayor) or Natasha (named for Boris) in his (or her) bag of spicy salty sweet bathwater.

Boris and Natasha were purchased the morning before the party from Wyndham House Poultry at Borough Market and brined for approximately 11 hours (about an hour a pound) in the fridge.  Chris had big plans to deep fry one of our turkey friends and had even purchased 12 gallons of oil and created a MacGyver style contraption of assorted hardware store items to fry the turkey and avoid incinerating himself in a spectacular ball of flames. Alas, the weather refused to cooperate and potential explosions are best to keep outside, so Boris and Natasha were lovingly rubbed with butter, stuffed with onions, carrots, oranges, and lemons, and placed in the oven to ultimately look like this:

While the turkeys roasted, potatoes were simmered, bread was sliced, stock was reduced, celery was chopped, onions were sauteed and eggs were devilled. I also got all up in a few packages of dry-cured English streaky bacon from Broadway Market.

Irene and I have a Best Stuffing Ever recipe that we make in some variation every year. Now I know you probably think your stuffing is the Best Stuffing Ever, but our stuffing is actually the best, you just haven’t heard of it yet. Here’s why: it’s full of bacon. Not only will you find deliciously salty crunchy bits of bacon in every bite, but the entire stuffing is infused with amazingness because…all the vegetables are sauteed in bacon fat. See, I told you it was the best stuffing ever. Bean and I started making this stuffing many years ago when planning an every-item-on-the-Thanksgiving-table-will-include-bacon meal. That started our traditional Thanksgiving kitchen takeover and probably helped develop our shared love for food and cooking and utter ridiculousness. So it’s all thanks to bacon, really.

Above, you can see The Best Stuffing Ever: Deconstructed – a pile of bacon on a pile of mushrooms, leeks, and celery sauteed in bacon fat on a pile of sliced wheat and white bread. To make The Best Stuffing Ever yourself, use this recipe from Bon Appetit but keep in mind that it’s very forgiving of measurements and flavorings. You don’t really need seven cups of leeks – in fact you can leave them out altogether and the stuffing will be delicious. You also don’t need tarragon – you can use sage or rosemary or whatever you like.

Back to the main menu. The entire meal, after some tasty devilled eggs and pretzels and dip,  looked like this:

Brined and Roasted Turkeys with Red Wine Gravy
Leek, Mushroom and Bacon Stuffing (aka Best Stuffing Ever)
Rye and Celery Stuffing (Also Seriously Excellent Stuffing)
Cheesy Mashed Potatoes (thanks for all the peeling, Jackie!)
Roasted Brussels Sprouts with Chili and Parmesan
Green Bean Casserole (thanks Michelle!)
Candied Yams with Marshmallows (thanks Damien!)
Homemade Plain and Cheese Rolls (thanks Lizzie!)

And that’s not even mentioning the 4539845 bottles of alcohol and, of course, dessert.  Thanksgiving wouldn’t be Thanksgiving without an excessive amount of dessert. Accordingly, I made five pies. Because I firmly believe that you can never have too much pie.

That includes two sweet potato pies (recipe here), because it’s hard to get real pumpkins here with a lot of flavor and I found out last minute that pumpkin in a can does not exist in London except as an American import. I got some funny looks in the supermarket.  I also made two apple pies, one with a lattice crust and a little mini apple cutout. The butteriffic homemade pie crust recipe can be found here, which I liked because it did not request the use of a food processor or any other appliances I don’t own, only a sick amount of butter.

Here’s a picture of the pecan pie (recipe here), with a little bit of kitchen disaster in the background for good measure.

And our fabulous baker friend Lizzie brought over a stunningly gorgeous Pavlova topped with a mountain of fresh berries.

To say we ate a lot of food is a bit of an understatement. Some people had seconds and then thirds and then several plates of dessert and could barely stagger out the door. But that’s what Thanksgiving is all about, right? We even played the ‘I’m Thankful For…’ game which you write down on a slip of paper and put it into a hat. Then you pick out an an answer to read anonymously and dramatically to the entire table, which resulted in some hilarious, happy and heartwarming moments. Maybe that’s what Thanksgiving is all about.  But even with all the love and all the effort, the twenty-two wonderful people in the room couldn’t finish off the absolutely monstrous amount of food on the table. And I give thanks for that. Because then we had leftovers. And that’s really what Thanksgiving is all about.

So why does the myth still exist in the States that British food is horrible? I’ve made it my personal mission to introduce every single one of my visitors to the wonders of London eating.  I’ve been lucky enough to have over  a dozen friends and family stop by the Hackney Hostel since I moved here and the tourist itinerary doesn’t involve Westminster Abbey or the British Museum. No, the most important sights of the trip are Borough Market for  toasted cheese sandwiches, Broadway Market for cupcakes and Ghanaian food and mushroom risotto, Gwilym’s coffee cart at Columbia Road Flower Market, Tayyabs for lamb chop and curried baby pumpkin feasting, the Breakfast Club for bacon butties (and mini-discos), the Brick Lane Upmarket for octopus balls and dulce de leche filled churros…and I’ll stop now because i’m getting very hungry.  Thankfully, every single one of my visitors cares about food just about as much as I do, which is probably a main reason we’re friends in the first place.  I don’t waste time with non-excitable eaters.

My friend Lex is one of these people.  She left just last week, after five straight days of talking about food, venturing off to procure food, deciding what to eat, eating, digesting, and then talking about what to eat next. In other words, my kind of girl. Oh yeah, and we cooked Chinese food for 20 strangers in my living room.  But although I always have to show off my favorite eating spots, the best part about visitors is opportunities to try new and exciting markets, cafes, and restaurants.

One happy new find is the Bedales Wine Bar, tucked into a tiny storefront in Spitalfields Market. It’s easy to overlook with the sprawling chains like Wagamama, Giraffe, and Leon taking up massive real estate, but we ducked into this charming  little  spot to get out of the rain and were happily surprised by excellent glasses of wine, a bowl of fresh bread from St. John and a board teeming with multiple varieties of cheese, pickles, olives, and a piquant little bowl of ratatouille.

Apparently you can purchase a bottle of wine and drink it there without the hefty restaurant markup…I’ll certainly return to prove that hypothesis (and eat more cheese…yum).

Another solid winner in our rapid-fire London food tour was the wooden-beamed, vintage-wallpapered, elk-skull-bedecked,  dreamy-design-geek-fantasy restaurant and bar The Elk in the Woods on Camden Passage in Islington. This miniscule  cobblestoned passageway is one of my favorite streets to show London visitors, both for its quaint historic charm and its abundance of tantalizing eateries.  We snacked on a potato and pancetta skillet with baked eggs, peppers, and tomatoes with toast…

…and a halloumi and hummous sandwich with grated carrots and beets, parsley, and olives.  I very much enjoy their use of assorted non-matching patterned tableware.

I try not to let any visitor leave London without joining me on a pilgrimage to my favorite Broadway Market, just up the street from our flat.  I also try not to let these visits conclude without at least one (or three) mini cupcakes from Violet Cupcakes.  After carefully considering our extensive eating options (there’s new Persian food which I must try next) Lex and I opted for the Heavenly Halloumi burger from The Veggie Table with a generous smoosh of onion jam on top, which smelled so good it  required an eyes-closed moment of silence and gratitude from Lex before biting into it.

This veggie burger, made of made of halloumi, carrots, zucchini, mint, and coriander,  is one of the best I’ve ever had and is surprisingly easy to make yourself. Makes you wonder why you ever put those unidentifiable-brown-defrosted-hockey-puck-soy-protein-things pretending to be meat in your mouth.  If you’re not going to eat meat, eat something that tastes like vegetables because, shockingly, vegetables are delicious.

Obviously, meat is also delicious. So we followed up the wholesome organic veggie burger with a triple meat sandwich from BanhMi11.  Yes, that’s actually what it’s called.  Stuffed with chicken, roast pork, pork pate, cucumber, red pepper, cilantro, and I don’t remember what else in a crunchy baguette, I’ve got to say it wasn’t the most amazing banh mi I’ve ever had, but quite enjoyable nonetheless.

Lastly, what foodie tour of London would be complete without attending the launch party of a brand new food and culture magazine in a stunning garage-warehouse complete with hanging ivy, bowls of roast lamb, and harp player? For The Love Of Life, indeed.

If you’re reading this and you haven’t been to visit yet, get your act together! I can’t drink all this wine and eat all this cheese by myself…or at least I shouldn’t. So save me from myself and come visit, okay? Bean, book some tickets already…

Bedales Wine Bar @ Spitalfields Market
12 Market St
London E1 6DT

The Elk In The Woods
39 Camden Passage
London N1 8EA

The Veggie Table and Banh Mi 11
@ Broadway Market
on Saturdays
from 10AM to 5PM

take, for example, my most coincidental of london acquaintances, patrice. patrice, on the right in the photo below, runs  sauce á part, a culinary company creating french-creole cuisine with pacific and mediterranean influences that caters, produces food events, and runs a stall at broadway market.

a few weekends ago, on a perfect sunny saturday of people-watching, canal-walking, vintage-browsing, and of course obsessive eating, i dragged a fresh-off-the-plane annie to broadway market just up the road as soon as she got to the house.  we stopped at patrice’s stall to chat and she asked how we knew each other. and all i could say was, it was just one of those random london encounters.  i first met patrice at his broadway market stall about 2 months ago with my friend dan. and by ‘met,’ i mean that he offered me a sample of sumptuous slow roasted pork and i accepted (obviously) but was too full from a face-stuffing borough market trip to purchase anything.  i told him i’d be back sometime with an empty stomach. and then we moved on.

later that night, after an extended journey all the way across london to the opening of the pavilion at the serpentine gallery in hyde park and back east, dan and i quite unexpectedly found ourselves at the final evening of the double club, a congolese street market themed pop-up restaurant/bar/dance club/art installation in a huge warehouse behind the angel tube station in islington.  waiting in line for drinks, i ran into patrice again, who somehow remembered me from our 3-minute encounter earlier in the day. we talked food, we talked markets, we talked global cuisine, we talked more food, and i promised to return to his stall again soon. it was a lovely discussion and such an odd encounter considering the series of steps it took for us to arrive at the double club and how many times we almost got derailed along the way. how often might this path-crossing occur unnoticed or unacknowledged?  it’s fascinating to think about all the different ways in which people’s lives intersect and how we might be completely unaware…

i always find it interesting to consider these trajectories. of course, being a bit of an obsessive eater, they often lead back to food. i didn’t see patrice again for about two months but a few weekends ago, fate crossed our paths to bestow upon me this gorgeously hued beet-marinated salmon, vibrant with color like the petals of a tropical flower.

patrice pulled out a hefty slab of the deep wine-colored salmon and artfully carved a few fresh slices for us, chatting all the while about the marinating process and the interplay between the acids of the citrus and the fattiness of the fish.  we sampled the cool and silky salmon with a mouthful of a light lentil salad. interspersed with zesty punches of spring onion and fresh greens, the lentils made a textured and earthy base for the beet-tinged fish and we promptly bought a bowl.

to keep things exciting, we decided a hot dish must also be purchased for full appreciation and maximum enjoyment of the range of sauce apart. it was a tough call between the marinated, roasted and glazed leg of lancashire pork…

and the fall-off-the-bone-tender looking chicken colombo creole…

but we went with patrice’s recommendation of the tiger prawns with spinach in coconut broth over jasmine rice. mmm, comfort food with flair.

i only wish we’d had room for these dangerously spiky and decadent looking meringues, but sometimes you just have to start your morning off with violet cupcakes. as much as i hate to say it, sometimes i can only eat so much dessert.

annie and i took our hard-earned treasures and sauntered off to london fields to eat. just another perfect foodie morning at my favorite market in london.  i’ll run into patrice and his french-creole food at any time. and unsurprisingly,  i did just 2 days later.  i guess that you just can’t escape the orbit of other obsessive eaters…

one of the best presents i’ve gotten recently is my trusty little eat.shop.london guide, which i’ve been addicted to since hopping over the pond. the author lives somewhere in the east end and has introduced me to some of my favorite local spots within minutes of our hackney home. i’ve eaten my way through nearly every east london location in the book. through pounding the pavement in search of each amazing spot, i’ve also stumbled across some lovely little gems that deserve a place in the next edition. i highly recommend the books – they’ve got editions for a number of major cities.  i love the visuals of the book and the amusing content and one of my goals in life is to write and photograph the second london guide.  cabazon books, i’m here for you. or rather, you’ll be hearing from me.

anyway, one of the food spots mentioned in the book, spinach & agushi,  is so local that it can only be found once a week at broadway market on saturdays. i can also be found weekly at broadway market, but i’ve been so busy eating roast hog sandwiches, violet cupcakes,  and wild mushroom risotto that i’ve only passed their ghanaian food stall with a longing glance and vowed to return posthaste.

return i did with michelle, one of my many conspicuous consumption partners in crime. after a wild mushroom sandwich from sporeboys, we worked up our appetites again wandering the market chatting with producers and sampling more food until we finally felt ready to take on spinach & agushi. our menu options were as follows:

we went for the slightly spicy and flavorful jollof rice with two stews – the namesake spinach & agushi with crushed melon seeds and a shredded chicken in a smooth and slightly creamy peanut sauce. they sprinkled a bit of carrot salad on top with a splash of hot sauce, we parked ourselves on a sidewalk curb and stuffed ourselves full of authentic ghanaian goodness.

make your way to the market and try it yourself! i’m excited to see what other dishes make it into the rotation and thus into my belly. i’ll be back!

********

I’ve always loved the idea of foraging for food, but the idea of dying from a poisonous mushroom overdose has always put me off from plucking edibles from the ground for dinner. Luckily, you can often find a carefully selected array of wild and exotic mushrooms at grocery stores or farmers markets. Sometimes, when there’s potential for serious injury, I find it’s best to leave things up to the professionals.

I found this gorgeous array of exotic mushrooms at the Sporeboys stall at London’s beautiful Broadway Market. Mushrooms are easy to cook, good for you, and have a deliciously rich, almost meaty taste that’s a great vegetarian substitute. I made a simple sautéed mushroom mix with olive oil, herbs, and cheese that tasted great on toast as well as pasta. It could also top a number of other dishes that you’ve already got in your kitchen. It’s simple, versatile, and oh so tasty…and no fear of poison! What more could you ask for?

Here’s an easy way to cook your mushrooms and a number of ways to serve them too:

Sauteed Mixed Mushrooms

What You Need:

Assorted mixed mushrooms – any varieties including crimini, portobello, erynjii, shiitake, oyster, nameko, shimeji

Assorted herbs – I used sage and rosemary

Any nutty hard cheese such as pecorino or parmesan

Garlic

Olive Oil

Salt and Pepper

What You Do:

1. Chop your mushrooms into bite-size slices or chunks while you warm a generous pour of olive oil on low heat in a frying pan.

2. Mince your garlic and add it to the oil.

3. Once the oil has warmed up and the garlic has changed color slightly, toss in the mushrooms and let them cook. After a few minutes, toss in the herbs and continue to sauté until soft.

4. Once the mushrooms have softened and absorbed some of the oil, remove from heat and top with some freshly grated cheese. Add salt and pepper and enjoy! The mushrooms are tasty on their own or as part of any number of delicious veggie-friendly dishes below.

Five Ways to Serve Your Mushroom Mix:

1.  Take a loaf of good quality brown or wholemeal bread and toast some thick slices with a bit of butter.  Spoon the mushroom mix on top for a yummy open-face sandwich, pictured to the right with a sprinkle of red pepper flakes.

2.  Serve the mushrooms on top of any kind of noodles for an easy vegetarian pasta.

3.  Fold the mushrooms into eggs for a cheesy mushroom omelette.

4.  Spread onto a pizza with any other veggie toppings.

5.  Mix into risotto for an impressive and incredibly delicious dish. Sounds complicated, but the recipe‘s right on the fantastic Sporeboys website. Thanks Sporeboys for offering such delicious mushrooms and a recipe too!

another beautiful saturday in east london, and it’s off to broadway market! vietnamese iced coffee in hand, i spent a lovely few hours last weekend wandering the stalls,  listening to the outdoor musicians, enjoying the sunshine, and chatting with various vendors of all kinds. of course, i did a bit of eating along the way.

check out this wild mushroom risotto with fresh arugula, grated pecorino, and a splash of truffle oil from the sporeboys stall.

it’s wild and exotic! sounds like a scantily clad late-night performance rather than a lusciously creamy and rich risotto. i bought a box of their assorted mushrooms last week and enjoyed a number of meals of  sautéed mushrooms with italian olive oil, fresh sage and rosemary, and grated piave cheese (hard and nutty, a bit like parmigiano reggiano or pecorino), also from the market. so good and can be served so many ways! recipe and ideas for lots of mushroomy fun in my post on eat.drink.better. even more MUSHROOM MUSHROOM fun here (and no, that site will never get old).

i also had a great time chatting with a cheesemonger from H.S. Bourne, a family company that has been making a deliciously mild and crumbly cheshire cheese by hand since 1930. that seemed pretty old, until the friendly and knowledgable cheese man dropped a wealth of information on the history of cheshire cheese. apparently, cheshire cheese is the oldest recorded cheese in british history, thanks to a reference in the domesday book.  in case your knowledge of british history is as limited as mine, the domesday book was a nearly comprehensive survey of all the holdings in england, down to numbers of livestock, commissioned by william the conqueror after his invasion of england back in 1066.

hmm. i suppose i would have kept track of my cheese acquisitions too. i personally conquered a thick wedge of cheshire cheese hand crumbled and mixed with cranberries. perfect on brown bread with walnuts and maybe even a drizzle of honey.

i also got some kick-ass (kick-arse?) ground beef from all-natural traditionally raised cows for sliders for a picnic with the lovely folks at yelp. more on that to come. bye broadway market…see you next week!

this  post is all about the best cupcakes i’ve had so far in london. i took kellin to visit the adorable and wonderful broadway market during her last hour in london before returning to italy. stuffed from our borough market visit, we brokenheartedly turned down wild mushroom risotto, ghanaian food, and roast hog with crackling sandwiches. but we decided to treat ourselves to ONE mini cupcake because they were so ridiculously cute, and obviously brownie mountains and fresh strawberries with jersey cream were not quite enough dessert for the morning.

so we stopped at the happy stall of violet cakes and bought the enticing rhubarb and rosewater mini cupcake, a pale  pink and perfectly formed little turkish dome of dessert.  it was, quite honestly, ethereally delicious. so light and smooth yet so intensely flavored, like having the essence of rose petals in your mouth. such a tiny bite yet such a concentrated burst of taste! we promptly returned and bought another.

salted caramel this time. buttery, sweet, reminscent of birthday cake but with just a tiny hint of saltiness to give it a grownup edge.  so good that we actually stopped walking, turned around and returned for a third. we ended with elderflower, which i’d only had in cocktails until then (side note: apparently you can go elderflower foraging in london, as evidenced by the locally grown cocktail served at sunday’s rambling restaurant. more on that coming soon!).  lightly perfumed, vaguely herbal, fresh-tasting and summery. truly incredible.

chatting with the cupcake sellers a bit, we discovered that the cupcake base is all the same – a light vanilla sponge cake – and the variations come from the perfectly symmetrical florettes of buttercream frosting lovingly squidged on top.  apparently the colors and flavors of the frosting are all natural; according to their sign, they use ‘pure fruit purees, flower essences, vanilla pods, Valrhona chocolate, dark caramel, or freshly brewed espresso’ to obtain those beautiful shades and unbelievable flavors. so gloriously delicious and also organic and all-natural. my mind is boggled that the intense purple hue of that candied violet cupcake isn’t made with food coloring!

trying to find out the genius behind these cupcakes, i’m stymied yet intrigued by the mysterious nature of violet’s website. all you see is a massive gorgeous photo of cupcakes and no information. but google says that the company was started by claire ptak, a former pastry chef at chez panisse.  this explains both the all-natural-organic thing as well as the oh-my-god-you’re-amazing thing.  chez panisse appears to have that effect on people.

i’m going to go out on a limb and say that i think i’ve just discovered the best cupcakes in london. and i haven’t even tried that many cupcakes in london. but i’ve ravaged the most famous and highly lauded new york cupcake shops like a japanese movie monster takes down tokyo – magnolia, sugar sweet sunshine, billy’s, and babycakes, to name a few – and based on these three incredible bites, violet just might be better. but you know what – it’s much too soon to say. clearly this is just  a hypothesis that can only be verified with a great deal of dedicated and thorough research. violet cakes, i’ll see you next saturday to begin my study…

i absolutely love markets. farmers markets, flea markets, even supermarkets in countries other than my own always bring a smile to my face no matter what kind of mood i’m in. things have been a teeny bit frustrating here in london what with the backwords hurdling werewolf chase of setting up a business. it’s been quite exciting but a bit exhausting, and going to the market is a great way to slow down and clear my mind.  we are sloooooowly moving towards signing our lease, but as non-citizens with no proof of UK employment, this process moves at about the brisk pace of the yearly expansion of finland‘s land mass thanks to post-glacial rebound. yes, post-ice-age isostatic recovery always provides me with an endless source of entertainment.

post-glacial rebound aside, i am here to talk about the endless excitement of markets. to tantalize your tastebuds and stimulate your imagination as to how ridiculously wonderful our apartment will be once we actually get it, i’ll show you some photos from last week’s broadway market. our hopeful new place is sandwiched right in between this phenomenal saturday market, chock full of independent food retailers and fashion stalls, and the famous sunday morning columbia road flower market. my first visit there will be to stock our new flat floor-to-ceiling with bouquets and plants and loveliness in bloom.

thus, we will have a one-two punch of back-to-back weekend marketing within a five minutes walk radius of our place. this idea makes me happy as a pig in sh*t.  or,  happy as me with a roasted bit of pig in bun in hand. miraculously, this exact item happened to be on sale at the first stall of the market. this poster, and the accompanying smell, called to me with  caressing words of love and promises of porky perfection.

yeah. for reals. i’m obsessed with this stand. they have a huge metal grill with a slowly rotating hog on a spit. when you order, they grab a ciabatta from a stacked pyramid of rolls in a cute wicker basket and slather it with homemade applesauce. it’s soft on the inside, but hardy enough to contain an massive helping of sandwich innards. then goes in a handful of roquette (which i assume =  rocket, which also = arugula…where are we, europe or something?) and then a generous serving of succulent moist pork. the crowning detail that swiftly buys my adoration? a few carefully selected pieces of crackly pork skin, artfully placed on top of this work of art.

HELLOOOOOOOOOOO BEAUTIFUL.

my mind was sufficiently distracted by the sandwich for the immediate future, but i did manage to snap some more
photos of what the market that will soon become part of my saturday ritual. i particularly enjoyed the adorable aesthetics of the shortbread owl cookies from the cinnamon tree bakery.

i also appreciated their chalkboard sign detailing their use of organic ingredients. they had another sign explaining how all their products are handmade in their south london kitchen. cute and local! yes, that IS lovely.

other stalls sold vintage dresses, handmade jewelry, old-school track jackets, grandpa cardigans, and lots of other clothes that brought me straight back to the dolores park fixie hipsterfests in  the mission. chris and i were particularly amused by the ‘vintage’ mountain view high school t-shirt for sale halfway around the world. we also bought dolmas from the olive stand. yum.

we also gazed longingly at the imported italian olive oil and aged balsamic vinegar and eyed the gorgeous bouquets. excited to have a house to put these in.

our stomachs were stuffed full of pork, so i plan to go back next week to try the ghanian food at spinach and agushi. steaming woks at the market can only mean very good things.

once we get our tasty snack, we can sit by the canal, just a block or so from our house, and enjoy what will hopefully be lots of sunny weather.

i can’t wait! every saturday, we shall go to market, to market, buy a fat pig. is mother goose reading my mind? she may not have mentioned the applesauce and the ciabatta, but she certainly knows whats up with the pork products.  i’ll leave you with her words of wisdom…

To market, to market, to buy a fat pig,
Home again, home again, dancing a jig;
To market, to market, to buy a fat hog;
Home again, home again, jiggety-jog;
To market, to market, to buy a plum bun,
Home again, home again, market is done.

hopefully soon we will have our apartment, and the jig dancing can begin. come visit me and off we will go to the market!