Shipping on the border of Belgium and the Netherlands

Everyone want to keep their shipping costs as low as possible and to help myself I have made an overview of the shipping options for someone like me, living in Belgium but the Dutch border is close. Belgium post Bpost gives more divisions in weight, Dutch post TNT in regions, so I kept it as compact as possible allowing for these differences. A general trend is usually easily spotted. Why are my shipping rates not as per these tables? Well I round off the amounts and allow a little for handling too.

Sheet for post that fits through the letterbox, approx max 30mm tick
Sheet for post that does not fit in the letterbox

• If you want to add (perhaps for those living near Belgium, Netherlands and Germany) to this list, just let me know and I'll send you the original files.
• If I made a mistake in typing or other I'm not responsible!
• I've indicated track and trace for some shipping options, but you might want to look into that further.
• I've not looked at insurance, registered and so on, usually these are extra again.
• Kiala B and DHLforyou NL prices as for service point to servicepoint
• I've not included http://www.postzegelsmetkorting.nl/ rates but these are -20% from TNT from what they claim.

Happy shipping!

Sweet Saturday - Baked Mango cheesecake

First of all very best wishes to all of you for 2011, 

enjoy every minute of it in good health, good company and good humour.

Here a recipe for baked mango cheesecake. I love the baked ones much better than the none baked ones. I made it the day before, so it could cool overnight and it was just the perfect dessert to top off 2010, not too heavy, even nice and fresh with raspberry sauce, mango sorbet and fresh mango on the side.
This recipe is the right amount for a 24 cm/9 inch baking tin.

• 75 gr butter melted
• 200 gr of digestive biscuits in crumbs
• 500 gr mascarpone 
• 500 gr soft cream cheese
• 150 gr sugar
• a tin of mango slices
• 4 eggs
• 1 mango
• raspberry sauce
• mango sorbet

Mix the melted butter and the biscuit crumbs and press firmly into the baking tin. Leave this than to coll for minimum on hour in the fridge.

Drain the mango slices and mix these, you should have about 200ml of mango purée. 

Preheat the oven to 150°C or 130°C if you have a fan oven.

Mix the cream cheese, mascarpone, sugar and mango purée. Beat the eggs and add these too. Pour all on top of the biscuit base and bake for 1,5 hour. 

Leave to cool with the door closed for another hour or the cake will crack. When cool enough put it in the fridge and leave it overnight to cool.

Dress the plates or the cake whatever you prefer with fresh mango and raspberry sauce, some mango sorbet on the side and enjoy!

A little help for a friend

My story bowls come in nice paper boxes which are lined with felt. I get them through the company STRAID - straight aid - from the Netherlands who have these custom made for me in Nepal. Today I got the sad news that Hari,  the owner of the felting company died at 38, way to young and leaving behind his wife and 3 kids. Ten families were depending on Hari's company for their income as well. Now STRAID wants to help to keep the company and the families going.

Therefore STRAID now offers a set of 5 gift cards (made by the company who makes my paper boxes) with envelopes and a wind chime in paper for only 9,85 euro of which at least 4 euro's will go to Hari's company. You can buy them via this link if you live in the Netherlands add code HARI10 on check out and the special offer price will be calculated. Best contact Marcel at STRAID if you live outside the Netherlands.

So you might think why not sell some felt products from Hari's company as a special offer instead of cards, simple because not enough were left in stock.

Give a friend a little help :-) Thanks!

getting ready for Xmas: Decemberwinkel

Today I helped to set up the Decembershop, a temporary shop where approx 12-15 local artists sell their work. This year it is located in a barn. Last week we cleared the barn and set up the lights and display area's and today these displays were filled with the goodies. On the Dutch Handmade site you can see an impression  of the nearly finished shop. Here I'd like to share some of my new items with you. I took the pictures late at night, inside and other not such good conditions, so excuse the quality.

Story Bowl: Lonely rabbit in the dessert where he lives in a box.

Story Bowl: Are you an Angel?

New necklaces and rings in the serie 'Dutch Folklore'

New necklace in sterling silver: Funky Chicken

Above it, a porcelain bird on a silver necklace, more porcelain animals will follow.

Story Bowl: Wanna go for a ride babe?

Another Funky Chicken in sterling silver.

Wants these, come to the Decemberwinkel!

Sweet Saturday

Apple's with Bailyes cream liqueur in a filo wrapping

I made this after reading another recipe with apples and Baileys. But I did want something wrapped in dough, which was not the case in the other recipe, as I wanted to hand these out as treats. I did not take measurements of the ingredients so these are guesses.

• 5 small apples
• 50 gr of dark brown sugar
• 50 gr of butter
• dash of baileys
• 50 ml cream
• ground cinnamon to taste
• ground ginger to taste
• ready bought filo dough

As I'm writing these down I can imagine raisins soaked in the Baileys first would go well with it too.

Take a baking tray for scones or muffins, fill each cup with 4 layers of filo dough, I just tore these into roughly the shape I wanted. I did not butter the tray.

Preheat the oven to 180°C.

Cut the apples and fry them in the butter in a pan, I added them apple by apple, so you have very soft pieces of apple and some with a bit of crunch in the end. Add the sugar, spices, cream and Bailyes too.

Once this is ready add a spoon full to each filo filled cup in the tray. And put in the oven for about 12 minutes.

Enjoy!!

PS Best served warm.

PS If you don't want to bother with the filo, I'm sure this apple-baileys mix will go real nice with some ice-cream.

Golden Gull - the award

Today was the big day, the award: the winner of the golden gull would be announced on the largest book-fair of Flanders in Antwerp. It was really busy and we spend ages looking for parking, but arrived at the award ceremony just in time.

The jury members Heidi Lenaerts and Rudi Vanschoonbeeck read some abstracts form the books which had entered the competion for best book published under own management and organised by "Creatief Schrijven" (creative writing). Karolien van Ransbeeck completed the presentation with some beautiful unplugged songs.

It was publisher Rudi Vanschoonbeeck who announced the winner: Bart Vermeer with his poetry album Medea-Brutus.

Here Bart Vermeer just received the award and shows it to the public:

And here a picture of Bart with the award (safely in it's box) and myself with the award winning book:

Bart was so good to let me keep that copy of the book :-) 

I hope he is really happy with this very special story bowl I made.

Many thanks to Bart for the book and 

many thanks to the organisation Creatief Schrijven to commision me to make the award!

If you want to read about the making of the golden gull, go here.

Golden Gull - the making

A few weeks ago I got a phone-call from an organisation "Creatief Schrijven" (creative writing). They had seen my work and they liked it; would I want to make an award called "De Gouden Meeuw", de golden seagull, for the best book published in private management. Of course I would; I was honoured to be asked!

I hinted here and there I was working on this, but did not want to reveal anything until the price was awarded to the winner today on the bookfair in Antwerp.

As they had seen my work and my story-bowls, they had for this occasion to make a bowl with a little seagull standing in it. But my mind started to work and I got a flying gull in my head, so I proposed this design instead:

They liked it too, so I went to work, I made the bowl in porcelain and made a second bowl in clay so it could support the porcelain bowl during firing. I had first in mind to string the gull on 1 wire, but quickly realised that this would be too wobble and changed the design to have a wire running under each wing. So I made several seagulls, which was ok, than I had spares and I would have some to test the gold finishes. In the end I also made another bowl as the first one did warp too much.

Turned out that the real gold leaf (head) gave the nicest finish, I had looked at fake gold leaf and gold paint (wing). So I tested the paint and real gold leaf. I got some special glue for the last and it worked fine, nothing as difficult as I had expected. Maybe it's because I work very fine that I did not have the troubles that some others had, as I read on comments on the internet. Just touch it with your hand as little as possible and use a soft brush the press it to the object.

I hung the gull on a very fine steel-wire. The end I closed with a silver bead and I hung a porcelain label with my logo and initials on it too. Found a nice box and ready it was to go to the winner.

 Read part 2 to know who the winner is.