a bit fishy, don't you think?

the past few days have been a little confusing for me, but i am also totally overwhelmed by all the support that has swamped my mailbox. your lovely comments and your encouraging emails give me lots and lots of strength and i want to thank every single one of you who has thought of me and/or dropped a line!

actually, i feel pretty healthy at the moment, only a little exhausted. the immediate cortisone treatment was not really a blast (eeeeeek, i don't like needles in my arms!) but the weird symptoms have totally disappeared. my sense of balance has improved drastically and my fine motor skills are totally back to normal. this was the reason i got checked out in the first place - if things slip out of your hand for no reason or you can not tilt your head without loosing balance and feeling disoriented ... well, that's a pretty good sign that something's wrong, right? suddenly i feel really stupid that i didn't see a doctor much sooner ...

i usually don't even take painkillers, i prefer to slow down and take it easy for a while, lay in bed and "cure myself" ... yeah well, that seems to be out of question right now :D ... i took it very easy over the weekend and i started to do some research on MS. i currently don't feel sick or weird, so i can not really embrace that i am in fact sick. all those super-clever webpages only make me go "huh??" at the moment. some suggest an immediate change of lifestyle, diet, workout and what not while others suggest to carry on as always and slowly adjust to this life changing disease ... i am pretty straight forward with my diagnose and not hopeless at all (aren't there supposed to be five stages of ... well, something?) so i think i just take it slow and see what's going to come ... i did so well with going all organic over the past few months, so i think i am heading in the right direction anyway. i don't want more adjustments in my diet right now. so before i get caught up in all these horror scenarios i decided to just take it easy for a while ...

and in my attempt to take it very easy i fell asleep while watching "finding nemo" on my laptop last night. it seems that springtime lethargy has slammed big time! can you believe that when i woke up all i wanted to do is eat fish? now, i am just cruel, right? i see this charming little movie and all i want to do is to have cute little nemo fried up on my plate!

so i am totally going for fish today. i am not at all experienced with cooking fish, because i usually eat tuna out of a can or i buy a smoked trout on the local farmer's market every once in a while. and i totally crave fish sticks once a year. yes, fish sticks! i am really scraping the bottom of my culinary barrel when i think about cooking a fish ... i am a bit scared to cook a whole one, actually ... so i decided to go for an über-expensive tuna steak from the local store.

tuna steak with a pepper and fennel seed crust

one tuna steak
one teaspoon of ground pepper
one tablespoon of fennel seeds
butter
salt

1. rinse the fish and dry it on a paper towel
   
   
   
2. grind a tbsp of pepper and a tbsp of fennel seeds - i used a mortar for that
   
   
   
3. pour the spices on a cutting board and coat the tuna steak on one side
   
   
   
4. put another board on top and weight it down with a bowl of water or the mortar you used earlier ... let the fish rest like this for 20 minutes
   
   
   
   
   
5. in a pan, melt a knob of butter and fry the tuna steak over medium heat on both sides, the coated side first. i am always going for a well done piece of meat, but if you prefer you can have your tuna steak medium rare too :)
   
6. season with salt before arranging on the plate
7. you can make a nice gravy for your veggies if you pour a little cream in the pan and bring it to a boil once more. add some of the ground spices too, it'll be delicious!
   
   
   
8. the tuna goes well with vegetables - in my case steamed swiss chard and boiled potatos
   
   
   

wow, i tell you, i don't want to blow my own trumpet here, but this late lunch was absolutely fantastic! i did not think that the combination of fennel seeds and fish would work so darn well! i am totally satisfied with this fishy creation ... maybe i'll try to get my hands on some good fish more often!