Day 39

Air / Water temperature: 23°C (14°C at night) / 18°C

Wind direction / Bft: South-southeast / 3-5

Area: ARGENTI FLUMEN (happiness on the hook) – Nautical chart showing the route

Combuse: Soldier croaker (1.2 kg) remove intestines, fillet and skin, rinse and pat dry. Break out the gills and clean well the carcass under running water. Bring to boil 1 L of water with 3 dl white wine, 1 dl of vermouth, 200 g leeks in large pieces, 200 g celery in large pieces, 1 carrot in wheels, 1 peeled and halved onion, 3 unpeeled slightly crushed garlic cloves, 1 bay leaf, 1 sprig of thyme , 1 lightly crushed tablespoon of white pepper, 1 tablespoon of salt. Add carcass, let it boil again, reduce heat and simmer gently for 20 minutes, skim off foam. Let flow the broth through a fine-mesh sieve into a clean pot, press well on the pieces, then discard. Set aside the broth. Cook 5 Savoy cabbage leaves for 9 minutes in some salt water and let cool. Mix to a sauce 2 tablespoons lime juice, 1 teaspoon sesame oil, zest of 1 lime, ½ teaspoon white pepper and 1 teaspoon salt. Cut from the fillets four beautiful pieces of 50 g each, marinate in the sauce for 1 hour. Remove from marinade, pat dry and sprinkle with salt again. Pack the fillets in 4 of the cabbage leaves. Lay out the remaining cabbage leaf on the bottom of a steam basket, put the fish packets on it and put everything aside until just before eating. Blanch the remaining bits of the fillet for two minutes in lightly salted water. Cook 400 g of beetroot in salted water for 2 hours, cool and peel. Cut 50 g of the beetroot into strips and set aside. Pass 300 g of the beetroot with the blanched remains of the fish fillets through a meat grinder, then dilute with 9 dl of the fish stock and simmer for 20 minutes. Let flow this soup through a fine-mesh sieve into a clean pot. Salt the soup to taste. Soak 20 g dried morels for 1 hour in lukewarm water, rinse well and briefly sauté in a little butter. Short before eating  steam the fish and cabbage packets for 8 minutes. Bring the soup to a simmer, add the beetroot sticks and the morels, warm for two minutes. Pour some soup into soup plates, put the fish and cabbage packages in and sprinkle some chives over. (More recipes from the Chief cook of «PS Narina»)

For a few days now Oskar has occasionally been standing still for a longish while: thereby cutting a very strange picture – because ants are creatures that are permanently in motion. My attempts to get him to sit on the couch remain unsuccessful – quite obviously the body of an ant is constructed in such a way that it cannot sit down. Or, perhaps it has to do with the spirit of an ant. Perhaps that can be the subject of research in the future: to breed ants that can also sit down. Hard to say what that will mean for the world.

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