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Everything is getting more expensive, but our Greek takeout is really taking it a bit too far, I believe, even compared to other restaurants.
Greek food is among my favorites, but especially those meat dishes (which are the best part, in my opinion), and gyros in particular, are really tough to get right in home-cooking, in my experience.
If you know how to pull off some good Greek dishes at home, then yes, definitely share some recipes and pictures, please. 
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Salad bowl recipe please! Gonna RAID this recipe!! Looks super delicious and a PERFECT for summer!
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Looks great, I just commented on your post. 
I'm following your blog, so if you ever make some Greek meat dishes like gyros, souvlaki or bifteki, be sure to post some pictures and possibly a recipe.
What's up, Trolls and friends? It was a slow trolling week, despite a live meetup, but things should be picking up soon.
We should see a shot at the next swimming badge next week, possibly another international burger, and I also have a major sporting challenge for me this summer to be revealed within the next couple of weeks.
Most importantly, we are working on re-introducing the poker challenges, and we may have found a solution. There are still a few formalities to be dealt with, but we should hopefully see the Trolls meet at the tables again by the end of the week. Looking forward to it. 
Troll Trivia of the Week
Harrier's nephew is turning 5 this weekend. What am I getting him?
1) a Lego soccer set
2) socks and shin guards
3) a tennis game for the Wii
Originally posted by Harrier88
Troll Trivia of the WeekHarrier's nephew is turning 5 this weekend.
1) a Lego soccer set
2) socks and shin guards
3) a tennis game for the Wii
No clue, but if I was getting something for a 5-yr old, it would be Lego
The Trolls party on - on PartyPoker! 
Primrose has left Pokerstars, which was the only room left where we both had accounts, making it impossible to meet up at the tables. Not a problem - I can simply join her at PartyPoker instead. There may not be any mixed games, but with hourly freerolls and some decent SNGs, it may have enough on offer to make it a decent secondary room for me.
I just set up my account and everything should be up and running now. Time to build that bankroll, then - and time to clash with the grindette soon, too.
New poker challenged shall be (re-)introduced within the next few days. Let's keep the party going!
Yaaaaaaaaaay, party on Partypoker!!!
Looking forward to meeting you at the tables for cool challenges. Those "Free to play around the clock" should already be a great option! Remember our "Troll Freeroll" on iPoker? Back in the good old days? Well: We got "our Troll Freeroll" back now! The party is on!
Still going for Silver...
I went to the pool today to do my Silver badge exam. Everything went well - the swimming, the diving, the theory... all passed. There is just one thing I still need to do: The jump from the 3 meter diving board, which seems to be mandatory by now. Problem is, my public indoor pool, where I did the exam, doesn't have any 3 meter diving boards...
What to do now? It's pretty simple, I just need to go to another pool which has any 3 meter boards, do the jump there, get an official confirmation by the pool attendant that I did the jump, bring it back to my local pool, where it has already been officially confirmed that I did the rest of the exam, and then finally collect my Silver badge.
So the challenge is not technically over yet - I still need to get my squirrel butt off the 3 meter board to make it official. But yes, as far as the actual exam is concerned, everything was passed. I can already start preparing for Gold.
First, though, let's collect that Silver badge. Not sure when I can find the time to get to any of those other pools, there are a bunch of outdoor ones in the area which have 3 meter diving boards. I hope that I will have it wrapped up by some time early next week, at least.
Prim presents for Recipe Raiders: summer salad bowl!!
Yes, Prim raided again a yummy summer recipe and this one comes from nobody else but "our" own reg-collegue: Nazgos! I asked him for the recipe for that delicious looking salad bowl in his blog and he gave it to me. As today is veggie Tuesday and I still have own grown salad, I decided that it´s a great opportunity to raid this recipe. So without further ado, Prim presents: Nazgos´salad bowl!!
Salad, lentils, "Kohlrabi", some carrots and some fake cheese, the dressing is made of fresh herbs from the garden, some garlic, olive oil and balsamico vinegar (unfortunately don´t have any own grown tomatoes and cucumbers yet, but the plants are already flowering)
Trolls verdict: Delicious! Five stars!
Looks great! I should really collect some good salad recipes too for my veggie days. Those artificial meat substitute products just ain't gonna cut it, as convenient as they are.
PartyPoker Warm-Up
Finally, we are able to do some poker challenges again. Let's start out easy, and also let me play my first ever hands on PartyPoker while we're at it. Primrose and I were simply playing one of the hourly freerolls and one $1 9-max SNG against each other, in both cases competing for who lasts longer.
We were also late regging another hourly freeroll that was already underway because we might as well. This one was not part of any challenges, though.
The Freeroll
I had a good start, then lost half my stack again with a flopped top pair vs a flopped two pair. After that, both Trolls were card dead, with stacks pretty close to each other, but I was the one leaving first - AQ didn't do so well after my all-in preflop.
So this round went to Prim, though she unfortunately didn't cash either. Oh, but I did cash the other late regged freeroll, which was not part of the challenge.
The SNG
Both of us were very card dead here too, and it seemed like one of us would bubble with only four players left... and then the unthinkable happened and one of the two bigstack bullies knocked the other one out. 
The Trolls were ITM, and clashed in the very next hand, when we finally did get something:
Sorry Primrose... 
Looks like AQ wasn't going so well for her either today.
Speaking of hands that don't go so well, I later pushed KK during the heads-up phase, and didn't have any more luck than the grindette tends to have with it lately. I ran into a small ace, I think it was A2 or A5, and my opponent rivered the wheel. 
So the Trolls were all even in this small warm-up challenge, but it felt good to be back. Can't complain about my first day on Party either, with a cashed freeroll and a SNG finishing 2nd.
All right, so instead of my usual aqua gymnastics class on Thursday evenings, I went to a nearby outdoor pool to do my jump off the 3 meter diving board. Two actually - I opened up my arms a bit too early on my first dive, must have been my flying squirrel instincts. Either way, we're done now - here's the Silver:
We did it!
Next stop: GOLD! ♠_grin: This one is going to be a lot tougher, we'll get to it later.
New burgers coming up soon...
Enough swimming for now, we're going to Israel. Sorry, bacon lovers...
This one is going to be our first chicken burger of this series, inspired by a barbecue dish called Jerusalem Mix. Following this recipe, I made a seasoning for it. I still have plenty of leftovers of it too to try it with other dishes, possibly the original.
Ingredients: 2 tablespoons of sumac, 1 tablespoon of salt, 1 tablespoon of garlic powder, 2 teaspoons of turmeric, 2 teaspoons of cardamom, 2 teaspoons of curry powder, 2 teaspoons of black pepper, 2 teaspoons of ground coriander, 1 teaspoon of cinnamon, 1 teaspoon of paprika and 1 teaspoon of chili powder.
As for the chicken patties, I'm following the guidelines from my earlier Recipe Raiders attempt at plain chicken patties. I simply put 400 g of chicken breast into this little blender here and later added an egg and eight tablespoons of panko breadcrumbs, as well as 2-3 tablespoons of the Jerusalem seasoning I prepared.
I probably should have blended it with the egg, breadcrumbs and seasoning right away, but it worked fine mixing it with my hands too. The chicken mush went straight into the frying pan...
...and soon it sets in place, with the help of a spatula.
To build the burger, I started with the seasoned chicken patty...
...then added some hummus and chopped olives on the other bun.
Put it together, and our Israel-inspired burger is ready.
Really good stuff! I forgot how good hummus was too, I had the rest of it on some toast in the evening. Primrose also approves, both Trolls are happy.
Yes, this one was really solid. Good seasoning, the other toppings didn't drown out too much of the meat and added some flavor of their own - this one will have a spot near the top for sure.
Where exactly? Switzerland is tough to beat... but I think I would put it above Greece after all, maybe still behind Cyprus, because I remember the halloumi being quite good. Not an easy choice just going from memory, without trying them side by side, but I think that's what I will go with.
1st Switzerland
2nd Cyprus
3rd Israel
4th Greece
5th Mongolia
6th Denmark
7th Korea
8th Spain
9th Germany
10th Alsace
11th Italy
12th Texas
13th California
14th Mexico
15th Brazil
16th Arabia
17th Turkey
18th England
19th France
20th Colombia
21st Cuba
22nd Canada
23rd Hungary
24th The Netherlands
Fun fact: I did a group dance performance to this song at a hannukah celebration in a local synagogue four years ago.
Going for Gold
We got through Bronze and Silver with relative ease, apart from the need to travel to a different pool on another day to do the 3 meter dive, but Gold could prove to be a tough nut to crack, and may even need more than one attempt.
The Gold badge once again doubles the required distance of non-stop swimming while enforcing a much stricter time limit, giving you less than a minute for each 25 meter lane. It introduces short distance speed goals too - 1:15 minutes sounds pretty tight for two lanes of breaststroke swimming. It also comes with a laundry list of different swimming techniques to master, even including some transport swimming, which I have never done before. Furthermore, the theory part goes beyond saving your own hide, and also includes some knowledge of how to save other people.
Let's take a look at the full list of requirements:
Theoretical part
- Knowledge of the bathing rules and assistance in case of swimming-, boating- and ice-related emergencies (self-rescue, basic third-party rescue).
Practical part
- Jumping heads first from the edge of the pool and swimming continuously for 30 minutes, making at least 800 meters of distance in a recognizable swimming style, including at least 150 meters of backstroke swimming.
- Starting dive and 25 meters of front crawling.
- Starting dive and 50 meters of breaststroke swimming under 1:15 minutes.
- 50 meters of back crawl swimming or swimming on your back with a leg whip kick, without using your arms.
(Note: The leg whip kick variation without using the arms seems to be mandatory now.)- Diving for 10 meters from a swimming stance (no push-off start).
- Retrieving three objects from the bottom of a 2 meters deep part of the pool within three minutes.
- Jumping from a height of 3 meters or performing two kinds of jumps from a height of 1 meter.
(Note: The jump I did yesterday may still be valid.)- 50 meters of transport swimming - pushing or pulling.
That's a lot, isn't it? Well, it's the ultimate of the standard DLRG swimming badges, it's supposed to be quite a challenge.
It's not easy, but it should be doable. I had been told that I had 6 minutes left after swimming my 400 meters in the Silver exam, which means that I did them in around 14 minutes. If I am able to keep that pace, I would already be on track for Gold in the stamina part... and I didn't even go all out yet.
Two lanes of breaststroke swimming in under 75 seconds sounds tough... I could get myself timed for practice purposes, but at that point I might as well do the exam already, since it only costs money if you pass. A good dive off the starting block should help shave off a few precious seconds.
Doing some distance diving out of a swimming stance could be tricky too. 10 meters is not a lot, however, considering that I made a full 25 meter lane from a push-off start before. It should not be a big problem. The three minutes time limit for the "deep diving" should be negligible too.
My biggest worry so far would be transport swimming, because I have genuinely no idea how to do it and would need to be briefed on it, not to mention that I would need a partner - I would have no problem asking some random strangers to volunteer, but I don't think many would jump on the opportunity. 
Doing it together with Prim would be ideal, but that would mean that I couldn't take a shot until after a month or so, and we wouldn't have a lot of time for each other for the rest of our stay at the pool.
Let's see what we can do. Not sure when I can get to it, maybe next week already. This is the ultimate standard swimming badge, but don't think this means that I will be done afterwards. 
But as always, first thing's first.
Originally posted by VorpalF2F
congrats on the silver!
Thank you! I guess I can be considered a barracuda in the pool now, not quite a shark yet.
Originally posted by Harrier88
Troll Trivia of the WeekHarrier's nephew is turning 5 this weekend.
1) a Lego soccer set
2) socks and shin guards
3) a tennis game for the Wii
Solution:
2) socks and shin guards
My nephew took up soccer at one of his local clubs a few weeks ago, so I am getting him some equipment.
He's a sporty little guy, very interested in both watching and playing sports, and soccer seems to be among his favorites. Fair enough, it's the most popular sport in this country. I also heard he gave field hockey a try earlier this year.
I made sure to introduce him to some of the more exotic sports too. When his birth was announced, I immediately invested in some lacrosse equipment for children, and I also later introduced him to baseball, American football, and let him mess around with hockey pucks. Remember the Little League challenge Prim and I did last year? The stuff we used was mostly either his, or things that technically belong to me, but which are kept around for when he's visiting.
I actually did get him a small Lego soccer set a few years ago too for his birthday, ignoring the concerns that he would be too young for it.
Now, however, he is ready for the real thing.
I will be visiting tomorrow to celebrate with him and catch up with my brother and his family. I will bring the shin guards and socks too, but shhhhhh... don't tell him yet.
My nephew liked the shin guards I brought him - even though he seemed unsure what they are at first. Kids his age don't seem to commonly wear them yet in practice. Once he tried them on, though, he didn't even want to take them off, he kept wearing them throughout the day, along with his new Borussia Dortmund outfit. He went on to play some soccer using a small toy ball with me in the living room, knocking over a glass of water at one point... 
It was a pretty busy week for me in general, I managed to get a lot of things done. Not only that, but it was also a very busy trolling week, with a new poker room, a new poker challenge, a new burger version which was very good, and a new swimming badge which took trips to two different pools. It's rare that we have so much content in one week, but we're not going to stop. 
There is a big, brand new challenge for me to be revealed, and maybe we will even see a shot at the final swimming badge already.
Things are going to heat up for the Trolls this summer! 
