Once my son heard that if he met a hedgehog with an apple on its back he should take it off. For sure it fell on the miserable animal by accident and it shouldn't be in the hedgehog's larder. hedgehogs lost a lot of appeal for my small son when he learnt that they eat beetles, snails, worms and other little tasty "dishes". Hedgehogs in stories eat apples, pears and nuts. Fortunately, the wise book "I believe in hedgehogs" by Dorota Sumińska rescues the affection for the hedgehog population.

Reminiscences about hedgehogs came to me while I prepared a dessert with raspberries. Fresh and sun-smelling raspberries arranged on a sweet chocolate mousse looked like colourful hedgehogs. I don't know if this dish will remind everyone of hedgehogs, but the dessert will for sure be tasty for everybody.

Ingredients (for 5 people)
1 pack of chilled French pastry
200g of raspberries
200ml of 30% sweet cream
200g of mascarpone cheese







Do you remember what our seasons looked like a few years ago? The winter was frosty, snowy, and it was on time. Christmas was white and we didn't worry about the snow during the winter holiday. Then came spring. A bit rainy, a bit sunny, with the temperature sufficient to wake everything up into life. June always promised the summer with a temperature up to 26C, sun and rain – just enough to make everybody happy: people on holiday and farmers during the harvest. The autumn was rainy and it got gradually colder, with painted leaves on the trees. And then everything started again with a clean slate.
For sure there were anomalies. Singularly strong frost in winter, snow in May or enormous heatwaves. But it was an exception to the rule. Rarely were there situations when the lack of snow in the winter, huge heat and lack of rain caused the most important Polish rivers to almost dry up. I remember last year waiting for the rain while the ever more shallow Vistula and Oder rivers bared the next treasures for archaeologists to find. This year's rains aren't normal. They are tropical rainstorms which cause water damage and local floods.
But we have this kind of climate and we have to deal with it. Those who can't spend the heat in the cool sea or can't go away to a chilly climate have to look for homemade ways of refreshment. One of these is eating fruit. Tropical fruits are best for the heat. They have the most water, ascorbic acid and micronutrients, which we lose by sweating. Limes, lemons, and oranges are excellent ingredients for homemade lemonade, bringing refreshment during the hottest days. Apart from the fact that they are very tasty, their look brings respite during the summer afternoon. Doesn't a jug with cool water, slices of fruit, peppermint leaves and ice cubes look beautiful?


There are as many recipes for scrambled eggs as there are chefs. Everybody has their own secret recipe. Some like to fry them for longer than others. Certain people whisk the eggs in a cup to pour on the pan as a fluffy yellow mass. Others put the eggs directly into the pan and mix when the white is congealed, and on the plate there is a white-yellow dish. Everybody has their own ingredients: onion, sausages, ham, tomatoes, chives. My summer proposal is to add chanterelles to scrambled eggs.

Chanterelles don't contain a lot of goodness. A few vitamins and minerals stack up poorly against other ingredients. We value them most of all for their gentle but expressive taste and for how beautiful they look. They also last a long time, rarely have worms and due to their colour it is easy to find them in the grass.

Serve scrambled eggs with chanterelles with fresh bread for Sunday breakfast and your family will be delighted.

3 eggs
1 onion
100g of chanterelles


Except for a suitcase with books (replaced partly with the library in my tablet) we bring a lot of board games with us on holiday. I take them out of their boxes, pack them into zipped plastic bags and put them into one box. Due to this our baggage doesn't look like we're preparing to move house, and during the holiday nobody can say "I have got nothing to play with".

Board games are a great idea for spending time with family and friends. They teach rivalry and the rules of fair play. The youngest players learn to deal with failure. Some of our games need a table, so they are great when "the children are bored when it's raining". Others don't have a board, so we can play anywhere: on the beach, on a picnic, in the tent.

1. Mushrooming and Chinese Chequers
On the front burner, an absolute classic. Everybody knows Mushrooming. We go around the board collecting small "edible" mushrooms. This game has a big asset: there are two winners: the one who collected the most mushrooms and the one who is first to the finish. I don't need to recommend Chinese Chequers. It could be a boring game because apart from moving the chequers nothing happens. But every time there are a lot of emotions. For the youngest players I recommend two chequers per player. The rules of the game are the same but the children won't be bored.

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