The 4 year Cooking Adventure

I really feel like I have been on a cooking adventure for the past 4 years.  I am sure you have seen the cooking show where the cooks are supposed to make something fabulous using the contents of a mystery basket.  The basket is always filled with weird stuff that people wouldn't usually eat, let alone combine with other odd stuff and made into an edible dish.
This morning I made egg and sausage burritos for the twins.  They had softball practice at 7am and really needed something substantial to get them going.  The sausage part of this dish has been an adventure since we moved here.  Ground sausage from the store is sold fresh and has an odd spicy taste.  It doesn't taste like Bob Evans or Jimmy Deans.  It really tastes more like lamb than sausage.  I found a good substitute for the Bob and Jimmy varieties at the Irish butcher, Jack O'Shea's, in Brussels.  Today when I started to cook up the eggs I realized the butter I had bought was not really butter but more of a butter cream mixture.  Although the butter/cream was not ideal for high heat cooking, it really did cook up the scrambled eggs nicely!  The burritos were the best ones I have made.

I should have read the package on the butter.  It is written in French and Flemish and states that this is butter with cream. It doesn't work well for frying.

The eggs turned out fine but I realized everything in my pantry is in another language.  This has made cooking really hard but it has actually helped me adapt and adjust.  I think I could really be on a cooking show where the contestants are surprised with ingredients they aren't familiar with.  I do that every day!!

This is Speculoos (spek u lows).  The picture on the front makes it look like it might be peanut butter right?  There are no peanuts in it.  It is actually a spread that tastes like a molasses cookie.  It is really tasty but definitely not peanut butter.

Obviously this is a can of peaches!  I have no idea what all those words mean.  Thank goodness there is a picture!

This is a small spice container.  Can you figure out which one it is?  The description is written in Flemish, French and German.

This is whole milk.  I bought it by mistake.  I usually buy the equivalent of 2% milk.  It took me about 2 years to finally find the milk we like!

Check out the flavor of this ketchup-balsamic vinegar!  It is really good and tastes a lot like A1 which we can only find in the international food section at bigger grocery stores.  Do they sell this in the US?  We can also buy curry ketchup.

I know I will welcome the availability of all my favorite brands when we move.  But I also know that my cooking adventure in Belgium with weekly fresh food markets and odd ingredients has been a lot of fun!