Category: Vegetables

"Today For You, Tomorrow For Me"

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Oh good grief. Why is it that whenever I get to that point in a particular scheme where I can’t back out, things just get more and more difficult?

You may, if you have eyes, have read in previous posts about Rent coming to Levin (or really Levin coming to Rent, it is their local performing arts group doing it.) Well, I booked tickets for Tim and I for tomorrow night. Well it’s Rent, I have to go.

It is times like this that a car would be useful (indeed, a driver’s liscence at all.) Tim has work at 7am on Friday (I know, it’s ANZAC day, way to honour the fallen with frappucinos, Starbucks), and there are no late trains or busses out of Levin on a Thursday night. The Friday night show isn’t an option as Tim has work at 6am the next day, and we have no way of getting to the Saturday night one. We are going to get the commuter train to Levin after I finish work tomorrow, but after the show we have six or so hours to kill until our 5.30am bus back to Wellington. Unfortunately their McDonalds isn’t open 24 hours on a Thursday and I don’t fancy living on the streets for the night so…we have had to book ourselves $90 worth of motel accomodation (the cheapest we could find! There are no hostels!) from after the show till 5.00am.

So, I really, really hope the show is good.

What if the audience is tiny? What if the performers have no chemistry? What if they have an unconvincing Angel? What if nobody starts to moo during Over The Moon?

As you can see I am very nervous about the whole operation especially since I am going to end up spending a week’s pay on it (And Tim’s only there under the “you have to be nice for my birthday” clause.)

On a more culinary note, I have been tagged again! This time by super-blogger Amy, who wants me to post ten of my favourite food photos that I have taken. This is quite good actually because I am far too frazzled to upload the photos of what I made for dinner tonight. Funnily enough, not many come from the fledgeling, badly-lit days of my blog, but if you feel like a chuckle then peruse the archives by all means.


Above: This is actually one of my earlier shots, from October in fact. I made the incredible Rhubarb Vanilla Mincemeat from Nigella’s Feast, and thought a close-up shot would look rather nifty. It kinda does, right? Click *here* to see the link to the original post, and how it all turned out.


Above: This is a vegetable stew – Tunisian if I remember correctly? – again from Feast. Nigella fully opened me up to the magical world of vegetable stews, which are far more delicious than the stringy name would indicate. I made this dish for a family birthday party when Tim and I flew up home for the Muse concert. The light at home seems so much nicer than in the flat. I suspect the fact that our flat is wedged halfway down a valley with a thousand other flats squidged around it might play a part… Click *here* for the original post.


Above: One from our new camera, this home-made Creme Fraiche picture was taken recently (you could scroll down if you like but I’ll give you the link anyway!) This photo is quite important to me as it’s the only photo I’ve managed to get onto Tastespotting, and it ended up being one of the top 25 most popular photos of the week! You would not believe how flipping excited I was about this – well, maybe you would.


Above: This is another one taken with our new camera. I made the Chocolate Guinness Cake from Feast, which has become one of the more popular cakes in the flat. What can I say, it’s an amazing recipe. I liked the light and the colouring in this photo – plus photos of cakes and desserts are always more popular, aren’t they!


Above: This photo is from the Christmas Feast I cooked for the flat last December, and do click *here* for the original post, I’d be most obliged if you’d read about how it unfolded. Because flatmate Emma is celiac, I tried my best to keep the whole meal gluten free but I couldn’t get around Rugelach (again from Feast) which I had been longing to make. Consisting of varying proportions of butter, dough, chocolate and brown sugar, it’s no wonder I loved them. This photo isn’t very well lit but I like the composition and I like that it reminds me of that fun time.

That’s not anywhere near ten photos but it’s all I (and possibly you, dearest reader), have the energy for right now. Isn’t it funny that four of the photos are from Feast? (ooh, try saying that quickly.) I guess it’s just a right place, right time thing. Anyway it’s getting late and I have to pack, and worry, and dither, and all sorts of other time consuming things. As with my previous post, I can’t think of anyone else to tag, but if you feel like having a reconaissance through your favourite photos knock yourself out and say it was at my insistence.

This time tomorrow, we’ll be seeing Rent! I’m nervous, but I’m excited…but I’m nervous…I’m in a glass cage of emotion!

Tag, You’re It!

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I always used to lose when we played tag at school (don’t even get me started on piggy in the middle!) Any long-term readers of this blog don’t need another vitriolic diatribe on how PE scarred me for life, but what I’m trying to blunderingly say is that not all forms of tag are bad. Particularly the sort you can play from the comfort of your own computer.

To the point, the lovely Erica (she of the delightfully named Oh my! Apple Pie! blog) has ‘tagged’ me to describe myself in six words. She did it herself, lots of others have, suddenly it’s my turn.

But first, while I deliberate – roasted cauliflower.


Above: I would never turn down cauliflower blanketed in cheese sauce, but secretly (okay, not so secretly at all, would I stop talking about it already) I think this is my favourite way of eating it. Roast florets at 200 C (give or take) until charred and smoky and slightly crispy in places and more delicious than you could believe possible from looking at this innocent white vegetable.


Above: This monumentally comforting dish comes from a Vegetarian Mediterranean cookbook that I got for Christmas from a family friend, and is a lot more delicious than its innocuous ingredients would suggest. When Tim and I got back to the flat yesterday – our trip home what very whistle-stoppish in nature – I made this for dinner. Already a simple recipe, I’ve simplified it further, because I’m lazy as heck and want to wash as few dishes as possible.

Baked Tomato Pasta (for 2)

300g spaghetti or fettuccine
400g can crushed tomatoes, or the same weight of passata (superior, but more difficult to find)
4 cloves garlic, finely sliced
1 or 2 tablespoons salt-packed capers, rinsed
grated cheese to top

Bring a large, ovenproof pan of salted water to the boil. Once bubbling merrily, add the pasta, and let it cook away till relatively tender – about 12 minutes does it usually. While this is happening, set your oven to 180 C. Drain the cooked pasta, and return it to the pan (off the heat), while you stir in the garlic, tomatoes, and capers. Sprinkle over as much grated cheese as you like, and bake for about 25 minutes or until burnished and golden and…well, you should be able to tell by looking at it that it’s done. Maybe serve with a salad on the side if you are doing the “proper dinner” thing, otherwise I like it eaten out of a bowl with no accompaniments.

This probably serves more than two, to be honest, but what can I say. We are growing lads. Plus, without leftovers, you can’t discover the charms of a pasta omelet…something I always dismissed as some kind of over-fangled modern cafe-style horror, but actually it turns out to be rather delicious…


Above: This was the best photo I could get, as the rising steam kept fogging up the lens and I was too hungry to let it cool into eggy rubber. For some reason though ,when I see this picture I think of 2001: A Space Odyssey, which Tim and I saw for the first time last week (truly bizarre, but nice to see the so-often parodied scenes in their original context). I don’t know why, there is just something planetary about the look of it. Anyway, it tasted out of this world (ba-doom boom!) and meant that the pasta didn’t go to waste. The recipe comes from Nigella’s Feast, and makes for a very simple, cosy supper served with warm buttered toast. (I know, so much for lightening up.) All you do is let a knob of butter sizzle in an ovenproof pan, add the pasta and some eggs and a splash of milk – I used four eggs because the pan was rather large – let it cook a bit before flashing under the grill to cook the top. I sprinkled it with a little grated cheese, too.
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Right, me in six words. For what it’s worth…
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Passionate – I’m not talking your everyday passion, I’m talking passionate to the point of one-eyed bloody-mindedness. I’m passionate about things I love, I’m passionate about things I hate. As I say to Tim, (often!) “I’m not exaggerating, I just feel very strongly about things!”

Bendy – I could do the splits at age three, I can do the splits now, and I plan on being able to do the splits when I’m eighty. If that doesn’t define me, what does?

Nervous – As with being passionate, I’m not fooling around here. I’m a very nervous person. There is so much that I’m afraid of. Examples…praying mantises (even cartoon ones, heck, even the words make me shudder), natural disasters, and brain aneurysms have all kept me awake in clammy fear at night. All too often. Which segues nicely into –

Imaginative – I have a very, very vivid imagination. In fact I tend to overthink situations regularly (which makes for more nervousness as I imagine every possible eventuality to a situation.) It does make for some nifty dreams though. Have you ever dreamt you were a white rabbit, chasing through a forest after an orca whale, in the name of unrequited love?

Silly – I am very, very, very silly. But never just for its own sake – it always (unfortunately or otherwise) comes from a place of real silliness.

Self-absorbed – yeah, I am a bit. Frankly, I enjoy talking about myself. Why else would I tell you what I cooked last night? Or indeed, how self-absorbed I am?

I’m pretty sure anyone who would be interested has already been tagged by now, but in lieu of this, why not check out the other food blogs on my blogroll to the right. Reading them is always inspirational, whether to cook or to take better photos or just to eat and eat and eat some more. Or click on the links of the people who comment me (although I’d say comment #11 on my last post looks distinctly spammy, maybe give that one a miss.) I may not be any good at tag, but leapfrog isn’t so hard – jumping from blog to blog is a great way to discover amazing writing. But don’t you forget about me!

Country Roads…Take Me Home…

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I’m writing from home – not the flat – Tim and I flew up yesterday morning and already it feels like I’ve never left. Funny how quickly you adapt to your surroundings. We had Mum’s vegetable soup last night for dinner and not only was it instantly soul-nourishing and delicious- it was much nicer than mine. Some things are worth traveling miles for…

Tim and I went out for brunch for my birthday on Thursday (it was supposed to be breakfast, but I always take too long to get figure out what to wear.) The weather was cold and miserable and I was half-tempted to stay in and make pancakes or somesuch but we persevered in the name of paying someone else to do it for us. We ended up at Epic Cafe on Willis Street, where the servings are large and the prices aren’t terrifying, and you can briefly feel like a character from Sex and The City for dining so well. Unfortunately the foul weather ruled out any would-be Carrie-style clothing creations, I went for practicality in jeans, hoodie, scarf and Chuck Taylors.


Above: I ordered the savoury French toast with sauteed vegetables and pine nuts, plus a side salad. There weren’t actually any pine nuts on mine…but the combination of their delicious hollandaise, tangy tomato sauce and amazing toast won me over, and, being the pansy that I am, I didn’t complain. The side salad was pleasant enough – for $3 – although I would have preferred some dressing. You’ll have to excuse the badly lit photographs – they were taken rather hurriedly – not only was the waitress looking at us funny but I was far too hungry to make more of an effort.


Above: Tim got the El Rancho Fryup, which featured perfectly cooked eggs and delicious, sweet-salty bite sized corn fritters that I longed to steal off him (I did manage to exchange one for a bit of my French toast.) Not to mention enough beans for one to want to avoid polite company for some time after.

We met up with my aunt who has been child-wrangling at a boarding school in Western Australia, it was fantastic to catch up with her and we spent a leisurely and loquacious afternoon in Smith The Grocer cafe in the Old Bank Arcade. Tim and I were still far too full from brunch to eat anything but I can tell you that their cups of tea come with a deliciously spiced complimentary wafer. She gifted me all sorts of wee foodie goodies including some black food colouring which I am very excited about trying out (she suggested an All Blacks cake – as if!)


Above: This is what I made for my birthday dinner. Because we were leaving for three days the next morning I couldn’t do anything too wildly extravagant – which was probably for the best, considering what it might have cost – but I did splash out and purchase some bacon. I fried and deglazed it with Vermouth, and added it to a vat of pasta along with brocolli, peas, lemon juice and the last of the creme fraiche. It was a lovely combo and also managed to use up a few things loitering sadly in the fridge. Please excuse the low-rent photo (noticing a theme?) the lens kept steaming up and this was my most serviceable shot. Any tips from more seasoned bloggers on how to prevent this?

Other things we have been eating lately…


Above: I made this free-form tart the other day for dinner, and though it really shouldn’t have worked…well, it did. First I made pastry out of 125g each of butter and flour, and bound it with a little buttermilk. I did this by hand, as I couldn’t be bothered dragging out my food processor (and there was anyway no benchspace for it) but I quickly was reminded why it’s worth the effort, as rubbing all that butter into the flour takes forever and strains the wrists substantially. Eventually I had a lump of something resembling pastry, so I rested it in the fridge, rolled it out, and started to freak as it began to almost melt on the tray, which had been heated by the oven underneath. In a blind, twitchy panic I flung my ingredients at it (creme fraiche, tomatoes, capers, pine nuts) and baked it at 200 C.

I expected to see a gooey, floury mess 25 minutes later but miraculously the pastry had come together. The tomatoes became deliciously scorched in places, making them even sweeter, which contrasted rather fabulously with the salty capers. The pastry itself was buttery and flaky, even though it really shouldn’t have been. Not the healthiest dinner, but a delicious one all the same, and something rather more “restaurant-y” than we normally get. Try it yourself – maybe even get out your food processor – and use whatever you have in your pantry that you think would go well together. I can imagine thinly sliced courgettes and parmesan being wonderful, for example…


Above: I don’t really go in for stir-fries that much – they seem kind of overdone and it’s easy to make them claggy and oily (not to mention all that damned fiddly chopping!) However upon seeing a can of water chestnuts gathering dust in our pantry I decided to make something resembling one for dinner the other night. We didn’t have a heck of a lot of vegetables so it comprised of courgette, carrots, garlic, ginger (the real, knobbly, amazingly zingy thing, not the acidy stuff from a jar), sliced water chestnuts, and cashews. A fairly slim meal, yes, but there were only two of us, and once it was banked up against a pile of brown rice and had a few judicious droplets of sesame oil, it was quite substantial. I flavoured it with fish sauce, lemon juice, and a little bit of black bean sauce. Black bean sauce is so slow moving and it is impossible to scoop it out of the narrow bottle with a spoon, so I made the mistake of shaking it over the pan with the lid off…which resulted in salty black streaks all over the wall.

All that aside, the end result was quite lovely, the water chestnuts have an intriguing texture and it was gratifyingly salty. Also, anything accompanied by brown rice makes me feel instantly Zen; a nice payoff for the long time it takes to cook.

On a “happy birthday to me” whim I purchased Jill Dupleix’ Lighten Up from the warm and friendly Unity Books on Willis Street. I have often flicked through this book and thought “eh,” but closer inspection revealed that it was actually full of exciting recipes. I’m quite wild with anticipation about trying her Lentil and Sweet Potato Pie for example… There is something about Dupleix’ authoritative “tone” that can be a bit annoying, even laughable at times, but on the whole her cookbooks make very enjoyable reads. Mum and Dad gave me a $100 grocery voucher for my birthday so I can’t wait to go buy lots of vegetables and get cooking from it. Speaking of purchases, today they bought a shiny shiny new oven (the last one made industrial grinding noises every time you turned it on which was most disconcerting and it never got hot enough). The new oven is self cleaning! What an age we live in…

Just Spent Six Months In A Leaky Blog

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My blog is six months old! In a time where technology moves so eye-wateringly fast, I feel I’m justified in getting a little misty-eyed over the half-year existence of my little blog that could. It feels like just last week that I was getting excited over my 200th hit!

Speaking of milestones, our weekend in Hawke’s Bay (for Tim’s grandparents’ 50th wedding anniversary) was a fantastic time, a large part of which was spent solidly grazing. We were also able to reap the benefits of one of life’s happiest pairings – someone who has a massive feijoa tree but doesn’t like to eat them. The feijoa is one of my very favourite fruits, and for some reason in my mind they are one of those fruits you don’t actually go out of your way to buy – you should just know someone who has a windfall. When living in a damp city full of apathetic university students though, one can’t expect to find them that easily. While up north we managed to get two shopping bags full of this wonderful fruit, by pillaging a family friend’s trees, and I absolutely can’t wait to do something with them – feijoa ice cream mayhaps – slices perched atop a pavlova – maybe some kind of pork-adorning salsa – or just eaten one after the other after the other after the other, cut in half and scooped out with a teaspoon.

For some odd reason, the feijoa is only really widely known in New Zealand, which seems a nice enough trade-off for all the things we don’t have here (Primark, Minstrel chocolates, access to Neil Young, 12th century cathedrals) It has a dense, gritty, pear-like texture and an elusive fragrance not unlike passionfruit. Heavenly.

Speaking of our weekend away, I completely forgot to post about the gluten free peanut butter biscuits I took up along with the Quince Loaf. This is the third time I’ve made these biscuits and the third time I’ve forgotten to blog about them…and the third time I’ve been solemnly staggered by how quick, easy and delicious they are. The recipe can be found here, from when I made them a few weeks ago.


Above: I ended up with two-tone biscuits, because the ones on the tray on the top shelf of the oven browned faster than those on the bottom shelf. Rigorous testing proved that there was no difference in taste though. Equally fab.

By way of further illustrating why you should always write things down (or is that, why I should write things down), I give you tonight’s dinner. I thought that I could use my creme fraiche in a simple pasta dish loaded with vegetables and garlic, and only realised after eating it that I’d forgotten half the things I was planning to put into it.


Above: There was carrot, courgette, and capsicum, but my brain mislaid the information about adding tomatoes, frozen peas (even though I bought them specially after work!) and pine nuts.
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I began by julienning the carrots and capsicum (all the while imagining I was a sous-chef in New York – inexplicably the words “julienne” and “sous-chef” are intertwined to me), and blanching them in a pan full of water in which I also placed about five cloves of garlic. The garlic simmered away and became soft and mellow, rather than burning and acrid. After fishing out the vegetables, I cooked the pasta in the same water and then drained it, stirring in some creme fraiche and the cooked vegetables. The garlic cloves I chopped roughly and mixed in too. It was certainly good – the creme fraiche made a kind of instant sauce – but all I can think about is what it would have been like had I not forgotten half the components.

This weekend we are flying up home for my best friend’s 21st, and next weekend I hope that we can go to Levin (in all honesty, the first time I’ve used “Levin” and “I hope that we can go to” in the same sentence) to catch a performance of Rent. I can’t find a review online for love nor money so it’s a bit of a gamble, but the idea of finally seeing this show onstage, no matter where, is too exciting to miss out on. In what seems like positively providencial circumstances, Palmerston North will be having their own production of Rent in May. I’m trying to convince Tim that two productions so very close to Wellington means this is a sign that it’s all meant to be but he’s still not quite buying it. Never mind, my birthday is a-pending which means he is obliged to humour me (if only briefly, for his sanity’s sake.) Oh and did I mention that Puccini’s La Boheme, the opera which inspired the very musical of which I speak, is coming to Wellington?

<.twilightzonevoice/.> “Doo-dee-do do, Do-dee-do do”

"In The Cold, Cold Night…"

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Baby, it’s cold outside…in Wellington, at least. Talk about hungry and frozen. I didn’t plan on making vegetable soup this early on in the year but what else can you do in this situation?

Above: Vegetable soup always reminds me of home, of making a large vat of it every weekend in winter, and letting it sit warmly in the crock-pot, only getting better with time.
I don’t follow a recipe, but I think you have to have onions, celery, and carrots – the basis of many a slow-cooked meal – and I like to really let the vegetables cook (I refuse to say sweat!) before adding any liquid. Because I was all out of the classic King’s Soup Mix, I just used some lentils and barley that I found in our pantry. By the way, King’s Soup Mix isn’t nearly as declasse as it sounds – it’s just a prepacked bag of lentils, beans and barley. It is very cheap, and so good for you – I don’t know why people don’t make this all the time.

So that was dinner last night. To go with I made a rather sassy Puy lentil, pea and feta salad. After adding peas to my lentil soup the other day, it struck me that this humble frozen vegetable could be paired with lentils in other ways. The earthy darkness of the Puy lentils, the perky green sweetness of the peas and the creamy saltiness of the feta was surprisingly moreish.
Above: I didn’t actually measure anything so I can’t give you an exact recipe…however I did make a dressing out of three tablespoons each extra virgin olive oil and red wine vinegar. With so few ingredients it should be easy to recreate it yourself, if you are so inclined.
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Above: Unfortunately I remain intimidated by our new camera, as you can see by this picture where the meal is out of focus and the wooden spoon is in. I tell you, I can’t seem to get it the other way around. I’d like to think there’s something wrong with our camera…but I suspect it’s still me.
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More soul food (if you can see it in that photo, anyway!) tonight in the form of a layered meat and pasta dish from Annabel Cooks, by NZ author Annabel White. It is very basic, a kind of no-effort lasagne – cooked small pasta is mixed with sour cream and cream cheese, and layered with mince that has been cooked in the usual spag-bol kind of way, topped with cheese, and baked. It sounds too simple and seen-it-all-before to be any good, but in fact I think she’s on to something. Much depends on the quality of your meat sauce, I’d recommend using red wine in it, and a tin of tomatoes instead of some premade pasta sauce. It is very comforting bowl-food, and helped to stave off the chilliness of our (inevitably freezing) student flat momentarily.
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As Nigella The Wise says in How To Be A Domestic Goddess, the benefits of colder climes are largely culinary, and I heartily concur. I can’t wait to try out more soups (getting ever-closer to The Lentil Soup), rich casseroles, melting stews, baking more bread in the weekends (proving it by the heater if need be), dusting off my pudding steamer…and, er, my Pilates DVD…

Rainy Day Woman

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Today – Saturday – was just as wet and miserable as last weekend. Luckily I love rainy weekends – cosying up with a blanket, becoming engrossed in a book, lazily browsing the internet…However with breakfast and lunch lamentably comprising only of Chocolate Guinness Cake, I forced myself to leave the house to get some fresh air, and found myself at Moore Wilson’s. Wherein I bought some organic buttermilk, some feta, a tub of white miso paste, and two quinces.

Above: Oh! You pretty things. I love quinces. In New Zealand now is the time for them, so grab one if you can. They are impossible to find year-round, absolutely rock hard and have to be cooked very slowly but their incredible fragrance and sweetness makes it worth the effort. Nigella has a whole swag of recipes for this particular fruit so I look forward to trying something new.
I got back to the flat in an advanced state of saturation. My $4 Kmart white canvas sandshoes (that are now rather fashionable and you can’t get them cheaply anymore) are on their last legs, and were completely filled with water. So, after getting out of my miserably drenched clothes I decided to make a warming curry for dinner, filled with vegetables and even some soul-soothing lentils to counteract the day’s cake-eating. (That’s a little misleading actually – I assure you, I did put some more clothes on before starting on the curry. I think the world only needs one Naked Chef…)
Pumpkin Curry For a Rainy Saturday

This is a very gentle and mild – no chilli at all, come to think of it – so if your tastebuds are made of stronger stuff than mine, by all means add as much chilli as you dare.
1/2 a pumpkin, chopped into large dice
1 T butter
1 onion, diced
3 cloves garlic, chopped finely
1 red capsicum, diced
2 tomatoes, diced
2 T tomato paste
1 t ground cinnamon
2 t cumin seeds
1 t ground ginger
1/4 cup red lentils
1/2 cup coconut milk
1/2 t garam masala
Melt the butter in a decent sized saucepan. Stir the onion, garlic, cinnamon, cumin seeds, and ginger together over a gentle heat till the onion is soft, but not browned. Add the tomatoes and paste (or if this is too much of a pain, just half a tin of chopped tomatoes) and the capsicum, and let this cook for a bit. Tip in your orange chunks of pumpkin, and then add 250mls water to the pan. You might need more depending on the size of your pan, you want the pumpkin pieces half-submerged in the water. Bring this to the boil then lower the heat and simmer till the pumpkin is nearly tender. At this stage add the lentils, and a bit more water – about half a cup. Simmer till the lentils have disappeared into the sauce. Finally add the coconut milk and the garam masala. Don’t let it boil at this stage. Serve over rice. This will feed 2 or three people. Just add a bit more of everything if you have more people over.
Above: I served it over brown rice, which is not so hard to cook as people think. This is the method I use: bring a pot of water to the boil, tip in a cup of brown rice, boil the living heck out of it for about 15 minutes or till it’s soft but firm, then drain. It barely takes longer than white rice. The curry itself was warm and inviting, the perfect thing to be eating by the greedy bowlful with this inhospitable rain beating against the windows.
Above: I made this quick pizza for dinner the other night, using a recipe of my paternal grandmother’s that I found whilst browsing through a folder of recipe clippings that I compiled as a teenager. I don’t think she was that much of a ‘foodie’ – for all I know she may never have actually made this recipe – but it is still meaningful to me that I got her cookbooks and bits and pieces. This particular recipe involves melting butter and frying in it garlic, diced tomato and sliced courgettes, and I assume it is supposed to be a side dish. Well I made it one night, and was so taken with the simple but delicious flavours, that I had to make it again, and soon. On Thursday night, having made it for the second time, I spread it thickly over a scone dough base (the recipe of which I found in Alison Holst’s Dollars and Sense, which my brother got me for Christmas) topped it frugally with cheese, baked it, and ate it whilst watching Coronation Street on telly, which Katie has got me back into. I see that Gail Platt is as depressing as she was last time I was into this show -rather comfortingly, some things never change.
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We are having something of a David Bowie Renaissance in the flat – his songs are just so densely brilliant that they don’t lose any gloss with repeat (and I mean repeat) listenings. Just try not to hug the next person on the street you see after listening to Modern Love – possibly the greatest song of all time (along with all the other greatest songs of all time.)
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It is just Tim and I in the flat tonight – Paul is in town, Katie and Stefan are in Napier, and Emma has trotted down to Dunedin. I’m trying to convince Tim that watching Rent would be the perfect way to end a rainy Saturday…but I think we might end up compromising with Green Wing, Season 1. Eh, either way I win!
Update: We actually watched some Black Books instead. Whenever I watch this show…I sort of wish I actually was Bernard Black, just for a bit.

“Run For Your Life…”

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Can you believe the final day of March is upon us already? My body clock is still ticking along as though it is late February, when in fact a whole quarter of 2008 has passed.

Because this is Wellington, and not say, Connecticut, we have no discernible Autumn to speak of – no crunch of fallen leaves underfoot, no crispening of the evening air – instead, Winter seems to have launched with a whoosh, and before you know it the drains are blocked with mulchy leaves and your shoes get soaked when you merely leave to check the mail. The upside of this grey, damp onslaught?

Soup.


Above: Tim and I bought the biggest pumpkin we (*cough* he *cough*) could carry at the vegetable market, and I used it to make soup last night. I have actually never made pumpkin soup before – I guess I am too busy faffing with lentils – but it has always been a favourite. I wanted to roast the pumpkin though, rather than do the usual method of simmering it in stock. I developed this recipe after making the Pumpkin Puree from Nigella’s How To Eat, and…I think it is pretty awesome. It is intensely creamy without the addition of any milk or cream, plus, you don’t need a blender to make it. I love my blender but dragging it out from under our computer table in our bedroom (hey, our flat has almost no storage space) and cleaning it after can seem like way too much effort sometimes.

Roast Pumpkin Soup

Preheat oven to 200 C. Take half a large pumpkin, and chop that half into eight chunks (or just four, if your pumpkin is not that big.) Encase each pumpkin chunk loosely in tinfoil, pinching the edges together. If you want to add a teaspoonful of butter with each piece, feel free (I certainly did.) Place in a roasting dish and bake for 45 minutes to an hour, depending on the size. Test the pieces with a skewer after this time has passed – you want it very soft, with no resistance.

Carefully open the tinfoil parcels and one by one, scoop the orange flesh into a pot. This is a tiny bit messy. The flesh should be highly yielding, but give it a go with the potato masher to get rid of any lumps anyway, adding more butter if you wish. At this stage you have yourself a perfectly serviceable bowl of pumpkin puree, which you can place with pride at your dinner table. For soup however, pour in four cups of stock (I used porcini), stirring with a wooden spoon after every cup of liquid. If you need more liquid, by all means add more. It should be thick and not too watery. Now, merely heat it over a low flame – don’t let it bubble – and before you want to serve, grate over some fresh nutmeg and add a tiny pinch of ground cumin.

You could make this Thai, by adding curry paste, fish sauce and coriander, or serve it Morrocan-style by upping the cumin and adding cinnamon, tumeric and tomato paste. Just don’t try and take a photo of it because the camera lens steam up something crazy, as you can tell by the above picture. This soup won’t be quite as velvet-textured as something blended, so knock yourself out, but even in its rough and ready state it still looks like distilled sunshine and tastes warm and fabulous.

On Saturday night, Emma, Ange, Paul, Tim and I went to the Relay For Life. I have to say I have very mixed feelings about the night. Because Emma works with the ANZ Bank, we were signed up with their team and given the 10 till midnight slot. The fact that it was raining very heavily didn’t help with the enthusiasm, but when we got to the event and the ANZ tent was absolutely soaked through, with no lighting but for some glowsticks and rapidly-fading police-style blue revolving lights, with some frozen hash browns that Paul was asked to cook, and some bowls of (admittedly pleasant) salad lying on the ground with dripping people stepping over them…I wondered what the heck we’d gotten ourselves into. Since ANZ is apparently one of the most wealthy corporations in New Zealand, I expected at least a table to put our gear on and some slightly more welcoming digs. And some light. On top of all that, the woman in charge of the tent was incredibly unpleasant to us, even though we had volunteered our time and money to help out her business. She seriously made us feel uncomfortable and unwanted and frankly, I am glad I don’t hold any accounts with ANZ if this is their representation. Paul had to leave early to go to a party, and the rain made Emma’s elbow sore, so it fell upon Ange, Tim and I to keep the alarmingly phallic ANZ baton aloft.

I am very proud to say that I didn’t stop moving for our entire 2 hour segment, even though my shoes were filled with water and the persistent showers meant that I was beyond saturated. I walked most of the time, but I did manage to run a whole lap, which I was pleased with. And yes, that is Iron Maiden that I quoted in the title, the song was running, if you will, through my head as I circumnavigated the track! I truly am no runner – I have actually never in my life owned a pair of running shoes and spent Saturday night in an old pair of Converse – so this was quite an achievement. To be frank though, the ANZ tent was so hostile and dank and horrible that it was something of an incentive to stay on the track.

At 8.30pm there was a candle ceremony, which was very moving despite the fact that it was held in an underground carpark. It made me realise how many people – and a few cats – I know that have died from cancer. I also thought briefly of Nigella Lawson, who lost her mother, her sister, and her first husband to cancer. Even though walking for hours round and round a circuit in the rain is not my first idea of fun, it was a surprisingly contemplative time for me. Tim ran for a bit, and Ange, who has amazing stamina, managed to get ANZ’s fastest lap. We live in a time of such incredible leaps and bounds in knowledge, technology, science, everything – who knows that one day we won’t have a cancer-free world. I certainly hope so.

We got given a goodie bag beforehand, and in said bag was an RFL tshirt, a blue ANZ hat which leaked its dye onto my forehead, and a few other bits and pieces, including these small bags of rather classy scroggin (or scrottage, as it is forever called to me). I decided to use this yesterday to make some muffins, slightly adapting Nigella’s Muesli Muffin recipe from Feast.


Above: After removing the vile dried banana pieces, I chopped this all with my mezzaluna, and added some rolled oats and bran to make up the 250g required for the recipe. I am so in love with these positively healthy muffins that once our ex-microwave gets replaced, I plan on making lots and freezing them, to be nuked as required throughout Winter.

Muesli Muffins

  • 225g plain flour
  • 1 t baking soda
  • 250mls buttermilk *I had none so used plain milk with some lemon juice added
  • 1 egg
  • 175g brown sugar
  • 80 mls vegetable oil
  • 250g good muesli

If you don’t actually have muesli, I recommend a mixture of rolled oats, bran, and whatever seeds, nuts and dried fruit you like. This is very simple: Heat the oven to 200 Celcius, and grease or line a muffin tray. Combine the flour, baking soda and sugar in a large bowl, then stir through the muesli. Pour in your egg, buttermilk and oil, and using a wooden spoon, mix gently till barely combined. As with all muffins, you do not want to overstir this, so go easy. Divide the mixture between the twelve holes in the muffin tin and bake for 25 minutes.


Above: The muffins. They are so full of goodness and health that I didn’t feel too bad about smothering them with butter before eating…

April is going to be a busy month. I have about forty squillion assignments due, I am flying up home for my best friend’s 21st, going with Tim’s family to his grandparents’ wedding anniversary party, hopefully taking in a performance of Rent in Levin, and turning 22 somewhere in the middle there. I’m exhausted just thinking about it…

Lentil As Anything

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Turns out that the Guinness cake is “the nicest cake in the world” according to Paul. He’s not wrong. Like a good casserole, fine cheese, or Helen Mirren, it just gets better with age. On Tuesday I ate three pieces of the damn thing. Small pieces (evening things up, you know) but nonetheless: three. So there have been lentils aplenty to atone.

But you don’t need me to tell you that the oft-maligned, unsexy lentil is actually seriously awesome. Or do you?

Above: This was Sunday night’s dinner. I must admit that I ate a whole ton of jellybeans that were supposed to be for Tim -should his blood sugar go low- while he was at work. I figured the only way to undo this would to make lentil soup. Now, I don’t have a hard and fast recipe for this, as I am still experimenting in the hopes of finding the perfect prototype. I think this could be close. I sauteed two onions, and added lots of garlic, some ginger, cinnamon, cumin, coriander, and turmeric. While this was softening and becoming headily aromatic, I tipped in half a cup each of organic Puy lentils, organic brown lentils, and red lentils from the bulk section at Pak’n’Save. Into this went a tin of chopped tomatoes, enough water to cover everything, plenty of salt…and that was it. It was pretty magical. Almost more of a curry than a soup, deeply flavoured with a marvelously thick texture. I thoroughly recommend you try it, especially if you find yourself crouching at the freezer with a spoon, surreptitiously eating your way through a tub of ice cream, or accidentally eating a whole loaf’s worth of overbuttered toast. Hey, we’ve all been there. Well, I have at least…

Above: This is what we had for dinner on St Patrick’s Day. Somehow it conspired that we had all the ingredients for that Autobahn classic, wedges with cheese, bacon, and sour cream. Even though there are probably far better uses for the bacon, at the time I couldn’t think of a better one. I served this with roasted capsicum and beetroot, which I drizzled with balsamic vinegar.

Above: Larb, with Cambodian Cucumber Salad from my Healthy Salads of Southeast Asia book, which was Tuesday night’s dinner. Larb is a bit of an in-joke for Tim and me – I guess we’re odd like that – we were playing Scrabble this one time (by the way, for someone who read the dictionary for kicks as a child, I am awful at Scrabble), and I used the word Larb. Tim said it wasn’t real, I told him he was uneducated, and he asked if I could use it in a sentence. All I could think of was “this is my larb.” Anyway, we found this kind of hysterical (I don’t expect you to, that’s why it’s an in-joke) but finally wikipedia proved me right. I still didn’t win that game. The cucumber salad is a great use of this particular vegetable, crunchy with cashews and dressed with fish sauce, garlic, and other such good things. I liked it a lot, and Tim said “yes” when asked if it was nice so you might be seeing this again. I’ll only tell you larb story this once though, promise.

Above: Lentil Cashew Cakes! (I’m not actually quite sure what to dub them; ‘patty’ sounds too earnest and I find something suspicious sounding about the word ‘fritter’ so ‘cakes’ will have to do.) I saw this recipe in the recipe column of the Sunday Star magazine section. It was written by the wonderful Ray McVinnie, whose column in Cuisine is always outstandingly inspiring, so I should have known these would be nothing less than brilliant. Cooked up brown lentils are mashed with cumin, garlic, coriander, eggs, chopped cashews and a little flour, and fried till cooked through (I used my awesome non-stick pan that I got for my 21st.) These chubby little cakes are fantastic – the soft crunch of the cashews provides the perfect foil for the unfamiliarly grainy texture of the lentils. To go with, I chopped some cucumber up, tossed it in some Greek yoghurt with ginger and garlic (adapting another recipe from this column) and steamed some brocolli. Oh, and there were more wedges:
Above: Wedges!
Easter is just around the corner and though I’m not looking forward to doing assignments instead of flying home, I am very, very excited about making my first ever batch of Hot Cross Buns (Nigella, of course!)
Oh yeah – we went to the cricket on Saturday. Technically we got a good deal: we paid $25 for a ticket to the cricket, (which I don’t like), a tshirt (which I’ll never wear), a beer (which I don’t drink), and a piece of toast with (excellent) bacon and (watery, curiously fishy) eggs at the Loaded Hog before the game. I’ve made no secret of the fact that I think Sports=Bullying (at least when I have to be involved, anyway) so it begs the question, what on earth was I doing there? Well, I was more than prepared to stay at home but I got told that it would be fun and that I should come and that it was a great way to spend nine hours of your life. So with this in mind it would be facetious (but not out of character) for me to slate cricket entirely; just because I hate something doesn’t always make it morally abhorrent. But for real: It is intensely tedious. At about 2pm I almost became frantic, panicky even , with boredom and no forseeable conclusion to this charmless game. There were many times when I turned to Tim and asked him – genuinely – if they were still playing or just having an hour-long team talk, because that’s what it looked like. There is literally nothing to see, and nothing to do but sit. I can’t emphasise this enough. On a positive note, we were sitting amongst the Barmy Army, who are truly a delightful bunch, convivial and entertaining and ready with a song for every possible eventuality. They chanted “Micheal Vaughan’s Barmy Army” for a full eleven minutes. Their insanity kept me sane. So, no more cricket. At least I know for sure now that I don’t like it. Does anyone want a free tshirt?

Let It Bee

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Apologies for the yawning gap between the last post and this one, but there were extenuating circumstances: (a) uni is incredibly stressful (okay, so it’s mostly photography giving me grey hair and wrinkles but everything is full-on) and (b) our other goldfish, also called Laurim or Taura, died yesterday and I didn’t really have it in me to blog, especially after a particularly draining photog class where my pictures were largely slated by the teacher (who, in all fairness, was most likely correct, but it still stings.) I guess loss is the risk of loving something, but it still saddens me that we are completely goldfish-less now.

Speaking of stings…there’s not much that can’t be fixed by the sight of marzipan bees.


Above: It was Ange’s birthday on Monday (and it’s Kieran’s birthday today – hoorah!) and she requested that I make her the Chocolate Honey Cake from Nigella’s Feast. It was quite easy to make, and in keeping with Nigella’s suggestion I fashioned wee bumblebees out of fondant icing and slivered almonds. Aren’t they sweet!

Above: The cake is not only cheeringly adorable, it is also delicious – the honey gives it an unexpected depth and complexity, while managing to avoid being viciously sweet.

A bunch of us went to Satay India to celebrate Ange’s coming of age. There was seven of us, and we ordered eight curries (they have a two for one deal) and absolutely soaked ourselves in the stuff. I’m not even sure if the photo can adequately convey how much we ate.

Above: As well as all that curry we also got roughly forty-seven pieces of naan. But we managed to dominate the lot. And the cake. Somehow.

Above: Told you we did it!

Other stuff we’ve been consuming lately:

Above: I seriously love making bread, and this particular recipe was very rewarding. At the Kelburn Fair on Saturday I picked up some Cuisine magazines abandoned stupidly, for only 50 cents! Result! And within one of them I found a recipe for Simit Bread, which is a Middle Eastern ring-shaped bun. (Not a bagel though!) I also found an unintentionally hilarious Cosmo from 1975 – full of nudity and innuendo!

Above: These were delicious. I sprinkled them with sumac and sesame seeds, and served them with meatballs, couscous, roast beetroot and brocolli.

Above: The recipe for the meatballs also came from Cuisine and had a ton of different herbs and spices in it, making for wonderfully flavoursome, er, balls. As I mentioned, the Kelburn Fair was on Saturday. As well as the magazines I also got a cool pair of green and blue t-bar high heels for $2, and a brioche tin for 50 cents. It was only Tim, Paul and I in that day because everyone else had travelled to Ohakune for a 21st. So we had…Rod Steward Appreciation Day. Instigated by Paul, this involves sitting in the sun, drinking, and listening to Rod Stewart. I can’t pretend I’m the biggest fan of The Rod – I mean, he has his place and all, and I quite like that “Wear it Well” song, but has anyone actually read the lyrics to “You’re In My Heart” without throwing up? Well have you? But it proved to be a novel way of passing the time.
Speaking of novel ways to pass the time, do look up David Bowie and Mick Jagger’s Dancing In The Streets on Youtube if you ever wanted to know what the greatest music video of all time is. Even better than the ones Michel Gondry did for The White Stripes. To watch this is to truly witness brilliance.

"Thus Goes Everyone To The World But I, And I Am Sunburned."

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Since I resume my higher learning on Monday, I thought it only appropriate to begin with a Shakespearian quote. Having said that though, enrolling was a complete and utter mission. Tim is rather smug as he got fully enrolled on like, the first day, while I dithered about which classes I was going to do. Which meant that yesterday I had to run around the campus getting papers signed. And then I had to dash into a campus in town…and then back…up fifty million staircases and hilly inclines (I am barely exaggerating.) Words don’t really do my 3-hour turmoil justice though. Instead, say it with doodles.

Above: The A-B line represents what the Uni enrollment office told me I would have to do. Go from A to B, get my paper signed, and get out. The line below represents what actually happened. Once I’d finished stumbling blindly about the hinterland, sweating madly in the midday sun and growing ever more panicked and horribly aged…I had just enough energy to make dinner.

And yes, I know, I should have been more organised, but the uni system really is dreadful.
Above: Tim arrived safely back from Napier…with a very burnt nose. I am extremely annoyed, especially as I see a lot of terrifying information at work about the effects of sunburn. I really like Tim’s nose, (it is indeed a fine example of that particular facial organ) and don’t want to see it being gouged off his face by melanoma. Off soapbox, but long story short – wear your sunscreen!
I was so hot and bothered after the day’s exploits that I felt like eating something temperature-appropriate. So, I decided to make home-spun kebabs. Not like the pork satay ones I made the other night – as you can see in the below post – but the sort you might perhaps ill-advisedly consume after a night getting trolleyed. I can’t exactly say this is an original idea – surely everyone knows that marinating lamb in yoghurt makes it deliciously tender – but it goes as follows. It is very simple – mostly a bit of chopping. Sobriety is probably recommended while making these.
Homemade Lamb Kebabs:
200g diced lamb
125mls thick plain yoghurt
1 T cumin seeds
1 t ground cinnamon
1 garlic clove, minced
– In a shallow container, mix the above ingredients, cover, and leave to marinate for at least 3 hours, preferably overnight (but I only did it for three hours because I got home so late and it still tasted fine!)
Place 1/3 cup burghal wheat in a bowl (I used this great organic stuff I got for Christmas) and cover with boiling water. Leave to sit while you get on with other things: grating carrot, dicing cucumber, chopping up tomato if you like.
Once the burghal wheat has absorbed the water, (drain off any if necessary), heat a non-stick pan. You don’t want much yoghurt going into the pan, but I haven’t figured out a good way to do this yet – I suppose you could wipe the meat on some Handy towel or something. Sear the lamb and let it cook through.
Now, assemble your kebab – lay a soft wrap/tortilla on a plate, spoon over a little burghal, some diced cucumber, some carrot, the meat, and finally spoon over some garlic yoghurt sauce, made by mixing 125mls thick plain yoghurt with plenty of chopped garlic and coriander. Wrap it up as you like, although I always find mine falls to pieces after a few bites anyway…This serves two, by the way. I go by 100g meat per person, the rest is fairly obvious. If you have some ground sumac handy, try adding a teaspoonful to the yoghurt sauce.
Above: I made this recipe from a Jill Dupleix book I got out of the public library. She calls it Double Happiness Beans, frankly…I don’t know why. But they taste great and also I finally got to use some of that Black Bean Sauce that had been languishing on the shelf.
Above: This is another something I cooked up out of my head; I got Paul, Emma, and of course, Tim, to try it out. I told them to be harsh, critical, judgemental, but the feedback was surprisingly rapturous. Needless to say, I was super-happy about this. You be the judge, if you like:
Miso-Honey Roasted Parsnips (thought this one up just as I was drifting off to sleep the other night)
2-3 parsnips
2 teaspoons white miso paste
2 teaspoons honey
1 teaspoon extra virgin olive oil
Heat oven to 200 C. Chop the parsnips in half, and then chop each half into quarters. Place in a small roasting dish. Mix the following three ingredients in a small bowl and spoon over the parsnips. It will be quite a thick mixture, you will be smearing, more than drizzling. Roast for 30 minutes. To serve, shake over a couple of drops of sesame oil and sprinkle with sesame seeds.
Finally – this really is the day for recipes, isn’t it – the Cinnamon-Date Icecream. I would be seriously appreciative of anyone who tried to make this and gives me feedback, at least so I know it wasn’t some crazy fluke that it worked in my kitchen.
Cinnamon-Date Icecream
150g dates
1/2 cup dark brown sugar
60g butter
2 teaspoons ground cinnamon
1/4 cup water
500mls (2 cups) cream
1 tin sweetended condensed milk
Full cream milk (sorry about all the dairy by the way, but if it’s any consolation dates are very cheap!)
Thoroughly chop the dates – a mezzaluna is very useful here – and check for any errant stones or woody bits. (Judging from flatmate feedback, woody bits in the teeth aren’t really appreciated.)
Melt the butter in a pot, add the sugar and 1 teaspoon of the cinnamon, and stir over a low heat.
Tip in the dates, and let them become covered in the caramelly butter. Pour in the water, stirring constantly till the dates soften. Add another 1/4 cup water if it needs more, and let it simmer for a bit, till a lumpily amalgamated sauce is formed. Don’t worry – this won’t take long.
Remove from the heat, and pour in the cream, stirring thoroughly, followed by the tin of condensed milk. Fill the now-empty tin with full cream milk, and tip into the pot. Finally add the second teaspoon of cinnamon, and stir everything to combine. Taste the mixture at this stage – if it needs more cinnamon, feel free. Pour this into a freezer-safe bowl, and, well, freeze. Stir occasionally if you want, during the freezing process. This ice cream melts very easily but more than makes up for this fact with its ridiculously good flavour. I hope…I guess I have talked this up a bit.
By the way, as I type, we are having a Back To The Future marathon…oh sweet Micheal J Fox! (Although I do have a soft spot for George McFly.)