Err, hi

You'd think what with being unemployed and all that I'd have lots of time to cook and blog. And yet...

I've been down the coast for a few days, and then off to Goulburn for the Blues Festival. And then there's other stuff. February sees my musical commitments starting up again, and then there's seeing the builder and the vet and going to the gym and the Fringe festival and all that.

I'm not at home one single night this week. Tonight it's choir practice, tomorrow a movie, then a dinner out for a review, and a folk festival practice. I do have a couple of posts planned, on food at the coast and Goulburn, so hopefully this week won't be so blank.

Gadgets! I has them!

I'm typing in from my laptop, which is sitting on the new "lapinator" pad which I am loving already. A batch of brownies is baking away, but sadly the package did not arrive in time for me to try out the new measuring cup and digital scale-spoon.

The skull & crossbones icecubes are in the freezer. And I'm wondering what to make from the Hungry Scientist Handbook: should it be the glow-in-the-dark lollipops? The edible origami? Dry-ice martinis?

Plus also I can has a sonic screwdriver. Wheee!!!

Internet Salmagundi XII

This is a Salmagundi Special Edition: stupid things that people do.

Perhaps it's a personal failing in me, but I do tend to find these things hilarious. (Ov corse i r sew mutch smrter.)

For generic FAIL, the icanhascheezburger people have got failblog.

And while not speaking a second language well isn't particularly stupid, the results can be very funny. There is the classic Engrish, for funny English language mistakes. And the cheezburgerz now have their own variant, Engrishfunny. And for some balance, there is also Hanzismatter for funny English speaker mistakes with Chinese and Japanese - especially on tattoos.

The Darwin Awards have been around for a while. It's about people removing themselves from the gene pool in especially stupid manners. Not always in the best of taste. Oh no.

Doctors and nurses are also not known for their good taste in humour. Student Doctor Network has this jaw-dropping Things I learned from my patients thread. And allnurses has a similar discussion.

Computer people have their own classics - we probably all know the cup-holder and "too stupid to own a computer" stories. There's a good collection at Rinkworks, and for some industry reporting, the daily WTF is often good.

Retail sales like to point out that the customer is NOT always right.

I once saw a lengthy thread about professional cooking mistakes at some chef site, but I can't remember where. I found another one at JamieOliver.com, though. And I know I've mentioned cakewrecks before, but it's worth a reminder.

Got any favourites of your own?

L is for Lyneham

I'm fond of Lyneham. When I was a student, my first group house was near the Lyneham shops. None of us had a car, so I did all the shopping on foot. I still visit regularly - it's close to a friend's house, quite handy to stop off to pick up some bread or meat for the BBQ. And I've often been to Tilleys, and more recently, The Front.

We have, for your foodie pleasure, an IGA with a nice range of European deli and bakery items. Their fruit & veg is OK but not brilliant - handy for top ups if you miss the markets. There's a Brumby's bakery, a pizza & takeaway joint, the Lyneham Pide Hut and the Mee Sing Chinese. The Pide Hut is, meh, not so great but OK. They do good zucchini balls. But given the option, I'd always prefer Dickson TurkOz. I've never tried Mee Sing, but I hear it's not bad at all.

Much more notable is the Lyneham Meat Centre, the home of Country Pride sausages (also available in many IGAs). This excellent local butcher sells a good range of award-winning sausages, all low in fat and most gluten-free (I asked). They actually bought the Country Pride recipes from the original owner, who has long since retired. There used to be a rumour going around that it wasn't legal to call these products sausages, because they contained too much meat, not enough fat and filler. My favourite is the hot chilli beef - they have a serious kick to them. Today I bought some of those, and some lamb and rosemary, and spicy Italian pork - all for the freezer, since I'm heading off to the coast tomorrow. They're all good, except I think the lemon chicken one is a bit weird. Most of them are $11 per kg.

Also notable is the Front, a cafe-gallery with not much in the way of food, but quite decent coffee. It's host to all sorts of music, performance art, exhibitions, and other artistic happenings. This is absolutely the hippest cafe in Canberra.

And then there's Tilleys. Oh, Tilleys, how you have fallen! Perhaps my rose-tinted nostalgia glasses are on, but I remember when it was new. It was just a single shop-front, and controversial because of their "no unaccompanied men" policy and their lesbian Friday nights. It was the hippest cafe in Canberra, no question. I heard my first live blues music there - Madam and the Ragtag Jazz Band. I danced the night away to DJs playing Do-Re-Mi and the Eurythmics.

I used to sit there in the afternoon, nursing a coffee with a cheap second hand paperback, while my laundry ran in the laundromat two shops down. And they had a fabulous cheese and fruit plate which fed all three of us housemates lunch for $6. (Yes, yes, but then again, the rent was only $60 a week for the whole house and our weekly food kitty was $20.)

Anyway, Tilleys grew and grew, and absorbed the neighbouring shops and restaurants in a slow but relentless crawl. Much like All Bar Nun, in O'Connor. The Thai restaurant, the sausage shop, the post office - all gone. The laundromat now houses a post office agency, and the sausages can be bought from the butcher, and the excellent little second hand bookshop is still there, so it's not a total loss.

When we came back to Canberra in 2002, Tilley's had grown huge and rather staid. The size of the place made it good for large group brunches, or random evening post-choir meals. There's lots of outdoor seating, and brunch until 3pm. Also, the music acts drew us in, so I've been there quite a few times.

They had some really good music acts, on a regular schedule. Eric Burdon was perhaps the best I went to. It's an excellent cabaret venue, all dark wood and red interiors, with a nice little stage. And all the edges are lined with booths of varying sizes, fitted with comfortable cushions. But a couple of years back, unfortunately for us, they cut back a lot on the music.

In recent experience, the food has been up and down. I've had good, bad and mediocre meals there in the last five years. Today was bad. I stopped in for lunch, and had a macchiato that was mostly just bitter. And a Cajun chicken salad ($17), which was disturbing. The fridge-cold slices of chicken breast seemed a little dry and overcooked, but the mild spice was quite pleasant and the lime-yoghurt dressing rather good. So far, OK. But the salad was highly dodgy. The cherry tomatoes were a little too squishy for me, and the mesclun included not just lettuce that was slightly brown around the edges; not just yellowing baby spinach leaves; but even some that were actually slimy. Oh dear. I ate the chicken and some cucumber and onion, because I was hungry, but I left most of the salad behind.

There is currently an ad on the door for a new cook, so perhaps it will turn around again.

More baking: carrots and onions

I've been slowly cleaning out the fridge and discovering things that need using up. Some very nice young carrots from the EPIC market had gone all limp and floppy. I also had some baby leeks and spring onions (the kind with the bulb) that were looking the worse for wear. And a couple of old tomatoes and half a punnet of large cherry tomatoes. These are easy things to deal with.

If you're a regular reader, you know that I roast tomatoes all the time. Cherry tomatoes work too. Since I'm basically reducing them to sauce, it doesn't matter that they take less time than the larger ones. Into the slow oven for an hour or so to caramelise a bit, peel when cool, and squish into a container for later use in a pasta or pizza sauce.

Floppy carrots will come good with iced water. You peel them and cut off the tops, and stick them in a container of cold water. Then it's into the fridge for an hour, or up to several days, even. They came so good that I ate several of them raw as a nice crunchy side to my sandwich lunch the other day. But I also saw a carrot muffin recipe in one of those cheapie supermarket food magazines and I felt inspired. I didn't have quite the required set of ingredients, so I improvised a bit. See below for the recipe.

As for the onions, well, as long as they're not too slimy you can just keep stripping off outer layers until you get to a nice core. I did this and chopped the resulting onion and leek mix fine. I fried them gently in a little mixed olive & canola oil until soft and a bit browned. Then I mixed them in to a beer bread mix, along with a teaspoon of caraway seeds and half a cup of coarsely grated strong cheddar. The beer was Cascade this time. We'll have it for dinner tonight, with some of that Carolina pork from the freezer, and a coleslaw.

I confess that I had to throw out some green beans and plums. They were definitely off. And some bread went moldy. In this weather, it really helps to keep it in the fridge. Mea culpa.


Recipe: Carrot and Honey Muffins
1 cup white SR flour
1 cup wholemeal SR flour
1/2 cup dark brown sugar
1 tsp cinnamon
1/2 tsp ground ginger
1/2 tsp allspice
2 cups grated carrot
--
1/4 cup honey
1/4 cup sunflower oil
1/2 cup plain yoghurt (low fat Greek)
2 eggs
3/4 cup milk
--
Mix all dry ingredients thoroughly.
Mix all wet ingredients well.
Add wet mixture to dry mixture, stir gently to just combine.
Bake in muffin pans for 20 minutes at 200C, or until a skewer comes out clean.

Notes: Makes 6 large or 12 small.
Tip: honey is easier to measure if you microwave it for 20 seconds to runny. Using an oiled spoon helps, too.

These muffins came out surprisingly well. At first I thought I'd totally screwed up by burning them, and I'm still dubious about whether my oven is behaving itself on the non-fan setting. (Fan setting is still broken.) I made 6 large ones, baked them for 25 minutes before testing, and by then they were all a bit burned on the bottom and a couple a tad burned on top. (Oven is hotter at front than back.)

But it wasn't too bad - cut off the bottom and trim any burned bits, and they are good to go. They're even nicely moist; perhaps that's the yoghurt. They are good with cream cheese - it's almost like having carrot cake for breakfast.

Oh, and here's a bonus. My lunch, a tuna pasta salad. Using up the last of several salad veggies - and now I must go to the shop to restock.

About that Spag Bog

I like to use the term "Spag Bog", because I doubt very much that any self-respecting citizen of Bologna would recognise my variant. Or rather, variants. I am not sure if I've ever made the same spag bog twice. What a "spag bog" is, is a tomato and minced meat pasta sauce, with Italian herbs. All other facets may vary. It's not easy to go wrong. I've never made an inedible one, except when I forgot about one and burned it.

The one I made last week featured kangaroo, and three different colours of capsicum. I also had a couple of little zucchini from the garden. They were lovely, much crisper than the usual ones. Bayleaves also come from the garden.

Here's my "recipe". Such as it is. Which it isn't.

Recipe: Generic Spag Bog Sauce
* Minced meat {lean beef, kangaroo, pork & veal, turkey, chopped up leftover roast beef etc}
* Baconish meat (optional) {bacon, prosciutto, ham etc}
* Alliums {garlic, onion, shallot, spring onion etc}
* Oil {olive, bacon fat, sunflower etc}
* Veggies to be cooked soft {mushrooms, eggplant, zucchini, carrot, celery etc}
* Tomatoes {fresh, tinned, roasted, paste, puree, sugo etc}
* Herbs {oregano, basil, bayleaves etc}
* Spices {pepper, chilli etc}
* Liquids {stock, wine, brandy, water, tomato juice etc}
* Other flavour agents (optional) {salt, sugar, balsamic vinegar}
* Veggies to be cooked crispish (optional) {capsicum, zucchini etc}

Method:
Fry up the alliums in the oil.
Add any of the soft-cook vegetables that need browning.
Add the meat (and optional bacon) and keep stirring until browned.
Add tomatoes, liquids, herbs, spices.
Simmer for at least an hour, stirring occasionally.
Taste and adjust flavours if need be.
Add in the last minute veggies for crispness while the pasta boils.

The proportions are left entirely to your own sense of culinary aesthetics. If you like it heavy on meat and light on veggies, or vice versa, go for it. I have done this with as little as 250g meat for 8 servings. Grated eggplant and finely chopped mushrooms do quite a good meat masquerade, if you want a vegetarian version. A half teaspoon of brown sugar helps if your tomatoes are too insipid - which fresh non-premium supermarket ones can be.


PS: Don't forget about the wonderful handmade market coming up at the Albert Hall next weekend. I'll be at the coast, so I'll have to miss it. Dang.

PPS: Look at me posting on a Monday morning. This unemployment thing is looking good so far.

The News

The Bloke and my mates B1&B2 have known about this for a while, and B1 sent me this wonderful card from the clever people at someecards. But finally, as of yesterday, it's official. So, I'm sitting here on a Saturday morning, with the dawning realisation that I don't actually have to get all the laundry and shopping and meal-planning and gardening and tidying up done this weekend, because I don't have to go to work on Monday. I have a nice little redundancy package, and am contemplating being mortgage-free. Whee!

In other news, I have started a new blog called Frumious Thought, which I intend to update totally erratically whenever I feel like it. I am planning to keep this one up regularly, though last week has been a bit, well, busy. Stressy. Angsty.

Also hot, so who's cooking? Several cafes and restaurants, and me making salads and a spag bog, that's who. Satis' veggie salad feast, om nom nom. I have a cute picture in connection with the spag, but my camera is in the shop for a grease and oil change, so that can wait. Expect normal service to be resumed shortly.

And finally, here is something very pleasing and cheerful: a little compare and contrast exercise from the US.

Baking up a storm

Or a minor downpour, perhaps. I made brownies, and a lemon polenta cake for a work morning tea.

It was this lemon polenta cake from the BBC Good Food site. And these brownies from Chocolate & Zucchini. I read C&Z regularly, and it was a recent post just as I was contemplating what to make. And with all the lemons needing using from the tree down the side, a lemon cake seemed like a great alternate choice. I decided to try for a gluten-free variety, just in case any of my audience needed it.

I won't give recipes, because basically I just did what the recipes said. Instead, here are my notes on how it went.

For the lemon cake, I poured over a lemon juice based syrup rather than limoncello - it was for work, not a home dessert. Other than that, it was down the line following the recipe. It was pretty good, but I think it needs work. It came out nicely moist, but it was also quite fragile, tending to crumble easily. The polenta remained a little bit grittier than I'd like - I used an instant one, but still. And I felt the lemon flavour was not strong enough for my taste. More zest, or perhaps a bit of lemon oil should do it. My tree is, I believe, a Meyer lemon. They are relatively mild and sweet, so perhaps using the bitier shop lemons would improve it, too.

The brownies were absolutely fabulous. I used a mix of roasted almonds and macadamias for the nuts. The one issue I had with the recipe is that they are supposed to be done when the top goes shiny and cracks. But this didn't happen in the given time, nor in the two ten minute extensions I gave it. I called a halt there, as underdone has got to be better than dried out. I was a bit worried that I might have overdone them, but they came out fudgy, rich, and very strongly chocolatey. Nom. I do think that a slightly larger pan would have been good: they are pretty thick. Cut them very small to serve!

BBQ Lamb a la Wog

In a hat tip to Australia day, and the forthcoming Canberra multi-cultural festival, I present you with this recipe in honour of our immigrant communities, and our sheep. In titling this post, I trust that years of "Wogs out of Work" and other comedians have sufficiently moved this epithet away from insult to a joke that a Skip may use.

So, anyway, roasting lamb is fine and good, but a roast dinner is a bit heavy for this weather. BBQ lamb and salad is the ticket - and it's really very easy. I bought a pre-made one from Meatways a while ago, and that inspired me to make my own. The salad in the picture is a random assembly from what salad fixings I found in the fridge - baby spinach, cucumber, tomato, avocado, olives. But to keep it in theme it was dressed with olive oil and lemon juice.

Recipe: BBQ lamb with lemon and herbs
1 small leg of lamb, butterflied. (About 1.2kg)
3 large lemons
6 medium cloves garlic
2 tablespoons fruity extra virgin olive oil
a loose half cup of chopped fresh herbs: parsley, oregano and a bit of basil.

Zest 2 of the lemons thoroughly, or three half-arsedly.
Juice the lemons, and crush the garlic
Mix everything except the lamb together.
Remove any large obvious chunks of fat and tendon from the lamb.
Place in a non-reactive container, and pour over the marinade mix.
Smoosh it around to coat, and leave for at least 3 and up to 36 hours. Turn it over occasionally.
When ready to cook, heat BBQ to a medium low flame.
Scrape off most of the herbs, and plonk the lamb on the BBQ, and leave it alone for ten minutes.
Turn it over and drizzle with some of the liquid from the marinade, or a bit of extra oil & lemon.
Leave to cook the other side - 5 minutes is enough for rare; up to 15 minutes for well-done.
Remove from heat, wrap in foil and leave in a warm place to rest for at least 15 minutes.
Slice across the grain. Serve as a pile of slices, not a big chunk.

Notes: A Greek salad would be the perfect accompaniment, of course.

We had part of this one night, cooked on the cast iron grill inside, with salad, pita bread and a dollop of bought hommous. And I took the rest to a BBQ on Friday, where our host and fellow guests added BBQ corn and asparagus, a sweet potato and chickpea salad, and a carrot and zucchini salad. And some other meats. All good stuff. I drank a few too many purple champagnes, though.

K is for Kambah

Aha! You were expecting Kingston, weren't you?

OK, I suppose not. I've been very obvious with clues back in November and December with my mentions of Meatways. Kambah it is, then. Down south, Kambah Village is at the corner where Tuggeranong Parkway changes its name to Drakeford Drive. The cross street is called Boddington Crescent to the west, Marconi crescent to the east. You can see it easily: look for the big sign and the metal sheep.

So, anyway, out at Kambah you will find Brew Your Own. Despite their minimal dead website, promising updates in 2005, this is a brilliant shop for the home brewer, wine maker or concocter of spirits. I am half appalled and half enthralled by the options of whisky essence, woodchips for infusing in your pseudo-bourbon and such devices. The bloke sticks to the grains, malts, yeasts, hops and such. The owner, Colin Marshall is deeply knowledgeable about beer. Discounts are available to members of the Canberra Brewers' Club. Brew Your Own is round the back of Kambah - go through the path beyond Woollies and turn left, or drive round. There's parking in front.

While the Bloke goes for the beer, I go for Meatways. This brilliant butcher is my main reason for visiting Kambah. If The Bloke is going to the brew shop on a Saturday, I'll tag along. Meatways has prize winning gourmet sausages of all kinds of flavours. The ones in the picture are pork with parsley, fetta and pine-nut. There's usually half a dozen flavours in stock, but the specifics vary weekly. The bacon is house-smoked, and it's very good. The owner, Cameron Fenson, also does smoked chicken, salmon and kabana sausage. There are several "value-added" meats - we had a Greek-style marinaded leg of lamb a while back, and it was very good. I'm often suspicious of pre-marinaded meats, and I never buy supermarket ones. But at Meatways it's good. Lemon, garlic, herbs, no mysterious flavour additives. They are open 7am-6pm Tues-Fri, 7am-1pm Sat; closed Sunday and Monday.

The Kambah Village complex has a Woollies supermarket, and it's a very big one. It's surrounded by clubs and pubs - the Burns Club, the Kambah Inn motel and bar, and the Vienna Restaurant. There's also a few restaurants, and a bakery in the actual complex. The bakery is an independent business, awkwardly named "Bakeshoppe". I bought a fancy "megagrain" loaf and some scotch baps from them, and they were pretty good. It's a standard bakery, rather than gourmet or artisan or patisserie, but it seems pretty good for its genre. It's bright and clean; the pies were selling well, and the finger buns and vanilla slices looked appealling.

I haven't tried any of the restaurants, and have heard no rumours, either. There is a fast-food style Indian, with the big bains-marie. Spring Garden Chinese looks like the usual local Oz-Cantonese generic place; the Village Cafe looks like a standard old-fashioned milkbar/take away with pizza. The Vienna is Austrian, a schnitzel and strudel place with lace curtains. And I don't know what the Burns Club offers. Maybe Sri Lankan haggis curry? Seriously, their website says that their "Banana Leaf Brasserie" serves Sri Lankan, British, Scottish, Portuguese, Italian and Australian Cuisine.