Too much of a good thing (read: this will be an epic post)...

...can be, as they say, wonderful.

I'm always at my most content when I'm baking. So I'm going to make a day of it. Well, half a day...it is well past midday-which means the sun is past the yard arm! Time for a drink!

Ah, Marlborough Sav Blancs, you can do no wrong...

My bread is mixed and rising (hopefully). I'm a bit bored of my usual recipe:

Ancient grains bread

(Mixer method)

1 cup sorghum flour

2/3 cup amaranth flour

1/2 cup mix of pepitas, flax seed and sunflower seeds

¼ cup quinoa flour

1/3 cup tapioca flour

1/3 cup packed brown sugar

1 tbsp guar gum

1 tbsp instant dried yeast

1 ½ tsp salt

2 eggs

1 egg white

1 cup tepid water

2 tbsp rice bran oil

1 tsp apple cider vinegar

Grease 9- by 5-inch (2L) loaf tin. Sift and mix all dry ingredients in a large bowl. In a separate bowl (of mix master etc) combine all wet ingredients until well blended. With the mixer on its lowest setting, slowly add the dry ingredients. Scrape the sides and with the mixer on medium, beat for 4 minutes. Spoon into prepared pan. Allow to rise, uncovered, in a warm, draft-free place for 60-75 minutes, or until dough has risen to the top of the pan. Meanwhile, preheat oven to 180°C. Bake for 35-45 minutes (I find it actually normally takes about an hour!), or until loaf sounds hollow when tapped on the bottom. Remove the pan immediately and let cool completely on a rack.

So I've tried a different flour combination.

1 cup quinoa flour

1 cup amaranth flour

1/3 cup arrowroot flour

1/3 cup white rice flour

We'll see how it goes. I'm bit sick of the flavour of sorghum but love quinoa, I hope it stands out more.

Ooh, it's rising! Half-way there.

She is risen!

Time to make some banana bread.

This is my G F adaption of Bill Granger's recipe-minus the chocolate. I know what you are thinking:

Who are you and what have you done with, Esther.

But I like banana bread for breakfast and I can't face chocolate for breakfast all the time, unless it is Nutella.

80 grams salted butter
2/3 cup raw sugar
2 large eggs
1 tsp vanilla extract
4 large over ripe bananas, mashed

1 cup sorghum flour (I know-after all just said-but the other flavours are sufficiently overwhelming)
1/3 cup arrowroot flour
1/3 cup white rice flour
1/3 cup amaranth flour
1 tbsp guar gum
2 tsp baking powder

Grease 9- by 5-inch (2L) loaf tin. Preheat oven to 180°C. In a mixing bowl sift and combine all dry ingredients (except sugar). In a separate larger bowl, cream the butter and sugar. Mix in vanilla and eggs. Then mix in bananas. Gradually add flour mixture. Spoon into tin and smooth top - G F things won't necessarily even out when baking. Bake for 1 hour and 15 mins or until a skewer comes out clean. Leave in tin for 5 mins then turn out on to wire rack to cool.

The bread is done.

Quinoa-y goodness

Time to cook dinner. Being lazy and making napolitana sauce to go with already cooked chicken breasts and G F spaghetti.

1 large brown onion, chopped
6 cloves of garlic, roughly chopped
1/2 cup red wine
500 gram tin of diced Australian tomatoes in (hopefully also Australia) tomato puree
2 tsp dried thyme
2 tsp dried oregano
2 tsp dried basil
2 tsp Murray River salt
1/2 tsp sugar

Pour in hot saucepan a TV chef's drizzle of olive oil, brown onions. Add garlic and cook until softened. Add red wine, bring to boil. Add tomatoes and herbs, give a good stir. Bring to the boil and then turn down to a simmer. Leave for as long as possible. I'm letting it go for two hours.

Meanwhile, back at the ranch...

The banana bread is done.

Could've put it in a smaller tin, it looks rather
flat. It tastes fabulous regardless.

Now, I'm giving myself a challenge: making french almond macarons. I know, I know, because of Master chef Australia they are so in right now. But I love anything meringue.

It is particularly challenging because it is raining today and rule #1 of meringue-making is:

1. don't make meringues in humid weather

Bah, I flout the rules! But I could just be setting myself up for failure, although they aren't exactly meringue-like, so it could be okay. But, definitely following the recipe this time.

French Almond Macarons

1 1/4 cups pure icing sugar

1 cup almond meal

3 egg whites

2 tbsp caster sugar

Preheat oven to 150°C. Line two biscuit trays with baking paper.

In a large mixing bowl sift the almond meal (I did not and they look lumpy) and icing sugar. Combine with a whisk to prevent lumps.

In a separate bowl, beat the egg whites until they form peaks. Then, gradually add the caster sugar. Add the egg white mixture to the almond mixture. It will be quite stiff. 

The recipe I had said spoon it onto baking trays but I new that would not make them look as pretty as the picture. I know they cheated!

So I decided to look up different recipes to freak myself out!

But ended up going with the latter half of this recipe.

So spoon into a piping bag and pipe into 1.5 cm rounds on the trays.

Pink poos!

Actually, I lie. I only let them sit for 10 mins-like the first recipe I looked at said and didn't have a problem with cracking.

But I did go with their baking timing. 10mins, swap shelves and further 10mins.

While they were baking I read the comments and discovered they weren't macaroons (I thought that was wrong - macaroons have coconut!) and so Googled macarons and found this recipe, which is scarily much more elaborate than the one I had, but I will try it next time.

Now for the filling

Raspberry chocolate ganache

100 ml cream (the recipes said thick, but I didn't have any and it still worked, so there)

100 grams fair trade 70% cocoa chocolate, finely chopped or grated

30 grams butter

In a saucepan bring the cream to the boil. Pour over the chocolate (in a mixing bowl) and stir until smooth, gently so as not to create any bubbles. Let rest and after 1 - 2 mins stir in the butter. Let sit until set, this will be at least half an hour. Then spoon onto the flat side of one and sandwich with another of the same size.

The finished product.

I feel sick...

Too much of a good thing...can make you feel slightly nauseous...

Drunk blogging #2: Long distance relationships

Why? Why? Why? Why?

I know why.

Some misguided attempt to save money and travel around the world.

But being two and a half states and a strait of water away from one's heart?

Not such a good idea.

Every visit only makes it worse...reminding me of what I am missing out on.

The peace and quiet of the Southern Highlands of New Souths Wales.

I used to dream of living there, or at least running away there...

But instead of being there helping my beloved I'm in fucking Tasmania.

Do I revoke whining rights if it's self-inflicted?

Image credit

If only.

Sigh.

Politics for breakfast

This morning, I received a questionnaire from the Liberal Party. I shall type it up because I intended to send it back and scribbled all over it and made a right mess, so I decided to send an email instead.

It reads:

HAVE YOUR SAY...           

Please number (from 1 to 4) the four issues that concern you most.

(next to this in a large bubble is Your views are important to me!)

__ The level of national debt under the Rudd Government

__ Local crime in our community

__ The lack of real action by the Rudd Government

__ Fixing our local hospitals

__ Creating local jobs

__ Taking Direct Action on climate change not just a Great Big New Tax

__ The state of our local roads and infrastructure

__ The lack of government support for small business

__ Border Protection and community safety

Before I realised that he is in fact a Federal Representative and not State I wrote under this one "From what? Penguins, seals, New Zealand?"

If you could fix one problem in our local area, what would it be?

________________________________________________________________________________

Please select from the following options:

I ALWAYS support the following party

__ Liberal

__ Labour

__ Greens

__ Independant/ Other

or

I USUALLY support the following party

__ Liberal

__ Labour

__ Greens

__ Independant/ Other

or

__ I don't really support and political party

Follow McDuff for my e-mail

Do I look bothered?

I am bothered.

Things that bother me: in which I drink wine and rant about things that annoy me (otherwise known as drunk blogging)

Well, my productivity levels did not increase due to my wonderful breakfast. I spent the day perusing the links in Feministe's Shameless Self-Promotion Sunday.

So, to kid myself into thinking I have actually done something I'm going to publish a rant I prepared earlier, with some additions. It shall be the first in a series entitled things that bother me; in which I shall drink my Merlette and rant to my heart's content.

Capitalism

Just because lots of countries are doing it, does not mean it is right.

Just because the people at the top of the food chain are earning lots of money and justifying this by saying that they worked oh-so-hard to earn more money than they could possibly spend in their lives, does not mean everyone that works hard could ever earn as much as them.

They should try telling that to the Chinese potters in Jing de Zheng who are working themselves into a painful early death caused by silicosis to earn mere cents per item.


All in the name of global economy. But in the world of Capitalism, people - just like monies - are expendable. Actually people are more expendable than money.

Oh wait, did I just use people in a supposed Communist country as an example of Capitalism?

Why yes, I did.

That is because I don't believe any attempts that have been made at creating Communist nations actually successfully created Communist nations. Hmm. That is another rant for another day.
From what I've read I don't think that ethnic-(or any other kind of)cleansing is actually fundamental to Communist principles.

I digress.

Just because some people worked hard for their money, does not mean that everyone can work hard.


The fact that not everyone cannot work hard for it, does not mean those who cannot do not deserve basic welfare, healthcare, living standards etc etc.

I am and always have been bothered by the necessity for money. Living in a major city like Sydney only exaccerbated this.

But it was never more obvious to me than when I was doing the 9 to 5 except it was 5am to 2pm. It started out at 7 but when a staff member left I ended up on the 5am starts.

The seven am starts were bearable. I could get home and still do things all afternoon. But when I had to get up at 4am for a 5am start I basically couldn't function when I got home. No matter how much sleep I had, I was exhausted for months. The job had taken control of my life.

Except, what really capped it off was that the job was making coffee for the 9-5ers.
My god.

What a bunch of whiners.

Every day I was reminded what day it was (I am normally not to bothered by this one, having always worked in hospitality weekends made no difference to me except that it meant there were more people around). I learnt that Wednesday is "hump day." I thought it was something else. Can't you do that every day? How far we were from the weekend. When you could do what? Get drunk and forgot how shit your job is. Or watch television. Watch DVDs. Watch movies.

And with every week that passes by you are only so far from retirement when you can do what, exactly? Really enjoy that widescreen television you spent all your hard earned money on.

Excuse middle-class white man with a mortgage, widescreen television, 4WD and 2.5 children, if you are wishing each minute, each day, each week, each fucking year away: you need a new job. Find something you fucking love and fucking enjoy.

If enough people fucking do it then we have a fucking revolution on our hands people!

I wish I had a glass of sparkling wine...

I just slept in til 11:20am.

Blech.

It makes me feel disgusting sleeping in so late.

So I cooked a fabulous breakfast to cheer myself up.

Scrambled eggs made with cream. Semi-sun-dried tomatoes and fresh basil mixed in, topped with shaved pecorino.

And of course a side of happy-pig bacon (read free-range) cooked to a crisp.

Yum.

Waiting for my real life to begin

Any minute now, my ship is coming in

I'll keep checking the horizon

I'll stand on the bow, feel the waves

Come crashing down down, on me

And you say, be still my love
Open up your heart

Let the light shine in
But don't you understand
I already have a plan
I'm waiting for my real life to begin

Fortunately, by the time I heard this song, it merely reminded me that my life had already begun.

I used to be waiting. When I was a teenager I thought...or was led to believe if I lost say 20 kilos then my life would magically fall into place.

But really my life had started somewhat sooner.

It started it the womb.

Well it really started when I was born. When I came out I was one chubby baby. They called me the Michelin baby. Yes, like the tires. Luckily I didn't understand English at the time. I could've got a complex.

That came later.

I think I must've evened out a bit at some point but even at primary school I started to get chubby again.

While I was a growing child my family always ate well. Though we weren't the most well off people, there were generous serves of tasty food. Mum and dad were inspired cooks and tried cooking with flavours beyond white-middle-Australia. I loved hanging out in the kitchen with mum. Always part of the action, especially when it came to the baking.

It wasn't until those cursed adolescent years that the relationship with food entered the love/hate stage. After a childhood blessed with an abundance of food, I came to find myself of larger proportions than some. One high school friend took it upon himself to point out I was in fact the fattest person in our year 8 class (of over 100 people) photograph.

Isn't that just what every teenage girl needs to hear?

But of course he wasn't the only one.

Random boys in passing cars yelling out "fat arse," as I walked down the street.

A grown woman telling me I was fatter than her and she'd had three children.

Random boys in passing cars yelling out "fucking fat," while I was actually walking for exercise.

A supposed friend saying that we just couldn't tiptoe around it anymore: I was fat.

And of course being surrounded by generally not very happy over weight people.

That is, my family.

Inevitably, the connection between the food and the fat was made. Years of yo-yo dieting ensued. Lots of 'low-fat' (high sugar of course) food. Eating up the advertising lies as quickly as the food. Holding firmly to the belief that if it's low fat you can eat more of it, right? My family's previously interesting menu was replaced with all the lower-fat less flavour-some substitutes.

There was the stint in Weight Watchers which was actually the beginning of the end for my attempts at weight loss. There was a check list for whether you were ready to lose weight.

One of the questions was "are you ready for this to control your life?"

And I remember at the time thinking...

No, actually I'm not.

I don't want to do this for the rest of my life.

But I ticked yes, because at the time I wanted nothing more than to lose the weight so I could enter my adulthood as a skinny person.

I wanted to lose the weight before I was 18.

But it didn't happen.

When I went to university, I was still fat. Still struggling.

But there was a niggling in the back of my mind. When I was home alone and looking in at myself in the mirror (sometimes...not all the time) I didn't actually hate my body. I didn't think it was that bad. I didn't feel inhibited by it either. I was always very flexible and agile. I could always bend down and touch my toes. It was only when I was around other people (thinner people) I was reminded that I was overweight.

Then things really changed.

And I have an admission to make.

I don't know if it is a bad thing.

But, I have to admit it began when someone else kind-of-liked-me-a-lot...

just the way I was.

That is aside from my other virtues, she actually considered my body to be amongst them.

She didn't love me in spite of my body she loved me, my brain, my mind and my body.

And she introduced me to a whole new world of food and a whole love of food, real food. Good food.

Not low-fat pseudo-healthy food.

I worry how I would be faring now had I not met her. Would I still be struggling, still waiting for the day I dropped those kilos so I could start my real life?

However, in my third year of university I moved out of home. Then things started to go in the other direction. I stopped caring about losing weight and rebelled against the prior self-inflicted control. Also given that I didn't really have very much money, I indulged my loves of chips and $10 steak and discovered a world copious amounts of alcohol.

The student lifestyle does takes it's toll. But it needed to be done.

Helped in finding the middle ground.

The middle ground is a very tasty place.

I love food. I love all those things you are told a bad for you but taste so fucking good: cream, salt, wine, butter.

God, I love butter. I have to write another post about the virtues of butter.

My life has already begun, it began about 23 and 1/4 years ago but it really started getting good when I stopped worrying about my fat arse.

In fact, I love food so much I want to make it my life.

I want to go back to school and study commercial cookery.

I want to own my own cafe and make the world's best Eggs Florentine.

I want to travel the world with my beloved and eat our way around the 100 best restaurants.

I want to work with her as she makes her pots so I can make food for them.

I want, I want, I want.

And I want to food to drive it all.

Oh, the irony.

Success!

I poured the second halves of the moulds at 8:30 pm.

And this morning I have four fabulous little two-piece molds.

It will be worth it when I have a production line going.

Procrastination

I promised myself I would not get distracted by cleaning out the sun room. It is not my number one priority. Presently my priority is to make some moulds so I can start making jewellery to take the Triennial International Ceramics Conference in Gulgong.

The sun room was promised to me as a space for art-making. But it has since been a dumping ground for everyones excess boxes - mine included. However, there are other spaces I could use temporarily, just to get myself started.

And what have you spent the morning doing, Esther?

Well I started cleaning the sun room of course. Got most of the way through and got annoyed that I wasn't clearing very much space.

I seem to have some aversion to the tedious process of mould making. Oh, yes that would be it. An aversion to the entire process.

I am going to eat some cold Nigella pudding and then get stuck into it!

Shock of the cock: part one

I'm half way through my bottle of clean skin rose (actually it's a merlette), so no better time than the present to write about what I have decided to call the 'shock of the cock.'

Yes, my friends, I am talking of the phallus. The big, hard, erect phallus that is even now penetrating my very consciousness. But in what form? No, I am not looking at gay porn. I am talking, very specifically about a very specific approach to art making.

This year's love

Yes, the blog title is a reference to the incredibly morose David Gray song, which for me is thoroughly connected to missing my girlfriend. For reasons we are both struggling to remember (at this very moment) we are spending this year apart. So while I do not doubt our love shall last this year I am hoping this blog will also.

I shouldn’t set such a gloomy precedent. I will be using this blog to write (obviously), to find my writing voice, to share my year’s culinary adventures, to explore my own opinions about feminism, politics, art.

But to start…a recipe, because my priorities are thoroughly in order, I assure you.

My own adaptation of Nigella Lawson’s Gooey Chocolate Puddings with a gluten-free twist

Ingredients

3 large eggs

125 grams dark chocolate (I use Lindt- a mix of 70 and 85% cocoa)

125 grams of butter (her recipe calls for unsalted but I think salted is better- that sweet/salty thing)

2/3 cup of sugar

½ cup of hazelnut meal* **

Pre-heat the oven to 200 degrees.

Nigella says this serves four, sometimes it serves four, but sometimes it’s way too much. Last night I spread this over ten little ramekins and one was sufficient for mum…but I had two. So it just depends on your ramekin situation. However many you chose, grease them. It makes them easier to take out if there are leftovers so you can eat them cold the next day.

Melt the chocolate and butter in a bowl over water on the stove. While they are melting mix the other ingredients together in a separate bowl. Once the chocolate and butter is melted add it slowly to the other mixture. Divide amongst ramekins.

Now pop them in the oven. How long they will take depends upon how thick the ramekins are etc. So keep an eye on them, they could take 10 to 20 minutes. Last night they took 15 minutes.

Best served with double cream.

* I don’t know if you can buy hazelnut meal but I make it myself. Just toast some hazelnuts quickly in a fry pan till they brown a little. Then crush in mortar and pestle or food processor etc.

** Look at the Post-modernism in action, by changing one ingredient I am not plagiarising…I hope.