culinary mount everest

It's what Deb Perelman of Smitten Kitchen calls her home made lasagne and no wonder.  It is a feat to accomplish and a feast to behold (although it didn't get beheld in our house as much as it got snaffled up).  Lasagne bolognese is up there as one of my favourite, hearty, home cooked treats and I'm always looking to improve the recipe I've used for all these years.  I've made it from scratch before a few times you see, even down to making our own pasta, but I've always skipped cooking the pasta first and while the flavours have been good, it's always been a little floury.  Now I know why, although I can't tell you why I've always ignored this step.  Maybe because it's another step in an already long list of tasks and well, when you want a lasagne, you want it bad.  And now.

I didn't skip a thing this time, no.  I followed Deb's recipe almost to the letter**.  I added an extra egg to the pasta (working on Jamie Oliver's 1 egg per 100g flour) and I'm glad I did, because even with the extra egg I needed a splash of water to bring the dough together.  I started it in our KitchenAid before kneading it myself, until it was as smooth and as sproingy as can be.  Deb doesn't suggest working the dough at all, but I've always thought you needed to work the gluten to get a nice, firm but springy pasta.  I could be wrong but after all the work I'd put into the ragu and the bechamel, I went with what I knew and had tested before, and it worked a treat.

The children got a kick out of cranking the pasta machine and I loved taking photos of them doing so, and while I'd hoped Ollie would be more enthusiastic about eating pasta having helped make it, it wasn't to be.  I must have the only child that doesn't want to eat pasta.  No matter what.  Is this normal?

So after the ragu, the bechamel, the pasta came the finished dish and a lot of washing up, which was totally worth it.  The result was delicious, although it didn't hold together terribly well, but it had that creamy/meaty quality that I often crave in a lasagne but can be lacking in the home made variety which can sometimes be too dry.  Max polished off his portion and I was left wondering whether for dessert I'd eat a slice of banana cake with some single cream or another portion of lasagne.  It was that good.  (I did both.)

Next time?  I'll keep the pasta a hair thicker.  I like it thin but I also like a bit of structure to my lasagne and a thicker pasta might help with that (although the next day the reheated slab was pretty much structurally sound).  Other than that, there's not much I'd change. I'd make more, though and freeze up a couple of those bad boys for that mid week moment when you know you deserve something special but after the boys are fed, bathed and in bed you can barely peel yourself off the couch to make it happen. After all, you've just climbed a culinary mountain (with a few detours along the way), so why not take an evening off?

** Changes included:
 - The ragu - I added some rosemary (and wished my bay laurel hadn't been demolished by those cheeky little grasshoppers only the day before).  I also used two 400g tins of tomatoes rather than tomato paste and water.  I found this meant I didn't need to keep topping the ragu up with water (although I did once or twice), and I got a much more mellow sauce rather than one which I think would have been too sweet and rich for my liking.  I only simmered mine for about 3.5 hours, which was ample.  I loved the idea of using the food processor for chopping the mirepoix (or I suppose the term soffritto would be more appropriate) as I do find the chopping a little tedious when I'm trying to get this done during the kids' naps.  Once it was on, the ragu was as easy as anything.
 - The bechamel - the nutmeg is, to my mind, essential.  It gives the bechamel a depth and a fragrance and an earthiness that is so good, Will eats the leftover bechamel straight from the pan with the wooden spoon.  I also needed much more milk than the recipe suggested but then I've never come across a recipe for  bechamel that didn't need a bit of judgement when it came to how much milk to add. 
 - Pasta - I added an extra egg and I used 00 flour, rather than plain (though we've used plain flour before and it was fine).  I've only ever made Jamie Oliver's pasta recipe, and it is a winner.  And I kneaded the bejesus out of the dough on a heavily floured surface before letting it rest for 30 mins in the fridge.  The humidity didn't help but we worked quickly and that did.

a stripey second birthday invitation

Max will be TWO at the end of March, which means party time for the little guy I love so much.  Having shied away from theming the boys' birthday parties so far, it seemed like a cool idea to give this next celebration a theme, but something simple that would be easy enough to execute and for everyone to participate in.

It was the usual deal, an idea based on a birthday card Ollie got for his last birthday scribbled onto some scrap paper, which was then executed into a great little card by the talented man in my life, while I agonised over fonts and colours (both of which I'm really happy with).  The cards were printed onto this awesome paper (it truly is fantastic, if a little expensive) with our new printer (the old one died a pretty spectacular death).  Here it is, the invitation to Max's Stripey Second Birthday Party.  I love it.

And so, we have stripey straws, stripey cupcake wrappers, an idea for a stripey cake and stripey themed food.  We've asked everyone to wear their stripiest clothes and I'm hoping to find time to do some striped paper bunting or similar to decorate our house on the day.

I'm sure we have many themed parties in our future, Lego, Star Wars, Hallowe'en, Pirates that Drive Garbage Trucks etc... but for now, keeping it simple is good practice for the fun times ahead.

the way the boys are

A month ago, Max joined Ollie at his day care centre.  We managed to secure a place for him at the very last moment, a week before Max would have started at another centre until the boys could be together in mid-March.  It was fortuitous to say the least.

Max has, as we quietly predicted he would, settled in with minimum fuss.  We had a couple of days of tears at the gate, and he still has a firm grip on my hand until the moment I ask him for a squeezy hug and kiss, but every afternoon when I pick him up, his carers tell me what a wonderful day he's had and how settled he is.  It makes every bit of me glow with pride.

One of the loveliest things about this new chapter is that I've had a chance to see the brotherly relationship between Max and Ollie blossom.  Actually, it's not even that it's blossomed, it's that I see a side to it that I don't see at home.  At home, they get on really well most of the time, but they can also wind each other up and each knows exactly how to push the other's buttons.  At 'kindy' as we call it, they seek each other out, take great comfort in each other's company, and I have on more than one occasion arrived early to catch them sitting together, talking about a book, a toy or just hanging out.  It's the sweetest thing a mother of sons can see.

I've no doubt that while a large part of Max settling in so quickly is because he's a confident and easy going little man, it's also because he's there with his brother and chum.  It must have made the transition so much easier, to know his brother is just in the next room if he needs him.  It's also safe to say that Max is the rock in Ollie's life.  Ollie wasn't as quick to settle in, but since his brother and best pal has been going to kindy, he's been much happier to be there and goodbyes are no longer the emotional, gut-wrenching affairs of a month or so ago when I didn't think he'd ever forgive me for putting him through the ordeal of big day care.

But you know, kindy has taught Ollie so much already - and Max too.  The other day we caught Ollie actually singing a song he'd learned there (he doesn't sing.)  He is learning how to interact with children that are different to him and his brother (definitely NO biting) and he talks so sweetly about bringing his friends home from kindy (if only his mum would make friends with some of the other mums).  Sure he has his off days but on the whole, it's been a good experience for him so far.

So the last couple of months have been a big deal in our house with the change in the boys' routine (one they are still getting to grips with because being at kindy is so exhausting for them - and us), but seeing how they are with each other there, with other children, with their carers and how they are bringing home what they learn, makes me so excited for the days when they will be at school, then uni and then grown up men themselves.  Until then, though, I'm pretty happy to see them just been little together and enjoying little breaks with them like the one we just had at North Straddie, where everything was damn near perfect.  Sunshine, waves, gelato every day.  I never want to forget these days.

the fish house

For the last 6 months or so, even longer if you count the thinking that went into it before pen touched paper, Will has been working on designing a new house to replace the shack at North Stradbroke Island that his mum has owned for the last 30 years or so.  It's a gem of a place, that ramshackle type of beach house where everything is blue or yellow and nearly everything has a picture of a fish on it.  The bedrooms are small and there's hardly any space inside but it's a great little house, just about 2 minutes walk from Cylinder Beach, with a deck looking out over the ocean, just about enough space for everyone in the family and somewhere you can forget about housework and sand in the beds because that's what Straddie is about.  Relaxing.

We've spent many a blissful (and sometimes stressful) weekend there since I moved out here almost 9 years ago, Wills' father's ashes are in the ocean at Home Beach, Will's brother married there, and I will never, ever forget the perfect 8 weeks shortly after Ollie was born that we moved over to the island, breast pump and maternity pads in tow, making short shrift of what could have been a stressful first couple of months as we got to grips with parenthood (we're still doing that, by the way).  I have no doubt that the sound of the ocean when we dozed off and woke up every morning, the hour long beach walks at 4pm and the evenings on the deck watching the stars and playing Trivial Pursuit made those months feel easy, rather than the slog they could have been.  This photograph was taken on Boxing Day (my UK friends can hardly believe it), and it's one I love.  My sons, happily playing, enamoured with the beach and island life.

But that house is now on its last legs and any attempt to renovate it would probably only last a short while before the bulldozers would need to be called in, so that's what Will's mum is doing now.  This will probably be the last summer that the house is used, before it's replaced with the house that Will is designing - The Fish House.  He's working with an old uni graduate friend of his, who's very talented but somewhat challenging to work with (deadlines?  what deadlines?  when did you say you needed that by?) and the disorganisation drives me crazy, but it's Will that he's working with, and his usual laid back self is coping just fine with his shambolic partner. Me, on the other hand...

It's not a project that has been completely smooth sailing so far, there are the opinions of 6 somewhat loud and opinionated kids and their mum (who's more unassuming), and then the mix of the engineer's point of view, the interior designer, the beach bums, the completely unassuming matriarch and the architect lends its own level of complication.  But it's something Will seems to be enjoying and fantastic experience, and on balance, it's going reasonably well, these challenges are probably no different to those faced by any other aspiring architect.  In fact the family has already agreed on one design (out of a possible four - and it was one of Will's) and now it's at the nitty gritty stage of working out what goes where and getting consensus on that.  I hope to share some of its progress soon and along the way.

It's going to be some time before this house is built and it's a long way from Council approval but it's going to be one of those achievements for the family and Will that will mark change.  A huge change for the family, but also for Will who will have seen through his first residential project from start to finish, dealing with conflicting view points, working in a partnership, council and building regulations, builders, engineers and lack of experience in nearly all those things.  I hope it all works out.  I want nothing but for him to feel proud of what he's doing, because he ought to.  After all, he's taken it upon himself to start this project and it's going to be some achievement to see it through to the end, when we'll be sipping cocktails on the deck and thinking about what it's taken to get there.  Although right now, that seems very, very long way away.

pinterest and potstickers

A few weeks ago, I finally joined the gang that is Pinterest.  I love it.  This newfound interest somewhat explains the lack of blogging (although the main reason for that is that Will is using my macbook for the Straddie project - more on that later) but the main thing about Pinterest is how damn cool it is to just be able to, with one click of the button, bookmark that awesome image/recipe/idea that you previously didn't have a good way of filing.  For an organisation freak, it's a dream come true.

Now, I love it, I spend a lot of time looking at stuff, but I also think I now waste less time looking for stuff.  You find people that like the stuff you do, and hey presto, at your disposal are images of all the things you want to look at!  Or make!  Or dream about!  Or cook!

Yes, cooking.  It's a veritable wealth of information, images that make you drool, that make you want to cook and then ideas for food that you never knew existed.  Hooray. 

So it was via Pinterest that I found this recipe.  It's for those delectable Chinese dumplings, which are dumplings when they are steamed but potstickers when they are panfried.  Do you know how much I love them?  A lot.  A potsticker is that perfect combination of crispy, chewy, savoury, juicy, bite sizedness and it comes with dipping sauce.  It's the perfect food for me.  And all those different fillings too!  So when I came across this cute little image of home made dumplings, I had to make them myself.  It seemed like madness what with time being so scarce but I wanted those little suckers so badly, I had to do it.

So I did.  I followed the recipe and shunned the food processor to hand chop everything except the pork which I did whizz in the Magimix, and the ginger, which I got out of the frozen stash of grated ginger I keep.  I didn't make my own wrappers since I thought this might be the bit I could really screw up and I wanted them to be at least half good.  So I bought pre made gowgee wrappers (for $1.90 a pack of 30, it seemed the sensible thing to do) and then sat and meditatively wrapped and crimped each one (and I made 75 in total), before laying them out on a tray, and freezing them for that quick fix.

The kids actually liked them.  We loved them.  They were crispy, succulent, flavoursome.  As I was filling them, Will and I kept commenting on how good the raw filling smelled.  The dipping sauce was the perfect accompaniment and they looked beautiful.  All up, about 90 mins of preparation and about 10 minutes to cook.  Worth every moment.  Happy to answer questions over technique but you know, it was easy.  Easier than I thought it would be and a very good investment of time.

You know, often you think you don't have time. Time to do anything. Now that I'm a working mother, I can't even fathom how I used to fill my days.  We feel so busy, we feel like there's no time, and especially not time to make home made Chinese pork dumplings. The truth is we do have time.  We aren't that busy, we just like to complain about it - lord knows I do.  But we should all make time to nourish our souls and learn something new, because that's what makes us feel good.  Happy Chinese New Year.

melanzane alla parmiagana

9

It's so good, I've written about it before.  It's arguably the best use of an aubergine I have ever come across and I've lost count of the times I've made and enjoyed this and every time, it gets that bit better.  It's straightforward, but grilling the aubergine takes time and patience and getting this bit right, I think, makes for a great dish rather than an ok one.  This is the recipe, except these are the changes:

1.  I use about 4-6 large aubergines, rather than 3.  I don't think 3 is enough to make a good, dense, aubergine rich dish, and like a good lasagne, I think you want lots of layers.  If you end up with a few too many slices of aubergine, eat them.

2.  I grill the aubergine long and slow so it's meltingly soft and golden.  I do it on the lowest setting on our barbecue, which means I can grill approximately 5 large aubergines, sliced about 1cm thick all in one go.  It's quicker, cleaner and I quite like standing at the barbecue slowly and methodically turning the aubergine slices until they are cooked to perfection (make sure they are as soft as can be).  I tend to do this the day before I assemble the dish, to split the work up a bit, but it's the only bit that's any work.

3.  The tomato sauce - Rather than one clove of garlic, I use three, and rather than one large onion, I'll use 1.5 or even two, very finely chopped and cooked slowly until soft and brown.  Cook the tomato sauce on a low heat for about 30 mins, or until you see a film of olive oil on top of the sauce which means (to me) that it's ready and your sauce will be very sweet and intense.  I like to be generous with the red wine vinegar and seasoning before blending the sauce until it's smooth.  Leftover sauce, if there is any, is great tossed through pasta with a bit of parmesan the next night (for the kids in particular for a quick mid week meal).

That's about it.  I top the assembled dish of layers of the aubergine, sauce and lots of parmesan with fresh  breadcrumbs, fresh oregano, torn up mozzarella and I bake it for about 40 mins.  Then, we eat it with warmed, crusty bread, cold butter and red wine. What we don't eat ends up in the freezer for the ultimate easy deluxe mid week dinner.

mushroom risotto heaven

This is fast turning into a diary of what we eat, but beyond looking after our boys, the grind of work and keeping house, enjoying the food we eat is what life seems to be about at the moment.  I've always been enthusiastic about only making what we want to eat and sometimes it can be a but cumbersome choosing to make what takes more effort than beans on toast (which is sometimes just what we fancy) but when we really feel like eating something, and in the absence of the long languorous dinners we used to enjoy, I think it's worth the extra effort to get it just right rather than settling for what'll do.  We have many pleasures in life at the moment, but for someone that eats every day, often three times or more a day, food is what fuels my every sense and I don't have the time or the inclination to eat anything except that which is cooked with love and enthusiasm.

So, I make no apology for this turning into a food diary.  And this next recipe is something else.  I love a good mushroom risotto but in all the years I've been cooking it, I've never managed to replicate that full-on, earthy, almost meaty flavour that you get in the restaurants.  Until now.

We had more field mushrooms than we knew what to do with, so I decided it was time to learn how to make a decent risotto, the oozy kind that you don't want to stop eating.  Even before finding the recipe I wanted to try, I knew I needed good stock, so I started with the homemade chicken variety, a few organic chicken wings, carrots, onions, fresh bay, thyme, parsnips, parsley, peppercorns, celery, plenty of water, simmered gently for a couple of hours.  This may seem like a lot of work but it's truly the easiest thing to make and having home made stock means you don't have to use the over-salted supermarket kind, which I fear is made with unhappy chickens and no love whatsoever.  I'm no chef but I know that home made stock, and you can make litres of it at a time, is probably one of the most useful things to have on hand, frozen into 250ml or 500ml tubs. (That, and frozen breadcrumbs made from fresh bread.)

So, stock made, I then searched for a recipe that came with a picture that looked like what I wanted to eat.  I found this one.  I followed it pretty much to the letter except I only had those big portobello mushrooms - none of the fancy kind - and more than the recipe needed, but I threw them all in (about double what was needed) and used plenty of stock, butter and salt (my stock was unsalted), parmesan and parsley and in 40 minutes, we had the perfect mushroom risotto.  (My only criticism of the recipe is that it said 'serves 4'.  Well I did 1.5 times the quantities suggested by the recipe which was enough for a big meal for two.  The original recipe would never have been enough for four.)

The key?  I'm no expert but I'm sure using good stock is important, and plenty of it too.  I reckon you want the risotto nice and oozy, so you probably need more stock than you realise (and this recipe was almost spot on with how much you'd need but I still used a tad more), don't skimp on butter and salt (good general rules for life, I think).  Keep stirring (it's not that big a deal to stand at a stove for 30 minutes), apparently the stirring is what makes the starch ooze from the rice, and don't let it get dry at any point.  Eat big platefuls, off your lap, in front of the tv while turning to your husband every few minutes and saying 'mmmm. best. risotto. ever'.

a visit from my mother-in-law

It doesn't happen often, as she has an enviable life of endless parties, weekends in Sydney and travel to faraway places, but when my mother-in-law does visit, it's always really nice and it's a perfect excuse to bake.  Here's our attempt at the London Cheesecake, by Nigella, topped with raspberries because even I need a bit of freshness on all that cake.

It was good and all, pretty damn good for a first attempt and even now, at 7am I could eat a slice, but I'm still on the search for that smooth, velvety, sweet, light slice of perfect cheesecake.

dots on new year's eve

On New Year's Eve, we made another trip to the GoMA.  I love it there.  This time to see the Look Now, See Forever exhibit by Yayoi Kusama, not that we knew that's what we were going to see, we just got the train there (mainly to entertain the boys) and walked over to the gallery in the rain, to find some awesome stuff.

Like this exhibit, The Obliteration Room.  It's a totally white room, white everything, couches, dining table, coffee tables complete with cups and saucers, computers, bookshelves, even a working white piano.  As you went in, each child was given a sheet of stickers to stick anywhere, ANYWHERE!  So much fun.  As you left, you had to check the soles of your shoes for little stickers to make sure you didn't trample them all over the rest of the gallery.  The GoMA.  It's a seriously cool place.

the year in review

I went back to work after giving birth to my littlest boy and to my surprise, loved it, I joined a gym and kept it up, we had visitors from England, we broke a fridge, we bought a new camera and took a million photographs, we edited our photos and backed them up responsibly, we realised we need a holiday but didn't have the time to take one, we escaped the floods but friends weren't so lucky, I baked a cheesecake and made a pavlova, both for the first time, we lost a baby and cried and cried, we learned our son is crazy for puzzles and our other son is a cheeky little devil with a naughty streak that is adorable, we watched movies, so many movies, I watched my husband become an actual architect, I used my KitchenAid way more than I thought I would, I Skyped my parents every week, sometimes twice, I missed them terribly, we didn't always try a new recipe every week but we always ate good food, I loved watching the royal wedding, missed England and her countryside, visited the GoMA at least twice, we still haven't managed to get out to dinner but we had an awesome party for Will's birthday, we decorated our garden with 800 fairy lights, we said goodbye to Sue, but hello to Emma and Clasein, I had the most awesome birthday week EVER and ate at my favourite restaurant with my favourite person, we visited a zoo, our house was a zoo, I discovered patience, then lost it again, I became a little more like my mum, we ate McDonalds for the first time in years and regretted it, I got to know my sister as my friend and lamented the years we spent apart but realised it's better late than never, our boys' birthday parties were awesome and it didn't rain, we didn't send Christmas cards this year, but I've been good at keeping in touch with those I love, we became really good at doing the kids' packed lunches in about 10 minutes, and kept on top of keeping house, I worried about how I'm doing at work but found out they think I'm ok, I playdoughed, painted, tidied, read to my sons, our boys started sharing a room together, we only broke a few baubles this year, I wished I had read more books and had more haircuts, we had Christmas at our house with my friend Kate, I learned the names of lots of vehicles, we repaired our lawn and now our garden looks fabulous, I got cross with my boys more often than I would have liked but always ended the day with kiss and a cuddle, I started and ended the year very tired.  But so happy.

Come on 2012.   I know you are going to be great.