Soggy Serviettes

Went out for a lovely walk on Beucott St with the Monster this morning, and stopped to grab a coffee and a spot of something tasty. When our lemon slice appeared, it was presented on a small plate, as expected, but between plate and slice was A PAPER SERVIETTE (NAPKIN).

This practice has always bewildered me. Why would you serve food, and often food designed to be eaten with a knife and fork, on top of a piece of PAPER when it alraedy on a nice ceramic plate? The paper goes soggy from the cream/sauce/grease whatever leeching out of the food, the soggy paper then gets all stuck onto your food... its just SILLY-- a waste of trees and a messy inconvenience (which then requires extra serviettes to clean up).

Does anyone know the WHY of this practice? Is it some sort of hygeine measure in case the plate isn't quite clean? Is it some sort of doily substitute, purely there for visual presentation? And if so, what time of person would be impressed by a plain paper napkin folded in half and stuck underneath their cheesecake? Perhaps its a display of wealth, as in, we're doing so well we can afford to provide a layer of soggy paper with every meal and dessert? Perhaps there is some perfectly simple reason for this which has eluded me and I am being an idiot. If so, please let me know via the comments box. Ta!

Vegan Recipes...

Friend recommended this site, FatFreeVegan.

AND I just received my copies of Garden of Vegan, and How It All Vegan in the mail.

Cooking frenzy on the horizon...

Breakfast In Bed

Was how I started my birthday yesterday: kind island yoghurt with strawberries, bananas and blackberries, crepes with lemon and sugar... Thankyou Monster!

Speaking of breakfast, look at this site, Mr Breakfast, for many many many morning food treats!

Ricotta Pancakes

Darkling, this one is for you!

Ingredients:
3/4 plain flour. 1 teaspoon baking powder. 1 1/2 teaspoons caster sugar. 2 eggs, separated. 1/2 cup (100g) fresh ricotta. 1 1/2 tablespoons honey. 2 teaspoons grated lemon rind. 1/2 cup milk. I'm all for adding a handful of frozen berries if you happen to have some in the freezer, and a pinch or two of cinnamon.

Method:
Whisk the egg whites until soft peaks form.
Combine the rest of the ingredients in a bowl.
Gently fold your egg whites through.

Fry 'em up in some nice hot butter, and serve with whatever takes you fancy. So far we have topped them with: caramelised strawberries and banana, chunks of honeycomb, lemon, golden syrup, leftover ricotta-- the usual sweet pancake friends. Yummy, and fluffy. Small amount of faffing about whisking the whites, but well worth it!

Meaty Beefy Big And Bouncy

From SMH:


Squeamish men look away now: a Serbian chef is bringing out a ballsy guide to cuisine with a twist: The Testicle Cookbook. Hailed as the world's first testicle recipe collection by e-book publishers YUDU, the cookbook includes author Ljubomir Erovic's favourite dishes, like testicle pizza, battered testicles and and barbecued testicles and giblets. The e-book, available for download from the internet, comes with handy video guides showing the Serb peeling the skin off testicles and slicing them up into bite-size chunks.

Several different animals, including stallions, ostriches, bulls, pigs and turkeys, get the Erovic treatment. "Wash testicles thoroughly for 30-45 minutes," begins the recipe for testicles pie. "Once softened, mince them in a mincer." A "very sharp knife" is needed for traditional style testicles, which get boiled, cut up and deep fried in hot oil. Erovic, 45, may be self-taught in the art of testicle cuisine but his 20 years of "cooking with balls" make him a world authority in the field. "The tastiest testicles in my opinion probably come from bulls, stallions or ostriches, although other people have their own favourites," he said. "All testicles can be eaten - except human, of course." Testicles are rich in testosterone and they are believed to be a powerful aphrodisiac in countries such as Serbia and China. "The best for aphrodisiac properties are sheep and stallion testicles", said Erovic. And with the credit crunch kicking in, more people may give up their rump steaks and turn to testicles instead. Erovic also organises the World Testicle Cooking Championship, held annually in Serbia since 2004. It draws in chefs from Australia, Bosnia-Hercegovina, Finland, Greece, Hungary, Norway and Serbia. One metric tonne of testicles are prepared.

Food Fever

Having some sort of food fetish fit, and fervently desiring a feast of:

Fresh honeycomb, quince, rhubarb crumble, clotted cream, cinnamon, cloves, treacle, pomegranates, fresh figs, pancakes, whipped butter, blackberries, lemon butter, marmalade, dark chocolate covered orange peel, teas flavoured with exotic spices, fruit mince pies, hot crumpets, mulberries covered in sugar, mulled wine, turkish delight, all manner of puddings and custard, hot apple pies with vanilla icecream, fresh scones...

Think maybe this is the result of reading Edward Lear and Lewis Carroll, a ye olde Englishe background, being away from 'home' and sickly and craving comfort foods, discovering a new organic food store and a general fit of whimsy. Have just caramelised some apples with golden syrup and walnuts to go in my citrus couscous, so there is a start! Yummy!

The Tip Of My Tongue

Is food sexy? Playboy regularly features stories about asparagus and bananas and leeks and courgettes or being smeared with chocolate chip icecream. I once bought some erotic body oil, authentic Pina Colada flavour, and poured it over myself but it made my lover's tongue come out in a rash.

Then there are candle-lit dinners and those leering waistcoated waiters with outsize pepperpots. There are, too, simple picnics on the beach which only work when you're in love and because otherwise you couldn't bear the sand in the brie. Context is all, or so I thought, until I started eating with Louise.

When she lifted the soup spoon to her lips how I longed to be that innocent piece of stainless steel. I would gladly have traded the blood in my body for half a pint of vegetable stock. Let me be diced carrot, vermicelli, just so that you will take me into your mouth. I envied the French stick. I watched her break and butter each piece, soak it slowly in her bowl, let it float, grow heavy and fat, sink under the deep red weight and then be resurrected to the glorious pleasure of her teeth.

The potatoes, the celery, the tomatoes, all had been under her hands. When I ate my own soup I strained to taste her skin. She had been here, there must be something of her left. I would find her in the oil and the onions, detect her through the garlic. I knew that she spat in the frying pan to determine the readiness of the oil. Its an old trick, every chef does it, or did. And so I knew when I asked her what was in the soup that she had deleted the essential ingredient. I will taste of you if only through your cooking.

- Jeanette Winterson
'Written On The Body' (36-37)

Lately I have become orally fixated, smoking ciggies and drinking beer with abandon, wanting to eat lots of creamy rich food, to gorge on frothy coffees and milky cereal, to stuff gooey melted cheeses into my gob and fill my mouth with hot apple pie and icecream, to pop boiled eggs like lollie... But its not enough, this hunger is physical but no amount of dairy or peanut butter is going to satisfy my appetite. My tongue searches over my teeth and gums for a trace, my tastebuds remember but can't quite touch it, she is right on the tip of my tongue...

Cheese On A Stick

I like eating cheese on a stick- this I knew already. But I also like BEING cheese on a stick- learn something new everyday huh?

Biting The Big Apple

Two of my favourite food groups can be found in NY, NY.

PS Read the label on the bottle of stout.

Grenoble Is Grand

Tales From Blighty And Beyond

My humblest apologies for not updating this blog very much- have had bugger-all internet access lately and have been rather busy. So, where to start??? Umm, oh, could people please let me know if they have received my postcards? Sent off HEAPS a few weeks ago but am concerned they aren't making it through as nobody has mentioned them. Admittedly many of them were sent from the UK and it seems there have been also sorts of Xmas mail chaos but at least SOME should have made it through by now...

Now, the rest of this will be as I think of it so not quite in chronological order at all. Currently watching the The Vicar of Dibley and scoffing chocolates from a big box given to me for Xmas. The latter is conveniently part of my new highly successful (if we count joy as success) diet of cheese, chocolate and coffee, supplemented sometimes with croissants and champagne. This more-than-passing fad was mostly inspired by my latest journey to France, which began on the first night in a bubble bath at my hotel with the delicious Litchi, a bottle of bubbly and several cocoa-based blocks of delight. YUMMY. Oh, and the fromage from the Land of Frogs is a sublime as ever! Ran around Grenoble buying small round cheeses from the markets (quote Litchi "she's a tourist- can we have the really revolting mouldy one from the bottom?"), and some baked goodies , and plump dates, and drinking hot chocolate with chartreuse, before catching the chairlift up the mountain and wandering through the art gallery at the top and taking lots of photos of the view, grabbing HUGE cafe cremes and then walking down to the city again, stopping to scoff market foodstuffs from our bags on the way. Bliss.... Hmm, more food... trying foie gras again at the markets, eating an enormous crepe full of jamon and fromage... Xmas dinner with Manchester Man yesterday of braising steak and peas and hot chip butties, followed by half a pudding each with tons of custard. Then off to his friend's place to hang out with her kith and kin, which was the perfect example of Northern Hospitality I have come across ever- and they are all mighty hospitable up here! Arrived to be greeted with punch, fruit mince pies, hot toddies, pretzels, chokkies, scotch eggs, cheese puffs, party supplies and heaven knows what else. We stayed up 'til almost dawn telling tall tales and being trashy, before passing out in the magic of central heating. Yay for the silly season!

Feast On This

Skip breakfast, undo that top button and don't wear your tighest corset, for it is Feastability again next Sunday, at Newtown School Of Performing Arts:

Whatever culinary delights take your fancy, Feastability 2007, Newtown's annual food and wine festival, will satisfy your tastes. More than 40 stalls showcase the eclectic international cuisines of Newtown Precinct along with Australian wines, boutique beers, confectioners, bakers and ice-cream makers.

Sensational entertainment hosted by comedian Jackie Loeb includes reggae-rock, blues/roots, African and indie performers, comedy and hip hop.

Bask in the spring sunshine as you try a new wine, munch on a tempting delight and finish with a tantalising treat such as gelato or confectionery from a local baker.

Creamy Goodness

The colder the weather, the darker the sky, the more I want to consume creamy things. In the last few days I have gorged myself silly on bowls of steamy creamy porridge with sultanas and brown sugar and milk, creamy barley soup full of dissolving soft vegies, and Whoretics creamy pumpkin risotto with shaved parmesan melting through it.

When I was in Sweden I became addicted to RissiFrutti, a deliciously creamy rice pudding affair. And nothing beats full milk creamy hot chocolate on a crisp winter's day, with a marshmallow oozing through it (best consumed at the mid-station of the Perisher quad chairlift, where you used to get one for $1 if you made it before 10am). Cream of asparagus soup, creamy mashed potato and parsnips with lashings of butter. And although not strictly creamy, I do have a strong urge for the texture of suet dumplings (preferably soaked in venison stew- vegaquarian who?). Mmmm... Its a starchy thing too perhaps? There used to be a brilliant Japanese restaurant in Neutral Bay, Shimbashi Soba, which not only made its own noodles on the premises and sold a wild variety of sakes and plum wines, but had the most curious (and wrong-sounding but astoundingly yummy), concoction of some strong spirit served alongside a piping hot teapot filled with the water they cooked the noodles in. You mixed the two of these liquids to conjure up a magical brew that warmed and intoxicated smoothly and slyly. Apparently it is astounding to some that any non-Japanese person should drink it, but I was addicted from the first sip.

Whoretic insists that I add vaginal juices to this assortment, so by all means I guess I really should add semen too, although the frothy connotations of this statement do make me gag a little. She also tells a rather sordid tale from long, long ago, involving a bioboy, an extravagent application of spermicidal jelly, and lots of in-out, with the result of the aforementioned prophylactic forming stiff egg-whitey peaks all over the bedlinen. Oh, and for reasons best known to herself, Whoretic also wants it mentioned that she is a great wife.

Mulling the Mountains

Shall be heading up to the Blue Mountains for the weekend with AuntyC and a beautiful queeny gayboy. The aim is to op-shop and buy bric-a-brac, procure all manner of organic goods and baked delicacies, watch DVDs and read a lot. Its not really cold enough yet for overcoats and mittens, but all the same The Mountains do always make me yearn for log fires and warming brews. Ahh, soon it will be the weather to make mulled wine, such as this Glögg I found at SwedishKitchen:

5 whole white cardamom pods, cracked
2 whole cloves
1 1-inch piece of cinnamon stick
1 teaspoon dried orange peel
2 Tablespoons brown sugar
1/3 cup Madiera wine
1 cup good-quality red wine such as burgundy

Put all of the ingredients in a stainless steel pan and slowly heat but do not boil. Strain and drink immediately or for a stronger flavor, let spices steep for several hours or overnight then strain and gently reheat.

Ah, I first fell in love with Glögg when I lived in Sweden, served with raisons and almonds in it. I am also quite find of the German Glühwein, served piping hot at the Christmas markets at Zoogarten. Perfect!