the sublime to the ridiculous

Having lived in the world of brief, self indulgent posts recently, I thought it time I put fingers to keys and pound out something slightly more serious - although admittedly the god post recently was a tad on the serious side.

This is the less serious side of god-stuff, the food. As you can see I baked Easter Bread, but that is JC Challenge post all of it's own. Really for me the table side of Easter is all about lamb. I had roast lamb, keftedes, hot lamb sandwiches. It was great. But Good Friday I went a bit traditional and, as a card carrying fish hater, cooked squid instead.

Buying a couple of squid, like fish, has elements of the hunter about it, because you get them whole. Glassy eyes staring out at you from the butchers paper. Ink oozing out like blood. Then you get to hold them firmly just above the eye and rip their guts out. Sounds more horrible than it is and the cats go absolutely crazy for the bits I don't want.

Then the cartilage comes out of the body

remove the skin and clean off the ink, and you're ready to roll.

just dust in flour seasoned with salt, pepper and Chinese five spice and fry in batches in hot hot oil.

If you're feeling good, roast some garlic and make your own aoli. Nothing beats home made aoli. And of course you have to make buckets of it, so the left overs are really great on your hot lamb sandwiches!

As a change of pace let's talk about the economy. It's screwed. Where I live, where you live, where we all live. GFC is now an accepted part of the vernacular. As someone involved in the tourism sector, I know that this means that discretionary spending has dropped and ticket sales have plummeted. Airlines are reluctant to close down routes or take off/landing spots, because it will be so hard to get them back when things pick up. So empty aircraft and circling the globe, loosing money as we speak.

So the sales are on, and I'm off to China.

Yes, based on a 15 minute GFC discussion at work, I decided to extend some existing leave and book a ticket on line, all done within half an hour of it coming up in conversation. $1000, all taxes and fees included. You can get to Europe for about $300 more. So I will be spending my birthday in Shanghai.

I am so excited I can't tell you. Really it would be much better for me to have taken the money that Kevin 07 is giving out and spent it in Australia. The reality is that I don't need the cash stimulus. I would have bought the air ticket anyway. I need my roof repaired and I'm doing that anyway. I'm also thinking seriously about re-doing the kitchen and putting in a solar hot water service. So tradesmen will do well from me this year.

And living in a country that is, in many ways, based on Socialist principles, you'd wonder why the living is so good, if you listen to some.

I've been known to promote other blogs from time to time, not mentioning Joy the Baker and Cupcake Rehab by name. But one of my favorite daily reads is a fellow Adelaidian (well, he lives here now). A Free Man is not afraid of diving into dangerous waters. Aside from (multiple) pictures of his son, you can often find social commentary in a writing style most of us can only dream of. Topic de jour? Well, amongst many things it seems to have turned into a right v's left wing debate. It has been claimed by one of AFM's readers that socialism is encouraging many to do too little only to be supported by those with more get up and go. Apparently we wouldn't have iPods if we were all socialists.

I'm not sure that would be such a bad thing.

But then again I'm a socialist. And an old fashioned kind of girl, who things that looking after others is just as important, if not more important, than looking after my own wants. I believe there's enough to go around if we're not greedy. The topic has turned to health care, something I know a fair bit about.

I could write something fabulous and/or inflammatory, but I'm too tired tonight. Visit A Free Man in a couple of days and join in the discussion. I'm looking forward to it!

saturday lunch

normally i wouldn't make lunch a post all of it's own, but the end of it was really good.

Lady Miss Fi came for lunch, and it was just lamb fillets marinated in lemon and garlic and rosemary, bbq'd and sliced thinly over salad with a yoghurt dressing.

but i though i'd make a cake for desert. one to get rid of some of the stuff i had hanging around from other baking escapades.

Raspberry and pistachio yoghurt cake
ingredients
2 cups self raising flour
2/3 cup brown sugar
100g melted butter
2 eggs
1 cup natural yoghurt
1 cup frozen raspberries

for the crumble
1/4 brown sugar
60g butter, chilled
1/2 self raising flour

pistachio ripple
50g crushed pistachio
1 tblspn brown sugar
1/4 tspn cinnamon powder

method

• preheat oven to 170 degrees, and butter and line a springform tin (20cm)
• make the crumble by rubbing all the ingredients together with the tips of your fingers. place in the fridge
• sift cake flour into a bowl and add in sugar
• add yoghurt and eggs to saucepan you've melted the butter in (just melt it, it doesn't have to be a bubbling inferno), and whisk to combine.
• pour the eggy, yoghurty butter mix into the flour
• put approximately half the batter into the cake tin, sprinkle liberally with the nut mix and the cover with the rest of the batter.
  
• press the raspberries into the top of the cake batter, so they sit flush with the top of the cake
  
• spread the crumble mix on top
• bake 55-60 minutes.
• dust with icing sugar, serve warm.

this is a variation on a recipe anyway, but the batter was a little thick, so i put about 1 1/2 tablespoons of ricotta in it as well.

very, very nice. rich, moist, berry and nutty. i put a spoonful of yoghurt on the side to serve. will certainly be making this one again!