Treat yo'self

Last week I was walking down Smith Street with Little Bean when I suddenly realised I was starving. Minutes later I walked past Peko Peko. Or to be more accurate I walked past the window of Peko Peko until I got to the door at which point I walked in the door. Why the hell not enjoy some delicious Japanese for lunch?! As I looked at the menu I felt torn, I wanted something delicious, satisfying, fresh, hearty. I decided I wanted the spinach salad and maybe a croquette. Maybe one tempura prawn too. But I felt like that would be too expensive and I thought maybe it was a jerk act ordering just one croquette and one tempura prawn. But hell, they are on the menu as single items, why shouldn't I order those things. And why shouldn't I spend an extra five bucks on my lunch just once in a while. Treat yo'self! Is this that thing people talk about? Women who can't say no, who don't ask for what they want because society makes them think they don't deserve it? I think it is! Or something like it. And let me tell you that lunch was delicious because I ordered all the things I wanted!!!

I don't know if it's society's fault or my fault or what, but why the hell should a person think they can't order the things from a menu that they want. I mean that is fucking ridiculous! Ladies (and gentlemen), it is time to treat yo'self. I mean, if the lobster is five times the price of everything on  the menu and you're broke, I guess I can see why you'd order something else, but if you've decided to eat at a restaurant just eat what you want.

And to be very clear I am talking both figuratively and literally here. If there is one benefit to aging it is seeing the world more clearly and seeing yourself more clearly. Which I guess is two benefits. Which is great, because if your tallying things up the other side may look heavily weighted (hair greying, hair loss, wrinkles, body decay, illness, more frequent death of loved ones, I better stop here before shit gets out of hand). On the plus side the benefits are also more substantial than the often (but not entirely) superficial elements on the list of disadvantages to aging.

Last night I went to a friend's house for fondue. She invited me and because I didn't know most of the people going and because it was a school night and I thought I should be home to perform my maternal duties I very nearly didn't go. But then I thought, 'Treat yo'self!' I used to hate going places where I didn't know anyone but now I just don't care about it so much. It is basically just habit that makes me think I want to avoid situations like that, not my actual feelings. And boy howdy that is liberating. I mean, imagine missing out on fondue because you were nervous around strangers! And in case you haven't had it for a while, let me remind you that fondue is delicious!

I guess what I'm learning is that by being open to listening to yourself and doing the things you want you to do you'll get to eat a lot of delicious food. So why the hell wouldn't you!?

Highlights (AM)

Today I'm bringing you a brief round up of highlights from the week. Best thing I saw is probably a toss-up between what I saw in my brain eyeballs yesterday morning in a dream that involved Jonah Hill and Leonardo DiCaprio fighting and the Instagram account called Mandy Patinkin's Beard, which is great because it blends pictures of Mandy Patinkin with hilarity. And although you may not have ever realised it  this is a winning combination that makes he world a better place.

Best thing I ate was probably a delicious escargot type thing I got from the Tivoli Street Bakery which had pistachios and custard but although it was delicious I kind of regretted not getting a croissant because I just want to understand all the croissants of Melbourne.

But the best thing I heard was something Baby said to me on the bus yesterday. There was a print ad on the bus for a disposable, water-free toothbrush from Colgate. Below is a Spanish version of the ad.  The one we saw was definitely busier with more images and text but it still had those black fingers holding a toothbrush.

And Baby was asking me all about the ad and then he asked me why a penguin was holding the toothbrush.

The Welsh Cakes Post (PM)

The first time I heard about Welsh cakes was in an email from K. All she said was 'Those things are delicious. Like a pikelet and a hot cross bun fell in love and had little babies.' I asked her to send a picture and it took days for her to come up with the goods. I think that the delay further piqued my curiosity. I was telling everyone about them. I was so intrigued by them. How the eff could HCBs and pikelets have babies? What was the texture like? I could imagine the flavour. I thought. When I Googled the recipe and found that they were made from a dough rather than a batter my mind was even more boggled. Griddle pan fry a dough. What?!?!?! Also when I Googled them I came across a Welsh onion cake. Of course we all know about Welsh rarebit. I starting wondering why the Welsh felt the need to put 'Welsh' in front of all their foodstuffs. Is it lack of imagination? A desperation to claim things as their own? It really made me wonder about the Welsh psyche.

Anyway you know what happened next. I made Russeth make them for me. And they were delicious!!! As you know from reading K's post they are full of butter. Now I don't know if the one's we made were authentico, as they say in Wales, but they were kind of crumbly cakes like a super moist not-dense scone. Also they were delicious. But they were first timers, you know? I gotsta make them again. Luckily this postcard arrived from K this very day!

Hello weekend Welsh cakes!

The Welsh Cakes Post (AM)

One of the first things I did when I got to Wales was eat a Welsh Cake, then another, and another and another and another.

I then frequently  referred to Welsh Cakes on Miss Soft Crab, but only in passing, promising I would one day write a proper post giving them the attention they deserve. 

This is that post!

And this is what Welsh Cakes look like sitting atop a piece of Welsh slate:

Oh Welsh cakes. 

Never before has a cake looked so very bland and tasted so very wonderful. 

When I first saw them at my local deli I thought they looked like a thin scone or a fat pikelet and neither option was terribly interesting to me. But I with so many sweet treats that don't look terribly interesting, I was drawn to them in their blandness, just in case my first impression was wrong. And finally I have all the encouragement I need to continue trying things that don't look terribly interesting, because when it comes to Welsh Cakes, I was wrong my readers, I was completely wrong. 

Those first Welsh cakes I tasted had the spice of a hot cross bun, but a rich butteriness making them more akin to croissant than scones. I loved them straight away. Some I heated in the oven and they were delicious. Some I ate as they were, and they were delicious. When I finished the pack from the fancy deli, I bought others. From bakeries, from supermarkets, from any damn place I could get my mitts on them.   They were all delicious. Most I ate with Welsh butter and it made the already delicious even more delicious.

 It turns out that Welsh cakes are made with dough, not batter, and are traditionally cooked on a Welsh bakestone, which is a stone for baking in Wales. 

I bought a cookbook called Welsh Bake-stone cookery so I could make my very own Welsh cakes. 

I'm yet to do it, but I will readers, I will. And in case you want to get to it before me, here is Bobby Freeman's recipe for Welsh cakes. 

225 grams of self-raising flour

1/2 teaspoon of baking powder 

125 grams of butter (cut into cubes)

75 grams of sugar

75 grams of currants

1 large egg and a little milk

A good pinch of mixed spice and an extra pinch of nutmeg

Add the spice to the flour, and rub in the butter.  Add the sugar and  the currants. Beat the egg with a little milk, then add to the flour mix until it forms a stiffish paste akin to shortcrust but a little softer.

Roll out on a floured board to 1/4 inch thick, then cut into 2 1/2 inch rounds and bake on a greased, moderately hot bakestone for 3-5 minutes each side until mottled with golden brown. 

Obviously none of us have Welsh bakestones, so cook on a griddle or heavy based frypan instead. Bobby Freeman says you can also cook them in a dutch oven which produces cakes that "are firm on the outside, soft and melting within." I don't have a problem with that. 

Yum things! (AM)

You know, K and I love to cook. To try new things, make classics - we love it all. And we are pretty good at it. Why shouldn't you guys benefit from that? But it has been really hot lately. And I was on holidays. I have made about three real dinners in the last 2 weeks.

Dinners I have eaten in the last week include:

Pizza
A salad sandwich
Indian takeaway
The tiniest amount of left over Indian takeaway to which I added a boiled egg



It's getting pretty desperate. But the lunches are worse. Some days I just eat a carrot. But yesterday I did something special. Really special. The hippy version of peanut butter and Nutella, nut spread and coconut chocolate butter. But far from being some pale imitation, the spread equivalent of carob to chocolate, this was the richest, creamiest deliciousest way to spread things on a bread.

Now I keep thinking about other things I could spread this combo on. Pancakes! Banana bread! Probably putting both these things on anything but the plainest old bread is unneccesary, but I like to think of the possibilities. Probably making salted caramel brownies is unnessary too but check out these bad boys. I can not wait to make the hell out of them. Gonna eat 'em too!

My phoney life (AM)

Because J has been posting photos of her holiday on the face space, I thought I would turn to my phone and see what story its recent photos tell.

It's a fairly predicable one...full of stuff to eat and see and think about. But some of it is noteworthy.

Like this truly explosive snake art on the bonnet of a Holden Barina that is sometimes parked on my street.

Really makes you think.

Then there's this.

Some delicious quail, wrapped in proscuitto I ate at Bar Idda recently.

That's Russeth making a lewd hand gesture in the background. I'm not sure whether that hand gesture is  an established thing, but I get where he was going with it.

Here's a drink I had at some fancy curry place in Northcote the other day.

It's called Birch Beer. The dude who sold it to me told me that it's made with some part of the birch tree and brewed in waters of a stream that runs off Niagara Falls. His spiel had me rolling my eyes very very heavily, but because of my FOMODT I ordered it. It tasted exactly and I mean EXACTLY like Deep Heat. And it wasn't even alcoholic. But I drank it all.

There's this picture.

Spinal what? Injury? Tap? Inquiring minds need to know more.

Here's a picture from Cape Bridgewater, down near Portland.

It's of windmills and ocean and Appleheart, a fine gentleman I'm knocking around with. After this, we saw a bunch of fur seals, kangaroos and a petrified forest, and then I ate a fig. It was an excellent day.

Finally, here's a picture of Midbro and Little nut doing a Britney Spears.

It's OK, the car was stationary.

Now let's see what J's got for us!

I made donuts (AM)

I think there is something wrong with me. Every time I do something awesome I pretty much love myself sick, even if the thing I did is really easy. Like the time I made croissants. I fully loved myself sick for ages after that. Still do in fact. Love myself more every time I do it. But, as I said at the time it's actually pretty easy.

Why am I so in love with myself this time? Oh, no big deal. Just made some donuts is all.

Happy Chanukah! I made these donuts/ponchkes/sufganiyot for Chanukah. You have to eat fried food. It's a rule. For reals.

But you guys, you can feel as smug as me too! It's totes simple! I know. I know. The deep frying is kind of off-putting. But it's seriously no biggie. Because those dough lumps are such little... dough lumps, the oil stays pretty fresh and totally reuseable. And they were nowhere near as greasy as store bought ones. Here's how you do it:

First put an apron on. I never do this but I can not stress how much better it made the cooking experience! I stayed so neat and could wipe my hands on myself without getting dirty!

Make a yeast dough with some flour, yeast, water, sour cream, egg. 

 

Let it rise. Roll it out, cut circles. Put jam on top. Don't these bastards look delicious already?!

Cut more circles and put on top of the jammed circles. They look messy, but don't worry guys. Just wait and see. Cause you gotta let them rise for a while.



 Fry them bad boys. Look how they look like real donuts!

 Finally, love yourself fully sick!

Northern (de)Lights (PM)

I can barely believe that neither Legsley nor Miguel referred to that dinner as Northern (de)Lights. Or Biz. All of them were key candidates for that kind of pun. Weird.

Don't worry guys! Here is a picture of K's pretzels plated up:

See that butter looking thing in the background? Anchovy and egg butter K made! Yum, people. Effing yum

I'm not going to take you on a step by step journey of my preparations, let me just tell you a little about the night.

We decided that in the ancient Nordic tradition we should eat smörgåsbord. Before people arrived with their food and the hot food hit the table, it looked like this.




By the time we sat down it looked like this:

From top right: pretzels (K), honey-glazed ham (K), cheese platter - jarlsberg, pickled sardines, crackers and pear (Blizzie), celeriac remoulade (K), hasselback potatoes (me), oysters (K), sides platter - egg white, egg yolk, cucumber, lemon, dill, pickles, capers (me), beetroot relish (guilty), Swedish meatballs (Miguel), gravlax and gravlax sauce (David), rye bread (Blizzie), Jansen's temptation (Russeth).

Oh, you wanna get a little up close and personal with some of that? I'm not surprised. David made TWO kinds of gravlax. One aniseedy one, the details of which I did not hear, but I know it included pernot.  The second one used the ancient tradition of pine needles from Fitzroy gardens. Needles(s) to say both were delicious!

Here are some hasselhoffback potatoes I made. Yep, as good as they look.

Everything was delicious. Personal highlights for me were (in no particular order) Jansen's temptation, hasselback potatoes, anchovy butter, gravlax - both kinds. But it was really the entire smörgåsbord that brought it all together.
Then it was time to retire to the sitting room for dessert and digestifs.

What are these you ask? Ice-cream sandwiches of gingerbread with honey and nutmeg ice-cream. Just a little something I whipped up. And yes, they are snowflake shaped. \

Oh, and there were these kanelbullar:

Swedish cinnamon buns

Just a little something Miguel whipped up. And in case you are interested, yes, you can have them with coffee in the morning and still respect yourself.

So what else happened at Northern (de)Lights? I got hysterical no less than 3 times, everyone got super full and we discovered that Ikea has an alcohol that tastes just like alcoholic Ribena. Basically it was success all round, I'd say! 

Happy Jew Year! (AM)

Shana tova, friends! Yep, it's Jewish New Year and I'm still feeling full. I hope you are too. From breakfast at least if not from your Rosh Hashanah dinner last night.

Yesterday I thought I may want to write about the dinner so I started documenting my day early. Around 8am, I started cooking my vegetable broth and frying apples for my honey apple upside-down cake.

But then, even though I did awesome things like add egg whites to the broth to clarify it and make a delicious caramelly cake which I put lavender on, um, I kind of forgot to take pictures. Then, at the start of dinner I remembered to start taking pictures again!

K made this beautiful-looking, delicious tasting challah.

And then I forgot to take any more photos because I was too busy eating. It was all I could do to make polite conversation. Sure, I managed to tell that Gorman story. At someone's request. No, really. And I found some time to talk about all the adorable things Baby does while he bounced around doing more adorable things. I listened to stories of Mondonna's wonderful LA life, and how G-Force's mum kept causing trouble at suburban supermarkets, resulting in a childhood spent travelling to ever further supermarkets. And among all that, there was no way I could remember to photograph all the delicious stuff. So I guess it was a pretty good night.

And at the end of it when everyone had left and I was tired and cold, I went home to my living room where it was toastie warm, I took off my shoes, I felt full, but not sick, and not long for bed, and I just felt so goddamn happy. Warmth and comfort and the promise of sleep, is there a better way to start the new year? Not for this loser.

Crab Cakes: the Miss Soft Crab Bakery Workshop (PM)

When K told me her great idea for the Miss Soft Crab Bakery Workshop you can bet I jumped on board right away. Like K, I also want to bake sweet treats all the time but don't feel I can justify it. Though I do sometimes bake biscuits because they keep for a while, you know? And you can just have one or two or five with a cup of tea and feel ok about it. Cakes and cake-like things though seem ridiculous to cook for no reason. You just gotta eat those babies up. And I do not feel good about eating a whole cake in 2 days, which is basically what happens when I make cakes. But if it is for the good of the greater Crab community, I'll do it. I'd do that for you guys!

But today is about biscuits! Like K, I decided to go for a classic. Choc chip! I used Stephanie Alexander's recipe from The Cook's Companion. See?

The recipe is right there for you to see. But the run down is, you chop up some chocolate.

Mix it in with chopped nuts and flour, salt and bicarb. I used all the nuts I had on hand - almonds, walnuts, hazelnuts! Yeah boyeeee!

Cream your butter and sugar, mix in an egg, add it to the dry ingredients.


Log it and chill it.

Chop it.

And bake it. Twelve minutes later you've got these bad boys!

Now I know you guys have eyes and brains so I'm pretty sure you can imagine how delicious these are without me having to tell you. But I tell you anyway. These are delicious! 

My nana used to make chop chip biscuits and these smell just like them. The butter! The nuts! The choc! And though they are not exactly the same I could not care less, cause these are some beautiful babies, right here.

Crab Cakes: the Miss Soft Crab Bakery Workshop (AM)

Miss Soft Crab is popping cherry's all over town this week. On Wednesday, we brought you the very first installment of Imaginary TV Show Workshop! which reader, TJ described as "some of the best crab work ever", even though it was in fact mostly written by people other than us.

Today, we are taking another Miss Soft Crab vessel on its maiden voyage. This one, which you may have guessed from the title, is called  Crab Cakes: the MSC Bakery workshop. FYI, if you're reading this before starting work, you should consider coming back at morning tea time. Seriously, I think you'll enjoy it much more. 


OK, i'm not going to over hype this guys. Basically, I wanted to bake something and eat it and then write about it here so I could feel like the baking and the eating are about more than just my desire for sweet treats. You see, I  try not to bake things unless I have a reason to, i.e. someone is coming over for dinner or it's someones birthday or something like that. But I guess all those occasions aren't enough to satisfy my needs, so I had to invent another occasion to bake for. Hey preston,  Crab Cakes: the Miss Soft Crab Bakery Workshop was born and happily, J's arm didn't need much twisting to get on board. Hooray! Shall we begin?

Ok, because I am a simple girl with simple pleasures, I thought we should begin Crab Cakes with one of the simplest pleasures going around: biscuits. Specifically the Melting Moment. 

For those of you who didn't grow up with the Australian Women's Weekly Beautiful Biscuits cookbook,  you may not be familiar with the Melting Moment. Readers: get familiar. It's basically a light buttery biscuit sandwiched together with lemony creamed butter. To the naked eye, it looks a little like a yo-yo but it is far superior. If, like me, you found the 1990s disappointing because biscuits that looked like Melting Moments but did not taste like Melting Moments because in fact that were a different biscuit were everywhere you looked,  then the Melting Moment is for you. 


Check out how easy they are to make. 


You cream 250g of butter with a third of a cup of icing sugar. Add one and a half cups of plain flour and half a cup of cornflour. Women's Weekly likes to pipe them in to fancy shapes, but like I said before, I am a simple girl with simple pleasures. I just make them in to biscuit shapes. 

You bake those babies for a mere 10 minutes on 190 degrees, then let them cool down a little. 

Then you sandwich them together with a combination of butter, icing sugar, lemon zest and lemon juice. 

Then you eat them with a cup of tea and have a wonderful time. 

I wanted it so bad I couldn't focus the camera properly. 

It couldn't be easier, right? And as someone who is forced to eat a lot of assorted cream biscuits at work, including Delta Creams, let me tell you, the Melting Moment is just so much better. In my opinion. Maybe you guys like Delta Creams, which of course is totally fine. It's just that for me, nothing beats the Melting Moment. 


Unless J bakes something more delicious. Lets come back at  afternoon tea time and find out, shall we?

Just some stuff I ate and saw and thought about (PM)

Hey, guess who's hands those are in that picture of Barbie Edward Cullen? Mine. I really should have exited the frame but I couldn't stop staring.

My hands are here too, holding the new Sow What When? calendar I just got from the Diggers Club.

It tells me what plants I should sow, and when, so I can have a verdant balcony garden. I've been looking at it a lot lately. Right now my balcony looks like this:

Semi-verdant

It's got a long way to go.

When it comes to what I have eaten lately, look no further than this.

It's the salted caramel spread I made on the weekend, ostensibly to audition it for chutney club but really, so I can put it all in my mouth. I planned to make some banana pancakes to serve it with, but I made the mistake of tasting a little bit first and since then, I have just been eating it out of the jar with a spoon. I never made the pancakes. I did drizzle (dollop) some on a banana at one point. Delicious.

Just some stuff I ate and saw and thought about (AM)

So, I don't know if you guys have ever noticed, but basically this blog is just some stuff we ate and saw and thought about. Sure sometimes that stuff comes from our brains. But sometimes, when we are lucky, that stuff gets caught on camera.

So I thought you may be interested in seeing some of the stuff I've eaten, seen, and thought about lately. Here goes.

First, some things I ate:

Jokies, I didn't eat a pigeon. I just saw this pigeon drinking some water in the city and thought it looked really cute.

I did eat this pie though. After it was cooked of course. When it looked like this:

It had a delicious buttery pastry and a filling of chilli beans, corn and potato. When it was cooked the eggs were a little runny. And yes, it was DELICIOUS! Couldn't eat that in summer, no sirree.

You know what else I ate recently? Some delicious carrots and beetroot.

Maybe it doesn't look so appetising, but it does look like a found cock! HAHA!

But seriously folks, recently  I was at the zoo and I saw so many mind blowing things, including some green frogs that sat really flat on leaves and had adorable peaceful smiles. They were to small to photograph well, but these iguanas weren't! Iguanas are awesome!

 Oh, and did you know I saw Prince recently?

 Sorry, I couldn't resist.

Just like I couldn't resist taking a photo of these Twilight Edition Barbies K and I saw recently. Yes, that is Bella Barbie and Sparkleface Barbie. WTF?! Look at their faces? They look nothing like Bella and Sparkleface. Mattel just think they can just stick a Barbie in a box with packaging telling you they are Twilight Barbie and people will buy it?! In fact I'm pretty sure that Sparkleface Barbie is just a Chuck Bass Barbie repackaged. What? Why wouldn't they have Gossip Girl Barbie? Crazy times people! Anything is possible.