in memorium: Carl George Norman, Jr. 1936-2005

Well, it's the anniversary of the death of my all-time favorite chef, my dad. He wasn't a celebrated chef, except in the local island newspaper where he ran a food column called "Good Stuff." And around our house. Every meal was simply not allowed to be done by halves - family lore revolves around everyday fare like tuna sandwiches served with garnish and flourish; and more grand adventures in "restaurants we have known."

Here's to you, George. I know a martini was more your style, but this gin and tonic with Bombay sapphire is going down well...
love you.
JB

cook your own

It's the dry season here in Darwin and that means lots of fun things going on outside. Last night we went to a fundraiser at the Deckchair Cinema for the NT Environment Centre. They were showing the very feel-good movie about British allotment gardens, "Grow Your Own."

Since it was a fundraiser, the cinema's usual food service was displaced by locals making dishes for sale, much of which was local and some even grown by the cooks themselves. Unfortunately, the food took second place to the desire to raise funds and they sold us tickets for meals even after the good stuff was gone. We weren't late but there were heaps there before us (since it was our first time, we didn't have the inside scoop of these obvious veterans). So we missed central desert camel and Mary River barramundi ("barra" here - so if you're visiting you can slip in the local lingo). We had one plate between two of wet rice and runny lentils...but all in good fun. The movie was good and the cause worth supporting.

It was a good excuse to make popcorn when we got home...

take me away from take away

Why do I keep trying it? Take away food, I mean. I get to feeling hungry, can't remember if there's anything at the house, don't feel like going to the store...and boom, there I am with a pile of pseudo food wondering why I've done it to myself again. Maybe it's only once a month, but my body doesn't seem to recover between episodes...

Strategy idea: cook something kind of like junk food and put it in the freezer - and remember that it's there next time the urge strikes to do the dirty deed.

Meanwhile, what am I going to do with those fish and chips swimming around in my arteries?

red whine

I shouldn't be whining (or whinging as they say in my other home town of London).

I've got chocolate and red wine. What's to complain about?

That there is no hot tub to slip into with this glass of red.
That the chocolate is finished but I'm not.
That another day of eating has ended and I made no discoveries!

That's not true - on daily headspa today we posted a video of some gorgeous little Finnish fellows making sticky buns. It's so good it bears repeating. Haven't tried to the recipe but discovering these boys and their joy of cooking is splendid!

wintry delights

Somewhere south of us, much further south of us, the forecast is for snow. Here in the tropics, we're in the midst of the dry season which has a certain autumnal quality to it. And while it isn't cool by any stretch of the imagination, if you work up a good sweat and then sit under a fan in your wet tennis clothes...you can almost feel a shiver coming on with the night.

So tonight we indulged the cooler clime appetites with a potato bake.

Red bliss potatoes sliced very thin.
Cream and milk (2 thirds/1 third respectively)
olive oil to cook 1 minced onion and 2 cloves garlic, chopped
3 tablespoons of flour
a bit of salami
cheese
salt
pepper

Heat the oven to 200C.
Sweat the onion and garlic in the olive oil in a saucepan. Add the flour to coat. Stir in the milk and cream. Add the potatoes, salt and pepper. Bring to the boil.
Layer in a baking dish with cheese and salami, finishing with a nice layer of cheese.
Bake for 45 minutes or until bubbling and browned; the potatoes nice and soft.
Let it rest before you dig in for best flavour and texture.

Snuggle up in your tank top and shorts on the rattan couch with a cold beer and tuck in!

do 2 smalls make a large?

I am suddenly a fan of the piccolo latte. Something more than a macchiato, less than a latte. Coffee Snobs can tell you what I'm talking about.

I do feel a bit of a coffee snob ordering these, but they are just perfect.

I had two today, the second was better but the first came with a "buy 5 get one free" stamp. But if it wasn't as good, should I complete the card or spend my hard-earned for the good stuff?

These are the questions that try my soul, at least when I'm a little speedy from two smalls that make at least a medium when I shouldn't have any at all!


thanks to the abstract gourmet for this flickr shot.

note to self: no cheese and tennis

Okay, so I found out today that Triple Cream Brie (a lot of), bagel chips, and chocolate pastilles do not mix well with tennis...It was a quantity problem (too much tennis or too much cheese?)

yes, I have been eating...

I've been eating a lot, in fact. Perhaps so much that I haven't had the energy to blog about it! It's been a lot of eating out, which leaves no time to post. Many a market here in Darwin in the dry, filled with all sorts of delights from Indonesian redang to green paw-paw salad.

Tonight, it was potato wedges, Little Creatures Pale Ale, and part of a caesar salad (is there anyone in the world who can actually make a decent caesar salad...this one wasn't).

But the sunset that came with the meal was grand, at the Darwin Trailer Boat Club.

Heard a great line from a 10-ish-year-old boy on the way out, "They should put on the menu, you can have it deep fried or you can have it cooked properly."

Future chef there, eh?

you can probably smell it from there

Paul is making carmelized onions and roasted garlic to put on his homemade pizzas. I am enveloped in rich, swirling smells...when's dinner gonna be ready???

We've Opened the Glorious Thai Book!

We've opened our new and glorious Thai Food by David Thompson. It's so pink and beautiful! We bought it months ago in London and had it shipped here to Darwin. It arrived a month or so ago and we haven't had time to play with it yet.
Last night we used the Thai green granite mortar and pestle to make the lovely chicken curry on page 291.


It was clean and fresh, a perfect tropical treat.

waiter?

I'm just back from a work retreat where someone has been cooking for us for the past three days. I didn't realize how wonderful that would be to be taken care of in that way for three days in a row. The best thing was a lemon curd tart with raspberries and cream. Should have stowed one away in my pack.

beer after run

After a day of too many morning and afternoon tea snacks at a meeting, I had a good sunset run immediately followed by a cold beer. One of life's most sublime pleasures, to be sure.

it was time for a picnic

Every once in a while I get a hankering for something particular from back home in the States. Today a dinner menu sprung to mind that was worthy of a Memorial Day picnic (the official start to summer there; the last weekend in May). Maybe because it was hot and rather humid today here it made me think such summery thoughts.

We grilled some ribs in the oven and made a fresh potato salad with mayo, tarragon, a little white wine vinegar and EVOO, salt and pepper in the dressing. Drank a cold beer while cooking and later had a delicious ice cream bar. Couldn't have been more perfect if we'd spread a red and white checkered table cloth or tucked a napkin under our chins.

early rising, late breakfast

I love getting up early. Well, not exactly. I love having a compelling reason to get up to do something early in the morning. I used to be a caterer for a hot air balloon company and I would have to go in to the kitchen about 2:00 in the morning. That was extreme. Yesterday, though, we got up and went canoeing with a friend. The tide was high, which gave us a chance to explore the mangroves. It was beautiful.

One of the best things in life has got to be doing something active in the wee hours and then having a great breakfast. Our canoe guide came over and we cooked bacon and eggs; Paul's homemade bread for toast; and a smoothie of frozen bananas and raspberries. Sweet, and well-earned.

dreaming of a pizza pie

While I was posting on the headspa blog about something I posted on daily headspa (whew - do I get around or what?) I worked up a real appetite.

I was writing about New Haven, home to my favorite apizza pie. When time and space collapse and we can travel anywhere in the blink of an eye, this is where I want to go first.

this place, in particular:

verandah stir fry

Last night we tried out the new set-up for stir fry on the verandah. Verdict? Yes!

Cross Creek

I was doing some reflecting on a sense of place over at the headspa blog and it brought to mind this place from my memories.

It's been 20 years since I've been to The Yearling Restaurant in Cross Creek, Florida, but I can still remember the cooter. That's turtle in Florida Cracker speak.

Hanuman's oysters so lovely

Last night some friends treated us to a dinner out at Darwin's best restaurant (until proven otherwise by experience!)

It's called Hanuman's, one of three in the group (the others are in Cairns and Alice Springs). It's not really a fusion restaurant, just a solid and varied menu of Thai, Indian and Nonya cuisine.

Everyone raves about the oysters and they were delicious indeed. (Follow that link to the recipe.) Amazing how doing so much to them in terms of flavors didn't drown the oyster flavor itself. A very neat trick.

fish curry in a hurry

The other night we were watching "Feast India" on SBS and saw this recipe. Made it tonight, but it requires some adjustments, as in he forgets to put "fish stock" in the ingredients list. Coriander is cilantro to Yanks like me...

It's very good without the tomatoes, also, but lacks a nice color. Tumeric maybe?

Ingredients
2 long green chillis thinly sliced on angle
¼ tsp salt
¼ tsp cumin seeds
½ tsp black mustard seeds
2 garlic cloves finely chopped
1 dessertspoons minced ginger
1 brown onions finely chopped
4 plum tomatoes skinned & diced
1 tins of coconut milk
12 curry leaves
Vegetable oil
4x200g portions of white fish
1 handful of chopped coriander


Preparation
Heat the oil in a large saucepan. Add the mustard seed & cumin seed and stir until it starts to pop (ours popped out of the pan so maybe it was a wee bit too hot), then add the onion, garlic & ginger and sweat for about 5 minutes.

Add the chilli & curry leaves and cook for a further 5 minutes then add the coconut milk, fish stock (see what I mean - not in the ingredients list. I improvised by making a reduction in the fish cooking pan - see below - with water in the coconut milk can and a tiny bit of fish sauce) & salt and bring to the boil then simmer for about 15 minutes. Remove from the heat and cool.

Refrigerate until ready to use. (or eat right away, also good)

Fry your fish skin side down in a fry pan until golden brown, then turn over and cook for about 2 minutes then add to the curry sauce, cook for a further 3-4 minutes, add the coriander to the sauce and serve.

the fish with the unfortunate name

Last night we made our first jewfish. I felt a bit uncomfortable ordering it - can't find on the net where the name came from and if I should be concerned about it not being very pc. It's a kind of grouper and it's delicious, proving that a fish by any other name can still taste good.

It's a thick and meaty fish and didn't need much done to it to bring out some lovely flavor.

We put the large fillet on foil on a baking tray, sliced garlic and ginger onto it, salt and pepper, drizzled EVOO on top, put a cover of foil on it, sealing the edges. We cooked it for 20 minutes at 180C, but it's good to check on it so that it doesn't get over done.

Made a sauce of EVOO, cashews, garlic, ginger, honey, rice wine vinegar, white wine vinegar, salt, pepper, basil, the juice of one small local lime, and water, all blended thoroughly with a bar mixer to the consistency of mayonnaise.

Delicious.