#115 - Punk Rock, Thanksgiving and a blast from the past

(Punk) Rock 'n Roll and more eating
I went to my first (and only?) rock concert / band thing...one of my brothers was touring with a band, "Bad Astronaut" through Australia - a tour called "Hits and Pits".

It was a very cold Sunday night in November when I met my Mom outside a venue whose name I have now forgotten.  We were the most unlikely duo there and if you did the old "one of these things isn't like the others" game from Sesame Street, just by looking, we would have been those people.

Anyway - my Mom is a very good mom:  she knew most of the songs (not all the newer ones), she knew the words and she bopped along to them.  Having your mom bop along to punk songs...I never thought that combination of words would ever be written, much less that I would be the one writing them.


Backstage - yes, we got to go backstage - very exciting (though you still needed earplugs) and Mom did what moms do - she mothered people a bit.  I was just taking it all in except I couldn't remember faces and/or names unless I wrote things down later.  (One of my brother's friends was a guy who had known us for probably 20+ years.  I asked him what band he was in.  Luckily he took it in good spirit and at least I remembered him when he joined us for dinner a few nights later.)  So AC is talking shop with Dave, a guy from a band which my Mom knew about, called Black Flag (?) - ugh, I've forgotten again.  Anyway - they're talking about amplifiers and a few other esoteric things which were incomprehensible to the uninitiated so I took the opportunity to play fan / not-groupie and got a candid shot.

In which I actually use some of the stuff I learned in cooking school...
Funny enough, most of my family seem to be foodie types.  AC is a really good cook so when I offered a home cooked meal, his eyes lit up.  Of course he pooh-poohed the chili which everyone else requests (my sister having done so only last night or so) since he can make his own.  The result:  a menu we cobbled together backstage.

He likes duck.  So does my Mom.  I do not like duck because...it took a while to nail down what the smell reminded me of, but I finally got it:  wet dog.  So here is the prep two nights before AC was due for a home cooked meal.  Duck:  bought and butchered and I took my time removing all the shafts from the feathers (yech!) because I do not have a blow torch.  So - duck confit done, duck breast separated, bones ready for stock, everything in the fridge ready to be schlepped up the hill for dinner.

Dinner

Dinner was set for after work.  Australia has influenced me in several ways - shopping (I can no longer say that I don't care what my bags and shoes look like, though I can say I don't care much about the label) and food - beetroot no longer appears to be the root of all evil but I will never come around to lamingtons or vegemite.  Anyway - the starter (left?  it shows as "above" as I write the post) is 3 layers of crispy biscuit type things (1 plate is gluten-free), 3 layers of goats cheese, baby heirloom tomatoes and peeled grapes.

The main:  duck confit with jus, pan roasted duck breast with orange reduction, rice (as a nod to the Hawaiian part of the meal, and to go with the Hawaiian Seasonings salt which I used as part of the marinade for the confit) and steamed vegetables.  You can't see the sauces very well and the jus was over reduced - but luckily most of those little details were only things I noticed.

Mixed salad and dessert, but I don't remember what we had - obviously not very memorable!

I give thanks for everything...
And for Thanksgiving - we went for Indian food down the street.

Do what you're afraid to do
I've always hated snakes.  We do not get along, but when you go to a function where an opportunity presents itself, you have to grab it with both hands.  Or in this case, touch it very gently with one hand.  In this case, there was an exhibit opening at the Taronga Zoo so my Mom and I went on behalf of someone else so that they could give us (and about 100 other people) a little preview.  We did not know that the preview would include live animals, including this spotted python, Sputnik.  Sputnik was very happy and relaxed, according to his handler.  He was warm and he felt very odd as I touched him.  The baby lemur was much less intriguing after touching the snake and he (the lemur, not the snake) was asleep so I thought I wouldn't disturb him.

Blast from the Past
And then there was a flying visit from a friend from Le Cordon Bleu days - I got a surprise message on Facebook from WP who said she would be in town for certain days.  We ended up having sushi at Hemmesphere after work one night and chatting away until we were both yawning more than the occasion warranted.

It was so nice to have a visit from what seems to be a lifetime ago.  We caught up on what each had been up to since graduation - I think we learned more about each other over those few hours than we had in the 9 months in London.  Then it was time to say goodbye and despite best intentions and endeavours, I had to get ready to go home for the holidays and she had the rest of her travels to complete.

I am now home for the holidays and ready to have some fun with cooking parties.  Christmas plans are in full swing so more later - so until next time, happy and safe holidays to all!

#68 - In which I get to walk through history...

English Countryside


The day after (not) graduation started relatively early.  I say relatively because I had taken to sleeping in as my schedule allowed (i.e. didn't have to get up for exams) and it was a Saturday morning.  I was going up to the English countryside and although I had previously promised to cook dinner, obviously this was out of the question given my knife handling skills are still precarious.  I chose an alternate occupation for the day - namely, being entertainment and the official photographer.  ACP and KP were going to paint a room for the impending arrival of a new family member in the next month or so.  Anyway - it was cold.  Officially really cold...generally for someone who comes from warmer climes, it's probably safe to say that it feels cold when you can see your breath frosting in the morning air.  There was also ice on the asphalt...and of course as we started to drive, there is the iconic symbol for the Underground.  You may or may not be able to see that this one we passed is the one for Arsenal.

One of the nice things about the houses in London is that they have little touches which give them such character.  This one seems to have been inhabited at some point by someone musical.  It was quite cute to see the clefs hanging out over the windows.  The treble clef has been kind of popular for patisserie tuile decorations because it's a slightly more interesting (and complicated looking, if you are not a musician) shape than the bass.  Potentially the alto as well...
  








Morning Tea

We drove towards Cambridge (north?  west?  couldn't tell you...) and eventually ended up going through a little town called Ware (where?)...ACP and KP had some painting to do and various bits and pieces which required our presence sort of by no later than noon.  Having arrived and shivered our way through their ritual of turning up the heating, etc. etc. they proceeded to attend to the various tasks.  Morning tea duling having been served and consumed (scones courtesy of the Cordon Bleu tea party, which I had kept in the freezer against such an eventuality as this), it was time to start painting.

I was on hand as official photographer, some entertainment (it's always funny when someone else falls and trips, as long as they aren't hurt), occasional joke and general all-around cheerleader.  No, there was no cheerleading outfit as it was too cold.  I did bring up some scones that had been in my freezer though - they served for a nice morning tea before the others began the job of painting a room.  The little church on the right is actually a shot I took from the window of the little room that was being painted.  The window had been opened part way to allow paint fumes to waft out into the cold (super clean smelling) air.  The only drawback is that it was also quite cold when the breeze blew.


Spoiled
Both ACP and KP are good cooks.  The nice thing about this for me was that since my hand was out of commission, KP was going to cook dinner.  A welcome change as I had been eating baked beans on toast with cheese.  Ok, toast was a baguette and cheese was sometimes a nice, hard chedder and sometimes a gruyere, but it still gets a tiny bit boring if you have it several nights running.  Anyway - delicious pasta by KP...in the meantime, ACP had made and put away the Christmas pudding for the following week and she and I watched KP make dinner.  What can I say, there are few things more enjoyable than when a someone cooks you dinner.

In which I find out I am not smarter than the heater
We rented a video that night (Body of Lies) - quite entertaining and if we were in any doubt as to whether we might have similar taste in videos, we found another copy of the same video near the TV.  It was freezing so I plugged in the little space heater.  In my defence, the light went on so I thought it was heating.  Couldn't figure out why it wasn't warm so I sucked it up.  The next morning when I went to turn it off, I found out I hadn't turned on the heating elements.  But honestly, if the light is on, wouldn't that make you think that the heating thing is actually doing its thing?

4 countries in 3 days...

Then it was an early wake up on Sunday so that I could make sure I got back into London on time.  There was a booking through Heathrow to fly to Dusseldorf (shorter trip) so that I could visit with a friend from law school.  Things are so close in Europe that it was only a little bit longer for him to come get me at Dusseldorf instead of Cologne.  Still cold - colder than the countryside had been, actually.  I was really regretting the fact that my sweaters were all in a closet in Sydney, which is currently in summer.  Especially since we ran into snow on Monday morning as we started to drive towards the mountains.

It was almost as though there was an invisible line over which all of a sudden snow appeared on the side of the road and on the branches.  This wasn't your small fall which melts as the day wears on, but rather the kind that has been there for a few days.  For the most part the brown bits from being driven over were at a minimum and it was just that smell you get in the air when it's snowing with the slightly glowy but dimmer light.

Winter Wonderland (Monschau)
We arrived at this little place called Monschau - a tiny village, mostly self-contained.  The ground wasn't that wet so we got a nice little walk around.  There were a bunch of little bridges going over the river - a tributary which eventually feeds into the Maas river (I think).  It was so picturesque I couldn't help myself from taking a zillion photos.  The Christmas market stalls were mostly closed as the market itself is only open on weekends.  Given the amount of traffic - or lack thereof - I can understand why.

We had a little stop for morning coffee / hot chocolate.  Once of the nice things about the cold is that since you are desperate to warm up, it feels a little less naughty to have a hot chocolate and since most of the places here use milk (instead of water, which you might get in the US) I think it tastes better.  More photos ensued before we went back out.  I have to admit to getting a little turned around at one stage so I thought we were on one side of the river when we were actually on the other side.  There was a stop at this shop which sold so many different kinds of mustard that I lost track.  I wanted to bring some back but hadn't checked any bags and was daunted by the weight so I gave the mustards a miss.

Maastricht
Then it was on through Belgium to the Netherlands - I hope I got the geography right!  Again there was an invisible line - a horse cropping grass through snow between Germany and Belgium, then something a bit more subtle at the Belgium/Netherlands border where at the bottom of a hill the snow disappeared and the light all of a sudden turned bit golden.  It was like we had driven into a Van Gogh painting of hay and other Dutch paintings with houses along a river.

More Christmas markets! We wanted to go into the church but it was actually closed so that didn't happen.  However, one of the good things was that since there had been some French influence since whenever, I was relieved to be able to understand the French signs.  Much excitement!

Then there was the option of stopping at Aachen on the way back to Cologne.  I love that everything is so close to everything else!  I remember reading quite a lot about how the capital of Christianity was in Aachen for a while.  Yes, I know this is going back quite a while, but then again, in this part of the world a "young" building was built in the 1500s (part of the wall in Maastricht).


In which the mind boggles - Aachen (aka Aix la Chapelle)
The streets wound their way around.  I mistook the Town Hall for the cathedral at one point - we were approaching from the side and it just looked a little church-y.  In any event, it wasn't - good thing because it seemed a bit disrespectful to have such a hugh market in front of the church, even though that was probably used as a gathering place for a while.

Stepping into the Aachen Cathedral was a completely different experience.  The first thing to hit you is the Byzantine style of everything - the mosaics were intricate, astounding and everywhere - which sounds less impressive than it actually is.  Apologies for the bad lighting / photography but this is the best I could do.  It invites you to just look and look - you could probably spend a lot of time just looking at everything but we actually had to get back.  No matter - it was enough to be in the Cathedral where Charlemagne's throne is.  There is a tour available to see it (apparently just a simple wooden throne) but we had missed it for the day.  Just something to bring you back another time, I think.

Outside view of Aachen Cathedral

Streets of Aachen and a Chrstimas Fai

It took UP's kids a little while to decide that perhaps the stranger wasn't so strange after all, although we didn't share a language in common so communication was done through the good graces of their parents translating or a little bit of mime and gestures.  They were very generous about my attempts to speak German (prompted, of course!) and if nothing else, there was a little bit of laughter at the American's attempts to pronounce words which to us can be a bit of a tongue twister.

In any event, it snowed early Tuesday morning.  I heard the something hitting the skylights and hoped it was snow, not rain.  Rain did eventually fall and melt most of the snow away, but when everyone got up in the morning, everything had been softly covered by about an inch of snow.  Getting the kiddies ready for school was interesting to watch.  I'd forgotten how wiggly they can be and seeing two parents almost outnumbered by an equivalent number of enthusiastic offspring was quite an experience.  I have to admit being glad that we don't have to do the same with my nieces and nephews.

After everyone had been dropped off at school and work respectively (UP's wife had to work) UP and I went to the Belgian Quarter of Cologne.  We walked through a park whose name I don't know and had coffee at a place whose name I've forgotten...then more walking - to the Cologne Cathedral.  When we were here a zillion years ago, the towers were not open to the public and they were covered in scaffolding.  There's still scaffolding but it has moved.   More Byzantine looking tiles and mosaics inside the Cathedral, as well as the controversial "new" stained glass window.  The colors match the cathedral quite well but apparently the design did not, being abstract rather than one depicting your typical stained glass scenes.  I could see both sides of the argument, which sometimes drives me crazy.  Occasionally it's just restful to have only one idea in your head.

UP was game when I suggested that we climb the tower.  Well - if you can count someone jumping up and down as "suggesting".  The only drawback was that we got caught in waves of teenage hordes who were there - possibly a school field trip but it was a little hard to tell.  I had expected to see Quasimodo up by the bell and the rest of the time I expected to see Harry and Dumbledore having a face-off with the rest of the cast of characters from the various Harry Potter movies.  Somehow they seem to end up by bell tower looking things quite often...

Several more Christmas markets later and a walk down slushy side alleys to the Rhine, we went to lunch.  A pub whose name I've forgotten where I had something like a brisket in BBQ sauce for lunch.  Really yummy and not something you would be able to eat, then do any work in the afternoon but perfect for a really cold day when you are on vacation.  Apparently it is a traditional dish (they describe it as braised Rhine beef or something similar)...followed by more walking.  Sorely needed after such a heavy lunch...all I can say is that it was delicious and if I could, I would probably have it every week - I wonder how it would taste with white rice to soak up all that delicious sauce.  Because the dish wasn't already filling enough, you know...

Back to reality
Back in London, there remains a ton of things to be done:  parking dispensation for the moving van, sort clothes, etc. for movers, get coffee so I am awake enough to direct the movers (rather than falling over which is what I feel like doing right now...apologies for any errors, I blame them on sleep typing.

So until next time, may the things that need to be done not pile up on you as they have done to me here.

#64 - Baby steps

I have started to lose track of days because the main purpose of being in London (going to cooking school) has been abruptly curtailed as classes draw to a close and people struggle not to buckle under the marathon Patisserie session this week.

Unintended benefit of being injured and being unable to go to class - I actually have some time to organize myself - very necessary as I have to juggle logistics and try to guess when I will be back in London to take my exams (so planning clothes, potentially some equipment and of course, my uniform) to mention just a few things.

Am trundling along, doing what needs to be done - which includes a lot of rest and allowing about twice as much time to do everything.  You don't realize the little things you take for granted until you can't do them anymore - like tie your own shoes (I've been wearing boots with zippers), not poke out your eye when trying to put on some mascara (preparation for last night's Christmas dinner was...interesting) or tucking in those strings on the dress which you  need to keep it on the hanger (or you would cut the darn things off).

Food for amusement (yours)
Hopefully my little trials and tribulations will give you a giggle or three and thank heavens that you aren't as clumsy as I am.  I debated whether or not to put in this next little bit, but I did promise the good, the bad and the ugly.  I'm not sure where this falls on that list.

So the Christmas dinner - lots of fun, lots of interesting people and I even remembered names!  The preparations were a bit fraught (this is the bit I debated).  Ok - so not having a roommate meant there was a little bit of acrobatics needed as well as a lot of patience in order to get the hooks done up on the bra which needed to go with the dress.  If you are wondering what I did for the last couple of weeks, the answer is that I have a lot of dance tops and I just wore my regular t-shirts under my chef's jacket because the bandaged club at the end of my right wrist didn't fit through the sleeves of my long sleeved shirts.  So yes, it was all a bit chilly.

Then there was the matter of the hair - fairly simple...when you get a hair cut, they blow dry it for you so that was fine.  But the makeup...the 10-minutes normally allotted had to be stretched a bit in order to allow for very slow work.  I was in a hurry the other day and accidentally poked my eye with the mascara wand - not an experience that anyone wants to repeat, I am guessing.  Speaking for myself, definitely not.

Final bit of embarrassment...so I managed to get through dinner with the gimpy hand fine during the starters but hadn't thought through the main very well.  The burn unit says lots of protein to help with the healing so I chose steak.  So far so good.  Until, of course, it's time to eat the thing.  They supplied a steak knife and I managed to cut a small bite.  The only thing is my hand is achy - no idea what from, but I am guessing one of the culprits is the middle finger.  Anyway - a very nice guy sitting near me volunteered to cut the meat for me - until one of the waiters saw and came over to finish.

I am guessing it's going to be a no go for the Patisserie final (even if I were able to do it in terms of the recipes) given the current state of the hand.

Must admit to inspecting the dessert and tasting it in pieces, then together (how they taste our things at school).

More learning!
Anyway, dinner over (in which conversational topics ranged from accents, words and misunderstandings, to Exceptional Men, to Christmas parties past and future, travels, movies, etc.) it was time for more education.  Previous  experiences with casinos have been limited to getting lost in one (Crown, in Melbourne) and going to a wedding (Star City in Sydney).

In terms of betting, I had no clue.  Luckily there were some sharks in our midst...I got a crash course in roulette, or at least this casino's one.  No photos were allowed so unfortunately there aren't any shots of people playing and having a good time.  It was actually more entertaining watching the people in our group playing that I think betting might have been.

Today was a whole day of nothing.  A little bit of organization to try to prepare for packing and vacating the flat but otherwise, a lot of sleep.  I'm not used to being up so late...

Class tomorrow morning - luckily they pushed it to 9am.  After this weekend, that's going to feel pretty early.  This is our last class - who knows, we may all wax nostalgic.

Anyway, must go and rest.  So until next time - may you also feel little stress from the silly season.

#57 - Sugar, fish, lights, action!

Long day Wednesday
Wednesday was Day 2 of sugar in Patisserie.  I got so used to Patisserie being late sessions (3 - 9pm) that I completely misread my schedule.  I want to say it was because I was on painkillers, but that would be untrue.  On the other hand, although I was still (mostly) in bed at 11:45am, that was more due to the fact that I was trying to get my back into working order.  Back spasms are kind of inconvenient when you have to push, pull and carry things.  Anyway - got a text from one of the girls in class - I was late!  Major rushing (also not good with bad back) and staggered into class.  Managed to finish the bow and ribbon, but I think I didn't pull the sugar enough.  For whatever reason, I didn't cool it enough before I put it together, so the ribbons looked ok when I put them together.  A few minutes later, however...


Then the centrepiece.  A second try - I tried out a couple of things, quite unsuccessfully.  I say unsuccessful because the second try turned out worse than my first try.  Also, I managed to drip some sugar on myself - a couple of burns on my fingers.  The blister on my middle finger burst in class on Friday morning while I was cleaning my knives.  The other one is still on my pointer finger, so we'll see how cleanly they heal.


Wednesday afternoon was the official ceremony to turn on the Christmas lights for Marylebone Village.  I was in class during the time when the street was closed off, but the lights were on when I was on my way home.  I must admit that any Grinch-like tendencies which normally want to rear their heads around this time of year have been quiescent - mainly because lights at nightime are pretty, regardless of the time of the year.  They are just more effective at the moment because the sun sets before 4:15pm so it's pretty dark by the time we get out of class and head home after 9pm.  No Christmas music yet (thank goodness) but the lights, the cold wind at night and breathing air which feels cleaner because of the drop in temperature all help alleviate any slightly depressed feelings that might otherwise make us a little more like Scrooge rather than Tiny Tim.


Cuisine Thursday...
Normally they give us a little leeway when plating now.  I took this to mean that the spinach could go the plate the way I wanted - as a swirl instead of a quenelle.  Apparently not.  I presented my plate and Chef FJ said "funny."  What do you mean?  "Funny plate, funny quenelle, funny lemon...are you feeling all right?"  When a teacher says they can tell you are tired and sore - that's not a good thing.


So the dish - halibut grilled...with Bearnaise sauce and other stuff.  I gave my fish to Chef P in the production kitchen.  I didn't give him the Bearnaise sauce because it was too light in texture (and I hadn't cooked the sabayon well enough at the beginning so I had to fix it by cooking another yolk / sabayon), but at least it tasted ok.  The potato is supposed to look like a rose but having to slice pieces that thin and long, like an apple peel, almost caused a nervous breakdown in class.  Apparently the potato rose tends to do that to people.  The potato is slippery, the peel gets oddly shaped and breaks off in short pieces which makes it hard to fasten into a rose.  Then when you cook it, it expands a bit - great if well assembled, but otherwise it falls apart or looks like mine.  It's supposed to be crispy outside and creamy/soft on the inside of the rose.  The centre was ok but something was wrong with the outside, I just can't remember what.


Then we had our wine tech class. It was the Patisserie wine tech (dessert and wine pairing), which means sweet and sticky wines. I like the flavors much better but generally this is also where we run into fortified wines. Even with the (inelegant) spitting, my ears still got really hot. Good thing it ended a little early so that I could actually get to the theatre in relatively good repair.


Chicago!
Tursday night capped off a slightly crappy practical with a show in the West End - Chicago, in case the heading to this section didn't tip give it away.  It was at the Garrick Theatre, near Leister Square.  I was expecting something like Broadway but this was almost more like off-Broadway.  Some of the singing was good and some of it mediocre (America Ferrera, of Ugly Betty fame, was Roxie Hart) - oh dear..her voice isn't bad but there were a few spots where I couldn't tell what the tune was.  She can carry a tune, but it's like she dropped it for just a couple of notes here and there.  Quite an entertaining show - I'd only seen the movie before - and the staging was great.  I loved having the characters move around the orchestra / band which was sitting up on stage, as a part of the set.


Thoroughly corrupted?
Afterwards I wanted something sweet.  Very unusual, I'm not normally a big sweets person.  My parents would be surprised by this picture.  I was a bit shocked - at the size of the ice cream thing whose name I've forgotten.  Something to do with chocolate.  Anyway, managed to get LM to have a teeny, tiny taste.  Pretty good for that time of the night, although it wasn't something that I could finish on my own.

Friday - Breakfast of champions?
We had an 8am demo on Friday morning. The practical which corresponds to this demo is our mock exam next week. Similar (but not same) conditions during the mock exam. In the meantime, Chef FJ prepared a standing rib roast, a Bordelais sauce, some mushrooms and mac 'n cheese.  Let me just say, normally I hate blue cheese. There is now an exception to this rule, which is gorgonzola in mac 'n cheese. I think they did something like this at some fancy restaurant - Ducasse? - although of course they call it by it's proper name, macaroni gratin. Anyway - wow! I don't think I can post pictures from demo because I don't have permission from the school or the chef, but I have the recipe so it's definitely on my list to make at some point in the near(ish) future.


Our dish for that day's practical was a Dover sole and crayfish timbale.  It was a fish mousse, blanched crayfish and crayfish sauce encased in a fillet of sole, served with more crayfish sauce and a champagne sauce.  Maybe it's because I don't drink, but I could really taste the champagne in the sauce so I put in butter at the end to soften the alcohol.  The result:  "too much butter".  Then Chef JB looked around and asked if he had just said there was too much butter.  We couldn't believe it - on the other hand, it wasn't that the sauce was super buttery (it kind of was, but I don't eat much butter at home either) - his objection was that he couldn't really taste the champagne.  I had put some aside to add at the end but didn't, so I added the reserved champagne and asked him to taste it again (marking was over).  Nope, still too buttery.

Then it was a bit of a hurry because I had dinner plans with MD.  We were going to meet for drinks in Gerrard Street, then head to dinner in Chinatown where her man was going to join us.  But first, the fish, mousse and crayfish needed a home.  I went to my go-to guys and even got a little cuddle.  Apologies for the school uniform - Michael had himself a little laugh but I felt so disgusting and sticky after cuisine, I couldn't bear the thought of changing into my civvies without having a shower first.  Not even the croquembouche decoration helped because it was quite a warm day so we didn't cool down much between end of cuisine and leaving school altogether.  Having seen Chef NH in action, I can only see how far we all have to go before we could even begin to look as smooth as he does when he works.

Harder than it looks (or else any monkey could do it) - aka guess the chef

It's actually like that with all the chefs.  Somehow they make it all look so easy, then we go to class and things fall to pieces.  People forget about the sugar ("Geraldine, I see blue smoke!  Who's burning the sugar?" or "The monkey used scisseaux to cut that.  I don't remember the monkey tearing the foil."  Or "I didn't say it was easy.  I didn't say a 2-year old could do it, did I?"  to which the reply was "No chef - you said a 5-year old could do it with one arm tied behind his back.")  Sometimes we forgot other things ("you can't pour the sugar on the side - you can't get it out")  In any event, it always seems that the thing which looks so easy in demo then is super fiddly in practical.  Occasionally it can make you want to throw the stupid potato across the room.

I'd write more but I have been falling asleep for the last 2 paragraphs so it's time to get some sleep.  so until next time, patience, Grasshopper!