road trip, sugar & the kiwi dream

One of the things that I have developed a liking for since living in NZ and am damn sure I wouldn't have if I still lived in Singapore, is the 'road trip'.  I mean come on.  Singapore fits into Lake Taupo.  One hour drive from end to end...okay maybe more in rush hour traffic.  But still, not much road-tripping to be done there!  But in NZ, there's the holiday road trip, the weekend road trip, the long weekend road trip and then there's just the road trip because it's time for one and I'm making an excuse for one.

I love everything about a road trip - the ever changing scenery (let me tell you, there's a difference from one paddock of sheep/cows to another, ok!), the smaller quaint towns with main streets that look like time stood still for them, the antique shops, the junk shops that say 'antique', the petrol station pies (it's not a road trip unless you eat one in the car), the food stops where you discover there's great coffee outside of Wellington!

Found this roastery in sleepy Raetihi - superb coffee and chocolate!

A cafe in quaint Cambridge makes iced coffee with coffee icecream that had bits of ground coffee in it instead of the usual vanilla icecream.

I particularly like those 'look what we stumbled upon' moments - like when we decided to take the back roads driving back from Auckland after Christmas, and saw strawberries sold direct from the grower, bought an ice-cream tub full of strawberries for $7 (I know!!) and then noticing as we drove out that the road the orchard was on was called Marshmallow Road.  My inner 7 year old self was tickled pink by the fact that we just bought strawberries on a road called Marshmallow Road.  And those strawberries were the BEST I've ever eaten.  Like seriously.

Or when the owner of a B&B we were staying at in Martinborough gave us tips on where they bought their amazingly fresh and rich tasting free range eggs from.  We drove for quite time and finally found the 'farm house with a red letterbox'.  Do you know how many farm houses have red letterboxes??!  There was no one home, but the eggs were on a table in the garage with an old rusty biscuit tin for whatever you felt like paying.  Those were some damn good tasting free range eggs!

And somewhere between Martinborough and Masterton (which is where we almost got to looking for those eggs!) we found Parkvale Mushrooms somewhere along the way and bought an obscene amount of  'B' grade mushrooms for a song.  Which made me think...do we get 'C' grade mushrooms at the supermarket or what??!

Road trips also mean staying in motels, motor lodges and B&Bs.  I have this thing about staying in a motel or motor lodge units - I love it!  I love the kitchenettes and coffee/tea making facilities - one of the first things I do is open up every cupboard to see what remnants of the past there is in those cupboards.  I can't tell you how many times I've been tempted to swipe 70s utensils & crockery from one of those units!  And no, there's nothing particularly special about why I like the coffee/tea making stuff.  Afterall, it's often just a jug and packets of dubious instant coffee, stale tea and super sugared up instant hot 'chocolate'.  But still.  I find it quaint and somewhat reassuring, and I like that.

It's on our last road trip over the Christmas holiday coming back from Auckland, that I found these cool little sachets of sugar in our Taupo motel room!!  (Yes, yes, the moment we entered our motel room, I proceeded to check out the coffee/tea making stuff in the motel room).

          

 

         

 

          

 

          

 

          

 

Aren't they cool?  Whoever had the idea to print these images on the sachets is genius (in my opinion anyway).  My favourites are the combi van and the one with the jandals (aka flip-flops, japanese slippers, jap-flaps, thongs...).  Which ones do you like?

To me, the scenes printed on the packets remind me of everything a Kiwi summer holiday is and, the Kiwi dream.  In fact, the images got me thinking a bit about the Kiwi dream.  My Kiwi dream doesn't entail owning a house (I don't think I'd ever feel any less of a person or achievement if I never bought a house), buying investment property, tickets to the Sevens or Fly My Pretties, nor does it include the almost obligatory Fiji holiday (we went to Samoa instead).

My Kiwi dream is this...

Photograph courtesy of  Tina Hillier, from the My Cool Campervan book.

You can stop laughing now.  Serious!  I would LOVE to go on road trip holidays up and down the country in one of these VW Westfalia campers.  I'd be a very happy girl!!

And then one day, when I think I've grown up sufficiently (which some will tell you may never happen) or caved in to the whole home-ownership thing that is so prevalent in NZ, my Kiwi dream will include a lifestyle block not too far from the city, maybe an hour at most (because I'm unashamedly a city girl), where I can have small vegetable patch, a handful of fruit trees, chooks for my own eggs and enough land to have as many rescue animals as I want to.  Okay...maybe not as many as I want to.  But a few - I'll stop at a respectable number just before I become that crazy animal lady.

So do you like road trips?  Which your favourite image on the sugar sachets?  Aaaand...what is your Kiwi dream? :-)

christmas past and present

Christmas was a bit of a non event this time for me. But I think for many of us, it becomes so as we grow older. We no longer see Christmas through child's eyes, or even a young adult eyes. The excitement is somewhat dimmed a little more as each year passes. And often what passes as 'family tradition' becomes meaningless when everyone just goes through the motions of the day. I noticed that it often doesn't get better until we have children of our own. Then there's a reason or two (or more) to celebrate Christmas again in a festive...and well, more fun way. The wow factor if you like, for Christmas comes back. 

I did try to make an effort with putting up the Christmas tree and dotting the house with decorations like I always do.

And this.

The look that my furbaby graced me with when I took this photo suggests, wow factor, not so much.

Don't get me wrong, I'm no Christmas grinch. I'm all for Christmas. When I was still living in Singapore, I used to 'do' Christmas in a big way and not just in a food kind of way. There would be weeks of carolling, musical production of the nativity, followed by more carolling and singing at midnight mass. And after Christmas morning with the family and doing the presents thing, my friends and I would drop in to each other's house for more celebrating (a lot of people I knew then had an open-door policy during Christmas). After dinner, there would usually be more music and games and festivities. These festivities would continue for at least another couple of days. In NZ, everyone kinda droops after dinner and Christmas day often ends with such an anti-climax. And dropping in unannounced at your friends' is almost unheard of, especially not on Christmas day.

But as I've grown older, I've found myself celebrating Christmas less and less. So perhaps why it's become such a non-event for me is due to both age and also living in NZ.

There is one thing I do miss a lot during this time though. Have you ever been to Singapore and Kuala Lumpur during Christmas? If you have, you'll know that all the streets in the city, up and down, are decked out. So are the shops and hotels (almost all the buildings really), are festooned with lights and decorations, inside and out. It's all sparklies and lights at every corner, so much so that a magpie would need a lie down from it all! You could argue that what I'm describing is the commercial side of the season, but it goes a long way to lending that 'Christmas is in the air' feeling! Now that, that I miss.

But event or non-event, I did manage to sneak in some edible Christmas gift making.

Once again, I made marmalade, balsamic onion jam and my festive granola, but with slight variations from the previous Christmas. For the marmalade, I followed a tried and true recipe from the lovely Emma of My Darling Lemon Thyme (it's never failed me) as a guide and added grapefruit and lots of lemon and ginger to the oranges, and also spiced it up a little with cinnamon (a stick of cinnamon when boiling and then removed before bottling, not ground cinnamon). 

The balsamic onion jam had minced up sultanas through it this time.  And I made a slight variation of my Glorious Granola for the Festive version. You can find the recipe for my Glorious Granola here. And the recipe for the Festive version below.

My granola recipe makes quite a large batch of granola, so I was able to save some for myself after wrapping up what I needed to give away as presents.  And with the glut of strawberries we've been having this summer, I've been enjoying some of that granola with strawberries and creamy thick Greek yoghurt. I must admit that it tastes pretty amazing!

I also made a batch of strawberry, lemon and vanilla jam. 

I didn't take any photos of the balsamic onion jam I made, nor did I write down exactly how much I used of each ingredient. But if you've made jams and chutneys before, making this is a no brainer. The recipe below is an approximate - go by taste and you won't go wrong.

Balsamic Onion Jam

INGREDIENTS

10-15 red onions, thinly sliced

3/4 cup sultanas, roughly minced

1 cup balsamic vinegar

1 cup of soft brown sugar (packed)

Oil (I used rice bran, but you can use any type of light oil without a strong taste)

1. Mix the sliced onions with some oil - not too much, but enough that all the onions are coated with oil.
2. Heat a heavy based pan/pot over medium heat and fry the onions until soft and translucent.
3. Add the minced sultanas, brown sugar and balsamic vinegar - cook until the onions become dark (caramelised) and sticky.
4. Bottle in sterilised jars and seal.

Strawberry, Lemon and Vanilla Jam

INGREDIENTS

Ripe Strawberries - 6 cups once hulled and roughly chopped

3 cups sugar - for every cup of strawberry I used 1/2 cup sugar. Traditional jam recipes ask for 1 cup sugar to 1 cup fruit. I like my jam less sweet, so 3 cups is plenty for me.

1 vanilla bean, split in half lengthwise, and vanilla seeds scrapped out

Zest and juice of 1 large lemon

1. In a large heavy bottom pan/pot, stir the sugar and chopped strawberries together. Set aside for couple of hours.
2. Stir in the lemon zest and juice, the vanilla seeds and bean. Bring to boil. Stir to ensure that the sugar has all melted and that the jam doesn't stick at the bottom.
3. With a handheld wizz/blender, blend the mixture until roughly half the strawberries have been blended, leaving the jam with small lumps of the fruit.  I don't like my jam smooth, but if you do, then go ahead and blend away.
4. With a clean sterilised spoon, skim any scum/foam off the surface.
5. Once the jam is ready, remove the vanilla bean halves.
6. Here's the method I use to check if my jam is ready - place a saucer in the freezer so that it's cold. Once the jam starts to coat the back of the sterilised spoon, take the saucer out from the freezer. Pour a little jam onto the saucer, wait for 10 seconds and then run a finger through the jam. If the jam stays separate, your jam is done. If not, boil for a few minutes longer and test again.
7. Bottle in sterilised jars and seal.

Festive Granola

INGREDIENTS

3 cups rolled oats
1 cup raw cashews, roughly chopped
1 cup almonds, roughly chopped
1 cup shredded coconut
1/4 cup sunflower seeds
1/4 cup pumpkin seeds
1 tbsp ground cinnamon
1/2 cup dried apricots, chopped
1/2 cup cranberries

1/2 cup currants
1 tsp sea salt
1/2 cup rice bran oil (or you can extra virgin olive oil)
3/4 cup honey
1/3 cup packed brown sugar

1. Preheat oven to 150C / 300F. Line a couple of large baking trays with baking paper.
2. Except for the dried fruits, combine all the other ingredients into a large bowl and mix well.
3. Spread the granola mixture out onto the trays evenly.
4. Bake for 40-45 minutes, stirring the granola around every 10 minutes. Stir in the dried fruit when you've got 20 minutes more baking time before the end.
5. Your granola is ready when it's all golden and sticky.
6. Cool the granola in the trays completely before breaking them up and storing them into airtight jars/containers.

This granola will also be my contribution to January's Sweet New Zealand, hosted by sweet Arfi of HomeMadeS.

spiced apple & walnut cake with a side of random thoughts & merry christmas! xxx

I haven't baked in months and really wanted to write beautiful, thought-provoking content to accompany the photos of this cake I made. (the cake was a success - yes!!)  But all I have are random thoughts.  Although I can assure you that there is food involved in these random thoughts!

Random thought 1:

Sometimes, when I walk through town, I daydream about the kind of job I could have.  And those thoughts evidently lead to...if I got a job here, is there any good eats around for lunch?  And more importantly, how far will I be from the nearest cafe with the best or my favourite coffee?  You know, the important things!

By the way, I used Lemonade apples.  They were new at the supermarket and I was intrigued to see how they would taste and hold up to being used in baking.  Verdict: It's okay - holds up to baking well even though I cut them into quite small and thin slices.  But it's not very sweet or fragrant.  Not very 'apple-ly'.  I think you could use type of apples really for this cake, just as long as they're fresh and still crunchy.

Random thought 2:

Sometimes there's either little in the fridge or only with odd bits that I wouldn't normally put together as part of a well thought-out dish.  This happens often and is usually when we're at the end of the pay cycle and it's two days away from pay day.  I'd stare at what I have with fierce determination and bash out dinner with one or two concoctions, made up with whatever I've got to work with.  Sometimes I'm asked never to make the dish again.  Ever.  But sometimes I surprise myself and it works brilliantly, and I think...how things could've been so different had I gone to cooking school and pursued a career as a chef.  I'd have mad knife skills for one!

By the way, if you're wondering why the cake is so dark in colour, it's because of the 3 teaspoons of ground cinnamon used.  I love cinnamon and didn't mind it at all that the cake was so heavily spiced.  But 2 teaspoons is plenty if you want a lighter spiced cake.

The cake batter is also rather lumpy-ish and you might think that there's too much apples to batter.  But go with it.  The fragrant spiced batter rises through the gaps between all that fruit and nuts as it bakes, and ends up looking like a pretty normal cake once cooked.

For those of you who have been following my blog, you may have noticed a difference with the photos for this post.  Yours truly had a sudden wave of creativity (yes, creativity - just go with that too) and decided to have a play around with the food styling.

So okay.  There isn't that much styling going on here - just strategically placed items on some brown paper that's actually recycled brown paper bags from a couple of delis.  And since I had these 'vintage' plates and cutlery like forever ago and haven't used them, I thought perhaps it was about time!

This is seriously good cake.  Even better with a dollop of thick Greek style yoghurt or slightly thickened cream on the side, and much nicer if eaten slightly warm.  It keeps well for 3 days in an airtight container.

Random thought 3:

Still on the job-career-food thoughts - my Dad's a businessman and has always had his own business from as early as I can remember.  According to him, entrepreneurship is supposed to run 'in the family', but I obviously did not get that memo.  So here's my last random thought for this post...

Sometimes when I'm on the bus or walking home, I think about owning my own business - specifically a deli.  By the time I arrive home, I'd have some idea on the name of the deli, branding, marketing plan, ideal sites/suburbs, products, packaging, etc.  By the time I change into my comfy clothes...I've reached the stage of madness where I am talking to myself: "Do you want to work 7 days a week, 14 hour days and have to deal with the IRD and the revolving door of staff?  Are you MAD?!"

So there ends my random thoughts for this post.

Have a gorgeous Christmas, happy feasting, merry drinking, spread the love and who knows!  Next year, maybe some (if not all) of our dreams might just come true...even the ridiculous ones. Happy summer everyone! :-)

xxx

Spiced Apple & Walnut Cake

I got the recipe for this cake from an episode of Annabel Langbein's Simple Pleasures.

INGREDIENTS

3 large apples, peeled, cored, quartered and then sliced
250g butter
2 cups granulated sugar
2 eggs, lightly whisked
2 ½ cup plain flour
2 tsp baking soda
1 tsp baking powder
3 tsp cinnamon powder
1 cup sultanas
½ cup walnuts

Have a large pot ready on the stove top – big enough for melting butter and mixing the cake batter
in.

1. Preheat oven to 150°C. Prepare a springform cake tin by lightly greasing the sides and bottom with butter, then line the bottom with greaseproof/baking paper.
2. Melt butter in a large pot. Once melted, remove from the heat and stir in the apple pieces.
3. Stir to coat apples with butter.
4. Add sugar and eggs, and stir lightly to mix.
5. Add flour, baking powder, baking soda and cinnamon.
6. Also add sultanas and walnuts.
7. Stir to mix until the mixture is wet – do not over mix but just enough so that the flour and mixed through and wet. The mixture should not be ‘smooth’.
8. Pour mixture into prepared cake tin, level the top out and bake for 1 hour and 20 mins, or until the cake is cooked (test by inserting a skewer into the middle of the cake – cake is cooked if skewer comes out clean).
9. Once cooked, remove from the oven and leave the cake in the tin for 5 minutes before removing onto a cake rack to cool.  You could dust the top with some icing sugar once the cake is cooled if you like.

 

 

This cake is also my contribution to December's Sweet New Zealand, hosted by sweet Lydia of Lydia Bakes.