A 'D'oh' Moment

I have lived in this house for almost a year and I only noticed today that the back half is built in red bricks (the front is painted a lemony cream). So I still live in a red house. And my blog title is correct. All this time I have been worrying that my blog title does not reflect our new life in Adelaide.

I noticed the red bricks when I was reading over this morning's blog post and saw the photos. Then it clicked. Doh!

I'm certainly not the fastest cab off the rank, or the sharpest knife in the drawer, am I?

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Bubble, Bubble

As a child I thought that Shakespeare's witches were chanting "Bubble, bubble, toil and trouble" instead of "Double, double toil and trouble".

My youngest two boys are often full of mischief, and indeed, can be double trouble, but at the moment their greatest mischief is creating 'experiments' with soap, bubble bath mix and dish detergent.

A few days ago my husband came home from a workmate's wedding shower with these cute little wedding-cake bubble kits, and since then we've had bubble mania.

I have only ever made bubble mix using detergent and water, although the 'experts' (if there is such a thing as a bubble expert) suggest that stronger bubbles can be made by adding a little glycerin to the mix.

Bubble Mix

7 parts water

3 parts dish detergent

1 part glycerine (from supermarkets or pharmacies)

Combine the above and start blowing bubbles.


Red House Tips:

1. This is one recipe where exact measurements don't really matter. If you combine a drip of glycerine with a good squeeze of detergent and add water, the mixture will still make good bubbles.
2. My friend Phoebe used to carry a little container of bubble mix in her baby daughter's nappy bag. If they were out somewhere and Zara grew restless, Phoebe would blow bubbles to keep her entertained.
   

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Two New Things That I Have Done

1. I constructed my first piece of flat-pack furniture. On Friday I bought my eldest son a flat-pack desk with hutch and shelves. He has a tiny bedroom and needed a desk with storage for his schoolbooks.

The desk came with detailed instructions using miniscule drawings. There were a few flaws, such as missing screws and holes that hadn't been drilled where they were meant to be, but that's a fact-of life with flat-packed furniture. Right?

I was determined to build the desk before my husband got home from work. It took about 5 hours, but I finally did it. I made lots of mistakes, like screwing the drawer runners in upside down, but finally I worked out where everything was meant to go. The desk even looked like the one in the shop.

Unfortunately, I couldn't screw all the screws tight enough using a manual screwdriver and I ended up with several nasty blisters on my hands.

So, on Saturday:

2. I bought my first powertool. I bought a lovely powerdrill with screwdriver bits and used it to finish off the desk. It made the job so much easier, but then, it cost more than the desk. I wish I had had a drill in the first place.

So here I am. A woman with a drill. Pretty powerful, huh?

Have you done anything recently that you have never done before?

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A Walk in the Park

Even in winter,

a walk in the park can be a delight,
with towering gums casting long, long shadows,

and grass sweetly green after summer's brown.

A bench shaped to fit a tree,

bridges to cross,


and scooters to ride.


And the river to watch for trolls and hobbits,

and the first ducklings of spring.

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Flourless Orange and Almond Cake

Winter is orange season in South Australia. And one of my favourite recipes using oranges is this flourless orange and almond cake from Stephanie Alexander's The Cook's Companion. Stephanie herself adapted the recipe from Claudia Roden's middle eastern orange cake.

Incidentally, I like it when chefs and authors acknowledge their influences and the sources of their recipes, rather than pretending that they created them themselves out of thin air.

There is a lot to like about this cake; it is moist, dense and utterly irresistible. As an added bonus, it is dairy and gluten free, so is a great dessert if your guests or family have allergies.

Although the recipe calls for ground almonds, I cut costs by purchasing whole almonds and blanching them myself. I then grind them in the food processor before adding the remaining ingredients. The almonds will be coarser than ground almonds but I think that adds to the texture of the cake.

Flourless Orange and Almond Cake

2 large oranges, washed

6 eggs, beaten

250 g ground almonds

250 g sugar

1 tsp baking powder

Boil oranges in a little water in a covered saucepan for two hours. Allow to cool, then cut open, remove pips, and chop roughly.

Preheat oven to moderate and grease and flour a springform tin. Blend oranges and remaining ingredients thoroughly in a food processor. Pour batter into prepared tin and bake for 1 hour. If cake is still very wet, cook a little longer (my cake took 15 minutes longer). Cool in tin before gently turning out.

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How to Blanch Almonds

image courtesy of www.allposters.com

Tomorrow I am going to make one of my favourite cakes, a flourless orange and almond cake.

This is not the most frugal of cakes as it requires 250 g or 8 ounces of ground almonds. And ground almonds are very expensive.

Fortunately, whole almonds in their little brown coats, as in the picture above, are significantly less expensive. I prefer to buy almonds this way and blanch them myself, before grinding them in the food processor.

Blanching is a culinary term for the process of removing the almonds' skins. Here's how you do it:

Blanched (peeled) almonds

1. Weigh the amount of almonds you need and place in a bowl.
2. Cover the almonds with boiling water.
3. Wait 5 minutes.
4. Peel the almonds. The skins should slide off easily. Don't drain the almonds before peeling them or the skin will tighten up; just take them out of the water one by one.

There you go. Beautiful blanched almonds without the expense.

image courtesy of www.almondbrothers.com

Stay tuned and tomorrow I'll post the recipe for my flourless orange and almond cake.

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Five Things I Like About Being a Working Mum

There is much talk in the media about the difficulties facing working mums: about the battles to to manage housework, husbands, children and achieve some level of work/life balance.

Yet as someone who began a new job 2 1/2 months ago after many years at home full-time or working part-time from home, I have found that my life is enhanced by work even though it is without doubt more challenging. While at first I found my job very stressful and the learning curve exceedingly steep, I am now finally finding my feet and gaining confidence daily.

For those who don't know, I work four days a week in a professional role for a university. My hours are currently 8 am to 3 pm, Monday to Thursday, which is a 0.7 position (full-time is 1.0).

So here they are, in no particular order:

Five things I like about being a working mum.

1. New opportunities and skills: Since I began work not only have I had to learn how to do the job, but I have also been given the opportunity to attend courses and learn new skills. I have attended a course on using the university's financial management system and another on website authoring (invaluable for a hobby-blogger). In August my boss has invited me to attend a breakfast meeting on blogging and wikis which will be of great interest to me.

2. Social contact outside of the family: This is especially important to me as I have lived in this city less than a year and didn't know many people before I began work. I am fortunate to work with a lovely group of people.

3. Money: Sordid but true. I am enjoying having a little extra money and am having no difficulty finding things to do with it.

4. The family has to pitch in more: When one is a full-time parent it is easy to take on most of the work of the house and to carry the slack for other family members. While my systems are far from perfect, I am getting better at getting others to do more around the house. I do spend most of Fridays house-cleaning, but it makes me feel more relaxed, so it's worth it.

5. I value family time more: When I was at home full-time I was often desperate to have a break from the demands of home and family. Now, although I spend approximately the same amount of time with the kids (I finish work in time to collect the younger children from school), I value their company more. Work is a wonderful break from home, but home gives me necessary respite from work.

Are you a working parent? What have you found to be the pros and cons of paid work?

image is from www.allposters.com

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On McDonalds and Ice Cream Trucks

I told my friend Carly that, when we were driving to Adelaide from Melbourne, my husband told the kids that there were no McDonalds' restaurants in Adelaide; the McDonalds signs were actually furniture shops. Familiar with his sense of humour, they didn't believe him.

In reply, Carly told me that, when she was a little girl, her parents told her that the ice cream truck only made music when it had run out of ice cream. Unfortunately for her, she believed them.

image is from www.allposters.com

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A Colourful Salad for Artichoke Lovers

I really love artichokes. While I have never cooked fresh artichokes myself (all that complex cutting and pulling out of chokes sounds w-a-y too complex for me), I have eaten them many different ways and have liked them each time.

Here is a salad I devised that makes great use of bottled artichokes. In fact, it's devised from another salad recipe that didn't have artichokes in it. I think the artichokes are an improvement. Like all salads, you don't have to worry too much about exact quantities and you can happily make substitutions, for example, you could use walnuts instead of the pecans.

Colourful Artichoke Salad

1 bottle marinated artichokes, drained (about 400g or 14 oz; I, in fact, used 2 bottles; you could also use ordinary tinned artichokes)

sliced green onions

1 red pepper, diced

1 cup roughly chopped pecans

1 cup frozen corn, thawed, or freshly cooked kernels, or drained, canned corn

Combine ingredients in a bowl. Stir in a vinaigrette or commercial salad dressing of your choice, spiked with a little chilli sauce, if you wish.

If you would like to know how to make a simple vinaigrette, visit my article on How to Create a Sensational Salad.

Tip: if you are using marinated artichokes, taste the marinade and if you like it you can use it for your salad dressing.

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Raspberry and Chunky Chocolate Muffins

Here is my version of raspberry and chocolate muffins, as discussed in yesterday's post. You could use any type of chocolate, but I chose white chocolate because I think raspberries and white chocolate are a match made in heaven. If you use fresh raspberries rather than frozen, stir them in very gently. You may also need to reduce cooking time slightly.

Ingredients

2 cups self-raising flour

2/3 cup caster sugar

60 g (2 oz) melted butter

3/4 cup (180 ml) milk

1 egg, lightly beaten

200 g block white chocolate (about 7 oz)

about 200g frozen raspberries (I always put in extra)

1. Line a 12 hole muffin pan with paper muffin cases. These muffins are moist and the fruit sticky, and using muffin cases will save you quite a lot of mess. Preheat oven to hot (about 200C or 400F, depending on your oven).

2. Sift flour and sugar into a large bowl.




3. Chop up chocolate into chunks. Part of the charm of these muffins is the irregular chunks of chocolate, so don't worry if your chunks are all different sizes. Stir the chocolate through the flour and sugar mixture.






Whisk melted butter, milk and egg in a separate small bowl.



Add wet ingredients to the dry ones and stir until only just combined.

Finally, gently stir in the raspberries.

Spoon into muffin papers and bake for about 20 minutes, until a knife inserted comes out clean.

Enjoy!

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Muffin Inspiration

Like many parents around the world, I spend a large part of each Saturday attending my children's sports games. Currently, we have soccer, netball and basketball teams to cheer for and encourage.

While rising early on a wintry Saturday morning to stand outside in the cold is not one of life's greatest pleasures, it does at least become bearable if there is a hot drink to sip and something high in carbs to eat.

Some entrepreneurial chaps have sensibly decided that parents like me are an easy target and they drive their coffee van right into my son's school. They have an espresso machine in the back of the van and they sell muffins and doughnuts to eat.

Sucker that I am for an attractive muffin or cupcake, I succumbed and spent too much on a raspberry and chunky chocolate muffin. It looks fabulous doesn't it?


Unfortunately, the muffin was a disappointment. Apart from the raspberry jam and chocolate studding the top, the rest of the muffin was bereft of either flavouring and was just cake.

"I can do better than this", I thought. So I went home and started experimenting.

Come back tomorrow and I'll share my recipe for raspberry and chunky white chocolate muffins. Yum!

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