Tussock Jumper - a label leads to ...
"Jump around the wine world" Last night we had this rather nice - not wow I guess - but very pleasant bottle of wine. We think somebody gave it to us. Thank you whoever you are because it's led me to a rather interesting concept in the wine world. I always look at the back of wine labels - partly to find out what I'm supposed to be tasting because I really don't have a disciminating palate. Our friend Stephen George - a more than reputable winemaker - - in the Adelaide Hi
3 days ago
Cooking in a mood
"Cooking is sorcery. Some days we desperately need its magic." Bim Adewunmi/The Guardian 'In a mood'. When we say that, we generally mean in a bad mood of some kind, not a good one - but the phrase technically belongs to both. This post is 'inspired' if that's the right word - 'stimulated' is probably more accurate - by a sad text conversation with a friend going through a bad time who in the course of the conversation said: "the process of cooking will occupy my scattered
4 days ago
Two quotes and a phone call
"A person buying ordinary products in a supermarket is in touch with his deepest emotions" John Kenneth Galbraith I've had that quote from John Kenneth Galbraith in my Ideas list for a long time. I wasn't quite sure what Galbraith meant, and I suspect, being an economist, that he wasn't really thinking the same things as have come to my attention today, from the phone call from a friend. There is so much to say about supermarket labels, and I know I have said lots of them
5 days ago
Liver and onions - ugh?
"There is rarely a middle ground with liver. Either you've turned the page already, or you're a devotee who gets excited about the idea of the exceptionally savoury exterior of a piece of flash-fried or chargrilled liver and its almost jelly-like flesh." Nigel Slater So true, and I'm willing to bet that when you see that title, signalling that this post is about liver, you will go no further. But I'm going to be true to my lucky dip rules, for this is a lucky dip post. Ran
6 days ago
A British classic - custard tart
"This is not a dessert that can be rushed, either in the execution or the enjoyment." Felicity Cloake This is sort of a postscript to my look at Delia classics. As I was flipping through her books I came across this in book one of Delia's How to Cook, which she calls Old-fashioned English custard tart. I had such a rush of nostalgia when I saw this picture for we sometimes had them at home. I say 'them' because, of course, you can get individual ones as well as large ones
7 days ago
Some Delia classics
"They are not so much the recipes that people dream over; this is the stuff they actually cook." Nigel Slater Indeed they do - as I did yesterday for my older son's birthday party. I made her Piedmont roasted peppers as part of an antipasti spread. I did cut out the stems - against her advice not to because: "they're not edible, but they do look attractive and they help the pepper halves to keep their shape." Well I was cooking for twelve and had decided to cut my large Au
Aug 3