magnolia jam

As you may have picked up from my recent posts, I've become rather enamoured of magnolias lately. I feel like I'm seeing them everywhere at the moment but especially in a few key locations where I often need a beautiful pick me up (on the way to work; on the way to the hospital). I feel like they're such a hopeful flower - blooming as they do at the end of Winter and early Spring on naked branches, gradually making way for green sprouting leaves.

If only I could cook up and bottle magnolias as jam, to savour them on toast in the morning, to literally consume the hopefulness they hold for me. Instead I thought perhaps homemade strawberry jam might be a fair substitute, especially as the strawberries seem to be exploding with brightness and flavour at the moment. There is something about the idea of ingesting bold colours that is appealing to me, something intrinsically nourishing and life affirming. And besides, I've never made strawberry jam before. In fact I never even used to like it. I don't know why, perhaps it was because growing up we were more of an apricot jam household. But the strawberries are demanding my attention at the moment and so to strawberry fields of jam we go.

Sally Wise, as usual, was my go to for this one and she makes it pretty simple and straightforward, which is always a nice way to go.

Strawberry Jam
Adapted from Sally Wise

500g strawberries, hulled
3/4 tsp tartaric acid
1/4 cup of water
500g sugar

Chop the strawberries roughly and place in a medium saucepan with the tartaric acid and water.  Bring to the boil and simmer gently for 10 minutes.  Add the sugar and stir until dissolved.  Bring the jam to the boil and boil over medium heat for 20 minutes. Keep an eye on it though. If you have a raging hot gas burner like I do, you may want to lower down the heat or take it off the stove a bit earlier. My jam ended up quite caramelised, which was good but might not be what you're going for.

Pour into sterilised bottles and seal immediately. Then enjoy on toast or stirred through yogurt or with fresh strawberries, gingerbread biscuits and mascarpone (as we did with my Mum on Tuesday night) or however you like it.

Just before we go, here a few interesting facts about magnolia which I discovered during my travels and which further reinforce my enjoyment of this rather amazing plant:
- Magnolia evolved before bees appeared
- the aromatic bark contains magnolol and honokiol, two polyphenolic compounds that may have demonstrated anti-anxiety properties
- in parts of Japan, the leaves of magnolia obovata are used for wrapping food and as cooking dishes.

So there you go: beautiful, hopeful and useful - qualities I think can safely apply to jam as well.

I wasn't the only one to make jam this month.
To see what all the lovely cooking club members made, do stop by their places below.

Lucent Imagery (cooking club founder)
From River's Edge
Down by the Sea
Explody Full
Chi Garden
Under Lock and Key
Adventures of the Ordinary
Christa to the Max

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made, read, heard, saw

Happy Friday!

Firstly, I wanted to say thank you for all your very thoughtful responses to my other side post.  Knowing that you are out there is a constant source of delight and inspiration! 

On the subject of things enjoyable and inspiring, the week in review:

1. Made these zucchini quesadillas and can highly recommend you do the same. I think my technique may have been a little bit suspect - I basically cooked up the filling in one pot and then lay the tortilla on a warm pan, put cheese on top then filling, then tortilla and then thought 'How the hell do I get these this out of the pan without making a colossal mess?' I ended up cutting the circle down the middle with a knife/ spatula then gently flipped the half circles on top of themselves to form quarters. It worked, sort of. Tasty though.

I also made a damn lot of crumbles. Apple crumble, strawberry crumble with chocolate, breakfast crumble (essentially leftover crumble from the night before with milk added). 

2. Read Haruki Marukami's interview in the Paris Review and was immediately inspired to finish my top drawer half-finished novel and simultaneously start on another, also to start up running again.  I think I need to re-read What I talk about when I talk about running. There is something very reassuring and inspiring about Murakami's routines and quiet persistence.

3. Listened to Carl Sagan's message to the Mars explorers and got a bit teary.

4. Watched Maira Kalman reading her work on identity, happiness and existence and nodded vigorously in agreement with many of her wonderful words and ideas. If you haven't come across her yet, check her out, you'll be glad you did.

And that is all for now, have a wonderful weekend!

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a childhood favourite

So long Maurice Sendak.

I remember fondly his books from when I was little and loved rediscovering them again as an adult. His philosophies on living and writing are humbling and enduring. A true master-storyteller and human.

"I've convinced myself — I hope I'm right — that children despair of you if you don't tell them the truth."

These interviews with him are a wonderful way of preserving his ideas. Have a listen and be reminded how precious this thing called life is.


[The picture was taken on our 2010 trip to Japan, where we saw Where the Wild Things Are]

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listing towards inspiration

When I was a kid I used to love going over to friends' houses for dinner because I would get to eat from a whole new playbook of meals. As much as I loved my Mum's cooking, I was pretty familiar with the usual range of meal options and there was something exciting about seeing and tasting someone else's take on things.

Lately, I've become a bit tired of my own meal playbook. There's been plenty of fine soups and stews and salads but nothing that's got me really excited. Nothing that has prompted Kristian to say, 'You should add this one to the regular rotation.' Part of this may be to do with my general fly-by-the-seat-of-my-pants take on cooking, especially for dinner. Often, I just take a bunch of ingredients out of the fridge or cupboard and they get assembled into something or other, based on what's at hand. This, incidentally was also my mother's most common (and best) cooking strategy when I was little. The other one was usually to ask me for inspiration as the car pulled into the local grocery store and I'd list off: sausages, meatballs, peanut chicken - you know, the classics.

Since we've moved house, I've temporarily (I hope) lost some of my food bearings.  Perhaps it's that I'm wanting to establish some new routines in the new place, to welcome in this new home with more honest and simple fare.  Bizarrely, despite living with Kristian for four years, I've also felt a strange domesticated urge since we got engaged to amp it up in the kitchen, to establish some new classic meals, which we can call our own.

So, with all this in mind, I've been compiling a list of things to cook in the new place.  I am trying to be honest about it, not putting down fancy stuff because it looks good or seems like something I should make but rather reminding myself of the food that gets my taste buds whirring. The good stuff. At the moment it reads:

chickpea and tomato salad
kumara and black bean soup with guacamole
something with pickles (roast beef?)
smashed baked potato with peas and bacon
tuna patties with yogurt dressing
ricotta pancakes
salsa
grilled cheese and avocado sandwiches
garlicky green beans
meatballs in sauce
spinach soup
curried squash
frittata with caramelised onions
roast chicken and coleslaw
lamb tagine

And, having written it, I'm already feeling a hint of excitement, mixed with lashings of hunger.  The list is going up on the fridge quick sticks, next to the wine vouchers for Camperdown Cellars and I have a feeling it's going to be a bit of a saviour over the next few uncertain weeks ahead. 

I've recently discovered some folk with inspiring thoughts around this idea:-
~ Astrid's dinner project
~ This book
~ The Yellow House post on information overload versus home cooking. Very well worth a read.

Do you have any particular favourite meals you like to make at home or reliable classics you fall back on? I'd love to know.

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an abode to abide in

We're moving house!

After a few weekends of walking around the inner west checking out places for rent, getting stressed and excited in equal measure and mentally moving into every second place we saw, we've found a house to live in!

Now I’m trying to avoid thinking about packing by fantasizing about all the great furniture I'm going to find to fill it with. I'll put up some pics of the place soon, once it's looking pretty.


1. Illustration by Chun Eun Sil
2. Kristian's Hut Lights


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inspiration

Spring has finally sprung and in the spirit of the season I've been on a tidying and clearing out blitz around the house.  It's been wonderfully cathartic. I've thrown away stuff I've been holding onto for years (old Christmas cards, cassette tapes from the 80s - the bad, embarrassing ones, school assignments and... even some cookbooks!

I was inspired by my friend Gianna, who told me all about her pre-three-month-world-tour packup.  When sorting through her belongings she asked herself the question, "Does this have a role in my future life?" If it did, it stayed, if not then it was turfed. I found it to be a wonderfully effective way of dealing with the reflective, sentimental items that we (I) tend to keep.

So with this in mind, the other night I finally got up the courage and stamina to tackle my pile of Gourmet Travellers and Delicious Magazines. I cued up some bad TV and got ripping. The result was primarily a lot less bulk on my cookbook shelf but secondly, and more interestingly, a distillation of the food I'm  drawn to make and eat at the moment, namely: coleslaw, salads featuring apples or figs or nuts, anything with lemon and lemon on everything, halloumi with watermelon, tacos tacos tacos,  skewered things, ceviche and juicy tomato salads with basil and balsamic.

The last picture is a little experiment of mine with lemon curd (very loosely adapted from this recipe) and inspired by a visit to Newtown's Black Star Pastry. 

Hope you have a lovely weekend ahead!

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smakfulle øyeblikk

It's been a little (long) while since I stuck my head out here and said hello... so hello there and hope things are going well with you.

As for me, I've been keeping busy - making salads and birthday cakes, running and reading (lots) but also suffering a mild case of bloggers block. Now and again the internet (and the world at large) can get a touch overwhelming and it's in those moments you sometimes need to take a break to refocus, to find the joy in small things again.

I think Meryl Streep said it rather well in the movie Adaptation:

There are too many ideas and things and people. 
Too many directions to go. 
I was starting to believe the reason it matters to care passionately about something, is that it whittles the world down to a more manageable size. 

Still, sometimes it just takes making a simple cake or a rocket salad or snapping a photo or even a great phrase to get you back on the horse so to speak.

The other day I discovered the wonderfully onomatopoeia-ish phrase smakfulle øyeblikk on this great blog. It's Norwegian for tasteful moments. And my word it's those tasteful moments that you've got to savour. They're not always the big brash momentous occasions you think will be important but the quiet spaces where you feel unexpected peace - in the kitchen, on the phone, in the garden, reading a good book, holding hands. Those words acted like a smack to the head, a whimsical nudge back into the land of here.

So, whilst I'm here, a few things I've been enjoying of late:
Inspiring questions;
This book;
Salads, specifically those featuring rocket, walnuts, parmesan, apple and balsamic - our rough and ready take on the great waldorf;
Inspiring lessons in creativity.

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food for friday

I've discovered the picturesque wonderfulness of pinterest food boards and so has my stomach.

I think I'm not alone in eating with my eyes but heavens it's becoming a bakelust expedition every time I go on there now. I've started a little file there called eat and have been enjoying adding some of my favourite things. Pinterest is also a strange and fascinating world to browse when it comes to food.  You might find something beautiful and inspiring or something truly bizarre. There are some scarily over the top sugary creations on there let me tell you.

It's also interesting to see patterns in what you pin and from where. At the moment for me it's vegetables and green things of the pesto type variety, lemon and bagels. I'm finding lots of good things on some of my frequent go-to sites for inspiration - roost, green kitchen stories, sprouted kitchen, simply breakfast and whole larder love.

Happy pinning and happy friday!

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quiet and simple

I think with everything you like to do, sometimes there is a reluctance, a need for freshness or new inspiration. Even with cooking, I sometimes feel stuck in a rut, and uninclined to get my hands dirty.  In these moments, I often just enjoy the beautiful, quiet moments at the table with something simple: a piece of sweet fruit, a cup of strong tea to accompany a good book. Yesterday, I enjoyed a luscious pink grapefruit and quite a nice one it was too. I think it was the first grapefruit I've voluntarily sought out since a bad experience in Italy when I was about 8. Incredible how the mind holds onto food related memories.

In that vein and because I need some travelling vistas to jazz me up today, here are a few other food related travel moments from the last few years : 

2006 - A hilltop cafe in Austria and an odd but delicious coffee-milk ratio in Switzerland
2007 - The New Years Day queue for Schwartz's  beef and pickle sandwiches in Montreal
2008 - Exploring the lanes in Melbourne
2009/10 - Homemade waffles in Tokyo


Have you got any favourite travel food memories? I'd love to know.