Entries from October 2008 ↓

Am wearing orange for Halloween today, again. Apparently others in the office might do so as well and there are quite a few rubber spiders and cobwebs draped around the place. I just get into it because of the orange really – not sure about the fake daggers and monster masks.

Some time later … eeeeeuuuuuw, our resident ‘Canteen Lady’ at work brought in finger cookies she baked for morning tea!

Here’s Brooke wearing her commissioned Xero cardie (see pink sleeve stripe for commissioner!) and really getting her teeth into Xero ha ha!

The twins and their pumpkins in Washington DC. They’re growing up fast.

Just feasted on a late lunch/early afternoon tea of date pinwheel scones – very successful! After playing with the mincer for the Xmas fruit mince we invented a kind of date paste (minced dates, golden syrup, milk, cinnamon) and spread it on a lightly cinnamonned scone dough.

We really were in new territory: the best scones I’ve made in Awakeri have been done so under the watchful eye of Mother, telling me “that’s enough” when I’m pouring in the milk with reckless abandonment and “that’s enough” when the ‘lightly knead the dough’ turns into some kind of squeeze-the-life-out-of-it-therapy and “that’s enough” when the ‘pat quickly into a round shape’ turns into some kind of carefully shaped sculpture – so when I had to roll the dough out thin and smooth enough so that we could spread the date paste and then get at least one revolution out of the dough I was nervous there would be no air left in the dough for them to rise.

No need to worry – I kept Mother’s words in my head the whole time and look! They turned out great And tasted very nice and sweet and datey and didn’t leave our mouths with scone horrors.

So perhaps we’ll be OK after all when there’s no more Nikau and I’m making scones every Sunday lunch!

So, this is our third year of doing Secret Santa style gift buying for one branch of the family. We set up the web-based Christmas Wish List that first year for everyone to log in to to record gift ideas to help out their Secret Santa. The drawing of who gets to be Santa for whom has been good old scraps of paper in a Tupperware container with the 6 of us taking turns at picking a name, throwing back our own or our spouse’s name.

This year we’re extending it to include the Washington family so the names-in-a-hat has become a bit more difficult. In the end, in manner of builder renovating their own kitchen, the Mister is writing (as we speak) a program that will randomly match a Santa and a recipient from the 8 names available, avoiding spouses or names already drawn and automatically emailing the name of the person you’re playing Santa to to the Santa’s address.

We could package and sell it! International Secret Santa!

So look out family … an email will be coming your way soon with “[NAME], you are Santa for …” (open the email to reveal the name randomly drawn for you).

Another great feast last night – the busiest Sunday so far and one of the other bar regulars sat with us so we chatted to him for a while. A retired chartered accountant … but we didn’t go there!

Sunday 3

Duck rilette with radishes & tangelo dressing
Pasta primavera
Seared herbed tuna with beetroot & green garlic aioli
Spanish cream with rhubarb & strawberry compote

(Rilette was served with chef’s homemade sour dour and was just delicious, like a posh chicken sandwich; pasta was DIVINE; tuna was way to raw for my liking; Spanish cream was very delicate and the strawberry mush with rhubarb bits was a new combo but lovely even though I was absolutely stuffed after the pasta course and really shouldn’t have gone on.)

Oh, and chef was very chuffed with my little jar of Xmas fruit mince – we’d labelled it using a bit of masking tape which is what we’ve seen them do in their kitchen.

When I work in the office at the weekend I pull up the Venetian blinds to let as much light in as possible – kind of makes me feel like I’m not really at work for some reason. I’m always intrigued by how cool the reflection of our building looks in the windows of the building across the road and with the blinds open today I’m getting a really good look at it. The oldness of the bank reflected in a modern building. You can also see some of the city rising up behind our old building.

Opened up the Cuisine that arrived a couple of days ago and was showered with loose leaf advertising tucked into it’s pages – heaps of it! Perhaps because it’s the Christmas issue, but c’mon, I want to read the magazine not all the bits of paper that are now all over the table and floor. Tucked inside were:

• Catalogue for Milly’s (kitchenware store) in Auckland … great … some of us don’t live in Auckland
• Mail order catalogue for New Zealand Nature … everything from clothes to books to monogrammed towels and souvenirs
• Wine Society order form
• Doubleday Book Club pamphlet
• Living and Giving store catalogue
• A postcard about Kapiti Aorangi Brie
• 2 Cuisine subscription order forms
• Cuisine Wine Country Magazine advert

That’s 9 bits of stuff!

Just jarred up the batch of fruit mince for this year that’s been soaking overnight in lots of brandy, orange and lemon juice. Fruit consistency is getting better from year to year as we hone our fruit mix and technique …

• 2006 was basically just a jumble of soaked fruit in jars – quite lumpy and we ended up with something like a raisin or 2 and bit of apricot in a pastry case with bits escaping out the side
• 2007 the Mister got a bit more involved and we cut up the fruit to make it a bit smoother and easier to fill pastry cases with
• This year – we used the great little suck-onto-the-bench mincer that M&D gave us for Christmas last year (I think Mother felt sorry for the Mister getting roped into making fruit mince, I mean what good kiwi bloke does that?, so gave *me* a mincer so I could do the women’s work myself) and the fruit got mushed to a proper mincey paste. Looks and smells goood. And the Mister was still involved – he wanted to turn the handle – it was quite hard to turn … needed a big strong man …

Now we’ll tuck the jars away until we get back early December. I’m not sure if you’re supposed to give real chefs food gifts but I’m going to take a jar to the Nikau chef. Just because she’s always cooking for us so this is a token doing something for her.

In celebration of Nikau life* and spring produce, they’re having 4 set Sunday night dinners with matched wine for regulars and friends of Nikau. I think we’re rather unique in that we signed up for all 4 dinners and have reserved our usual place at the bar.

It’s a complete mystery what’s on the menu for dinner – it’s set, and 4 courses. Not really my style as it’s unlikely to be mashed garlic potatoes followed by non-chocolate ice-cream however the owners have guessed I’m rather unadventurous with food choices – I suppose 4.5 years of nothing but date scones was a bit of a clue.

Anyway, we’ve enjoyed 2 Sunday dinners and 2 to go. There’ve been some ’strange’ things on offer but I’ve been very brave and sampled each course offered (and the Mister has had all my wine).

Sunday 1

Salted cod & potato ravioli with saffron broth
Artichoke, grapefruit & olive salad
Roast pork with baby turnips & asparagus
Strawberry semi fredo

(Ravioli was too fishy; artichokes OK but I prefer them mixed in with something (& don’t like olives); wasn’t too keen on the turnips; LOVED the semi fredo)

Sunday 2

Cured salmon, cauliflower, caper & sorrel salad
Asparagus, ricotta & marjoram sformato
Spring lamb, artichokes, mint, chard & skordalia
Tangelo & chemoya ices with coconut macaroons

(Salmon was especially for me, others had clams; sformato was GORGEOUS, licked the plate clean, so creamy and rich and asparagussy GOD IT WAS GOOOOD; lamb good but was getting full by this stage; tangelo sorbet was very orange but I couldn’t eat the chemoya one (custard apple), tasted a bit like I imagine a grandmother’s perfume would).

Still a bit nervous of the crayfish/curry or spicy/chocolate pudding arrangement …

* Good news is that they’ve managed to negotiate with the council or City Gallery to stay open until the weekend before Christmas so we don’t have to deal with the wrench as early as anticipated. Still no news of a temporary or alternative location for next year so I’m thinking we’ll boycott Wellington cafes for Sunday lunch and I’ll make date scones every Sunday myself until Nikau re-emerges.