Why Wellington is cool

Walking to the Sunday market, a circle of Falun Gong followers were seated on the grass in Aro Park doing their meditative exercises as plangent music played from a portable sound system. Beside them, in the Aro Valley community hall, the wonderful uplifting singing of an African evangelical church group rose to the heavens. A few steps on, at the fence of the play centre a young (non-Chinese) boy called ‘ni hao’, greeting a friend, a (Chinese) girl already playing inside.

After the market, where middle-aged Pakeha like me are a definite minority, we called into Le Moulin, the French-style bakery run by Cambodian migrants, for an oven-warm baguette and almond croissants.

The sun was shining, and I thought to myself, “isn’t Wellington an amazing city”. The monolingual, monocultural world of my childhood has long gone, the new New Zealand is a different place, and it’s almost possible to believe that Wellington really is the coolest little capital in the world!

Never again

When we moved into this house, one of the delights was discovering the  garden as the seasons unfolded. We were puzzled, that first summer, by tall leafy plants that L thought were sunflowers & I thought were possibly a type of salvia. Turns out we were both wrong. They’re Jerusalem artichokes.

And they’re edible.

But the question is: what to do with them? A recipe book said they need to be peeled, and the best way, apparently, is to boil these knobbly tubers and then peel the skin off. Well! It was like pulling the skin off dead squid. Time consuming, and not altogether pleasant. And enormous amounts of waste.

Never again, I thought. What an extraordinary thing to invest time in preparing. Unless someone can convince me otherwise.

Insomnia and ice cream

Doctors and what-have-you do tell us not to eat too much before bedtime, and experience has taught me to avoid coffee and (too much) chocolate at night, but now I’m adding something else to the list … rum raisins & prunes over ice cream!

I made and bottled this 2 or 3weeks ago, after seeing the recipe in a magazine. We’ve had it a couple of times now, and each time I’ve been wide awake until, well, after 4 a.m. the other night. Thank goodness for a good book.

It’s easy to make. Put 2 cups dark rum, a cup of sugar, & a cinnamon stick in a saucepan, simmer & stir till the sugar’s dissolved. Add a cup of prunes and a cup & a half of raisins to the liquid, bring back to a simmer. Then bottle, seal & refrigerate for a week before using.

It is yummy, and a damn sight better than the rum & raisin ice cream you buy in shops.

But now I think of it … we had this over chocolate ice cream. Maybe it’s not the sauce that has insomniac potential, after all.

Better experiment over vanilla ice cream … just to be sure!

A bouquet for Nikau

Heading off to meet a friend for lunch, I walked through Aro Park where, I discovered, they were having some sort of second-hand/local produce fair. Local produce in the inner city? Well, yes. Laila was selling her home made lemon curd & giving away sourdough starters + a recipe. I admire such generosity of spirit, & action. She even had the most delicious samples … a dollop of lemon curd with mascarpone in a small meringue basket. I can imagine cafes selling these for several dollars, but here she was, giving them away. I suppose I should have bought some of her lemon curd, but I already have two unopened jars in the pantry … ah well, maybe next weekend.

Anyway, also in Aro Park I bumped into the neighbour-from-across-the-road & in the midst of idle chatter asked, where can one go for lunch in the central city. And he said, Nikau. And I thought, but of course. Nikau used to be a regular haunt a few years back, but then it closed while work was being done on its parent building, the City Gallery. And I forgot all about it.

So,that’s where we headed for lunch. And it was good. Attentive waitrons, and my kedgeree rather yummy. Generous amounts of smoked fish – one of the sustainable varieties, too – and a wonderful creamy consistency to the dish.

I shall return.

Baked custard

Packing up a holiday house after a few days’ stay, especially at this time of the year when you know no-one else is likely to be in residence for some time, there’s always the question of what to do with the left-over food. After all, no-one can plan so well that there are no leftovers. Anyway, as I’m not in favour of the next person being greeted by exploding pots of yoghurt and mould-encrusted unidentifiables, I tend to use, take with me, or throw out. So, there was the question of the egg yolks remaining from the pav. And for something different, why not try a baked custard? A little egg-y to taste, but with whipped cream on a wintry night, very agreeable.

3 eggs

¼ cup sugar

2 cups milk, heated

½ tspn vanilla essence

pinch of nutmeg

In a saucepan, whisk eggs, sugar, heated milk & vanilla together. Pour into a 20cm pie plate. Sprinkle with nutmeg. Set pie plate in a shallow pan of water. Bake at 150 C for 1 hour or until set.  

This from the Edmonds’ Cookbook. I confess, I wasn’t sure what ‘heated’ milk meant. Luke-warm? Near boiling? Decided that it meant, to me, warmed until steaming slightly and the first vague suggestion of a skin forming, then I added the rest & whisked. Seemed to work okay. And a simpler way of using up yolks than crème brulée. Though not as delicious!

Le Canard

A birthday treat, a restaurant specialising in duck. It began on a high note, and swooped downwards. The entrée was very, very good … though perhaps would have been even better if served at room rather than fridge temperature. The main … well, with neither salt nor pepper on the table the message from the kitchen was clear … we season the food around here! And while I’m no salt fiend I did think this would have been improved with a tad more seasoning (though, of course, I didn’t ASK for the salt!). But all was not lost, dessert to come, profiteroles, impossible to go wrong with those. Unless of course you overcook the choux pastry! For some reason they decide to slice the profiteroles into pieces and arrange as swans around the balls of ice cream … cutesy on the plate, but I’d guess they bake them in their shapes. Not a smart idea. And, of course, as I’ve said before, dessert can make or break a meal. This evening’s meal didn’t inspire me to an early return to Le Canard.

LA PLANCHE DU CANARD A trio of duck liver mousse, rillettes and terrine of duck with fig and walnut

MAGRET DE CANARD SAUCE CASSIS Duck breast with blackcurrant sauce, braised red cabbage and bacon

PROFITEROLES AU CHOCOLAT Choux pastries, vanilla ice cream, hot chocolate sauce

Pavlova – the last word

Thank goodness for my own blog! Here we are, down the Sounds again, and I could read the signals … a pavlova was wanted.   But the recipe I’ve come to trust was in Wellington … this was the first one I used, the one contributed by S. Reynolds to, from memory, the Eastern Southland Hockey Association cookbook … I found that by drawing a 22 cm circle on a piece of moistened baking paper and making sure it all sat inside that, this gave a reliable result, especially if the oven was a little hotter than S. Reynolds suggested. Anyway, so I went online, found the recipe, then looked in the pantry … an electric egg beater, to make life easier; ordinary white sugar, no castor sugar; and a choice of vinegars – balsamic or white wine. Balsamic didn’t seem to be the go (though it might have been interesting). And so I swung into action. With success. Though, to be fair, I’ve a very broad definition of success … we’re not the most discerning of pavlova consumers!

But anyway, this will be my LAST word on pavlovas. Promise.

Tiramisu

Has been ages since we entertained, but now that I’m back in the country it’s time to be a bit more hospitable. So, friends for dinner on the weekend and as usual going for an Italian-themed meal. I don’t know what it is, but there’s something about Italian food that I like. Actually, I do know! It’s the colours, and the flavours, and the redolence of summer. So, we had …

… not Italian, but great colour & flavour, Silver Palate’s minted pea & spinach soup

… beef stew with red wine

… and a second Gabriella Rossi recipe, her tiramisu. The real thing, with mascarpone instead of whipped cream. Here it is, slightly adapted.

3 eggs, separated

450 gms mascarpone, at room temperature

3 tbspn caster sugar

½ tspn vanilla essence

½ cup brandy (or coffee flavoured liqueur)

18 sponge fingers

dark chocolate

Whisk egg whites till stiff peaks form. In a separate large bowl mix mascarpone, sugar, vanilla & egg yolks until evenly combined. Fold in egg whites. Spread some of mix in bottom of a large serving bowl.

Mix coffee and brandy together in a shallow dish. Dip a sponge finger in the mix, turn quickly – aim for saturated rather than sodden. Place on top of the mascarpone mix in the bowl. Add another 5 dipped sponge fingers. Add a layer of mascarpone mix. Add another layer of dipped sponge fingers. And repeat.

Cover & chill overnight. Before serving, grate generous amounts of dark chocolate over top. Serve, and watch disappear.

Blokes’ chicken

Not quite sure what to call this dish … I think I copied it into a notebook from a newspaper supplement that was talking about food that blokes could cook, or perhaps it was food that blokes would like to eat. Whatever. It meets all my prerequisites – simple to make, limited ingredients, and good taste. So here goes …

Preheat oven to 200 C. Dry a chicken (I used size 14, free range) and season with salt & pepper, stuff with fresh thyme (happily we have a (now somewhat denuded) thyme hedge). In a cast iron casserole, heat 1 tbspn olive oil & 1 tbspn butter. Then add the chicken and brown on all sides.

Once the chicken is suitably browned (and it does brown beautifully), pour ½ cup white wine, ½ cup chicken stock & ½ cup cream over. Cover, put in oven, and cook for 50 minutes, basting twice. 

After 50 minutes, add baby carrots & baby turnips (well, I couldn’t find any in the supermarket & used quartered parsnips instead; it’s the size of the veggies you add rather than the variety that matters). Re-cover, and cook for a further 15 minutes. By which time the veggies will be cooked.

Transfer the chicken & veggies to a serving dish to rest. Reduce the juices a little, if necessary, over a high heat, check seasoning, spoon over the chicken.

And, for an easy, special-looking, mid-week meal, this takes some beating.

Pork chops, Modena style

Waikanae was a surprise. I’d imagined Zimmer frames and mobility scooters, but nary a one in sight. The resident population’s more retirement village than rest home, it seems, and the place much more attractive than I’d imagined. Leafy, quiet, affluent streets. And, of course, if you drive to the coast there’s the black sand beach and in the distance the striking silhouette of Kapiti Island. Afterwards it struck me as extraordinary that I’ve passed through Waikanae countless times, but never once turned off SH1 to have a look. And if it wasn’t for friends having shifted there, I still wouldn’t have.

Anyway, they were there, and we went to stay. And for dinner the most delicious pork loin braised in milk. From a Marcella Hazan cook book. Afterwards John sent us the recipe, and another. Here’s the other. We had it a couple of nights after I returned from Kiribati. Oh, it was delicious! And, even better, easy. So here it is – braised pork chops with sage & tomatoes, Modena style.

25 gms butter

1 tbspn olive oil

4 pork loin chops flour

6 – 8 fresh sage leaves

salt

black pepper

1 tin chopped Italian plum tomatoes (the recipe called for a 200 gm tin, but I used a 425 gm tin without ill effects)

In a pan that can hold all the chops without overlapping, put butter & oil with heat at medium-high. When the butter foam begins to subside, turn the chops on both side sin flour on a plate, shake off excess and put in pan with sage leaves. Cook for about 1 ½ – 2 minutes each side. Add salt, freshly ground pepper, tomatoes. Leave to simmer on a low heat, covered with lid slightly askew, for about an hour. Turn chops occasionally. Spoon sauce (reduced a little if too thin) over chops. Yummy!