Early Anzac biscuits

Next Friday I leave for Japan for 3 weeks, which will be very exciting, but it means I will miss out on Anzac Day. April 25, 1915, was the date that the Australia and New Zealand Army Corps (ANZAC) troops landed in Gallipoli, Turkey. It was the first Australian and New Zealand involvement in World War I. During this time I like to bake Anzac biscuits. There are several ideas about how Anzac biscuits came about, but basically they're crunchy, well keeping biscuits that were eaten - and later sold by - the Anzacs.

This is my mother's recipe for Anzac biscuits:

75 g rolled oats
125 g sugar
70 g desiccated coconut
120 g wholemeal flour
2 tbsp golden syrup
1 tsp bicarbonate of soda
40 ml boiling water
125 g butter, melted

• Preheat oven to 160 C.
• Mix oats, sugar, coconut and flour together.
• Combine the golden syrup and boiling water. Add the bicarbonate of soda, followed by the butter. Stir until frothy and then add to the dry ingredients. Mix until well combined.
• Spoon onto greased baking sheets, making sure there is plenty of room for them to spread. Bake for 15 mins.

Walnuts

The walnuts have been falling from our walnut tree and I'm still very excited! Walnuts are definitely one of my favourite foods and I generally just eat them as is. I'd love to cook more with them, but as a young boy Gib ate so many he made himself ill on them and doesn't really like eating them now...


I love roasting nuts though. I get a bag of mixed nuts (about 250 g) and put them in a bowl. I mix in 2 tbsp olive oil, 2 tbsp brown sugar or honey and then select some spices to add depending on whether I want to go more sweet or savoury or both: Cinnamon, mixed spice, cumin, chili, paprika, tumeric or some other generic spice blend that I have in the pantry at the time (Moroccan, Mexican, Indian... they all taste good). You can't really fail with this: no matter what combination of spices you put in it's going to taste great. Quantities are approximate, but I tend to use 1/2 tsp of each spice (or 1/4 tsp chili), or if I'm using a spice blend, 2-3 tbsp. Roast on a tray at 180C for 15 mins, giving them a bit of a shake/turn over with a spatular half way through.

A delicious dessert

This recipe came out of the Herald Sun City Style lift out yesterday. (Much to my delight, the liftout also also featured meet me at mikes and other "cool crafters" around Melbourne!).

It worked out quite well, but was a little mushy on the bottom. A small portion was left the next day, and some of the gooeyness on the bottom had seem to be absorbed. Maybe the cooking temperature needs to be adjusted for next time?

Apple roll cake

1.5 tbsp butter
1/2 cup sugar
1 small egg, whisked
2 cups self raising flour
1/2 cup milk
1 400g tin of pie apple (but I used 200 g pie apple and 200 g tinned strawberries)
1 1/2 tsp cinnamon

Preheat oven to moderate.
Cream butter and sugar until pale & fluffy
Add egg, beat well
Sift in flour, mix alternatively with milk.
Turn mixture out onto a floured bench and kneed until smooth
Cut in half and roll out one half onto baking paper in a rectangle, 5 mm thick. Spread with the fruit and cinnamon.
Roll out remaining pastry and press, particularly around the edges.
Bake for 20 mins or until the pastry is golden brown (see below!).

I should probably have got a photo of the insides too, but I was too busy eating it and forgot... oopsies... but you can get an idea if you look at the bottom left corner and see a bit of apple poking through... delicious. Will definitely make this one again.

Look what we found!

I was helping my mother clean out her craft room. It's a large task, as there are many years of crafting and craft books to sort through (as is always the case when you decide to organise a craft room). We're making considerable donations to the local Salvos and Freecycle!

Here are just two of our great finds so far:

The Golden Circle 'Tropical recipe book'.
I couldn't belive my mum owns this book. It was published in 1962 and I think it was my grandmother's originally. This meal has whatever meal you can possibly think of and adds pineapple to it. There's spaghetti with meat sauce tropical (which is literally spag bog with... pineapple.) Rissoles with pinepple. Kidneys with pineapple. Liver and bacon with pineapple. Macaroni cheese and pineapple. Shepherd's pie with pineaaple. And then there's a recipe called "Sweet and pungent lamb". It just never ends! But some of the desserts sound intrigueing... I'm tempted to try some out, like the frangipani pie, which appears to be like a lemon meringue pie but with a coconut cream layer (ohhh yum). The pineapple chocolate cheesecake doesn't do much for me though... hrmm.

The Three Golliwogs - by Enid Blyton.
Oh yes! It's certainly politically incorrect in places, and most of the stories seem to revolve around the same plot of people getting confused because all three gollies look the same. This one will be a keeper. Love it!

Aprons!

I really hate washing. Well, it's not the washing I hate, it's the bit where I have to hang stuff on the line, and then unpeg them again. It's just that you have to have your arms up in the air all the time: walk over to the peg basket hanging on the line, grab some pegs, peg your clothes, walk back again... I feel like a gibbon! And my arms get tired! So I can give my arms some relief I made a peg apron with some cute fabric I picked up at the Salvos in Oakleigh today. I got the fabric free with a bunch of other stuff I bought. In the photos below, it's quite obvious just how short I am!

To make your own peg apron:

1. Cut out three rectangles of fabric for the backing, lining and pocket: 12" x 24". Cut 2 x 28" long strips of twill tape for the ties. I cut my backing from a canvas drop sheet I bought from the local hardware store.
   
2. From the pocket material, get a large dinner plate and trace around 1/4 of the plate on each side to mark the pockets. Cut the pockets out and sew bias binding along these edges.
3. Layer your fabric pieces: lining, pocket piece, canvas. Insert the twill tape 1" from the top of each side, so that they are pinned between the lining and the canvas. Pin down the rest of the sides, leaving a 10cm gap along the bottom edge, where you will turn the aprong the right way out.
4. Sew along all 4 edges, except for your 10cm gap. Clip the corners, turn your apron the right way out.
   
5. Iron your apron, particularly along the edges so that they sit flat! Sew up your 10cm gap with an invisible stitch and you're done!
   

Here is another apron I finished off a bit earlier in the week. It's for a friend's engagement present. She does karate and loves cooking (much like me!) so I thought I'd go with a bit of an oriental flavour for her apron. It's reversible too (pattern from Lotta Jansdotter's Simple Sewing book). I'm in the process of making her some matching oven mitts to go with it. The chopsticks are machine appliqued, the noodles are white ribbon with a stitch down the middle to keep them in place, and the pocket is lined with a white, light cotton fabric, and then zig-zag stitched around the side and bottom of the bowlto keep it in place.

With all of this apron making, I think I should sign up for the next sassy apron swap...

Reds and oranges

Yesterday I participated in the Run for the Kids (see sidebar) and what an exciting event it was! So many people were wearing red event tshirts! It was such a wonderful day. So many people out there supporting the Royal Children's Hospital and the terrific work that they do. It was just amazing to run with so many people around me! ~27,000 other people in fact! They raised AU$750,000 for the hospital.


And then afterwards I popped by the Oakleigh Market and found a chili plant for only $4! What a bargain. Gib has been totally hooked on chilis of late so this was a great find. A fig tree was also purchased at the same time, so hopefully I will have some delicious fresh figs to eat soon enough! I'm not really sure where I'm going to plant that one though...

I have new red shoes! They're kind of clog like, kind of elf shoe like, and a little bit Wizard of Oz. I love them to bits. They're just so cute! I got them from this place in Glen Waverley called "On a shoestring". I love their shoes - so many interesting designs that you don't see anywhere else... and they're cheap (hence the name).

I picked up this little padded orange thingy for the kitchen in an op shop. I don't actually know what you do with it because it isn't heat resistant and it's quite small but it's cute as!

And finally I have made a very small start on my doona cover that I'm going to make out of the fabrics I picked up from the vintage Japanese fabric warehouse. I just like looking at the colours, really. Reds, oranges, yellows and green. I think I need some indigo in there too. I'll pick that up on my next trip there!

Chocolate and banana loaf

Gib's mum made this tonight. YUMMO!

250 g plain flour
20 g cocoa powder
2 tsp baking powder
120 g butter, softened
130 g raw sugar
2 large eggs
2 very large bananas (~500 g), mashed
60 g shredded coconut
80 g dark choc chips

Preheat oven to 175 C, fan forced
Sift combined flour, cocoa and baking powder.
Beat butter and sugar until light and fluffy.
Add eggs one at a time, making sure each egg is combined before adding the next. Mix in banana.
Fold in flour, then coconut and chocolate chips. Mix until well combined.
Grease a loaf pan (22 x 12 cm) and line the base with baking paper. Spoon mix into the pan.
Bake for 60-65 mins or until the insides are cooked.

Oh gosh...

It's been over a week since my last entry... oopsies! I had intended to post an entry about baking hot cross buns but they were quite a failure and not really worth mentioning...

I've been hanging out over in Adelaide with Gib's relatives. We were staying with his grandmother who is an absolute champ. I want to be as fit and cool as her when I am a grandmother!! She also had a pair of adorable oven mitts that fit my tiny little hands perfectly! And what's more, they had a gorgeous owl print on the outer layer of fabric. So I took a trace and will have a go at making it this weekend. Will let you know how that goes.

Taste Sensation: Fresh Pie

So Gib and I were in the supermarket and we saw this: Fresh Pie. It looked neither fresh nor pie-like and so this was to be our next Taste Sensation. The whole packaging just screamed Taste Sensation!


The outside of the "pie" kind of like foam rubber with a thin plastic coating. Not appealing to me so far and definitely not "fresh" at all. But upon eating the texture was far better than I anticipated! Quite light and fluffy and not entirely foam tasting, it blended well with the mock cream with raspberrry/strawberry conserve. But even Gib, who regularly scoffs down vast quantities of highly processed foods, struggled with the sweetness of these little things. I cannot impart upon you just how incredibly sweet these were. But, as promised, you could actually taste the strawberry and raspberry combination. I think during those times of extreme sugar cravings, these are a definite "yes" to buy again. This was a Taste Sensation success!

Pickled onions!

I made these at Christmas time and have just opened them, and I have to say, they taste delicious. It's all about that bright red chili you can see there and the honey used in the pickling mixture. The weather has been so damn hot that I haven't really bothered to do anything other than eat pickled onions and drink beer -- gosh, I sound like such a bogan. I saw some pickling onions on special for $1.50 for 2kg (only at Oakleigh market) and I'm inspired to make more. Hmm, I should post the recipe for these so I don't have to keep going through the random pile of recipes that I have written out on scraps of paper to find it. I have tried many pickled onion recipes, but this one delivers consistently fantastic results for me.

A goat from the hills

My friend, Kat, who I gave that kitsch 70's picture to (she adored it), picked me up Saturday morning for a drive to the hills, about 30 mins east of Melbourne. There's a puppet shop on the main street of Sassafrass, called Geppetto's Workshop. I always loved puppets as a kid - there was always something magical about them. Even if I saw the hand go into the puppet, my mind didn't really want to believe that that puppet hadn't just become real on its own! I do have a decent puppet collection of my own now, mostly consisting of bugs and creepy crawlie puppets, but when I saw this guy, how could I resist?


He's just adorable and is currently sitting next to me watching TV. But my new goat friend needs a name.

The company that makes these beautiful puppets is Folkmanis. I'm constantly amazed at the intricies and precise anatomical details they put into their puppets. They have just SO MANY puppets you can choose from - if you can think of an animal (real or mythical!), Folkmanis have made it. They're such beautiful, high quality puppets, and given their standard, the prices aren't outrageous either.

Hippo - complete!

So I'm a bit delayed in typing this up. I've been in the process of moving back to our bungalow and haven't really had my computer set up. It's been a slow process getting set up again. Really our bungalow is a shed. A nice, insulated, carpeted room, with a lovely window and pateo area... but still it's a shed nonetheless. And it's been 30-40ºC outside pretty well all week. Not really weather for getting a shed organised.

But anyway, here will be a week's worth of catching up.

I did in fact finish the hippo. I finished him Saturday morning and I have to say I was quite pleased with the result. I reckon the total amount of time to make him, from start to finish, would have been the equivalent of a weekend (and that's including the time I took to stand around and just stare at the pattern pieces, wondering how I'd ever get it finished). I can say in retrospect it really wasn't worth my worrying. It turned out to be quite a simple project to do. The only hassle was the size and bulk of the project, but I had a big table to work on so it wasn't too bad.

Procrastination

I'm starting my PhD next week and wont have as much time on my hands, so today is my final day of freedom. I'm about to head over to the post office to pick up the paperwork for a new passport. I hope to attend many conferences during my PhD and also do some non-PhD related training overseas in Japan. It's a hassle getting a passport done, and I've been procrastinating about it for some time, but today is the day I'm going to get it sorted!

But the REAL reason why I'm getting my passport sorted is because I'm actually procrastinating about finishing this damn hippopotamus. It's really not that hard, but all of the bits are really getting to me. I've nearly done all of the applique and I'm now down to "putting it together". So I'm now up to the bit that requires working with 4 layers of batting and that isn't so fun. The baby is due today and that alone should be motivating me to get it finished. There's all the stress over "what if she doesn't like it?" "what if it ends up looking really dodgy?" "what if... err... I don't know...". I'm relying on the baby being late.

I don't think I want to give him his ears just yet... he'll hear all of my cursing!

I'm also sorting out my fat quaters and scraps at the moment (see? I'd rather organise fabric than sew this hippo) and found some cute little Japanese dinosaur and robot fabric that I'll turn into some little shoes for another friend's baby. So while I'm getting my passport paperwork I'll try to find some suede or leather too.

I'm thinking that even by typing this post, I'm procrastinating about all of the tasks above... I'm at the end of my post now. Better get cracking!

Vintage Japanese fabrics

I spent yesterday hanging out with my mother in Richmond. Specifically, we went to Ziguzagu, a direct-to-the-public warehouse that sells Japanese vintage fabrics, kimonos and Japanese antiques. We spent absolutely ages in there! It was so hard deciding what to buy - there was so much beautiful stuff there. It was all excellently priced too and the scrap bins had a lot to offer. The best part for me was I discovered they give 15% student discounts on fabric and kiminos! Apparently they're getting a massive shipment in and they told me it will be well worth my while coming back in 2 weeks. I don't need to be told twice!

I have decided with the fabrics that I bought that I will make a new doona cover.

What a weekend!

Sassy apron arrival!
My Sassy Apron arrived last Friday! I was absolutely delighted and it came at the best time for me as I did end up having to say goodbye to my little furry friend. I was so excited. Fiona, who created my apron, was kind enough to add some fat quarters in with the apron too! I love the apron: the fabric is so happy and the pocket is nice and deep. I only have a photo of the apron, but not what it looks like on yet. I need to find someone to take the photo! The pumpkin soup recipe she included was used for the remaining half of the pumpkin that my friend gave me the other day.

In the garden...
Saturday I introduced my mother to Kuranga Native Plant Nursery in York st, Mt Evelyn. We came home with about many plants, so Sunday afternoon was spent in the sunshine planting them. Most of the plants we bought are found along a nearby creek and nature reserve, so not only are they native to the area but should survive well in our garden:

Pomaderris prunifolia
Olearia glandulosa
Pomaderris aspera
Goodenia ovata
Bauera rubioides

Gib and my mother, with the Kuranga cafe in the background (they do they BEST coffee and food!)

Our garden is either sand or clay, and our front garden is in a lot of shade thanks to a rather large camphor laurel (a horrid weed in Australia, but my dad is quite attached to it). This one was kind of cute, coloquially known as "pussy tails", and it grows in Melbourne's western plains. I think I'll grow up in a pot. I love feeling the flowers... they're so furry! I'm really developing a thing for furry plants.

The Bauera rubioides grows dainty little pink flowers and is said to be quite a robust little plant, so that one will be planted in memory of Mobius.

Great op shop find!
On the way to Kuranga Nursery we found this great little op shop in Heathmont, of all places. I've just been introducing Gib to the joys of op shopping and after this expedition he is totally sold on them! I was astounded that I found a black tshirt that fitted me there. I'm 4'11" and can't ever find clothes in regular shops, but miraculously I have more luck in op shops. I also found this fantastic, horridly kitch picture which I know my friend Kat will adore! The colours are absolutely wonderful. I'm catching up with her on Saturday, but it's taking all my strength not to just blab to her about it now. I want to keep it as a surprise (because aren't surprises fun?!).