dish 12) jamie oliver's chicken/potato roast

Well actually the recipe is called "Crispy and sticky chicken thighs with squashed new potatoes and tomatoes"... a little long don't you think? Anyway I was at the Grand Final BBQ last Saturday and the 'Jamie at Home' cookbook was open to this page on the bench:

Josh and I were drooling a little at the sight of it... after all it was 3pm and we hadn't had lunch! I knew that I had the same book at home so I made the dish last night for Josh and a vegan version for Hayden for when they got back from band practice at 10pm! Here's mine:

It lost some of the lovely green flecks in the cooking process, but I swear to you, it was orgasmic! I covered it in olive oil, salt and pepper, thyme, rosemary, a little basil, lemon juice, red wine vinegar and threw a few unpeeled garlic cloves in for good measure. They are really yummy cooked like that! Everything was crispy on the outside but soft and fluffy on the inside. We all chowed down in silence except for the occasional "mmmm!!!" or "yum!", it was nuts! Haven't had a success like that since ratatouille or the re-make of the frozen chili con carne. Josh was so cute, he said "You really have a flair in the kitchen!" and i knew he was being sincere and complimentary but it did sound slightly 50's husband-ish so I told him to pat my fanny next time he says that. Poor Josh :) I agree Josh, I AM pretty amazing!

Also, 10 points if you saw the lemon pip in the photo sticking out like a sore thumb. YOU CAN'T UN-SEE IT NOW!!!

jamie's clothing sale!

Well folks, I must tell you about one great thing I did on Sunday.... I attended Jamie's clothing sale! You are probably all like "uh, whatttttt???" so please allow me to explain! I think it is safe to say that my friend Jamie is a shop-a-holic (Jamie, if you would like to refute this, I will revoke the slander against your name!). She buys things only to wear them once, twice or not even at all. Her wardrobe is absolutely bursting with pretty dresses and nice jackets and bags! So about 6 months ago she decided that she needed to downsize. She was going to put each item on eBay and take photos and ship them all individually etc... but then she thought "who could be fucked!?" and decided instead to have a garage sale-esque affair to which her friends would come and purchase her unwanted items and give them a new home and a new life! So she held her first sale 6 months ago which, I am sad to say, I was too poor to attend after just buying my house and getting back on my feet.

BUT THEN!!!!! fortune smiled upon me when I received a text message on Saturday announcing that the very next day would behold yet another sale! After hearing good things about the first sale I was quite interested to say the least! Jamie had said that she didn't have everyone's numbers and forgot to put it on the net so there were only 4 of us there in the end. It was great for me because I got lots of nice things!! If you don't believe how cool it was, check out some of these reactions...

Well it certainly was rad! Once we arrived we were handed a glass of sparkling wine with strawberries in it, as well as a slice of berry cheesecake! There was this chilled ambient music playing in the next room and the place was decked out like a shop:

Everything we picked up we had to try on, and do a little fashion show! Amazing. I got 3 brand new handbags (volcom, forever new, valleygirl), a wallet (billabong), a dress (valleygirl), 2 button up plaid shirts, 3 cardigans, 2 skirts, and 2 or 3 jumpers all for about $50. Let me hear you say AMAZING!!! "AMAZING!!"

So now that I have some new bags and wallet, I can finally let mine retire...

Oh Batman wallet, I'm sorry to see you go. It's hard to believe you were once $20 from Dangerfield, after all the laughs we shared. I used to have a picture of Josh in you, from when he was in grade 3. He looked like Harry Potter. Every time I opened you at a shop people would either think I'd had a child very very young or I was a pedo. Josh didn't mind, he said the joke was on me. It all started to become clear to me how things were going when I took out my bank card only to find a sticky glue strip along it. I then noticed you were cheaply made and all of the card slots had exposed glue, and all of my cards became sticky and tacky. I put up with this for a long time, fervently wiping the glue off with my thumb before handing my card over to the shop assistant, then wondering if they had noticed the stickiness of the card. Of course they had. They all had. But I was loyal, i still flashed you around like you were some prize trophy. And for what? More glue? More strange looks? When the zip broke I knew... I knew I would have to say goodbye. You started spilling coins all in my bag, I couldn't handle it. It was just too much. Along came this $1 billabong wallet and I couldn't resist a break from the glue and the lost coins. I went for it. I'm sorry. This may just be a rebound wallet until I can find another to match your visual attractiveness, who knows? But I'm happy. I hope you understand.

Oh Dangerfield "China Doll" bag. You were my friend for such a long time! Again, your demise started early and kept going to the very end. Your beauty was such that veritable strangers would comment on you, and friends would confess they wanted to steal you from me. It started with the broken lining into which my possessions would slide, causing me to have minor panic attacks thinking I had lost my phone or iPod or paw paw lip balm. Then the leather straps started to crack from over-use, and somehow half a bandaid got stuck to the bottom of you and i was too grossed out to remove it. I pretended it wasnt there. Then the fabric on the outside started to tear, and I knew I had to find a replacement. Again, these bags may not touch as many people's hearts as you did, but for now i have a new lease on life and will always remember the places we went. RIP.

*love*

So ladies, let's all encourage Jamie to go shopping all the time so we have lots more amazing things to look at at her next sale!!! She thinks it will probably be in about another 6 months! So if you are australian sizes 10-14 BE PREPARED! Get your cashola ready and make sure you get in early to get some great bargains! Jamie is so appreciative of all the things we bought and I'm sure is excited for her next chance to downsize her collection and see her beloved items go to a new home :) This time I'll help promote it so she gets 100% of her stuff sold! Can't wait!! :D

Dish 11) Zucchini Slice

Well I finally made this dish! I tried a really yummy zucchini slice many years ago and thought I might try my hand. I used this recipe from Taste.com.au but it lacked the flavour of the one i tried once upon a time IMO. Maybe one day I'll get given a really finely-tuned recipe and it will rock my socks off! Oh i added some carrot to the recipe...

It looked OK and tasted OK. Maybe I am just really fussy with my cooking. Yes, I definately am :P What to make next....?

Project Update

Wow, what a busy weekend!! My dad came back from Sydney and began work on the pergola again. It's pretty tall, and it was scary being up that wobbly ladder :S but it will be totally worth it when it's done :)

This is still very rough, and as i had to go out in the afternoon I didn't get a picture of where he got up to. He got all the top beams in place so now he just needs to tidy it all up and attach the roofing!

The fences are so low, if i stand on tip-toe I can see 4 backyards over. What is this, the 50's? Fuck man. I want to get extenders on the fence or put up some lattice for a bit of summer party privacy. Hoorah! Oh also, another thing I'm working on is the rabbit hutch in preparation for getting a wee rabbit! Once the pergola is done hopefully that will be the end of loud noises and i can safely get my bunny! So Josh's sister donated me this hutch, and as you can see, it needs a little bit of TLC...

Josh tells me that he made this years ago for the rabbit :) Even more reason to hold onto it and give it new life. I don't have big plans for it as yet because I have to focus on making a chicken coop BUT i plan to sand it back and tack down the chicken wire and give it a fresh coat of outdoor paint. I bought a similar colour because it looks so bright and happy! Will get onto that ASAP :)

frames and bunnies

Firstly, look at what I saw at the Vic Market yesterday....

I want to buy this rabbit, LOOK HOW CUTE IT IS!!!!! I think it was looking out the corner of it's eye at me weeeee!!!! OMG Ok, calm down, calm down!

What I was really wanting to post about is picture frames. I have lots of photos which i want to display in my house, but I'm not 100% sure how I want to go about it. I could stick the photos themselves onto the wall in a big collage... or i could use lots of frames. I think I like the frame idea, but then the secondary question arises of what way to display them? A random cluster of different shapes and sizes...

Or a more uniform arrangement with similar frames and all lined up in rows?

Wow, i love the white floorboards :D *one day* ahem... I already have lots of frames from the op-shop so i guess i should use those and do a nice little cluster. I will probably go for the black and white look and might have to get some card to make faux mat board. I am excited! The only thing is, i think it would look more effective on a coloured wall but I am planning this for my hallway... which i don't really want to paint. It's not like a cool victorian style hallway, just a boring modern one. I will have to get cree-ay-tive!

I stumbled across this blog the other day while i was looking for pictures of the kitchen from the movie "It's Complicated". It's called Hooked on Houses and this woman is totally obsessed with houses and interior design. There is a section there for Movie and TV houses where she puts heaps of still shots and explanations and quotes from the set designers. I found out that the production designer for It's Complicated, Something's Gotta Give and The Holiday are all the same- which explains why when i saw the movies i was wowed each time. Great style! I haven't gone through it yet, but there is soooo much still to see. I hope to get some good ideas to add to my *dream house* collection of photos. Enjoy!

fat tooshie!

Howdy gang-bangers! Firstly I'd like to shout out props to my boi Roo for becoming the newest follower of the subarizzle ba-lizzle! respect. No longer shall he lurk in the shadows singing along to the rasmus "I've been watching, I've been waiting, in the shadows..." crap song. crap song.

So anyway last night I made dish 10/52... a dish you may have seen around called FATTOUSH. It comes from Lebanon but I think a few other countries in the Levant have similar dishes. It fits nicely into the category of "summery salad" and is really delicious, here's some eye candy for you:

It's really dead easy to make, let me show you how:

1 round Lebanese bread
Vegetable oil for deep-frying (or you could oven bake it or pan fry it)
2 Lebanese cucumbers, finely diced (if very fresh, no need to peel)
2 tomatoes, finely diced
½ cup radish, finely diced
½ red capsicum, finely diced
½ green capsicum, finely diced
4 spring onions, finely diced
2 tablespoons mint, finely chopped
½ cup parsley, finely chopped

Dressing:
juice of 1 lemon
¼ cup extra virgin olive oil
Salt and freshly ground pepper to taste

Basically you chop everything up, and then add the torn up bread at the end. Oh actually I added like 1 Tbsp of Sumac as well.

I found that recipe on the SBS website - lots of yummy international recipes from all their cool cooking shows! God i love that channel. Anyway, we ate our fattoush with fish, but i used Blue Grenadier for something a little different and it wasnt great. It turns out i'm not really a fan - it's a bit bland, but that's what this list is alll about hey? Trying new things, and deciding what i do and don't like! Turns out i fucking LOVE fattoush, and i imagine lamb and yoghurt would go beautifully with it :) this will be a fattoush summer i think!

Speaking of my list, my pergola is under construction! My dad is super busy so he has been fitting in the work on it here and there and now he is in Sydney helping his brother do some home reno stuff. When he gets back he will finish it off. But here are some pics of our first day of work:

My dad wanted me to show everyone his makeshift "plumb-bob" for getting a straight line, but after looking up what a real plumb-bob is, i don't know how accurate this double adaptor could be...

It has all posts in at the moment, and also the top beams and stuff but i just forgot to take a photo! I'll update later in the week!! I did actually help, as I specified in my list that I must! I carried one heavy post and put it in the hole, i also helped to measure it all out, and i held stuff and passed tools etc. There wasn't too much that I could do really, but I think dad appreciated my help nonetheless. We'll see what more I can do when he starts work on it again!

Oh look at this photo of Evan showing his approval of the pants...

Sneaky! I had Joshs's Sister's 21st on Saturday night and Josh made such a nice speech! Brought a wee tear to the eye :) It was a lovely set-up and there were 2 frozen daquiri machines and more booze than you could imagine.. so needless to say i got a little crunk. Friday and Saturday night both crunk nights. Sunday i was absolutely dead on my feet. Can't drink as much as i used to at 18 haha. Probably a good thing for my body though I would say :) So now I am running out of things to say today! Except I can't stop watching Skins and when I get paid I am going to rape and pillage Bunnings and Spotlight for all my upcoming projects WOO!

post with the most

Look at this super cute bunny i found here:


When I saw it, it made my heart swell almost to the point of explosion! I want to play with it and hold it in my palm and let it bat my fingers like a little bunny boxing practice. I want it. And soon I shall have it, for you see Josh's sister gave me her rabbit hutch when we helped clean up her yard, so now i have to fill it with BUNNIES!!! I want 1 or 2 bunnies and i want them to be house trained so they can play with us, and then they can go outside (supervised of course) and eat some grass, or go in the hutch. I know that my cat will dig some new friends and hopefully he won't scare them too much. I heard that rabbits can only see in shapes so can get easily threatened, so it is important to talk to them so that they get used to being around you. No problemo, if it's any indication I talk to my cat a lot... some would say a little too much. So i will keep you updated on the bunny rabbit hunt. I have already made a shortlist of cute names: Charlie and Honey. It is a very short list. If Charlie bites me i can go "ooh, ahh, ouch! OUCH CHARLIE! AAAAAAAHHH! CHARLIE! Charlie bit me..." haha. But he wont bite me. I am looking into rescue centres and rabbit adoption places, but will also check out the market. I think it will be a good idea to get baby rabbits so they get used to the cat and people. weeeeeeee

So anyway, I bet you are wondering why I am not smashing my list apart right now, am I correct? Well, you see, I am one of those people who pretty much hibernates in the Winter months. I am anti-social, lazy, demotivated, generally unhappy and completely lackluster. Come sunshine time I am all action! Maybe I am solar powered... it would explain a lot.

This morning the sun was shining, a few weeks into Spring, and I felt my heart swell with happiness and my brain powered up just thinking about all the wonderful things I must do. So let me tell you that I am super excited to cross another item off my list this week!! My dad is coming to my place tomorrow and Friday to build my pergola!! Tomorrow he will just be putting in the posts, but Friday is the action day. It worked out well that I have an RDO from work and can help him :D So I have saved up lots of pennies for this pergola and it is the first major improvement to my house so far. I also bought an aircon for those searing summer days but have to pay for installation. Same goes with new light fittings to replace all the gross flurescants. So hopefully this pergola will be a good return on the investment come time to lease or sell it.

Once the pergola is done, I have to put in some concrete or pavers or stones or something under it. I will probably go for the cheapest option which might be recycled bricks and pavers. I could even design my own pattern.... i don't know. I am probably getting waaay ahead of myself as usual. I have no idea how to pave, but I'm sure it can't be that tricky. I'll just Youtube it! I love DIY stuff on Youtube! It's so helpful, so far i have learnt how to grout between tiles and make puff pastry. Pretty good eh?

So once the pergola is done, my list of things to make/do is this:
- Ground cover for under the pergola (pavers?)
- Aircon installed (contractor)
- Light fittings installed (contractor)
- Make curtains for lounge/dining room to block out sun/heat
- Make new scatter cushions for the lounge
- Try making round tufted pillows
- Make a Picnic Blanket
- Create a photo collage for an empty wall
- Create a piece of art for the house
.....
oh and build a chicken coop... AH! I am dreading this, i don't know where to start!! I guess I'll have to start looking up plans and designs... ugh! Why did i set this list again?

Oh, and as soon as the sun starts shining I will be ready for the nude beach. You wont be able to stop me. All over tan... here i come :) lollllllllllllllllllllllllllllll

dish 9) Chicken Kiev...from scratch

oh wowwww! Guess whattttt i had the best Chicken Kiev last night and... I MADE IT! :D wee-hoo i'm the best i'm the best at life and various other things wooooooooooooooooooooooooooo!!! suck it, suck my fat one, EAT IT!

Ok, now that's out of the system, I have to apologise for the lack of photos to accompany this post... my camera tragically and epically died and the back-up battery was dead also. DAGGONE IT! Daggone it Annie! Did you know thats what MJ said in Smooth Criminal? Well it's true, unless the Thai subtitle man did the wrong thing on the burnt music dvd is saw on Saturday. I highly doubt that, their grasp of English is impeccable. They could probably put me to shame. Ok enough Effin 'n' jeffin. Let me tell you about my Kievzzz :) I loosely followed this recipe i found on taste.com.au which appeared in Good Taste Magazine:

Ingredients (serves 2)
50 g coarse breadcrumbs made from day-old bread
1 tbs dried oregano leaves
Salt & freshly ground black pepper
2 single (about 200g each) chicken breast fillets, excess fat trimmed
Plain flour, to dust
1 egg white, lightly whisked

Herb butter
30g (1 1/2 tbs) butter, at room temperature
2 garlic cloves, crushed
Herbs of choice (I used basil and oregano pastes from Josh's fridge)
Salt & freshly ground black pepper

First, you mix the butter and herbs and S&P together in a bowl and spoon it onto some Glad wrap. Roll it into a log and place it in the freezer like so:

Then the camera died, but I can explain the rest! OK so the next thing i did was to flatten the chicken breasts out. You get a meat mallet and put the chicken between gladwrap sheets and then with the flat side pound the breast until it is flatter and rounder. That sounds weird. But here is a picture (which I found at Exclusively Food) of what you do next....

you place a little bit of the butter log on the breast and then roll the end over and the sides in to hold the butter in place during cooking. Roll up and leave on a plate in the fridge for a bit while you prepare the breadcrumbs. I used the 2 end bits of a loaf of Helgas bread. I didnt realise Josh had a blender so i used my hands to crumble it, then baked them in the oven for a few mins as a single layer, until they darkened and smelled toasty. I them transfered that to a bowl and added in dried oregano and salt and pepper to the mix.

Get 3 bowls, one with the flour, second with an egg white, and third with the breadcrumbs. Dip your kievs into the bowls in that order and then cook them whichever way you like. I pan fried them for a bit, then transfered to the oven so i could use the stovetop to get the veggies ready.

We made stirfried beans, wilted spinach and potato/pumpkin mash. Check dis out:

It was so tasty, we used all really good and fresh ingredients, as well as organic free range chicken... it was just amazing! You've gotta try it, you'll never get a Safeway Deli one again! Now i just need to work out how I can freeze these and then stock up :) WOO!

look what i got at the ASIAN GROCER

Some may say that $30.30 doesn't go far, but i beg to differ. I went out for Japanese dinner last week and afterwards we all went to the big Asian Grocer on Russell Street and got lots of goodies! Ch-ch-ch-ch-ch-ch-check it out...

Yummy rice crackers!!

yummy orange NATCHAN drink :)

creepy candy, but oh so delish! The flavours in this one are Honeydew, Strawberry, Banana, Pineapple. I think this candy was designed just for me! The top picture looks like one of my couch cushions :O

Hello Kitty Strawberry Pocky Sticks!!!!

More Drops. In Grave of the fireflies the little girl has a tin of drops and she calls them "droppu" and she is the cutest little thing EVERRRRRRR!!! so i had to buy them.

and of course i had to stock up on the essentials :) weeeee i had fun!

dish 8) pasulj

Zdravo! Today i'ma get all Serbian up in yo asses. Let me teach you the first thing you need to know in the Serbian tongue. This will get you through any situation without fail. OK. Imagine you are on a holiday. Around Europe. You've been travelling blissfully for 3 months, and then you decide "Sure, I''ll hit up Serbia. I mean, why the hell not?". Before you know it, you are bound and gagged and under interrogation by the Serbian Mafia. They believe you are single-handedly trying to sabotage a massive drug trafficking operation, but you have absolutley no idea what they are talking about. The translator tells you you have one chance to defend yourself before they blow your fucking brains all over the damp brick wall behind you. You start to breath heavily and fear hyperventilation... but you must remember this lesson. Say one thing, and one thing only: Govno. It means 'shit'. Now, you're probably thinking you will have barely uttered the full word before they pistol whip you across the face spraying your blood and teeth across the room for being a smart arse. You are wrong. I have it on good authority that the Serbian Mafia like to cuss and even look favourably upon smart mouths and in this situation would admire your Chutzpah, proudly welcoming you into the murky depths of humanity that is their organisation.

So now that you know how to cuss in Serbian, you can learn how to cook. Those things are more closely related than you would believe. Last weekend my Serb friend Dragana came over to my place to show me how to make a traditional Serbian dish called PASULJ (pass-ool[y]) the "Y" is like the y in Yes. You have to say the lj together like ll-yuh kind of. Oh i dont know. Too hard. Too much.

So we hit up the Vic market on our lunch break, visiting the Polish Deli to get some Kranskys and Frankfurts and spicy pancetta. We also went to the nut place and got 1.5 Kg of dried beans. I got the minestrone mix which had Kidney, Borlotti, Lima, Great Western, Cannellini, Chick peas and... maybe that's it. In hindsight I bought waaaaaaaay too much BUT i wasn't to know as this was my first time cooking with dried beans!


So I gathered all of my ingredients and then Drags came over and we started COOKINGGGG!!! Firstly, roughly chop your 2 large onions, and then slice your Kranskys and Viennese Frankfurts into little rounds or semi-circles.

Put the onions in your soup pot with some oil (supposedly not Olive Oil but i used it anyway). Cook them off for a bit, then add your sausages. I also put in 2 bay leaves for a bit of flavour.

Stir around for a while, then add the beans and put enough cold water to cover everything.

Put the lid on and bring to the boil. Once boiling, turn the heat down slightly and take the lid off slightly so air can escape. Leave this for approx 1.5 hours- or until all beans/chick peas etc are soft. Once the soup is nearly ready - Mix together in a bowl flour and paprika, adding some boiling water from the pot. Mix into a paste ensuring to remove all lumps (Drags used a desert spoon for this – this bit takes a bit of practise until you get to know how much flour and paprika is required to how you like it. For Dragana it is usually two-ish heaped tablespoons of flour and 2-3 tablespoons of paprika for the colour you want)

Add this to the pot of soup stirring until all paste has blended and the soup thickens and colours. Add salt, pepper and "vegeta" to taste. You are supposed to serve with a crispy salad but we didnt :)

yum! It had such a comforting flavour, and if you spend the money to buy good quality kransky you will not be disappointed. I was really impressed with the difference in dried and soaked chickpeas - they are so much tastier and softer. Canned varieties are a little dry and carry on the tin juices flavour. ick. So i am definately going back to the market to get lots of dried beans to play around with at home. Chick peas for sure!

INGREDIENTS:

2 x large onions

2 x 750g tins of 'four bean mix'

1 x 410g tin of chick peas

1 x 410g of any other legume you want - like soy beans, butter beans etc..

2 plain Kransky

2 vienesse Frankfurts

100g spicy flat Pancetta

2ish tbl sp. plain flour

2ish tbl sp. sweet paprika powder

salt, pepper, vegeta (gourmet veg stock)

Alternatively you can buy all beans, legumes fresh and then soak them overnight in a large bowl of cold water. Be careful not to buy too much like i did. I went by how much you get in the cans... but buy less!

Doviđenja!

randomania

I have taken a few photos lately of some things that make the eyes go 'weooeoeoeooeoeoeoe!!!!!'

Firstly, I was at the supermarket the other day and saw this...

Is that... Jason Biggs? Is it?? Cos sometimes I'm like "Yeah it's totally him" .... and other times i'm like "nah it's just a similarity..."


My god. Oh and now I want to introduce my friend... Brother Nashua. He is an Ahmish youth on Rumspringa...

As you can see, his eyes are closed because of his rejection of technology. He refuses to see the camera or any of the lights on in the house. He's still getting the hang of Rumspringa. But i'm sure I saw him eat what he thought was an av-er-age brownie and soon he was trying to eat a light bulb with his head stuck in the microwave. He went a little nuts. That was on Saturday, and by now he is probably a meth dealer or harrassing his community by driving past their farms with Bruce Springsteen blaring out of the stereo. It's true, i've seen it on a Rumspringa doco. Crazy days. Oh and also, my DVD player broke so Josh took it apart to see what the problem might have been...

and i found out there was a whole mini city inside!!!

buildings, bridges, weird art installations, and even a half-pipe at the skate park! amazing.