Who needs Twitter?

When I first started investigating what this Twitter thing was all about, I deduced that the 'Serious' users took umbrage with the 'Frivolous' users, whom they accused of wasting precious bandwidth by posting worthless junk like "Hey Look I'm having a bagel for breakfast", and "On the Tube, with a coffee and a danish".

Far better, the Serious users would argue, that Twitter be used for Useful Things, like the [Insert Product or Service Here] that the Serious user is peddling.

Truth be told, I still haven't quite figured Twitter out. I don't know how to follow #streams yet, and I seem to have a lot of people following me who just want to sell me stuff. So I ignore them.

Am I a Serious Twitter user? I use Twitter as an additional tool to keep an ear to the ground in the publishing world mainly, but it's so full of noise that it's hard to know what you're hearing that's worthwhile and what's not. Twitter is, for me, a mild diversion at the very most. I'm sure there's some real value to it, but I haven't had to the time to really get to grips with it yet.

I do, however, pop links to Freshly Ground up there from time to time. I haven't yet posted what I had for breakfast on Twitter, but there's a first time for everything.

Even though this is a scheduled post, when I get back online I'll be sure to let all my 30-odd followers know that if they'd like a look at what a Fantasy writer cum-Weekend Chef eats for breakfast on a Sunday, they can get a glimpse, in full living colour, with the simple click of a mouse.

So when it comes to posting on Twitter about what you had for breakfast, who needs it? That's what I've got a blog for!

French Toast with Bacon and Maple Syrup

(Serves 3, or 2 if you're slow)

Start with 3 large free range eggs.
In a large bowl, mix up the eggs with 3T Milk, and season with freshly ground pepper and salt.
Add a little grate of fresh nutmeg. (Ah, freshly grated nutmeg. How you brighten my days and warm my nights.)
Start frying up some bacon in a hot pan, preferably greased with the bacon rind.
Soak a piece of bread in the egg mixture while a slab of butter sizzles in a nearby pan. I have two pans on the go at a time like this; there's no point letting it get cold. Fry each piece of French Toast for about 3-4 minutes a side, until brown and crispy and cooked through.
Dish up with crispy fried bacon and maple syrup, with a pot of fresh coffee near at hand. Best eaten with the sun pouring in on the kitchen table, or rain running down the window while you're cozy inside.

Wanganui Road Trip

What would the holidays be without a road trip?

Well, a nice boat trip can be just as good if not better, but we had a road trip instead.

Just before Christmas we took Isaac up to visit his Great-Gramps and Gran in Wanganui. We must have missed all the traffic, because it was a quick trip up the country. We stayed in Foxton on the Friday night, with Isaac's Nana Beth.

Great-Gramps is one of my revered cooking mentors, and Gran has been responsible for pointing out all sorts of interesting and helpful little things in the kitchen over the past few years. I was very much looking forward to having dinner with them on Saturday, and I was not to be disappointed.
Beef fillet, wrapped in bacon and smothered in butter.
I'm not going to mention how healthy this may or may not have been, but it was delicious.
I can't pass on the secrets of cooking this fine dish, as Great-Gramps and I were very busy drinking gin and wine respectively, and immersing ourselves in a very engaging discussion about politics and the environment. I haven't had so much fun in a long while. Ah yes, there were mushrooms involved, too.
I know I've already used this shot, but to be fair it was Gran who had prepared these raspberries and strawberries for us for dessert,
with a delicious amaretto cream to match. They were also good enough to make us breakfast on Sunday morning, with hot coffee, to give us the strength for the drive home.

We stopped again on the way down in Foxton, and had lunch with Dessert Chef's whanau, before making it home at a leisurely pace.

Yip. Road trips aren't what they were when I was 18 anymore.

*sigh*

A Change of Seasons

I can't believe how busy I've suddenly become. Winter is gone and the days are getting longer, but it seems that there is more and more going on to fill them up. I barely even have time to blog anymore! Gone are those cold winter nights when it was OK to sit at the table with the fire roaring and waffle on about sustainable gardening and the guilt of eating bad food. Work is going nuts and since I published Urban Driftwood, that has been keeping me busy as well. It was meant to be a job off my plate, not create more work! Oh well, its good we've been generating interest. We even sold a copy!

Daylight Savings didn't help. It took more like two weeks rather than the usual one to get over the inevitable jetlag, but now that it's normal we're loving the extra sunshiney hour. It means that Isaac is staying up later too, just enough to chew into our sanity time in the evening and deny us time to get important things - like blogging - done. Mind you, I seem to have had an awful lot of television to catch up on lately, mainly because I was ignoring it all while I completed the third draft of my novel. Now I'm at a bit of a loose end in that regard. I have this hankering to start on my next one, but Dessert Chef has rapped me over the knuckles and told me to bl*@dy well DO SOMETHING ABOUT IT first. For that I must turn to my good friend Morgue, he of the sly wit and the golden wink, who knows all about this getting-a-book-published business. So alas, there will be no mad launch into a wild new adventure with all my favourite characters just yet. Patience, my friends.

I spent all day today out in the sun. Went to the Hutt Riverbank Market this morning, and it was packed. Heaps of people out in the gorgeous spring air hunting for new season asparagus and other delicious goodies among the cacophony of greengrocers and fishmongers. I doled out my coins very carefully, and was rewarded with enough change at the end of the circuit to afford some more of my favourite lamb. I got the sausages this time, and I'll be sure to let you know how that goes. Then I went up to Aunty L's where I spent another afternoon with Uncle B building playhouses for their kids and Isaac. What amazed us was that when we came to put all the bits together, it actually looked like a little house. There's something to be said for measuring before you cut, then. Who would've guessed?

Tomorrow we have to bring the frames we built at Aunty L's for Isaac's one home and assemble them into his playhouse. Going to be another long day in the sun. So much for getting any gardening done. Oh well, it's Labour Weekend next weekend, so we can do it all then. Fingers crossed for sunshine.

And I hear that people come here because I write about food sometimes. OK, lets see what I can pull out of my chef's hat today.

Cheese Hash (with Leftover Roast Veges)

This is a great way to use up those pesky leftover veges that seem to hang around the kitchen after a big roast dinner, and aren't quite enough to make into soup.
Grate up as many leftover veges as you need to feed the hungry mouths present. I used potato and kumera, about 8 pieces in total. If you have a some roast onion, chop that up raggedly and add all this to a bowl. Grate in a hunk of Cheddar cheese and a generous shaving of parmesan cheese, add freshly ground salt and pepper, and break in 2-3 eggs, or as many as you need to avoid open revolution.

Fry in hot ricebran oil (no cholesterol!) turning once or twice to prevent burning. Slice up a tomato or two and fry at the same time. When the hash is cooked, serve with sour cream and a sprinkle of paprika, along with the obligatory hot coffee.
Not only is that a brilliant way to start a weekend morning, its also making the most of the food in your pantry and therefore the money in your wallet. Nyummy.

Birthday Pancakes... Sort of

Today was LBS's birthday. I got up and made her our favourite pancakes, with whipped cream, banana and home-made pancake syrup.

Unfortunately for her, LBS lives in Canada, no less then 20 hours flying distant, so she missed out. But as they say, it's the thought that counts. She can be assured that her Birthday Pancakes were very much enjoyed by Isaac, Dessert Chef C and myself.I increased the recipe this time, using 4 eggs, 150g of self-raising flour and 190mls of milk, and I had to go hunting for a recipe for pancake syrup as we used the last of ours a week or so ago and haven't replenished the stocks. This is the recipe I used. It came out a bit crystally, but I think that if it was to cook for longer those crystals would break down and it would be smoother. The recipe I used as a basis called for Corn Syrup, which we didn't have, so that would probably have made it a lot smoother too.

Pancake Syrup

In a small pan, melt 25g of butter. Add 1/4C of brown sugar, 1/4C of white sugar and 1/4C of water. Heat to a brisk simmer and stir until the sugar is dissolved. Reduce heat and stir constantly to thicken. Serve warm over pancakes or icecream.

Breakfast Dinner

What better way to wake up on a Sunday morning than to the smell of frying bacon and onion and hot toast, with fresh coffee? Fixing up a huge feed for breakfast on the weekend is all good and well, but what really bites is then having to do all the dishes. What a way to drag down your Sunday morning. So here's the solution. Instead of going to all that effort when you should just be sleeping in, whip it up for dinner on a Thursday or Friday night instead. Somehow that way, the dishes don't seem like such a burden. Of course none of this applies if you have one of those new-fangled dishwashers, but we're certainly not that flash (despite the Dessert Chef's insistence that we move into the 20th Century and cram one into our rather undersized kitchen). Either way, here's what I reckon is right royal Breakfast-Dinner nosh-up, complete with hot coffee in the morning or followed up with a hot milo at night. Yes, we really do have a milo at night. And with your Sunday morning, cook porridge and don't waste all that time doing dishes.

The Ultimate All-Day All-Night Cooked Breakfast

Bacon, fried.
Onions & Capsicum, fried.
Hot Baked Beans.
Buttered Toast.
Scrambled Eggs.
Tomatoes, halved and fried, then covered in grated parmesan & freshly ground pepper before being finished under the grill.

Sunday Scones

There's nothing nicer than waking up on a Sunday morning and enjoying freshly baked scones in the sun with jam and whipped cream. It makes getting up the morning before and going out to the market in the cold and the rain worthwhile. This was a little treat from my resident Dessert Chef, C. Thanks, Honey.


Yummy Scones

Recipe is courtesy of Alison Holst's Dollars & Sense Cookbook. Full credit, Alison.

2 Cups of Self Raising Flour
1/4t Salt
1 T Sugar
25g Melted Butter
1/2 C Milk
1/4 - 1/2 C Water

Sift dry ingredients into a bowl. Heat butter until it melts, tip all the milk and 1/4C of water into the flour. Mix until blended, adding extra water as necessary to make a soft dough. Turn on to a floured bench and roll out lightly into a square. Cut into triangular sections, place 1cm apart on an oven tray . Bake at 220c in the middle of the oven for 12-14mins, until the tops of the scones are lightly browned.

Break open with your hands, butter and serve with jam and whipped cream. Then enjoy the rest of the day, because after all, it's Sunday. (Disclaimer - May not actually be Sunday)

Searching for Breakfast Inspiration

It was a rather uninspired week on the cooking front. Between family being sick and myself being focused on revising the second draft of my novel, this blog has been a bit, shall we say, underfed. We had a few repeats of earlier meals, as well a few simple things like bacon and egg sandwiches, and leftover pizza from the freezer with fresh veges.

Last night we had alfredo with bacon instead of chicken, which deserves mention. Just cook up the sauce and pasta as per instruction, and fry up 4 sliced rashers of bacon, one chopped onion and a couple of sliced garlic cloves. We had carrot sticks and tomato wedges with it, and it was good.


But today I want to focus on some real rainy Sunday morning comfort food, because today its really, REALLY raining. What better to have on a write-off rainy weekend morning than big, fluffy pancakes? If it hadn't been raining so hard, I would've even made it out to the tree for a lemon, but as it was, we managed with cream, banana, and syrup, as well as fresh, hot coffee. Mmmm.

Fluffy Pancakes (like them Americans make)

115g Flour
1 heaped t Baking Powder
140ml Milk
3 Large Free Range Eggs
1 pinch salt

Separate Eggs. Mix the yolks, flour, baking powder and milk up to a smooth batter.

Whip the egg whites until they form stiff peaks, then gently fold the whites into the batter with a rubber spatula. Do not overmix, or the air will all be forced out of the batter and you won't have fluffy pancakes.

Melt some butter in a pan (I do two small pans at once) and place a 1/2 cup of batter in the pan to cook. When the underside is golden brown, flip the pancake and cook through. Serve with syrup, cream, jam, lemon juice, peanut butter, banana, or whatever you like.


This recipe makes about 7 pancakes, which used to be enough for us but is a bit light now, so increase the recipe accordingly if you feel you've been shortchanged.