Cooking 9/10ths of the time

My neighbours gave me lemons. It warmed my heart no end as I HATE paying for lemons! Why should I? Lemon trees are everywhere and I don't understand why we all don't have mountains of lemons at our disposal at a moments notice. If I have to buy lemons I am at my most crabby and disagreeable. I disgruntledly mumble like an old bag lady with 23 cats who can't find her shopping trolley full of crap. I moan and sulk, I pick up lemons and then put them down and frown and then snort out my nose, fast. Then I put the stupid thing in my basket and move on. Did I spend time photoshopping a lemon in between those hands? Yes I did, that's how much I like lemons. But, my neighbours gave me some. Sarah's grandmother has a tree, which is only right and proper, all grandparents should have a lemon tree, that should be legislated on. And all lemons on the tree should always, always be pressed fervently onto family members. Because even if they don't need the lemons, then

Isn't it the worst when you have yourself all set up with your lappy on your knees and the DVD is in and you are all ready to multi-task writing your blog with watching the last part of that Dragon tattoo girl trilogy and then you realise that the DVD remote is over THERE. I hate that. Anyway crisis averted and we can get on with the delightful task of discussing cheesecake and Yo-yo's or melting moments if you know them by that name. Oh that's right it's a foreign language film. Darn it. Oh well, I read the books I'll figure it out. I recently visited the superpower of the last century, the USA, it felt really quaint and old fashioned much as I expect parts of Austria feel - except without all the rolling hills and goats. At any rate it was very nice to be back in the States and to see my friends, co-workers and that orange cheese I'm so fond of. I wanted to make something sweet to show my appreciation to my lovely San Diego hosts, Holly and Jared, and al

If I were to sing a song to Pavlova it would go like this "Roll me over, in Pavlova, roll me over in Pavlova, do it again!". To the tune of "Roll me over in the Clover". Out of the two I would much prefer to be rolled over in Pavlova - clover is itchy and grassy. Pavlova is wonderful and crunchy! They don't much like to be hugged though... more on that later. I made a Pavlova. It is my first one. Pavlova is a kind of national dish in Australia - it is served along with things like Lamingtons and Trifle and various stodgy puddings at events all over this wide brown country. Pavlova is my favourite - running a very close second is lamingtons - they are great too, but so fiddly - I read the recipe for lamington and am always like "make sponge and then.. wha? Roll it in wha? Cover it in wha?" Needless to say that's three "Wha's?" too many. Well hello there shiny lady! Pavlova is much easier - in one way. Did you notice that I slip

It's hard not to make that joke when you are cooking with pears, I don't want to cater to the lowest common denominator, but let's face it, boob jokes are funny and allusions to them are side splitting. On with the pears. I love cakes with fruit in them. I say this a lot, because it is true a lot of the time. I am not mad on things like prunes in cake (clammy and weirdly "elderly" tasting - I expect to like them more when over 70), but most fresh fruit gets a thumbs up. I also really like upside down cakes, because there is a sort of theatrical style reveal at the end. Not only will there be cake, but there is also an element of excitement as to how it will look, how it will set and whether it will come out of the tin. Granted the last one is edging towards the terror end of the excitement scale. But it's still on the scale. Gabe has show no interest in the three pears sitting on the side board until the split second that I started to peel them for this re

I had mistakenly left the "s" off "Skillz" in the title, thus it read "New Killz" - which looks like a blog post title that some sort of annoying Gen Y contract killer would leave. As it is I am just an annoying Gen X food blogger aping Gen Y. So who's clever now eh? Hard to tell. I learned new things this month - My friend CC and I had decided many many many months ago to do a "Cupcake Masterclass". Sounds fairly splendid doesn't it? It took us a while to actually get there, we had some, ahem, issues getting a booking and then some hilarious misunderstandings and then some recriminations and then some tears and then some sulky apologies and eventually we were all friends again. I did not make this, but God, how I wish I did... I was under the impression that we would bake a cupcake and then decorate it, but it was pretty clear when we mounted the stairs and were looking at rows and rows of naked cupcakes that we would be decorati

Initially Gabe's fifth birthday cake was to be a volcano. We enthused about it for quite a few months. I researched how to best tackle the cake and then how to make it ACTUALLY EXPLODE, in a way that would not take out the eyes of every small child in a 50 metre radius. Plus it had to be edible afterwards. The natives ran and screamed.. I had taught Gabe the phrase "pyroclastic flow" in readiness, so that other parents would be impressed with my child's precocious use of language and when told about it I would blithely answer "Oh did he? Oh well he does love to read!". An then I would have laughed my patented carefree parent laugh. It is a light sounding laugh, slightly distracted and adorably unselfconscious. I haven't really had much call to use it yet. Anyway after all that research and time and energy and sourcing a tin that would be a good mountain shape and discussing a plan of attack with my good friend Sue - and then getting her excited a

I am making Rock Cakes tonight, they are helping me to calm down from a big fight with the kid. We don't fight much, Gabe and I, we are generally in tune with each other. But not tonight. we were so out of tune that the band leader would have thrown his baton to the floor and stomped from the room. Or I would have, Or I did. Whatever. Solid and dependable, strong like man muscle. I want an alcoholic beverage and I want it now. I can't drink though because I am meant to be writing. Ah... yes now you understand why two blog posts in the same day. Avoiding. I am in the process of avoiding. Anyway, it's all temporary - I have to write and because I have to write I can't drink. I can't drink because I am a hopeless drinker. One drink and I'm blearily slow dancing to a song off the Jukebox and then laughing and crying and laughing again. I am basically a Joni Mitchell song when I drink. Spell checker tried to convince me that I wanted juicebox then, not jukebox.