i ordered a little hida konro for individual charcoal grilling, they are too cute and I think I may order a couple more for dinner parties, so i whipped up some tare (sauce) for yakitori and skewered up some chicken thighs with spring onions. perfect with a cold beer!
Watching David Chang on “The Mind of a Chef” inspired me to have a crack at Yakitori today, i picked up a kilo or so of chook wings and then spent the next 11 months de-boning them! Ok so it was about 20 minutes actually, and i did get faster once I got a technique happening.
Looking at David Chang’s it looks like he only takes out the big bone and not the 2 smaller ones, but I decided to take the lot out which is a bit more fiddly but I like the idea of bone free.
I set the de-boned wings on 2 wooden skewers for each wing that I had soaked in water, and put them in the fridge while I made the ‘tare’ or sauce. Its basically soy, mirin, sake and sugar thickened with a bit of corn flour so its pretty quick to whip up.
Then it was simply a matter of firing up the char grill and cooking the de-boned chook wings, when they were just about ready I brushed on the ‘tare’ and gave them another minute before plating up and garnishing with chopped shallots.
a perfect, glassy, build-up sunday! we headed off round cape arnhem to sir roderick rocks.
kai aptly renamed moon rock as poo skull rock!
possibly the biggest fish i have ever caught in arnhem land, a massive barracoutta, i caught a decent mackerel on the line, it got eaten by this huge ‘coutta, leaving the mack head on the line above the lure, while the ‘coutta was chased all the way to the boat by an even bigger shark!
all that remained of the macky after the ‘coutta got it!
a nice catch of mackerel, one big one, one half eaten one (victim of the grey ghosts and a couple of nice sized ones.
not much to say really!
its that time of year again, glass off days perfect for getting out on the boat. i was amazed to see this bird sitting on the back of a sleeping turtle! actually saw this twice on the same day so it must be more common than i realised.
it has also been a busy month for visitors, jeremy and leesi have been back for a week or so and our friend phil o’brien has also been here for a week. phil has been a friend from the very early days of garma, he and i started out with me helping him in the kitchen, among my other jobs. as well as being a bush cook phil is a singer, songwriter, author, actor, film maker, rouseabout and calendar producer – although as he says, “i have done a lot of things, but I am not very good at any of them!”
phil and i were out seeing friends, tony & linda and we scored half a dozen crayfish from them so it was onto the char grill with those babies, i split them in half and made a butter with garlic, chilli, fish sauce, kaffir lime leaves and a few other bits and pieces and let them sit with the butter slowly melting into the flesh, some lime slices on top and they were ready to throw on the heat! phil knocked up a monster potato bake and leesi’s salad crafting skills came to the fore.
kai also decided to use phil as his news story for school, he asked phil if that was ok and whether phil could play a song for his news. phil agreed – but only if kai and i were the backing singers for the chorus! (the things you do for your kids!)
here is the video of his news presentation.
simon, annette, jess, nick & tim made the long trip north from birregurra in victoria to visit us for a few days. it is nearly 10 years since they last visited – tim wasnt even born then!
they flew in from cairns last tuesday night, the flight was delayed thanks to qantas being bastards. after they had boarded and were about to taxi out to take off qantas decided to put all the passengers from the direct darwin flight onto the gove flight to save themselves a flight. so the flight was deleayed nearly 2 hours and it was very late when they finally got back to our house. no wonder qantas’ reputation has fallen so far.
so wednesday was a bit of a recovery day, simon and annette we put up in our friend’s annie’s house as she was away, it was only the second time in about 15 years that they have slept on their own without the kids so i think it was appreciated!
we ended up just having lunch at the walkabout resort and had a swim in the pool.
thursday was to be fishing day, i borrowed a mate’s tinny so we had 2 boats to take the whole tribe and we set off from yirrkala and headed out on another perfect day!
after lunch on the beach we got serious about the fishing and we caught a couple of nice mackeral, and simo hooked on to a stonking giant trevally, it was his biggest fish out of 3 trips here and has raised the bar – it will have to be a monster next time to keep up the record!
friday was again a bit of a quiet day after a huge day on the water, there was quite a bit of red skin and so we had a relaxed start to the day and then took a picnic lunch down to the town pool and lazed around, the early evening saw us down at rugby to watch kai win his game and then on to the surf club for burgers and beers with john and tomo and the kids joining us.
saturday we packed up the troopys and headed out to the art’s center for a squiz and then on to the giddys river for a swim and lunch.
after we came home jess and i made dinner and cooked a pavlova as well as making passionfruit ice cream, i reckon even the kiwis would have been proud of that pav!
sunday we headed off at the crack of dawn to bawaka for the day, after a very tough drive through the early morning fog and then the deep, powdery, dry season sand we arrived at the beach and as we drove along i got a bucket of bait with the cast net. this turned out to be fortuitous as while we were having lunch at bawaka, nike the croc swam in for a feed and as all i had was the bait thats what he got for lunch! I dont think he was overly impressed.
the hire troopy got bogged in the heavy sand on the way home so the old faithful had to pull it out, another time the winch has been worth its weight in gold!
all in all a fantastic visit, if a little too short, kai was very sad saying good bye to his cousins at the airport, but we have lots of memories and photos!
a final panaroma from paradise!
i woke up at lunch time after my sleep following night shift and for some reason i was filled with un seasonal energy and enthusiasm! remembering i had a kilo of beautiful wagyu mince beef in the fridge i thought i would whip up a batch of burgers for dinner.
you can see the colour of the meat here, nothing fancy, some fried onion, 2 eggs, parsley and seasoning. i reckon you could have eaten the uncooked the beef was so good!
i realised i had the makings for some bread as well so i made a batch of bread rolls and caramelised some spanish onions. that was about it, a hot roll, sploosh of aioli, slice of swiss cheese, lettuce and beetroot and balsamic jam and dinner was done!
if you missed our recent trip to bali, i blogged about it on our balibliss blog, http://balibliss.tumblr.com
today we had a late start but decided to head out on the boat for a picnic lunch, john, tomoko, joe & hana joined us in their boat. we watched manta rays and dolphin swimming around the boat while we enjoyed lunch.
it was a nice lazy finish to the long weekend, the rain stayed away and the water was flat, fishing was quiet but that was no surprise considering the amount of rain we have had this past week.
storm brewing
we had a pretty quiet easter, although i was off for most of it we had very wet weather friday, saturday & sunday so we lay about taking it easy! john & tomoko came over for dinner on sunday night and we had an entree of chargrilled asparagus, followed by spicy, butterflied lamb, also chargrilled, served with spicy pearl cous cous.
we polished off the last of the lime, coconut & chilli sorbet before enjoying tomoko’s chocolate puddings.
i have been over in darwin for a few days at a conference and when i got home i discovered my new ice cream maker had turned up. it is a small commercial type that has its own inbuilt compressor, meaning you dont have to refrigerate the bowl in advance and it is possible to make back to back batches of ‘i scream’ or sorbet.
so with my usual patience and care i tore the box open, threw the instructions in the bin and made up a batch of vanilla and pineapple ice cream and a lime chilli and coconut sorbet.
the pineapple ice cream is made using a base of my french vanilla ice cream,
basically make a ‘half and half’ mixture of cream & milk (1 cup of each), add vanilla in some form, from fresh bean to paste or as a last resort essence, and a pinch of salt.
bring the half & half mix to just below the boil and add it to 3 eggs that you have whisked for a couple of minutes with the sugar. add mix slowly while whisking to ensure eggs dont scramble.
move bowl of mix onto a saucepan of simmering water to create a double boiler and cook while stirring until a custard starts to form, when its thick enough to ‘back a spoon’ then take off heat and sit in a saucepan of cool water and stir to reduce heat and stop cooking. put mix in fridge and chill until ready to make into ice cream. add in pineapple (or any other fruit to suit) and pour into your ice cream maker.
the finished product, judging by the smile on the boy’s face and the ice cream smeared around his mouth, it is pretty yummy!
the basis for the sorbet is a sugar syrup, i usually keep some in the fridge, 1kg of sugar dissolved in 1lt of water, i boil it for a couple of minutes to make sure the sugar is properly in solution.
finely chop a couple of kaffir lime leaves and a chilli, add the grated rind of the limes and their juice, fold into the egg whites and salt that have been whisked to stiff peaks, add about 1/4 cup coconut milk and enough sugar syrup to make up a batch of sorbet. load into your ice cream maker and enjoy!
golden snapper, tempura batter, french fries, mayo with chilli, ginger, kaffir lime, lime rind, lime juice, mirin & palm sugar. dusted with chilli powder
….and better the next!
saturday was a beautiful day, i went barra fishing with mark in the morning, we had no success but it was a lovely windless, tropical day.
today promised to be even better so sal, kai & i headed off north to a spot off cape wilberforce to try our luck, i expected this spot to fish well at about 10:30am on wards until the tide stopped running just before lunch. we had a great run up the coast with flat water, a very light breeze and bright sunshine.
we pulled up on the spot and set the electric trolling motor to ‘anchor’ us on the spot, this saves having to drop and pull anchor and is really helpful with small isolated ground such as this reef. the motor has its own GPS and holds you aver the mark allowing for wind and tide.
the bite was on straight away and we caught some nice small mouth nannygai, a beautiful coral trout (above) and a couple of pan sized golden snapper.
after the bite went off, we motored round into elizabeth bay and stopped for a beer and lunch, the water stayed flat and the light breeze gave just enough relief from the heat. so after a leisurely lunch and a refreshing swim we headed home along the coast, kai had a great day and helped with driving the boat, pulling up the anchor, cutting up bait for us when we were fishing and it made for a lovely family sunday.
we dont get many days as good as this when we are all off work and school and we are able to enjoy it together so it was a bonus to be able to make the most of it and catch some nice fish!
first mate, kai, at the helm!
inspired by the wonderful chefs in the cooking show of the season, “Two Greedy Italians”, i decided to cook their ‘Ndundari con salsa di pomodoro e basilico’ which translates as ricotta dumplings with a tomato and basil sauce.
it is a truly simple recipe with a minimum of ingredients in the best tradition of italian cuisine, it takes about 10 minutes to make and is quite similar to gnocchi.
if you get a chance to watch these two marvellous old men revisiting the country of their birth and revelling in the fresh food and the history of food, family and friends while all the time carrying on like a couple of 5 year old playmates then do yourself a favour and sit down on the couch with a nice glass of red and soak it all up!
you can see the similarity to gnocchi at this stage of preparation, for the full recipe follow this link, Recipe
with a glass of rough bordeaux and a sprinkle of parmesan the meal was cast, the chilli in the simple tomato and basil sauce gave the dish an extra dimension, it would be a terrific sauce with any pasta. the only missing element was some nice crusty ciabatta to scrape up the leftover sauce with!
we caught some nice barra a few days ago and I came up with a new way to present them, this recipe would work fine with most white fish fillets. its a very quick dish to prepare and scrumptious to boot!
in a frying pan, add one can of coconut cream, a couple of tablespoons of palm sugar, a couple of finely chopped birds eye chillies, a couple of kaffir lime leaves finely chopped, a sploosh of fish sauce and a sploosh of mirin.
in a saucepan or bowl soak a pack of vermicelli rice noodles for 15 minutes in room temp water.
poach fillets gently in sauce, serve on bed of noodles in a bowl
wallah!
i was wandering around woolies this morning trying to find some inspiration for my work lunches when i bumped into my friend jess, she suggested a quinoa salad – so here is my take on her quinoa salad!
i am not really convinced that a salad ever warrants a recipe, its a bit like having a recipe for a sandwich!
anyway, obviously a cup of quinoa cooked and cooled, a red onion, a packet of craisins (dried cranberries), mint, coriander, parsley, capers, gerkin, fetta and seeded and diced choc cherry tomatoes.
i had a couple of peking duck breasts i sliced and tossed into the salad, dressing is just some fresh lime juice and a sploosh of olive oil.
plenty of options for other ingredients to flavour the salad to your desire, jess also mentioned baby spinach, i reckon rocket would work too. its a nice alternative to a rice salad really and the quinoa is an unusual texture which adds to the overall flavour of the salad.
dear dad, your breath finally stopped this morning at about 6:30 my time, how extraordinary that the final moment should come just an hour after your other son, simon, held the phone to your ear while i spoke in your unconscious ear and said goodbye, apologised for not being at your side, wished you peace, an end to the pain and discomfort, and told you it was ok to let go now and stop fighting.
it was really against my rational and logical nature (wonder where i got that from, eh dad?), and I only did so because my workmates ruth & cath had talked with me during night shift that night, saying that often people in your situation need to hear from all those they love before they can let go, and that often the simple act of verbally giving ‘permission’ to let go is the catalyst for that final breath. they both gave examples of friends and family where a very similar thing had happened.
so when simon rang this morning to tell me that he had sat with you last night, comforting you and nursing you, I asked if he was still with you and if he could let me say a few words to you. i went home after that call and had only just got into bed when he rang again, i knew before i answered why he was ringing and i felt nothing but relief for you and happiness that in some small way i might have played a part in releasing you from the suffering.
dad, i have spent the last couple of days digging out all the photos i have of you and putting a slide show together of the images, its been a work of joy – i thought it might be an emotionally difficult task, but it was more a sense of reflection on a life filled with adventure and a reminder of how much i loved you.
it also made me start thinking about how i would articulate our relationship and your life, and this is some of my initial thoughts.
a man who not just loved racing cars, but as well as driving also built his own race cars,
a man who not just wanted a house for his family, but built one.
a man who not just loved boats and sailing, but came to build a number of yachts himself as well as sailing half of the world.
a man who not just started a business as a house painter, but became probably Australia’s first industrial painter, combining your background as a fitter with painting.
from the earliest age i can remember a man that tolerated no intellectual laziness, around the dinner table adult conversation on politics, society, beliefs etc was encouraged, but we were never let get away with an unchallenged point of view!
you suffered fools very little, but always showed compassion and tolerance.
in many ways you were a modern day Renaissance man, although you had no tertiary qualifications, you were incredibly widely read, all the classics, poetry, science, virtually any subject you had read the important texts, your reasoning and analytical skills were as finely honed as any academic.
your practical skills were without bound, i cant think of a task that ever was beyond your mastering, your background in the metal trades was no doubt the basis for that but it extended to working with wood, everything mechanical and electrical through to the design and engineering skills required to build a racing car and a 12m yacht.
you, with mum, were adventurers, never afraid to step outside the safety of conventional suburban life – in a time that our society was a lot more conservative, you and mum decided on the basis of one dinner with a crazy dutchman from FNQ, to sell up everything in our settled toorak suburban life, build a custom made campervan, take us out of school, drive from melbourne to cape tribulation, and live in the jungle by the beach for 6 months.
the move from our comfortable life in mitcham to the farm at digby in SW victoria was a similar uprooting and adventure based on the continuing dream to build a large cruising yacht and move onto the ocean.
even thinking of times like this brings back specific memories, we had bought that mad siamese cat from peter brock’s family just before moving to the farm, we stopped for a rest somewhere on the road between geelong and hamilton and when one of us opened the car door, the mad cat shot out like a bullet from the gun, across the fields never to be seen again!
you and mum gave us the greatest gift parents can give their children, a safe and happy home with unconditional love. i nearly 20 years of marriage i dont remember hearing you or mum once raise your voices with each other or fight.
you came from a generation where it was harder for men to show their love outwardly, but as a child I never doubted that love and i try every day to be at least as good a parent as you and mum have been to me.
my special bond with you came out of the ashes of your marriage to mum, as I joined you as a young man to help build genesta and then spent 6 years living on genesta with you and travelling the oceans with you. it was the adventure of a lifetime for a young man and made me the man I am today. we had an incredible time together, saw so many places , made so many friends, a couple of times stared death in the face – but your seamanship and my confidence in your ability got us through.
very few adults ever get to have a relationship like that with their fathers and i am forever grateful for the experience.
thats all i have for the moment, i will add more as it comes to mind.
https://vimeo.com/55700866
for those interested, the backing music is by gurrumul yunupingu, a song called “Bapa” (father)
here are the words in yolngu matha and english,
the background music is by gurrumul yunupingu, his song “Bapa” (father)
Warwuyu ŋarranha mulkana
Ŋarraku bäpawu
Ŋuruŋuna guṉipunharayu
Yaa, bäpa marrkapmirri
Ŋäthina wilawilayurruna
Ŋuruŋuna djarrawalyurruna
Ḻiya-wayna Bekuḻŋura
Yaa, bäpa marrkapmirri
Ŋäthina Djotarra maṉḏa
Garray Dhuwandjika Daylulu
Ŋuruŋuna djarrapalwuyu
Ḻiya-wayna wäŋaŋura Gunyaŋarri
Grief have taken hold of me
for my father
when the sun sets
o. h. beloved father
Crying and crying
when the sun goes down
my mind there at Bekulngura
o.h, beloved father
m..m m..m m..m
Two Gumatj ladies crying
ancestor boss ladies Dhuwandika and Daylulu
when the sun sets
my mind there at the place Gunuangara (Bekulngura)
m..m m..m m..m
after months of waiting, my pre-production ES-2 Espresso Machine has arrived from Espresso Strietman in Holland.
Wouter Strietman has made a pre-production run of 20 machines and I was lucky enough to secure one of them, drawing inspiration from machines like the Arrarex Caravel from the 1960’s and incorporating modern electronic temperature control they are an amazing design.
The courier waved me down in Woolies car park this morning to tell me she had a box for me,
I whisked it home and unpacked the very well padded parcel to reveal the component parts of the ES-2, I have put it together with the drip tray holder inverted which allows it to sit upright on the table for pictures, the intent is to wall monut the machine.
as you can see, there is not actually much to it and assembly took a matter of minutes with no instructions required! everything is well built and very solid feeling, i love the industrial finish – its not a polished and glossy finish like my big Izzo lever but it really suits this machine I think.
you can see the nice detail on the control unit here, and finally the assembled machine. it will be a few days before I have it up and running as I dont have time to work out the mounting system and set it up but I am hugely excited to see just how good the extractions are from this timeless design of coffee porn! Wouter also kindly included a couple of nice porcelain cups bearing his name as well as 3 different portafilters to try.
in my excitement this morning I did forget to mention the relationship with Wouter through this process, he has been fantastic, communicating at every step of this unique process, adaptive to issues as they came up (he couldnt use wood handles and send it to australia easily), he has sent photos through as work progressed and generally been a pleasure to deal with. i am sure I will have even more positive feedback once i get to the point of pulling shots on this beauty!
tonite was a fine night for tempura, so i whipped up a batch of batter, peeled some prawns and grabbed a bunch of asparagus!
my batter is half plain flour, half corn flour, soda water added and slightly stirred to make a thin and lumpy batter, another bowl of just plain flour for dusting prior to dipping items in the batter.
dipping sauce is some dashi, saki, mirin, soy and water.
sorry for my lengthy absence from the pages of nhawi, my primary excuse is that I have been struck down with the scrouge of Ross River Virus.
to save you having to listen to a litany of whinging about aching joints and lethagy, i suggest those ignorant of, or with a morbid curiosity for, the details of RRV, do a google search and enlighten themselves.
i have been crook with it for about 2 months and can expect at least another month of feeling like an 85yo man, an insight I could easily have lived without.
anyway with no further ado i present you with proof that i am not completely overcome, a small video of a shot pulled on my Arrarex Caravel manual lever coffee machine with a new ‘naked’ or bottomless portafilter – which will mean absolutely nothing to all but the few coffee obsessed readers of my little blog. again readers, google is your friend.
and with that i shall return to the cricket and watch the skippies flog the saffies.
….back from the cricket, my friend Koffee Kosmo has requested a view of the extraction looking up into the portafilter so here is ‘nekkid2’
this week i made ravioli, i use packets of wonton skins and lay them out on a floured board and then add the filling, top them with another skin and then cut them out with a plastic cup.
the filling was a mix of beef, pork and chicken mince with sage and french sheep’s cheese, i fried off some onions and garlic, braised the mince, a good sploosh of wine and then chucked it in the food processor, then mix the meat with the cheese and a couple of eggs.
the ravioli is then gently boiled for about 6 minutes, i served it with a sauce I call Kai’s secret tomato sauce – amazingly simple and absolutely yummy!
its 2 cans of italian tomatoes, 70g butter, 1 large brown onion peeled and cut in half, a tablespoon of sugar and seasoning. simmer for 45 minutes then remove onion and dispose. Job done!
