mountain masala

off to ncyc

well the pizza blog will have to wait... we're packing tonight to head off to melbourne tomorrow for the uniting church's national christian youth convention, where I'm leading a bible study and the twins are participants.

i am foolishly taking a bunch of stuff for my bible study that i could have easily borrowed from people in melbourne. ah well, at least you know that you own black cloth is... er.... black!

should be a sensational week. my 12th ncyc...

well done kids

well the girls have all had a big year. grace and ellen have finished their year 12 studies with a part-time year at marden senior college alongside doing "the big year out".

grace got a TER of 89.2 and ellen got 93.1, including a score of 20 for women's studies. they're both hoping to go to flinders uni next year to do a BA - womens studies, sociology etc, and possibly visual arts minor for grace.

maddy is off to annesley college (adelaide's MLC...) on a scholarship. she topped her grade 7 class, and was also presented with a medal for a perfect score in the Australasian maths olympiad (top 0.6% of 27,000 kids) - she got her photo in the local paper for that one.

so the parents are happy campers....

fire and smoke

we've got a little barbecue book called "fire and smoke". the other day i made a BBQ sauce from a combination of the recipes in the book. it went something like this:

Melt 1/2 cup butter. Saute 1 cup chopped onion, 1 cup chopped celery, 2 tsp minced garlic for about 10 mins. Add the following and simmer for at least 30 mins:

1 cup tomato puree
1/2 cup cider vinegar
1/2 cup brown sugar
1 cup chicken stock
1/4 cup worcestershire sauce
2 bay leaves
2 tsp freshly ground black pepper
1 tsp ground cumin
2 tsp chili powder
1/2 cup molasses or dark treacle
2 tbsp mustard powder

let it stand for at least an hour before using as a marinade and basting sauce. We had it first with pork roast in the weber, but it was sensational with roast chicken too.

and then a couple of days ago I used it as a pizza base and everyone went "wow", but that's tomorrow's post.

brioche, berries and boxing day salad

hope you had a great christmas day.

while I have misgivings blogging about food at this time of year when the wealthy stuff themselves while much of the world starves, I do have a thing about food, and I havent posted about food much at all...

so I'm going to... (read on if you care...)

ch... ch... chutney... (really)

the blogging is slow because I'm apparently on holidays, but actually preparing to run a bible study at our national youth convention in a couple of weeks...

nevertheless it's christmas so i'm back in the kitchen. clearly there weren't any cooking blog posts when i was travelling, and although i've been exercising my culinary instincts since, nothing has made it into cyberspace...

i have a bit of a tradition of making mustard at christmas, putting it in little jars and giving it out randomly. i've got a great little book of mustard recipes, including a german one that i'm sure was a secret weapon back in WWII.

but this year it's chutneys. living in the adelaide hills, my christmas theme this year is local cheeses and berries along with local wine. so i've got some goats cheeses waiting to for a recipe, and yesterday made two chutneys from paul gayler's "passion for cheese". (and a third chutney this morning).

pete rollins in adelaide

i'm pleased to announce that pete rollins will be in adelaide 4 - 7 may 2009, as part of a visit organised by cheryl in victoria. we're planning some events in the city in the evening, at the ACD and nearby during the day, a young adults breakfast, and possibly something at one of the universities.

Pete Rollins sees the ‘emerging church’ as a transformative movement for western Christianity. In his writing, speaking and lecturing, Pete explores what honest faith might look like for postmodern people. As founder and co-ordinator of “ikon”, an experimental faith community of young adults and adults in Belfast, Pete seeks to express his spiritual and philosophical journey in community life.

As a keynote speaker at NCYC 2007 Pete was a crowd favourite. He is a regular speaker at Greenbelt, the major UK Christian arts festival, and has also spoken at numerous events, churches and universities in the UK and the US.

ocean without a shore

the national gallery of victoria has 'purchased' a bill viola video installation called 'ocean without a shore'.

it featured at the venice bienniale. apparently the video (on multiple screens) runs for 14 hours.

more info here

can't wait to see it when I'm in melbourne in january,

new music

some new emusic on my computer for any who are interested .....

- "le onde" by ludovico einaudi (yes I am officially a fan)
- "songs from deep forest" by duke special (thanks to pete rollins for this one)
- "pink velour" by syd straw (former member of the Golden Palominoes back after many years from her sensational 1989 solo album "surprise")
- "picaresque" by the decemberists
- "pop ambient 2008" from the kompakt label
- "must I paint you a picture: the essential billy bragg"
- "selected ambient works 1985-1992" by aphex twin
- "ramblin'" by lucinda williams (blues covers album)

all of the above available at www.emusic.com

plus a couple of itunes albums on sale
- "black holes and revlations" by muse
- "when the flood comes" by the audreys

how's that for variety. it should get me through the holidays...

strange attractor

mercury rev have a new album out, "snowflake midnight". apparently they solved writers block by using an electronic music generator - feed in a photo and out comes music.

anyway, they also made a second album, "strange attractor", available for free. its' weird and wonderful electronic stuff and the opening track "love is pure" is already on my list of easter music i think.

you just have to sign up for their mailing list to get the free album. great soundtrack-type stuff... click here

caption competition.......