apologies to jamie oliver, but its bloody hot again, and while I should wear an apron....
the good weekend mag had some great christmas recipes by terry durack, but of course I forgot to take them to west wyalong. we each provided some salads and dessert for the christmas lunch. I made the good old turnip salad (sans pomegranates - couldnt find them anywhere, including west wyalong! - but there they were at the supermarket as soon as we got home!)
Terry had great salad which I sort of made from memory, using what was available in the WW supermarket... some red cabbage, sliced & marinated in water & lemon juice overnight (I don't think this achieved anything, but I couldnt remember what terry had done). some fresh beetroot which I baked (garlic cloves, balsamic vinegar and thyme). the recipe (jamie oliver) has fresh rosemary, but we were in WW... AND THE SUPERMARKET WAS SOLD OUT OF BALSAMIC VINEGAR!! they had balsamic vinaigrette, but I wanted bloody vinegar!
sold out? clearly, cuisine has hit cootamundra (and surrounds). apologies for the alliteration. the headline could have said "bland goes balsamic". west wyalong is in "bland shire". really.
I was desperate. I went back down to my WW holiday haven, "thom, dick & harry's", a really nice little gourmet food & gift shop run by one of yvonne's old school friends. my second favourite shop is harvey norman, formerly for decades "fred's tv" which has the best discount CDs west of Forbes!) THEY WERE SOLD OUT OF BALSAMIC VINEGAR! what is going on in the Riverina? however they did have Maggie Beer's vino cotto, which just shows you what a classy place this is. given the shameful price, I went back to the supermarket and bought some red wine vinegar as well.
so the most spoilt baked beetroot in western NSW had vino cotto and red wine vinegar, not balsamic after all..
the salad consisted of the sliced red cabbage, the beetroot julienned (I dare you to try in your christmas clothes...), and thinly sliced lettuce (one of those red leafed ones - I never know which is which). trying to fake the forgotten recipe, I added a splash of red wine vinegar, a double splash of vino cotto, some squeezes of fresh lemon, and the SECRET INGREDIENT which I remembered from Terry's article - MAPLE SYRUP. yep. they sell the Canadian stuff in west wyalong.
personally, I thought it was a winner. but jenny's prawn salad was clearly a standout on the day. I mean. i would kill for prawns any day, but especially in WW at Christmas.
now I just have to find terry durack's recipe and post it!
went to see "Enchanted" with Maddy yesterday. just loved it. I'll have to see it again to count the movie references. of course, Disney making fun of fairy tales within what ends up being a fairy tale... perhaps a touch of tim burton wouldn't have gone astray. I have to say that the "picture book" ending was stunning and has me thinking... now how could I...? you'd need to make a 3D book and do some rotoscoping...
back to the kitchen. I bought some $2 ramekins today, so we're having beef pot-pies - a kind of goulash - paprika, dried bell peppers, red wine, mushrooms, worcestershire sauce, etc.
further christmas culinary concoctions coming shortly. the tale of the mouldy black ball...
not to mention the gorgeous bottle of Henchke red that Rod gave me for my birthday. smell. sigh. swirl. gasp. sip. ah.